loudes thatt stayne the azure nyghtt,
Or starrs thatt shoote beneathe theyr feeble lyghtt,
And eke as crymson as the mornyng's rode,[15]
The lornlie[16] payre inn dumbe dystracyon stoode
Whann onn the banke Matylda sonke and dyed,
And Alfrede plong'dd hys daggerr inn hys syde:
Hys purpell soule came roshynge fromm the wounde,
And o'err the lyfeless claie deathe's ensygns stream'dd arownde.

_Literary Gazette._

[7] Tender.
[8] Woes.
[9] Express.
[10] Fiery.
[11] Dancing.
[12] Meadows.
[13] Blood-coloured.
[14] Mingled.
[15] Complexion.
[16] Forlorn.

* * * * *

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

FOX HUNTING.

"Well, do you know, that after all you have said, Mr. North, I cannot
understand the passion and the pleasure of fox-hunting. It seems to me
both cruel and dangerous."

Cruelty! Is there cruelty in laying the rein on their necks, and
delivering them up to the transport of their high condition--for every
throbbing vein is visible--at the first full burst of that maddening
cry, and letting loose to their delight the living thunderbolts? Danger!
What danger but breaking their own legs, necks, or backs, and those of
their riders? And what right have you to complain of that, lying all
your length, a huge hulking fellow snoring and snorting half asleep on a
sofa, sufficient to sicken a whole street? What though it be but a
smallish, reddish-brown, sharp-nosed animal, with pricked-up ears, and
passionately fond of poultry, that they pursue? After the first tallyho,
Reynard is rarely seen, till he is run in upon--once perhaps in the
whole run, skirting a wood, or crossing a common. It is an idea that is
pursued, on a whirlwind of horses to a storm of canine music,--worthy,
both, of the largest lion that ever leaped among a band of Moors,
sleeping at midnight by an extinguished fire on the African sands. There
is, we verily believe it, nothing foxy in the fancy of one man in all
that glorious field of three hundred. Once off and away--while wood and
welkin rings--and nothing is felt--nothing is imaged in that hurricane
flight, but scorn of all obstructions, dikes, ditches, drains, brooks,
palings, canals, rivers, and all the impediments reared in the way of so
many rejoicing madmen, by nature, art, and science, in an enclosed,
cultivated, civilized, and Christian country. There they go--prince and
peer, baronet and sq