The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-12-19 00:00:00

Dcc. 19, 1845,

•iterature.

VARIETIES

Revolution has added 45 per cent. to the direct taxation
of France. A;4l

Nines and Semiramis, who reigned 2017 years before
Christ, had armies amounting to nearly two millions of
fighting men. The first guards and regular troops, as a
standing army, were formed by Saul, 1093 B.C. So says
Eusebius.

CIVIL WAR.—A worthy miller was reading an account
of the first disturbances at Berlin ; and, among other
matters, he read that " the burgher guard and the people,
when the conflict was over, shook hands in the most ami-
cable manner." "Ah (said he) now I see—now I see—
that's what they call civil war I reckon." He had heard
of civil war before, but never could comprehend the civi-
lity of it till then.
HISTORICAL REMINISCENCES OF WALES.—An old
gentleman, who was somewhat of an antiquarian, retired
to spend his evening of life to a remote village in one of
the Welch counties. He was exceedingly desirous of
picking up whatever information he could find respecting
the locality in which he had fixed himself. In one of these
rambles he encountered an old Welch farmer, when the
following dialogue ensued :—" Good morning, friend ; can
you tell me if there is anything remarkable in this neigh-
bourhood ?" . Anything remarkable did you say ?" en-
quired the old farmer, not quite sure what was meant by.
the word. "Yes, my good man, anthing remarkable?"
"0 ! aye, well,• iss—(exclaimed the farmer, as a light
broke in upon him)—is, iss—remarkable--aye, indeed!
Do you see that field, sir ?—do you see that field ? Well,
it was there that Oliver Cromwell fought with Julius

Saisar I"

A FOREIGNER'S OPINION OF ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.
—But what is the University of Oxford ? A corporation
composed of ecclesiastics and laymen—of doctors of every
kind, some very Christian, others very little so, and others
again as little as possible so. It is also a body subject: to

all the variations of the political temperature, which
twenty years ago turned out Sir Robert Peel on account
of his vote for the Catholics, and to-day adops Mr. Glad-
stone though he votes for the Jews. How beautiful would
be the dogmatic authority of a court presided over by his
Grace Field Marshall the Duke of Wellington, Chancel-
lor of the University, and Commander-in-Chief of the
British Army, and doubtless of British consciences also !
—and besides, why Oxford rather than Cambridge ? The
University of Cambridge has also a very suitable Chan-
cellor, his Royal Highness Prince Albert, the husband of
the head of the Church. There is an ancient rivalry
between the two Universities : it was said formerly
" that Oxford had always the honour of burning the
bishops which Cambridge had had the honour of educat-
ing." Who shall pronounce between these two authori-
ties ?—M. Lemoine, in the Revue des Deux itiondes.
AvAtucz OUTWITTED.—The case of John Eyre, Esq.'
who, though worth upwards of £3OOOO, was cony

.cted at the
Old Bailey and sentenced to transportation, was rendered
more memorable by the opportunity which it gave Junius
to impeach the integrity of Lord Mansfield, who was sup-
posed to have erred in admitting him to bail. An anec-
dote is related of Mr. Eyre which shows, in a striking
manner, the depravity of his heart, and may help to
account for the meanness of the (-rime of which he was

"Alia • ••
convicted. An uncle of his, a man9...
,of very considerable
property, made his will in favour of a clergyman who was
his intimate friend, and committed it, unknown to the
rest of the people, to his custody. However, not long
before his death, having; altered his mind with regard to
the disposal of his wealth, he made another will, in which
he left the clergyman only £5OO, leaving the bulk of his
large property to his nephew and heir-at-law, Mr. Eyre.
Soon after the old gentleman's death, Mr. Eyre, rum-
maging over his drawers, found this last will ; and, per-
ceiving the legacy of £5OO in it for the clergyman, without
any hesitation or scruple of conscience, put it into the fire,
and took possession of the whole effects, in consequence

of his uncle being supposed to have died intestate. The
clergyman coming into town soon after, and inquiring
into the circumstances of his old friend's death, asked bite
if he had made any will before he died : on being answered
by Mr. Eyre in the negative, the clergyman very coolly
put his hand in his pocket and pulled out the former will,
which had been committed to his care, in which Mr. Eyre
had bequeathed him the whole of his fortune. amounting
to several thousand pounds, excepting a legacy of £5OO to

his nephew.
A VISIT TO THE LONDON SEWERS.—How few of all
the curious and intelligent inhabitants of London have
any conception of the vast channels which have been
formed under our leading thoroughfares to convey the re-
fuse of London to its present ill-chosen destination ? We
wish we could induce some of them to accompany us in 3
subterranean excursion from Oxford-street to the outlft
of King's Scholars' Pond Sewer. In the good old time of
the heptarchy of dirty waters, when it was not thought
amiss to preface animal or biennial ceremonies by a sub-
stantial breakfast or ajeuners al a fourehette, the offici-
als and a privileged few were wont to fortify themselves
for the important tour of inspection by such creature
comforts. The consolidated commission eschews all
such extravagancies, and serves the public without fee or
feast ; about the expediency of which proceeding we have
a misgiving or two, for we confess to a prejudice in favour
of paid officials. But be this as it may, the breakfast
under the old system was a right good one, and as satis-
factory a preparation as could he desired for our discent
into the realms of darkness. But the breakfast was not by
ition required of_us. There

y means tl-

le, by the

certain vestments to be pat on,

woulc

Thick 1e

have effectually disguised an Irish rebel.
of felt, thick leathern boots reaching to
h. +Mob mnrintnch of amnie dimensions,

and a slouched hat, were the chief items of the costume.
Down, then, we dived, till we splashed into the waters of
the far-famed. tributary ; and on we toiled, with the black
stream above our knees, erect under the substantial arch
of brickwork, lighted with fragments of candles. There
was something very striking in this world of brick and
mortar, stretching as far as the eye could reach, echoing
with the roar of mimic cataracts pouring from the higher
levels, and resounding with the shouts of the presiding
genii, as they hunted a poor solitary rat, till he suffered
the unexpected fate of being squelched, after Carlyle 's
fashion, beneath the merciless heel of his pursuer Thus,
..

