Bacchus to the hot climes of Indy when he became Iswara and Baghesa; she sported on crocodiles' tails in Egypt when Bacchus once more changed himself into Osiris. She was a Sanscrit fairy when Bacchus became Vrishadwaja. The stout bulrushes of old Nile, the gigantic palms of Indostan, the towering bamboos of China, quavered lightly as the myriad elves of fairyland danced upon them. Wherever there was mythology, wherever there was poetry, wherever there was fancy, there was Queen Mab: multi-named and multi-formed, but still queen of the beautiful, the poetical, the fanciful."

there were palaces, built, destroyed, and rebuilt, in an instant; there were fifty thousand black slaves with jars of jewels on their heads; there were carpets which flew through the air, caps which rendered their owners invisible, loadstones which drew the nails out of ships, money which turned to dry leaves, magic passwords which caused the doors of subterranean caverns to revolve on their hinges. Yes; and the Eastern Queen Mab could show you Halls of Eblis, in which countless multitudes for ever wandered up and down; black marble staircases, with never a bottom; paradises where Gulchenrouz revelled, The East was long her favorite abode. She and for which Bababalouk sighed; demon dwarfs hovered about Chinese marriage feasts, and blew with scimetars, the inscriptions on whose blades out the light in variegated lanterns; she sat on baffled the Caliph Vathek, and who (the dwarfs), Chinese fireworks, let off squibs and crackers and being menaced and provoked, rolled themselves pasted wafers, upon Mandarins' spectacles, thou-up into concentric balls, and suffered themselves sands of years before lanterns, fireworks, or to be kicked into interminable space. Queen Mab spectacles were ever heard or thought of in this held her court in Calmuck Tartary; and there," part of the globe. When the whole of Europe in the Relations of Ssidi Kur, yet extant, she was benighted and in gloom, she Queen Mab, originated marvellous stories of the wandering as the Fairy Peribanou- -was giving that gor- Khan; of the glorified Naugasuna Garbi, who was geous never-to-be-forgotten series of evening "radiant within and without;" of the wonderful parties known as the Arabian Nights' Entertain-bird Ssidi, who came from the middle kingdom ments. She had castles of gold, silver, brass, of India; of wishing-caps, flying-swords, hoband precious stones; of polished steel, and adamant, and glass. She had valleys of diamonds and mountains of sapphires. In her stud were flying horses, with tails that whisked your eyes out; mares that had once been beautiful women. In her aviaries were rocs whose eggs were as large as Mr. Wyld's Globe; birds that talked, and birds that danced, and birds that changed into princes. In her ponds were fishes that refused to be fried in egg and bread-crumb, or, in the Hebrew fashion, in Florence oil, but persisted in holding astoundingly inexplicable converse with fairies, who came out of party-walls and defied Grand Viziers; fishes that eventually proved to be not fishes - but the mayor, corporation, and burgesses of a highly respectable submerged city. From them doubtless sprang, in after ages, the susceptible oyster that was crossed in love, and subsequently whistled; and the accomplished sturgeon (I think) that smoked a pipe and sang a comic song.

goblins, and fairies in abundance. In the East, Whittington and his Cat first realized their price; it rested in Italy on its way northward; and the merry priest Piovano Arlotto had it from a benevolent Brahmin, and told it in Florence before there was ever a Lord Mayor in London. The King of the Frogs-that of Doctor Leyden and the Brothers Grimm - was a tributary of Queen Mab in Lesser Thibet, centuries ago; and the fact of the same story being found in the Gesta Romanorum, and in the popular superstitions of Germany, only proves the universality of Queen Mab's dominion. It is no proof that, because Queen Mab's fays and goblins hovered about the rude incantations of Scandinavian mythology, they were not associated likewise in the One awful and mysterious monosyllable of the Hindu Triad.

