The Sun.
London, England, 1855-11-08 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Ballads : Romantic, Fantastical, and Humorous.
By William Harrison Ainsworth. G. Routledgo
and Co.
Precisely the very volume we have long wished
for—and to the which we are here enabled at last
to accord the heartiest welcome imaginable. In
this charming little volume will be found collected
together for the first time, we believe, the nume-
rous lyrics scattered through the romances, novels,
tales, and historiettes penned by Harrison Ains-
worth. The musical, comical, pathetic, humorous,
legendary fragments of verso sprinkled up and
down those wondrous stories of gloom, and mys-
tery, and adventure which have built up gradually,
but perceptibly the fabric of our author's reputa-
tion. Here they all are at length strung together
like "gems in one ample coronal. " Fantastical
Ballads" from Old St. Paul's, that grim and
ghastly tale of the fire and plague. " Romantic
Ballads" from Crichton, that most romantic if not
most chivalrous of adventurers. " Legendary
Ballads" from the Flitch of Bacon, that quaintest
memorial of the quaint old Custom of Dunmow.
" Humorous Ballads" from Bookwood, still to our
mind incomparably Mr. Ainsworth's masterpiece,
and from Jack Sheppard, in many respects the
most enthralling and animated of his motley com-
positions. Among these same "Humorous Ballads"
those wonderful slang ditties which are far and
away the very best things ever accomplished in this
most curious branch of our popular literature.
Here they all are at last collected together as they
ought to have been long ago—classified under the
distinctive heads already indicated, and embellished
with eight graceful illustrations from the inex-
haustible fancy of John Gilbert. So—here we may
listen to their strange melodies once more—apart
from the long interruptions of the prose letterpress.
Listen ! It is the old gravedigger chaunting again
to the clank of his greasy mattock and spade—
The Carrion Crow's a sexton bold,
He raketh the dead from out the mould;
He delveth the ground like a miser old,
Stealthily hiding his store of gold.
Caw I Cilo
The Carrion Crow bath a coat of black,
Silky and sleek, like a priest's to his back
Like a lawyer he grubbeth—no matter what way—
The fouler the offal, the richer his prey.
C WI Caw! the Carrion Craw /
Dig/ Dig 1 in the ground below 1
Or, hark ! again—lt is Manger the headsman
croaking to the whir I of the wheel, sharpening
the edge of his axe—
" Salisbury's Countess, she would not die
As a proud dame should—decorously.
Lifting my axe, I split her skull,
And the edge for a month it was notched and dull.
Whir—whir—whir--whir !"
Again I—lt is the witch-howl---
At the foot of the gibbet the mandrake springs
Just where the croaking carcase swings ;
Some have thought it engendered
From the fat that drops from the bones of the dead;
Some have thought it a human thing;
But this is a vain imagining.
ilia..anatha—Ana!liema !
Dretd is the curse of .31andragora!
Euthanasy 1
Do we want a defter verse, or daintier tones of
music ? Listen !

Marguerite, with early wiles—
Marguerite
On light Charins and D'Antragues smiles—
Margot, Marguerite.
Older grown, she favours then,
Smooth Martigues, and bluff Turenne.
The latter but a foolish pas,
Margot, Marguerite en bas.
Are we inflamed with a zest for the bacchanalian?
Here are assuagements for our literary thirst plen-
tiful and appetising !
- - •

" I'm sadly afraid of my Old Complaint—
Dying of thirst.—Not a drop I've drunk
For more than an hour : 'Tis too long to wait.
Wonderful how my spirits have sunk !
Provocation enough it is for a saint
To suffer so much from my Old Complaint !"
Or—" a better song than t' ocher :"
" The Toper who knows how to empty his can
Is not half so afraid of a highwayman
As he is of indifferent tipple :
With the last a stout fellow may fight for his purse;
Of the other the consequence certain is worse
Down the throat if permitted to ripple."

