1 412 THE FARMER'S PLOUGH. - BENEATH THE WAYSIDE TREE. party-colored pallium of the Gesta.* We shall | Through the moist valley clogged with oozing clay, conclude our article with a couple of anecdotes, which, though unconnected with our literature, we think will amuse by their piquancy. NO. VII. AN ARTFUL DODGE. A certain soldier suspected his wife of having transferred her affections from himself to another; but not being able to prove the fact, he requested a cunning clerk to assist him in demonstrating his lady's infidelity. The clerk consented, on condition of being allowed to converse with the fair frail one. After having chatted on a variety of indifferent topics for some time, he took her hand, and pressed his finger on her pulse, at the same time mentioning in a careless tone the name of the person whom she was presumed to love. The lady's blood, at that sweet sound, rushed through her veins like a swollen stream; but when her husband became the theme of their discourse, it resumed its usual tranquil flow. The clerk communicated the result of A lady, during the absence of her lord, received a visit from her gallant. One of her handmaidens understood the language of birds, and a cock crowing at midnight, the faithless spouse inquired the meaning of his chant. "He says," replied the maiden, "that you are grossly injuring your husband."-" Kill that cock instantly," said the lady. Soon after another cock began to crow, and his notes being interpreted to signify that his companion had died for revealing the truth, he shared his fate. Last of all a third cock crew. "And what does he say?" asked the lady. "Hear and see all, but say nothing if you would live in peace."-"Oh, don't kill him!" retorted she. Lectores, scripsimus-plaudite aut tacete! THE FARMER'S PLOUGH. BY DR. O. W. HOLMES. CLEAR the brown path to meet his coulter's gleam! Lo, on he comes behind his smoking team, The patient convoy breaks its destined way; Toil, These are the hands whose patient labor brings Yet, O, our mother, while uncounted charms And thy fond weakness waste our strength away. No! by these hills, whose banners, now displayed, To crown with peace their own untainted soil ; "I had a lover true, But now he's gone far, far away; With toil's bright dew-drops on his sun-burnt brow, And the new things have grown old, and from the The lord of earth, the hero of the plough! First in the field before the reddening sun, Last in the shadows when the day is done, Marks the broad acres where his feet have trod; * N. B. Our samples are literally samples. We have not raked up a few instances of plagiarism, but out of very many deeds of plunder have exposed some of the most barefaced. old things have sprung new, Since last he came this way." "Let the new things grow old, From old things let new spring again! True love is neither new nor old, one ever-for, behold! I love thee now as then!" His frame was no more young, Wrinkled his brow, his hair grown gray; Yet round him not less tenderly her arms the pale one flung; And life for both once more was May. From the Britannia. The Court and Reign of Francis the First. By Miss PARDOE. Two vols. Bentley.* THE spirit of the best French memoir-writers has been caught by Miss Pardoe. admirable tact in constructing biographical hisShe has tory, and in selecting all those personal anecdotes which illustrate at once a character and an age. Her gossip, though always amusing, is usually full of matter, and, even when she is forced to descend to scandal, she can relate a courtly intrigue without a particle of coarseness. Nearly every name which appears on her page is drawn at full length by her skilful pen in characteristic lines. Her books must take their place between romance and history, possessing, as they do, some of the best qualities of both, without the fables of the one or the formality of the other. In this work of "Francis the First," she has remarkably succeeded in presenting us with an authentic picture of the monarch and his court, and in imparting to it all the interest which arises from correctness of drawing, truth of coloring, and art in composition. Her design leads her not only to give an amusing memoir of the king, but to exhibit the counsellors, courtiers, and generals who surrounded them, and to show them much as they were "in their habit as they lived," both in their private and public life. The epoch was a stirring one; the world was agitated by great thoughts; and both ideas and manners were on the eve of that great revolution which separates modern from mediæval history. It is only justice to Miss Pardoe to say that she has omitted no research which could add to the value of her book, and that her talent in the disposition and arrange ment of her materials is equal to her industry in collecting them. The discursive nature of her book is, according to the plan on which it is formed, one of its greatest attractions; but it prevents us from giving anything like a distinct notice of its contents. Full of personal anecdote, and of those biographical sketches which an entertaining and judicious writer, Mr. Craik, has truly shown make up the romance of history, each chapter is a story in itself, and might be made the subject of a distinct critique. But we cannot pass from it without making a few extracts illustrative of its entertaining character. We may remark that the volumes are beautifully produced, and that they contain well-engraved portraits of the principal personages of the times: AMUSEMENTS OF THE COURT OF FRANCIS. In the month of May, Francis, probably somewhat alarmed by the deficit which had already betrayed itself in the national exchequer, removed his court to Amboise, whither Madame d'Angoulême had preceded him for the purpose of celebrating at that castle the marriage of Mademoiselle de Bourbon, the sister of the connètable, with the Duke de Lorraine; and it is upon record that, on this occasion, being desirous to give some variety to the festivities, which were limited in their nature * Reprinted by Lea and Blanchard, Philadelphia. of mourning for the late king did not permit either high between the young nobles on their respective DIANA OF POITIERS PLEADING FOR THE LIFE OF had consequently passed her twenty-third year, but tomed herself to the gloomy etiquette by which she was surrounded; and, knowing nothing of a world passed her time among her