Is on the south bank , about a furlong and h road. In plan it is ram. The body is ain unbroken walls o dwelling-house rectnd doorways, as dend architectural ornaing is of grace and lows are in two se, the lower shallow. in number five, and n wall. In describroken, I have, how otice several pilasters ection, one of which en the two windows 1 each of the side livide the cast front vision is a window. the western, is finishnd acroteria. To the building is attached a f six fluted columns ic order, sustaining , and cornice of a insignificant propor whole building, and, together with the rest of the edifice, have no other connexion with the columns, than the cramps and cement that hold them together. When I add, that the triglyphs and mutules are entirely omitted, and that the whole entablature wants breadth, it will be seen how barbarously the order has been innovated upon. There is, however, an attempt at ornament in the frieze of the west front, where the places of the triglyphs are supplied by chaplets of myrtle. Excepting the porticos, Mr. Bedford's church designs are very convenient; and their dubious style of architecture equally suits the Doric and the Corinthian. The steeple, between a tower and a spire, possesses some merit for its originality. In common with the body of the church, it stands high in its designer's favour, having been set up with but little variation on two other churches. The plan is square, and the elevation is made into two principal diminishing stories, the whole supporting a square pedestal, with honeysuckle mouldings on each face, and finished with a stone ball and cross. The first story rests on a rus and in two Doric columns with antæ at the angles. On the frieze two chaplets, as the west front. The second story is uniform; the order Ionic. Both stories are open, and the angles with Grecian tiles. In many points of view this tower is not an inelegant object. THE INTERIOR. A portion of the design being occupied by the stairs to the galleries and the tower, the audience part is reduced almost to a square; it is naked and empty, and, except in size, closely corresponds with Trinity Church; although the order is in that building Corinthian,-of equal merit, however, with the imitative Doric of the present. The first objects which meet the eye on entering are two pulpits, square unornamented boxes perched upon tall stone pedestals, formed of the upper part of a Doric column; and on looking for the altar, in its place is only to be seen a large unsightly slab of veined marble, more fit for a hearth-stone, let into the eastern wall, having the Decalogue, &c. inscribed upon it, which, like a Dutch painting, may with difficulty be made out in a particular light. Beneath is the Communion Table, and above, a frieze of gilt honeysuckles. I never saw in any building the altar so neglected as it is here. The usual quota of galleries, with their delicately tinted fronts, supported on slender Doric columns, all white or nearly so, remind the spectator how far inferior the cold naked appearance which modern architects delight in giving to a building, is to the brown wainscot galleries of the old churches. Although the altar is so totally neglected, the highly enriched organ-case displays that perversion of ornament which so fully proves a bad taste. Between the windows are placed Ionic pilasters, with enriched capitals, occupying the whole height from the floor of the church, to an architrave and a rich frieze of honeysuckle work, on which rests the ceiling, which is panelled into large square compartments, having a flower in the centre of each. The font is an antique vase, enriched with mouldings, standing on a square pedestal; it is cast, I apprehend, in the same mould as that at Trinity Church, which actually cost the parish of Newington £32. 9s. though from appearance, any one unacquainted with the actual value of the article, would imagine it might be purchased of the itinerant Italians for as many shillings. In the tower is a musical peal of six bells, much admired in the neighbourhood for their melody, which is no doubt improved by the adjacent canal. The first stone was laid on the 7th of March, 1822, by the bishop of Winchester, and the edifice was consecrated on the 26th of March, 1824.