84 PASQUE 



? 



MARCH 24. St. Irenaeus, bp. of Sirmium, m. 

 A.D. 304. 

 St. Simon, an infant, martyr, in 1472. 

 St. William of Norwich, martyr, in 1137. 



Obs. Sirmium was formerly capital of Pannonia ; it is now only 

 a Hungarian village. Of this place, formerly of vast importance, 

 St. Irenaeus was bishop, hut he fell a martyr to the persecution of 

 the infamous Dioclesian in the year 304. 



St. William of Xorwich was crucified in sacrilegious derision of 

 Christ by a gang of reprobate Jews in the twelfth year of his age. 

 It seems that the Jews have in several other instances perpetrated 

 similar atrocities in those times, and have even escaped the punish- 

 ment awarded by the law. Butler's Lives, iii. 269. 



St. Simon was an infant, inhumanly sacrificed at Trent by the 

 Jews, some of whom were taken and put to death for the fact. 



Golden Saxifrage Chrysosplenum oppositifolium fl. 



This brilliant Saxifrage is sometimes kept in pots, and made to 

 blow early by being placed in the greenhouse. A light bog earth 

 suits it best, mixed with siones or lime rubbish. 



We mentioned yesterday the prevalence of the hooting and 

 screeching of Owls ; before rain this is particularly observable, as the 

 following lines remind us : 



When the lonlie Owle 



On the chimney howle 

 In the dead of a wintrie niofht : 



The devil doth prowle 



In search of some soule, 

 They say, that is taking its flight. 



But better, I ween. 



Should this bird be seen, 

 ^Vithout brooding on death or slaughter ; 



As a prophet in feathers, 



Of winds and of weathers, 

 Foretelling the falling of water. 



Authol. Bor.et Aust. 



Against the return of fair weather after rainy, Virgil observes, 



Nequidquam seros exercet noctua cautus. 



Geor. lib. i. 

 6 



