Touched by the sound, I nearer drew;

But my rude step increased the cause of pain: Soon o'er my head the whirring Partridge flew, Alarmed; and with her flew an infant train.

But short th' excursion; for, unused to play,

Feebly the unfledged wings th' essay could make : The parent, sheltered by the closing day,

Lodged her loved covey in a neighbouring brake.

Her cradling pinions there she amply spread,
And hushed th' affrighted family to rest;
But still the late alarm suggested dread,

And closer to their feath'ry friend they pressed.

She, wretched parent! doomed to various woe,
Felt all a mother's hope, a mother's care;
With grief foresaw the dawn's impending blow,
And, to avert it, thus preferred her prayer:

'O Thou! who e'en the sparrow doth befriend;

Whose providence protects the harmless wren; Thou, GOD OF BIRDS! these innocents defend From the vile sport of unrelenting men;

'For soon as dawn shall dapple yonder skies,

The slaughtering gunner, with the tube of fate, While the dire DOG the faithless stubble tries,

Shall persecute our tribe with annual hate.

'O may the Sun, unfanned by cooling gale,

Parch with unusual heat th' undewy ground; So shall the pointer's wonted cunning fail,

So shall the sportsman leave my babes unfound.

'Then shall I fearless guide them to the mead;

Then shall I see with joy their plumage grow; Then shall I see (fond thought) their future breed, And every transport of a parent know.

'But if some victim must endure the dart,

And fate marks out that victim from my race, Strike, strike the leaden vengeance through this heart! Spare! spare my babes! and I the death embrace.'

PRATT.

OCTOBER.

THIS month was called Domitianus in the time of Domitian; but, after his death, by the decree of the Senate, it took the name of October, every one hating the name and memory of so detestable a tyrant. It was called wyn-monat, or wine-month, by the Saxons.

Remarkable Days.

1.-SAINT REMIGIUS.

REMIGIUS is styled the French Apostle. After he had held his bishopric seventy-four years, he died at ninety-six years of age, A.D. 535.

6. SAINT FAITH.

This virgin martyr suffered death under Dacianus, about the year 290, the most cruel torments being inflicted upon her.

*6. 1806.-HENRY KIRKE WHITE DIED.

Unhappy WHITE! while life was in its spring,
And thy young Muse just waved her joyous wing,
The spoiler came; and all thy promise fair
Has sought the grave, to sleep for ever there.
Oh! what a noble heart was here undone,
When Science 'self destroyed her favourite son!
YES! She too much indulged thy fond pursuit,
She sowed the seeds, but Death has reaped the fruit.
'Twas thine own genius gave the final blow,
And helped to plant the wound that laid thee low:
So the struck EAGLE, stretched upon the plain,
No more through rolling clouds to soar again,
Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart,
And winged the shaft that quivered in his heart:
Keen were his pangs, but keener far to feel;
He nursed the pinion which impelled the steel,

While the same plumage that had warmed his nest
Drank the last life-drop of his bleeding breast'.

9. SAINT DENYS.

St. Denys, or Dionysius, the Areopagite, was converted to Christianity by Saint Paul. The French say, that he was the first that preached the Gospel among them, and, for that reason, consider him their tutelar saint.

13.-TRANSLATION OF KING EDWARD THE

CONFESSOR.

He was the youngest son of King Ethelred; but as all his elder brothers were either dead, or had fled away, he succeeded to the crown of England in the year 1042. He collected all the most useful laws made by the Saxon and Danish kings. The additional title of Confessor was probably given him by the pope, for settling what was then called RomeScot, but now better known by the name of Peter's Pence. See T. T. for 1815, p. 281.

*14. 1806.—BATTLE OF JENA.

*15. 1815.-MURAT SHOT.

And thou, too, of the snow-white plume!
Whose realm refused thee even a tomb2;
Better hadst thou still been leading
France o'er hosts of birelings bleeeding,
Than sold thyself to death and shame
For a meanly royal name;
Such as he of Naples wears,
Who thy blood-bought title bears.-
Little didst thou deem when dashing

On thy war-horse through the ranks,
Like a stream which bursts its banks,
While helmets cleft and sabres clashing
Shone and shivered fast around thee-
Of the fate at last which found thee!

See the suppressed poem, entitled English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, by Lord Byron, p. 64.

2 Murat's remains were torn from the grave, and afterwards burnt.

Was that haughty plume laid low
By a slave's dishonest blow?
Once it onward bore the brave,
Like foam upon the highest wave.—
There, where death's brief pang was quickest,
And the battle's wreck lay thickest,
Strewed beneath the advancing banner

Of the Eagle's burning crest-
(There with thunder-clouds to fan her,
Who could then her wing arrest-
Victory beaming from her breast?)
While the broken line enlarging

Fell or fled along the plain;
There be sure was MURAT charging;
There he ne'er shall charge again
!

BYRON.

16. 1586.-SIR PHILIP SIDNEY Died. But if (fie of such a But!) you be born so near the dull-making cataract of Nilus, that you cannot bear the planet-like musick of Poetry; if you have so earth-creeping a mind, that it cannot lift itself up to look to the sky of Poetry, or, rather, by a certain rustical disdain will become such a Mome, as to be a Momus of Poetry: Then, though I will not wish unto you the ass's ears of Midas, nor to be driven by a poet's verses as Bubonax was, to hang himself; nor to be rhymed to death, as is said to be done in Ireland; yet thus much curse I must lend you, in behalf of all Poets, That while you live, you live in love, and never get favour for lacking skill of a sonnet; and when you die, your memory die from the earth for want of an epitaph.-Defense of Poesy.

SIDNEY, than whom no gentler, braver man,
His own delightful genius ever feigned,
Illustrating the vales of Arcady

With courteous courage, and with loyal loves.

SOUTHEY.

17.-SAINT ETHELDREDA.

She was a princess of distinguished piety, daughter of Anna, King of the East-Angles, and Hereswitha his queen, and was born about the year 630,

at Ixning, a small village in Suffolk. In the year 673, she founded the conventual church of Ely, with the adjoining convent. Of this monastery she was constituted abbess, the monks and nuns living in society and regular order: it flourished for nearly two hundred years, but was destroyed, with its inhabitants, by the Danes, in 870.

18. SAINT LUKE THE EVANGELIST.

Luke was born at Antioch, the metropolis of Syria, a place celebrated for the study of the liberal arts. The notion that he was a painter is without foundation, as it is not countenanced by antient writers. Dr. Lardner thinks that he might have been by profession a physician, as the expression beloved physician,' Col. iv, 14, seems to intimate. Luke lived a single life, and died in the eighty-fourth year of his age, about the year of Christ 70; probably a natural death.

6

25.-ACCESSION OF KING GEORGE III.

Upon the death of George II, his present Majesty came to the throne, on the 22d of September 1760.

25.-SAINT CRISPIN.

Two brothers, Crispinus and Crispianus, were born at Rome; whence they travelled to Soissons in France, about the year 303, to propagate the Christian religion. Being desirous, however, of rendering themselves independent, they gained a subsistence by shoe-making. It having been discovered that they privately embraced the Christian faith, and endeavoured to make proselytes of the inhabitants, the governor of the town immediately ordered them to be beheaded, about the year 308, From this time, the shoe-makers chose them for their tutelar saints.-For a curious anecdote relative to this day, see our last volume, p. 291-293.