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Cumberland. By his care they were first located at Selkirk; after the death of his brother they removed to Roxburgh, and finally to Kelso, as a more eligible resting place. It was by the advice of John Bishop of Glasgow that this step was taken; and the monastery was founded by David, on the 2nd of May, 1128, and dedicated by him to the honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St John the Evangelist. He bestowed liberal donations on the house, and exempted its inmates from divers tolls and services; and various privileges were obtained for them through his influence with the Pope, or rather Popes, for more than one occupant of the chair of St Peter was moved in their behalf. The royal foundation was ratified by Innocent II; and Alexander III granted the Abbot the privilege of wearing the mitre, with pontifical robes, and also the right of assisting at all general councils; Innocent III made the same dignitary independent of all episcopal jurisdiction. The Abbot further was granted, by the diocesan of the Bishop of St Andrew's, an exemption from all kinds of tribute, and a right to receive ordinations and the other sacraments from any prelate, either of Scotland or Cumberland.

In those times many individuals joined religious fraternities, not from feelings of devotion, but in the hope of living in joyous indolence. To disappoint the views of such pretenders to sanctity became the solemn duty of really devout men. A feeling of this sort probably caused Bernard d'Abbeville, the framer of the Tyronesian rules, to order that all sorts of handicraft should be performed by the monks of his convent. The avowed object was to guard against the evil thoughts encouraged by idleness; the real one might be to profit from the labour thus exacted. The brethren were obliged to work daily, and the produce of their industry was brought in aid of the general funds of the monastery. Whatever the motive of the Superior, the effect could hardly be other than good.

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The establishment was one of considerable importance: a number of churches were held to belong to it, and among them those of Selkirk, Roxburgh, Innerletham, Molle, Sprousion, Hume, Lambden, Greenlaw, Symprink, with their titles, and the Sibools of Roxburgh. It was by Malcolm IV, grandson of David I, that the church of Innerletham was granted by charter, in 1159, which confirmed all prior donations.

At the time of the Reformation the revenue of the house was as follow:-In money, 2,501. 16s. 5d. sterling; nine chaldrons of wheat; fifty-two chaldrons, six bolls, and two firlots of beer; forty-one chaldrons, eight bolls, and three firlots of

meal; and four chaldrons and three bolls of oats. The monastery, with all its possessions, passed by royal grant from Henry VIII to the Roxburgh family. The original charter of Malcolm IV still exists, being carefully preserved among the archives of that noble house.

Kelso Abbey was considered to be in the Saxon or early Norman style. The noble proportions commanded admiration, but it presented few decorations. When it ceased to be a monastic institution the church was still appropriated to religious exercises. Divine worship was performed in it till within about seventy years of this time.

The progress of decay at length rendered it unsafe, and a new building was erected in the churchyard to receive the congregation, which could no longer prudently assemble within the walls of the old abbey. The portions of it yet standing are believed to be a remnant of the original edifice.

The son of King David, a very holy man, about twenty years after Kelso Abbey was founded, became second Abbot of Melrose, and having performed divers miraeles while living, he was canonized as St Walter, or Waldeal, after his death.

When William, the ninth abbot, died, in 1209, forty-eight years after the decease of Walter, it was resolved that he should be buried with the saint. The grave of Walter was accordingly opened, when there issued from it a most fragrant odour, and the body and the vestments in which it had been committed to the earth were found entire and undecayed. At a subsequent period, when the tomb was again inspected, the body had crumbled into dust. Some of the small bones were carried away as relics. A knight named William, son to the Earl of Dunbar, and nephew to the King, had the good fortune to possess himself of one of St Walter's teeth, with which he was said to have effected many wonderful cures in cases which the most accomplished leeches of the time had deemed hopeless.

The name of the architect who had the care of the Abbey of Kelso and Melrose is supposed to have been Murdo, or Murow. Part of an inscription preserved in the latter building, Grose gives as follows:

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DR JUSTUS LIEBIG, IN HIS RELA·TION TO VEGETABLE PHYSIOLOGY.