Before Queen Mab came to be a "case of real distress." she was everywhere. She and her sprites played their fairy games with Bramah In those golden Eastern days, the kingdom or and Vishnu, and with the Ormuzd of the Zendaqueendom of Fairyland was peopled with one- vesta. Her stories were told in Denmark, where eyed calenders, sons of kings, gigantic genii who the trold-folk celebrated her glories. The gibfor countless ages had been shut up in metal cat eating his bread and milk from the red earcaskets hermetically secured by Solomon's Seal; thenware pipkin of Goodman Platte, and in and who, being liberated therefrom by benevolent deadly fear of Knune-Marre, is the same Scottish fishermen, began in smoke (how many a genius gib-cat that so rejoiced when Mader Watt was has ended in the same!), and finally assuming told that "auld Girnegar o' Craigend, alias Rumtheir primeval proportions, threatened and terri- ble-Grumble, was dead. The Norman Fabliaux fied their benefactors. In the train of the Ara- of the Poor Scholar, the Three Thieves, and bian Queen Mab, were spirits who conveyed the Sexton of Cluni, are all of Queen Mab's kinhunch-backed bridegrooms into remote chambers, dred in Scotland. The German tales of the and there left them, head downwards; there were Wicked Goldsmith, the Talking Bird, and the fairies who transported lovers, in their shirts and Eating of the Bird's Heart, were written in drawers, to the gates of Damascus, and there in- Queen Mab's own book of the Fable of Sigurd, cited them to enter the fancy-baking trade, bring-delighted in by those doughty Scandinavian heing them into sore peril in the long run, through roes Thor and Odin. A corresponding tradition not putting pepper into cream-tarts; there were has been seized upon by that ardent lover of Queen cunning magicians, knowing of gardens underground, where there were trees whereof all the fruits were jewels, and who went up and down Crim Tartary crying: "Old lamps for new;

Mab, Monsieur Perrault, in his story of the Sleeping Beauty in the Wood. The Golden Goose we have read and laughed at when told us by the Brothers Grimm, in their Kinder-märchen, is but

the tale well known to Queen Mab, of Loke hanging on to the Giant Eagle, for which you may consult (though I dare say you wont) the Volsunga Saga, or the second part of the edition of Resenius. Monk Lewis's hideous tale of the Grim White Woman, in which the spirit of the child whistles to its father:

66

pew-wew-pew-wew My Minny he stew,"

is but the nether-Saxon tale of the Machandel Boom or the Holly Tree. "My Minny he stew,"

is but

"Min moder de mi schlacht,
Min Vater de mi att."

latinity. Nay, and queen Mab has nought to do with courtly Joseph Addison and his academic vision of Mirza, where the shadowy beings of Mohammedan fancy seem turned into trochees and dactyls. Queen Mab never heard of Exeter Hall; and never made or encouraged dense platform eloquence. I claim for Queen Mab that she once

alas! once- - possessed the whole realm and region of fairy and goblic fiction throughout the world, civilized and uncivilized. I claim as hers the fairies, ghosts, and goblins of William Shakspeare; Prospero with his rough magic, the beast Caliban, the witch Sycorax, the dainty Ariel, and the whole of the Enchanted Island. I claim as hers, Puck, Peas-blossom, and Mustard-seed. As hers, Puckle, Hecate, the little airy spirits; the spirits black, white, and gray; the The Queen-Mab records of the Countess whole goblin corps of the Saturnalia in Macbeth. d Anois delighted children whose fathers' fa- These were wicked subjects of the Queen of Faithers had anticipated their delight hundreds of ryland - rebellious imps; but they were hers. years before, in the Pentamerone of Giovan' Bat-I likewise claim as hers, all the witches, mantista Basile. The Moorish tales of Melendo the eaters, lavaudeuses, brucolaques, loup-garous, Man-eater were known of old to the Welsh, and pusses-in-boots, talking birds, princes changed are recorded in their Manobogion, or Myvyrian into beasts, white cats, giant-killers (whether Jacks Archæology. The Boguey of our English nur- or no), dragon-quellers, and champions, that never sery was found in Spain, in the days of Maricas-existed. Likewise, all and every the Bevis's, Artana; and, under the guise of a horse without a thurs, dun cows, demon dwarfs, banshees, Browhead, he yet haunts the Moorish ramparts of the nies (of Bodestock, or otherwise), magicians, sorAlhambra, in company with another nondescript cerers, good people, uncanny folk, elves, giants, beast with a dreadful woolly hide, called the Bel-tall black men, wolves addicted to eating grandludo. Belludo yet haunts Windsor Forest as mammas and grandchildren, communicative fish Herne the Hunter. I hear his hoarse growl, (whether with rings or otherwise), ghoules, afrits, awful to little children, in the old streets of Rou- genii, peris, djinns, calenders, hobgoblins, "grim en, where he is known as the Gargouille. I have worthies of the world," ogres with preternatural seen him at least I have seen those who have olfactory powers, paladins, dwergars, Robin Goodseen him as the headless hen of Dumbledown-fellows, and all other supernatural things and deary.

persons.

