suffered to remain, was the tomb of Godric their patron saint, which, if an opinion may be formed from the portions of it which were discovered during the late proceedings in the church, was of the altar shape, with Norman pilaster mouldings at its corners. These are the only stones in the edifice which bear the stamp of Norman architecture."

The first part of the body of this volume contains the charters of endowment, indulgences, letters missive, and other documents in Latin and English, relative to the Priory, with engravings of all the most important seals. The second part consists of the rolls of account, the series of which for more than three centuries, in a succession only occasionally broken, is preserved with the charters among the records of the Dean and Chapter of Durham. To these are appended a very interesting Glossary, from which we have already made some extracts, and abstracts of the prices of grain, provisions, and utensils disclosed by the accounts. Lastly, indexes of persons and places perfect the utility of the volume.

We may safely say that so complete a developement of the history of a monastery, from the beginning to the close of its existence, has never before been published. The only similar instance that we are aware of is what Mr. Raine has himself before done for another of the cells of Durham, the Holy Island of Farne, in his topography of North Durham. Indeed, scarcely anywhere but in the well-preserved records of Durham have such materials been kept together. To the Glossary in particular we must award particular praise, as it will be of much use in the study of other volumes besides that to which it is attached and we should mention that it is formed from various sources additional to the vo

lume itself, particularly the rolls of Coldingham Priory, and the memoranda of the Bursar of Durham.

Gleanings in Natural History, by Edward Jesse, Esq. (2nd Edit.) 2 vols. Murray.

NOTHING, we have been informed by a friend who was at Court at the time, could equal the astonishment of the late Persian Ambassador, when,

having been introduced to Mr. Jesse, whose appearance he was pleased with and called Bad-neest, not bad; he asked the nature of the official situation which he held, and was answered that he was "Jungle-vizier to the king." "Is my mother a cow," he cried to the mehmendar, or interpreter, "that you should tell me such tales as these? Who ever heard of appointing a vizier over things only fit to make charcoal for the cooks? But when he was informed that Mr. Jesse was not only vizier, but had mastofees (clerks and secretaries) under him, "Worse and worse," he cried, "you have exchanged your beard for that of an ass! and how many tomauns does he pay to the king for his place? What peishkesh does he give to the Prime Minister?" But, on being told that he not

only paid nothing either as bribe or present, but actually received every year a purse of a thousand gold tomauns from his Majesty's Exchequer his different parks and jungles, his for counting the trees and bushes in patience and belief could extend no

further.

"These dogs of infidels," said he, "make no end of their lies.

May their faces be black! may they eat earth! Poof! the thing is impossible. Who can know anything of the trees in Persia? who cares for them, except those Turks, those beasts, the charcoal-burners ? Who wants trees, when we want grass and water. A thousand gold tomauns! Billah! Tallah! who ever heard of such a thing? Why it is more than the prime visier, the master of the horse,

and all the officers of the Shah's house

hold have together. Besides, who can count the trees in the forests of Ghelan and Mazanderan? not Shaitan and all his imps. A thousand gold tomauns! why he might have as many wives as the Shah himself. He might

have the choice of all the Circassian slaves that are brought to the market of Tehran!" "What words are these," exclaimed indignantly the English interpreter, who saw that the ambassador's wrath was fast rising, and that he was blowing over his left shoulder: "What dirt are you eating? Jesse is no kizzil-bash; he wants no Circassian slaves, nor Cûrdish either, no Zeenahs; no not even the celebrated

Mr.

Taous or peacock herself, whose face was like the full moon, and her eyes of the circumference of one's finger and thumb. Would you change the manners of a country? If your Shah wears a beard, that is no reason why our king should not be shaved. If you

want half a dozen wives, and much good may they do you, Mr. Jesse may be contented with one. He has no Anderûn in his house. His rooms are all open-his women go unveiled and show their faces to all who look at them. Go! every nation has its own customs. If our king chooses to give a thousand gold tomauns to have his charcoal looked after, and his bushes counted, it is no concern of yours. Your face is thrown upside down. Till you have been longer among the Franks, keep the lips of discretion over the tongue of wonder, or your beard will be laughed at." Mr. Jesse, however, may well laugh at the ignorance of the Mussulman, for while he has been visiting his jungles, and inspecting the charcoal, he has also been devoting his attention to all subjects connected with the study of nature; and has produced

two volumes much to be commended for the variety of their information, and the agreeable manner in which it is detailed. Many curious anecdotes of the sagacity of the animal creation are mentioned, and many accurate observations are made of their habits and instincts; so that the book is a valuable addition to that part of the great volume of nature which the industry of man has unrolled and studied. we cannot afford any copiousness of extract, we will give one which records an instance of the power of imitation, acting chiefly through memory, as remarkable as any that we remember to have heard of in the animal creation. He is speaking of a parrot at Hampton-Court. (Vol. ii. p. 9.)

