A Scottish clergyman, whose name is annually to be found in other registers than the almanack, was, one Sunday, in passing through the people assembled in the kirk-yard, addressed by several farmers, his parishioners, requesting him to pray for rain, as both corn and grass were suffering exceedingly. He replied, "I shall do so, to please you; but it is mere nonsense; for there will not be a drop of rain till the change of the moon. The Reverend Johnstone, minister of Monikie, about fifty years ago, was an early riser, and indulged himself by walking in the buryingground, which was then contiguous to the Manse. One fine summer morning, he was taking his walk more early than usual, accompanied by Mrs Johnstone. Some person was to be buried that day, and as the grave-digger wished to attend the fair at Monifeith, some miles distant, he had risen very early to dig the grave, which was nearly finished by the time that the minister and his lady came to their promenade. The morning being warm, the sexton had stripped to the shirt, and from his stooping position, and the depth of the grave, was below the level of the ground around him. However, a motion of his body made his white shirt appear above the surface, but it was only for a moment, when it again vanished. It had caught the minister's eye; he started, and exclaimed, "Good God! my dear! I see a ghost!" This being distinctly heard by the grave-digger, he started up, calling out, "Eh! where is it, Sir?" His sudden appearance rather increased the panic, which it was some time before reason could dissipate. A worthy clergyman of my acquaintance was assisting his servant in taking home the oxen from his glebe. John was loading the cart, the minister throwing up the sheaves with a pitch-fork; and the shock had all been put into the cart except one sheaf, which was beneath the cart-wheel. The minister pulled and tugged till breathless, in fruitless efforts to withdraw this sheaf. Fairly baffled, he called out, "John, you must come down from the cart and assist me; I cannot get this sheaf from VOL. IX. below the wheel!"" O, Sir," re- Many instances have been recorded of clergymen making choice of texts on particular occasions, which, susceptible of a double meaning, have produced strange inferences, and ludicrous remarks. The following circumstance, which came within my own observation, not many years ago, I consider worthy of record, as it may serve for a beacon to clergymen to avoid subjects admitting of mal-à-propos applications. A pious and zealous preacher, with whom I was intimately acquainted, had seen many years pass over his head without finding 66 a patron kind to bless him with a kirk;" his situation being that of assistant minister in a charge where his income was very scanty, and great part of it dependent upon the caprice of his hearers. In this office he continued many years; when at last, by the friendship of a nobleman, he received a presentation to a living at the foot of the Grampians. It was publicly announced when he was to preach his farewell-sermon; the kirk was crowded; I was an auditor, and must acknowledge, that when he read out the 121st psalm, beginning, "I to the hills will lift mine eyes, From whence doth come mine aid. " I could not avoid noticing the double entendre of which these were susceptible, when applied to him who had just uttered them; and looking up, I observed a smile on all sides of me. I afterwards heard more than one of his auditors affirm, that the psalm had been chosen for the express purpose of alluding to the prosperous change in his situation. This, I am convinced, was not the case; the preacher was, and still is, a man of too much unaffected piety to apply the language of inspiration in this manner; and I most thoroughly believe, it was one of these strange coincidences which sometimes happen; and that, could he have an 3 L ticipated the interpretation which forced itself upon his best friends, the blunder would have been avoided. The late Reverend J. Murray, of Newcastle, author of Sermons to Doctors of Divinity, &c., used to relate the following anecdote of an old woman, a member of his congregation. She had been in the practice of coming to him very often, under the pretence of wishing to hold religious conversation, or of seeking spiritual advice; but rather, in his opinion, for the purpose of having the unction of flattery applied to her spiritual pride. One day, she waited upon him with a graver face and more serious deportment than usual, and after much circumlocution, said, that she was in great distress of mind. "What is the matter, Janet ?" said her pastor." Oh, Sir! I cannot be satisfied with myself! I am a barren tree-a dead branch, only fit to be hewn down." She then went on to enumerate, at great length, the various duties of faith and practice, which, like the young man in the gospel, she had endeavoured to perform from her youth up; and concluded by saying "but still I fear there is something wrong, and that I am far from the kingdom of heaven!" "With so much orthodox faith, adorned by such uniform purity of practice, what makes you think so?" replied Mr M.