Should this trifling sketch fall into the hands of any of my respected fellows, who were with me during my labours at the above-named school, I am confident they will contemplate this great man's memory with that regard which his rich pleasantries, and our personal knowledge of him, are calculated to inspire. He was an honourable man; and it was his honourable conduct which alone conducted him to an honourable distinction in the even ing of his days. Unlike the many of his profession, whose talents blaze forth for a while, and then depart like a sunbeam, he retired into the quiet of domestic life-sought peace and solace—and found them. In a word, "Gentleman Smith" was a respecter of virtue :-and he developed its precepts to the world in the incidents of his own life. The rood was a carved or sculptured groupe consisting of a crucifix, or image of Christ on the cross, with, commonly, the virgin Mary on one side, and John on the other; though for these were sometimes substituted the four evangelists, and frequently rows of saints were added on each side.* The rood was always placed in a gallery across the nave, at the entrance of the chancel or choir of the church, and this gallery was called the rood-loft, signifying the rood-gallery; the old meaning of the word loft being a high, or the highest, floor, or a room higher than another room. In the rood-loft the musicians were stationed, near the rood, to play during mass. The holy roods or crosses being taken down at the time of the reformation, the rood-loft or gallery became the organloft or singing gallery, as we see it in our churches at present: the ancient roodloft was usually supported by a crossbeam, richly carved with foliage, sometimes superbly gilt, with a screen of open tabernacle-work beneath.† When the roods, and other images in churches were taken down throughout England, texts of scripture were written on the walls of the churches instead. The first rood taken down in London was the rood belonging to St. Paul's cathedral, and then all the other roods were removed from the churches of the metropolis. The holy rood, at Boxley, in Kent, was called the Rood of Grace; its image, on the cross, miraculously moved its eyes, lips, and head, upon the approach of its marvelling votaries. The Boxley Rood was brought to London, and Hilsey, bishop of Rochester, within whose diocese it had performed wonders under the papacy, took it to pieces at St. Paul's cross, and showed the people the springs and wheels by which, at the will of the priests, it had been secretly put in motion.§ The open detection and destruction of this gross imposture, reconciled many, who had been deceived, to the reformation. The festival of Holy Cross, or as it is more elaborately termed by the Catholics, the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, is in commemoration of the alleged miraculous * Fosbroke's British Monachism. + Ibid. Stow's Chron. Hume. appearance of the cross to Constantine in the sky at mid-day. It was instituted by the Romish church on occasion of the recovery of a large piece of the pretended real cross which Cosroes, king of Persia, took from Jerusalem when he plundered it. The emperor Heraclius defeated him in battle, retook the relic, and carried it back in triumph to Jerusalem. According to Rigordus, a historian of the thirteenth century, the capture of this wood by Cosroes, though it was recaptured by Heraclius, was a loss to the human race they never recovered. We are taught by him to believe that the mouths of our ancestors" used to be supplied with thirty, or in some instances, no doubt according to their faith, with thirty-two teeth, but that since the eross was stolen by the infidels, no mortal has been allowed more than twenty three!"* "This day, they say, is called Holy-rood day, And all the youth are now a nutting gone." It appears, from a curious manuscript The weather on an average is, at least, The morning hath not lost her virgin blush, By a full quire of feathered choristers, Plaited with vallies, and imbost with hills, Enchast with silver streams, and fringed with woods, Chamberlayne. Sts. Ninian, or Ninyas, St. Editha, A. d. 984. JEMMY GORDON. This eccentric individual, who is recorded on the 23d of May, died in the workhouse of St. Leonard's, at Cambridge, on the 16th of September, 1825. He had for many years been in the receipt of an annuity of Give and twenty pounds be Slater's Schol. Eton, A. D. 1560. M. G. Donat. + Gentleman's Magazine. A SONG-SINGS ITSELF. TUNE.---Galloping Dreary Dun. Fine singers we have, hoth woman and man, Gallop O! fly away! jump! queathed to him by Mr. Gordon, a de- He is a saint in the Romish calendar; his name "Lambert" stands unsainted in the church of England calendar and almanacs sometimes he is called Landebert. He was bishop of Maestricht from which see he was expelled in 673, and retired to the monastery of Stavelo, where he continued seven years, submitting to the rules of the novices. He was afterwards restored to his bishopric, and discharged its functions with zeal and success. But during the disorders which prevailed in the government of France, he was mur dered on the 17th of September, 703, and in 1240, his festival was ordained to be kept on this day.* THEATRICALS. This is about the season when the summer theatres close, and the winter thea tres open. Most of the productions written, and represented of late years, seem symptomatic of decay in dramatic and histrionic talent. The false taste of some of the vocal performers, is laughed at in a light piece called "Der Freischütz Travestie by Septimus Globus, Esq." One of its versifications is in a 66 SCENEUNSEEN." According to the author, *Audley's Comp. to the Almanac. They mock Catalani, Galloping all away! drag and tail,-die They come on the stage, so fine and so gay, They canter one off, all into the dark, They let off a trill, and it asks the way, They mock Catalani, &c. I sing by myself, but pray take a peep, Gallop O! fly away! jump! You'll soon find singers, to sing you to sleep, They mock Catalani, &c. other "seasonable" extract, for we are Etherial Race-inhabitants of air,' con- SONG AND CHORUS, BY SKELETON HUNTSMEN. "Bright Chanticleer proclaims the dawn." To join the ghostly crowds, With a hey, ho, chivey! he was discovered and beheaded near the river. The anniversary of this