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not there. I then arose, and having mentioned the circumstance to some of my family, caused a memorandum to be made of what I had seen. In the course of the forenoon a person arrived who had gone round with the vessel to the Downs, from whence he had been put ashore the morning before, and saw the ship in full sail. He was the bearer of the letter I had expected from the individual aboard, whose appearance I had witnessed only a few hours previous to its being put into my hands; it of course relieved no apprehension that might have been excited by the recent spectre.

"That the dead are seen no more," said Imlac, "I will not undertake to maintain against the concurrent and unvaried testimony of all ages and of all nations. There is no people, rude or learned, among whom apparitions of the dead are not related and believed. This opinion, which, perhaps, prevails as far as human nature is diffused, could become universal only by its truth; those, that never heard of one another, would never have agreed in a tale which nothing but experience can make credible. That it is doubted by single cavillers can very little weaken the general evidence, and some who deny it with their tongues confess it by their fears."

No man is privileged to impugn_the knowledge of existences which others have derived from their experience; but he who sees, without assenting to realities, audaciously rejects positive proof to himself, where presumptive testimony would be satisfactory to most: he daringly falsifies what he knows to be indubitably true, and secret convictions belie the shameless hardihood of pretended incredulity. These, it is presumed, would be the sentiments of the great author of Rasselas, upon the expression of disbelief in him who had witnessed spectral appearances; and yet the writer of these pages, with a personal knowledge upon the subject, declines to admit that knowledge as good evidence. He would say untruly were he to affirm, that when he saw the corpse-like form, and for some time afterwards, he had no misgivings as to the safety of his friend. It was not until a lapse of six months that the vessel was reported to have touched at a certain port in good condition, and this was followed by a letter from the individual himself, wherein he affirmed his good health; he subsequently wrote, that

he and his family were at the place of their destination. This spectral appear ance therefore at Ludgate-hill, between eight and nine o'clock of the morning on the 30th of January, was no indication of his death, nor would it have been had he died about that time, although the co. incidence of the apparition and his decease would have been remarkable. The case at Carlow only differs from the case at Ludgate-hill by the decease of the lady having been coeval with her spectral appearance to the gentleman who was depressed by her illness. The face which the writer saw looking at him from a closet in the dead of night was no likeness of any one he knew, and he saw each spectre when his faculties had been forced beyond their healthful bearing. Under these circumstances, his eyesignt was not to be trusted, and he refuses to admit it, although the spectres were so extraordinary, and appeared under such circumstances that probably they will never be forgotten.

Coupled with the incidents just related, the death of the king of Naples in January 1825, which was first announced in the "News" Sunday paper on the 16th of the month, recalls the recollection of angular circumstance in the bay of Naples. The fact and the facts preceding it are related by Dr. Southey in his "Life of Nelson." Having spoken of Nelson's attachment to lady Hamilton, and his weariness of the world, Dr. Southey proceeds thus:

"Well had it been for Nelson if he had made no other sacrifices to this unhappy attachment than his peace of mind; but it led to the only blot upon his public character. While he sailed from Palermo, with the intention of collecting his whole force, and keeping off Maretimo, either to receive reinforcements there, if the French were bound upwards, or to hasten to Minorca, if that should be their destination, capt. Foote, in the Seahorse, with the Neapolitan frigates and some small vessels under his command, was left to act with a land force consisting of a few regular troops, of four different nations, and with the armed rabble which cardinal Ruffo called the Christian army. Ilis directions were to cooperate to the utmost of his power with royalists, at whose head Ruffo had been placed, and he had no other instruc tions whatever. Ruffc advancing with

