The Battle of Naseby.—The new modelled army was spoken of with scorn by the Royalists, but it soon made its power felt. The decisive struggle came, and the last great battle was fought on the 14th June, 1645, upon the field of Naseby, near Northampton. The King was in the field in person, and his nephew, Prince Rupert, commanded the cavalry. Fairfax, Cromwell, Shipton, and Ireton, led on the Puritans, and when the day was over the royal cause was hopeless. The King was the last to quit the field on which he had displayed at least the heroic virtues of a Cavalier. When the battle was all but lost, he placed himself at the head of his only regiment in reserve to confront the dreadful Cromwell. The Earl of Carnwarth, alarmed for his safety, or suddenly panic-stricken, caught at Charles's bridle and turned his horse. The contagion seized the officers who surrounded him, and all fled. The King waved his sword and cried, ‘One charge more and we recover the day!' but all was lost.-NEAL.

Archbishop Usher at the Execution of Charles I.— Opposite to Whitehall, where now stands the Horse Guards, was a mansion, on the leads of which was Archbishop Usher. The venerable old man was observed by the few whose attention was for the moment diverted from the scaffold, lifting up his hands, his wrinkled face streaming with tears, interceding with God for his dying sovereign. When the hollow sound of the fatal axe reached him, he, too, swooned and fell, in appearance as lifeless as if he himself had received the stroke.—Ibid.

The prosperity of a jest depends on the ear of the hearer. There must be a congenial audience for jests and music. Mathews the comedian was dumb in dull company. So many a singer is puzzled in the presence of those who cannot appreciate sweet sounds.

Archbishop Laud.-The year 1644 closed with a dismal. tragedy! The Archbishop of Canterbury had been for three. years a prisoner in the Tower. He was now impeached in the House of Commons and brought up for trial on the charge of high treason, before the shadow of an Upper House which still sat at Westminster. The indictment was contained in ten articles. In six he was charged with attempting to subvert the laws of the land; in the remaining four with the design of overthrowing the Protestant faith and restoring Popery. The trial continued seventeen days. An Englishman who now reads it may indeed commiserate the old man who pleaded at the bar, but stronger emotions and a deeper sense of shame steal over him as he reflects that the scene was in the House of Lords, and that the actors were his countrymen. Laud no doubt was a great delinquent; had he been deposed from his sacred office, had he been heavily fined, had he been imprisoned for the remainder of his days, his sentence would have been well deserved. More than any other living man he was responsible for the destruction of the Church of England which had recently taken place, and for the war which was now raging. He had tampered with Popery and forced upon a Protestant people its detested symbols. The Pope even had shown his gratitude by the offer of a cardinal's hat; the offer indeed was declined, he did not mean, we are persuaded, that England should actually submit herself to the Popes of Rome, but the offer itself was infamy. In civil affairs he had invariably urged those measures which were most opposed to liberty. The most violent proceedings of the Star-chamber and the Court of High Commission were congenial to his nature. The Archbishop defended himself with eloquence and with undaunted resolution; but until the sentence was passed upon him and he came forth to die upon the scaffold, we see nothing of

the meekness of the Christian martyr. Treated with insult he returned it with contempt. More than once he forgot the dignity of his calling and of his sacred office, and descended to abuse. His death alone has retrieved his character. He was condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered; nor was it without difficulty that the House of Commons was induced to remit any part of this ferocious sentence. On his own humble petition, and at the twicerepeated remonstrance of the House of Lords, he was at length permitted to die by the axe.-NEAL'S History of the Puritans.

The name of Hugonot was first given to Protestants at Tours in France. 'In all our towns,' says De Thou, 'they have their particular names for fairies and hobgoblins, and other imaginary beings about whom old women's tales are told to frighten children. So at Tours, King Hugo is famous, who is said to ride about the precincts by night and plunder all he meets; from him they were called Hugonots, because they assembled secretly and by night in those places, for the purpose of hearing sermons and for prayer, which at this time it was not lawful to do.'

In the year 1272 the wages of a labourer were 1d. per diem, and the price of a Bible fairly and legibly transcribed 30. A common labourer in those days could not have procured a Bible with less than the entire earnings of thirteen years. He can now do so with the earnings of one day.

An appropriate Motto.-An eastern sage being desired to inscribe on the ring of his Sultan a motto equally applicable to prosperity or adversity, returned it with these words engraved upon the surface, 'And this too shall pass away.'

Churches and schools are very good things in themselves but they will never supersede dragoons and policemen.

Milton's Defence of the Regicides.-Milton, with incomparable powers and entire good will, hastened to the defence of the regicides. In a few months his Eiconoclastes was before the world. Two years later he returned to the charge, and published his Defence of the People of England. The one was in English, the other in Latin. The former was, perhaps, when it first appeared the richest specimen of English prose-writing in existence; severely simple, full, nervous, and majestic. Scholars have awarded equal praise to his latinity, though on this field no such distinguished honours could be won; for Latin had long been the vernacular tongue of learned Englishmen. It had never been written before with equal force, though often with equal grace. Here his superiority lay in his vast mind more than in his deep scholarship. But the two volumes will for ever stand amongst those models to which the learned and the wise incessantly repair to refresh their taste and to invigorate their powers. And yet all that Milton wrote has in no wise impaired the reputation of his king! No upright historian has recourse to him. In all his might of intellect he is nothing more than a party scribe. He assails the dead with bitterness, without evidence, and often in open violation of truth, in contemptuous disregard of facts with which he was or might have been acquainted; he heaps upon the king's memory charges the most unjust-cruelty, prodigality. In short, it is no feeble triumph to the memory of Charles the First, that it was assailed by Milton, and assailed in vain.-NEAL.

Purification of the Blessed Virgin-or Candlemas day. February 2nd.

The Cucking or Ducking Stool.—The punishment formerly inflicted on scolding wives and slandering women. It was

a stool or chair suspended by a block and pulley from a bridge, and the victim was let down and immersed three times, or more, unless she showed signs of penitence,

'No brawling wives, no furious wenches,

No fire so hot, but water quenches.'

This practice was finally abolished about the middle of the last century. The repair of the cucking-stool was a

common item in churchwardens' accounts.

When Plutarch was asked why he remained in his native city after it had become so obscure and so little, he said, 'I stay lest it should grow less.'

A Persian Fable-the Palm and the Gourd.-A gourd wound itself round a lofty palm, and in a few weeks climbed to its very top. 'How old mayest thou be?' asked the new-comer. 'About a hundred years,' was the answer. 'A hundred years! and no taller. Only look, I have grown as tall as you in fewer days than you can count years.' 'I know that well,' replied the palm. 'Every summer of my life a gourd has climbed up round me, as proud as thou art, and as short-lived as thou wilt be.'

By examining the tongue of a patient, physicians find out the diseases of the body, and philosophers the diseases of the mind.

The manner of a vulgar man has freedom without ease, and the manner of a gentleman has ease without freedom.