-" Oh, Sir! I am afraid that I am only a hypocrite!" said she. "Indeed, Janet, that is my fear too; for I have thought you that these seven years!" said the minister. Janet departed in great wrath, and never returned to seek either advice or consolation. I have heard the Reverend John A relate the two following anecdotes. He died a few years ago, having been incumbent of the populous parish of St V-for about half a century. There is a fishing village in the parish, the inhabitants of which, about the commencement of his incumbency, were very illiterate. In the course of his annual diets of examination, he was catechising a man whom he knew to be tolerably shrewd in worldly affairs; but who could not, or would not, answer one question put to him by the minister. This ignorance elicited a severe reprimand, and accusations of carelessness, as Mr A. said, he was convinced it did not proceed from want of capacity. The fisherman heard him patiently, and when he had finished, said, “Now, Sir, you've speered mony questions at me, will ye let me speer ane at you?" "O certainly, John."-" Weel, Sir, how mony hooks will it tak' to bait a fifteen score haddock line?”→ "Really, John, I cannot answer you; that is quite out of my way.”— "Weel, Sir, you should na be sae hard upo' poor fowk-you to your trade, an' me to mine!" When Mr A. was considerably advanced in life, being in Edinburgh at the General Assembly, he took the opportunity of consulting the late Dr Cullen for an occasional deafness, which troubled him. The Doctor having made the necessary inquiries, and duly considered the case, wrote a prescription, which he gave to Mr A., who, in return, tendered a fee. "I thank you, Sir," said Dr C., "but I have long made it a rule, never to accept a fee for advice to a country clergyman-he cannot afford it, Sir."" Perhaps there are many who cannot," said Mr A., "but I can; for my living is good, and I have no family."-" What! are you a bachelor?" cried Dr C. "I am," replied Mr A.-" Now, why did you not tell me so at first? -it would have saved much trouble," said the facetious Doctor. "Destroy the prescription I have given you. Go home, and get married as fast as possible; and I hazard my reputation, that in a month after, you shall hear on the deafest side of your head!" A clergyman, about to be translated to another charge, when making his valedictory visit among his parishioners, entered a farm-house, and was most courteously received by Margaret, in the absence of her hus band. She expressed her most unfeigned regret at his departure, and paid him many compliments on his orthodoxy, or, as she expressed it, his sound gospel, and also for his zeal and unremitted diligence in feeding his flock concluding her compliments by saying, that she had only one objection to him as a minister. And will you have the goodness to 66 report was treated with ridicule by the Maltese faculty, and with merriment by the populace. However, in a few days, symptoms of sickness exhibited themselves in the house of a person who had recently received some leather from the Levant. This man's child was taken ill, and died suddenly. His wife shared the same fate: and, after having been carried to the quarantine hospital, or lazaretto, he, too, fell a sacrifice to the unknown disease. state that objection?" said the clergyman. "A'deed, Sir," said she, simpering, there's mony ane in your parish, that's no sae weel beuk leared as me, and you make use of mony kittle words that they canna understand."—"I must say I am surprised at that charge, Margaret," replied the preacher, for I have made it my study to preach in such language as any person of ordinary capacity might readily comprehend."-"Now, "The dissolution of this family creathere's you at your crank language ted for some time an alarm, which again, Sir!" cried Margaret: wavered between hope and fear, till, all pacity and comprehend! wha but at once, the pestilence burst forth in vascholars can ken words like thae?" rious parts of the town. Amusements instantly ceased-places of public worship were shut up ;-for it was confidently asserted, that infected persons 66 ca ANTÓNIA, A POEM, WITH NOTES, having gone thither, communicated the DESCRIPTIVE OF THE PLAGUE IN We regret to learn that this modest little performance has not met with that success which has often crowned the exertions of inferior versifiers, and to which we think it has no mean or subordinate claims. It is obviously the attempt of an unpractised hand; but it nevertheless bears marks of strong feeling, of deep sympathy with human suffering, and of a valuable talent for judicious observation. The author has a vigorous sense of the beauties of poetry, possesses considerable powers of poetical expression, and gives satisfactory promise of future and higher excellence. As we have seen no authentic account of the plague which raged in Malta in 1813, and which proved so destructive, we extract the following highly interesting Note, descriptive of that terrible visitation, and which Mr Young has appended to his Tale. To preserve the consecutiveness of the narrative, we have omitted the interspersed quotations from the poem. "Having been in Malta in the year 1813, during the prevalence of the plague in that island, and having seen no description of its ravages since my arrival in this country, I am induced to give a brief account of its appearance, progress, and termination. "About the beginning of May, 1813, a rumour was propagated that the plague had made its appearance in the city of La-Valette, the capital of Malta. This evil to the multitude, and thereby conduced to its general diffusion. "The unusual heat of the sun at this time, joined with the want of sea breezes, rendered La-Valette so intolerably dis agreeable, that many of the higher orders suddenly departed into the interior of the