INDEX.

[1]. The relative proportions of the letters, in the formation of words, have been pretty accurately determined, as follows:—

A85
B16
C30
D44
E120
F25
G17
H64
I80
J4
K8
L40
M30
N80
O80
P17
Q5
R62
S80
T90
U34
V12
W20
X4
Y20
Z2

[2]. Now known to have been written by Miss Catherine Fanshawe.

[3]. The Sandwich Island alphabet has twelve letters; the Burmese, nineteen; the Italian, twenty; the Bengalese, twenty-one; the Hebrew, Syriac, Chaldee, and Samaritan, twenty-two each; the French, twenty-three; the Greek, twenty-four; the Latin, twenty-five; the German, Dutch, and English, twenty-six each; the Spanish and Sclavonic, twenty-seven each; the Arabic, twenty-eight; the Persian and Coptic, thirty-two; the Georgian, thirty-five; the Armenian, thirty-eight; the Russian, forty-one; the Muscovite, forty-three; the Sanscrit and Japanese, fifty; the Ethiopic and Tartarian, two hundred and two each.

[4]. Tristram Shandy.

[5]. Meaning in substance, Purify the mind as well as the body.

[6]. The truth of this circumstance was confirmed by Mr. Hoffman in the course of a conversation upon that and similar topics several years afterward.

[7]. In a collection of proverbs published in 1594, we find, “Dieu mesure le vent à la brebis tondue,” and Herbert has in his Jacula Prudentum, “To a close shorn sheep God gives wind by measure.”

[8]. A London periwig-maker once had a sign upon which was painted Absalom suspended from the branches of the oak by his hair, and underneath the following couplet:—

If Absalom hadn’t worn his own hair,

He’d ne’er been found a hanging there.

[9].

I n times momentous appeared the world’s triple conjunction,

E ncouraging human hearts to shout melodious praises.

S ole salvation for us, that power exalted ’bove measure,

U nloosed the bonds of sin through the precious atonement.

S alvation illumines all earth through ages unceasing.

[10]. See also Prescott’s Conquest of Mexico, Vol. I. Bk. II. Chap. 4; and Stephens’ Incidents of Travel in Yucatan, Vol. II. Chap. 20.

[11]. The peculiar stateliness and dignity of Johnston’s style, when applied to the smaller concerns of life, makes, as will be seen from the above caricature, a very ludicrous appearance. A judicious imitation of his phraseology on trifling subjects was a favorite manner of attack among the critics. Erskine’s account of the Buxton baths is one of the most amusing. When several examples of this sort were shown to Johnson, at Edinburgh, he pronounced that of Lord Dreghorn the best: “but,” said he, “I could caricature my own style much better myself.”

[12]. Ogilvie.

[13]. Napoleon himself, (Voice from St. Helena,) when asked about the execution of Palm, said, “All that I recollect is, that Palm was arrested by order of Davoust, and, I believe, tried, condemned, and shot, for having, while the country was in possession of the French and under military occupation, not only excited rebellion among the inhabitants and urged them to rise and massacre the soldiers, but also attempted to instigate the soldiers themselves to refuse obedience to their orders and to mutiny against their generals. I believe that he met with a fair trial.”

[14]. Versified by Darwin.

[15]. Brother of Dr. Franklin.

[16]. On a long freestone slab, in Caery church, near Cardiff, Glamorgan co., Wales, is the following inscription:—

Here lyeth the Body of

William Edwds,

of the Cairey who departed this life

February 24, Anno Domini, 1688,

Annoque ætatis suæ 168.

O, happy change!

And ever blest,

When greefe and pain is

Changed to rest.

[17]. The following inscription on a medal of Louis XIV. illustrates the servile adulation of that period:—

See in profile great Louis here designed!

Both eyes portrayed would strike the gazer blind.

[18].

Come, gentle sleep! attend thy votary’s prayer,

And, though death’s image, to my couch repair;

How sweet, though lifeless, yet with life to lie,

And, without dying, oh, how sweet to die!—Wolcot’s Trans.

[19]. The following madrigal was addressed to a Lancastrian lady, and accompanied with a white rose, during the opposition of the “White Rose” and “Red Rose” adherents of the houses of York and Lancaster:—

If this fair rose offend thy sight,

It in thy bosom wear;

’Twill blush to find itself less white,

And turn Lancastrian there.

[20]. Athol brose is a favorite Highland drink, composed of honey, whiskey, and water, although the proportion of the latter is usually so homœopathically minute as to be difficult of detection except by chemical or microscopical analysis. Possibly the Scotch aversion to injuring the flavor of their whiskey by dilution arises from a fact noted by N. P. Willis, that the water has tasted so strongly of sinners ever since the Flood.

