esteem. In the earlier ages of Greece, shepherds were held in great Their names were given to Mounts Citharon and the Caucasus and in Egypt that of the shepherd, Philistis, was given to one of the pyramids. Homer has many allusions to this agreeable life. In one place he compares a general marshalling his army, to a shepherd gathering his flocka: in another, the clamour of a multitude to the bleating of sheep, standing to be milked and in a third passage a general, surveying his troops, to the delight of a shepherd leading his flock to the mountains. Similar passages occur in Tasso, in Ariosto, and in Camöens. : Boccalini frequently illustrates his subjects by references to flocks and herds. In one instance, he makes sheep and shepherds illustrate the maxim, that the best means to make nations quiet, humble, and obedient, is to afford them all pos sible opportunities of becoming rich. In another he draws a moral from the circumstance of the sheep having sent ambassadors to Apollo, to request being allowed long horns and sharp teeth. And in a third advertisement he makes Apollo declare, that he loved husbandmen and shepherds far better than nobility . The Afghauns are stated to be extremely partial to a pastoral life. 66 They enter upon it," says an accomplished traveller," with pleasure, and abandon it with regret." The them among clear brooks, he guideth them to fresh pasture. If the young lambs are weary, he carrieth them in his arms; if they wander, he bringeth them back. "But who is the shepherd's Shepherd? who taketh care for him? who guideth him in the path he should go? and, if he wander, who shall bring him back? "God is the shepherd's Shepherd.-He is the Shepherd over all; he taketh care for all; the whole earth is his fold; we are all his flock; and every herb, and every green field, is the pasture which he hath prepared for us. "God is our Shepherd, therefore we will follow him; God is our Father, therefore we will love him; God is our King, therefore we will obey him.” shepherds are emancipated from control; a few families, closely connected by blood and interest, associate together; and they require no magistrate. Feeling the charms of independence, they lead a life of ease. Their flocks supply them and the frequent change with almost every thing they want; of scene, with hunting and guarding their flocks, give variety to their lives, and afford relief from the listlessness of monotony. The Guanchos of the Canary Islands have a curious opinion, in respect to the efficacy of the bleating of lambs and sheep a: when they want rain, therefore, they collect their flocks into one spot. Then they separate the lambs from the ewes; upon which both set up a violent bleating, which the Guanchos imagine will induce the Deity to favour them with rain. The Murtats of the Crimea keep numerous flocks of goats; while the Coriacs, wandering along the north-east sea of Okotska, devote themselves to the pasturing and breeding of deer. Some chiefs have not less than 5,000. In Zetland and in Zealand, the shepherds pull the wool from them, instead of shearing; believing that practice to be the better method of making it grow of a fine quality. In Japan there is neither a sheep nor a goat. In the Taurida, they are, on the contrary, so numerous, that flocks extend even to 50,000; and he is but a common proprietor, who has a flock of only 1,000. In Iceland, they are, of course, far from being numerous; but every flock has a trained ram, which, let the night be ever so dark and tempestuous, leads the sheep to their fold. In many countries shepherds know the countenances of every sheep; and, among the Peruvian mountains, they not only note their increase and decrease, but keep a strict account of the day on which every lamb is ewed; and on which every sheep dies. Pales, the Tuscan goddess of shepherds, and whose annual Astley's Voy. vol. i. p. 549. festival was on the 21st April, was unknown to the Greeks, whose chief rural deity was PAN ;- -a name synonymous with universal nature. When the Tuscan and other Italian peasants wanted a good crop of corn, they offered ears of corn; and when a good vintage, branches of grapes: but if they desired a good lambing season, they offered large pails of milk. In the early ages of mankind, says Porphyry, "every man was a priest in his own family; and the only sacrifices were fruits and vegetables." A few vestiges of this patriarchal mode of life still remain. They are found in Java; in some parts of America; and even in Greenland; where