exhibits Adam and Eve in all their primeval simplicity, while near them, in full costume, is seen a hunter with a gun, shooting ducks.

Thackeray's Geographical Blunders.

The novelist, in "The Virginians," makes Madam Esmond, of Castlewood, in Westmoreland county, a neighbor of Washington at Mt. Vernon, on the Potomac, fifty miles distant, and a regular attendant at public worship at Williamsburg, half-way between the York and James rivers, fully one hundred and twenty-five miles from Mt. Vernon; and so "immensely affected" are the colored hearers of a young preacher at Williamsburg "that there was such a negro chorus about the house as might be heard across the Potomac," the nearest bank of which is fifty-seven miles away.

He makes General Braddock ride out from Williamsburg (he never was there) in "his own coach, a ponderous, emblazoned vehicle," with Dr. Franklin, "the little postmaster of Philadelphia" (Franklin's average weight was 160 pounds), over a muddy road, in March, through a half-wilderness country of more than one hundred miles, to dine with Madam Esmond, in Westmoreland county, near Mt. Vernon.

A Stupid Critic.

Commentators are sometimes stupid, and their criticisms so absurd as to be amusing. A German critic, in explaining the text of Shakespeare's comedy "As You Like It," came to the following passage—

He made this comment upon it: "The lines as they now stand are manifestly wrong. No one ever found books in the running brooks, or sermons in stones. But a slight transposition of words reduces the passage to sense. Shakespeare's meaning is clear, and what he meant he must have written. The passage should read thus"—

Crooked Coincidences.

A pamphlet published in the year 1703, has the following strange title—

"The Deformity of Sin Cured, a sermon preached at St. Michael's, Crooked Lane, before the Prince of Orange, by the Rev. James Crookshanks. Sold by Matthew Dowton, at the Crooked Billet, near Cripplegate, and by all other Booksellers." The words of the text are, "Every crooked path shall be made straight," and the Prince before whom it was preached was crooked, i. e., deformed.

The Bride of Abydos.

In this poem of Byron's there is no bride, for the heroine dies heart-broken and unwedded.

Grandiloquent Outbursts.

There is a volume printed at Amsterdam, 1657, entitled: "Jesus, Maria, Joseph; or the Devout Pilgrim of the Everlasting Blessed Virgin Mary, in his Holy Exercises, Affections and Elevations, upon the sacred Mysteries of Jesus, Maria and Joseph." We append a few extracts from this curious book, as a specimen of the language employed at that time in addressing the Virgin—

"You, O Mother of God, are the Spiritual Paradise of the second Adam; the bright cloud carrying him who hath the cherubims for his chariot; the fleece of wool filled with the sweet dew of heaven, whereof was made that admirable robe of our royal shepherd, in which he vouchsafed to look after his sheep; you are pleasing and comely as Jerusalem, and the aromatical odours issuing from your garments outvie all the delights of Mount Lebanon; you are the sacred pix of celestial perfumes, whose sweet exhalations shall never be exhausted; you are the holy oil, the unextinguishable lamp, the unfading flower, the divinely-woven purple, the royal vestment, the imperial diadem, the throne of the divinity, the gate of Paradise, the queen of the universe, the cabinet of life, the fountain ever flowing with celestial illustrations."

"All hail! the divine lantern encompassing that crystal lamp whose light outshines the sun in its midday splendour; the spiritual sea whence the world's richest pearl was extracted; the radiant sphere, the well-fenced orchard, the fruitful border, the fair and delicate garden, the nuptial bed of the eternal world, the odoriferous and happy City of God, etc., etc."

Dialect Rhyme.

The subjoined is a specimen of the dialect spoken in the county of Lancashire, England. The verse is a description of a lost baby, by the town-crier, or bellman, who still plies his trade in out-of-the-way parts of England—

In Search of a Rhyme.

Luttrell made this couplet on the wife of "Anastatius" Hope, famous for his wealth and her own jewels—

Noted Anachronisms.

Shakespeare makes Lear, an early Anglo-Saxon King, speak of not wanting spectacles, which were not known until the fourteenth century. Cannon were first used in the year 1346, but in relating Macbeth's death, in 1054, and King John's reign in 1200, he mentions cannon. In his Julius Cæsar, he makes the "clock" strike three.

Schiller, in his "Piccolomini," speaks of a "lightning-conductor" as existing about 150 years before its invention.

Diogenes and his Tub.

Modern scepticism about the practical stoicism of the ancients is surely brought to a climax by a living writer, M. Fournier, who maintains that the so-called tub of Diogenes was in reality a commodious little dwelling—neat but not gorgeous. It must be supposed, then, that he spoke of his tub much as an English country gentleman does of his "box."—The Book Hunter, by Burton.

Slave Advertisements.

The following announcements are curious, showing the merchandise light in which the negro was regarded in America while yet a colony of Great Britain:

Francis Lewis, has for Sale,

A Choice Parcel of Muscovado and Powder Sugars, Tierces and Barrels; Ravens, Ducks and a Negro Woman and Negro Boy. The Coach-House and Stables, with or without the Garden Spot, formerly the property of Joseph Murray, Esq.; in the Broadway, to be let separately or together:—Inquire of said Francis Lewis.—New York Gazette, April 25th, 1765.

This Day Run away from John McComb, Junier, an Indian Woman, about 17 Years of Age, Pitted in the Face, of a middle Stature and Indifferent fatt, having on her a Drugat, Wast-coat, and Kersey Petticoat, of a Light Collour. If any Person or Persons shall bring the said Girle to her said Master, shall be Rewarded for their Trouble to their Content.—American Weekly Mercury, May 24th, 1726.

A Female Negro Child (of an