with cocoa-nuts; and how king Domy would have built him a mud hut and made him a peer of the realm, if he would have stopped with him and taught him to make trowsers. He has a sister at a "school for young ladies," who blushes with a mixture of pleasure and shame at his appearance; and whose confusion he completes, by slipping fourpence into her hand, and saying out loud that he has "no more copper" about him. His mother and elder sisters at home doat on all he says and does, telling him however that he is a great sea-fellow, and was always wild ever since he was a hop-o'-my-thumb no higher than the window-locker. He tells his mother she would be a duchess in Paranaboo; at which the good old portly dame laughs and looks proud. When his sisters complain of his romping, he says that they are only sorry it is not the baker. He frightens them with a mask made after the New Zealand fashion, and is forgiven for his learning. Their mantle-piece is filled by him with shells and shark's teeth; and when he goes to sea again, there is no end of tears, and Godbless you, and home-made gingerbread. His officer on shore does much of all this, only, generally speaking, in a higher taste. The moment he lands he buys quantities of jewellery and other valuables, for all the females of his acquaintance; and is taken in for every article. He sends in a cart load of fresh meat to the ship, though he is going to town next day; and calling in at a chandler's for some candles, is persuaded to buy a dozen of green wax, with which he lights up the ship at evening; regretting that the fine moonlight hinders the effect of the colour. A man, with a bundle beneath his arm, accosts him in an undertone; and, with a look in which respect for his knowledge is mixed with an avowed zeal for his own interest, asks if his honour will just step under the gangway here, and inspect some real India shawls. The gallant lieutenant says to himself, "this fellow knows what's what by his face;" and so he proves it by being taken in on the spot. When he brings the shawls home, he says to his sister with an air of triumph," there Poll, there's something for you; only cost me twelve, and is worth twenty, if it's worth a dollar." She turns pale-" Twenty what, my dear George' Why, you haven't given twelve dollars for it, I hope?" "Not I, by the Lord."-" That's lucky; because you see, my dear George that all together is not worth more than fourteen or fifteen shillings." "Fourteen or fifteen what! Why, it's real India, en't it? Why the fellow told me so; or I'm sure I'd as soon"-(here he tries to hide his blushes with a bluster) "I'd as soon have given him twelve douses on the chaps as twelve guineas." "Twelve GUINEAS," exclaims the sister; and then drawling forth "Why-my-DEARGeorge," is proceeding to show him what the articles would have cost him at Condell's, when he interrupts her by requesting her to go and choose for herself a teatable service. He then makes his escape to some messmates at a coffee-house, and drowns his recollection of the shawls in the best wine, and a discussion on the comparative merits of the English and West Indian beauties and tables. At the theatre afterwards, where he has never been before, he takes a lady at the back of one of the boxes for a woman of quality: and when after returning his long respectful gaze with a smile, she turns aside and puts her handkerchief to her mouth, he thinks it is in derision, till his friend undeceives him. He is introduced to the lady; and ever afterwards, at first sight of a woman of quality (without any disparagement either to those charming personages), expects her to give him a smile. He thinks the other ladies much better creatures than they are taken for; and for their parts, they tell him, that if all men were like himself, they would trust the sex again-which, for aught we know, is the truth. He has, indeed, what he thinks a very liberal opinion of ladies in general; judging them all, in a manner, with the eye of a seaman's experience. Yet he will believe nevertheless in the "true-love" of any given damsel whom he seeks in the way of marriage, let him roam as much, or remain as long at a distance as he pleases. It is not that he wants feeling; but that he has read of it, time out of mind, in songs; and he looks upon constancy as a sort of exploit, answering to those which he performs at sea. He is nice in his watches and linen. He makes you presents of cornelians, antique seals, cocoa-nuts set in silver, and other valuables. When he shakes hands with you, it is like being caught in a windlass. He would not swagger about the streets in his uniform, for the world. He is generally modest in company, though liable to be irritated by what he Alps, continue perpetually to increase in bulk. At certain times, in the ice mountains of Switzerland, there occur fissures, which show the immense thickness of the frozen matter; some of these cracks have measured three or four hundred ells deep. The great islands of ice, in the northern seas bordering upon Hudson's Bay, have been observed to be immersed one hundred fathoms beneath the surface of the sea, and to have risen a fifth or sixth part above the surface, measuring, at the same time, about a mile and a half in diameter. It has been shown by Dr. Lyster, that the marine ice contains some salt, and less air, than common ice, and that it therefore is more difficult of solution. From these premises, he endeavours to account for the perpetual aug. mentation of those floating islands. By a celebrated experiment of Mr. Boyle, it has been demonstrated that ice evaporates very fast, in severe frosty weather, when the wind blows upon