Or—
" With my back to the fire and my paunch to the tablo
Let me eat, let me drink as long as I am able ;
Lit me eat, let me di ink whata'er I set my whims on,
Until my nose is blue, and my jolly visage crimson."
And that reminds one—best of all—of—what ?
The gutteral voice of glorious Paul Bedford and
the fiddles of poor Rodwell, rollicking off to the
tune of—

Jolly nose ! the bright rubies that garnish thy tip
Are dug from the mines of canary :
And to keep up their lustre I moisten my lip
With hogsheads of claret and sherry.
Jolly nose ! he who sees thee across a broad glass
Beholds thee in all thy perfection ;
And to the pale snout of a temperate ass
Entertains the profoundest objection."
Which iu its turns calls back to mind the chirrup-
ing tones of delightful Mrs. Keeley as that archest
of arch-scamps, Jack Shepherd, trolling out the
best slang song ever written :--
" In a box of a stone jug I was born,
Of a hempen widow the kid forlorn,
Fake awry.
And my father, as I've heard say,
Fake away,

Was a merchant of capers gay,
Who cut his last fling with great applause,
Nix my dolly pals, fake away.
Who cut his last fling with great applause,
To the tune of a `hearty choke with caper sauce,'
Fake away.
The knucks in quod did my schoolmaster play,
Fake awry,
And put me up to the time of day,
Until at last there was none so knowing,
Nix my dolly pals, fake away.
And so forth to the close of the song of the " regu-
lar rollicking Romany"—flashiest of flash chaunts,
the pride of the aLX.9St, as it would have been of
old the glory of Alsatia. ! A gladly welcome treat
to every lover of genuine lyrical poetry this volume
must prove beyond all questiop, from the earliest
of the wild legends herein recounted to the latest
of Mr. Ainsworth's animated and ingenious trans-
lations.

The Martins of Cro' Martin. No. 12,
Introduces us to Captain Martin about to make
preparations for his journey, from which, however,
he is deterred by an unworthy suspicion that after
all he may only be the dupe of a designing woman
anxious to try her power over him. Could he not
send Fletcher instead, who would be back in a
fortnight with the whole state or the case ? Before
he has arrived at .a conclusion, Mr. Merle makes
his appearance in apparent trouble and anxiety.
Government has been carrying things with too
high a hand, and mischief is brewing. Stocks are
going rapidly down. He will be a loser of some
thirteen thousand pounds, needs money, an. d must
into i
turn some of the Captain's Irish securities 1
cash ; which of them shall he select ? The Captain
is indignant and imprudently sarcastic ; when he
gave those securities, had ho not received a pledge
that they should not be negotiated ? There is some
sparring, and finally the Jew money-lender takes
his departure with letters of introduction in his
pocket to " Mademoiselle" and Mr. Scanlan—hav-
ing consented to undertake an inspection of the
Cro' Martin estates. At night, the captain repairs
to his club, in the magnificent salon of which he
finds a number of haughty young bloods assem-
bled, who vote the infliction of a fine ou any
member who alludes to the great question that is
stirring the Parisian mind to its depths. Play
follows, and Martin, after losing heavily, has a run
of luck. Massingbred enters in great disorder,
fresh from an unexpected conflict, in which he has
barely escaped being shot by the military, and
trodden down by the people. Paris is in arms.
The revolution has commenced. Massingbred, with
a duel in prospect, having its origin since his arrival
at the club, and otherwise meditative, repairs home-
ward with Martin, under whose roof he consents
to pass the night. On the same evening La
ry_
Dorothea has a rout, during which Kate Rentdaeby
son electrifies Villemart, and horrifies the
tg: por-
traiture fierce retort to an unfair and depreciatory
room is
traiture of the great leaders of. '92.,. _
rapidly cleared, and alone with .1-4 d
aandy ordered to
Dorothea,
Kate is haughtily taken to attask once,
ere she
sit down and write an apology
leaves a roof under which she
ology, however,
ncaanpbe no longer suf_
fered to abide. Instead
pass signed "Jules
Ott a
her ladyship is presented with
ad inte,im." Kat®,
Lagrange, Minister. of
.n
thatounc of the
it turns turns out,
.is deep
land ges immediate flight
gents. Martin
.enterse
best of it. Finally, ".
Lady
The mob are gettinfied
by her son and Massi
Dorothea, accompa
by Kate,
issue into the street,nbred, and escorted
A,. pass through the la "11 .
eig bouring
and are suffered
top
troops
barricade just as _ arrive. An exciting
d Lady Dorothea is borne '
scene follows, an . amid
the rattle of balls intoan archway for safety by
Kate, who receives a
.shot in the arm. Lady Do-
rothea is unable to withstand this proof of devo-
tion, and the number closes on her ladyship while
expressing the strongest sympathy for her wounded
preserver.