out any plan, but relying upon the enemy's want of numbers, which prevented them from attempting to act upon the offensive, and ready to take advantage of any accident which might occur, approached Naples. Fort St. Elmo, which ommands the town, was wholly garrisond by the French troops; the castles of Uovo and Nuovo, which commanded the anchorage, were chiefly defended by Neapolitan revolutionists, the powerful men among them having taken shelter there. If these castles were taken, the reduction of Fort St. Elmo would be greatly expedited. They were strong places, and there was reason to apprehend that the French fleet might arrive to relieve them. Ruffo proposed to the garrison to capitulate, on condition that their persons and property should be guaranteed, and that they should, at their own option, either be sent to Toulon, or remain at Naples, without being molested either in their persons or families. This capitulation was accepted: it was signed by the cardinal, and the Russian and Turkish commanders; and, lastly, by capt. Foote, as commander of the British force. About six and thirty hours afterwards Nelson arrived in the bay, with a force which had .oined him during his cruise, consisting of seventeen sail of the line, with 1700 troops on board, and the prince royal of Naples in the admiral's ship. A flag of truce was flying on the castles, and on board the Seahorse. Nelson made a signal to annul the treaty; declaring that he would grant rebels no other terms than those of unconditional submission. The cardinal objected to this: nor could all the arguments of Nelson, sir W. Hamilton, and lady Hamilton, who took an active part in the conference, convince bim that a treaty of such a nature, solemnly concluded, could honourably be set aside. He retired at last, silenced by Nelson's authority, but not convinced. Capt. Foote was sent out of the bay; and the garrisons taken out of the castles, under pretence of carrying the treaty into effect, were delivered over as rebels to the vengeance of the Sicilian court.-A Jeplorable transaction! a stain upon the nemory of Nelson, and the honour of England! To palliate it would be in ain; to justify it would be wicked: here is no alternative, for one who will not make himself a participator in guilt, But to record the disgraceful story with borrow and with shame.

"Prince Francesco Caraccioli, a younger branch of one of the noblest Neapolitan families, escaped from one of these castles before it capitulated. He was at the head of the marine, and was nearly seventy years of age, bearing a high character both for professional and personal merit. He had accompanied the court to Sicily; but when the revolutionary government, or Parthenopæan repub lic, as it was called, issued an edict ordering all absent Neapolitans to return, on pain of confiscation of their property he solicited and obtained permission of the king to return, his estates being very great. It is said that the king, when he granted him this permission, warned him not to take any part in politics; expressing, at the same time, his own persuasion that he should recover his kingdom. But neither the king, nor he himself, ought to have imagined that, in such times, a man of such reputation would be permitted to remain inactive; and it soon appeared that Caraccioli was again in command of the navy, and serving under the republic against his late sovereign. The sailors reported that he was forced to act thus: and this was believed, till it was seen that he directed ably the offensive operations of the revolutionists, and did not avail himself of opportunities for escaping when they offered. When the recovery of Naples was evidently near, he applied to cardinal Ruffo, and to the duke of Calvirrano, for protection; expressing his hope, that the few days during which he had been forced to obey the French, would not outweigh forty years of faithful services :-but, perhaps, not receiving such assurances as he wished, and knowing too well the temper of the Sicilian court, he endeavoured to secrete himself, and a price was set upon his head. More unfortunately for others than for himself, he was brought in alive, having been discovered in the disguise of a peasant, and carried one morning on board lord Nelson's ship, with his hands tied behind him.

"Caraccioli was well known to the British officers, and had been ever highly esteemed by all who knew him. Capt. Hardy ordered him immediately to be unbound, and to be treated with all those attentions which he felt due to a man who, when last on board the Foudroyant, had been received as an admiral and a prince. Sir William and lady Hamilton were in the ship; but Nelson, it is affirm

ed, saw no one, except his own officers, during the tragedy which ensued. His own determination was made; and he issued an order to the Neapolitan comnodore, count Thurn, to assemble a court-martial of Neapolitan officers, on board the British flag-ship, proceed immediately to try the prisoner, and report to him, if the charges were proved, what punishment he ought to suffer. These proceedings were as rapid as possible; Caraccioli was brought on board at nine in the forenoon, and the trial began at ten. It lasted two hours; he averred, in his defence, that he acted under compulsion, having been compelled to serve as a common soldier, till he consented to take command of the fleet. This, the apologists of lord Nelson say, he failed in proving. They forget that the possibility of proving it was not allowed him; for he was brought to trial within an hour after he was legally in arrest; and how, in that time, was he to collect his witnesses? He was found guilty, and sentenced to death; and Nelson gave orders that the sentence should be carried into effect that evening, at five o'clock, on Doard the Sicilian frigate La Minerva, by hanging him at the fore-yard-arm till sunset; when the body was to be cut down, and thrown into the sea. Caraccioli requested lieutenant Parkinson, under whose custody he was placed, to intercede with lord Nelson for a second trial,-for this, among other reasons, that count Thurn, who presided at the courtmartial, was notoriously his personal enemy. Nelson made answer, that the prisoner had been fairly tried by the officers of his own country, and he could not interfere forgetting that, if he felt himself justified in ordering the trial and the execution, no human being could ever have questioned the propriety of his interfering on the side of mercy. Carac cioli then entreated that he might be shot. I am an old man, sir,' said he: I .eave no family to lament me, and thereore cannot be supposed to be very anxious about prolonging my life; but the disgrace of being hanged is dreadful to me. When this was repeated to Nelson, he only told the lieutenant, with much agitation, to go and attend his duty. As a last hope, Caraccioli asked the lieutenant, if he thought an application to lady Hamilton would be beneficial? Parkinson went to seek her. She was not to be seen on this occasion,-but she