-Gentleman's Magazine. ASTRONOMICAL OBSERVA. TIONS FOR APRIL. ECLIPSE OF THE SUN-THE SOLAR SPOTS THEIR MAGNITUDE-PHENOMENA FLANETARUM. (For the Mirror.) THE sun rises every day more sensibly to the northward, is more elevated at midday, and continues longer above the horizon; he enters the first degree of the sign Taurus on the 20th, at 9 h. 30 s. evening. On the 26th, he is eclipsed; but this phenomenon will be invisible here, the moon's northern latitude at the time of conjunction being only 51 m. 9s. The semidiameter of the moon is 14 m. 56 s., while that of the sun is 15 m. 55 s.; therefore the eclipse cannot be a total one any where. At the time of the sun's greatest altitude in those parts where the eclipse is visible, the periphery of the moon will be encompassed with a ring of light of a digit in breadth. Eclipses have in all ages greatly attracted the attention of mankind; the ignorant and superstitious have viewed them with terror, and in former ages they were often considered as the forerunner of national calamities. The Chinese, even at the present period, upon their appearance, perform the most absurd and superstitious ceremonies, although they are so far acquainted with their nature as to be able to predict them. The face of the sun when clear of spots, seen by the naked eye through a smoked or coloured glass, or through a thin cloud, appears all over equally luminous; but when viewed through a telescope, the glasses being smoked or coloured, the middle of the disc appears brighter than the outskirts, because the sun being a globular body, the light is darted more directly towards us from the middle than from any other part, while the faculæ, or parts brighter than the rest of the disc, appear more distinctly near the sides as being on a darker ground than in the middle-they sometimes turn to spots. As regards the solar spots, or macule, as they are termed, there is a great variety in their magnitude, the difference being chiefly in superficial length and breadth; their depth or thickness is very small. Some have been so large as, by compata tion, to be capable of covering the whole surface of the earth, or even five times its surface. The diameter of a spot, when near the middle of the disc, is measured by comparing the time it takes in passing ever a cross hair in a telescope with the time wherein the whole disc of the sun passes over the same hair. It may also be measured by the micrometer, and thus we may judge how many times the diameter of the spot is contained in the diameter of the sun. They increase and decrease in magnitude, and seldom continue long in the same state. The number of them is very uncertain; there are sometimes a great many, sometimes very few, and sometimes none at all. Scheiner, who made observations on the sun from 1611 to 1629, says, that in the year 1625, he counted fifty spots on the sun at a time. Hevilius observed one that arose and va nished in sixteen or seventeen hours, and no one has been known to continue longer than seventy days. Those spots that are gradually formed are gradually dissolved, and those that arise suddenly for the most part vanish in the same manner. When a spot disappears, the place where it was generally becomes brighter than the rest of the sun, and continues so for several days. The spots all keep the same situa tion with respect to one another, and adhere to his surface or float in his atmosphere very near his body, and as long as they last are carried round in the same manner. By the motion of the spots, therefore, is learned, what would not have otherwise been known, that the sun is a globe, and has a rotation upon his axis. Mercury cannot be seen this month, being enveloped in the brighter beams of the sun, he arrives at his inferior conjunction on the 5th, is stationary on the 19th, and at his greatest distance from the sun on the 25th. Venus rises on the 1st, at 4 h. 20 m. morning, in 26 deg. Aquarius, and on the 30th, at 3 h. 37 m. morning, in 29 deg. Pisces, her illuminated part being directed towards the east. Mars is too near the sun to be very favourable for observation this month; he rises on the 1st, at 6h. 29 m. morning, in 10 deg. Taurus, and on the 30th, at 5 h. 32 m. in 1 deg. Gemini. Jupiter. This noble planet is visible throughout the evening during the month, rising on the 1st at 6h. 12 m. in 9 deg. Libra, reaching the meridian at 11 h. 54 m. He rises 2 hours earlier by the end of the month, and retrogrades 4 deg. The visible emersions of his first satellite are seven : On the 3rd, at 3h. 5m. 38s. morning. 19th, at 1h. 22m. 9s. morning. Saturn, having commenced a direct movement on the 26th February, arrives on the 14th of this month at the same spot where he was on the 14th January whilst moving retrograde; he will then be very near the star Gamma, in the constellation Gemini. He culminates on the 1st, at 5 h. 19 m. afternoon, in 1 deg. Cancer, setting at 1h. 32 m. morning. He advances 1 deg. in the course of the month. PASCHE. THE SEA. (For the Mirror.) I'VE stood to gaze ou the shining sea Their home in the depths of that boundless lake; THE LAST LEAF. A withered, sapless, lifeless form, By all thy kindred long forsaken, My peace, my joys, my hopes are flown; Yet, ah! while many a moistened eye Is turn'd with mournful gaze on thee, MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF