sition; and which, though much in the manner of the verses that were printed under the illustrations of his own Pilgrim's Progress, when that work was first adorned with cuts, (verses worthy of such embellishments,) are very much worse than even the worst of those. Indeed, it would not be possible to find specimens of more miserable doggerel.

Here is one of the Tinker's tetrasticks, penned in the margin, beside the account of Gardiner's death :

"The blood, the blood that he did shed

Is falling one his one head;
And dredfull it is for to see

The beginers of his misere."

One of the signatures bears the date of 1662; but the verses must undoubtedly have been some years earlier, before the publication of his first tract. These curious inscriptions must have been Bunyan's first attempts in verse he had, no doubt, found difficulty enough in tinkering them to make him proud of his work when it was done; otherwise, he would not have written them in a book which was the most valuable of all his goods and chattels. In later days, he seems to have taken this book for his art of poetry. His verses are something below the pitch of Sternhold and Hopkins. But if he learnt there to make bad verses, he entered fully into the spirit of its better parts, and received that spirit into as resolute a heart as ever beat in a martyr's

bosom.*

*Southey's Life of John Bunyan, reprinted in Murray's Colonial and Home Library.

LITERARY LOCALITIES.

I once

LEIGH HUNT pleasantly says:-"I can no more pass through Westminster, without thinking of Milton; or the Borough, without thinking of Chaucer and Shakspeare; or Gray's Inn, without calling Bacon to mind; or Bloomsbury-square, without Steele and Akenside; than I can prefer brick and mortar to wit and poetry, or not see a beauty upon it beyond architecture in the splendour of the recollection. had duties to perform which kept me out late at night, and severely taxed my health and spirits. My path lay through a neighbourhood in which Dryden lived, and though nothing could be more common-place, and I used to be tired to the heart and soul of me, I never hesitated to go a little out of the way, purely that I might pass through Gerard-street, and so give myself the shadow of a pleasant thought."

CREED OF LORD BOLINGBROKE.

LORD BROUGHAM says:-"The dreadful malady under which Bolingbroke long lingered, and at length sunk -a cancer in the face-he bore with exemplary fortitude, a fortitude drawn from the natural resources of his vigorous mind, and unhappily not aided by the consolations of any religion; for, having early cast off the belief in revelation, he had substituted in its stead a dark and gloomy naturalism, which even rejected those glimmerings of hope as to futurity not untasted by the wiser of the heathens."

Lord Chesterfield, in one of his letters, lately published by Lord Mahon, (ii. 450,) says that Bolingbroke only doubted, and by no means rejected, a future state.

BUNYAN'S PREACHING.

It is said that Owen, the divine, greatly admired Bunyan's preaching; and that, being asked by Charles II. "how a learned man such as he could sit and listen to an itinerant tinker ?" he replied: "May it please your Majesty, could I possess that tinker's abilities for preaching, I would most gladly relinquish all my learning."

HONE'S "EVERY-DAY BOOK."

THIS popular work was commenced by its author after he had renounced political satire for the more peaceful study of the antiquities of our country. The publication was issued in weekly sheets, and extended through two years, 1824 and 1825. It was very successful, the weekly sale being from 20,000 to 30,000 copies.

In 1830, Mr. Southey gave the following tribute to the merits of the work, which it is pleasurable to record; as these two writers, from their antipodean politics, had not been accustomed to regard each other's productions with any favour. In closing his Life of John Bunyan, Mr. Southey says:

"In one of the volumes, collected from various quarters, which were sent to me for this purpose, I observe the name of William Hone, and notice it that I may take the opportunity of recommending his Every-day

Book and Table Book to those who are interested in the preservation of our national and local customs. By these curious publications, their compiler has rendered good service in an important department of literature; and he may render yet more, if he obtain the encouragement which he well deserves."

BUNYAN'S ESCAPES.

BUNYAN had some providential escapes during his early life. Once, he fell into a creek of the sea, once out of a boat into the river Ouse, near Bedford, and each time he was narrowly saved from drowning. One day, an adder crossed his path. He stunned it with a stick, then forced open its mouth with a stick and plucked out the tongue, which he supposed to be the sting, with his fingers; "by which. act," he says, "had not God been merciful unto me, I might, by my desperateness, have brought myself to an end." If this, indeed, were an adder, and not a harmless snake, his escape from the fangs was more remarkable than he himself was aware of. A circumstance, which was likely to impress him more deeply, occurred in the eighteenth year of his age, when, being a soldier in the Parliament's army, he was drawn out to go to the siege of Leicester, in 1645. One of the same company wished to go in his stead; Bunyan consented to exchange with him, and this volunteer substitute, standing sentinel one day at the siege, was shot through the head with a musket-ball. "This risk," Sir Walter Scott observes,

E

was one somewhat resembling the escape of Sir Roger de Coverley, in an action at Worcester, who was saved from the slaughter of that action, by having been absent from the field."-Southey.

DROLLERY SPONTANEOUS.

MORE drolleries are uttered unintentionally than by premeditation. There is no such thing as being "droll to order." One evening a lady said to a small wit, "Come, Mr. tell us a lively anecdote ;" and the

poor fellow was mute the rest of the evening.

"Favour me with your company on Wednesday evening-you are such a lion," said a weak party-giver to a young littérateur. "I thank you," replied the wit, "but, on that evening I am engaged to eat fire at the Countess of and stand upon my head at

ORIGIN OF COWPER'S "JOHN GILPIN." Ir happened one afternoon, in those years when Cowper's accomplished friend, Lady Austen, made a part of his little evening circle, that she observed him sinking into increased dejection; it was her custom, on these occasions, to try all the resources of her sprightly powers for his immediate relief. She told him the story of John Gilpin, (which had been treasured in her memory from her childhood), to dissipate the gloom of the passing hour. Its effects on the fancy of Cowper had the air of enchantment. He informed