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trencher. I now earnestly again craved

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The laurentinus flowers, if mild.
The Persian fleur de lis flowers in the

house.

January 4.
Tennis, &c.

On the 4th of January 1664, Mr. Pepy went "to the tennis-court, and there saw the king (Charles II.) play at tennis. But," says Pepys, " to see how the king's play was extolled, without any cause at all, was a loathsome sight; though sometimes, indeed, he did play very well, and deserved to be commended; but such open flattery is beastly. Afterwards to St. James's park, seeing people play at pall mall."

Pall-Mall.

a crùmb of this stone; and, at last, out of January 3.-Day breaks
his philosophical commiseration, he gave
me a morsel as large as a rape seed; but,
I said, this scanty portion will scarcely
transmute four grains of gold Then,
said he, deliver it me back; which I did,
in hopes of a greater parcel; but he,
cutting off half with his nail, said, even
this is sufficient for thee. Sir, said I,
with a dejected countenance, what means
this? And he said, even that will trans-
mute half an ounce of lead. So I gave
him great thanks, and said I would try it,
and reveal it to no one. He then took his
leave, and said he would call again next
morning at nine.-I then confessed that
while the mass of his medicine was in my
hand, the day before, I had secretly scraped
off a bit with my nail, which I projected
on lead, but it caused no transmutation,
for the whole flew away in fumes. Friend,
said he, thou art more dexterous in com-
mitting theft than in applying medicine;
hadst thou wrapt up thy stolen prey in
yellow wax, it would have penetrated,
and transmuted the lead into gold. I
then asked if the philosophic work cost
much, or required long time; for philoso-
phers say that nine or ten months are
required for it. He answered, their
writings are only to be understood by the
adepts, without whom no student can pre-
pare this magistery; fling not away,
therefore, thy money and goods in hunting
out this art, for thou shalt never find it.
To which I replied, as thy master showed
it to thee, so mayest thou, perchance, dis-
cover something thereof to me, who know
the rudiments, and therefore it may be
easier to add to a foundation than begin
anew. In this art, said he, it is quite
otherwise; for, unless thou knowest the
thing from head to heel,thou canst not break
open the glassy seal of Hermes. But
enough,-to-morrow, at the ninth hour, I
will show thee the manner of projection.
But Elias never came again; so my wife,
who was curious in the art whereof the
worthy man had discoursed, teazed me to
make the experiment with the little spark
of bounty the artist had left me; so I
melted half an ounce of lead, upon which
my wife put in the said medicine; it hissed
and bubbled, and in a quarter of an hour
the mass of lead was transmuted into fine
gold,at which we were exceedingly amazed.
I took it to the goldsmith, who judged it
most excellent, and willingly offered fifty
florins for each ounce."

The most common memorial of this
diversion is the street of that name, once
appropriated to its use, as was likewise
the Mall, which runs parallel with it, in
St. James's park. From the following
quotations, Mr. Nares believes that the
place for playing was called the Mall, and
the stick employed, the pall-mall.
one had a paille-maile, it were good to
play in this ally; for it is of a reasonable
good length, straight, and even."+ Again,

66

"If

a stroke with a pail-mail bettle upon a bowl makes it fly from it." Yet, Evelyn speaks twice of Pall-mall, as a place for playing in; although he calls such a place at Toms' a mall only.§

On the 4th of January, 1667, Mr. Pepys had company to dinner; and “at night to sup, and then to cards, and, last drunk out of a wood cup, as a Christmas of all, to have a flaggon of ale and apples, draught, which made all merry."

Cups.

