Christmas Day. "Here's Monsieur Tonson come again!" (Two Sheets, Price (with Portrait) Is. fight in their own closets, with no one to answer them; and we have dealt out our dogmas, now and then perhaps rather pragmatically. But we deny that we ever gave publicity to a sentiment which we were not sincere in entertaining; and that we have secured for ourselves a fair proportion of elbow-room amidst the crowds that are jostling each other on the same road, is sufficiently attested by the favour in which this our JOURNAL stands, and the position of more than ordinary respectability which it has been enabled to maintain. We hesitate not to say, that it has taken a hold of the people of Scotland--a hold which could not now be shaken by the jealousy or the enmity of any other periodical whatever. THE writing that speaks to the feelings and the affections, is the writing for CHRISTMAS DAY. It is the day when they who are at home gather their friends around them, and they who are absent live over again in memory their old associations, and the dear companionship of the past. We are all at this moment more or less under these heart-awakening influences. The spirit of sympathy is abroad over the whole of merry England, and in every ancient city and remote village of our own loved Scotland. It is a delightful thing to know that every- We are everanxious to assert that this success is mainly body is thinking as we are,-that one pulse is beating in to be attributed to the friends who have rallied round us, the bosom of a nation, that one Targe family inhabits and who have stuck by us from first to last. The Litethis beautiful island,—alike in faith, in mind, and inrary Journal is read, we may safely say, by all the litemoral sentiment. Of all the Saturdays in our year, there is none on which we come before our readers with so much confidence and joy as on this. We know that they will look to our pages, expecting to find in them some transcript of their own emotions; and though we were to reflect but dimly a few of the images passing through their own soul, though we were to touch but one chord that vibrated to the heart, they would love us better; for they would feel, that at a time hallowed by a thousand reminiscences, our spirits were in unison with theirs. But we shall do more than merely call forth one note of music, and then fall back into silence. We have waved our wand, and lo! a bright and varied congregation of flowers has sprung up before us! each with its own hue and fragrance, but each calculated to take the sense with pleasure. It is itself a consolation—a sufficient recompense for all the toils and cares of authorship, to know that this our CHRISTMAS NUMBER,-that these very words which we are now writing, will lie on the breakfast-table of hundreds, ay thousands, of the beautiful and the virtuous of the land, and that the smile will play upon the lip, or the tear glisten in the eye, as the different masters of the melody, who fill up our literary concert, touch a gayer or a sadder key. This to-day is the height of our ambition -to be acknowledged as having done some service in the cause of that old religion of the heart, which has descended to us from the grey fathers of an earlier day, and which many of our friends, blessed with the blessing of genius, have assisted us in doing reverence to. To the "fair women and brave men" who will peruse our pages, we dedicate them with all earnestness. For our individual reward, we ask only that they will believe us ever anxious to maintain all the national, time-honoured, and touching customs, observances, and ceremonials of "rocky Caledon." They serve to link us more closely together, and they give to intellectual exertion, and the honourable ambition of the literary arena, that redeeming softness of tone, without which every species of billes lettres is bare, aud cold, and vulgar, and uninspired. We have at times skirmished hotly enough,-with all the determined positiveness of self-complacent crities, who rary population of Scotland; and by a great number of the most respectable part of that population, articles have been contributed to it. Men of established eminence have stood by us, and men of talent, before unknown, have gathered around our banner. From England, too, and from green Erin, the hand of fellowship has been extended to us. We mention these things, not boastfully, but with gratitude. We must not particularize our contributors, lest we be thought, tedious; but we beg of them to believe, that we love to reflect on each in rotation, and that they all have our thanks and good wishes. Enough of our own concerns. Readers! May your Christmas be merry, and your New-Year's-Day happy! May all those you love be near you! May your memories of the past, though sad, be sweet; and may your hopes of the future be bright as your blazing fire, and cheerful as your smiling board! Catch the hour as it flies, and make it yours