And preferring these great claims - howsoever wise we grow, are they not great after all!

of Queen Mab's, to the general respect, I present Her Majesty as a case of real distress. She has been brought very low indeed. She is sadly reduced. She has hardly a shoe to stand upon.

I count as Queen Mab's subjects and as part of her dominions, all persons and lands not strictly mythological, but only fanciful. Homer, Virgil, Ovid, and Company, may keep Mount Olympus, the ox-eyed Juno, the zoned Venus, the limping Vulcan, the nimble-fingered Mercury, for me. I envy not Milton his "dreaded name of De-Boards, Commissions, and Societies, grimly edumogorgon," his Satans, Beelzebubs, Molochs, his tremendous allegories of Sin and Death. Queen Mab has no sympathy with these. Nay, nor for Doctor Johnson's ponderous supernaturals (fairies in full-bottomed wigs and buckles), his happy valleys of Abyssinia, many-pillared palaces, and genii spouting aphorisms full of morality and

cating the reason, and binding the fancy in fetters of red tape, have sworn to destroy her. Spare her, drivers of Whole Hogs to, not unprofitable markets: spare her, also, Marlborough House; spare her, MR. COLE, for you ride your hobbies desperately hard!

THE BEST SOCIETY. A curious conversation contrary, the high class were the vulgarest people after dinner, from my saying that, "after all, it one met. Vulgar enough, God knows! some of was in high life one met the best society." Ro- them are; vulgar in mind, which is the worst gers violently opposing me; he too, of all men, sort of vulgarity. But, to say nothing of women, who, (as I took care to tell him) had through the where, in any rank or station in life, could one greater part of his life shown practically that he find men better worth living with, whether for agreed with me, by confining himself almost ex-manners, information, or any other of the qualiclusively to this class of society. It is, indeed, ties that render society agreeable, than such perthe power which these great people have of com- sons as Lords Holland, Grey, Carlisle, Lansdowne, manding, among other luxuries, the presence of Cowper, King, Melbourne, Carnarvon, John Russuch men as he is at their tables, that sets their sell, Dudley, Normanby, Morpeth, Mahon, and circle (taking all its advantages into account) numbers of others that I can speak of from perindisputably above all others in the way of so-sonal knowledge ?— Moore's Diary. ciety. Said, with some bitterness, that, on the

From The Spectator, 14 Jan. RELIGIOUS CHART OF ENGLAND.

the list does not show a proportion of more than 45 per cent of actual attendance to the total number of sittings provided in places of public THOSE members of the Peerage who objected worship belonging to one sect; the lowest on the to the collection of religious statistics under the list shows that in one sect the proportion is only Census Act will find their refutation in the mas8 per cent. The highest figures apply to the terly volume which Mr. Horace Mann has pre- Wesleyan Reformers; the next sect who distinsented to the public under the instructions of the guish their zeal by the assiduity of attendance Registrar-General. It is difficult to understand are the Particular Baptists; the original Wesleythat accurate information could do harm in any ans stand much lower; the Church of England case; but perhaps on no subject has information is sixteenth in the list, and only exhibits a probeen at once more desirable and more vague than portion of 33 per cent; the lowest but one in the on the state and distribution of religious sects in list are the Jews, who like the Unitarians show a this country and while through the present vo- proportion of 24 per cent; the lowest of all is lume we may be said for the first time to know the Society of Friends. The Dissenters appear ourselves in our actual condition, so far as ma- to attend oftener and to bestow longer time terial indications show it, the general tendency on religious worship than members of the Esof the report is at once to stimulate exertion tablished Church. In the unendowed sects, thereand to afford cheering prospects for the issue of fore, more use appears to be made of the places that exertion. The idea of collecting religious for public worship than in the Establishment. statistics appears to have originated with Major Mr. Mann carefully distinguishes those who might Graham, the Registrar-General; and notwith- attend, from those who would be prevented by standing the mutilation of the act, the census-infancy, sickness, or engagement with inevitable collectors were instructed to request information duties; and he calculates that the total number from the ministers of religious bodies. Although of the population able to attend church is this request could not be legally enforced, it appears to have been complied with in the great majority of cases; and there are many tests which combine to show that the general results are not very far from strict accuracy. The volume is a striking testimony to the utility of a public department in collecting information and condensing it to an available shape.