was present at the execution. She had the most devoted attachment to the Nea. politan court; and the hatred which she felt against those whom she regarded as its enemies, made her, at this time, forget what was due to the character of her sex, as well as of her country. Here, also, a faithful historian is called upon to pronounce a severe and unqualified condemnation of Nelson's conduct. Had he the authority of his Sicilian majesty for proceeding as he did? If so, why was not that authority produced? If not, why were the proceedings hurried on without it? Why was the trial precipitated, so that it was impossible for the prisoner, if he had been innocent, to provide the witnesses who might have proved him so? Why was a second trial refused, when the known animosity of the president of the court against the prisoner was considered? Why was the execution hastened, so as to preclude any appeal for mercy, and render the prerogative of mercy useless?-Doubtless, the British admiral seemed to himself to be acting under a rigid sense of justice; but, to all other persons, it was obvious, that he was influenced by an infatuated attachmenta baneful passion, which destroyed his domestic happiness, and now, in a second instance, stained ineffaceably his public character.

"The body was carried out to a considerable distance, and sunk in the bay, with three double-headed shot, weighing 250 pounds, tied to its legs. Between two and three weeks afterward, when the king was on board the Foudroyant, a Neapolitan fisherman came to the ship, and solemnly declared, that Caraccioli had risen from the bottom of the sea, and was coming, as fast as he could, to Naples, swimming half out of the water. Such an account was listened to like a tale of idle credulity. The day being fair, Nelson, to please the king, stood out to sea; but the ship had not proceeded far before a body was distinctly seen, upright in the water, and approaching them. It was soon recognised to be, indeed, the corpse of Caraccioli, which had risen, and floated, while the great weights attached to the legs kept the body in a position like that of a living man. A fact so extraordinary astonished the king, and perhaps excited some feeling of superstiticus fear, akin to regret. He gave permission for the body to be taken on shore, and receive christian burial."

Persian

Hazel.

3d. St. Genevieve.
Fleur-de-lis. Iris Persica.
4th. St. Titus

Corylus avellana.

Helleborus fœtidus.
Stn. St. Simeon Stylites.

Bearsfoot.

6th. St. Nilammon.
Tortula rigida.

7th. St. Kentigern.

Portugal Laurel. Prunus Lusitanica. 8th. St. Gudula.

The late Dr. Clarke mentions in his Travels," that as he was "one day leaning out of the cabin window, by the side af an officer who was employed in fishing, the corpse of a man, newly sewed in a hammock, started half out of the water, and continued its course, with the current, towards the shore. Nothing could be more horrible: its head and shoulders Screw Moss. were visible, turning first to one side, then to the other, with a solemn and awful movement, as if impressed with some dreadful secret of the deep, which, from Yellow Tremella. Tremella deliquescens. its watery grave, it came upwards to reveal." Dr. Ferriar observes, that "in a certain stage of putrefaction, the bodies of persons which have been immersed in water, rise to the surface, and in deep water are supported in an erect posture, to the terror of uninstructed spectators. Menacing looks and gestures, and even words, are supplied by the affrighted imagination, with infinite facility, and referred to the horrible apparition." This is perfectly natural; and it is easy to imagine the excessive terror of extreme ignorance at such appearances.

January 19.

9th. St. Marciana.

Common Laurel. Prunus Laurocerasus
10th. St. William.
Ulex Europaas.

Gorse.

11th. St. Theodosius. Early Moss. Bryum horæum. 12th. St. Arcadius. Hygrometic Moss. Funaria hygrometica. 13th. St. Veronica. Taxus baccata. 14th. St. Hilary. Barren Strawberry. Fragaria sterilis. 15th. St. Paul the Hermit.

Yew Tree.

Ivy. Hedera helix.

16th. St. Marcellus.

Common Dead Nettle.

reum.

17th. Garden Anemone.

Larnium purpu

hony. Anemone hortensis.

18th. St. Prisca.

Four-toothed Moss. Bryum pellucidum.

Sts. Martha, Maris, Audifax, and Ahachum. St. Canutus. St. Henry. St. Wulstan St. Blaithmaie. St. Lomer. Sts. Martha, Maris, &c. St. Martha was married to St. Maris, and with their sons, Sts. Audifax and Abachum, were put to death under Aurelian (A. D. 270.) Butler says, that their White Dead Nettle. relics were found at Rome, in 1590, one thousand three hundred and twenty years afterwards.

