GLEANINGS.

The Story-Teller contains some unpublished verses by George Canning addressed to Mrs. Leigh, a lady of fortune, who had given him, apparently, the stuff for some shooting-breeches. How sone fashions change . The verses are smart, and the author indulges in no licence ; yet none would now-a-days think them in the best taste to address to a lady, by v ay of epithalamiurn, or atleut a wedding-anniversary salute, as these were; for they were addressed "to Mrs. Leigh on her Wedding-day "— 0 While all to this auspicious day,

Well pleased, their heartfelt homage pay, And sweetly smile, and softly say A hundred civil speeches, My muse shall strike her tuneful strings, Nor scorn the gift her duty brings,

Though bumble be the theme she sings—

A pair of shooting-breeches.

0 Soon shall the tailor's subtle art

Have made them tight, and spruce, and smart, And fastened well in every part With twenty thousand stitches :

Mark then the moral of my song—

Oh ! may your loves but prove as strong, And wear as well. and last as long, As these my shooting-breeches.

" And when, to ease the load of life, Of private care, and public strife, My lot shall give to me a wife, 1 ask not rank or riches ; For worth like thine alone I pray, Temper like thine, serene and gay, And formed like thee to give away, Not wear herself, the breeches."

The conflict of rival missionaries is one probable source of future embarrass- ment in China ; and by no means the easiest kind to deal with. The Asiastie Journal illustrates the speculation by referring, in a note, to what actually has occurred elsewhere. " We observe in the Report of the Church Missionary Society, an account of a dispute of this kind in New Zealand, which could have had no beneficial effect upon the natives who were present. The English missionary (according to his own account) pressed the priest sorely ; when the latter replied, ' You had better tell me the names of the Bishops of your Church, from the time of the Apostles.' The English missionary says—' I then related to the natives Augustine's coming to England, and the unfavour- able reception which our own Bishops gave him, with the probable reason. Then he would interrupt me by reading, in a pompous manner, the names of some of their earliest Bishops. He repeated this so many times,—continually telling the natives that Elizabeth was a very wicked woman, using no very delicate words,—that I was at last constrained to remind him not to forget Pope Joan. Indeed I may say, that, after seven hours, all 1 could get from him was, Who were the Bishops of your Church after the Apostles ?' I charged his Church with fifteen errors, such as the natives could understand; adding,' &c."

Mr. Dickens is using his American experiences after a fashion more con- genial to his talents than he did in his Notes, by turning the current of his narrative, Martin Chuzzlewit, into the United States ; whither he has carried his hero. Martin is made a lion of, and at the same time insulted on the score of his country. he is made a settler of, and swindled ; and in return, his histo- riographer exhibits the citizens in a series of caricatures. In the journey to- wards Eden, the new settlement, Martin, accompanied by his Achates, Mark Tapley, falls in with a highly patriotic party. " ' Well!' resumed their new friend, after staring at them intently during the whole interval of silence : ' how's the unnat'ral old parent by this time ? ' Mr. Tapley, regarding this inquiry as only another version of the impertinent English question ' How's your mother ? ' would have resented it instantly, but for Martin's prompt in- terposition. You mean the old country ' he said. Ah!' was the reply. Hon's she? Progressing back'ards, I expect, as usual ? Well! How's Queen Victoria ? " In good health, I believe,' said Martin. ' Queen Victoria won't shake in her royal shoes at all when she hears tomorrow named ?' observed the stranger : ' no." Not that I am aware of. Why should she?' ' She won't be taken with a cold chill, when she realizes what is being done in these dig- gings,' said the stranger no.' • No,' said Martin ; I think I could take my oath of that.' The strange gentleman looked at him as if in pity for his ignorance or prejudice, and said, Well, Sir, I tell you this—there ain't a Lin-gine with its biter bust, in God A'mighty's free U-nited States, so fixed, and nipped, and frizzled to a most e-tarnal smash, as that young critter, in her luxurious lo-cation in the Tower of London, will be, when she reads the next double-extra Watertoast Gazette.' • * • ' But if it is addressed to the Tower of London, it would hardly come to hand, I fear,' returned Martin; 'for she don't live there.' The Queen of England, gentlemen,' observed Mr. Tapley, affecting the greatest politeness, and regarding them with an immove- able face, 'usually lives in the Mint, to take care of the money. She has lodgings, in virtue of her office, with the Lord Mayor at the Mansionhonse ; but don't often occupy them, in consequence of the parlour-chimney smoking.' ' Mark,' said Martin, ' I shall be very much obliged to you if you'll have the goodness not to interfere with preposterous statements, however jocose they may appear to you. I was merely remarking, gentlemen—though it's a point of very little import—that the Queen of England does not happen to live in

