A modern voyager, relating the particulars of his being cast away on a desert shore, says, "After having walked eleven hours without having traced the print of a human foot, to my great comfort, and delight, I saw a man hanging upon a gibbet; my pleasure at the cheering prospect was inexpressible, for it convinced me that I was in a civilized country." Was ever civilization so libelled? Never, we believe, and yet the charge is too true, for the barbarous punishments, the hangings, gibbettings, racks and tortures of the enlightened nations of Europe are not only a reproach on its character, but if practised by the untutored Indian, or the half-inan half-savage of new or unexplored regions, would be pronounced as revolting and barbarous. The subject of our plate for this week has induced these reflections. It represents the execution of a criminal in the Sandwich Islands, as described by M. Arago, in his interesting Narrative of Freycinet's Voyage round the World. The punishment of death is inflicted in various ways in the Sandwich Islands, and, as if suffering was regarded as nothing, they begin by subjecting the criminal to a fast of forty-eight hours. This practice entirely differs from the system of the Brazilian tribes, who, previously to punishing, indulge their prisoners of war with every pleasure which can make them regret the loss of life. Here, as soon as the two days' fast is terminated, they conduct the criminal bound to a morai, at the door of which the high priest is waiting for him, and pronounces a certain formula. Two or three persons then lay the criminal down on a piece of wood, placing his head on a stone, while the executioner, who is chosen indiscriminately from among the most athletic of the spectators, despatches him by a violent blow on the forehead with a club, as exhibited in our engraving. His body is either interred immediately, or left to the birds of prey, according to the will of the priest, or the nature of the crime. The Sandwich islanders have another с с mode of execution by strangulation: the criminal is fixed with his back to a cocoa-nut tree, and strangled by two men, who pass a cord round his neck, and draw it with great force, supporting themselves by another tree at a short distance from the first. ANTIQUITY OF HATS, SHOES, AND PATTENS. (For the Mirror.) In HATS were first seen about the year 1400, at which time they became of use for country wear, riding, &c. F. Daniel relates, that when Charles II. made his public entry into Rouen, in 1449, he had on a hat lined with red velvet, and surmounted with a plume, or tuft of feathers; he adds, that it is from this entry, or at least under this reign, that the use of hats and caps is to be dated, which henceforward began to take place of the chaperons and hoods that had been worn before. process of time, from the laity, the clergy also took this part of the habit, but it was looked upon as a great abuse, and several regulations were published, forbidding any priest, or religious person, to appear abroad in a hat without coronets, and enjoining them to keep to the use of chaperons made of black cloth with decent coronets; if they were poor, they were at least to have coronets fastened to their hats, and this upon penalty of suspension and excomnunication. But in modern days hats are made in shape according to the whim of the wearer, and we have the Joliffe-the Noble Duke-the Regentthe Collegian-the Dandy, &c. and to crown all, a scientific treatise on that ornament of the caput. SHOES. The history of the covering of the foot is very obscure. Baudoin, a shoe-maker by profession, has a learned treatise of the ancient shoe, "De Solea Veterum," where the origin, matter, form, &c. thereof are particularly inquired into. Baudoin maintains that God, in giving Abraham skins of beasts to clothe him, did not leave him to go barefooted, but gave him shoes of the same matter; that after ram skins, men came to make shoes of rushes, broom, paper, flax, silk, wood, iron, silver, and gold. Pliny says, that one Tychius, of Boeotia, was the first who used shoes; Xenophon says 10,000 Greeks who followed Cyrus, wanting shoes in their retreat, covered their feet with raw skins. Caligula wore shoes enriched with precious stones. The Indians, like the Egyptians, wore shoes made of the bark of the papyrus. But in modern days we have well hammered soles, backed with bright revolving heels, and upper leather, which reflects the passing objects like THE MIRROR; and, as Gay says "Let firm