The number of creeds in England is a proverbial subject of remark; but the reader who turns over the tables in this book will receive new ideas as to the surprising subdivision-a subdivision which prevents any one sect from being other than a minority. We cannot even except the National Church. But, independently of the minuter subdivisions of recognizable sects, such as the "Trinitarian Predestinarians," the "Free Gospel Christians," or the "Supralapsarian Calvinists," Mr. Mann reckons thirty-six religious communities or sects,- twenty-seven native and indigenous, nine foreign; besides a number of sects so small and unconsolidated that they cannot be included in the list, and separate congregations, of which there are many. Not a few of the last eschew sectarian distinctions. There are, for example, ninety-six which simply call themselves Christians. The proportion of the distribution is in some degree indicated by the number of buildings. Out of 34,467 places of public worship of all denominations, there are belonging to the Church of England 14,077 churches, with more than 10,000 clergy, and an aggregate property estimated at more than £5,000,000. Although not a majority of the whole people, the Church of England greatly exceeds any other section of the population in numbers. In one place, Mr. Mann calculates that the total number of persons attending divine worship in the churches of the Establishment is greater than in all the rest put together.

At page 156, there is a table showing the proportion per cent of attendance at sittings; which is remarkable in many respects. The highest in

10,398,000, or 58 per cent on the entire population of England. Of those, however, who might attend, by every test of age, of personal freedom, and of access to sittings, but stop away altogether, it is calculated that the number is 5,288,294. This last is a great fact, and it is the subject of earnest inquiry.

In

One reason for non-attendance is the defective distribution of church accommodation. 34,467 churches, 10,212,563 sittings are provided

nearly the total wanted; but ill-apportioned distribution reduces the total number available to 8,753,279; and a number of these are again rendered unavailable by being in churches which are closed at some portion of the day when services are usually held. The large town districts are particularly deficient in church accommodation compared to the growth of the population; and Mr. Mann calculates that 2,000 more churches and chapels would be required the size in towns to be larger than the average. Recently, however, there has been an increase; by no means, indeed, sufficient to meet the want, but still tending to improvement: while the people have multiplied by 29 per cent since 1831, the sittings have increased by 56 per cent; the number of sittings have increased from 50 per hundred persons in 1831 to 57 per hundred persons in 1851.

The five millions, however, consist of persons who are free to attend, who could have access to sittings, but who choose to stay away. The reasons appear to be partly the maintenance in church of those social distinctions which offend the humbler classes; also misconception, Mr. Mann thinks, as to the motives of religious ministers, who are erroneously supposed to be intent too much upon their own personal interests; and the want of aggressive means for carrying church accommodation and religious preaching to the poor. It is probable that new chapels would be attended in towns where the old churches never will increase the numbers of their congregations; but it is to be feared that there are also causes

which do not come properly within the scope of | to the branching of the Protestant Reformation Mr. Mann's inquiry. Besides want of sufficient into the innumerable sects that exist around us. zeal for the comfort of the poor, with which he The reporter tells us not only what are the sects, charges the leaders of religious movements, there but how each arose, and what is its tendency. must also be a want of power in the clergy- But by the standards of faith, from the Artiperhaps a want of zeal, or a want of that sym-cles of the Church of England, which are includpathy with the human heart which would enable ed in the volume to the declaration of the Conthem to compel not only attendance but atten- gregational churches and other principal Distion. If the inquiry were carried into the senting bodies, down to the new "Catholic and churches amongst the actual attendants, how Apostolic Church,” — Mr. Mann shows that the much light might be thrown upon this part of differences consist far more in ideas of church the question, by taking the statistics of the wan- constitution or discipline than in the essentials dering eyes, of the trivial conduct; or, on the of Christianity. The subdivision appears to be other hand, if the inquiry were pushed into the accompanied by another tendency, which has adpulpit, how many a mechanical sermon in the vanced us by rapid stages towards a social and upper class of churches, how many a low and spiritual harmony between sects severed by convulgar tirade of superstitious denunciation stitution and discipline. This result Mr. Mann amongst the lower Dissenting chapels, alienates attributes partly to the perfect freedom in this rather than attaches the congregation! There country which admits the full development of is a repulsion both in the turgid vulgarity and religious ideas. The explanation is quite philoin the apathy of the pulpit, which casts indiffer-sophical; for religion must essentially be one in ence over many a heart that duty brings to a origin, and there is but little structural variety place of worship, while the same revulsion keeps throughout every sect in its true tabernacle, the out considerable numbers. The working classes human heart. The balance of opportunity, place, have all the simplicity of women; they judge doctrinal questions by very instinctive standards; and it is not only ignorance, or class prejudice, or bad clothing, which prevents many of them from entering a place of worship.

