sioned Officers to watch the prisoner, is highly reprehensible."* (Signed)

"C. B. WOLLAston, Dep. Judge Adv. "E. DISBROW, Lieut.-Col. President."

By a letter from his Royal Highness the Commander in Chief, to Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Burrard, the following order took place on the sentence:

"His Royal Highness the Prince Regent having approved and confirmed the same, was afterwards pleased to command that the admonition awarded by the Court should be

remitted.”

The power of enforcing obedience to frivolous and vexatious orders is, therefore, determined not to exist in the British army; and also, that the arrest necessary to the administration of its justice, is not to be equivocally or unnecessarily limited. And this, instead of inducing any thing like an insubordinate spirit, must inspire a more perfect respect for a service in which every individual is protected in his duty.

warm vigorous constitution, you will not be surprised if I tell you I was captivated at Church by a neatly dressed country-girl, to whom I immediately offered my heart and my hand. After the usual time spent in fond courtship, "I led her blushing to the Hymeneal altar," and now commenced business on my own account. For two years and upwards I had succeeded beyond my most sanguine expectations-hut on a sudden I felt such an alarming decline in my business that I was almost driven to despair.-As I was conscious I had not offended my customers, either by incivility in my shop or by peremptory demands for payment, this change appeared totally unaccountable. At last, however, the mystery was developed.—I was sent for to measure a gouty old gentleman for an easy shoe (by the way, Mr. Editor, I am famous at this) and while I was busily engaged in taking the length, his lady was asking me numberless questions relative to the price of leather, lasts, knives, ends, and wax, which I answered with all the gravity Į could muster.

On my return home, I thought it so laughable, that I ran openmouthed to relate it to the landlord of the Four-awls. He heard me

without a smile, as to him it was no novelty, and then replied he had been told that the Q-n, the Ps, and all the ladies of quality, were learning my trade, and never wore a shoe which they had not stitched and closed themselves!

Now really, Sir, though I entertain the most exalted ideas of the ingenious art and craft of cord

waining,"

waining," yet I am candid to confess, that the profession is not calculated for the delicacy of the female, and that were I an independent young gentleman in search of a fair partner of my happiness and fortune, I should not select the best shoemaker, or her who smelt the strongest of cobler's-wax and welt-leather. Thank God, I have every reason to believe this evil will soon cure itself: for this morning an elegant lady with a splendid equipage drove to my door, and desired me to take a large green bag out of her carriage; she told me it contained a few articles in my way, which she would sell me a bargain. On opening it, I found it contained her entire stock in trade, consisting of upper and under leathers, hammers, pincers, pegs, paring-knives, lasts, ends, wax, bristles, awls, aud

lap-stones.-My wife gave me a spiteful glance, intimating I was not to purchase, and would have expressed herself to that effect, had I not, by a significant dangle of my knee-strap, given her a signal to withdraw.-After what I conceived to be a fair valuation of the articles, I took to the whole concern, not, however, until I had exacted a promise that the lady should not set up again during the War, a period, Sir, which will, according to the present aspect of things, certainly last my time!

I shall esteem it, Mr. Editor, a prodigious favour, if you will tell all the ladies, that upon acceding to the above sine quâ non stipulation, they may dispose of their stock very advantageously, to their's and your devoted humble servant,

NED HEELTAP.

Bath, April 6, 1812.

Newmarket, May 2.....

Chester, May 7.

Richmond,

taken to prevent any fatal circumstances from attending these acts, of needful hostility, and orders are uniformly issued never to fire upon the natives, unless any particularly irritating act should render sech a measure expedient. They are amazingly expert at throwing the spear, and will launch it with unerring aim to the distance of thirty to sixty yards. I myself have seen a lad burl his spear at a hawk-eagle (a bird which, with wings expandel, measures from seven to ten feet), flying in the air, with such veloci y and correctness, as to pierce his object, and bring the feathered victim to the earth.This circumstance will tend to shew how soon the youth of these tribes are trained to the use of the spear, and the dexterity to which they attain in this art before they reach the age of manhood. Indeed, instances are by no means uncommon, where an army of natives is seen following a youthful leader of fifteen or sixteen years of age, and obeying his directions implicitly, because his previous conduct had been characterized by remarkable vigour of body, and intrepidity of mind-virtues which qualify natives of every age and rank for the highest honours and the most marked distinctions amongst these untutored sons of nature. Their attachment to savage life is unconquerable; nor can the strongest allurements tempt them to exchange their wild residences in the recesses of the country, for the comforts of European life. A singular instance of this fact occurred in the case of Be-ne-long, who was brought to England by Governor Phillip, and returned with › Governor Hunter. For some time after his return, it is true, he assumed the manners, the dress, and

