The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-03-05 00:00:00

VERY OF SPLENDID WORKS OF ART.—About the year
1518 twelve busts of the Roman Emperors, executed in terra
cotta, beautifully enamelled, and nearly the size of life, were
forwarded tb Cardinal Wolsley, to decorate his palace of
Hampton Court, by Pope Leo the Tenth. Eight of these
splendid works of art have always existed in the first and se-
cond courts at the palace; but not one of the remaining four,
to complete the valuable series, could be found until within
the last few months, although many years ago very strict
search had been made for them by the various authorities
connected with Hampton Court. In the reign of George the
Fourth the search and inquiries were again renewed, but
without any discovery. A few months ago one of the missing
four was by mere chance discovered in a back-room at Hemp-
On Court Palace, attached to one of the private aparments,
in a fine state of preservation. Since then another of the
series has been recovered, and that by the merest chance also,
in a small cottage close to the stag paddocks in Windsor
Great park. It appears that this cottage had just undergone
ome repairs preparatory to its being occupied by one of the
' ' Albert's gamekeepers. The workmen in the course
and a bust fixed in the wall, about 10
and upon this discovery reaching the
ntleman connected with the court, be proceeded
to the cottage, when he found it was one of the four long-

)1 their occupation

eet from the grow
!ars of

lost works, perfectly free from injury, and in a most excel-
lent state of preservation. It was immediately taken down,
and soon afterwards forwarded to Hampton Court. Within
the last few days another of these valuable works of art was
discovered by Mr. Jesse, the surveyor of woods and works
at one of the royal lodges in the great park, known
as the World's End Lodge, inhabited by one of the
park keepers. It was found set into the external wall,
about ten or twelve feet from the ground, where it must have
been for considerably more than a century. It was always
considered by the persons living at the lodge to be a bust of
Queen Anne. Of so little value was it supposed to be that
the boys of the neighbourhood, as they passed by the house,
frequently amused themselves by pelting it with stones and
clay. Notwithstanding this rough usage, it is but very
slightly injured. It has been carefully removed from the
building, and will be forwarded to Hampton Court Palace in
the course of a few days, where, with the other two alluded
to, it will be placed in appropriate niches in the first and
second Courts. There is now only the twelfth of the series
which remains to be disccovered..

A suicide, attended with mysterious and distressing cir-
cumstances, is thus related by the Gazette des Tribunaux :
" Mr. C., an artist who had distinguished himself in the
style which succeeded that of David, Gros, and G6rard, left
France some years ago for America, where he was appointed
director of an academy of painting. He left in Paris a son
of minor age, whom be destined for the medical profession,
depositing in the hands of an avoue a small sum of money to
meet the first expenses of his son's education, intending to
make remittances from time to time to meet the increasing
charges. The young Paul C., who had attained his 24th year,
returned to his humble lodging in the rue Dauphine, on
Thursday evening, evidently overwhelmed with distress of
mind. For a considerable time, all his letters to his father
had remained unanswered, and a hanker to whom Mr. C.
had remitted 30,000 f., had refused to advance Paul even the
small sums absolutely necessary to provide him with food
and clothing. Thus left destitute and without the means of
joining his father, the young man sank into utter despair.
Having entered his room, stopped every aperture by which
air could pass, and prepared his bed ou which he was about
to commence an eternal sleep, be lighted two braziers of
charcoal, and, seating himself at his table, wrote a long let-
ter, taking a tender leave of his father, but expressing the
bitterness of his own snfferings, and adding invitations to se-
veral of his friends to attend his funeral. Death did not
come upon him so fast as he had hoped, for at three in the
morning he roCe again from his bed, and placihg himself
again at the table resnrned his
pen, but with a weak and
trembling hand, and having drawn the form of a cross at the
top of the paper and surrounded it with the Fatalite,
he added the following unconnected and broken sen-
tences :—` I have deferred an instance—a rich man can-
not comprehend what another may be reduced to.
The charcoal has been lighted an hour—its vapour dif-
fuses itself—my head is becoming heated—my arteries
are swollen and • beat quick and heavily—my . sufferings
will not be long. I entreat those to whom I have done wrong
to pardon me—l take advautarbT of my remaining senses to—'
He could write no more. Two days elapsed without any
susdicion of the fatal act, and it was not till Saturday that it
discovered by the fetid odour which issued from the
On Sunday the young and unfortunate Paul C.
was buried--:the friends he had invited, with Many others, .
attending his funeral."—Galignanes Messenger.

chamber

SEASONS OF 14:GI, NI? EIOIRT CENTURIES AGO.—The
year 1086, the Saxon Chroniclei-remarks, " was a very heavy
season, and a swinkful and sorrowful year in England in
murrain of cattle ; and corn and fruits were at a stand, and
so much untowardness is the weather as a man may not
easily think." The following year " was a very heavy and
pestilential year in this land ; and the caus
"e is attributed to
the badness of the weather. Then came, says the writer,
" so great a famine over all England, that many men died a
miserable death through hunger." The year 1089 " was a
very late year in corn, and in every kind of fruits, so that
many men reaped their corn about Martinmas, and yet later."
In 1095, the weather was " very unseasonable ; in conse-
quence of which, throughout all this land were the fruits of
the earth reduced to a moderate crop." The year 1096 " was
a very high-timed year throughout all England ; both through
the manifold tributes, and also through very heavy timed
hunger, that sorely oppressed the earth." The succeeding
year was " in all things a very heavy timed year, and beyond
measure labourions from badness of weather, both When men
attempted to till the land, and afterwards to gather the fruit
of their tilth." Again, 1098, " was a very troublesome
year, through manifold impositions ; and from the abundant
rains that ceased not all the year, nearly all the tilth in the
marsh-lands perished." Five .yea's afterwards (A.D. 1103)
was a very calamitous year. There was a murrain among
the cattle, and a deficiency of the crops of every kind ; but
the latter seems to have been occasioned by a violent storm of
wind on St. Lawrence's day, which "did so much harm to
all fruits as no man remembered that ever any did before."
In 1105, the produce of the soil was also injured by the wea-
ther. In 1110 the weather was again unfavourable, by which
" the fruits of the earth were very much marred, and the
produce of the trees over all this land entirely perished."
In 1111 " the winter was very long, and the season heavy
and severe ; and through that were the fruits of the earth
solely marred, and there was the greatest murrain of cattle
that any man could remember." . The next year was fortu-
nately " a very good year, and very fruitful in wood and
field.', It was, however, accompanied by a severe•mortality
amongst men. In 1116 "occurred a very heavy-timed winter,
long and strong, for cattle and for all things." The chro-
iicler adds, that " this was a very vexatious and destructive
-with respect to the fruits of the earth, through the im-

oderate ra.

s that fell soonaiter the beginning of August,
iarrassing and perplexing men till Candlemas Day." It was
ilso noted for a deficiency of the woods in mast to such an
!xtent, " that there was never known such in this land or in
Wales." " The next year was a very blighted year in corn,
hrough the rain, that scarcely .
ceased through all the year."
In 1124 " the seasons were very unfavourable England for
corn and all fruits." A famine ensued in the following year.
Ia 1131 "there was so great a Murrain of cattle as never
was before in the memory of man over all England. That
was in neat cattle and swine • had not one left. Afterwards
perished the hen fowls-• then' shortened the flesh meat arid
the cheese.* '—Pictorial History of England.