O Nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve when all the woods are still,
Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill,
While the jolly hours lead on propitious May.
Thy liquid notes that close the eve of day,
First heard before the shallow Cuckoo's bill,
Portend success in love: O, if Jove's will
Have linked that amorous power to thy soft lay,
Now timely sing, ere the rude bird of hate

Foretell my hopeless doom in some grove nigh:
As thou from year to year hast sung too late
For my relief, yet hadst no reason why:

Whether the Muse or Love call thee his mate,

Both them I serve, and of their train am I.-MILTON.

From the time of Homer* to the present day, the poets have ever considered the Nightingale as a melancholy fowl, and the tragic fable of Philomela still continues to be associated with this bird. Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, all concur in describing the Nightingale's strains as fraught with melancholy. One instance from the latter will suffice:

On thee, who build'st thy tuneful seat
Protected by the leafy groves, I call,
O Nightingale! thy accents ever sweet,
Their murmuring, melancholy, fall

Prolong; O come, and with thy plaintive strain
Aid me to utter my distress!

May 16. St. Brendan.

pomucen, M.

St. Ubaldus. St. John Nu-
St. Abdjesus.

FLORA. The Lurid Iris Iris lurida, the Gentianleaved Speedwell Veronica gentianoides, and the Silver Weed Potentilla argentea, are now in flower.

The Vernal Flora is now in her richest beauty, and every hour adds fresh blooms to the garish day.

Spring Song.

Now returns the blooming Spring,
Flora treads the smiling plain,

Zephyrus with musky wing

Fans the flowery mead again.

Primrose pale and Violet blue,
Scented Woodbine, Lily fair,
Muskrose bathed in morning dew,
With rich odours fill the air.

* Od. T. 518.

Meadows fresh with Daisies trim,
Shady banks with Harebell blue,
Groves where birds are carolling,
Towering Pines where Turtles coo.
To you I dedicate my hours,

Lovely May; then grant to me
To kiss thee, drest in all thy flowers,
Neath the shade of yonder tree.

URANIA. - The Planets. In giving our readers directions for finding the fixed Stars, we are obliged to omit the Planets, as the latter are constantly changing place; we recommend, therefore, the use of an almanack yearly, that this branch may not be neglected. The following was found in MS. wafered into Ferguson's Astronomy.

"To assist the mind in framing a conception of the magnitude and relative distances of the primary Planets, let us have recourse to the following method. The dome of St. Paul's is 145 feet in diameter. Suppose a globe of this size to represent the Sun; then a globe of 9 inches will represent Mercury; one of 17 inches, Venus; one of 18 inches, the Earth; one of 5 inches diameter, the Moon (whose distance from the Earth is 240,000 miles); one of 10 inches, Mars; one of 15 feet, Jupiter; and one of 11 feet, Saturn, with his ring four feet broad, and at the same distance from his body all around.

In this proportion, suppose the Sun to be at St. Paul's,
Then Mercury might be at the Tower of London,

? Venus at St. James's Palace,

The Earth at Marybone,

Mars at Kensington,

Jupiter at Hampton Court,

↳ Saturn at Clifden;

all moving round the cupola of St. Paul's as their common centre."-MS. found in Ferguson's Astronomy.

May 17. St. Pascal Baylon. St. Possidius. St. Silan. St. Maw. St. Cathan. St. Madan.

FLORA.--The COMMON PEONY Paeonia officinalis, and the Peregrine Peony Poconia peregrina, flower about this time; the former being a few days the earliest. The Slenderleaved Peony is going out of flower, and the Monkey Poppy in full bloom. The complete Catalogue of Vernal Flora will be found under May 24 of this Calendar. Contrasted to the glowing crimson of the two above flowers, we may consider the brilliant light red flowers of the Monkey Poppy Papaver Orientale which now begins to blow.

When the weather be fine, this is a most delightful time

of year, and people like, if possible, to spend their time in the country; though, owing to the bad manners of modern. times, the Spring season, as it is called, is hardly over in Paris and London.

We are reminded by Virgil, in his Georgics, of the delights and advantages of a country life, in the following lines:

O fortunatos nimiùm, sua si bona nôrint,
Agricolas! quibus ipsa, procùl discordibus armis,
Fundit humo facilem victum justissima tellus.
Si non ingentem foribus domus alta superbis
Mane salutantum totis vomit aedibus undam ;
Nec varios inhiant pulchrâ testudine postes,
Illusasque auro vestes, Ephyreïaque aera;
Alba neque Assyrio fucatur lana veneno,
Nec casiâ liquidi corrumpitur usus olivi.
At secura quies, et nescia fallere vita,
Dives opum variarum; et latis otia fundis,
Speluncae, vivique lacus; at frigida Tempe,
Mugitusque boum, mollesque sub arbore somni
Non absunt. Illic saltus, ac lustra ferarum,
Et patiens operum parvoque assueta juventus,
Sacra deùm, sanctique patres; extrema per illos
Justitia excedens terris vestigia fecit.-Geor. ii. 470.

Thus also Menander: :

Αγρον ευσεβεστερον γεωργείν ουδένα

Οίμαι φερει γαρ όσα θεοις ανθη καλα,

Κίττον, δάφνην κριθας τ', εαν σπείρω, πάνυ
Δικαιος αποδίδωσ ̓, ὅσας αν καταβαλω.