for ever, by rendering it worthy of being locked up in the store-house of remembrance. How few such hours there are in life's long catalogue of days and weeks! If a Christmas season does not present them to you, we know not when you are to seek for them. Why should not a holyday be made a holyday indeed?a day when we forget our animosities, and petty cares, and unworthy jealousies,—a day when the scorpions of the bosom are at rest, and loves, and friendships, and good deeds, and holy thoughts, and lofty aspirations, come in their place? We may not-we cannot spend the present Christmas as we spent the last, and we assuredly shall not spend the next as we do this,—for change is the doom of mortality. Yet, though there are many roads through life, we are all tending to the same goal, we must all meet at last, and the more joyous will that meeting be the more we have done to multiply the number of our friends as we passed along-the more we have studied the amenities and the social delights of human intercourse. Listen to the words of one now dead : "Some I remember, and will ne'er forget, My counsellors, my comforters, and guides; If ye are young, ye may not yet look back upon these things; but even in youth your dreams of friendship are liable to change, and to fade. Strange, unforeseen, and perhaps fortuitous circumstances, may alienate the affections of those in whom you most confided, and you may come to pass, without recognition, or with a smile of careless indifference, beings round whom your very heartstrings were entwined. "They whom the world in vain had tried, and you may find yourself like the bark which sailed from shore with a goodly convoy, but which, ere long, is left alone on the melancholy ocean. Seize, then, we beseech you, every opportunity that offers of drawing closer round you the ties of companionship, of kindred, and of home. Warm, enthusiastic affections are the jewels that glitter with purest light in the overflowing cup of life; they are worth all other kinds of happiness put together; they are the only sources of bliss we can imagine in heaven. In the indulgence, however imperfect, of the benevolent sentiments of which we speak, we have strung together to-day our literary garland. May the subtle influence of its perfume titillate not the nerves of sense alone, but, with a finer influence, penetrate to the heart, and awaken some of its most generous emotions! To these prayers, gentle readers, let all the good wishes of the season be sincerely added, by your friend, THE EDITOR. SOCRATIC DRINKING SONG. (RECOMMENDED AND INSCRIBED TO ALL UNIVERSITIES, INSTITUTIONS, AND SEMINARIES OF LEARNING.) By the Author of "Anster Fair." Now the sun is gone down to the depths of the earth, Skink again, drink again! Joy burnish our eyes till they blink again, pink again! The sun of the skies mingles darkness with light; O, happy the man that doth temper a wee The wisest of kings that to men e'er gave law, But Shimei, the scoundrel that cursed his king, On mischief he mused, as he drank his cold water, With Jew and with Heathen, true Christians agree At Athens, the city of sages, 'twas sung I see him-the wine-god-he hovers on high, Yet, yet, gentle god, though we worship before thee, Repentance be his that adores with prostration ! Then fill to the brink again, But aye, mid our glee, let us think again, think again! THE CROOKED STICK. By Mrs S. C. Hall. "And took the crooked stick at last ?*** "Even so." I HAVE rarely known any one, of either sex, who de liberated upon the matrimonial question until their hai silvered, and their eye dimmed, and then became nubered among the "newly wed," who did not, accordin to the old story, "take the crooked, stick at last." Al doubtless, will remember the tale, how the maiden was sent into a green and beautiful lane, garnished on either side by tall and well-formed trees, and directed to chocer, cut, and carry off, the most straight and seemly branch she could find. She might, if she pleased, wander on # the end, but her choice must be made there, if not made before the power of retracing her steps, without im stick, being forbidden. Straight and fair to look upea were the charming boughs of the lofty trees-fit scions of such noble ancestry! and each would have felt honoured by her preference; but the silly maid went on, and on, and on, and thought within herself, that at the ter mination of her journey she could find as perfect a stick as any of those which then courted her acceptance. Er and by, the aspect of things changed; and the branch] she now encountered were cramped and scragged-d÷} figured with blurs and unseemly warts. And when she arrived at the termination of her journey, behold! on miserable, blighted wand, the most deformed she had ever beheld, was all that remained within her reach. was the punishment of her indecision and caprice. She was obliged to take the crooked stick, and return with her hateful