able, and anticipating still greater pleasures to come. But about noon a considerable change took place in the state of affairs, and when a violent and continued rain bad driven me to take refuge with my family inside the coach, an opportunity was afforded for discovering how much of my late exhilaration and contentment was dependant upon outward circumstances. Alas! a man whirled quickly through the open air in the sunshine is a very different being from him who is cooped up with two women and five children in a narrow space till he is heated almost to fusion, and cramped nearly to dislocation. I never before was fully aware of the thousand ills which flesh is heir to, or of the various shapes they can assume. A suspended bonnet flapped continually in my face, and two or three parasols and umbrellas ran their united points into my side, one of my children fell to sleep on my knee, another smeared me all over with bread and butter, and the nurse seemed to take every opportunity of treading on my .corns. One moment I was ordered to put the window up because it rained in, and the next to put it down because Emma was sick; the baby never ceased whining, and the tiresome nurse sang to it twice as loud as there was any occasion for; my eldest boy was incessantly jumping up to watch for a mile-stone, and my youngest urging me to sing "Rule Britannia." My patience, meanwhile, was rapidly exhausting, and was only preserved in a wavering existence by means of occasinal glances at the placid countenance of my wife, who, like many others of her sex, possesses that happy power of resisting the petty annoyances of life which is so seldom found in company with masculine dignity and courage. Tired and hot as she was, no fretful word or look escaped her; she could still smile at the inconvenient mirth, and ill-timed activity of the children; still point enconfagingly at the breaking cloud, and talk cheeringly of to-morrow's pleasures; while I sat the very image of despair and gloom, and had just persuaded myself that it would rain incessantly for six weeks, when the sun shone again, and I hastened outside to uncrook my limbs and restore my temper. The fresh air speedily improved my spirits, and a good dinner at Canterbury had its usual effect upon mind as well as body. At length the noblest and most exhilarating sight under heaven, the broad bosom of the ocean sparkling under a cloudless sun, met our longing, watching eyes; and after a dislocating jolt through rough and narrow streets, our whole party was safely deposited at a comfortable-looking house, where the VOL. VI

K

cook's cousin was ready to receive us, and a host of tradesmen to ask our custom. And now another domestic scene occurred, scarcely less formidable to man's unwonted eyes and ears, than the miseries which I had endured in the morning on a more contined theatre. Of all the perplexing medleys of bustle and noise which I ever witnessed, the arrival of a large family at a watering-place is certainly the most Babel-like and over-whelming. From above came the thundering noise of the trunks in their progress to their destination, accompanied by an incessant slamming of doors, opening and shutting of drawers, and that bouncing, stamping sort of walk, those unnecessary questions, useless complaints, and perplexed directions, by which servants delight to make "con fusion worse confounded." From below arose the clattering of tea-things and saucepans, the repetition of inventories, the importunities of tradesmen the cook's groans over the inconveniences of the range, and the footman's murmurs at those of the pantry. Meanwhile, the children did their best to add to the tumult; the baby whined, Emma clamoured for her tea, George took a fancy to play on his trumpet, and the two elder boys first sent one of the maids into hysterics by leaning too far out of a window, and then gave another a race by slipping out of the house and making the best of their way to the beach. Upon this hint I resolved to speak, and repairing to the destined nursery, where my wife was quietly superintending the arrangement of the baby's crib: I said, in rather a conscious tone, "My dear, it appears to me I cannot be of the least use, and I think the best thing I could do would be to take the boys out for half an hour; tea cannot be ready yet, for there is no knife in the house to cut the bread with, and Martha has just broken the only tea-pot." My wife looked up from the trunk over which she was leaning. and gave her consent to my proposal with a smile which seemed to say, "How glad you are of an excuse for getting out of this bustle,” and down stairs I hurried as fast as possible, without either allowing myself to criticise my own motives, or to hear one of the maids say to another, "Perhaps master car tell us." Before they had settled the "perhaps," I was on my road to the shore, my boys shouting from wonder, surprise, and delight, and myself almost wishing that some such ebullition were permitted to my own strong and excited feelings. When we returned home the chaos and the whirlwind had subsided into order and repose; the baby and Emma were in bed and asleep; the servants had begun to move less rapidly and speak