well-hammered soles protect thy feet Thro' freezing snows, and rains, and soaking sleet." PATTENS. A patten, or a shoe of wood, with an iron ring, worn under the common shoe by women, to keep them from the dirt. Gay says the word is derived from Patty, where in Trivia, he says "The Patten now supports each frugal dame, Which from blue-ey'd Patty takes the But name; does not recommend its use in snow; Let not the virgin tread these slipp'ry roads, The gath'ring fleece the hollow patten loads." But- "Good housewives Underneath th' umbrella's oily shed, Safe thro' the wet on clinking pattens tread." Solearius, in Latin, signifies a pattenmaker, a maker of horse-shoes, a shoemaker, cordwainer. But in the modern state of refined life the patten is looked upon with contempt by the fair part of creation, who trip away with fantastic toe, and scatter to and through, with the sculponea or clog, the London mud. P. T. W. SPIRIT OF THE Public Journals. DRAMATIC TRAVELS. The Diligence from Paris to Lyons. Madame de Staël (and hers is the best name I know to lead off an essay) declared, that, were she going to the gallows, she would be busied all the way in scrutinizing the characters of her fellow-convicts. No doubt, she was thinking of the old times, when one was sure to meet with good company, and plenty of it, in a trip to the guillotine. Not being over particular, I must prefer, for the scene of my observations, a vehicle of less dispatch; for in running post to the other world, acoording to the supposition of the ever-supposing Baroness, I should be a deal too absorbed in number One to be at all dramatic. Such scenes are rather too much for a joke-and I here may mention having been for the first time highly disgusted with the facetious Pierce Egan, for representing the last scene of the condemned in one of his variegated caricatures. No-give me a Diligence, that pleasant misnomer, that with sixteen, eighteen, nay, twenty passengers, stowed in three cabins, and a parachute-looking affair called a Cabriolet, at top, together with I know not how many tons weight of baggage, rolls along the pavé at the rate of two miles and a half per hour, stoppages non-included. Didst ever see a Diligence?" Wert thou ever, then, at Chelsea or Battle-bridge, at Greenwich or Brook-Green fair? Saw'st thou the elephant's vehicle and habitation, or that of the lions?"Walk in, gentlemen!" You may remember these. Such is a Diligence! And lumbering vehicles as they are, enough indeed to drown any John Bull in a flood of spleen, yet, let me tell you, the yard of the Messageries Royales beats out and out your White Horse Cellar, or your Swan with Two Necks. I don't talk of Portsmouth, or Liverpool, or voyages in the sea-way, for that beats Banagher," as we Irishmen say; but in the quiet, well-behaved, rowley-powley mode of travelling on dry land, the very sublime of tantalization is the Messageries. Only suppose one of our island brethren dropt there, one of those fellows, greedy of travel, with the organ of space protruding like a horn from the midst of his forehead, with what feelings must he peruse the inscriptions on the Diligence and over the bureaus-to Bayonne and Madrid-to Lyons, Turin, Milan, Rome, &c.-to Strasburg, Munich, Viennato Berlin-to St. Petersburg. Lord bless you, sir, 'twould be as much as his life's worth! I "En route," cries the conducteur, "Montez Messieurs;" but before getting in, and, consequently, describing my company, I must premise that the Diligence has five horses; 'tis strange, but I have always found that French postilions, like poets, (is it poets?) delight in odd numbers. For many a cogitative post was this point a subject of puzzle and annoyance to me. asked the reason of all and every postilion; they shook their enormous cues, but answered nothing, till, at last, one fellow, more knowing than the rest, told me, with a sly look at his legboxes, that the odd horse was for his boots. This reason was fully adequate. Being all seated, we trotted off, and ere the coach reached Fontainbleau, I was in full possession of the country, profession, and opinions of my fellow. passengers. In spite of my wishing to be a bit of a republican, I never yet encountered a society, great or small, without being thoroughly convinced of the non-existence and moral impossibility of equality: go where you will, there is always a cock of the walk. There was one here-a stout, well-built, comfortable Breton, of that province of France which preserves, in character, the similarity to Old England, which its name and origin would lead us to expect. Our Breton, however, was not all English: a sharp hook nose, and jaw of more than ordinary dimensions, bespoke the Frenchman. He accosted us all gaily, without any of that long ice-breaking conversation about the weather, which generally occupies the first half-hour of our stage-coach journeys. Of the postilions, peasants, conducteur, &c. he demanded divers questions out of the window in an authoritative tone, designating them with a supercilious, tu.