Of an opposite character, but equally useful, and more attractive for the general reader, is the second,—The Spoilsman's Pocket Book, by a brother of the author of the preceding. Here are the usual pocket-book contents, and the laws, &c. of British sports and pastimes—as shooting, angling, hunting, coursing, racing, cricket, and skating: from the latter we subjoin a hint for the benefit of the Serpentine Mercuries; which proves the adage ex liguo non fit Mercurius:—
"Care should be taken that the muscular movements of the whole body correspond with the movements of the skates, and that it be regulated so as to be almost imperceptible to the spectators; for nothing so much diminishes the grace and elegance of skating as sudden jerks and exertions. The attitude of drawing the bow and arrow, whilst the skater is forming a large circle on the outside, is very beautiful, and some persons, in skating, excel in manual exercises and military salutes."
The whole series of pocket books by the Messrs. Adcocks, extend, we believe, to eight, adapted for all descriptions of industriels, as well as for the less occupied, who are not "the architects of their own fortunes."
Dr. Parr was the last learned schoolmaster who was professedly an amateur of the rod; and in that profession there was more of humour and affectation than of reality, for with all his habitual affectation and his occasional brutality, Parr was a good-natured, generous, warm-hearted man; there was a coarse husk and a hard shell, like the cocoa-nut, but the core was filled with the milk of human kindness.—Quarterly Review.
CRANIOLOGY.
On a celebrated craniologist visiting the studio of a celebrated sculptor in London, his attention was drawn to a bust with a remarkable depth of skull from the forehead to the occiput. "What a noble head," he exclaimed, "is that! full seven inches! What superior powers of mind must he be endowed with, who possesses such a head as is here represented!" "Why, yes," says the blunt artist, "he certainly was a very extraordinary man—that is the bust of my early friend and first patron, John Horne Tooke." "Ay," answers the craniologist, "you see there is something after all in our science, notwithstanding the scoffs of many of your countrymen." "Certainly," says the sculptor; "but here is another bust, with a greater depth and a still more capacious forehead." "Bless me!" exclaims the craniologist, taking out his rule, "eight inches! who can this be? this is indeed a head—in this there can be no mistake; what depth of intellect, what profundity of thought, must reside in that skull! this I am sure must belong to some extraordinary and well-known character." "Why, yes," says the sculptor, "he is pretty well known—it is the head of Lord Pomfret."