choice, amid the taunts and the sneers of the straight tall trees, who, according to the fashion of the good old fairy times, were endowed not only with feer ing and reason, but with speech! Bitter Many, I fear me, are the crooked sticks which "the ancient of days," by a strange infatuation, compel them, selves to adopt. And much might be gravely and pro-i perly said upon this subject, for the edification of young and old; but the following will be better than grave discussion, and more to the tastes of those who value scenes from real life: 1 "Lady Frances Hazlitt, Charles! Surely the most regard the future as an undefinable something pregnant fastidious might pronounce her handsome ?" with light and life; to such, diamond-like are the sands "My dear fellow, you must permit me to correct your that sparkle in the hour-glass of Time, while the withertaste. Observe, I pray you, the short chin, and that un-ed hand which holds the mystic vessel, is unheeded or fortunate nose; it is absolutely retroussé.' unseen. So be it so, doubtless, it is best. One of the choicest blessings bestowed by the Creator on the creature, is a hopeful spirit! "It may be a little opposed to the line of beauty calculated to overset it, perhaps; but did you ever see such a glorious brow?" "Mountainous !" "Such expressive eyes?” "Volcanoes!" "Psha!-Such grace?" "Harry,” replied the young nobleman, smiling according to the most approved Chesterfield principle, removing his eyeglass, and looking at his friend with much composure, you had better, I think, marry Lady Frances yourself." 66 "You are a strange being, my good lord," replied his friend, after a pause. “I would wager a good round sum, that, notwithstanding your rank, fortune, and personal advantages, you will die-or, at all events, not marry until you are a veritable old bachelor. I pray thee, tell me, what do you require ?-A Venus?-A Diana?-A Juno?-A-a "Simply, a woman, my dear fellow; not indeed one of those beings arrayed in drapery, whom you see moving along our streets, with Chinese features, smoke-dried skins, and limbs that might rival those of a Hercules; nor yet one of your be-scented, spider-waisted priminies, who lisp and amble-assume a delicacy which they never felt, and grace which they never possessed. My ideas of woman's perfections of the perfections, in fact, which I desire, and—I may say"-(Lord Charles Villiers was certainly a very handsome and a very fashionable man, and yet his modesty, I suppose, made him hesitate in pronouncing the latter word)—“ I may—I-thinksay-des rve," gaining courage as he proceeded, "are not as extravagant as those required by your favourite Henri Quatre. He insisted on seven perfections. should feel blessed, if the lady of my love were possessed of six." Five-and-twenty summers had passed over the brow of Lord Charles Villiers since Sir Harry Beauclerc noted on his tablet the six indispensable qualities the young nobleman would require in his wife. The lord still remained an unmarried, and an admired man, seeking to find some lady worthy his affections. It is too true that some of the young creatures, just come out, on whose cheek the blush of innocence and modesty still glowed, and whose untutored eyes prated most earnestly of what passed in the sacred citadel, called heart,--such creatures, I say, did discover, to the sad annoyance of their speculating mothers, and sensible-(Heaven bless the word!)-sensible chaperons, that Lord Charles's once beautiful hair was now indebted to " the Tyrian dye" for its gloss and hue; and that, moreover, a most ingenious scalp mixed its artificial ringlets with his once exquisite curls, that the belles (whom a few years had rendered staid mammas, and even grand-I cannot finish the horrid word) used to call, in playful poetry," Cupid's bowstrings!" Then his figure had grown rotund ; he sat long after dinner, prided himself upon securing a cook fully equal to Ude-(I write it with all possible respect)-equal to Eustache Ude in his best days; descanted upon the superiority of pheasant dressed en galantine, to that served in aspic jelly; and gained immortal honour at a committee of taste, by adding a most piquant and delightful ingredient to Mr Dolby's" Sauce à l'Aurore." These gastronomical propensities are sure symptoms of increasing years and changing constitution; but there were other characteristics of" old boyishness" about Lord Charles, which noted him as a delightful gentleman “of a certain age." A rich silk handkerchief was always carefully folded, and placed within the bosom of his ex "Moderate and modest," observed his friend, laugh- quisitely made Stultz, ready to wrap round his throat ing. Most undoubtedly," replied his lordship. * To look forward for a period of five-and-twenty years blanches many a fair cheek, and excites the glow of hope and enthusiasm in those of vigorous and determined cha'racter; while the beauty trembles for her empire—the statesman