the Tower of London. General!' cried Mr. La Fayette Kettle. Yon hear ?' General!' echoed several others. ' General " Hush! Pray, silence! 'said General Choke, holding up his hand, and speaking with a patient

and complacent benevolence that was quite touching. have always re- marked it as a very extraordinary circumstance, which I impute to the natar' of British institutions and their tendency to suppress that popular inquiry and information which air so widely diffused even in the trackless forests of this vast continent of the Western Ocean, that the knowledge of Britisher. themselves on such points is not to be compared with that possessed by our in- telligent and locomotive citizens. This is interesting, and confirms my ob- servation. When you say, Sir,' he continued, addressing Martin, ' that your Queen does not reside in the Tower of London, you fall into an error, not un- common to your countrymen, even when their abilities and moral elements air such as to command respect. But, Sir, you air wrong. She does live there—' When she is at the Court of St. James's,' interposed Kettle. When she is at the Court of St. James's, of course,' returned the General, in the same benignant way :r for if her location was in Windsor Pavilion, it could n't be in London at the same time. Your Tower of London, Sir,' pursued the General, smiling with a mild consciousness of his knowledge, ' is nat'rally your royal residence. Being located in the immediate neighbourhood of your Parks, your Drives, your Triumphant Arches, your Opera, and your Royal Almacks, it nat'rally suggests itself as the place for holding a luxurious and thoughtless Court. And, consequently,' said the General, consequently, the Court is held there."

Martin attends a meeting of the "Watertoast Sympathizers." "The General was voted to the chair, on the motion of a pallid lad of the Jefferson Brick school; who forthwith set in for a high-spiced speech, with a good deal about hearths and homes in it, and unriveting the chains of Tyranny. Oh but it was a clincher for the British Lion, it was! The indignation of the glowing young Columbian knew no bounds. If he could only have been one of his own forefathers, be said, wouldn't he have peppered that same Lion, and been to him as another Brute-tamer with a wire whip, teaching him lessons not easily forgotten. Lion (cried that young Columbian) where is he ? Who is he ? What is he ? Show him to me. Let me have him here. Here!' said the young Columbian, in a wrestling attitude, ' upon this sacred altar. Here 1' cried the young Columbian, idealizing the dining-table; ' upon ancestral ashes, cemented with the glorious blood poured out like water on our native plains of Chickabiddy Lick ! Bring forth that Lion • said the young Colum- bian. 'Alone, I dare him I I taunt that Lion. I tell that Lion, that Free- dom's band once twisted in his mane, be rolls a curse before me, and the Eagles of the Great Republic laugh, ha, ha!' When it was found that the Lion didn't come, but kept out of the way—that the young Columbian stood there, with folded arms, alone in his glory—and consequently that the Eagles were no doubt laughing wildly on the mountain-tops—such cheers arose as might have shaken the hands upon the Horse Guards clock, and changed the very mean time of the day in England's capital. • Who is this ? ' Martin telegraphed to La Fayette. The Secretary wrote something, very gravely, on a piece of paper, twisted it up, and bad it passed to him from hand to hand. It was an im- provement on the old sentiment : • Perhaps as remarkable a man as any in our country.' This young Columbian was succeeded by another, to the full as eloquent as he, who drew down storms of cheers. But both remarkable youths, in their great excitement, (for your true poetry can never stoop to details,) forgot to say with whom or what the Watertoasters sympathized, and like- wise why or wherefore they were sympathetic. Thus, Martin remained for a long time as completely in the dark as ever; until at length a ray of light broke in upon him through the medium of the Secretary, who, by reading the minutes of their past proceedings, made the matter somewhat clearer. He then learned that the Watertoast Association sympathized with a certain Pub- lic Man in Ireland, who held a contest upon certain points with England : and that they did so, because they didn't love England at all—not by any means because they loved Ireland much; being indeed horribly jealous and distrustful of its people always, and only tolerating them because of their working hard, which made them very useful ; labour being held in greater indignity in the simple republic than in any other country upon earth. This rendered Martin canoes to see what grounds of sympathy the Watertoast Association put forth : nor was-he long in suspense, for the General rose to read a letter to the Public Man, which with his own hands he had written. Thus,' said the General, thus, my friends and fellow-citizens, it runs- "' Sir—I address you on behalf of the Watertoast Association of United Sympathizers. It is founded, Sir, in the great republic of America! and now holds its breath, and swells the blue veins ID its forehead nigh to bursting, as it watches, Sir, with feverish intensity and sympathetic ardour your noble efforts in the cause of Freedom. [At the name of Freedom, and at every repetition of that name, all the Sympathizers roared aloud, cheering with nine times nine, and nine times over.] In Freedom's name, Sir—holy Freedom—I address you. In Freedom's name, I send herewith a contribution to the funds of your Society. In Freedom's name, Sir, I advert with indignation and disgust to that accursed animal, with gore-stained whiskers, whose rampant cruelty and fiery lust have ever been a scourge. a torment, to the world. The naked vinters to Crusoe's Island, Sir—the flying wives of Peter Wilkins—the fruit- smeared children of the tangled bush—nay, even the men of large stature, anciently bred in the mining districts of Cornwall—alike bear witness to its savage nature. Where, Sir, are the Cormorans, the Blunderbores, the Great Feefofums, named in history ? All, all, exterminated by its destroying hand. I allude, Sir, to the British Lion. Devoted, mind and body, heart and soul, to Freedom, Sir—to Freedom, blessed solace to the snail upon the cellar-door, the oyster in his pearly bed, the still mite in his home of cheese, the very winkle of your country in Isis Shelly lair—in her unsullied name, we offer you our sympathy. Oh, Sir, in this our cherished and our happy land. her fires burn bright and clear and smokeless : once lighted up in gouts, the Lion shall be roasted whole.