less loudly; the tea was made, shrimps and bread and butter ready for us; and my wife looking calm, tired, and happy, invited me to my first holiday meal. Oh! the delights of that meal, all present comforts enhanced by the refreshing consciousness that they were the first-fruits of a coming season of rest and tranquillity! What man of wealth and leisure can duly estimate the keennes of that enjoyment which is sharpened by previous labour and confinement? Who but the man of business can understand the luxury of having nothing to do? At the sea we are privileged to be idle; thither neither the toils of business nor of dissipation should pursue us; there the philosopher should trifle, the statesman observe no prognostics but those of the weather, and the gravest student read nothing but novels. Preserve me from the man who is so laboriously and unremittingly wise as to think it childish to spend hours in throwing pebbles into the sea, or waste of time to sit on the beach counting the waves. If a trip to the sea does not usually produce as salubrious an effect upon our moral as upon our corporeal frame, it is, perhaps, that we do not pursue the proper regimen-we are too busy or too gay, we cherish silly acquaintances, invent silly amusements-we dress, and dance, and raffle-nurse-up a public breakfast into its wearying perfection, or welcome with open arms a conjuror or infant Roscius-dreading, apparently, lest Fashion and Folly should he obliged to leave us a breathing-time for reflection, and "leisure to be good."

JANET SMITH'S "CHAMPIT POTATOES."+

IT was in the character of a school-boy that I became acquainted with old Janet 'Smith, who lived in a cottage overshadowed by an ash-tree, and by her wheel earned a subsistence for herself and a somewhat sickly granddaughter. Janet had a particular way, still the practice in Dumfrieshire, of dressing or preparing her meal of potatoes. They were scraped, well dried, salted, beetled, buttered, milked, and ultimately rumbled into the most beautiful and palatable consistency. In short, they became that first, and, beyond the limits of the south country, least known of all delicacies," champit potatoes." As I returned often hungry and

weary from school, Janet's pot presented itself to me, banging in the reek, and at a considerable elevation from the fire, as the most tempting of all objects. In fact, Janet, knowing that my hour of return from school was full two hours later than hers of repast, took this method of reserving for me a full heaped spoonful of the residue of her and her Jessie's meal. Never while I live, and live by food, shall I forget the exquisite feelings of eager delight with which that single overloaded spoonful of beat or champit potatoes were devoured. There are pleasures of sentiment and imagination of which I have occasionally partaken, and others connected with what is called the heart and affections; all these are beautiful and engrossing in their way and in their season, but to a hungry schoolboy, who has devoured his dinner “piece" ere ten o'clock a. m., and is returning to his home at a quarter before five, the presentiment, the sight, and, above all, the taste and reflection connected with the swallowing of a spoonful-and such a spoonful!-of Janet Smith's potatoes, is, to say nothing flighty or extravagant, not less seasonable than exquisite. As my tongue walked slowly and cautiously round and round the lower and upper boundaries of the delicious load, as if loath rapidly to diminish that bulk, which the craving stomach would have wished to have been increased, had it been tenfold, my whole soul was rapt in Elysium; it tumbled about, and rioted in an excess of delight, a kind of feather-bed of downy softness. Drinking is good enough in its season, particularly when one is thirsty; but the pleasures attendant on the satisfying of the appetite" for me!-this is assuredly the great-the master gratification.