the consequence of an European, and treated his countrymen with a distance which evinced the sense he entertained of his own increased importance; and this disposition was encouraged by every method which suggested itself to the minds of those of the colony with whom he associated; but, notwithstanding so much pains had been taken for his improvement, both when separated from his, countrymen, and since his return to New South Wales, he has subsequently taken to the woods again, returned to his old habits, and now lives in the same manner as those who bave never mixed with the civilized world. Sometimes, indeed, he holds intercourse with the colony; but every effort uniformly fails to draw him once again into the circle of polished society, since he prefers to taste of liberty amongst his native scenes, to the unsatisfactory gratification which arises from an association with strangers, however kind their treatment of him, and however superior to his own enjoy

ments.

"Yet there are many of the natives who feel no disinclination to mix with the inhabitants occasionally to take their share in the labours and the reward of those who toil. Amongst these there are five in particular, to whom our countrymen have given the names of Bull Dog, Bidgy Bidgy, Bundell, Bloody Jack, and another whose name I cannot call to recollection, but who had a farm of four acres and upwards, planted with maize, at Hawkesbury, which he held by permission of Governor King; and the other four made themselves extremely useful on board colonial vessels employed in the fishing and sealing trade, for which they are in the regular receipt of wages. They

strive,

strive, by every means in their power, to make themselves appear like the sailors with whom they associate, by copying their customs, and imitating their manners; such as swearing, using a great quantity of tobacco, drinking grog, and other similar habits. These natives are the only ones, I believe, who are inclined to industrious behaviour, and they have most certainly rendered more essential services to the colony than any others of their countrymen, who, in general, content themselves with assisting to draw nets for fish, for the purpose of coming in for a share of the produce of others' toil.

"The jealousy of the new settlers, which originally existed, has entirely vanished; but the proximity of a civilized colony has not tended in the least to polish the native rudeness and barbarism, which mark the behaviour of the original inhabitants of this remote spot of the universe.”

SPORTING GLEANINGS.

CARDS.

ONE of our periodical writers pretends that a pack of cards was originally a perpetual almanack used in Hindostan, and brought to Europe by the Portuguese. The individual cards represent the fifty-two weeks, the four suits are the four seasons, the twelve court-cards are the twelve months. The oriental astrologers, or jugglers, he says, would find a man's birth-day on the cards, and affect to calculate bis luck.

Father Menestrier, on the contrary, maintains that cards were invented in 1392, for the amusement of the Emperor, who became VOL. XL.-No. 235.

insane: but he thinks that Tarocco cards were in use before the abridged pack, and that the Germans, who made these, first invented the art of printing, by copying the card-maker's process.

RINGING.

A more extraordinary feat in ringing, than was atchieved at Soham, in Cambridgeshire, in November, 1809, has, perhaps, never been recorded in the annals of that art.

A complete peal of 5230 changes of Oxford Treble Bob, was neatly and distinctly rung in three hours and thirty-five minutes, by eight persons, all of the same name (Tebbit), being three brothers and their sons, one of them only fifteen years of age.

AN OLD SPORTSWOMAN.

About the early part of the last century, a female resided at Wanstead, who annually attracted the attention of the public by advertisements: that for 1717, was as follows:-" This is to give notice to all my honoured masters and their ladies, and the rest of my loving friends, that my lady Butter

field gives a challenge to ride a horse, to leap a horse, or run on foot, or balloo, with any woman in England, seven years younger, but not a day older, because I would not undervalue myself, being now seventy-four years of age. My feast will be the last Wednesday of this month, April, where there will be good entertainment for that day, and all the year after, at Wanstead, in Essex.