of the Saxon race displayed itself in a steady though ineffective resistance to their Norman rulers, and for a long time they were animated in their efforts by a legend generally circulated among them, that Harold, their gallant king, instead of being killed, had escaped from the field of battle, and would one day return to lead them to victory. History records many such reports, which, under similar circumstances, have been eagerly adopted by the vanquished party, and are exemplified, among other instances, by the rumours prevalent after the deaths of Don Roderick, the last of the Gothic kings of Spain, and of the Scottish sovereign James IV., who perished at Flodden. FIELD-MARSHAL KEITH. Among the eight generals of Frederick the Great, who, on foot, surround Rauch's magnificent equestrian statue of the monarch in Berlin, one is a Briton. He was descended of a Scotch family, once as great in wealth and station as any of the Hamiltons or the Douglases, but which went out in the last century like a quenched light, in consequence of taking a wrong line in politics. James Edward Keith, and his brother the Earl Marischal, when very young men, were engaged in the rebellion of 1715-16, and lost all but their lives. Abroad, they rose by their talents into positions historically more distinguished than those which their youthful imprudence had forfeited. The younger brother, James, first served the czar in his wars against Poland and Turkey; but, becoming discontented with the favouritism that prevailed in the Russian army, and conceiving himself treated with injustice, he gave in his resignation in 1747, and was admitted into the Prussian service as field-marshal. Frederick the Great made him his favourite companion, and, together, they travelled incognito through Germany, Poland, and Hungary. Keith also invented a game, in imitation of chess, which delighted the king so much, that he had some thousands of armed men cast in metal, by which he could arrange battles and sieges. On the 29th of August 1756, he entered with the king into Dresden, where he had the archives opened to carry away the documents that particularly interested the Prussian court: he also managed the admirable retreat of the army from Olmutz in the presence of a superior force, without the loss of a single gun; and took part in all the great battles of the period. He was killed in that of Hochkirchen, 14th of October 1758. His correspondence with Frederick, written in French, possesses much historical interest. He was of middle height, dark complexion, stronglymarked features, and an expression of determination, softened by a degree of sweetness, marked his face. His presence of mind was very remarkable; and his knowledge, deep and varied in character; whilst his military talents and lively sense of honour made him take rank among the first commanders of the day. His brother, the lord-marshal of Scotland, thus wrote of him to Madame de Geoffrin: 'My brother has left me a noble heritage; after having overrun Bohemia at the head of a large army, I have only found seventy dollars in his purse.' Frederick honoured his memory by erecting a monument to him in the Wilhelmsplatz, at Berlin, by the side of his other generals. ORATOR HENLEY. ORATOR HENLEY. Possessing considerable power of eloquence, with great perseverance, a fair education, and a good position in life, Henley might have pursued a quiet career of prosperity, had not overweening vanity induced him to seek popularity at any risk, and eventually make himself preacher and zany of the age,' according to the satirical verdict of Pope, which he had well earned by his ill-placed buffoonery. Henley was the son of a clergyman residing at Melton Mowbray, in Leicestershire, where he was born in 1692; he was sent to St John's College, Cambridge, and while an undergraduate there, sent a communication on punning to the Spectator (printed in No. 396), which is now the most readily accessible of all his voluminous writings, scattered as they were in the ephemeral literature of his own day. This paper is a strange mixture of sense and nonsense, combined with a pert self-sufficiency, very characteristic of its writer. On his return to Melton, he was employed as assistant in a school. He preached occasionally, and from the attention which his fluency and earnestness attracted, was induced to betake himself to London, as the proper sphere for the display of his rhetorical talents. He was appointed reader at St George's Chapel, in Queen Square, and afterwards at St John's, Bedford Row; delivered from time to time charity-sermons with great success; and worked at translations for the booksellers. After some years, he was offered a small