It

But Janet did not only deal in potatoes, she had likewise a cheese, and on pressing occasions, a bottle of beer besides; the one stood in a kind of corner press or cupboard, whilst the other occupied a still less dignified position beneath old Janet's bed. To say the truth of Janet's cheese, it was not much beholden to the maker. might have been advantageously cut into bullets or marbles, such was its hardness and solidity-but then, in those days, my teeth were good-and, with a keen stomach, and willing mind, much may be effected even on a three times skimmed sky-blue!" The beer, for which I have often adventured into the "terra incognita" already mentioned, even at the price of a prostrate person and a dusty jacket -was excellent-brisk, frothy, and nippy -my breath still goes when I think of it.

Do you not hear a noise-a hoarse, turbulent, rushing, roaring, noise? This, too, is my voice!

Have you not admired the gliding motion of some gentle fair with grace in her steps and heaven in her eye?" This is the way I often come to salute you! And when I go, "'tis murmuring, loath to part."

Have you not marked a hurried, uplifted motion, like rampant horses, with snowy manes? This, too, is the manner of my approach! In fact, I am made up of contradictions. Were I to enumerate my deeds, you would not only accuse me of vanity, but of hypocrisy and falsehood!

I have been the means of conquering nations, and my dominion is greater than that of an Alexander or a Cæsar!

tens of thousands!

In the main, I am generous and noble; spurning oppression, and much averse to concealment. I make a powerful resistance to the slightest coercion. Xerxes

and his ten thousand could not imprison me, although he threw his chains upon me! Canute the Great, though he could conquer the Anglo-Saxons, could not resist my advances upon his territory, although I came unattended and unarmed.

My complexion is as varied as the chamelion's; and one calls me black, another white, and a third red; yet I do affirm, I am neither black, white, nor red! Yesterday I was blue, to-day I am green! It is said, that the surface of the chamelion has the peculiar property of reflecting surrounding colours, which accounts for its various hues at different periods. This is precisely my own case. Some people call me superficial-and with some show of rea son; I have so much show on my surface, that few look farther

He who would search for pearls must dive below.

and those who sound me, will find how profound I am. I despise low cuuning, but I am deep-very deep-" full fathom five;" and, without being witty, I have a great deal of Attic salt in my composition. Inconstant as the winds, yet I am ever punctual in my appointments; "true as the needle to the Pole." Being thus strict. in my assignations, I never wait for any one; indeed my regularity in this respect has become proverbial, and if you reflect on the nature of my attributes, you will, I prefer Great Britain, though myself a. discover perpetual motion. Ofall countries, cosmopolite. obliged and her pre-eminent power. What amongst nations is due to me. would commerce be without me? A mere. traffic of pillars. My wealth is so great, and I have so many untouched hoards, that nothing in the balance. My pearls are of the Bank of England would weigh as the choicest kind; richer far than any "jewel in an Ethiop's ear;" indeed, my as incalculable as the possessions are sands upon the shore!

We love those we have

then, in my happy, lucid moments, with a Moonlight is my favourite hour; and silvery garment thrown across me by the Queen of Night, I put " my pearls upon my feet," and "dance upon the sands."

There is a prejudice amongst the vulgar, that the moon has great influence on various diseases of the human frame.

Howsoever it may be with others, every change of the moon has a visible effect upon me-although I am no lunatic! I am somewhat of a physician; and so impartial in my practice, that the noble Lord, in all the "boast of heraldry and pomp of power," will receive from me the

same treatment as the humblest individual in the realm.

I need scarcely add, that I am a latitu dinarian in principle, and fond of levelling all distinctions; notwithstanding which, my success is undoubted.

There never was a poet who did not celebrate my praise, unless it were some Bohemian, who never saw me; and I have furnished more simile, than earth, or air, or sky!

Treacherous and deceitful; yet open and rough in my manners;-calm, yet contentious. Who or what am I? Beware how you ponder!

Aristotle, unable to find out the cause of my actions drowned himself in despair.The New Years Gift for 1831.

Half in day, and half in night,
Chiefly prized when least in sight,
Little knowing, ever prying,
Always living, always dying,
Craving peace, yet loving strife.