for his place the monarch even for his throne -those who have nothing to lose, and every thing to gain, when he quitted the delightful crush-room of the delightful Opera, to ascend his carriage; then an occasional twinge reminded him of the existence of gout-a most unpleasant reminiscence in the galopade, which he was hardy—I had almost said fool-hardy-enough to attempt. Had he not been so perfectly well bred, he would have been considered touchy and testy; the excellent discipline of the old school fortunately preserved him from those bachelor-like crimes, at all events in ladies' society; and whatever spleen he had, he wisely only vented on those who could not return it; namely, his poor relations, his servants, and occasionally, but not often, (for he was a member of the society for preventing cruelty to animals,) on his dogs and horses. However, his figure was as erect, if not as graceful, as ever; and many a fair lady sighed at the bare idea of his enduring to the end in single misery. Sir Harry Beauclerc never visited London except during the sitting of Parliament; and it was universally allowed that he discharged his duties as M. P. for his native county with zeal and independence. Wonderful to say, he neither ratted nor sneaked; and yet Whigs, Tories, and Radicals, treated him with deference and respect. He had long been the husband of her, who, when our sketch was commenced, was known as Lady Frances Hazlitt; and it would be rare to behold a more charming assembly of handsome and happy faces than their fire-side circle presented at the celebration of merry Christmas. The younger portion of this family were noisily and busily occupied at a game of forfeits, while those who considered themselves the elders of the juvenile set, sate gravely discussing matters of domestic or public interest with their parents, when a thundering peal at the portal announced the arrival of some benighted visitor. I am 1 -a very worthy-a most excellent man-not exactly one of us--but a highly respectable person I assure you; his name is Scroggins." "Powers of fashion!" mentally ejaculated the baronet, "will it can it be believed-the courted, the exquisite Lord Charles Villiers-the glass of fashion, and the mould of form'-the star, the idol of ton and taste—married--positively married to Molly Scroggins of Bunhillrow!" "I am anxious, I do confess, that Lady Frances should receive Lady Charles Villiers here,” persevered his lordship, after a very long pause; “and I can answer for it, that the native and untutored manners of my unsophisticated bride would gain hourly upon her affections." not about to introduce a hero of romance at such an unseemly hour,-only our old acquaintance Lord Charles, who claimed the hospitality of his friend as protection against an impending snow-storm. When the family had retired for the night, a bottle of royal Burgundy was placed on the table as the sleeping-cup of the host and his guest; old times were reverted to; and Sir Harry fancied that there was more design than accident in the visit with which he had been honoured. This feeling was confirmed by Lord Charles drawing his chair, in a confidential manner, towards his friend, and observing that he was a lucky and a happy fellow to be blessed with sa lovely a family and so amiable and domestic a companion." Sir Harry smiled, and only replied that he was happy; and he hoped his friend would not quietly sink into the grave without selecting some partner, whose smiles would gild the evening of his days, &c. &c. A fine sentimental speech it was, but ill-timed; for the gallant bachelor suffered it to proceed little farther than "evening," when he exclaimed," Faith, Sir Harry, you must have strange ideas. Evening! I consider myself in the prime and vigour of existence; and I have serious ideas of changing my condition-it is pleasant to settle before one falls into the sere and withered leaf. And although, as I said before, I feel myself in the veryject for Almack's!—the rosy, (doubtless signifying redvigour of life, yet it is time to determine. You are considerably my senior-—." "Most sincerely do I wish you joy, my dear lord, and doubt not your choice is fixed upon one who will secure your happiness. I am sure Lady Frances will be delighted at an introduction.-Your pardon one moment, while I relate a most extraordinary coincidence. Do you remember my noting down the six perfections which you required the lady of your choice to possess?