are reliques that have not been swept away with their cells and monasteries; whilst New-College pudding, Oxford John, Dean's particulars, &c., still grace their ancient halls. In an old family register I find, besides many other dainties requisite for a bishop's table, that capon was a standing dish, and formed a considerable portion of his kain. I do not believe, that now-a-days, a single capon would be procured for money, from Tweed to John-o'Groats. To the patriotic zeal of the monks, are we much more indebted for fine breeds of animals, than to the Agricultural Society of the present day. They discovered a spring of action, as yet wholly overlooked, by the less scientific members of that society; for they received no poultry, as kain, under an enormous weight; and I saw, a few years ago, at Paisley Abbey, a pretty tolerable sized ring for measuring eggs, beneath which, the friars used to place a basin; the eggs that fell through were, of course, not counted, being broken, and only fit for puddings.

With respect to servants, their depravity is too notorious to require exposure or minute detail. Its evil effects are so universally, and so severely felt, that the bare mention of a chance for ameliorating it, would, it might be supposed, be seized with avidity. This, however, is far from being the case, because the real root of the evil is in the factitious state of society, and want of proper education.

But, at all events, the more we can be useful to ourselves, and the more we can do without servants, the happier we shall be. It would be quite Quixotic to call society by its right name, or to think even of the pains and assumed happiness it costs; but let those who have the greatest trial and exertion to maintain themselves in it, and who are, consequently, most dependent on servants,

A portion of rent or tithe paid in kind.

+ The monks on the continent, at this moment, are reputed the best of cooks. I may say that I never saw a better dressed or better served dinner than one that was begged, cooked, and served by a mendicant friar. He came to Rome once a-week, went his rounds, and brought his gleanings to an Abbate who patronized him. The door was then shut, the outer cloak thrown off, and half a dozen bags, plump as their carrier, displayed themselves to the enraptured eyes of the benevolent host. Fearing that the load under which the frater's shoulders themselves were made to bend, would completely overwhelm the credulity of my readers, 1 abstain from the bill of lading. Suffice it to say, that for a dinner of ten dishes, no one ingredient was wanting, not even oil. The receipt for one of them-baked curds-I regret I have lost. I shall refer to the receipts for a Quarter of kid dressed à l' Isaac, which was truly savory. I had an opportunity of witnessing several sights of the kind, being introduced by the friendly Abbate as the Sorella

mark some point at which they judge the pleasures of society to be more than counterbalanced by its pains. Let such persons, then, summon up courage, and retire from it at once, and save, for the support of their children, the substance they lavished on strangers, that ridiculed them while they fed on their misapplied bounty. Let them not suppose, that, in the parade of society, there is any thing. captivating beyond idea. It is afflicting to think, that the mind, which we are accustomed to call free and uncontrolled, should not only be less free than the body, but that the means of enslaving it should be greater: "when goods increase, they are increased that eat them; and what good is there to the owners thereof, save the beholding them with their eyes." I should recommend that no servant be taken, without a character of three years at least; that no master or mistress give a good character to bad servants, for the sake of getting rid of them; and that no servant be taken from the recommendation of trades-people.* Were these simple maxiins attended to, the result, I have no doubt, would answer the most sanguine expectations. Servants would then seldom quit their places; they would have an interest in pleasing their masters; and masters have always an interest in overlooking a few faults, that they may not be put to the inconvenience of changing. In short, servants would consider their places as their homes. The system of giving false characters, seems now quite a matter of course. Indeed, a brother, a husband, or a father of a family, would risk much in refusing one to an impertinent fellow. The only means of remedying this, is requiring testimonials of a period of residence in one family of a considerable length; surely people could not falsify in this respect. If a man, who knows himself wholly de

Though it is not my plan to enter particularly into the subject of servants, yet there is an abuse too serious to be omitted, as it is not generally known, though I do not see how it is to be remedied, A gentleman runs about to a dozen coachmakers to save a couple of pounds on his carriage, and (say) it costs him 2001. The coachman, before he drives it from the tradesman's door, receives, perhaps, 200 shillings, though the tradesman has to wait for his money, and long enough too sometimes. He has likewise to supply the coachman with tickets for drink when he chooses to pay him a visit, with dinners, civilities, and whatever else may be going on, and to pay him three times the value of the old harness, should that be unfortunately a perquisite. The cause of this is, that the coachmaker has warranted the coach to run for a certain period, and of course he must season the coachman as well as the coach.

A case of false character has lately been tried, and 7007. damages were adjudged against a person who gave a character for honesty to a servant whom it was proved he knew to be dishonest. A few such examples would have a very salutary effect.

ficient, in point of honesty, find his master give him the character of an honest servant, what inducement can he have to forego a practice that adds to his stock, and detracts not from his good name?