' I am, Sir, in Freedom's name, your affectionate friend and faithful

Sympathizer, CYRUS CHOKE, General, U. S. M.'

[Scarcely is this address read, when arrivepapers containing Mr. O'Connell's speech in favour of " Nigger Emancipation."] " If any thing beneath the sky be real, those sons of Freedom would have pistolled, stabbed—in some way slain—that man by coward hands and murderous violence, if he had stood among them at that time. The most confiding of their own countrymen would not have wagered then, no, nor would they ever peril, one dunghill straw upon the life of any man in such a strait. They tore the letter, cast the fragments in the air, trod down the pieces as they fell, and yelled, and groaned, and hissed, till they could cry no longer. I shall move,' said the General, when he could make himself heard, • that the Watertoast Association of United Sympathizers be immediately dissolved.' Down with it ! Away with it ! Don't hear of it ! Burn its records ! Pull the room down ! Blot it out of human memory."

Among the sayings at a meeting recently held in Manchester, by certain wandering leaders in the "Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland," to raise the wind, was an illustration used by the Reverend Dr. Cooke of Belfast. He was urging on his English hearers the policy of being prompt with their sub- scriptions ; and in doing so he used this story, which seems to apply rather against him. " He remembered hearing once of a man who was very fond of money ; when a friend went to him one day, and told him that he was come to befriend him, and to save him 10,000/. *Indeed,' replied he ; 'bow do you propose to do it?' ' Why,' replied his friend, 'you have a daughter, very fair and very. pleasing; I understand you intend to give her 20,000/. : now 1'11 be very glad to take her with 10,0001."—It was the fate of Dr. Cooke's celebrated countryman to cut blocks with a razor ; but Dr. Cooke, in performing much the same feat, takes the blade of the razor in his own hand. However, though the illustration is awkward, the story is good. The suitor only followed the rule of pushing shopkeepers, who ticket their wares, no matter how indifferent in qua- lity, at "a very low figure," knowing that people will always buy a thing, no matter how useless, "because it is so cheap." The proposer of this maneeuvre of economy matrimonial did just the same : he ticketed himself "This hus- band, ONLY 10,0000 We have heard the leases of theatrical lessees—losses incredible, because so perpetually and eagerly incurred—accounted for on a similar principle. A lessee makes estimates for the season, and he reckons that he ought to net 15,0001.: on the strength of that supposititious income he spends 10,0001.; he nets only 5,0001., and is as much in debt : he has therefore "lost " 5,0001.

To interpolate needless aspirates is reckoned among the traits of London Cockneyism ; but it is a habit, in fact, confined to neither time nor place. It is even more characteristic of North Cheshire or Lancashire than of London. There you can never tell, until you see it written, whether a man's name is Hallworth or Allworth, Anson or Hanson; for in either case the H is sure to be sounded. A vulgar Londoner will talk to you of what is "hexorbitaut" or " hinaudible "; but only a North of England man would think it proper to write "exhorbitant " or "inhaudible," as we have seen it written—" exhorbitant " more than once. Philology proves how in all time nations have tampered with the h; but Catullus is witness that the Cockney habit was not unknown to the Romans in his day- "' Chommoda ' dicelytt si qnando commode vellet

Dicers, et • hinsidias' Arriusissidias."

The satirist might be supposed to speak of some pragmatically emphatic Lan- cashire man when he says-

" Et tam miriflce sperabat se ease lecuhun, Cum, quanta113 poterat, dixerat ' "

And the reckless libeller goes on to attack the Roman Cockney's maternal ancestry ; the h running in that branch of the family-

" Credo sic meter, sic Liber avuuculus ejus

:Re matermasavus dixerit, critic aria."