I page 218 of the present volume of the 'Mirror,' some notice was taken of Dr Mohl's strictures on Professor Liebig. The im portance of the question raised induces us to give it some further attention. Mohl remarks:-Dr Liebig expresses his surprise, that in all the works of agronomists and physiologists, one looks in vain for the leading principles of cultivation; nevertheless, at the end of this part of his work, he states that cultivation supplies every plant with that sort of food which it requires for the development of such organs or substances as are most available to man. He further dwells on the means of arriving at that end, viz., the chemical analysis of the inorganic ingredients of soil. But these latter facts, says Dr Mohl, were known long before Liebig, Charles Sprengel having written a series of memoirs, to demonstrate the importance of the inorganic ingredients of the soil. Under this

head, Liebig certainly ought to have mentioned the name of Sprengel, and although he has not done so (concludes Dr M.), the history of science will amply repay the omission.

In the last chapter, headed "Rotation and Manures," L. opens the difficult question, why several crops of the same plant will not succeed on the same soil in an uninterrupted succession; and why, therefore, farmers resort to rotation. He thinks De Candolle's theory the best explanation of this, forgetting, it seems, that that coarse excrementitious theory has no better foundation than bad and injudicious experiments of Macaire Prinsep, the same man who misled De Candolle on other occasions also. Liebig, however (says Dr Mohl), who has no idea that these experiments are fallacious and controverted by all succeeding ones of the same kind, works out this theory in its most minute details, and proves, à priori (p. 149), that plants must have excrements. He divides the latter into two classes: those, namely, which have been absorbed by the roots, but not being adapted for the nourishment of plants, are again returned to the soil; and secondly, such substances as, having been transformed in the vegetable organism by the process of nutrition, are the result of the formation of starch, woody fibre, gluten, &c. Excrementitious matter of the first class may serve as food for other plants; nay, they may even be essential for that purpose. Those of the second, however, cannot be used by other plants in the formation of woody fibre, &c., until changed into humus, and decomposed into ammonia, carbonic acid, &c.

This theory, says Dr Mohl, is not only destitute of all reasonable foundation, but

is directly contradicted by the experience of rotation. There is no known evidence in proof of the existence of such excrementitious matter. It is true, Liebig says, that such must be the case, but then he adduces no proof except an ambiguous analogy with the animal kingdom, and forgetting, as he so often does, what he said (page 24), " that analogy is the parent of that unfortunate comparison between ve getable and animal functions which places both on the bed of Procrustes, and is the cause of all error." "There is not," concludes Dr Mohl, "the least necessity for assuming a secretion from roots. If substances formed by vital Processes are of no further use to a plant, they are excreted in the form of gas through the leaves, or deposited in the form of secretion in the glands and other organs, or thrown off with decaying leaves." This theory is, moreover, at variance with the experience of what takes place in the shifting of crops. According to Liebig's views, the excrementitious matter of the second class above-mentioned would not only injure the plants whence it is derived, but could not be assimilated by any others before it is transformed into humus. But experience points quite another way, because the stubble of clover, lucerne, or sainfoin, which is unfit for the growth of those species, will at once produce excellent crops of other plants. If Liebig should attempt to meet this objection by saying that such excrementitious matter cannot be assimilated by the plants whence they are derived, but may be used by others, he will upset his whole doctrine of vegetable nutrition, according to which not only all the organic compounds which remain behind after the formation of starch, sugar, &c., but even starch and sugar themselves (and thus all the organic substances of plants) are absolutely deleterious to other plants. It is impossible, therefore, not to arrive at conclusions entirely opposite to those of Liebig, especially if we consider the phenomena of rotation at greater length. The barrenness of soil for the growth of one kind of plant, whilst it is still fertile for others, can only depend (says Dr Mohl) on two causes. The first generation of plants may exhaust the soil of such substances as are indispensable to growth, so that the second generation_ will be starved; and this certainly takes place: but it cannot be the main cause of the failure of crops, else manure would again render the soil suitable for the same crop, which is only the case to a slight extent. We must, therefore, assume that the first crops do communicate to the soil substances detrimental to the subsequent crops. These substances must be of an organic nature. It has been shown that these cannot be excrementitious, and therefore it follows

that such deleterious substances must consist of organic compounds, derived from the roots which have accumulated and remained behind in the land. If, then, in a soil filled with the remains of roots, the same crop will only succeed after a lapse of years, whilst other crops will. thrive luxuriantly, we may conclude that the organic compounds of such roots will be absorbed by plants previous to their being decomposed into inorganic substances; and that, consequently, plants of a different kind will use them for food, although those of the same kind will be injured by them.

