Monthly Review of Literature, 



204 



spite of their veils, an I the locks under which they 

 are shut up, they find means to indemnify them- 

 selves for this constraint ; and it is here that we 

 roust see the truth of that maxim, which says 

 " that virtue protects itself, and that good prin- 

 ciples are the best dowry of a female," &c. 



We were amused with the following 

 speaking of Cairo : 



Men in office, says the writer, and the rich, have 

 a kind of amusement, which was in great vogue 

 in Europe during the middle ages, namely, that of 

 buffoons, or professed fools. They often tell their 

 masters very plain truths, &c. I was told the fol- 

 lowing trait of ingenuity in one of these buffoons. 

 This man one day seeing his master cat pillaw, a 

 favourite dish among the Turks, which he would 

 not have dared to touch before the end of the re- 

 past, amused himself meantime with holding over 

 the dish pieces of bread, which he swallowed after 

 they were imbued with the steam of the rice, to 

 shew how desirous he was to have what was left. 

 When the Turk had finished eating, he said to 

 him, in an angry tone, " You have been robbing 

 me of the steam of my dish ; you shall pay me for 

 it ; this pillaw was worth a piaster ; you shall pay 

 me four." " Nothing is more just," answered the 

 buffoon ; " I will pay you immediately for what I 

 have taken from you." He then drew from his 

 purse a Spanish dollar, which he balanced on the 

 top of his finger, and made it ring in the ear of his 

 master. The latter, not knowing what this meant, 

 at length asked, impatiently, when he was to be 

 paid ? " Are you not paid already?" said the buf- 

 foon ; " surely the sound of this dollar is as good 

 as the smell of your rice!" 



The whole volume may be soon read, and 

 it is worth reading. It is singularly well 

 translated by a lady. 



Specimens of Sacred and Serious Poetry, 

 from C/wucer to the present day, by John 

 Johnstone; 1827. This very neat little 

 volume has all the merit a compilation of 

 the kind can have judicious and unhacknied 

 selection. It embraces the whole of Gra- 

 hame's " Sabbath" and Blair's " Grave," as 

 being, we suppose, wholly applicable to his 

 purpose a selection of sacred and serious 

 poetry and neither of them very long ex- 

 tracts, from eighty or ninety poets, fill up the 

 rest of the volume, from Chaucer, the " Prio- 

 ress's Tale," down to some of the more 

 conspicuous poets of the present day among 

 whom we observe, to our surprise, the Secre- 

 tary for Foreign Affairs the merit of the 

 little piece attributed to him, we leave to the 

 compiler, who, perhaps, has read it, and to 



[FEB. 



those who can read it, to discover. To many 

 of the extracts is prefixed a memoir of the 

 author, accompanied with remarks on the 

 genius and character of his writings written 

 generally with sound discrimination. 



The music of the following lines appear to 

 us to be singularly sweet. They are taken 

 from two small volumes of great merit, en- 

 titled the " Harp of Zion,'' and " Songs of 

 Israel," by the late Mr. W. Knox. 



DIRGE OF RACHEL. 



And Rachel lies in Ephrath's land, 

 Beneath her lonely oak of weeping ; 



With mouldering heart, and withering hand, 

 The sleep of death for ever sleeping. 



The Spring comes smiling down the vale, 



The lilies and the roses bringing ; 

 But Rachel never more shall hail 



The flowers that in the world are springing. 



The Summer gives his radiant day, 

 And Jewish dames the dance are treading; 



But Rachel, on her couch of clay, 

 Sleeps all unheeded and unheeding. 



The Autumn's ripening sunbeam shines, 

 And reapers to the field is calling ; 



But Rachel's voice no longer joins 

 The choral song at twilight's falling.' 



The Winter sends his drenching shower, 

 And sweeps his howling blast around her ; 



But earthly storms possess no power 

 To break the slumber that hath bojind her. 



Neither Mr. Knox, nor his poetry, we be- 

 lieve, is much known. He was the son, it 

 seems, of a respectable farmer in Roxburgh- 

 shire. The latter part of his life was em- 

 bittered by that unsteadiness and uncertainty 

 of pursuit, in which a man without any fixed 

 profession is but too apt to become involved, 

 however great may be his talents, and which 

 has too often a pernicious influence in un- 

 settling the social habits of those, who pos- 

 sess more facility of temper than decision and 

 firmness of mind. Knox was of this class 

 a man, of whose faults the best and 

 worst thing that can be said is, they injured 

 no one so deeply as himself. His failings 

 were those of habit his virtues had a deeper 

 root. He died in Edinburgh, in 1 825, after an 

 illness of three days, at the age of thirty-six, 

 affording yet another melancholy lesson of 

 the inefficacy of mere genius to impart 

 either happiness to life, or grace or dignity to 

 character. 