There is one consolatory fact involved in this survey, which is complete not only in its extent but in its retrospective research. The volume grasps in one view a history of religion in England, from the early days of Druidism to the invasion of Paganism, Roman and Saxon; the introduction of Christianity, the establishment of a national church under Henry the Eighth, down

power, and prescription - lies with the Church of England; the balance of zeal, at present, speaking generally, is with the unendowed bodies. But while this report shows how much remains to be done, even by the communities possessing that zeal, and by the Establishment possessing that opportunity, it also shows that the apparent antagonisms do not penetrate to essentials so deeply as we supposed, and that there is a dawning tendency in the English mind towards the more modest and candid cultivation of a common Christianity.

From Fraser's Magazine.
THE PAST.

BY MRS. ACTON TINDAL.

Il Passato é passato, e per sempre!"—AZELIO.
THE Past is past! with many a hopeful morrow;
Its errors and its good works live with God;
The agony is o'er of joy, or sorrow;

The flowers lie dead along the path we trod.

The Past is past! in solemn silence taking
Alike the sunny and the rainy day,
On the live altar of the fond heart breaking
Full many an idol built on feet of clay.

The Past is past! in certain still rotation,
Deadening and loosening, as it travelled by,
Each hope that bounds in glad anticipation,
Each vivid passion and each tender tie!

The Past is past! and our young selves departed
Upon the flashing whirl of those fleet years;
Its lessons leave us sadder, stronger hearted,
More slow to love, less prodigal of tears.

To dim the spirit with its foul, cold shrine; For many a base and dark thing finds admission Amid the wisdom learnt from life and time.

The Past is past! and in that twilight valley

Fears for the future from those shadows sally,
Dwell slow repentance and the vain regret;

And hang around the path before us yet.
The Past is past! and ah! how few deplore it,
Or would re-live their time had they the
power;

Though Nature, sometimes, weakly weepeth o'er it

At memory of some wrong or happier hour.

The Past is past! There's bitter joy in knowing

'Tis gone for ever; dead, and buried deep, It lies behind, and on life's stream is flowing, Where the dark waters of the Dead Sea sleep.

The Past is past! in faith and patience taking
Its lessons, let us lay them on our hearts;
The chain's attenuated links are breaking!
Be earnest !-use the present ere it parts!-

From Chambers's Journal.

their long frocks or tailed coats on, is here the

FEMALE BEAUTY IN OLD ENGLAND AND every-day food of young and old. Salt-pork is

NEW ENGLAND.

Ir is generally allowed that there is more of what is called chiseled beauty in America than in Europe that the features of the women are finer, and the head more classical. But here ends the triumph of our sisters of the West; their busts are far inferior to those we admire at home, and a certain attenuation in the whole figure gives the idea of fragility and decay.

