LADY F. Well, I believe I must try you. Let me see, what will be the best thing to put you to first. Come a little nearer, (he approaches) I suppose you can wind up a clock?

THOMAS. I can wind up a jack.

LADY F. It is all the same-only you must go more gently to work, Go into my boudoir, and wind up the clock over the couch but be sure you do not touch the alarum, and I'll come and see how handy you are in your first operation. But I forgot to ask you, did Nancy Williams come up to town with you?

THOMAS, Oh! no, my lady, I was very glad to leave her behind, and all that belonged to her.

LADY F. Well, go and wind up my clock: and If you don't understand it, I'll shew you how; but methinks, to judge by appearances, you can wind up a lady's clock as much to her satisfaction as the smartest lacquey in the parish of St. James's.

[Exeunt.

SUPPLEMENT TO BUFFON'S NATURAL HISTORY. THE PRIEST.-This is a biped, or two-legged animal :—its body black-sleeky, dew-lapped, and inclined to corpulency. This ani mal is confined to no age and climate, having been found at all times, and in all quarters of the earth, though in some places in a more wild and savage state than in our own country. From remains which have been dug up in the Fields of History, there is good reason to believe that it was in former ages larger and more ferocious than our present breed;-its skeleton, indeed, like that of the mammoth, is immense, and even terrific; and we know that there was a time when mankind were dreadfully tossed and gored by its fury. More peaceable, however, in its present habits, and become comparatively domesticated, it is now generally found in fat pastures, and in the parks and meadows of the Great; or, like the town bull, it frequently feeds upon the parish at large, consuming a whole tenth part of the produce and stock, both alive and dead, of a district.—Although retaining a smack of its original inclination for blood, this creature is generally inactive in its habits, and extremely tractable to the commands of its master. Hired to guard the flock, it has been frequently found to worry, and always to fleece them; and there are those amongst us sanguine enough to

hope, that the time may yet come, when their numbers may not merely be reduced, but when, like the wolves which formerly infested our island, they may be wholly destroyed-and, with the kind permission of heaven, the race become eventually extinct.

A COMMON SCOLD.-PHILADELPHIA, SEPT. 8.-Catherine Fields was indicted and convicted for being a common scold. The trial was excessively amusing, from the variety of testimony, and the diversified manner in which this Xantippe pursued her virulent propensities. "Ruder than March wind, she blew a hurricane ;" and it was given in evidence, that after having scolded the family individually, the bipeds and quadrupeds, the neighbours, hogs, poultry, and geese, she would throw the window open at night to scold the watchman. Her countenance was an index to her temper-sharp, peaked, sallow, and small eyes. She was sentenced to be ducked in a horsepond seven days successively.

The following tragi-comic paragraph appeared in a Paris paper of Sunday last:-" On Thursday. some boatmen took a man out of the Seine who had thrown himself in from the PonauChange. On conveying him to the Corps de Garde, they suc ceeded in recovering him. He was no sooner restored than he assured the Commissary of Police very seriously, that as soon as he was free he should take the first opportunity of drowning himself. The Commissary proposed to him to sign a declaration of his intention to destroy himself, and to which the man readily agreed. At this juncture, a female arrived, loudly screaming, My husband, I will see my husband! When, however, she found him alive, she was immediately silent. The boatmen approached her, to ask for some reward for having saved her husband, when she angrily repulsed them, saying, Why did you not let him drown himself? what business had you to meddle with him? These words had the effect of curing the husband of his folly, and he swore that he should not again attempt to drown himself."

DAVID'S SOW.-" As drunk as David's sow," is a common saying, which took its rise from the following circumstance One David Lloyd, a Welchman, who kept an alehouse at Hereford, bad a living sow with six legs, which was greatly resorted to by the curious; he had also a wife much addicted to drunkenness. One

day David's wife having took a cup too much, and being fearful of the consequences, (her husband being in the habit of giving her a little discipline for her cure) turned out the sow, and lay down to sleep herself sober in the sty. A company coming to see the sow, David ushered them to the sty, exclaiming, "There is a sow for you! Did any of you ever see such another !" all the while supposing the sow had really been there; to which some of the company, seeing the state the woman was in, replied, "It was the drunkenest sow they had ever beheld;" whence arose the saying, "As drunk as David's sow."