A SUNDAY IN VIENNA.

BY J. G. KOHL.

THE workday and morning tumult had quite subsided, the constant" Ho! ho!" of the hackney carriages, and the "Auf!" of the car-drivers were silent, for 20,000 of the inhabitants of Vienna were rolling over the newly-opened railway to the newlydiscovered Paradise of Stockerau; and 20,000 were flying by the Raab road to Mödling Baden, and the other valleys of the forest of Vienna, 50,000 more were gone into the country for the summer, and another 50,000 were gone after them for the day, to forget the troubles of the week in their society. Another not less respectable number of citizens and citizenesses were scattered over the gardens of the suburbs, the Prater, and the meadows, and thus I remained in possession of the inner city, with a remnant of lackeys, beggars, and sick; the Turks might have attacked and taken it at that moment with ease. The do. mestics were lounging before the doors and conversing with their opposite neighbours ; the maids were chattering in the inner courts; the coffee-house of the 'Orientals was still full of company, for they were scarcely likely to approve of our way of keeping Sunday. In the cathedral of St Stephen, a few old women were telling their rosaries, and screaming their devotions through the church; and one grating voice among them, louder than all the rest, repeated, at the end of each verse, Holy, holy, holy!" In the courtyard of one house into which I looked, I saw a little boy reading prayers aloud from a book. He told me that he was eight years old, and that he did this every Sunday. I took his book, and saw that he was reading the gospel of St Luke, from the ninth to the 14th verse. He said it was the gospel for the day, and that many boys in a similar manner read the gospels on a Sunday before the houses of Vienna. When he had finished, there descended on him, from the upper stories, a grateful shower of kreuzers wrapped in paper. In the usual tumult of the town, I had overlooked many smaller

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elements of the population, which I now discovered for the first time, as some inhabitants of the waters are perceived only when the tide has ebbed. I noticed, for the first time, the people who hawk Italian and Hungarian cheeses about the streets. They are chiefly from the neighbourhood of Udine, and also sell Italian macaroni. The greater number could speak as much German as they found necessary for their street traffic. There are in all not less than thirty thousand Italians in Vienna, and the passenger is not unfrequently accosted with," Poveretta! signor mio! la carita!" Beggars should, out of policy, always speak a foreign language; it excites far more compassion than the language of the country. Going farther, found a man standing before a baker's shop, occupied in scolding a little maidservant. She was a Bohemian, he told me, and added, “That Bohemia must be a very poor countryevery year there come thousands of them to Vienna- men and women, maids and boys. They learn as much German as they must, seek a service somewhere, are very moderate in their demands, will put up with a bed in the stable, or on the floor, and when they have earned a few florins they go back to their own country." In fact, if we inquire of a hundred people we meet in Vienna what country they are from, the answer of twenty, on an average, will be, "Ich bin en Behm" (I am a Bohemian). The whole number of the Slavo. nians in Vienna is, it is said, about 60,000, and of other Non-Germans 100,000. In the highest circles, as the lowest, the foreign element mingles everywhere. The number of Hungarians is reckoned at 15,000; but of these many are not genuine Magyars. At last I came to the end of the city, and went out upon the Glacis. Here seemed to be gathered together all whose legs were too short to gain the open country beyond the extensive suburbs of Vienna. It was the part called the Water Glacis, where there is some gay music every afternoon; numbers of little children, with their nurses, were lying and playing about the grass, and several schools, under the guidance of their masters, were doing the like. Some of them had pitched a tent in one of the meadows near which they were diverting themselves. There is no other city in Europe where the children have such a playground in the very heart of the town. The benches were bare of other visitors, with the exception of one solitary Turk seated among the children. He was taking his coffee, and dividing the "kipfel," that had been brought him with it, among the sparrows, which are constantly flying in numbers round the Glacis. I sat down by him to share in both his amusements, and remarked a trick of the sparrows that I had never before noticed. Some of them were

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so greedy, that they kept fluttering in the air about us, and sometimes snatched a morsel of bread before it could even reach the ground, where the others were eagerly picking up the scattered fragments. Like a polypus turned inside out, the inner life being displayed externally, the dead exterior skin turned within, even so is the life of Vienna reversed on a Sunday. The swarms that on other days are driving and bawling in the streets and public places in the city, are then singing, dancing, eating, drinking, and gossiping in the houses of public entertainment without. All this humming and drumming was so little in unison with my idea of a Sunday walk, that I was glad to take refuge from the noise in a place I was sure of having more to myself on a Sunday than any other day -the flower-gardens and churchyards. Beethoven's monument stands in the Währinger cemetery. His simple family name is inscribed in gold letters on the stone; but of late the growth of a bush planted near it has almost overshadowed the letters. I asked the sexton why he did not cut away the boughs that the name might be more plainly seen; he said the friends would not allow it to be done.