Pepys took his Christmas draught "out
About thirty years before Mr. Secretary

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of a wood cup," a writer says, "Of drinking cups divers and sundry sorts we have; some of elme, some of box, some of maple, some of holly, &c.; mazers, broad-mouthed dishes, noggins, whiskins, piggins, crinzes, ale-bowls, wassell-bowls, court-dishes, tankards, kannes, from a pottle to a pint, from a pint to a gill. Other bottles we have of leather, but they are most used amongst the shepheards and harvest-people of the countrey: small jacks we have in many ale-houses of the citie and suburbs, tip't with silver, besides the great black jacks and bombards at the court, which, when the Frenchmen first saw, they reported, at their returne into their countrey, that the Englishmen used to drinke out of their bootes: we have, besides, cups made out of hornes of beasts, of cocker-nuts, of goords, of the eggs of ostriches; others made of the shells of divers fishes, brought from the Indies and other places, and shining like mother of pearle. Come to plate; every taverne can afford you flat bowles, French bowles, prounet cups, beare bowles, beakers: and private householders in the citie, when they make a feast to entertaine their friends, can furnish their cupboards with flagons, tankards, beere-cups, wine-bowles, some white, some percell gilt, some gilt all over, some with covers, others without, of sundry shapes and qualities."* From this it appears that our ancestors had as great a variety of drinking vessels as of liquors, in some of which they were wont to infuse rosemary.

Rosemary.

In a popular account of the manners of an old country squire, he is represented as stirring his cool-tankard with a sprig of rosemary. Likewise, at weddings, it was usual to dip this grateful plant in the cup, and drink to the health of the new-married couple. Thus, a character in an old play, says,

Before we divide

Our army, let us dip our rosemaries
In one rich bowl of sack, to this brave girl,
And to the gentleman.

Rosemary was borne in the hand at marriages. Its virtues are enhanced in a curious wedding sermon.§ "The rose

Heywood's Philocothonista, 1635, Brand. Nares.

The City Madam.

A Marriage Present by Roger Hackett, D. D. 1607 4to., cited by Brand

mary is for married men, the which, by name, nature, and continued use, man challengeth as properly belonging to himself. It overtoppeth all the flowers in the garden, boasting man's rule: it helpeth the brain, strengtheneth the memory, and is very medicinal for the head. Another property is, it affects the heart. Let this ros marinus, this flower of man, ensign of your wisdom, love, and loyalty, be carried, not only in your hands, but in your heads and hearts."

At a wedding of three sisters together, in 1560, we read of "fine flowers and rosemary strewed for them, coming home; and so, to the father's house, where was a great dinner prepared for his said three bride-daughters, with their bridegrooms and company.' Old playst frequently mention the use of rosemary on these occasions. In a scene immediately before a wedding, we have

"

Lew. Pray take a piece of rosemary. Mir. I'll wear it. But, for the lady's sake, and none of yours.

In another we find "the parties enter with rosemary, as from a wedding."§ Again, a character speaking of an intended bridegroom's first arrival, says, “look, an the wenches ha' not found un out, and do present un with a van of rosemary, and bays enough to vill a bow-pot, or trim the head of my best vore-horse."|| It was an old country custom to deck the bridal-bed with sprigs of rosemary.¶

Rosemary denoted rejoicing. Hence in an account of a joyful entry of queen Elizabeth into the city of London, on the 14th of January, 1558, there is this passage: "How many nosegays did her grace receive at poor women's hands? How often-times stayed she her chariot, when she saw any simple body offer to speak to her grace? A branch of rosemary, given to her grace, with a supplication by a poor woman, about Fleet Bridge, was seen in her chariot till her grace came to Westminster."

It is a jocular saying, among country people, that, where the rosemary-bush flou

Stow's Survey, by Strype.
Cited by Brand.

Elder Brother, a Play, 1637, 4to.
Woman's Pride, by Fletcher.
Ben Jonson's Tale of a Tub.

¶ Brand.

rishes in the cottage garden, "the grey mare is the better horse;" that is, the wife manages the husband.

Shakspeare intimates the old popular applications of this herb. It was esteemed as strengthening to the memory; and to that end Ophelia presents it to Laertes. "There's rosemary, that 's for remembrance; pray you, love, remember." In allusion to its bridal use, Juliet's nurse asks Romeo, "Doth not rosemary and Romeo both begin with a letter?" And she intimates Juliet's fondness for him, by saying, "she hath the prettiest sensations of it, of you and rosemary, that it would do you good to hear it." The same play

denotes its use at funerals. When friar Laurence and Paris, with musicians, on Juliet's intended bridal, enter her chamber, and find her on the bed, surrounded by the Capulet family, mourning for her death, he sympathises with their affliction, and concludes by directing the rosemary prepared for the wedding to be used in the offices of the burial:

Stick your rosemary

On this fair corse; and, as the custom is, In all her best array, bear her to church. Of a bride who died of the plague on her wedding-night it is said, "Here is a strange alteration; for the rosemary that was washed in sweet water, to set out the bridal, is now wet in tears to furnish her burial."*

It was usual at weddings to dip the rosemary in scented waters. Respecting a bridal, it is asked in an old play, "Were the rosemary branches dipped?"

