212 NOTES OF THE MONTH. 



found the path of life so thickly strewed with briars., that the occasional 

 roses they met with afforded a very inadequate balm for the wounds 

 occasioned by the former. Resolving to rid themselves of an ex- 

 istence they could not enjoy, they shook off their " mortal coil" by 

 swallowing a pint of laudanum. An inquest, of course, sat upon the 

 bodies ; and one of those Solons, of which England is so plethoric, 

 ycleped coroners, directed a verdict of self-murder to be returned. 

 The poverty of the deceased was manifest. The unfortunate beings, 

 who had sought a refuge from misery in death, were of no conse- 

 quence either in themselves, or through relatives, however distantly 

 allied ; therefore, was the religious ire of the " twelve good men and 

 true" aroused. Examples must be made to the whole county of De- 

 vonshire and who so fit as paupers ? And then ensued the interesting 

 and highly edifying ceremony of terrifying the male and female old 

 women and little children of the surrounding villages by a burial at 

 midnight. Lanterns, processions, the ding-donging of muffled bells, 

 and all the other rawhead-and-bloodybones absurdities, customary at 

 these detestable exhibitions, were put in requisition. The poor half- 

 bewildered peasantry looked on amazed, during what the Exeter 

 Flying Post calls an imposing ceremony. Imposing it certainly was ; 

 and if the impostors who got up the affair were pitched into the 

 pit they had dug, and left there till morning, it might have cured 

 them of their love of the marvellous. Can any thing more monstrous 

 be conceived than the breaking in upon the quiet habits of a rural 

 population, by the intrusion of those barbarous remains of superstition 

 and brutality ? As for the effect such sights are likely to produce, 

 we apprehend, that it would puzzle the heads of wiser men than 

 Devonshire coroners to define all the good they ever knew result 

 from them. An unhappy clodpole, unable to escape the persecutions 

 of tithe and tax, drowns himself in a ditch ; and the coroner of the 

 district and his satellites pronounce -felo-de-se. A neighbouring 

 squire, in a drunking brawl, over a wine-table or a dice-box, blows 

 his brains out ; and the self same coroner, and the self same myrmi- 

 dons, return a verdict of temporary insanity ; the feelings of re- 

 lations must be respected. The first decision consigns the poor 

 peasant to a midnight interment, accompanied by all the usual would- 

 be-horrors ; while the wealthy man, by the latter decision, is pomp- 

 ously borne, amid his sleek and gloved attendants, with every honour 

 to the family vault. We question if an instance could be adduced 

 of a man of five hundred a year being pronounced a suicide ; but no 

 'one need be at a loss for examples in a country where poverty is 

 punishable as a crime. These are the arbitrations that contribute to 

 make us the envy and admiration of surrounding nations. 



BASHFUL REFULGENCE. We never heard that Winchester was 

 particularly conspicuous for giving the tone to provincials, in ball- 

 room elegancies ; but a circumstance connected with that town has 

 lately occurred that must speedily raise it to deserved celebrity. At 

 one of the recent race assemblies the floor of the apartment, appro- 

 priated to dancing, instead of being chalked, as is customary on 

 such occasions, was covered with fine pink coloured cambric, tightly 

 strained, bearing the arms of the steward, T. C. Chamberlayne, Esq., 