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A young stranger, who gives his name Andrew Lidiard, took up his abode in a narrow lane on the north-east side of Temple Bar, in the abode of a person who designated himself Gervas Estridge. This stranger was a Catholic, and Estridge proved to be a Catholic priest. Some of the heads of the rebels executed on the 30th of July in that year (1746), were then exhibited on Temple Bar, and the curious were from day to day inspecting them through telescopes let out for the purpose by persons who attended on the spot. Lidiard looked at the remains with great emotion. During his residence with Estridge, one of the heads was stolen. A reward was at that moment offered in the 'Gazette' for the apprehension of a man who had committed felony. His description accorded with that of an individual Lidiard was anxious to meet. Estridge, on being applied to, promises to bring the man, who is named Brabant, to him on the following day. Instead of making good his promise, the priest absents himself. He, however, returns stealthily at a late hour, is surprised in his kitchen changing his dress by Lidiard, who bitterly reproaches him with his falsehood, and orders him to accompany him to his room. After some

resistance Estridge consents, and they ascend the stairs, followed by Rachel, the faithful, half-witted servant of Estridge, with a loaded pistol. The narrative then proceeds:

66 6 Now,' said Lidiard, heaving a deep sigh, when the door had closed on him and his landlord-' now, I will soon ascertain if my suspicion is correct.' Taking a lamp from his table, he unlocked a closet, and drew a black cloth from an object placed there, when the head which had been taken

from the summit of Temple Bar was disclosed. 'Look here! look here!' gasped he.

"Estridge's eyes fell on the grim relic, which could easily be identified by a peculiar scar on the forehead, inflicted on the deceased when fighting, at the head of his regiment, against the butcher, Cumberland, for the miserable pretender. One glance was enough: Estridge's eye-lids dropped; his countenance changed; he shrieked with dismay; and sank on a seat, uttering incoherent exclamations of despair.

"I am right!' shouted Lidiard. Thou is a fearful witness of your treachery-sorarthe! Murderer, your time is come! Here did, base, degenerate treachery, for filthy gold! I am your victim's son. Ah, now you know my real name, as I know yours!'

"Mercy, mercy!' ejaculated Estridge, falling on his knees.

"You supplicate in vain,' rejoined the young man, with features deformed by passion, and eyes glaring with an almost insane expression. My father's spirit sees me, and

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demands a sacrifice. I have rescued his head from the infamy of public exposure, and will now wreak a bloody revenge on his destroyer. Had you not betrayed him who trusted in you, he might now be living. O, that I had been with him! See, how shortsighted is treachery! Abandoned by your party for perfidy, you have been driven to eke out a miserable existence by felonious practices; and unerring Fate has guided my blind steps to your very door. If you brandishing a poniard; for, by the blessed have grace to pray, pray now,' he continued, saints in heaven, you shall not live many minutes!'

"Estridge was convulsed with terror. One chance, however, remained for escape. The door was suddenly thrown open from without by Rachel, and darting towards it, Estridge received a pistol from the girl's hand. But, even thus armed, he dared not turn on his assailant; but, mad with the spasms of fear, rushed headlong down the stairs. Lidiard followed him at equal speed.

"A dead silence ensued. The girl kept her post. Hour after hour did she remain in breathless agony. Nothing occurred to break the loneliness of the night.

"At last, resolved to know the worst, she

descended to the kitchen. The melancholy, ghost-like dawn was making its first shivering approaches. It was a solemn hour for so She went to the outer door, and found it dreadful a quest. No human being was there. bolted inside. She next examined the parlours and the cellars. Like the rest, all was quiet and empty. She went again to Lidiard's

room, and there her terror was increased on seeing the ghastly head. All was drear perplexity and horror!