As

"As you wished me to write down whatever I could collect about my sister's wonderful parrot, I proceed to do so, only promising that I will tell you nothing but what I can vouch for having myself heard. Her laugh is quite extraordinary, and it is impossible not to help joining in it one's self, more especially when in the midst of it she cries out Don't make me laugh so, I shall die, I shall die,' and then continues laughing more violently than before. Her crying and sobbing are curious, and

if you say Poor poll, what is the matter ?" she says 'So bad, so bad, got such a cold!' and after crying for some time, will suddenly cease, and making a noise like drawing a long breath, says Better now,' and begins to laugh. The first time I ever heard her speak was one day when I was talking to the maid at the bottom of

the stairs, and heard what I then considered to be a child calling out Payne, (the maid's name,) I'm not well, I'm not well;' and on my saying 'What's the matter with that child?' she replied 'It is only the parrot; she always does so when I leave her alone, to make me come back ;' and so it proved, for on her going into the room, the parrot stopped and began laughing quite in a jeering way. It is fronted, in any way, she begins to cry, and singular enough that whenever she is af. when pleased, to laugh. If any one happens to cough or sneeze, she says, 'What a bad cold.' One day when the children were playing with her, the maid came into the room, and on their repeating to her several things which the parrot had said, Poll looked up and said quite plainly, No, I did not !' Sometimes, when she is inclined to be mischievous, the maid threatens to beat her, and she often says 'No, you won't.' She calls the cat very plainly puss, puss!' and then answers 'mew !' but the most amusing part is, whenever I want to make her call it, and to that purpose say puss! puss!' myself, she always answers' mew,' till I begin mewing; and then she begins calling puss' as quick as possi ble. She imitates every kind of noise, and barks so naturally that I have known her set all the dogs on the parade in Hampton-Court barking; and I dare say, if the truth were known, wondering what was barking at them; and the consternation I have seen her cause in a party of cocks and hens, by her crowing and clucking, has been the most ludicrous thing possible. She sings just like a child, and I have more than once thought it was a human being. It is most ridiculous to hear her make what is called a false note, and then say 'Oh! la!' and burst out laughing at herself, beginning again quite in another key. She is very fond of singing Buy a Broom,' which she says quite plainly; but, in the same spirit as cat, if we say, calling the view to make her repeat it, Buy a Broom,' she always says Buy a Brush,' and then laughs as a child might do when mischievous. She often prefers a kind of exercise which I do not know how to lance exercise. describe, except by saying it is like the She puts her claw behind her, first on one side, then on the other, then in front, and round over

with a

One

her head, and whilst doing so, cries'Come on come on,' and when finished, says, 'bravo! beautiful!' and draws herself up. Before I was as well acquainted with her as I am now, she would stare in my face for some time and then say,- How do ye, Ma'am?'-this she invariably does to strangers. day I went into the room where she was, and said, to try her, ' Poll, where is Payne gone?' and to my astonishment, and almost dismay, she said- Down stairs ;' I cannot at this moment recollect anything more that I can vouch for myself, and I do not choose to trust to what I am told; but, from what I have myself seen and heard, she has almost made me believe in transmigration."

There is no necessity, with this young lady, to believe in transmigration, or to suppose that some roguish Abigail for her niaseries had been transmuted into this parrot; nor is there any need to puzzle oneself, as Mr. Jesse too often does, about reason and instinct; the marvellous cleverness of this kind resolving itself into quick observation, retentive memory, and that habit of imitation which some animals, as monkeys, magpies, daws, starlings, &c. possess. No animals can possess what is called reason in man; but the limits of instinct cannot be defined. Perhaps, the most curious branch of the inquiry is, the extraordinary change which the instinctive habits of animals undergo through civilization, or change of circumstances, and which becomes hereditary.

The Mabinogion, Part I. containing the Lady of the Fountain. 8vo. pp. 160. At length we owe to the enthusiasm and liberality of a highly talented lady what has been so often promised from other quarters, but never effected. For the last fifty years the literati have been repeatedly calling for the publication of the Mabinogion, in the hopes that a translation might follow, and a new light be thrown on the origin of romance. Lady Charlotte Guest, well aware of their importance, and convinced from experience that procrastinated promises from those who had obtained copies would never be realized, determined by her own exertions, and at her sole expense, to undertake this desideratum in literature.

We have before us the result of her

enterprizing zeal in what she terms Part I. containing a romantic tale, which has been edited in so complete a manner, in Welsh and English, with illustrations and notes so full of curious learning, that she leaves nothing to be wished in addition. As, however, her ladyship has not thought proper to usher these fictions into the world according to their chronology, we deem it requisite to say a word on the antiquity of their origin.

