Among the ancients the voluntary motion of inanimate objects was considered an evidence of their divinity. When Juno paid her celebrated visit to Vulcan, she found him engaged in the manufacture of tripods, which moved about and performed their office with a bustling air of zealous activity—
"Full twenty tripods for his hall be framed,
That, placed on living wheels of massive gold,
Wondrous to tell, instinct with spirit, roll'd
From place to place around the blest abodes,
Self-moved, obedient to the beck of gods."
Picnics Centuries Ago.
Mainwaring, in a letter to the Earl of Arundel, dated November 22d, 1618, says: "The prince his birthday has been solemnized here by the few marquises and lords which found themselves here; and (to supply the want of lords) knights and squires were added to a consultation, wherein it was resolved that such a number should meet at Gamiges, and bring every man his dish of meat. It was left to their own choice what to bring; some chose to be substantial, some curious, some extravagant. Sir George Young's invention bore away the bell, and that was four huge brawny pigs, piping hot, bitted and harnessed with ropes of sarsiges, all tied to a monstrous bag-pudding."
Skeletons at Feasts.
In old times the guests at an Egyptian feast, when they grew hilarious, were called back to sober propriety by the exhibition of a little skeleton, and the admonition to reflect upon the lesson it conveyed.
Hair Cutting in Russia.
Among the lower classes in Russia, the barber, a primitive artist, claps an earthen pot over the head and ears, and trims off whatever hair protrudes from the pot.
Antiquity of Tarring and Feathering.
Tarring and feathering, it seems, is an European invention. One of Richard Cœur de Leon's ordinances for seamen was, "that if any man were taken with theft and pickery, and thereof convicted, he should have his head polled, and hot pitch poured upon his pate, and upon that the feathers of some pillow or cushion shaken aloft, that he might thereby be known as a thief, and at the next arrival of the ships to any land be put forth of the company to seek his adventures without all hope of return unto his fellows."—Holinshed.