the manor of Turpull [Broadwater, Devonshire] which belonged to her first husband John de Camois, this extraordinary grant to Painel was pleaded in bar, in consequence of which she lost her suit, it being determined that "she had no right to dower from thence." The venerable historian Camden mentioning this circumstance says "I confess myself ashamed to mention this; but I see Pope Gregory was not mistaken when he wrote to Lanfranc, archbishop of canterbury, that "he learned there were certain persons in Scotland, that not only forsook, but sold their wives; whereas in England they gave and granted them away." So much for the virtues of our ancestors, and the simplicity and innocence of good folks "in the olden time."

BINGLEY'S MOUSE.

Of the numerous works which, within the last two years, have fallen from the British press, few have been more read, few. are more calculated to excite interest and convey important information, than Bingly's Memoirs of British Quadrupeds. We purpose, therefore to diverify the matter of the Mirror with occasional selections from them. For the present num ber we extract some amusing anecdotes of a little harvest mouse which Mr. B. had in his possession for two years. It must first be observed that these mice, which are of a bright chesnut colour, and so small as seldom to be more than about the sixth of an ounce in weight, are hitherto unknown in any other parts of England than the counties of Hants, Dorset, Wilts, and Sussex.

"About the middle of September, 1804 (says Mr. Bingley) I had a female harvest mouse given to me by Mrs. Campbell, of Chewton House, Hants, it had been put into a dormouse cage, immediately when caught, and a few days afterwards produced eight young ones. I entertained some hopes that the little animal would have nursed these, and brought them up; but having been disturbed in her removal, about four miles, from the country she began to destroy them, and I took them from her. The young ones at the time I received them (not more than two or

three days old,) must have been at least equal in weight to the mother.

"After they were removed, she soon became reconciled to her situation; and, when there was no noise, would venture to come out of her hiding place, at the extremity of the cage, and climb about among the wires of the open part before me. In doing this I remarked that her tail was, in some measure, prehensile and that to render her hold the more secure, she generally coiled the extremity of it round one of the wires. The toes of all the feet were particularly long and flexile, and she could grasp the wire very firmly with any of them. She frequently rested on her hind feet, somewhat in the manner of the Jerboa, for the purpose of looking about her; and in this attitude could extend her body at such an angle as at first greatly surprised me. She was a beautiful little animal; and her various attitudes in cleaning her face, head, and body, with her paws, were peculiarly. graceful and elegant.

"For a few days after I received this mouse I neglected to give it any water; but when I afterwards put some into the cage, she lapped it with great cagerness. After lapping, she always raised herself on her hind feet, and cleaned her head with her paws. She continued even to her death exceedingly shy and timid; but whenever I put into the cage any favourite food such as grains of wheat or maize, she would eat them before me. On the least noise or motion, however, she immediately ran off, with the grain in her mouth, to her hiding place.

"One evening, as I was sitting at my writing-desk, and the animal was playing about in the open part of its cage, a large blue fly happened to buzz against the wires. The little creature, although at twice or thrice the distance of her own length from it, sprang along the wires with the greatest agility and would certainly have seized it, had the space betwixt the wires been sufficiently wide to have admitted her teeth or paws to reach it. I was surprised at this occurrence, as I had been led to believe that the harvest mouse was merely a granivorous animal. I caught the fly, and made it buzz in my fingers against the wires. The mouse though usually shy and timid, immediately came out of her hiding-place, and, running to the spot,

seized and devoured it. From this time I fed her with insects, whenever I could get them; and she always preferred them to any other kind of food that I offered her.

"When this mouse was first put into her cage, a piece of fine flannel was folded up in the dark part of it, as a bed, and I put some grass and bran into the large open part. In the course of a few days all the grass was removed; and on examining the cage, I found it very neatly arranged betwixt the folds of the flannel, and rendered more soft by being mixed with the knap of the flannel, which the animal had torn off in considerable quantity for the purpose! The chief part of this operation must have taken place in the night; for although the mouse was generally awake and active during the day time, yet I never once observed it employed in removing the grass.

