no 



JSrOTES AND QUEKIES. 



[No. 170. 



generous, and affectionate ; she conceals nothing, 

 and lays. bare her poverty and her wish to marry 

 again. She advertises herself under the form of a 

 pony for sale : 



" For since she has been free by the death of her 

 Late owner, the poor thing has been a scamperer, 

 And has often known the want of a good meal ; 

 For she was highly fed in her old master's lifetime. 

 But he, alas ! sleeps in peace, and peace be to his 



soul. 

 He was a good master and a real gentleman. 

 And left his little trotter to a merciless world : 

 She is gentle by Nature ; but the poor thing's heart 

 Is now breaking ; yet I)y kind treatment she might 

 Be made one of the most valuable and amusing 

 Things in Nature. She is a little foundered, but not 



to hurt 

 Or retard her movements ; she is of some mettle and 

 High spirit, notwithstanding her hard fate, 

 She will even kick if roughly handled. 

 Nor would she suffer a dirty hand to touch her." 



P. 105. 

 Again, she says : 



" I wish I had an only friend. 



To shield me from the winter's blast, 

 For should I live to see another. 



He may cut keener than the last ; 

 And I shall never wish to feel 

 A keener winter than the past." 



P. 288. 

 She complains of a refusal from one to whom 

 she wrote " to beg or solicit ^some bacon," and 

 .eays ; 



" To him she has given, she never did lend. 

 For her plan is to give to the foe or the friend." 



P. 180. 

 Some one, probably Clarke, wrote an anony- 

 mous letter to dissuade her from publishing. This 

 she answers indignantly in prose, concluding : 



" Should he be tempted to write again, let him sign 

 his name, or where a letter may find the kind-hearted 

 creature, who has such a love for Nature. His sting- 

 ing advice was to run down the widow's soul's delight, 

 her dear scraps, which not a block in Nature can 

 suppress." — P. 366. 



Throughout the silliness run veins of feeling, 

 respect for her husband, gratitude for the smallest 

 acts of kindness, and cheerfulness under want. 

 In some lines to a cat, apparently written during 

 her husband's sickness, she says : 



" Now Grimalkin each day on her throne takes a seat, 

 "With a smile on her face when her master can eat ; 

 Bui, alas ! he eats Utile" — P. 309. 



Truly Mary Mackey must have been a good 

 wife and friend, and I hope I may claim some 

 credit for extracting evidence thereof from perhaps 

 the weakest verses ever written. Her own opinion 

 was different, and Is thus expressed in her 



" PuEFACE OR. NO PREFACE. — No preface can be to 

 the Scraps of Nature, for God gave none when He 



formed creation, nor was there ever a book sent into 

 tlie world like the volume of Nature, since the creation 

 of the world, nor ever so bold an undertaking. It has 

 never been seen by any eye, nor corrected by any hand, 

 but the eye and hand of the writer. No volume has 

 more humour," &c. 



G.C.'s copy Is defective. Mine has a portrait 

 of Mrs. Mai-y Mackey, which indicates considerable 

 beauty, despite of very poor drawing and engrav- 

 ing, and the execrable thin curls and short waist 

 of 1809. The " falling tear is visible;" but, had 

 not the authoress told us what It was, it might be 

 taken for a mole or a wart. As the face is per- 

 fectly cheerful, and the " scrap " is headed " Com- 

 pliment to the Engraver," I hazard the con- 

 jecture that he was instructed to add the tear to a 

 miniature painted before she had been compelled 

 to shed tears on her own account. H. B. C. 



U. U. Club. 



MAP OF CEYLON. 



(Vol. vil., p. 65.) 



Your correspondent Ajax asks information of 

 me as to the best, or even a tolerable, map of 

 Ceylon. I am not surprised at the inquiry, as no 

 satisfactory map of that island exists to my know- 

 ledge. It may illustrate this assertion to mention, 

 that in 1849 I travelled through the vast and in- 

 teresting district of Neura Kalawa, to the north of 

 the Kandyan range ; and I carried witli me the 

 map of " India and Ceylon," then published, and 

 since reprinted in 1852, by the Society for the 

 Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. In that map the 

 country I was passing through appears as a large 

 blank, with the words " Unknown mountainous 

 region." JBut I found it abounding in prosperous 

 villages, and tracts of land cultivated both for rice 

 and dry grain. So far from being " unknown," its 

 forests have a numerous though scattered popula- 

 tion ; and as to its being " mountainous," there Is 

 scarcely a hill in the entire " region." There is a 

 meagre map of Ceylon, drawn by George Atkin- 

 son, who was civil engineer and surveyor-general 

 of the colony, and published by Wylde in 1836. 

 It is more correct than others, but sadly deficient 

 in information. 



Mr. Arrowsniith, of Soho Square, published in 

 1845 an admirable map of what is called the Kandy 

 Zone, being the central pnjvlnce of the island, 

 prepared by the Deputy Quarter -Master-General, 

 Colonel Frazer ; assisted by Captain Gallwey and 

 Major Skinner, of the Ceylon Civil Service. 

 Col. Frazer has since placed in Mr. Arrowsmith's 

 hands a map of the entire island : it has not yet 

 appeared; but when published it will be found 

 to be as nearly perfect in its details as any map 

 can be. 



In reply to the inquiry of Ajax as to the pub- 

 lication of my own work on the history and topo- 



