used to place itself on the ceiling of a room over the spot where a lady played the harp, and which followed her if she removed to another part; and he also says that the celebrated violinist Berthome, when a boy, saw a spider habitually approach him as soon as he began to play, and which eventually became so familiar that it would fix itself on his desk, and on his arm. Bettina noticed the same effect with a guitar, on a spider which accidentally crossed over it as she was playing. BREAKFASTING HUT IN 1745.

This quaint announcement, in a handbill of the time, shows how cheaply those who lived a century or so past could enjoy suburban pleasures in merrie Islington :—

"This is to give notice to all Ladies and Gentlemen, at Spencer's original Breakfasting-Hut, between Sir Hugh Middleton's Head and St. John Street Road, by the New River side, fronting Sadler's Wells, may be had every morning, except Sundays, fine tca, sugar, bread, butter, and milk, at fourpence per head; coffee at threepence a dish. And in the afternoon, tea, sugar, and milk, at threepence per head, with good attendance. Coaches may come up to the farthest garden-door next to the bridge in St. John Street Road, near Sadler's Wells back gate.— Note. Ladies, &c., are desired to take notice that there is another person set up in opposition to me, the next door, which is a brick-house, and faces the little gate by the Sir Hugh Middleton's, and therefore mistaken for mine; but mine is the little boarded place by the river side, and my backdoor faces the same as usual; for

I am not dead, I am not gone,
Nor liquors do I sell;
But, as at first, I still go on,
Ladies, to use you well.

No passage to my hut I have,

The river runs before;
Therefore your care I humbly crave,
Pray don't mistake my door.
S. SPENCER."

"Yours to serve,

SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION.

In Leroux's Journal de Medicine, is an account of a very fat woman, twenty-eight years of age, who was found on fire in her chamber, where nothing else was burning. The neighbours heard a noise of something like frying, and when the body was removed it left a layer of black grease. The doctor conceives that the combustion began in the internal parts, and that the clothes were burnt secondarily.

MOTHER MAPP THE BONE-SETTER.

She was the daughter of a man named Wallis, a bone-setter at Hindon, in Wiltshire, and sister to the celebrated "Polly Peachem," who married the Duke of Bolton. Upon some family quarrel, Sally Wallis left her professional parent, and wandered up and down the country in a miserable manner, calling herself "Crazy Sally," and pursuing, in her perambulations, a course that fairly justified the title. Arriving at last at Epsom, she succeeded in humbugging the worthy bumkins of that place, so decidedly, that a subscription was set on foot to keep her among them; but her fame extending to the metropolis, the dupes of London, a numerous class then as well as now, thought it no trouble to go ten miles to

see the conjuror, till at length, she was pleased to bless the afflicted of London with her presence, and once a week drove to the Grecian Coffeehouse, in a coach and six with out-riders! and all the appearance of nobility. It was in one of these journeys, passing through Kent-street, in the Borough, that being taken for a certain woman of quality from the Electorate in Germany, a great mob followed and bestowed on her many bitter reproaches, till Madame, perceiving some mistake, looked out of the window, and accosted them in this gentle manner, "Confound you, do'nt you know me? I am Mrs. Mapp, the bone-setter!" upon which, they instantly changed their revilings into loud huzzas.

TWO CERTIFICATES OF GRETNA-GREEN MARRIAGES AT DIFFERENT DATES.

"This is to sartfay all persons that my be consernid, that A B from the parish of C in the County of D and EF from the parish of G and in the county of H and both comes before me and declayred themseless both to be single persons, and now mayried by the form of the Kirk of Scotland, and agreible to the Church of England, and givine ondre my hand, this 18th day of March 1793.”

"These are to certify, to all whom it may concern, that John N. from the parish of Chatham in the County of Kent, and Rosa H. from the Parish of St. Maries in the County of Nottingham, being both here now present and having declared to me that they are single persons, but have now been married conformable to the Laws of the Church of England, and agreeable to the Kirk of Scotland. As witness our hands at Springfield this 4th day of October 1822.

"Witness

Jane Rae

John Ainslic."

THE WOMEN OF ENGLAND.

"Witness me.
David Lang.
John N..

Rosa H...

The women here are generally more handsome than in other places, sufficiently endowed with natural beauties, without the addition of adulterate sophistications. In an absolute woman, say the Italians, are required the parts of a Dutch woman, from the girdle downwards; of a French woman, from the girdle to the shoulders: over which must be placed an English face. As their beauties, so also their prerogatives are greater than any nation; neither so servilely submissive as the French, nor so jealously guarded as the Italians; but keeping so true a decorum, that as England is termed the Pergatorie of Servants, and the Hell of Horses, so is it acknowledged the Paradise of Women. And it is a common by-word amongst the Italians, that if there were a bridge built across the narrow seas, all the women in Europe would run into England. For here they have the upper hand in the streets, the upper place at the table, the thirds of their husband's estates, and their equal share of all lands; privileges with which other women are not acquainted. They

were in high esteem in former times amongst foreign nations, for the modestie and gravitie of their conversation; but of late so much addicted to the light garb of the French, that they have lost much of their ancient honour and reputation amongst knowing and more sober men of foreign countries who before admired them.-Peter Heylin's Cosmographie, 1652.