-perhaps you recollect it was some five-and-But no matter-well, the tablets upon which I wrote, this morning-only this very morning, I was looking over a box of papers, and, behold! there they were, and do you know, (how very odd, was it not?) I put thein in my waistcoat pocket," continued the worthy baronet, at the same moment drawing them forth, "intending to show them to my eldest son,-for there's a great deal—I assure you I speak in perfect sincerity a great deal My dear lord, what is the matter? you look ill?" To confess the truth, Lord Charles appeared marvellously annoyed-he fidgeted on his chair-the colour heightened on his cheek, and he finally thrust the poker into the fire with terrific violence. "Never mind the tablets, my good friend," said he at last; men change their tastes and opinions as they advance in life-I was a mere boy then, you know, full of romance." "Your pardon, my lord-less of romance than most young men," replied the persevering and tactless baronet, who was, moreover, gifted with a provokingly good memory, "decidedly less of romance than most young men-and not such a boy either. Here are the precious mementos. First on the list stands 'NOBLE BIRTH;' right, right, my dear lord, nothing like it-that (entre nous) is Lady Frances's weak point, I confess; she really carries it too far, for she will have it-that not even a royal alliance could purify a citizen." Lord Charles Villiers looked particularly dignified as he interrupted his zealous friend. "It is rather unfortunate," he observed gravely, "that I should have chosen you as my confidant on this occasion; the fact is, that, knowing how devilish proud all my connexions are, and my Mary-what a sweet name Mary is you remember Byron's beautiful lines, I have a passion for the name of Mary?' -my Mary's father was only a merchant-a-a citizen "Of course-of course, we shall be most happy to receive her ladyshin," stammered forth the baronet; "and doubtless her BEAUTY”—glancing at the tablets 66 "Pardon me, Sir Harry," interrupted the nobleman; you must not expect what in our world is denominated Beauty;-she is all animation— 'Happy nature, wild and simple rosy and laughing, but not a beauty, believe me " faced,) laughing (meaning romping) daughter of some city butterman, thrust into the peerage by the folly of a man who might have plucked the fairest, noblest flower in the land!" "At all events," he said, when his powers of articulation returned, " your lady is endowed with both PRUDENCE and WIT, and nothing so likely to create a sensation in the beau monde as such a combination." "Oh, yes-prudence I daresay she will have, much cannot be expected from a girl of seventeen; and as to wit, between you and me, it is a deuced dangerous and troublesome weapon, when wielded by a woman." "A flirt and a fool, I suspect," again fancied Sir Harry, "in addition to her other qualifications." "GENTLENESS and FIDELITY," he ejaculated, fixing his eyes on the unfortunate tablets, while Lord Charles, evidently determined no longer to endure the baronet's untimely reference to the detestable memorials, snatched them (it is perfectly astonishing what rude acts polite persons will sometimes perform) from the hand of his friend, and flung them into the fire. "Heavens and earth, sir! what do you mean by such conduct?" said Sir Harry, at the same time snatching them from the flames. "These ivory slates are dear to me as existence. I must say, that I consider such conduct very ungenerous, ungentlemanly," &c. &c. One angry word produced another; and much was said which it would ill befit me to repeat. The next morning, even before the dawn of day, Lord Charles Villiers had quitted Beauclerc Hall, without bidding a single farewell either to its lady or its master. "There!" exclaimed the baronet, placing the fashionable "Post" in Lady Frances's hand at the breakfast-table one morning, about three months after the above scene had taken place; "I knew how it would be; a pretty fool that noble friend of mine, Lord Charles Villiers, has made of himself. I never knew one of these absurdly particular men who did not take the crooked stick at last. By Jove, sir," (to his son,) "you shall marry before you are five-and-twenty, or you shall be disinherited! The youthful mind is ever pliable; and the early wed grow into each other's habits, feelings, and affections. An old bachelor is sure either to make a fool of himself, or be made a fool of. You see his lordship's wife has publicly shown that she certainly did not possess the last of his requisites FIDELITY-by eloping with her footinan. I will journey up to town on purpose to invite Lord Charles here, and make up matters; he will be glad to escape from the désagremens of exposure just now, as he is doubtless made a Lion of, for the benefit-as Sir Peter Teazle has it-of all Old Bachelors." London, December 18, 1830. A HIGHLAND SONG OF TRIUMPH FOR KING WILLIAM'S BIRTHDAY. By the Ettrick Shepherd. To the pine of Lochaber Due honours be given, That bourgeons in earth, And that blossoms to heaven. Ho urim! siug urim,* With pipe and with tabor, To the tree of great Bancho, The lord of Lochaber! Ho urim! sing urim, &c. That tree now has flourish'd And globe in its glory; And the wicked restrain'd too; It has pierced the dark cloud, And dishevell'd the rainbow. Ho urim! sing urim, &c. Long flourish our stem, And its honours rise prouder; The stem