country living, but would not consent to the obscurity which it entailed. The same exaggeration of style and action in the pulpit, however, which rendered him a favourite with the public, exposed him to animadversion on the part of the clergy and churchpatrons. He now attempted political writing, offering his services to the ministry; and when they were declined, made the same offer to their opponents, with no better success. Determined for the future to trust to his own power of eloquence to draw an income from the public, he announced himself as the restorer of Ancient Eloquence,' and opened his 'Oratory' in a large room in Butcher Row, Newport Market. Here he preached on Sundays upon theology, and on Wednesdays, on any subject that happened to be most popular. Politics and current events were treated with a vulgar levity that suited the locality. The greatest persons in the land were attacked by him. After having undergone some prosecutions, he turned his rhetoric to buffoonery upon all public and private occurrences. All this passed in the same room where at one time he jested, and at another celebrated what he called the "primitive eucharist." In a money point of view, he was very successful, his Oratory was crowded, and cash flowed in freely. For the use of his regular subscribers, he issued medals (like the free tickets of theatres and public gardens) with the vain device of a star rising to the meridian, the motto, Ad summa; and, beneath it, Inveniam viam aut faciam. Pope has immortalised Henley's gilt tub,' as he terms the gaudy pulpit from which he poured forth his rhapsodies. There is a caricature of him as a *Note to Pope's Dunciad. ORATOR HENLEY. O great restorer of the good old stage, Preacher at once and zany of thy age! O, worthy thou of Egypt's wise abodes, A decent priest, where monkeys were the gods! But fate with butchers placed thy priestly stall, Meek modern faith to murder, hack, and maul; And bade thee live, to crown Britannia's praise, In Toland's, Tindal's, and in Woolston's * days.' After some years, Henley left Newport Market, but, faithful to his old friends the butchers, he opened his new Oratory in Clare Market, in the year 1746, and indulged in the most scurrilous censoriousness, and a levity bordering on buffoonery. His neighbours, the butchers, were useful allies, and, it is said, he kept many in pay to protect him from the consequences of his satire. In some instances, he must have run risks of riot and mischief to his meeting-room, which could only be repressed by fear of his brawny protectors. In one instance he tricked a mob of shoemakers, by inducing them to come and hear him describe a new mode by which shoes could be made most expeditiously; the plan really being, simply to cut off the tops of ready-made boots! His reflections on the royal family led to his arrest, but he was liberated, after a few days, on proper bail being tendered, and a promise to curb his tongue in future. His ordinary free-and-easy vulgarity is well hit off in an article on the Robin Hood Society,'t published in No. 18 of the Gray's Inn Journal, February 17, 1753; he is called Orator Bronze, and exclaims: 'I am pleased to see this assembly; you're a twig from me, a chip of the old block at Clare Market; I am the old block, invincible; coup de grace, as yet unanswered. We are brother-rationalists; logicians upon fundamentals! I love ye all-I love mankind in general-give me some of that porter !' represents Henley in his pulpit, half-clergyman, half-fox; his pulpit is supported by a pig, emblematic of the swinish multitude; the brazen head' of the popular romance of Friar Bacon ;* and a well-filled purse. The lines of Hudibras are made to apply to him, beginning 'Bel and the Dragon's chaplains were In an unlucky hour he attacked Pope, who afterwards held him up to obloquy in the Dunciad: 'Imbrown'd with native bronze, lo! Henley stands, Despite his boldness and impudence, and the daring character of his disquisitions on politics and religion, Henley found a difficulty in keeping up an interest in his Oratory. A contemporary writer says: for some years before its author's death, it dwindled away so much that the few friends of it feared its decease was very near. The doctor, indeed, kept it up to the last, determined it should live as long as he did, and actually exhibited many evenings to empty benches. Finding no one at length would attend, he admitted the acquaintances of his door-keeper, runners, &c., gratis. On the 13th of October 1753, the doctor died, and the Oratory ceased, no one having iniquity or impudence sufficient to continue it.' *In this old tale, the brazen-head was to do wonders when it spoke; but the