maids, her flowers and of which she was one day to become the idol, she her birds, without one repining thought. all the charms which enslave. Nature had endowed Diana possessed all the graces that attract, and her alike with beauty and with intellect; and, as she moved through the sombre saloons of Anet like a spirit of light, the gloomy seneschal blessed the day upon which he had secured such a vision of loveliness to gladden his monotonous existence. * * * * * scaffold was already erected upon which her father ity, of the usher on duty; come?" sire; and she has come post from Anet.” Francis; " she has chosen an unhappy moment to 1 J guess the purport of her visit. Admit her in-her bust, were each in their turn the theme of the stantly." "The lady is anxious to be permitted to see your majesty alone," said the usher respectfully. The monarch glanced rapidly about him with a slight inclination of the head, and in a moment the apartment was cleared; while, as the retreating steps of the courtiers were heard in the gallery, a lateral door fell back, and, closely veiled, and enveloped in a heavy mantle, Diana rushed into the saloon and threw herself at the feet of the king, screaming breathlessly, " Mercy! mercy!" " I pity you, madame, from my very heart," said Francis, as he lifted her from the ground, and placed her upon a seat. "Do more, sire," exclaimed Diana, rising and standing erect, her beautiful figure relieved by the sombre drapery which she had flung aside in the effort. "You are a great and powerful sovereign. Do more. Forget that Jane de Poitiers was the friend of Charles de Bourbon, and remember only that he was the zealous and loyal subject of Francis I. The most noble, the most holy of all royal prerogatives, is mercy." "Madame" "Ah, you relent! My father is saved!" exclaimed the grande seneschale; "I knew it I felt it-you could not see those venerable gray hairs soiled by the hands of the executioner." What more passed during this memorable interview is not even matter of history. The writers of the time put different interpretations upon the court poets. That the extraordinary and almost fabulous duration of her beauty was in a great degree due to the precautions which she adopted. there can be little doubt, for she spared no effort to secure it; she was jealously careful of her health, and in the most severe weather bathed in cold water; she suffered no cosmetic to approach her. denouncing every compound of the kind as worthy only of those to whom nature had been so niggardly as to compel them to complete her imperfect work; she rose every morning at six o'clock, and had no sooner left her chamber than she sprang into the saddle; and after having galloped a league or two, returned to her bed, where she remained until midday engaged in reading. The system appears a singular one, but in her case it undoubtedly proved successful, as, after having enslaved the Duke d'Orleans in her thirty-first year, she still reigned in absolute sovereignty over the heart of the King of France when she had nearly reached the age of sixty! It is certain, however, that the magnificent Diana owed no small portion of this extraordinary and unprecedented constancy to the charms of her mind and the brilliancy of her intellect. Ar a recent meeting of the Ethnological Society an interesting paper was read from E. G. Squier, our charge des affaires at Guatemala. Mr. Squier has already commenced his antiquarian researches, and forwarded several curious relics to Washington. He gives an account of the recent discovery clemency of the king. Suffice it that the Count de of an ancient city, buried beneath the forest, about St. Vallier was reprieved upon the very scaffold; a hundred and fifty miles from Leon, which far and that Madame de Brézé remained at court, surpasses the architectural wonders of Palenque. where she became the inspiring spirit of the muse A curious letter was also read, addressed to the of Clemont Marot, who has succeeded, by the President of the United States, from the last of the various poems which he wrote in her honor, and Peruvian incas. Samuel G. Arnold, of Providence, of which the sense is far from equivocal, in cre- who has recently returned from South America, ating a suspicion that it was not long ere she met with the venerable inca, who is ninety years became reconciled not only to the manners but also of age. He found him sitting in the shadow of the to the vices of the licentious court, in which there- Temple of the Sun, reading Tasso. -N. Y. Mirror. after she made herself so unfortunately conspicuous. Some historians acquit her of having paid by the forfeiture of her innocence for the life of her father, from the fact that in the patent by which his sentence was remitted, no mention is made of her personal intercession, and that his pardon was attributed to that of the grand seneschal himself, and others of his relatives and friends; but it appears scarcely probable that Francis would, under any circumstances, have been guilty of the indelicacy of involving her name in public disgrace, aware, as he necessarily must have been, of the suspicion which was attached to every young and beautiful woman to whom he accorded any marked favor or protection. DIANA'S CARE OF HER CHARMS. At this period, 1535, the widow of Louis de Brézé had already attained her thirty-first year, while the Prince Henry was only in his seventeenth; and at the first glance gla it would appear as though so formidable a disparity of age must have rendered any attempt on her part, to engage the affections of so mere a youth, alike abortive and ridiculous; but so perfectly had she preserved even the youthful bloom which had added so much to her attractions on her first appearance at court, that she appeared ten years younger than she actually was. Her features were regular and classical; her complexion faultless; her hair of a rich purple black, which took a golden tint in the sunshine; while her teeth, her ankles, her hands and arms, and From the N. Y. Tribune. IT CANNOT LAST. Ir cannot last-this pulseless life, This nightmare sleep that yields no rest; The speeding time renews the strife To tear with terror Europe's breast. Repose is not for dungeon chains; Peace cannot dwell 'mid armies vast; Though frightened men in frenzy turn To stand at midnight's zenith fast, Returning life, returning light, RED FLAG |