66

The Mabinogion were originally oral tales for the instruction of youths (as the name imports) into the principles of the Bardic mythology. They were put into writing, as well as the mystical Triads, when Druidism was on the wane, and became the principal source of those romantic narratives which for a considerable period were the favourite reading of Europe. The Rev. Edward Davies, in his erudite work, "The Mythology and Rites of the Druids," thus expresses himself on this subject: Such tales as the Mabinogion, it will be said, do not deserve to be ranked with sober history. This is freely acknowledged. They are only brought forward to diffuse a faint ray over ages where history refuses its light. In this sense they may be useful. They contain traditions of remote times, when Druidism had many private and some avowed friends, and they are found to coincide with the most authentic documents which we have upon the subject of British superstition, and with the researches of our best antiquaries."

When once the collection was formed, it was from time to time enlarged by borrowing or imitating the continental romances, to which the more ancient Mabinogion had given birth; and such practice does not seem to have been entirely disused, until Sir Thomas Maleor (Maelwr), knight, finished his Morte d'Arthur, "in the ninth year of the reign of King Edward IVth.” i. e. 1469 or 1470.

Of the most antiquated, specimens may be seen in the work above quoted. They allegorically detail the Druidic mysteries, or show the engrafting of the Sabæan idolatry on the more simple Pagan worship. These are followed by such as describe, under an

assumed fabulous character, the various struggles made by the professors of the Druidic religion against the efforts of those who propagated Christianity. We have next, to suit the temper and prejudices of the times, a reality given to the mythological persons of Bardic superstition, as if actually existing in the human shape, and they form a court of which the British divinity, by the title of Arthur, i. e. the constellation of the Great Bear, is made the sovereign. Particular and difficult adventures are assigned them, founded on ideas derived from the allegorical terms and mystical language of a period much anterior. Of this class it will be sufficient to cite the romance of Sir Tristrem, all the characters in which, even the dogs, prove, from their names being only translateable when regarded as Welsh, in what country that tale originated. The imitation, amplification, and improvement these stories underwent from the Norman pen, occasioned fresh Mabinogion to be written, either as originals or adoptions from the continental genius, and of this last style is the narrative of the Lady of the Fountain; in which, as her ladyship has observed, is incorporated the story of the Chevalier au Lion.

The principal collection of Mabinogion is in the Llyvr côch or red book of Hergest, or Yr gêst, a mansion of the ancient family of Vaughan, in the parish of Kington, Herefordshire, now merely a farm-honse. This MS. is in the library of Jesus College, Oxford; but they are found dispersed in various directions, and we unexpectedly meet with one at the commencement of the Treveilir pedigree, although that family, notwithstanding its domicile in Môn, the favourite island of Druidism, could not have derived its origin from any mythological personage.

The Mabinogi now published is the Iarlles y fynnawn, The Lady of the Fountain, Iarlles being the feminine of larll, the Anglo-Saxon Eorl or Earl; and it has been produced, with the most ample illustrations, in such a manner as gives the highest idea of the press of Mr. W. Rees, of Llandovery. Her ladyship has presented us with a fac-simile of a page from the original manuscript in Jesus College library, another from the tale of Ywain

and Gawin, in English, in the British Museum, and a third romance of the Chevalier au Lion, in the Bibliothèque du Roi at Paris; and has enriched the whole with such copious annotations as prove the most unwearied assiduity. In fact, she has left nothing undone; and it is to be hoped that the approbation of the public will induce her to persevere, and edit the remaining Mabinogion in an equally satisfactory

manner.

.The Chevalier au Lion, which Lady Charlotte has been the first to put in print, is attributed to Chrestien de Troyes, and said by M. Le Roux de Lincy, in his Introduction au Livre des Légendes, in which he has given a long extract, to have been composed at the close of the 12th century, the MS. which her ladyship has followed being of the 13th. Ywain and Gawin Mr. Ritson regarded as of the time of Richard II. Now the date of the larlles y fynnawn must be derived from its own internal evidence, and in matters not historical we have rarely any other clue than the costume. In such investigations, it is of the greatest importance to have the original as well as the translation; for had we depended solely on the latter, the introduction of the word tabard, p. 49, would have led to the conclusion that the composition could not have been earlier than the latter part of the fourteenth century. The word in the Welsh version is arwyd, which signifies an emblazoned surcoat, and indeed the term surcot itself is sometimes used, which may take it back above a hundred years. We have another very instructive passage for this purpose, which runs thus: "Owain struck the knight with his sword so powerful a blow that it cut through" (y helym ar penfestin ar pengwch pwrgwin athrwy y kroen ar kig ar asgwrn) the helmet, the head-piece or wiffe, the conically woven bonnet, and through the skin, and the flesh, and the bone." In the English translation pengwch purgwin is rendered "visor," and in Owen's Welsh Dictionary is made to signify, "the crest or plume of a helmet;" but by a close examination of the roots of this word the above translation is warranted, and it is the only one which agrees with the context. The author means to show