PRICES FOR SEATS AT CORONATIONS.

On consulting Stowe, Speed, and other antiquaries, it appears that the price of a good place at the coronation of William the Conqueror was a blank; and probably the same at that of his son William Rufus. At that of Henry I. it was a crocard, and at King Stephen's and Henry the Second's a pillard. At King Richard's and King John's, it was a fuskin; and rose at Henry the Third's to a dodkin. In the reign of Edward I. the coins began to be more intelligible; and we find that for seeing his coronation a Q was given, or the half of a ferling, or farthing, which was, as now, the fourth part of a sterling, or penny. At the coronation of Edward II. it was a farthing; and at that of Edward III. a halfpenny, which was very generally given. In the reign of Richard II. it was a penny, and continued the same at that of Henry IV. But at that of Henry V. it was two pennies, or half of a grossus, or groat; and the same at that of Henry VI. and of Edward IV.; nor do we find it raised at the coronation of Richard III. or that of Henry VII.

At that of Henry VIII. it was the whole grossus, or groat, nor was the price altered at those of Edward VI. and Queen Mary; but at Queen Elizabeth's it was a teston, tester, or sixpence. At those of James I. and Charles I. a shilling was given; which sum was advanced to half a crown at the coronations of Charles and James II. At King William's and Queen Anne's, it was a crown; and at George the First's the show was seen by many at the same price.

At the coronation of George II. some gave half a guinea; but at that of George III. and Queen Charlotte, anno 1761, curiosity seems to have risen to an amazing height. On this occasion the price given for single seats were almost incredible; in some houses ten guineas, and in ordinary houses five guineas. Great and universal anxiety prevailed to see this grand spectacle, from the reflection how improbable it was that many who were there could ever have an opportunity of witnessing the like again. As an instance of this extreme anxiety, it is confidently related, that a gentleman was prevailed on to take a room for his lady, at the price of one hundred and forty guineas; but the appointment of the solemnity of the coronation falling unluckily at the exact time when she expected to be delivered, she actually further prevailed on her husband to let a skilful man-midwife, nurse, &c., attend her, and to hire another room, lest the hurry of the day should bring on her labour, when it might be impossible for her to be removed without endangering her life.

ANCIENT HOUSE AT BLACKWALL-SAID TO BE THE RESIDENCE OF

SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

The house shown in the engraving is interesting from two causes; first, that it was the house in which Sir Walter Raleigh smoked his first pipe

of tobacco in England, and secondly, that it is one of the few relics remaining of those picturesque old houses of the days of Queen Bess. The house is built of strongly framed timber, which, in recent years, has

been plastered over; and the carved heads that ornament the gables, and which are good both in design and execution, show that this house is at least 350 years old.

At the present time a tavern has been built between this house and the river. Formerly, however, there was, no doubt, a trimmed garden and terrace towards the Thames, from which the inhabitants may have watched the progress of Queen Elizabeth from the Tower to her palace at Greenwich.

It is singular to notice the fashion of these old houses, arising from the value of space within walled towns; each floor projects over the other, so that the upper apartments have more room than the lower. While, in an artistic point of view, we cannot help regretting the disappearance of the venerable and quaint gables, for sanitary and other reasons we must be content with the change.

AMBASSADORS-WHY HELD BY THE ARMS AT THE OTTOMAN COURT.

A dervise addressed Bajazet, emperor of the Turks, 1495, for alms, and while the charitable Sultan searched for his money, the treacherous beggar wounded him with a dagger, and was instantly slain by the royal attendants. This incident is rendered memorable by its having occasioned the ungracious restraint under which even the ambassadors of Christian powers were subject to in former times when they received an audience from the Ottoman Emperor.

They were held by the arms by two attendants, when they approached the throne, nor were their arms loosed till they had quitted the presence.

TRAVELLING IN 1760.

The nobility and gentry were accustomed to make their long journeys in ponderous family-carriages, drawn by four horses. These vehicles would be laden at the top with an array of trunks and boxes, while perhaps six or seven persons, with a lapdog, would be stowed within. The danger of famine on the road was averted by a travelling larder of baskets of various condiments; the risk of thirst would be provided against by bottles of usquebaugh, black cherry-brandy, cinnamon-water, sack, port, or strong beer: while the convoy would be protected by a basket-hilted sword, an old blunderbuss, and a bag of bullets and a great horn of gunpowder.

OLD ST. PAUL'S.

In the old cathedral was a tower of stone, in height from the ground 260 feet, on which was a spire of wood, covered with lead, 274 feet high, In the tower was a celebrated peal of bells; and somewhat above the stone-work was a "faire dial," from which there was order taken in the eighteenth year of Edward III. that the rich chasing and gilding should be always kept in good preservation. On this dial was the figure of an angel pointing to the hours of both day and night-a device more appropriate than most of the clock-hands in present use. From this lofty steeple, which formed such an important feature of old London, the chimes rung merrily on saints' days and holidays; and at times the choristers mounted up aloft and chaunted forth their orisons at dawn and sunset-a custom still observed at Durham Cathedral. Before the fire of London, the spire of St. Paul's was more than once destroyed or damaged by fire and lightning.