friar, tired with watching, left his servant to listen while he slept. The head spoke the sentences which appear on the three labels issuing from the mouth, and having spoken the last, fell with a crash that destroyed it. This was typical of the unstable foundation of Henley's popular power, Irrespective of the improper character of the subjects he chose to descant upon, his inordinate conceit induced him to treat every one as his with the most violent gesticulation. Henley's inferior in judgment; and he enforced his opinions feverish career is a glaring instance of vanity overcoming and degrading abilities, that, properly cultivated, might have insured him a respectable Three deistical writers, whose works were published in the early years of the last century. A public debating-society, held at the sign of the Robin Hood, in Butcher Row, near Temple Bar. Each person paid sixpence for admission, and had a ticket for four pennyworth of drink, the twopence paying the expenses of the society. This is an error, Henley's death being recorded in the obituary of the Gentleman's Magazine, on 14th October 1756. position, instead of an anxious and fretful life, and an immortality in the pages of a great satirist, of a most undesirable nature. OCTOBER 15. St Hospicius or Hospis, anchoret, about 580. St Tecla, virgin and abbess. St Teresa, virgin, foundress of the Reformation of the Barefooted Carmelites, 1582. Born.-Virgil, Latin poet, 70 B. C., Andes, near Mantua ; Evangelista Torricelli, inventor of the barometer, 1608, Piancaldoli, in Romagna; Allan Ramsay, Scottish poet, 1686, Leadhills, Lanarkshire; Alexander Fraser Tytler, Lord Woodhouselee, author of Elements of General History, 1747, Edinburgh; Christian, Count Stolberg, poet and dramatist, 1748, Hamburg; Frederick William IV., king of Prussia, 1795. Died.-Lucretius, Latin philosophical poet, 55 B. O.; Andreas Vesalius, eminent anatomist, 1564, Zante; Pope Gregory XIV., 1591; Dr James Anderson, author of works on political economy, &c., 1808, London; Michael Kelly, composer, 1826, Ramsgate; Letitia Elizabeth Maclean (née Landon), poetess, 1838, Cape Coast Castle; Rev. John Foster, celebrated essayist, 1843, Stapleton, near Bristol. MRS MACLEAN (L. E. L.'). On New-year's Day morning, 1839, the readers of newspapers were startled by the announcement of the death, at Cape Coast Castle, of Mrs Maclean, wife of Mr George Maclean, the governor of that settlement. But a few months before she had quitted the shores of England with all the gay paraphernalia of a bride, proceeding after the nuptial knot had been tied to her future home by the palm-clad shores, and amid the tropical vegetation of West Africa. Recollections of the young and enthusiastic 'L. E. L., whose contributions to the Literary Gazette had in their youthful days of romance called forth so many juvenile tributes of admiration both in prose and verse, filled with tears the eyes of many staid men of middle age, whilst to those who had enjoyed the privilege of her society, and the vivacity and charm of her conversation, the shock produced by this sad and unexpected intelligence was overwhelming. Other feelings, however, were speedily to be excited -those of an intense curiosity and interest, not unmingled with horror, by the report that Mrs Maclean had died from the effects of a dose of prussic acid, incautiously taken, and, as some did not hesitate to insinuate, with the intention of self-destruction. The whole affair was involved in the deepest mystery, the sole explanation afforded being that between eight and nine o'clock on the morning of Monday, 15th October, a female servant had gone to Mrs Maclean's room, for the purpose of delivering a note which had just been received. She experienced some difficulty in opening the door, and found that it was occasioned by Mrs Maclean having fallen with her back against it. The unfortunate lady was lying perfectly senseless, with an empty bottle in her hand, labelled as containing hydrocyanic or prussic acid. Assistance was immediately procured, but all in vain-the vital spark had fled. Mr Maclean, her husband, MRS MACLEAN ('L. E. L."). had been suffering from indisposition for a few days previous, and had been most assiduously tended by his wife, who, on the morning of her death, had risen to administer some refreshment to him, and had then retired to her room to resume repose. The servant also who found her in the condition we have mentioned, had seen her about half an hour previously. No one had observed anything peculiar in her demeanour, or any indication of depression of spirits, though from her attendance night and day on her husband, she had become very much exhausted, and was