Sum them up!-the whole is life.-The Cameo.

less loudly; the tea was made, slirimps and bread and butter ready for us; and my wife looking calm, tired, and happy, invited me to my first holiday meal. Oh! the delights of that meal, all present comforts enhanced by the refreshing consciousness that they were the first-fruits of a coming season of rest and tranquillity! What man of wealth and leisure can duly estimate the keennes of that enjoyment which is sharpened by previous labour and confinement? Who but the man of business can understand the luxury of having nothing to do? At the sea we are privileged to be idle; thither neither the toils of business nor of dissipation should pursue us; there the philosopher should trifle, the statesman observe no prognostics but those of the weather, and the gravest student read nothing but novels. Preserve me from the man who is so laboriously and unremittingly wise as to think it childish to spend hours in throwing pebbles into the sea, or waste of time to sit on the beach counting the waves. If a trip to the sea does not usually produce as salubrious an effect upon our moral as upon our corporeal frame, it is, perhaps, that we do not pursue the proper regimen-we are too busy or too gay, we cherish silly acquaintances, invent silly amusements-we dress, and dance, and raffle-nurse-up a public breakfast into its wearying perfection, or welcome with open arms a conjuror or infant Roscius-dreading, apparently, lest Fashion and Folly should be obliged to leave us a breathing-time for reflection, and "leisure to be good."

JANET SMITH'S "CHAMPIT POTATOES."+

Ir was in the character of a school-boy that I became acquainted with old Janet 'Smith, who lived in a cottage overshadowed by an ash-tree, and by her wheel earned a subsistence for herself and a somewhat sickly granddaughter. Janet had a particular way, still the practice in Dumfrieshire, of dressing or preparing her meal of potatoes. They were scraped, well dried, salted, beetled, buttered, milked, and ultimately rumbled into the most beautiful and palatable consistency. In short, they became that first, and, beyond the limits of the south country, least known of all delicacies," champit potatoes." As I returned often hungry and

+ From the Edinburgh Literary Journal. No. CIV.

weary from school, Janet's pot presented itself to me, banging in the reek, and at a considerable elevation from the fire, as the most tempting of all objects. In fact, Janet, knowing that my hour of return from school was full two hours later than hers of repast, took this method of reserving for me a full heaped spoonful of the residue of her and her Jessie's meal. Never while I live, and live by food, shall I forget the exquisite feelings of eager delight with which that single overloaded spoonful of beat or champit potatoes were devoured. There are pleasures of sentiment and imagination of which I have occasionally partaken, and others connected with what is called the heart and affections; all these are beautiful and engrossing in their way and in their season, but to a hungry schoolboy, who has devoured his dinner “piece" ere ten o'clock a. m., and is returning to his home at a quarter before five, the presentiment, the sight, and, above all, the taste and reflection connected with the swallowing of a spoonful-and such a spoonful!-of Janet Smith's potatoes, is, to say nothing flighty or extravagant, not less seasonable than exquisite. As my tongue walked slowly and cautiously round and round the lower and upper boundaries of the delicions load, as if loath rapidly to diminish that bulk, which the craving stomach would have wished to have been increased, had it been tenfold, my whole soul was rapt in Elysium; it tumbled about, and rioted in an excess of delight, a kind of feather-bed of downy softness. Drinking is good enough in its season, particularly when one is thirsty; but the pleasures attendant on the satisfying of the appetite" for me!-this is assuredly the great-the master gratification.

But Janet did not only deal in potatoes, she had likewise a cheese, and on pressing occasions, a bottle of beer besides; the one stood in a kind of corner press or cupboard, whilst the other occupied a still less dignified position beneath old Janet's bed. To say the truth of Janet's cheese, it was

It

not much beholden to the maker. might have been advantageously cut into bullets or marbles, such was its hardness

and solidity-but then, in those days, my teeth were good-and, with a keen stomach, and willing mind, much may be effected even on a three times skimmed sky-blue!" The beer, for which I have often adventured into the "terra incognita" already mentioned, even at the price of a prostrate person and a dusty jacket -was excellent-brisk, frothy, and nippy -my breath still goes when I think of it.

