r, that no less illustrious a
saint than Augustin, to whom Puritanism can hardly be imputed, had made
a parallel confession of like early depravity many centuries before.
Enlarging on his own puerile delinquencies, and indeed on the wickedness
of children in general, he confesses that, in company with other
"naughty boys" ("nequissimi adolescentuli"), he not only stole apples,
but stole them for the mere pleasure of the thing, and when he "had
enough at home":

"Id furatus sum quod mihi abundabat, et multo melius. Nec ea
re volebam frui quam furto appetebam; sed ipso furto et
peccato. Arbor erat pirus in vicinia vineae nostrae pomis
onusta, nec forma nec sapore illecebrosis. Ad hanc excutiendam
atque asportandam, nequissimi adolescentuli perreximus nocte
intempesta; et abstulimus inde onera ingentia, non ad nostras
epulas, sed vel projicienda porcis, etiamsi aliquid inde
comedimus.... Ecce cor meum, Deus meus, ecce cor meum, quod
miseratus es in imo abyssi!"--_Confessionum_, lib. ii. cap.
iv.

In comparing the two cases, the balance of juvenile depravity is very
much against the great Doctor of Grace. He does not seem to have had
even a fondness for fruit to plead in extenuation of his larceny. He
robbed orchards by wholesale of apples, which, by his own admission, had
no attractions either of form or flavour to tempt him. Yet the two
anecdotes are so much alike, that one would be inclined to suspect one
story of being a mere recoction of the other if it were possible to
doubt the veracity of Richard Baxter.

{328}
The incident, however, is one too familiar in schoolboy life to make the
repetition of the story a matter of surprise. The property in an apple
growing within the reach of a boy's hand has from time immemorial been
in peril, and the law itself has not always regarded it as an object of
scrupulous protection. The old laws of the Rheingau, and (if I mistake
not) of some other states, warranted a wayfaring man in picking apples
from any tree, provided he did not exceed the number of three.

E. SMIRKE.

* * * * *

FOLK LORE.

_Subterranean Bells_ (Vol. vii., pp. 128. 200.).--In answer to J. J.
S.'s inquiry, I beg to state, that at Crosmere, near Ellesmere,
Shropshire, where there is one of a number of pretty lakes scattered
throughout that district, there is a tradition of a chapel having
formerly stood on the banks of