Births, Deaths, and Marriages in England in 1851.
The Regitrar-Generars Fourteenth Annual
Report has just made its appearance, and will be
welcomed by all who desire to become intimately
acquainted with the vital statistics of the English
portion of the United Kingdom. Starting with a
return of the marriages, births, and deaths, and.
their annual proportions to the population ill each
of the years 1838-51, the Registrar-General 130 those
ceeds to give more detailed abstracts thai! p
re-
contained in the quarterly returns already the
seated to Parliament for 1851, clistuigulaw"6

particulars of each marriage, birth, and death
which can be compared with the facts that the
census of 1851 has placed at his disposal. In that
year we find that 154,206 marriages were cele-
brated, so that 308,412 persons were married, or a
number equal to four-fifths of the deaths and to
one-half of the births. Of these marriages 130,958
were performed according to the rites of the
Established Church, 6,570 of the Roman Catholic
Church, and 9,540 of other Christian denomina-
tions, 6,813 being married in Superintendent-Re.
gistrar's offices. Rather more than five per cent. of
the men and fifteen per cent. of the women were,
instances
both would appear, minors, while in 36,186
both husband and wife signed with marks; in
73,141 both wrote their names, and in 44,879 one
of the parties only signed with a mark. The pro-
portion of bachelors married was 58 per thousand.
The births (615,865) were at the rate of 3.425 per
cent. on the population. Of the entire number
42,000 were born out of wedlock, or nearly 7 per
cent. (the proportion in London being the lowest,
or 4 per cent.). The mortality of the population
was at the rate of 2.199 per cent (the deaths wer•
395,396, the relative mortality of males and females
being as 2.276 to
if 2.124). The reader, it is to be
hoped, has by this time resolved to obtain the re-
turn, and he does so he will find a multitudinous
array of useful information on these important
subjects, the labour, care, and judgment required
to gather which up and tabulate it cannot but
have been immense.

Punch's Pocket-Book for 1856.

This will be found as useful if not so lively a
companion as some of its predecessors. As usual,
it is divided into two parts—one devoted to the
practical, and the other to the humorous and
satirical—the whole being enlivened by whimsical
or laughter-moving illustrations by Leech and
Tenniel. The first part contains an almanac, a
diary and memoranda for every day of the week,
the names of court and public officers, and of
Peers, Peeresses, and Commons, in connection
with their respective functions, ranks, itc., besides
a large amount of business information. Among
the more noticeable contents of the second part
are A Quiet Street "—a pandemonium of vocal
and instrumental discord and dire confusion, felici-
tously depicted in a fly illustration. " The Ro-
mance of a Button "—showing that the insecure
fastening of a button may lead to the most terrible
events. " Plurality of Worlds"— settling the
question by pointing out some half dozen whose
existence is generally reccgnised. " The Boys in
the Street "—posing and practical. "A Story of a
Lamp "—a Moderateur, offered at 21., and requir-
ing, according to the modern trade fashion, some
31. more to set it a-going. And " The Language
of Flowers "—in which the crabbed Grieco-Latin
nomenclature in vogue among botanit.ts is plea-
santly satirised. On the whole, however, Part IL
for '56 will, we are afraid, be considered a failure.

The Farmer's Almanac Calendar for 1856. By
C. W. Johnson, Esq., F.R.S., and W. Shaw,
Esq.

The important class for which this annual is
especially designed will End in it a vast amount of
information, more or less necessary for their guid-
ance towards the profitable cultivation of the soil
and the breeding of stock. A more useful com-
pendium of the kind we do not remember to have
seen. The statistical tables will be found not the
least useful of its contents.