ALL NATIONS. No. IX. LAPLANDERS AND REIN-DEER. MANY of our readers will doubtless remember the engraving of the Laplanders and their rein-deer which we gave in No. 9 of the MIRROR, and many who were at that time unacquainted with our work, but who are now our readers, will remember that a family of Laplanders with a herd of living reindeer were imported by Mr. Bullock, and exhibited at the Egyptian Hall, and elsewhere, in the year 1822. From Captain Brooke's recently published Winter Sketches in Lapland, we learn, that in 1823, the Laplanders were on the Roraas Mountains, endeavouring to raise a herd of deer; that they had acquired great licentiousness in consequence of their visit to this country; and that they had wasted much of the wealth which they had taken away with them. The same writer further informs us, that out of two hundred deer brought by Mr. Bullock, only twelve throve, and are now near Dublin. Others were placed in Scotland, but they died; still Capt. Brooke is of opinion, that if the experiment were tried, these fine animals might be naturalized in this country. The rein-deer, however, increases in bulk and power as it approaches the extreme north, and is a far finer animal in Spitzbergen than in Finmark. The speed of these animals is well-known, and Capt. B. mentions the following instance of one deer going one hundred and fifty miles, at the rate of eight miles an hour:- In consequence of the Norwegians making a sudden and unexpected irruption into the Swedish territories, an officer was despatched with a sledge and rein-deer to Stockholm, to convey the intelligence; which he did with such speed, that he performed one hundred and twenty-four Swedish miles (about eight hundred English) in fortyeight hours; but his faithful animal dropped down lifeless on the Riddarhustorget, just after his arrival in the capital. The bearer of the news, as it is said, was in consequence ennobled, and assumed the name of Rehnstjerna (Reindeer Star.) The Laplander can hardly be prevailed pon to sell his deer; but Capt. Brookes succeeded in purchasing one from a nave, who brought it down to Fuglenæs o kill; an operation which the Lapland ers will never allow a stranger to perform. We shall conclude this brief notice of the manners and customs of the Laplanders with a relation of the singular and cruel operation of their SLAYING A REIN-DEER. Having fettered the animal, and thrown it upon the ground, he plunged his knife into it exactly between the fore legs, and left it there, sticking up to the hilt. The animal was then loosed; but, instead of life being extinct, after a little struggle it got upon its legs and walked a short distance, the knife still remaining in the wound. In this manner it continued for some time, appearing to be little affected, and the Laplanders were preparing to repeat the cruel operation, when the deer suddenly dropped, and immediately expired This barbarous method of slaughtering their deer is general among the Laplanders of Finmark, and I have even seen the poor animal, after the knife was struck into it, appear so little conscious of the blow, as to begin feeding, and to survive several minutes before its effects proved fatal. The reason for leaving the knife in the wound is that the blood may be preserved, which would gush forth if the knife were taken out. When the animal is opened, the blood is found coagulated, and is carefully preserved by the Laplanders, who consider it a great deli. cacy. SPIRIT OF THE Public Journals. THE WRECK. HAVING arranged my affairs in Port Louis, bade adieu to the few acquaintances I had on that island, and settled myself comfortably in my spacious cabin of seven feet by five, in the good ship Albatross, my thoughts naturally reverted to home and my kindred-home! from which I had for eight years been an exile; kindred with whom (from the wandering, desultory life I led,) I had held little, or in fact, no communion. Shall I, said I to myself, find in the land of my nativity those congenial spirits, from whom, in the hey-day of youthful blood parting seemed so bitter, even amid the greedy cravings after novelty, so natural to the ardent and youthful mind? I thought of the changes time or death night have wrought, and could not repress my tears. The voice of the captain of the vessel aroused me from my reverie: We shall have a greasy night, I doubt," said he, anxiously looking towards the receding land. I turned to gaze upon it; masses of dense and marble-like cloud enveloped it; the evening was lowering, and although there was scarcely enough of wind 66 a to fill the sails, there was that uneasy motion of the waves, termed by seamen short sea ;" and occasionally fitful squalls of wind swept past us, hurrying the vessel for an instant with the swiftness of