HATTON-GARDEN.— A Dancing-Master and a MUSICAL LADY. ̧ -An affair of crim. con. came up for inquiry. The dancing master described himself as living upon good terms with his wife at an obscure village in Buckinghamshire, and on Saturday last he accompanied her to witness an exhibition of strolling players in a barn. The husband left his frail rib to see Pizarro, while he took a glass of comfort with a neighbouring farmer, and did not return home till after the play was over; and, to be brief, the musical lady had become enamoured with the performance of Rolla, and she eloped with him in a neighbour's chaise cart. The husband discovered the retreat of the fugitives at Somers-town, but the wife refused to leave Rolla, and, the former sought advice how to make her. The only answer given was-by an action for criminal conversation, "What!" said the husband, with much emphasis, "an action against a strolling player."

MARRIAGE LOTTERY.-It has often been said, figuratively, that marriage is a lottery; but we do not recollect to have met with a practicable illustration of the truth of the simile before the following, which is a free translation of an advertisement in the Louisana Gazette:-" A young man, of good figure and disposition, unable, though desirous, to procure a wife, without the preliminary trouble of amassing a fortune, proposes the following expedient to attain the object of his wishes:-He offers himself as the prize of a lottery to all widows and virgins under 32. The number of tickets to be 600, at 50 dollars each. But one number to be drawn from the wheel, the fortunate proprietor of which, is to be entitled to himself and the 30,000 dollars."New York American.

DANDYISM.-We really thought dandyism was extinct until a

few days since, when three dandies of the first order, were charged, at the Public Office, Marlborough-street, by a female, with throwing a handful of snuff into her eyes, in Piccadilly; they pleaded, in their defence, inebriety, and the rudeness of the lady's conduct in taking indecent liberties with them!!!

O tempora! O mores!

The magistrate fined them five shillings each for being drunk, and ordered them to find bail for the assault.

PECUNIARY REPARATION. -A widow lady, at Southampton, died last month, and left a very large fortune to a former admirer, whose addresses she refused forty years ago.

ENJOYMENT.-A singular instance of the rage for the pleasures of matrimony, was lately evinced by a young girl, in the neighbourhood of Glasgow, who being unable to find money to purchase wedding-clothes, actually submitted to the operation of having five front teeth drawn, for which she received five guineas, and purchased the necessary articles; after this we may well exclaim with the poet

"Happy the climate where the beau

"Wears the same suit for use and show;
"And at a small expence your wife,

"If once well pink'd, is cloath'd for life."*

BON MOT.-A gentleman meeting his friend in the street, "Jack," said he, "what's the matter with your father, I hear he is dangerously ill." "No, no," replied Jack, "not dangerously; he only labours under a disorder very incident to old people, a confinement in the chest."

ANECDOTE. A gentleman threatening to give a poor fellow a good dressing, the man replied, "I am much obliged to your honour; but as you are a gentleman, you ought to be best dressed ; and if you please, I will undertake you shall be so."

* Our readers are, doubtless, aware that in many parts of Asia, Africa, and America, the natives have so far forgotten the shame of Mother Eve, as to go entirely naked; while in other parts they tattoo the skin; to which the poet alludes.

E

At the last assizes in the county of Norfolk, a man was tried on a charge of bigamy. Two wives had already proved their titles to his person, when a third stood up for the same purpose, and a fourth appeared in readiness.-" Why, you fellow," exclaims the Judge, "at this rate where do you intend to stop?" "To stop, my Lord!" replies the other, "I was going on till I could find a good one."

A young lady of quality was lately cured of a dropsy of nine months standing, in a very surprising manner. A substance was brought away which has motion, and actually increases, and all her friends are agreed, that it is a monstrous bore!

BON MOT.-A company of gentlemen in the town of being met, and chatting about the news of the day, one of them informed the company, that the pretty sempstress of the place was going to be married to an ordinary barber. Her beauty was so extraordinary, as to excite surprize and pity in some of the company, that she should accept so poor an offer; upon which, one of the gentlemen spoke the following, extempore

Why shou'd we Molly's humble fate condole,
Where shou'd the needle turn but to the pole?

MATRIMONY.--Since in these times of depravity, most people marry more for money than love, and, as it were, make marriage a kind of traffick, it may not be amiss to lay before the public, as an instance that there are disinterested people in this respect, a late match between a gentleman at the west end of the town, and the widow of Leadenhall-street. It has been observed, and I believe the observation to be just, that old hat is in continual great demand, and of course a good commodity: it will be said then that Mr. *****, when he married the brisk widow above-mentioned, was in hopes of coming into a good stock: if that was really the case, his hopes are realized; it certainly is a snug thing, and promises to make him a pretty lively-hood. The marriage articles were concise, but much to the purpose; viz. "She has bound herself to furnish him with an old hat, so long as he is able to keep it well brushed."

The Courier, in extenuation of a very gross blunder that he published, dwells on its having been contained in a tiny letter of half a