besides liable to spasmodic attacks, for the relief of which, it was stated at the inquest, that she was in the habit of taking in a glass of water a few drops of medicine from the bottle which was found in her hand. The conjecture then come to was, that she had inadvertently taken an overdose, and feeling its effects, had endeavoured to open her door and call for assistance, when she was stricken down helpless. No satisfactory conclusion was arrived at, and there the matter rests. It should be stated, however, that all the evidence brought forward went entirely to negative the idea of suicide having been committed. Between Mr Maclean and herself a strong and sincere affection subsisted; there had never been an unkind word between them; and from the tone of all her communications to her friends at home, it was evident that she looked forward with great complacency and cheerfulness to her future career at Cape Coast. ever Previous to her marriage, the life of Letitia Elizabeth Landon had not been diversified by much incident. The greater part of it was spent in London, in the neighbourhood of Chelsea and Brompton, in the former of which localities she was born in 1802. Her father, John Landon, the son of a Herefordshire rector, had in his early days gone to sea, but afterwards settled in London as an army-agent. From her earliest years Letitia displayed a most engrossing propensity for reading, and the bent of her genius towards poetry was displayed nearly at as early a date as with Pope and Cowley. When the family resided at Brompton, they happened to have as their near neighbour William Jerdan, the celebrated editor of The Literary Gazette, and an acquaintance having been formed, some of Miss Landon's juvenile pieces were shewn to him, approved of, and inserted in his journal. Public attention was soon attracted by the beauty of these pieces; and the mysterious initials 'L. E. L.,' by which the authoress subscribed herself, came soon to be recognised as belonging to the finest lyrics of the day. Thus stimulated, she proceeded to more ambitious undertakings, and the poems of The Improvisatrice, The_Troubadour, The Golden Violet, and The Venetian Bracelet, procured for her all the fame which their glow and luxuriance of description, with the most melodious harmony of verse, so richly merited. Whether, however, from its essentially artificial character, however natural an appearance it may wear, the poetry of Miss Landon is destined to an abiding immortality, may not unreasonably be questioned. Never was there a poet whose works were less a reflex of his own mind than those of L. E. L. With all the enchanting descriptions of woodland glades, sunny gardens, and flowery meadows, beneath the magic of a Provençal or Italian sky, Miss Landon, like Charles Lamb, had little affection for the country, and found herself nowhere in a more congenial atmosphere than amid the smoke and bustle of London. Neither did her disposition partake of the pensive, melancholy cast, so conspicuous in her poems, being, on the contrary, remarkable for its vivacity and cheerfulness. Those who expected to find in her an embodiment of the feelings portrayed in her works, found themselves generally egregiously mistaken in their anticipations. It was said of her, that she should write with a crystal pen dipped in dew upon silver paper, and use for pounce the dust of a butterfly's wing; the real fact being, that her locality for invoking the Muses was her bedroom-a bare homely-looking room facing the street, where she wrote at an old worn-out desk, placed on a little old dressing-table. In person, the impression conveyed was a very pleasing one. Her figure was slight and graceful, and without being artistically beautiful in feature, her face, when she spoke, became handsome in its expressiveness. It is recorded of Hogg the Ettrick Shepherd, that, on being first presented to her at the house of Mrs Hall, he took her hand, and looking earnestly in her face, exclaimed: 'Oh dear! I hae written and thocht mony a bitter thing about ye, but I'll do sae nae mair; I didna think ye'd been sae bonny!' THE WYNYARD GHOST-STORY. No modern ghost-story has been more talked of in England, than one in which the seers were two military officers named Sherbroke and Wynyard. The men occupied conspicuous places in society, and were universally known as persons of honour, as well as cool good sense; the reality of their vision was attested by a remarkable circumstance which afterwards took place; and every effort of their own or on the part of others to give an explanation' has been vain. John Cope Sherbroke and George Wynyard appear in the army list of 1785, the one as a captain and the other