a meteor, and then, leaving her to plough her sluggish course, rolling and pitching as the short abrupt seas struck her now forward and then aft. Every thing, as the captain observed, seemed ominous of at least a squally night; nor was he deceived. I had continued on deck, listessly watching the crew, as they bustled about the ship and rigging, making all snug, in anticipation of the gale, till at length the perfect stillness about me, broken only by the booming of the sea against the ship's sides, and the creaking of the masts and rigging, warning me of the lateness of the hour, I descended to my birth. It was then blowing a fresh breeze from the N. E. I suspect I had slept about three hours, when I awoke, and found the ship lying down nearly on her beam ends, and by the rapid rush of waters past her sides, knew that a heavy squall must have caught her. There was a great stir above, and the boatswain was turning up all hands. I rushed immediately on deckthe night was pitchy dark, and the wind had freshened to a hard gale: all the following day it increased; by night it blew a furious tempest, and the sea increasing with it, rose literally mountains high. We had hitherto laid our course, but the wind now hauled round to the eastward; to ease her, we sent down topgallant-masts, mizen-top-masts, and jibboom, and kept as close to the wind as the violence of the weather would allow us; but the sea canted her head off, so that she made more lee than head-way, and the rigging was terribly strained with the work:about day-break, a tremendous storm tore the foresail in ribbons; we had now but a close-reefed main-topsail and fore-try-sail set (every hand flatly refusing to go aloft to bend another sail to the fore-yard,) so that we had little hope of keeping off the Mozambique shore, near to which we imagined we must have driven; unless, indeed, the wind shifted, and of this there was little likelihood. The gale too, if possible, seemed to increase; the sky was one vast black cloud; and the rain fell so thick, that we could scarce distinguish an object from the wheel to the main-mast. One pump had been incessantly at work for the last six-and-thirty hours, but the water gained so fast upon her, that we were obliged to rig the weather one and even then we could scarcely keep it under. About noon, however, the rain ceased, the atmosphere cleared, and the wind lulled; and then our spirits and energies revived. The captain now determined, if possible, to wear ship. After a hard struggle, we succeeded; and found, to our great joy, that she made better weather on this tack, as the sea now headed her, and she had time to rise to one sea before another struck her. By four P.M. we had gained considerably on her. She had still some water between decks, but nothing to be alarmed at; and though we had battened down the hatches, there was such a weight of water on deck, from the continual seas she shipped, it was impossible to keep them perfectly tight. Our anxiety was now in a great measure dispelled, and we sat down to the first comfortable meal we had enjoyed since leaving harbour; indeed we had not as yet been able to cook at all. There was on board the Albatross, the young widow of an English merchant of Port Louis, returning with her infant to Europe. This lady strangely interested me. Settled melancholy was stamped on her pale and care-worn features: she would sit for hours gazing on the innocent face of her child, till the tears trembled in her eyes; and then she would start, and affect to smile, and to wonder at her own abstraction; but it was evidently the effort of a heart desolate and stricken. Her story was an affecting one. She had loved, and her passion was returned--but her lover was poor! They married and her sordid, implacable parent, drove her from his roof, with bitterness and cursing. An offer was made to her husband to join a young but flourishing concern in the Mauritius; and he departed, leaving his Maria to follow him, should his hopes succeed. They did! Joyfully did she obey his summons: and her heart throbbed with delight, as she anticipated the moment when she should place in his father's arms, the son born to him in his exile. Alas! it was ordained that he should but see her and die! She found him stretched on the bed of death! The rest of the story is soon told. The unhappy widow, with her infant, sailed for England-every hope and happiness buried in her hus band's untimely grave! The weather continued moderate for the whole of the two following days; and with a fair and leading breeze, we rapidly sped on our way towards the Cape of Good Hope. It was now the fifth evening since our departure: the day had been sultry, and the captain and myself stood upon the poop, conversing in high spirits: Mrs. C. sat between us, and she |