cheap- that is, greasy fulsomeness makes it pall sooner on the appetite than any other meat, and so it forms the pièce de résistance at almost all tables, except those who live within hail of a butcher, and whose owners are well to do in the world. Tea is the grand panacea for all fatigue, low spirits, dampness, coldness, pains in the head and in the back, and, in short, for nearly all the ills that flesh is heir to; the quantity taken by middle aged and elderly women almost surpasses And this idea is correct. What they want is belief. Certainly, to put the average at six or soundness of constitution; and in consequence eight cups a-day would be setting it low enough." of the want, their finely-cut faces, taken generally, What mere human beauty could stand these are pale instead of fair, and sallow when they horrors? Fancy Miss Angelina, dressed for her should be rosy. In this country, a woman is in first ball, and sitting down, before she goes forth the prime of her attractions at thirty-five, and conquering and to conquer, to keep up the stamshe frequently remains almost stationary till fifty, ina with just a little snack of fat pork, gooseberryor else declines gradually and gracefully, like a jam, and pumpkin-pie! Is it any wonder that beautiful day melting into a lovely evening. In this young lady should wither at twenty-five? America, twenty-five is the farewell line of beauty Yet fat pork has its advocates. Cobbett was dein woman, beyond which comes decay; at thirty-lighted" with the fondness of the Americans for five, she looks weary and worn, her flat chest symbolizing the collapsed heart within; and at forty, you see in her thin and haggard features all the marks of premature age.

extreme unction," and on his return to this country, did everything in his power to force the greasy dish upon the English palate, affirming that a dislike to fat pork was a decided symptom It is customary to regard this as the effect of of insanity. We may allude, likewise, to the imclimate; but some think it folly to go to an ulti-portant part played by hogs' lard in the compomate cause, when the whole system of artificial sition of cosmetics. The thousand-and-one kinds life in America offers direct defiance, as they as- of paste and pomatum for the skin and hair are sert, to the known hygienic laws. This view is all of this substance, only differing a little in the supported with great intrepidity by a woman's color and perfume; and in nineteen cases out of journal in Providence, called the Una- not a twenty, hogs' lard is. bears' grease. Why should Lady's Magazine, fair reader, but a regular broad- a substance improve beauty when absorbed by sheet, written by and for women, whose leading the skin, and destroy it when taken into the articles are on women's rights, and whose ad-stomach? This is a question we leave to be setvertisements are from women-doctors, women- tled between Una and the chemists. professors, women-lecturers, women everything. Another cause of the unhappy condition of feUna admits the fleeting character of her country-male beauty in America is stated, by the outwomen's charms, and contrasts more especially spoken Una, to be the dirtiness of the fair sex. Old England with New England, yielding frankly This is dreadful. Not one woman in ten, she asthe pas in beauty to the former. She hints, we serts, permits cold water to touch her whole permust own, at some very problematical causes of son every day, and not one in five performs the the early loss of female charms in America- same ablution once a week; "while, if the truth such as, "the bounding of life's horizon by the could at once be flashed forth from its hidingpetty cares that wait on meat, drink, and raiment ; place, it would show still longer intervals, from the absence of genial and improving intercourse, the bare thought of which imagination shrinks." and of earnest interest in the hopes and fortunes We do not know what is the case, in this respect, of the race; and the little rivalries and little aspi- as regards the majority of our own country. rations on which, for lack of better objects, so women; and, to say the truth, we are afraid to many a soul is fain to waste its energies." All ask. this is very well for the philosophic Una, who pays her taxes under protest, since she had no voice in laying them on; but the implied notion, that our pretty countrywomen have no petty cares connected with their food, no little rivalries and little aspirations, but plenty of earnest interest in the destinies of the race- is very compliThese coffins are called bed-rooms, for mentary. After flourishing a little, however, no other reason than that they are large enough about these grievances, which, we fear, are not to hold a bed, a light-stand, and a wash-stand; wholly unknown to our English beauties, she pro- and "they are often rendered redolent of sweetceeds to the main point. "What," she asks, "is ness by thickets of coats, pantaloons, dresses, and the diet of New England generally? Hot bis- petticoats hung on the walls." This is so faithcuits, fat pork, and tea! these are the staples. ful a sketch of the bed-rooms of the middle-class They are varied with preserves, made pound for Londoners, that one might fancy Una to be pound, and endless varieties of cake, and the in-speaking, by mistake, on the wrong side of the evitable pie. Pastry, which most children in question, till we hear that the dens described are England are not allowed to touch until they get "purified by the perfumes of the adjoining kitchen,

The wrath of Una falls next upon the sleeping accommodation. "Three-quarters of New England," she tells us, "sleep in slightly-enlarged coffins ;" and, in our opinion, a capital plan it is, for, if the fourth quarter were stowed with the rest, the public might as well be in their graves at once.