a lieutenant in the 33d Regiment -a corps which, some years after, had the honour to be commanded by the Hon. Arthur Wellesley, subsequently Duke of Wellington. The regiment was then on service in Canada, and Sherbroke and Wynyard, being of congenial tastes, had become friends. It was their custom to spend in study much of the time which their brother-officers devoted to idle pleasures. According to a narration resting on the best authority now attainable,+ "They were one afternoon sitting in Wynyard's apartment. It was perfectly light, the hour was *Archdeacon Wrangham alludes to them in a note in his edition of Plutarch. A very singular story, however,' says he, could be told on this head by Generals Sand W both men of indisputable honour and spirit, and honourably distinguished by their exertions in their country's service.' The death of the first is thus noted in Blackwood's Magazine for June 1830: At Calverton, General Sir John Cope Sherbroke, G.C.B.' The other seer seems to have passed into another branch of the army, and died as lieutenant-colonel of the 24th Light Dragoons, June 13, 1809. The narration here given is from Accredited Ghost Stories, collected by T. M. Jarvis, Esq. London, 1823. Mr Jarvis adds the following note: This story has been read by a relation of General Wynyard, who states that, in all important circumstances, it is strictly true.' THE WYNYARD GHOST-STORY. about four o'clock; they had dined, but neither of them had drunk wine, and they had retired from the mess to continue together the occupations of the morning. It ought to have been said, that the apartment in which they were had two doors in it, the one opening into a passage, and the other leading into Wynyard's bedroom. There was no other means of entering the sitting-room but from the passage, and no other egress from the bedroom but through the sitting-room; so that any person passing into the bedroom must have remained there, unless he returned by the way he entered. This point is of consequence to the story. 'As these two young officers were pursuing their studies, Sherbroke, whose eye happened accidentally to glance from the volume before him towards the door that opened to the passage, observed a tall youth, of about twenty years of age, whose appearance was that of extreme emaciation, standing beside it. Struck with the presence of a perfect stranger, he immediately turned to his friend, who was sitting near him, and directed his attention to the guest who had thus strangely broken in upon their studies. As soon as Wynyard's eyes were turned towards the mysterious visitor, his countenance became suddenly agitated. "I have heard," says Sir John Sherbroke, "of a man's being as pale as death, but I never saw a living face assume the appearance of a corpse, except Wynyard's at that moment." 'As they looked silently at the form before them, for Wynyard, who seemed to apprehend the import of the appearance, was deprived of the faculty of speech, and Sherbroke perceiving the agitation of his friend, felt no inclination to address ceeded slowly into the adjoining apartment, and, in it-as they looked silently upon the figure, it prothe act of passing them, cast its eyes with an expression of somewhat melancholy affection on young Wynyard. The oppression of this extraordinary presence was no sooner removed, than Wynyard, seizing his friend by the arm, and drawing a deep breath, as if recovering from the suffocation of intense almost inaudible tone of voice, "Great God! my astonishment and emotion, muttered in a low and brother!"-"Your brother!" repeated Sherbroke, "what can you mean, Wynyard? there must be some deception-follow me;" and immediately taking his friend by the arm, he preceded him into the bedroom, which, as before stated, was connected with the sitting-room, and into which the strange visitor had evidently entered. It has already been said, that from this chamber there was no possibility of withdrawing but by the way of the apartment, through which the figure had certainly passed, and as certainly never had returned. Imagine, then, the astonishment of the young officers, when, on finding themselves in the centre of the chamber, they perceived that the room was perfectly untenanted. Wynyard's mind had received an impression at the first moment of his observing him, that the figure whom he had seen was the spirit of his brother. Sherbroke still persevered in strenuously believing that some delusion had been practised.* *The two gentlemen remarked at the time, that the figure appeared as dressed in a light indoor costume, while they wore furs and wraps owing to the severity of the weather.-M. E. M., in Notes and Queries, April 3, 1858. |