of the Stuart, And Rose of the Tudor. Ho urim! sing urim! Let's hallow together The day that gave birth To our king and our father. Ho urim! sing urim To the best and the latest, And honour'd King William, The last and the greatest. Heaven's arm be around him To guard and secure him, The hearts of his people, Ho urim! sing urim, IT IS NOT GOOD TO BE ALONE IN THE WORLD. By Dr Gillespic. Ir is not good, said one to whom the demands of our nature were not unknown-it is not good for man to be alone; and accordingly, from the period when God walked with man in the solitude of his antenuptial para dise to the present hour, man has associated with himself, has connected his outgoings and his incomings with a companionship of Divinity, or, at least, of such scriptural agencies and influences as own the Supreme Spirit as their sovereign and director. If at any time man, in the absurdity of a perverted philosophy, or in self-reliance, has ventured to walk forth into this dreary world alone, and unaccompanied by superior and spiritual intelligences and agencies, by that very movement he has found himself expelled from paradise, and driven forth a solitary and unsupported, uncomforted wanderer in the wilderness of sin. * Urim, Gael.-glory. "Oh, solitude! where are the charms That sages have seen in thy face? Better dwell in the midst of alarms, Than reign in this horrible place ;”— better submit to all the exaggerated and absurd fears of the nursery legend-better dwell in the midst of goblins, fays, and kelpies, than remain sole and solitary potentate, a small speck in the midst of a material, and merely material system--as Hogg has it, "A wee clud in the warld its lane." And yet, such is the doom of man, that his tendencies seem to point, when undirected, and guided by a revelation, to this dark, deep, and unhallowed solitude. Take a stoic of the day, and place him in the presence of what he calls the laws and tendencies of that supreme and overruling agency, which "Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, of that "mens divinior quæ agitat molem," and you have, after all the sublimity and impress of such apprehensions, or rather expressions, a deserted being, without a providence to protect, or a friend to uphold--" without God in the world." And this loneliness of faith-these aerial, and less than aerial impersonations (if such they may be called) of Divinity, are all that the mere philosophers of the nineteenth century have to lean upon in this crumbling tenement of clay. Surely, surely God is not here his voice and presence are not in the wind, nor in the whirlwind, which are thus so foolishly sown, and so mournfully reaped. Of all the beings which God has permitted to crawl into observation, and even note, in this table-land of his universe, the most deplorably pitiable is that man of letters, learning, science, and fume, who, arrayed in the asbestos garment of a temporary immortality, looks only to his ashes, and those embers of materiality of which they are composed. A little dust, scattered to the winds, is polluted by the reptile, and a Galileo, Newton, or a Laplace, have ceased to live even to the amount of the animation of a plant-.. "Dum vitant stulti vitia in contraria currunt." In To escape this extreme, from which the soul recoils, as from a void, a vacuum, in the contiguity of matter, men fled into an opposite extreme. They peopled the water, the earth, the air, and the heavens; the rivers, the winds, and the mountains; the hearth, the highway, and the field, with spiritual agencies in mortal garb, with the statue and the image intended and calculated to express to the senses, the “ presens numen"-the all-pervading and searching knowledge and residence of the Divinity. The old Roman, by his fireside, was never alone. There were his Lares and Penates, in their dogskin garb, to arrest his attention and command his veneration. Over his festive board his Genius presided. his orchard, he was sure to meet with Priapus; in his garden, with Flora and Pomona. If he extended his walk into the woods, there he was beset and encompassed by Fauns, Satyrs, Pans-et hoc genus omne of Dryad and Nymph! In the curling waters of the stream, and at the sparkling orifice of the fountain,-in the Tyber, and at Blandusia, still the voice and presence of Divinity were recognised and acknowledged. The winds, the heavens, the very depths and innermost recesses of the earth, were peopled and planted with the conceptions and imaginations of man respecting particular and local Providence. All this breathed, and strongly, of what we term superstition; but it was superstition emanating from, and tending to, religion--the daughter, in fact, overstepping the modesty of the parent; and, instead of the simple garb and the modest deportment, arraying herself in all the gaudy and meretricious finery of a court. It was religion run mad, but still retaining traces and evidences of her |