island; but, notwithstanding all their precautions, they carried the plague along with them. In the early stages of its progress, the victims of this disease lingered about a week before they expired; but now it became so virulent, that a man fell lifeless in the street! People observed him stagger, reel round, and sink in conhim :-life was dear to all-and there was vulsions, but none would venture near no power to compel them. Persuasion was used in vain; for it was immediately retorted-Go yourself! One might as well ask them to rouse a lion from his slumber, as to bear the victim to his grave. "Prohibitory orders were now issued, forbidding all persons to appear in the streets, with the exception of those who had passports from the Governor, or the Board of Health. The consequence of this necessary precaution seemed to be, that the disease abated considerably, and very nearly ceased to exist. But while the rigour of quarantine was relaxing, and the intercourse of business renewing, the plague suddenly reappeared. This was owing to the reprehensible avarice of mercenary individuals, who had been em. ployed to burn the furniture, clothes, &c. belonging to infected houses, but who, instead of effectually performing their duty, had secreted some articles of value, and some wearing apparel, which they now sold to needy people, who, ignorant of the consequence, strutted in the splendid garb of pestilence to a nameless grave. "The plague now raged with accumulated horrors; and the lazaretto being insufficient to contain one half of the sick, who were daily crowding in, temporary hospitals were, at a very great expence, erected outside of the town. Indeed no expence was spared to overcome the evil. But the manifest incapacity of the native doctors, or rather quacks, was worthy of their cowardice. They were wofully deficient in anatomy, and never had any distinct idea of symptom, cause, or effect. Their knowledge extended no farther than common-place medicine, and herbs-to the use and application of which, old women, in all countries, have equal pretensions. These unfeeling quacks could never be prevailed upon to approach within three yards of any patient whom they visited. They carried an opera glass, with which they examined the diseased person in a hurried manner, being always ready to make their escape if any one approached near enough to touch them. I witnessed a ludicrous proof of their selfish terror, while the plague was under the same roof with myself. While a quack was looking in the above manner at the attendant upon the person infected, and enquiring how he felt, &c. &c. the sick man walked up to the quack, and exhibited the part affected. The charlatan, not being aware of this, felt so confounded on perceiving him so near, that, in his anxiety to gain the door, he actually pushed the infected man from him, and hurried away! It is but justice to except from this character of the Maltese faculty one gentleman, who, having tra velled on the continent of Europe, had made himself master of the various branches of his profession: but I am sorry to add, that he fell a sacrifice to his humanity in behalf of his country men. "About the middle of summer, the plague became so deadly, that the number of its victims increased to an alarming degree, from fifty to seventy-five daily. The number falling sick was equal, indeed greater. Such was the printed report of the Board of Health: but the real extent of the calamity was not known; for people had such dreadful apprehensions of the plague-hospitals, whither every person was carried along with the sick from the infected houses, that they actu ally denied the existence of the disease in their families, and buried its victims in the house or garden. These were horrible moments! Other miseries of mankind bear no parallel to the calamities of the plague. The sympathy which relatives feel for the wounded and the dying, in battle, is but the shadow of that heart rending affliction inspired by the ravages of pestilence. In the first, the scene is far removed; and were it even present to the view, the comparison fades. Conceive in the same house, the beholder, the sickening, and the dying: to help is dreadful! and to refuse assistance is unnatural! It is like the shipwrecked mariner trying to rescue his drowning companion, and sinking with him into the same oblivious grave! Indeed, the better feelings of the heart were quenched by this appalling evil; and the natives who ventured to remove the sick and the dead, shared their fate in such numbers, that great apprehensions were entertained, lest, in a short time, none would be found to perform this melancholy office-but Grecians came-a death-determined band, clad in oiled leather, these daring and "The ignorance of the native faculty was now assisted by the arrival of reputed plague-doctors from Smyrna. These strangers excited great interest; and treated the malady with unbecoming contempt. They related the vehemence of pestilence in their country, where it was nothing unusual, when the morning arose, to find from one to three or four hundred persons in the streets and fields, stretched in the dewy air of death!