"On opening its nest about the latter end of October, 1804, I remarked that there were, amongst the grass and wool at the bottom about forty grains of maize. These appeared to have been arranged with some care and regularity; and every grain had the corcule or growing part eaten out, the loves only being left. This seemed so much like an operation induced by the instinctive propensity that some quadrupeds are endowed with, for storing up food for support during the winter months, that I soon afterwards put into the cage about a hundred additional grains of maize. These were all in a short time carried away; and on a second examination, I found them stored up in the manner of the former. But though the animal was well supplied with other food, and particularly with bread, which it seemed very fond of; and although it continued perfectly active through the whole winter, on examining its nest a third time, about the end of November, I observed that the food in its repository was all consumed, except half a dozen grains.

"This interesting little animal died in the month of December, 1806, after a confinement of 2 years. I have some reason to belive that its death was occasioned by water being put into its cage, in a shell picked up on the sea shore, that had been much impregnated with salt,"

ACTORS.

Of the various trades and professions, to which men have recourse, either to gratify their inclinations or to procure a livelihood, there is not one, particularly of those called liberal, more laborious, or wasteful of life, than that of an actor, and more especially a tragedian. To arrive at consummate excellence requires indefatigable study, unwearied practice, and the utmost exertion of the vocal organs; not to mention the violent bodily exercise frequently demanded; and above all, the violent agitation of alternate passions, which, though assumed, are often very deeply felt, and which being deeply felt, must rapidly impair the vigour of the animal spirits, and exhaust the lamp of life. When I see an actor straining himself on the stage, and contemplate the faces of the audience, as they look on with vacant hilarity or stupid apathy portrayed in them, instead of thinking how I shall compose smart things, by the way of showing critical discernment, and parading my wit at the expense of the former, I cannot help saying to myself, what a pity it is that a man of talents should be killing himself in a vain attempt to please or to profit so many logs. And it is quite unfashionable too, to seem pleased or affected; so the gentry in the boxes sit in a kind of stupid pout, while the laugh or the tear is drawn from the unsophisticated frequenters of the pit, and the actors are repaid by a roar of rude mirth from the coarse throats in the gallery. Then I whisper to myself, with Pierre,

"I could hug the greasy rogues--they please me."

These reflections occurred to me to day on reading a list of names of actors who have absolutely fallen victims to their exertions in the service of the public.

It does not require the physical or anatomical skill of an M. D. to understand how intimately the passions and feelings are connected with and affect the bodily frame-how destructive they often prove to health-how fatal even to life itself; and yet without feeling and passion what is a player? "Rules," said Baron, the sublime actor, the Garrick of France, "may teach us not to raise the arms above the head; but if passion carries them there it will be well done;-Passion knows more than Art”

In a French work, entitled " Parnasse Reformé," the author makes MONTFLEURY, one of the greatest tragic as well as comic actors of his time, and who died of his violent exertions in performing Orestes in the Andromache of Racine, utter the following curious soliloquy in the shades. It throws a strong light upon the subject, at the same time that the lamentations it contains are excessively droll, and cast much ridicule, while they convey some severe raillery on the distresses and inconveniences, which tragic actors must feel, often in an extreme degree, more particularly where the actor's constitution is irritable and delicate, in which case the assumption of a variety of characters, not only impairs the health and shortens life, but may have a serious effect upon the mental faculties. The celebrated BoxD felt so exquisitely the character Lusigman in Zara, which he personated, that when Zara, in her turn came to address the old man, she found him absolutely dead in his chair.

"Ah!" says Montfleury in the shades, "how sincerely do I wish that tragedies had never been invented! I might in that case have been yet in a state capable of appearing on the stage; and if I should not have attained the glory of appearing in sublime characters, I should at least have trifled agreeably, and have worked off my spleen in laughing! I have wasted my lungs in the violent emotions of jealousy, love and ambition. A thousand times, have I been obliged to force myself to represent more passions than Le Brun ever painted or conceived. I saw myself frequently obliged to dart terrible glances; to roll my eyes furiously in my head, like a man insane; to frighten others by extravagant grimaces; to display on my countenance the redness of indignation and hatred, and to make the paleness of fear and surprise succeed each other by turns; to express the transports of rage and despair; to bellow like a demoniac; and consequently to stain all parts of my body, to render them fitter to accompany these different expressions. The man then, who would know of what I died, let him not ask if it was of the fever, the dropsy, or the gout; but let him know it was OF THE ANDROMACHE."