May 18. SS. Theodotus, &c. MM. St. Eric. St. Venantius, M. St. Potamon, M.

FLORA. The WALL HAWKWEED Hieracium murorum may now be found in flower on dry banks, and sometimes on old walls. This plant grows large in Sussex, and is observed to flower again in Autumn. About the same time, the Mouse Ear Hawkweed H. Pilosella becomes common, and lasts all the Summer.

We resume some remarks on the antiquities of the Moveable Feasts:

Whit Monday. This day and Whit Tuesday are observed as festivals, for the same reason as Monday and Tuesday in Easter. Their religious character, however, is almost obsolete, and they are now kept as holidays, in which the lower classes still pursue their favourite diversions. The Whitsun Ales, and other customs formerly observed at this season, are now obsolete.

On Whitsuntide, by Kirke White.
Hark, how merrily, from distant tower,
Ring round the village bells; now on the gale
They rise with gradual swell, distinct and loud;
Anon they die upon the pensive ear,
Melting in faintest music. They bespeak
A day of jubilee, and oft they bear,
Commixt along the unfrequented shore,
The sound of village dance and tabor loud,
Startling the musing ear of solitude.

Such is the jocund wake of Whitsuntide,
When happy superstition, gabbling eld,
Holds her unhurtful gambols. All the day
The rustic revellers ply the mazy dance
On the smooth shaven green, and then at eve
Commence the harmless rites and auguries;
And many a tale of ancient days goes round.
They tell of wizard seer, whose potent spells
Could hold in dreadful thrall the labouring moon,
Or draw the fixed stars from their eminence,
And still the midnight tempest; then, anon,
Tell of uncharnelled spectres, seen to glide
Along the lone wood's unfrequented path,
Startling the nighted traveller; while the sound
Of undistinguished murmurs, heard to come
From the dark centre of the deepening glen,
Struck on his frozen ear.

A superstitious notion appears anciently to have prevailed in England, that "whatsoever one did ask of God upon Whitsunday morning, at the instant when the sun arose and played, God would grant it him." See Arise Evans's "Echo to the Voice from Heaven; or, a Narration of his Life," 8vo. Lond. 1652, p. 9. He says, " he went up a hill to see the sun arise betimes on Whitsunday morning, and saw it at its rising" skip, play, dance, and turn about like a wheel."

"At Kidlington, in Oxfordshire, the custom is, that, on Monday after Whitson Week, there is a fat live lamb provided; and the maids of the town, having their thumbs tied behind them, run after it, and she that with her mouth takes and holds the lamb, is declared Lady of the Lamb; which being dressed, with the skin hanging on, is carried on a long pole before the lady and her companions to the green, attended with music, and a Morisco dance of men, and another of women, where the rest of the day is spent in dancing, mirth, and merry glee. The next day the lamb is part baked, boiled, and roast, for the Lady's Feast, where she sits majestically at the upper end of the table, and her companions with her, with music and other attendants, which ends the solemnity." Beckwith's edition of Blount's Jocular Tenures, p. 281.

The following lines on Whitsunday occur in Barnaby Googe's translation of Naogeorgus:

On Whitsunday whyte pigeons tame in strings from heaven flie, And one that framed is of wood still hangeth in the skie. Thou seest how they with idols play, and teach the people so; None otherwise then little gyrles with puppets use to do.-fo. 53. b. Poor Robin, in his Almanack for May 1757, has some homely lines illustrative of the amusements at this

season:

The term goes out, and must give way
To the pleasant time of Whitsunday;
When men and maids, to take the air,
To Highgate or Hyde Park repair.
Some who are wise, or otherwise,
Go down to Hampstead or Belsize *;
Some handsome girl picks up a spark,
And walks into St. James's Park;

Some in Moorfields, some on Tower Hill;
And let the rest go where they will.

May 19. St. Peter Celestine, P. C. St. Prudentiana, V. St. Dunstan, B. C.

Sol in Gemini-Rom. Cal.

CHRONOLOGY.-Battle of La Hogue in 1692. Anne Bullein beheaded

in 1536.

St. Dunstan was born at Glastonbury, and took on the monastic habit by the advice of Elphegus the Bold, Bishop of Winchester. He constructed a cell at his native place, and led a devout life of austerities, beguiling the intervals of devotion by bodily labour, which he considered as a part of penance, and which he directed to making crosses, beads, and other holy emblems. He spent a year in exile in Flanders, and became Archbishop of Canterbury. In this capacity he obliged King Edgar to do penance for the seduction of a Vestal Virgin, by founding a nunnery, which the King complied with, and founded the Nunnery at Shaftesbury. St. Dunstan continued in the Archiepiscopal See of Canterbury till he died in 988, in the 64th year of his age. The following whimsical legend relating to this Saint is extracted from the Morning Chronicle, July 19,

* Belsize House at Hampstead was formerly a place of considerable notoriety for public diversions. It was open for the entertainment of gentlemen and ladies during the whole Summer season, with dancing. An advertisement in one of the papers of the day says, "The park, wilderness, and garden, are wonderfully improved, and filled with variety of birds, which compose a most melodious and delightful harmony."