Some

of Herrick's verses show that rosemary at weddings was sometimes gilt.

The two-fold use of this fragrant herb is declared in the Hesperides by an apostrophe.

To the Rosemary Branch.

Grow for two ends, it matters not at all,
Be 't for my bridal or my burial

One of a well-known set of engravings, by Hogarth, represents the company assembled for a funeral, with sprigs of rosemary in their hands. A French traveller, in England, in the reign of William III., describing our burial solemnities and the preparation of the mourners, says, "when they are ready to set out, they nail up the coffin, and a

• Dekker's Wonderful Year, 1603, 4to. Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornfu Lady, 1616, 4to.

servant presents the company with sprigs of rosemary: every one takes a sprig, and carries it in his hand till the body is put into the grave, at which time they all throw their sprigs in after it." A character in an old play,† requests

If there be Any so kind as to accompany

My body to the earth, let there not want For entertainment. Prithee, see they have A sprig of rosemary, dipt in common water, To smell at as they walk along the streets.

In 1649, at the funeral of Robert

Lockier, who was shot for mutiny, the corpse was adorned with bundles of rosemary on each side, one half of each was stained with blood. At the funeral of a

country girl, it is said, that,

To show their love, the neighbours far and

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Paul Van Somer, an artist of great merit, born at Antwerp in 1576, died in London, and was buried at St. Martins in the fields on the 5th of January 1621. His pencil was chiefly employed on portraits of royal, noble, and eminent personages. He painted James I. at Windsor, and Hampton Court; the lord chancellor Bacon, and his brother Nicholas, at Gorhambury; Thomas Howard earl of Arundel, and his lady Alathea Talbot, at Worksop; William earl of Pembroke, at St. James's; and the fine whole-length of the first earl of Devonshire in his robes, "equal," says Walpole "to the pencil of Vandyke, and one of the finest single figures I have seen."

Van Somer seems to have been the first of those artists who, after the accession of James I., arrived and established themselves in England and practised a skilful management of the chiaro-scuro. His portraits were admired for great elegance of attitude, and remarkable

blance.

resem

It was fortunate for the arts that king James had no liking towards them and let them take their own course; for he would probably have meddled to introduce as bad a taste in art as he did in literature. Hayley says,

James, both for empire and for arts unfit, His sense a quibble, and a pun his wit, Whatever works he patronised debased; But happy left the pencil undisgraced.

Zeuxis, the renowned painter of antiquity, flourished 400 years before the birth of Christ, and raised to great perfection the art which the labours of Apol

• Walpole's Painters.

lodorus had obtained to be esteemed. Zeuxis invented the disposition of light and shadow, and was distinguished for coloring. He excelled in painting females; his most celebrated production was a picture of Helen, for which five of the loveliest virgins of Crotona in Italy sat to him by order of the council of the city. Yet he is said to have lost the prize for painting in a contest with Parrhasius. The story runs, that Zeuxis's picture represented grapes so naturally that the birds flew down to peck at them; and that Parrhasius's picture represented a curtain, which Zeuxis taking to be a real one desired to be drawn aside to exhibit what his adversary had done: On finding his mistake, he said that he had only deceived birds, whereas Parrhasius had deceived a master of the art, To some who blamed his slowness in working, he answered, that it was true he was long in painting his designs, but they were designed for posterity. One of his best pieces was Hercules in his cradle strangling serpents in the sight of his affrighted mother; but he himse.f preferred his picture of a wrestler, under which he wrote, "It is more easy to blame than to imitate this picture." He is the first painter we read of who exhibited the pro ductions of his pencil for money."