DEDICATION OF FLOWERS.

The monks, or the observers of monkish rules, have compiled a Catalogue of Flowers for each day in the year, and dedicated each flower to a particular saint, on account of its flowering about the time of the saint's festival. Such appropriations re a Floral Directory throughout the fear, and will be inserted under the sucreeding days. Those which belong to this and the eighteen preceding days in January are in the following list:

JANUARY.

1st. St. Faine. NEW YEAR'S DAY. Laurustine. Viburnum Tinus.

2d. St. Macarius.

Groundsel. Senecio vulgaris

19th. St.

THE GARDEN.

ha.
ium album.

In the "Flora Domestica" there is a beautiful quotation from Cowley, in proof that the emperor Dioclesian preferred his garden to a throne:

Methinks I see great Dioclesian walk
In the Salonian garden's noble shade,
Which by his own imperial hands was made

I see him smile, methinks, as he does talk
With the ambassadors, who come in vain
T'entice him to a throne again.
"If I, my friends," said he," should to you
show

All the delights which in these gardens grow,
'Tis likelier far that you with me should stay,
Than 'tis that you should carry me away;
And trust me not, my friends, if, every day,
I walk not here with more delight,
Than ever, after the most happy fight,
In triumph to the capitol I rode,

To thank the gods, and to be thought myself
Imost a god."

To the author of the "Flora Domestica," and to the reader who may not have seen a volume so acceptable to the cultivator of flowers, it would be injustice to extract from its pages without remarking its usefulness, and elegance of composition. Lamenting that "plants often meet with an untimely death from the ignorance of their nurses,' the amiable author "resolved to obtain and to communicate such information as should be requisite for the rearing and preserving a portable garden in pots ;-and henceforward the death of any plant, owing to the carelessness or ignorance of its nurse, shall be brought in at the best as plant slaughter."

The cultivation of plants commences with our infancy. If estranged from it by the pursuits of active life, yet, during a few years' retirement from the "great hum" of a noisy world, we naturally recur to a garden as to an old and cheerful friend whom we had forgotten or neglected, and verify the saying, a man, and twice a child." There is not one of woman born" without a sense of pleasure when he sees buds bursting into leaf; earth yielding green shoots from germs in its warm bosom; white fruitblossoms, tinted with rose-blushes, standing out in clumps from slender branches;

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flowers courting the look by their varied loveliness, and the smell by their delicacy; large juicy apples bowing down the almost tendril-shootswherefrom they miraculously spring; plants of giant growth with mul tiform shrubs beyond, and holly-hocks towering like painted pinnacles from hidden shrines :

Can imagination boast,

'Mid all its gay creation, charms like these? Dr. Forster, the scientific author of a 66 Atmospheric Phenomena," treatise on and other valuable works, has included

numerous useful observations on the wea

ther in his recently published "Perennial Calendar," a volume replete with instruction and entertainment. He observes, in the latter work, that after certain atmospheric appearances on this day in the year 1809," a hard and freezing shower of hail and sleet came with considerable violence from the east, and glazed every thing on which it fell with ice; it incrusted the walls, encased the trees and the garments of people, and even the plumage of birds, so that many rooks and other fowls were found lying on the ground, stiff with an encasement of ice. Such weather," Dr. Forster observes, "has been aptly described by Philips at occurring oftentimes during a norther winter:—

Ere yet the clouds let fall the treasured snow,
Or winds begun through hazy skies to blow,
At evening a keen eastern breeze arose,
And the descending rain unsullied froze.
Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew,
The ruddy morn disclosed at once to view
The face of Nature in a rich disguise,
And brightened every object to my eyes;
For every shrub, and every blade of grass,

And every pointed thorn, seemed wrought in glass,
In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorns show,
While through the ice the crimson berries glow,
The thick-sprung reeds the watery marshes yield
Seem polished lances in a hostile field.

The stag in limpid currents, with surprise,
Sees crystal branches on his forehead rise.

The spreading oak, the beech, and tow'ring pine,
Glaz'd over, in the freezing ether shine.
The frighted birds the rattling branches shun,
That wave and glitter in the distant sun.
When, if a sudden gust of wind arise,
The brittle forest into atoms flies;
The cracking wood beneath the tempest bends,
And in a spangled shower the prospect ends.

"It may be observed, that in both the above descriptions of similar phenomena, the east wind is recorded as bringing up

Philips, Lett. from Copenhagen.

the storm. There is something very re markably unwholesome in east winds, and a change to that quarter often di

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