But it requires something more than precept and the terror of true characters to constitute a well-principled and a well-regulated family- the good conduct and good principles in the master and mistress, of which servants are the best judges. What can oral precepts do, when constant practical ones are in opposition to them? or with what reverence can servants look up to those whose duplicity and petty frauds they daily witness? How can they receive benefit from their instructions, when they merely recommend honesty and truth? This remark I would address more particularly to the mistress, as her conduct is an example to her husband, as well as to others, from the persuasive and engaging delicacy that belongs to the female character;- the only return, and a poor one it is, that woman receives in lieu of every thing society denies. And besides, it is her virtues alone that can be displayed in the most necessary and endearing offices of domestic life, in the management of the household, in the toils and anxieties of bringing up a family, and in the tender and indefatigable watchfulness of a sick bed. Evil example is generally considered much more contagious than good; but, placing the standard a good way below perfection, as is requisite to make the cases admit of comparison, I think it is just the reverse. I could mention instances of prudent women whose example has influenced their neighbourhood for miles around; and, while no female tongue could allow them the slightest praise, mothers became more attentive to their families, and mistresses to their households.

Another fundamental error is the ignorance in which the wife is kept of the real state of her husband's affairs, of whose ruin she may thus be the innocent and unconscious cause. Men often seem more anxious to conceal from their wives, than from others, the embarrassment they should wish them alone to know. They have buoyed them up with expectations, the failure of which mortifies their own pride. With the rent-roll let the debts and mortgages be produced, and at all events, let the young wife, before she runs into the heedless expense, find

some means to ascertain whether there be incumbrances, and to what extent. If example be required, I will produce that of a lady of more than patrician birth, and of a mind as elevated as her rank. Suspecting, from several circumstances, the embarrassed state of her husband's affairs, she went into the steward's office, and, locking the door after her, declared that she would not quit the place till he made her acquainted with her real situation. Her suspicions being more than confirmed, she prevailed on her husband to go and pay some visit, and then immediately dismissed the carriages, horses, servants, hounds, and all the et cetera of expense, and when her husband returned, received him with open arms to a state of peace and comfort to which his former condition rendered him a stranger, and which pomp and festivity had served at best to interrupt. The creditors, by wisely trusting their honour and discretion, saved their own money, and prevented the ruin of the family. It was, however, a long and painful task of fourteen years. With less labour the fortune might have been triply earned; but it had more value as the work of integrity. Had the lady been a merchant's daughter, in all probability the family would have been ruined for what judgment or feeling can be expected from boarding-school discipline? Many mistresses, who subscribe to the Bible Society, have servants at home without a Bible. Let them take home a common Bible, and books, of which there are many suited to their capacity, both engaging and instructing. These books should be changed at proper intervals (say once a week) and some of them examined as to their contents to secure their perusal. Thus mistresses would gain a knowledge of the dispositions of their servants, and obtain intellectual authority over them, the reaction of which, by requiring in her the same moral superiority and a regard for the principles which she nurtures, would extend its beneficial influence to the society in which she moves, to her children, and even to her children's children. Let us not regard remote causes as insignifiThe highest flights of genius, and the profoundest arguments of philosophy, are but assemblages of minute and individually inconsequent relations. By this discipline, servants also will have their minds occupied and improved, and consequently their happiness increased. Is

cant.

not idleness the source of all evil? What then can be expected from a number of idle people sitting down together from three to five hours every evening, deprived by dependence and distrust of every sense of honour, with no spur to improvement, and every incentive for vice? As their service is indispensable to our comfort, their comfort, morals, and happiness, are indispensable to our tranquillity. Their life, however, is far from being happy, and, though our happiness is intimately connected with theirs, we seem not to have a care on the subject. We are exalted by their degradation, but let it not appear that we are happy by their misery. There is a great deal of time, precious to their families, wasted by well meaning and virtuous women in running after charitable institutions, whilst their children are suffering from neglect, or abandoned to neglectful servants, and whilst there is perhaps twenty times the value of their alms wasted in their kitchens, not from any particular mismanagement, but from the want of attention to economy and knowledge of it so universal in this country. I do not mean to say that charities are always prejudicial: there are many on the contrary highly meritorious; such as schools of all descriptions, when food and clothes are not given; relief in all cases of accident, unforeseen calamity, fires, &c. But the constant and systematic practice of alms-giving, the Foundling and Lying-in Hospitals, and the like, are checks to industry, and premiums for vice, and are as remote from the spirit, as from the letter of the Scripture, on the authority of which they are generally maintained. There are, who are carried away by what they call tender sympathies, and who give some from their abundance, some from their necessity, and some forgetting that justice is before liberality; and there are, I am sorry to say, whose sole aim is a fair report, who would think it very harsh that the poor should be taught to have an honest contempt for the bread of charity, and that they should save even from their needful to support their aged parents, or to keep in store for their own necessities. But what could such people think of any one who would say, that, "If any man provide not for his own, and especially for his own kindred, he hath denied the faith he is worse than an infidel?"

Women, guided by judgment and reason (as well as