no difficulty in keeping nine hundred and ninety-nine cows all safe and sound; but, do what he would, he could never keep a thousand. If he bought one to make up the number, two or three others were sure to die; nay, if he purchased ten or twenty at a time, before he could get them home, a sudden mortality would dispose of other ten or twenty; thus always keeping the number down to the charmed nine hundred and ninety-nine. At least so went the story; the truth of which no cook-maid, housemaid, or old maid in the neighbourhood seemed to doubt. In later years, we detected the same superstitious notion in France, Spain, Switzerland, and Italy.

Some years after Mr. Burckhardt's death, his collection of Arab proverbs, edited by Sir William Ouseley, was published in a quarto volume by authority of the Association for promoting the discovery of the interior of Africa. Though it has been neglected by the generality of readers, it is a curious, and in some instances, a highly useful volume.

A very large portion of these proverbs in their form of a verbal translation would be altogether unintelligible without the traveller's explanation and running commentary. A few are intelligible enough, and almost counterparts of European sayings.

The Arabs have,

"The one-eyed person is a beauty in the country of the blind."

The French,

"Dans le pays des aveugles les borgnes sont rois." The Arabs also have the "bird in the hand" proverb, but expressed with much more grandiosity than in English or Turkish. They say,

"A thousand cranes in the air, are not worth one sparrow in the fist."

"The walls have ears," is as common an adage at Cairo as in London.

The Arabs have a number of proverbs against borrowing, e. g.

"A borrowed cloak does not keep one warm."

66 Lending is ruinous both to borrowers and lenders." "Lending nurses enmity."

"A hand accustomed to take, is far from giving."

They have several of the " de gustibus non est disputandum" character. The first of the following reminds us of the Italian adage about St. Anthony and the sow. "Thy beloved is the object thou lovest, be it even a monkey."

"One shaved his beard, a second plucked out his hairs; every one, they said, according to his own liking."

The Egyptians also make frequent use of the following, which are old English:

"A dog that barks does not bite."

"Hearing is not like seeing."

"Be of good memory if you become a liar."

"The kettle reproached the kitchen-spoon, and called it Blackie."

"A word only is sufficient for the wise."

"He who cannot reach the bunch of grapes, says of it,

A proverb they put into the mouth of an unlucky man is,

"If I were to trade in winding-sheets, no one would die."

They also make such a doomed person say,

"If thou wast to see my luck, thou wouldst trample it under foot."

Το express that a husband and wife are ill-suited to each other, and quarrel, they say,

"Her meat and his meat cannot be cooked together in the same pot."

Here follow a few more curious specimens of these Arabic adages:

"There are no fans in hell."

"If you do not eat at a man's wedding, take care to feast at his funeral."

"He who eats a hen of the sultan will have to give a cow in return.”

"Man is only man by his money."

"Tear off the curtain of doubt by questions."

People are more like the times they live in than they are like their own fathers."

"He who eats alone coughs alone."

"The man who makes chaff of himself shall be eaten by cows."

66

66

They said to the cock, What hast thou seen in thy sleep? I saw people sifting corn,' he replied." They said to the hen, Eat, and do not scatter thy corn about.'-'I cannot leave off my old habits,' she replied."

"The young ones of the duck are swimmers."

"Give dinner to the drunken, but not supper to the tipsy."

"The blind man does what is nasty on the house-top, and thinks people do not see him.”

66

Singing without remuneration is like a dead body without perfumes."

This

"When the singing women," says Mr. Burckhardt, perform in Egypt, they collect money from all the persons present, the landlord or host as well as the guests; and, according to custom, one of them proclaims with a loud voice the sum which each person puts on the plate, mentioning at the same time the donor's name. custom excites the vanity of those who form the company, each from a kind of emulation in liberality wishing to have his own name mentioned as the most generous; this heightens the interest and pleasure of the society, and fills the pockets of the singers. . . . A mixture of camphor and rose-water is sprinkled over the face of a dead person before the body is placed in the coffin."

LV. A DEVIL AT THE TOP OF ST. PAUL'S.

A SINGULAR HALLUCINATION.

DR. PRITCHARD, in an essay on somnambulism and animal magnetism, with which he has enriched the Cyclopædia of Medicine, has given so remarkable a case of ecstasis, as he calls it, that it deserves to be presented entire to our readers; it would be unjustifiable to clip it of a single line.

"A gentleman, about thirty-five years of age, of active habits and good constitution, living in the neighbourhood of London, had complained for about five weeks of slight headache. He was feverish, inattentive to his occupations, and negligent of his family. He had been cupped, and taken some purgative medicine, when he was visited by Dr. Arnould of Camberwell, who has favoured us with the following history. By that gentleman's advice he was sent to a private asylum, where he remained about two years; his delusions very gradually subsided, and he was afterwards restored to his family. The account which he gave of himself was, almost verbatim, as follows. We insert the statement as we received it from his physician. One afternoon in the month of May, feeling himself a little unsettled, and not inclined to business, he thought he would take a walk into the city to amuse his mind; and having strolled into St. Paul's Churchyard, he stopped at the shop-window of Carrington and Bowles, and looked at the pictures, among which was one of the cathedral. He had not been long