always and everywhere, has man the spirit of the chase
moving in him. We shall scarcely be believed when we
affirm that the chief inconvenience in the excursion con-

'sisted in the heat of our strange garments, and the fatigue
of wading through so many hundred yards of flowing water.
But so it was. The atmosphere is much less objectionable
a.1.:«1, + 1.2,7 th wt.

emerged from our underground pilgrimage, not burry lA,
put off our strange garments, and ready to appreciate to
the full the luxury of soap and water. A short walk
brought us to the Thames, where we took a last view of
our tributary stream flowing in all its darkness into the
mass of muddy waters. Who would have thought that
this foul burn was carrying with it the very wealth which
our merchants are sending thousands of miles to procure
—that it was nothing less than a guano stream, with a
clear marketable value in it of between £30,000 and
£40,000 a-year. Such are the wonderful revelations of
that science which is skilled to see things impure and
offensive to the senses the source of almost fabulous
wealth.—Fraser's Magazine.
PHONETIC SPELLING.—In a former number of our
journal, we stated that the cause of the great difficulties
felt by children in our National and British Schools, when
learning to read, arose from the complexities and absur-
dities of our orthography. The amount of this is best
T, • 4, -I- 4-I,it

ay tne following statements. Ao
no one can tell the sound of an English word frcm its
spelling. Proof.—To readthe book he has read; to pre-
sent a present ; the slough of a snake in a slough ; lead
, • rot-use. &c. &c. ; the

me to the lead mine ; refuse the rcj -
words in italics are pronounced differently, that is,
different spoken words, according to their meaning alone ,
and there are 201 words of this kind in our language,
which are pronounced in 406 different ways.-2. The
same combination of letters has very different significa-
tions in different words; compare hear. heard, heart;

here,
her, rum

where ; hoe, s,

lover, clover; lum-

titer, slaughter; doe, doe's, (v.,) doeth

There is a very large number of
concerning the pronunciation of which even crr
are not agreed : as, knowledge, (nolledge, no-
zhur, lezh-ur,) inimical, inimical:

nite number of cases
words

thoepists
ledge ;)

leisurl;

o one can he sure o

of any word he h

not been previously taught

let the
rowlock,

reader try the unusual words, batman, beaufin,
bourgeoise, (type ;) and the riames-of -places-and-,,eisone,
Beaulieu, Auchinleck, Hochelagu, and so on. Those who
do not know how to pronounce these words, may turn the
page and read :
.yvfiyolysoHVATv'yozaipaorpng‘annna‘ugpquntainog
11. It is a fact, that no one can tell the spelling of an
English word from its sound. Proof.-1. There are 364
spoken words, each spelled in two ways, (waste waist,
hall haul, leek leak, stake steak, &c.;) 36 spoken words,
each spelled in three ways, (ewe you yew, pairpare pear,
meet meat mete, &c. ;) 4 spoken words, each spelled in
four ways, (I eye ay aye, by buy bye b'ye, road rode
rowed Rhode, rite write right wright ;) 1 spoken word,
spelled in five ways, (air ere e'er eyre heir;) total, 405
spoken words, spelled in 857 ways ; but the variations of
the spelling never depend on the sound, and cannot be
learned from it.-2. There are upwards of 1500 word!,
about the spelling of which authors are not agreed ; and
writers also disagree with regard to the spelling of maul
classes of words represented by honor, honour, beveled
bevelled, benefited benefitted, centre, center, dependent
dependant, patronise patronize, appal appall, inquire!
enquirer, negotiate negotiate, control controul, expene•
expense, allege alledge, complete compleat, connexion
connection, precede preceed.-3. The style of spelling
cannot even be predicted from a knowledge of etymology
compare fancy phantom, concede succeed, island, bey,
husband house, rhyme, ghost, city, flys flies, burgess
burgeoise, burgher, &c. &c.-4. No sound in the lee'
guage is uniformly represented by the same sign ; there
are 2 modes of writing the sound of the italic letters
the ; 4 for those in yea, way, hay ; 6 for those in pea;
for those in be, cheese, go, thin, vision, sing; 8 for those
in foot, do, view ; 9 for that in joke ; 10 for those in 0,14 r,
row ; 11 for those in oil ; 12 for those in art, tea, fee's",
lea: 13 for those in on, me ; 16 for that in am ; 18 for
that in as; 19 for those in cat, sin, no; 21 for that in all;
24 for that in up; 26 for that in idle; 29 for that in who
30 for that in use; 34 for those in ale, hole ; 36 for that
37 for that in ill ; and 40 for the sound expresso'
the italic letters in eel.-5. Every letter of the alpha'
:cept j, is occasionally mute : and every letter bf
more than one phonetic sense ; s
water, many -nd au in gauguiP

!ee a in hatin

catbcrt
haul,

, hat, want, al,. _.,6, aunt,
hauteur, Jervaulx Abbey, laurel, meerschaum, Menelaus
The detailed proofs of these-extraordinary facts, WWl'
those who are accustomed to mechanical correctness °f

I spelling all the

on use, by ye

! s Plea .fo;

.1 of entertaining matter and startling fa(