Zeuxis was succeeded by Apelles, who never passed a day without handling his pencil, and painted such admirable likenesses, that they were studied by the physiognomists.

We speak of the Romans as ancients; ancients; and the Greeks of the Egyptians the Romans spoke of the Greeks as

as their ancients. It is certain that from

them they derived most of their knowledge in art and science. If the learning of Egypt were now in the world, our attainments would dwindle into nothingness The tombs and mummies of the Egyptians show their skill in the preparation of colors and that they practised the arts of design and painting. Vast monuments of their mighty powers in architecture and sculpture still remain. We derive from them, through the Greeks, the signs of the zodiac.

The Greeks painted on canvas or linen, placed their pictures in frames, and decorated their walls with designs in fresco. Their sculpture contained portraits of dis

• Bayle.

tinguished personages, in which they were imitated by the Romans. The frieze of the Parthenon is supposed to represent portraits of Pericles, Phidias, Socrates, and Alcibiades. Nero caused to be exhibited a portrait of himself on a canvas 120 feet high.

The Anglo-Saxons illuminated their man

fection of the apothecaries can equal their excellent virtue. But these delights are in the outward senses; the principal delight is in the mind, singularly enriched with the knowledge of these visible things, setting forth to us the invisible wisdom and admirable workmanship of Almighty God."

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The bearsfoot, Helleborus fætidus, flowers.

January 6.

uscripts with miniatures; from this prac- January 5.-Day breaks.
tice of illuminating we derive the word
limning, for painting. The term illumina-
tor was corrupted to limner. The Anglo-
Normans decorated our churches with
pictures. In the cathedral of Canterbury,
built in the eleventh century, their pic-
tures were esteemed very beautiful. The
art of painting in oil is ascribed in many
works to Van Eyck of Bruges, who died
in 1442, but oil was used in the art iong
before he lived. Our Henry III. in 1236
issued a precept for a wainscoated_room
in Windsor Castle to be "re-painted, with
the same stories as before," which order
Walpole parallels with the caution of the
Roman Mummius, to the shipmasters who
transported the master-pieces of Corinthian
sculpture to Rome" If you break or
spoil them,' he said, "you shall find
others in their room."

Our old herbalist John Gerard, in dedicating his "Historie of Plants" to the great Secretary Cecil, Lord Burleigh, thus eloquently begins: "Among the manifold creatures of God, that have in all ages diversely entertained many excellent wits, and drawn them to the contemplation of the divine wisdom, none have provoked men's studies more, or satisfied their desires so much, as plants have done; and that upon just and worthy causes. For, if delight may provoke men's labor, what greater delight is there than to behold the earth apparelled with plants, as with a robe of embroidered work, set with orient pearls, and garnished with great diversity of rare and costly jewels? If variety and perfection of colors may affect the eye, it is such in herbs and flowers, that no Apelles, no Zeuxis, ever could by any art express the like if odors or if taste may work satisfaction, they are both so sovereign in plants, and so comfortable, that no con

Andrews Forbroke.

EPIPHANY-TWELFTH DAY.

In addition to the usage, still continued, of drawing king and queen on Twelfth night, Barnaby Googe's versification describes a disused custom among the people, of censing a loaf and themselves as a preservative against sickness and witchcraft throughout the year.

Twise sixe nightes then from Christmasse,
they do count with dilligence,
Wherein eche maister in his house

doth burne by franckensence :
And on the table settes a loafe,

when night approcheth nere, Before the coles and frankensence

to be perfumed there :

First bowing downe his heade he standes,
and nose and eares, and eyes
He smokes, and with his mouth receyves
the fume that doth arise:

Whom followeth streight his wife, and doth
the same full solemly,
And of their children every one,
and all their family:

Which doth preserue they say their teeth,
and nose, and eyes, and eare,
From euery kind of maladie,

and sicknesse all the yeare.
When every one receyued hath

this odour great and small,
Then one takes up the pan with coales,
and franckensence and all,

An other takes the loafe, whom all

the reast do follow here,
And round about the house they go,
with torch or taper clere,
That neither bread nor meat do want
nor witch with dreadful charme,
Haue power to hurt their children, or
to do their cattell harme.

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