saint and martyr is celebrated at Marseilles with great pomp. The houses are decorated with streamers to the very tops; and the public way is crossed by cords, on which are suspended numberless flags of various colours. The ships are always ornamented with flags and streamers. The procession passes under several arches, Hark forward, hark forward, tantivy! hung with boughs, before it stops at the &c. No hill, no dale, no glen, no mire, No dew, no night, no storm, With a hey, ho, chivey! altars or resting-places, which are covered with flowers: every thing concurs to give to this solemnity an air of cheerfulness. The eye dwells with pleasure on the garlands of beautiful flowers, the green boughs, and the emblem of the divinity contained in the flags of the procession. The attendants are extremely numerous; every gardener carries his wax taper, ornamented with the most rare and beauti Hark forward, hark forward, tantivy, ful flowers; he has also the vegetables &c. and fruits with which heaven had blessed his labour, and sometimes he bears some nests of birds. The butchers also make a part of this procession, clothed in long tunics, and with a hat à la Henri IV. armed with a hatchet or cleaver; they lead a fat ox dressed with garlands and ribands, and with gilt horns, like the ox at the car nival: his back is covered with a carpet, on which sits a pretty child, dressed as St. John the Baptist. During the whole week which precedes the festival, the butchers lead about this animal: they first take him to the police, where they pay a duty, and then their collection begins, which is very productive: every wishes to have the animal in his house; and it is a prevailing superstition among the people, that they shall have good luck throughout the year if this beast leave any trace of his visit, however dirty it may be. The ox is killed on the day after the festival. The child generally lives but a short time: exhausted by the fatigue which he has suffered, and by the caresses which he has received, and sickened by the sweetmeats with which he has been crammed, he languishes, and often falls a victim. one A number of young girls, clothed in white, their heads covered with veils, adorned with flowers, and girded with ribands of a uniform colour are next in the procession. Children, habited in different manners, recal the ancient "mysteries." Several young women are dressed as nuns; these are St. Ursula, St. Rosalia, St. Agnes, St. Teresa, &c. The handsomest are clothed as Magdalens; with their hair dishevelled on their lovely faces, they look with an air of contrition on a crucifix which they hold in the hand: others appear in the habit of the Sœurs de la Charité, whose whole time is devoted to the service of the sick. Young boys fill other parts, such as angels, abbots, monks; among whom may be distinguished St. Francis, St. Bruno, St. Anthony, &c. In the midst of the shepherds marches the little St. John, but half covered with a sheep's skin, like the picture of his precursor; he leads a lamb decked with ribands, a symbol of the saviour who offered himself for us, and died for the remission of our sins. The streets are strewed with flowers; numerous choristers carry baskets full of roses and yellow broom, which they throw, on a given signal, before the host or holy sacrament: they strew some of these on the ladies who sit in rows to see the procession; these also have baskets of flowers on their knees, which they offer to the host; they amuse themselves with covering the young virgins and little saints with the flowers. The sweet scents of the roses, the cassia, the jessamine, the orange, and the tuberose, mingled with the odour of the incense, almost overpower the senses The procession proceeds to the port, and it is there that the ceremony presents a sublime character: the people fill the quays; all the decks are manned with seamen, dressed in their best blue jackets, their heads uncovered, and their red caps in their hands. All bend the knee to the God of the Universe: the seamen stretch out their hands towards the prelate, who, placed under a canopy, gives the benediction: the most profound silence reigns among this immense crowd. The benediction received, every one rises instantaneously; the bells begin to ring, the music plays, and the whole train takes the road to the temple from which they came.* FLORAL DIRECTORY. Pendulous Starwort. Aster pendulus. Dedicated to St. Thomas, of Villanova. *Times Telescope, 1819; from Coxe's Gentleman's Guide through France. This place, near Cambridge, is also called Sturbridge, Sturbitch, and Stirbitch. A Cambridge newspaper speaks of Stirbitch fair being proclaimed on the and of Stirbitch horse-fair commencing 19th of September, 1825, for a fortnight, on the 26th of the month. The corruption of this proper name, stamps the persons who use it in its vulgar acceptation better instructed should cease as being ignorant as the ignorant; the from shamefully acquiescing in the long continued disturbance of this appellation. Stephen Batman, in his "Doome warning," published in 1582, relates that "Fishers toke a disfigured divell, in a ing togither of waters, from some narrow certain stoure, (which is a mighty gatherlake of the sea,) a horrible monster with a goats heade, and eyes shyning lyke fyre, whereuppon they were all afrayde and himselfe under the ise, and running uppe ranne awaye; and that ghoste plunged and downe in the stowre made a terrible noyse and sound." We get in Stirbitch a most " disfigured divell" from Stourbridge. The good people derive their 66 good name" from their river. Stourbridge fair originated in a grant from king John to the hospital of lepers at that place. By a charter in the 30th year of Henry VIII., the fair was granted to the magistrates and corporation of Cambridge. The vicechancellor of the university has the same power in it that he has in the town of Cambridge. By an order of privy council of the 3rd of October, 1547, the mayor and undersheriff of the county were required, not only to acknowledge before the vicechancellor, heads of colleges and proctors, that they had interfered with the privileges of the university in Stourbridge fair, but also," that the mayor, in the common hall, shall openly, among his brethren, acknowledge his wilfull proceeding." The breach consisted in John Fletcher, the |