it; and as ice, in a thawing state, is known to contain six times more cold than water, at the same degree of sensible coldness, it is easy to conceive that winds sweeping over islands and continents of ice, perhaps much below northing on Farenheit's scale, and rushing thence into our latitudes, must bring most intense degrees of cold along with them. If to this be added the quantity of cold produced by the evaporation of the water, as well as by the solution of ice, it can scarcely be doubted but that the arctic seas are the principal source of the cold of our winters, and that it is brought hither by the regions of the air blowing from the north, and which take an apparently easterly direction, by their coming to a part of the surface of the earth, which moves faster than the latitude from which they originate. Hence, the increase of the ice in the polar regions, by increasing the cold of our climate, adds, at the same time, to the bulk of the glaciers of Italy and Switzerland. Reasonings of this kind are supported by the greatest names, and countenanced by the authentic reports of the best informed travellers. Mr. Bradley attributes the cold winds and wet weather, which sometimes happen in May and June, to the solution of ice islands accidentally detached and floating from the north. Mr. Barham, about the year 1718, in his voyage from Jamaica to England, in the beginning of June, met with some of those islands, which were involved in such a fog that the ship was in danger of striking against them. One of them measured sixty miles in length. On the 22d of December, 1789, there was an instance of ice islands having been wafted from the southern polar regions. It was on these islands that the Guardian struck, at the commencement of her passage from the Cape of Good Hope towards Botany Bay. These islands were wrapt in darkness, about one hundred and fifty fathoms long, and above fifty fathoms above the surface of the waves. In the process of solution, a fragment from the summit of one of them broke off, and plunging into the sea, caused a tremendous commotion in the water, and dense smoke all around it. These facts were strongly urged upon public attention in the autumn of 1817,* as grounds of not only curious and interesting, but likewise of highly important speculation. A supposed change in the temper, and the very character of our seasons, was deemed to have fallen within the observation of even young men, or at least middle-aged men; and upon this supposition, it was not deemed extravagant to anticipate the combined force of the naval world employed in navigating the immense masses of ice into the more southern oceans; while to render the notion more agreeable, and to enliven the minds of such as might think such matters of speculation dull or uninteresting, the project was laid before them in a versified garb, characterising the arctic regions. There in her azure coif, and starry stole, There, Nymphs! alight, array your dazzling powers, On ice-built isles expand a thousand sails, Hinge the strong helm, and catch the frozen gales; Sce M. Chronicle, 4 Oct, 1817. • Pass where to Ceuta Calpe's thunder roars, MR. REDDOCK's paper on this subject, at page 13, has elicited the following letter from a literary gentleman, concerning a dramatic representation in England similar to that which Mr. Reddock instances at Falkirk, and other parts of North Britain. Such communications are particularly acceptable; because they show to what extent usages prevail, and wherein they differ in different parts of the country. It will be gratifying to every one who peruses this work, and highly so to the editor, if he is obliged by letters from readers acquainted with customs in their own vicinity, similar to those that they are informed of in other counties, and particularly if they will take the trouble to describe them in every particular. By this means, the Every-Day Book will become what it is designed to be made, a storehouse of past and present manners and customs. Any customs of any place or season that have not already appeared in the work, are earnestly solicited from those who have the means of furnishing the information. The only condition stipulated for, as absolutely indispensable to the insertion of a letter respecting facts of this nature, is, that the name and address of the writer be communicated to the editor, who will subjoin such signature as the writer may choose his letter should bear to the eye of the public. The various valuable articles of Darwin. this kind which have hitherto appeared in the work, however signed by initials or otherwise, have been so authenticated to the editor's private satisfaction, and he is thus enabled to vouch for the genuineness of such contributions. To the Editor of the Every-Day Book. Sir, In your last number appeared a very amusing article touching some usages and customs in Scotland, and communicated from Falkirk. In the description of the boys' play, ingeniously suggested as typical of the Roman invasion under Agricola, we, however, read but a varied edition of what is enacted in other parts besides Scotland, and more particularly in the western counties, by those troops of old Father Christmas boys, which are indeed brief chronicles of the times. I mean, those paper-decorated, brickdust-daubed urchins, 'yclept Mummers. To be sure they do not begin, "Here comes in the king of Macedon ;"; but we have instead, "Here comes old Father Christmas, Christmas or Christmas not, I hope old Father Christmas never will be forgot." And then for the Scottish leader Galgacus, we find, "Here comes in St. George, St. George These "western kernes" have it, you see, |