[21]. Statue of Mr. Pitt, in Hanover Square.

[22]. This will remind some of our German readers of the following inscription:—

Der, der den, der den, den 15ten März hier gesetzten Warnungspfahl, das niemand etwas in das Wasser werfen sollte, selbst in das Wasser geworfen hat, auzeigt, erhält zehn Thaler Belohnung.

(Whoever, him, who, on the 15th of March the here placed warning-post, that nobody should throw any thing into the water, has thrown the post itself into the water, denounces, receives a reward of Ten Dollars.)

[23]. Irving gives the inscription thus:—

Por Castilla y por Leon

Nuevo mundo hallo Colon.

[24]. This spot conceals the body of the renowned Columbus, whose name towers to the stars. Not satisfied with the known globe, he added to all the old an unknown world. Throughout all countries he distributed untold wealth, and gave to heaven unnumbered souls. He found an extended field for gospel missions, and conferred prosperity upon the reign of our monarchs.

[25]. A Nestor in discrimination, a Socrates in talent, a Virgil in poetic art; the earth covers him, the people mourn for him, Heaven possesses him.

[26]. The original is in Greek, as follows:—

Τον ταφον εισοραας τον Ολιβαριοιο, κονιη

Ἀφροσι μη σεμνην, ξεινε, ποδεσσι πατελ.

Οισι μεμηλε φυσις, μετρων χαρις, εργα παλαιων

Κλαιετε ποιητην, ιστορικον, φυσικον.

[27]. From Pope’s Epitaph on Fenton.

[28].

Du kamst, Du gingst mit leiser Spur,

Ein flucht’ger Gast in Erdenland:

Woher? wohin?—Wer wissen nur

Aus Gottes hand in Gottes hand.

[29]. Meaning, All is well, or good news.

[30]. Read from the bottom of the columns upward, commencing with the right.

[31]. Lucan’s Pharsalia. (Lib. 1.)

[32]. Knives were formerly inscribed, by means of aqua-fortis, with short sentences in distich.

[33]. It is not a little singular that Mr. Arvine, in his excellent Cyclopædia, gives Milton and Dryden, while boys at school, equal credit for originating, in the same way, this beautiful idea.

[34]. Mirabeau’s hasty temper is well known. “Monsieur le Compte,” said his secretary to him one day, “the thing you require is impossible.” “Impossible!” exclaimed Mirabeau, starting from his chair: “never again use that foolish word in my presence.”

[35]. A curious instance of bathos occurs in Dr. Mavor’s account of Cook’s voyages:—“The wild rocks raised their lofty summits till they were lost in the clouds, and the valleys lay covered with everlasting snow. Not a tree was to be seen, nor even a shrub big enough to make a tooth-pick.”

[36]. The same expression will be found in the original draft of Mr. Jefferson. Congress changed the words “inherent and inalienable” to “certain inalienable.”

[37]. “There was disorder in the mind—a disturbance of the intellect, something more than that which he was feigning; but if the question of insanity involve the question whether his mind ceased to be under the mastery of his will, assuredly there was no such aberration.” (Reed’s Lectures.)

Dr. Johnson goes further, declaring that Hamlet “does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity.”

[38]. General W. H. Palfrey, of New Orleans, who served in Major Planche’s battalion, which was stationed from Dec. 23, 1814, to Jan. 15, 1815, in the centre of General Jackson’s line, makes the following statement, (dated April 5, 1859,) which is confirmed by Major Chotard, General Jackson’s Assistant Adjutant-General:—

“About twenty or twenty-five bales of cotton were used in forming the embrasures of five or six batteries. There were four batteries of one piece of artillery, or howitzer, and four of two pieces, established at different points of the lines. Four bales were used at some of the batteries and six at others. None were used in any other portions of the works, which consisted of breast-works formed of earth thrown up from the inside, branches of trees, and rubbish. Each company threw up its own breastwork; and the more it was affected by the enemy’s artillery and Congreve rockets, the more industriously the soldiers toiled to strengthen it.”

[39]. Carlyle’s translation.

[40]. Related, or of my lineage.

[41]. True.

[42]. Byron’s Translation.

Ah! gentle, fleeting, wavering sprite,

Friend and associate of this clay!

To what unknown region borne,

Wilt thou not wing thy distant flight?

No more with wonted humor gay,

But pallid, cheerless, and forlorn.

[43]. A German journal proposed that the following lines should be translated into any other language, so that the number of lines and words should not exceed those in the original (twenty words).

Sohn! Du weintest am Tage der Geburt, es lachten die Freunde;

Tracht, dass am Todestag, wæhrend sie weinen, du lachst.

The English response thus complied with the conditions (seventeen words):—

When I was born I cried, while others smiled;

Oh, may I dying smile, while others weep.