"Rachael remained at home the entire succeeding day; but as night came on, she abandoned the place over which a spell

seemed to hover.

"To the surprise of the neighbours, day after day passed, and Estridge's house was not unclosed, nor did a soul go in or come out. So strange a circumstance could not fail to become the subject of much wondering conversation; and at last, on application being made to a magistrate, the door was broken open, and the dwelling searched. Every room was furnished; but they were untenanted. What could it all mean? But the greatest surprise was the discovery of the head which had been stolen from the Bar. Extensive inquiry was made; though nothing to elucidate the mystery came to light; and for years the deserted house, and the Jacobite's head, furnished food for gossip and wonder, and for the speculations of writers in newspapers, of ballad-mongers, and of pamphleteers, some of whom ascribed the sudden disappearance of tenant, servant, and lodger, to the witchcraft of the scarlet lady of Babylon, and others to the personal agency of his Satanic majesty.

"About twenty years after the above event, as some workmen were excavating the ground near Temple Bar, for the purpose of making a sewer, they broke into a subterranean chamber curiously fashioned, and which, from the remains of an altar, had probably been used by recusants, as a hidden place of worship. In this apartment two skeletons were found; a rusty knife or dagger, and a pistol were lying beside them. On searching further, the men discovered a door made of strong quarterings filled with bricks on edge, firmly cemented, and evidently contrived to look like the wall, and elude observation. On pushing this, the rusty hinges gave way, and further examination showed that the door had been formerly opened and closed by a spring. An entrance was now gained into other vaults, the course of which being pursued, led to the cellars belonging to a house in a court near Shire lane. This house was identified as the one wherein the mysterious transaction of 1746 had occurred. It was supposed, therefore, that Estridge, knowing of this place of refuge,

had taken the house which commanded it; and being pursued by Lidiard, had flown thither, though not quickly enough to gain the sanctuary so as to exclude his enemy. In this deep and hidden recess, the opponents had probably fallen by the hands of each other."*

HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY. Few among us are aware of the extraordinary resources and wide-spreading plans of this remarkable society, which has exercised in its barren domains a steady, enterprising

* An old subterranean Catholic chapel was lately discovered under a house in the city, which had most likely been used as a secret place of worship by recusants during the severe persecution of the Papists. (See 'The Year Book.')

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policy, not inferior to that of the East India Company itself, and now occupies and controls more than one-ninth of the soil of the globe. The great business of this company is the fur trade, of which it is now nearly the sole monopolist throughout all the choicest fur-bearing regions of North Ame rica, with the exception of the portion occupied by the Russians. The bulk of its empire is secured to it by charter; but it is in possession of Oregon as debatable land, under stipulations between Britain and the United States. The stock-holders are British. The management of its affairs in America is carried on by 'partners' so called, but, in point of fact, agents paid by a proportion of the net income of the Company. These are scattered in various posts over the whole territory between Hudson's Bay and the Pacific. They are chiefly Scotsmen, and a greater proportion of shrewdness, daring, and commercial activity, is probably not to be found in the same number of heads in the world. fore 1820 this body carried on a fierce contest with the North West Company, attended with hideous battles of Indians and half-breeds, and the burning and sacking of each other's posts. In 1821 they were consolidated, since which they have had no British rival, and have exerted all their policy to repress interference on the part of the Americans. In this they seem to have thoroughly succeeded. The attempts of the Americans to establish a fur trade of their own, one by one, have ended in disappointment. Their own trappers and hunters prefer the markets of the Company. Its agents seek out the Americans, so, at least, they complain, outbid them and undersell them in every point to which they can penetrate. So powerful is this body, that it has actually established a kind of game laws over a region twice as large as Europe; regulating the quantity of trapping to be done in particular districts, uniformly diminishing it whenever the returns show a deficiency in its It keeps both production of animals. savages and whites in order, by putting into serious practice the threat of "exclusive dealing.' Mr Farnham met with an American in Oregon, who informed him that in consequence of some offences taken (very unjustly of course) "the Hudson's Bay Company refused for a number of years to sell him a shred of clothing, and as there are no other traders in the country, he was compelled, during their pleasure, to wear skins.” — Edinburgh Review.

SCIENTIFIC MEETINGS.

PARIS ACADEMY OF SCIENCES.-A communication was made respecting a new mode of preventing horses from running away when in harness. The author hav

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