examples are occasionally presented of the manners and customs of ancient times. It is curious, however, to remark, that countries, once occupied chiefly by shepherds, are in the present age occupied in the same manner. It is not thus with the other pursuits of life. The Dutch now live like gardeners, and fishermen; their Batavian ancestors like herdsmen; and the Britons, once living like hunters, and hewers of wood, are now merchants, agriculturists, and manufacturers. a It is also curious to remark, that the hunting and shepherd states were never known to exist in any quarter of the torrid zone. But in Tartary they have prevailed from the earliest ages and it is said, that when Ghengis Khan conquered China, there was a deliberation in his council, as to the propriety of destroying all the Chinese; in order that the whole of that immense empire might be converted into pastures for flocks and herds. b So agreeable is the shepherd's life, that even Jews have taken to it. In the government of Cherson there is a body of them, consisting of four thousand; who, having left their a Kaimes, i. p. 103, second edit. b Solomon, the converted Polish rabbi, Letter to the Rev. C. S. Hawtrey, dated Kremenchug, May 24, O. S. 1819. native trades in Poland, cultivate the soil, given them by Alexander, emperor of Russia; and live in the patriarchal manner of former ages. Spenser seems to have taken great pleasure in painting this mode of life. The time was once, in my first prime of years, To follow sheep and shepherd's base attire. And in the prince's garden daily wrought: With sight whereof soon cloy'd, and long deluded From native home, and spent my youth in vain, I 'gan my follies to myself to plain; And this sweet peace, whose lack did then appear. I from thenceforth have learn'd to love more dear Faerie Queene, B. vi. Cant. ix. St. 24, 25. In Spain the country has received great injury, not so much from the number of Merino flocks, as from the custom, which has prevailed for many centuries, of traversing every year the plains and mountains of the two Castiles, Biscay, and Arragon; Leon, Estremadura, and Andalusia. In these peregrinations, they do so much injury, that in one province (Estremadura), there are only 200,000 inhabitants; when it is capable of maintaining upwards of two millions. In 1778 there were seven flocks, which amounted in number to no less than 220,000. Of these, the Duke of Infantado had one flock, consisting of forty thousand; the six remaining flocks consisted of thirty thousand each; belonging to the Countess of Campo Negretti; the Marquis Perales; the VOL. II. a Dillon, Trav. Spain, p. 47, 4to. I Duke of Bejar; and the convents of Guadaloupe, Paular, and the Escurial. The mesta seems also to have obtained in ancient Italy; for the shepherds used to drive their flocks into Calabria in summer, and into Lucania in winter. This is what Horace probably alludes to, when he says that his sheep fed in agris longinquis". In ancient Britain, too, the shepherds, called Ceangi, traversed the plains with their flocks and herds; and vestiges of them remain even to the present day. b MUSIC. THE painter says, "Open thine eyes, and I will delight thee;" the philosopher, "Attend, and I will instruct thee; the musician, "Listen, and I will subdue thee." The passions of the soul, assuredly, are more obsequious to music than to any other art. This power to subdue has procured music, it must be confessed, too much attention in this age of heartless refinement. Young ladies play airs, as spiders spin cobwebs— to catch flies. The flies are caught. But Crabbe shall tell "Full well," says he, us the result. "Full well we know that many a favourite air, That charms a party, fails to charm a pair: And as Augusta play'd, she look'd around, To see if one was dying at the sound; But all were gone—a husband, wrapt in gloom, Stalk'd careless, listless, up and down the room! Music gives an ambrosial character to every thing. But of all instruments the Æolian harp, for a time, gives the greatest play to the imagination of the poet. Nature operates upon a Epist. viii. 1. 6. b Baxter, Gloss. Britt. p. 75. The Javanese have a tradition, that their first idea of music arose from the circumstance of some one of their ancestors having heard the air make a melodious sound, as it passed through a bamboo tube, which hung accidentally on a tree, and was induced to imitate it. Thus they fable that music came from Heaven. In some of the Australasian Islands they have a curious species of |