— That the promptitude of the people was commensurate with the evil; for whereever a corpse was found, two men unbound their sashes, rolled them round the head and feet of the body, and hurried with it to the grave. However, they seemed to have left their knowledge at home; for though their indifference was astonishing, and their intrepidity most praise-worthy-entering into the vilest and most forbidding places-handling the sick, the dying, and the dead-the nature of this disease completely baffled their exertions, and defied their skill. "The casals or villages of Birchircarra, Zebbuge, and Curmi, suffered lamentably; the last most severely, on account of its moist situation. The work of death was familiar to all: and black-covered vehicles, to which the number of victims made it necessary to have recourse, rendered the evil still more ghastly. Large pits had been previously scooped out, and thither the dead were conveyed at night, and tumbled in from these vehicles, in the same manner as in this country rubbish is thrown from carts. The silence of day was not less dreary than the dark parade of night. That silence was now and then broken by the dismal cry for the "Dead!" as the unhallowed bier passed along the streets, preceded and followed by guards. The miseries of disease contributed to bring on the horrors of famine! The island is very populous, and cannot support itself. Trade was at a stand-the bays were forsaken—and strangers, appearing off the harbour, on perceiving the yellow flag of quarantine, paused a-while, and raised our expectations only to depress our feelings more bitterly by their departure. "Sicily is the parent granary of Malta, but, though the Sicilians had provisions on board their boats ready to come over, on hearing of the plague they absolutely refused to put to sea. The British commodore in Syracuse was not to be trifled with in this manner, and left it to their choice, either to go to Malta, or to the bottom of the deep. They preferred the former; but, on their arrival at home, neither solicitation nor threat could induce their return. In this forlorn state, the Moors generously offered their services, and supplied the isle with provisions, which were publicly distributed; but the extreme insolence and brutality of the creatures employed in that office, very often tended to make the hungry loathe that food which, a moment before, they craved to eat. "In autumn the plague unexpectedly declined, and business began partly to revive. But every face betrayed a misgiv. ing lest it should return as formerly. People felt as sailors do on the sudden cessation of a storm, when the wind changes to the opposite point of the compass, only to blow with redoubled fury. Their conjecture was but too well founded. The plague returned a third time, from a more melancholy cause than formerly. Two men, who must have known themselves to be infected, sold bread in the streets-the poor starving inhabitants bought it, and caught the infection. One of these scoundrels fell a victim to the disease, the other fled; but his career was short-the quarantine guard shot him in his endeavour to escape. This guard was composed of natives, who paraded the streets, having power to take up any person found abroad without a passport. "Fancy may conjure up a thousand 66 horrors, but there is one scene, which, when imagination keeps within the verge of probability, it will not be easy to sur pass. About three hundred of the convalescent were conveyed to a temporary lazaretto, or ruinous building, in the vicinity of Fort Angelo. Thither some more were taken afterwards-but it was like touching gunpowder with lightning-infection spread from the last, and such a scene ensued, as even imagination fears to trace." The catastrophe of the black hole at Calcutta bears no comparison to this: there, it was suffocation-here, it was the blasting breath of pestilence !the living-the dying—and the dead, huddled together in one putrescent grave! Curses, prayers, and delirium, mingled in one groan of horror, till the shuddering hand of death hushed the agonies of na ture ! "A singular calamity befel one of the holy Brotherhood. His maid-servant having gone to draw some water, did not return. The priest felt uneasy at her long absence, and, calling her in vain, went to the draw-well in quest of her-she was drowned! He laid hold of the rope with the intention of helping her-and in that act was found, standing in the calm serenity of death! "The plague usually attacked the sufferer with giddiness and want of appetite apathy ensued. An abscess formed under each arm-pit, and one on the groin. It was the practice to dissipate these; and if that could be done, the patient survived; if not, the abscesses grew of a livid colour, and suppurated. Then was the critical moment-of life or dissolution. "The rains of December, and the cold breezes of January, dispelled the remains of the plague in La-Valette: but it existed for some months longer in the villages. The disease, which was supposed to have originated from putrid vegetables, and other matter, peculiarly affected the natives. There were only twelve deaths of British residents during its existence in the island; and these deaths were ascertained to have followed from other and indubitable causes. Cleanliness was found to be the best preventive against the power of the disease, the ravages of which were greater in the abodes of poverty and wretchedness. Every precaution was wisely taken by the former, and by the present Governor. The soldiers were every morning lightly moistened with oil, which proceeded in constant exhalation from the heat of their bodies, and thereby prevented the possibility of the contagion affecting them. Tobacco was profusely smoked, and burnt in the dwellings of the inhabitants, who, during the pro |