Do you not hear a noise-a hoarse, turbulent, rushing, roaring, noise? This, too, is my voice!

Have you not admired the gliding mo tion of some gentle fair with " grace in her steps and heaven in her eye?" This is the way I often come to salute you! And when I go, "'tis murmuring, loath to part."

Have you not marked a hurried, uplifted motion, like rampant horses, with snowy manes? This, too, is the manner of my approach! In fact, I am made up of contradictions.

Were I to enumerate my deeds, you would not only accuse me of vanity, but of hypocrisy and falsehood!

I have been the means of conquering nations, and my dominion is greater than that of an Alexander or a Cæsar!

Like a mighty conqueror, I have overwhelmed whole territories, and left no trace behind! I sometimes bring peace to the wretched, and wretchedness to the peaceful! I often bring smiles to the brow of an anxious friend, and "waft a sigh from Indus to the Pole." I have been the ruin of thousands, and made the fortune of

tens of thousands!

In the main, I am generous and noble; spurning oppression, and much averse to concealment. I make a powerful resistance to the slightest coercion. Xerxes and his ten thousand could not imprison me, although he threw his chains upon me! Canute the Great, though he could conquer the Anglo-Saxons, could not resist my advances upon his territory, although I came unattended and unarmed.

My complexion is as varied as the chamelion's; and one calls me black, another white, and a third red; yet I do affirm, I am neither black, white, nor red! Yesterday I was blue, to-day I am green! It is said, that the surface of the chamelion has the peculiar property of reflecting surrounding colours, which accounts for its various hues at different periods. This is precisely my own case. Some people call me superficial-and with some show of rea son; I have so much show on my surface, that few look farther

He who would search for pearls must dive below.

and those who sound me, will find how profound I am. I despise low cuuning, but I am deep-very deep-" full fathom five ;" and, without being witty, I have a great deal of Attic salt in my composition. Inconstant as the winds, yet I am ever 66 true as. punctual in my appointments; in my assignations, I never wait for any the needle to the Pole." Being thus strict one; indeed my regularity in this respect has become proverbial, and if you reflect on the nature of my attributes, you will, I prefer Great Britain, though myself a. discover perpetual motion. Of all countries, cosmopolite.

We love those we have obliged and her pre-eminent power. What amongst nations is due to me. would commerce be without me? A mere. traffic of pillars. My wealth is so great, and I have so many untouched hoards, that the Bank of England would weigh as the choicest kind; richer far than any nothing in the balance. My pearls are of jewel in an Ethiop's ear;" indeed, my possessions are as incalculable as the sands upon the shore!

Moonlight is my favourite hour; and then, in my happy, lucid moments, with a silvery garment thrown across me by the Queen of Night, I put "my pearls upon my feet," and "dance upon the sands."

There is a prejudice amongst the vulgar, that the moon has great influence on various diseases of the human frame. Howsoever it may be with others, every change of the moon has a visible effect upon me-although I am no lunatic! I am somewhat of a physician; and so impartial in my practice, that the noble Lord, in all the "boast of heraldry and pomp of power," will receive from me the same treatment as the humblest individual in the realm.

I need scarcely add, that I am a latitu→

dinarian in principle, and fond of levelling all distinctions; notwithstanding which, my success is undoubted.

There never was a poet who did not celebrate my praise, unless it were some Bohemian, who never saw me; and I have furnished more simile, than earth, or air, or sky!

- Treacherous and deceitful; yet open and rough in my manners;-calm, yet contentious. Who or what am I? Beware how you ponder!

Aristotle, unable to find out the cause of my actions drowned himself in despair.— The New Years Gift for 1831.

Half in day, and half in night,
Chiefly prized when least in sight,
Little knowing, ever prying,
Always living, always dying,
Craving peace, yet loving strife.

Sum them up!-the whole is life.-The Cameo.