— Sweet second person singular!-not when thus flung to a menial or inferior, but when the fascinating lip of the foreign fair allows, and replies with the endearing monosyllable. Reader, if thou intendest to act the gallant traveller, a kind now the most fashionable amongst us, and strangely omitted by Sterne, and if in thy first adventure thine ears are saluted with the novel and delightful sounds of mon cœurje suis à vous, &c. &c. believe them not. One tu, one va, one va-t-en, is worth a thousand pathetic sentences and protestations, unless, indeed-the lady should go so far as to call you her good friend, her bon ami, for that denotes a conquest won. Strange! that so vivacious a nation should use, in appearance, the coldest terms of endearment, should mark their affection by one syllable, and its highest point by three." Ma respectable amie," writes St. Preux to Julie. What a sentence for an English lover to preface a love-letter with!" My respectable friend!"-O Jehu! The worthy Breton had received answers from, that is, made acquaintance with, all the inmates of our rumbling tabernacle, save and except one, an English dandy, who as yet had not recovered confidence enough in strange company to trust his mouth with French. He, however, shewed his affability and wish to be conversable by admiring with his eyes and fingers the fur-pelisse of the Breton. Having felt it for some time, he demanded what it was made of?" Wolf-skin." To which, in the true dandy chain of argument, the Englishman redemanded, where such was to be had, and what it would cost? "Un coup de fusil ?" said the Breton. "And there are such animals here?" said the Briton. "Sure as a gun, in Bretagne," said the other. About ten minutes had elapsed, when my dandy drew out his memorandum-book, as by stealth, and noted down-Mem. Wolves in Brittany. In the corner opposite to me sat an old corporal of the Ex, or imperial guard, as I soon found out, when the view of the little inn at Cour de France, where Napoleon passed the night of the surrender of Paris, and the Chateau of Fonteinbleau, the scene of the Emperor's first abdication, led us to talk of the great man. The corporal had been in Spain, and in Russia, and at Leipsic he had bidden adieu for a while to the grande armée, having got heartily tired of fighting all day, and accompanying the Emperor all night with torches. I envied the rogue's situation of holding a candle to Napoleon. He added, that his regiment had been ecrasé, annihilated at Vaterloo; that, has one of the ex-guard, he could not hope to be again employed; and that toe was returning to Nismes, his native shwn, to turn his sword into a ploughthare. Yet he did not speak as a anorough Bonapartist, whose extreme had uncompromising admirers are now, I to veremarked, for the most part confined Engiand. Like almost all the French agilitaires, he had grown not a little le hamed of the later invasions of Napoinon; and he had made that progress impartiality, which the ignorant enerally do, who never arrive farther than common-place. He hated the English mortally, and told me so, for which I honoured him internally, externally striving to put on a smile of contempt; and the fellow was deeply read in the twenty volumes of the "Victoires et Conquêtes des Français," which he quoted, chapter and verse, to my frequent discomfiture, who could by no means cope with the twenty volumes. To complete my dramatis personæ, I should describe the bodkins, otherwise the occupiers of the middle seats, who, however, exchanged places now and then with other and divers wights from the cabriolet, a parte post, and a parte ante, as Mr. Coleridge would describe them. The bodkins proper, consisted of a young gentleman and his wife, both of whom (for in France, in 能 forty-nine cases out of fifty, the grey mare is the better horse) had a little time since established an iron-foundry on the banks of the Loire, through the means of English capital, English machinery, and English workmen an hundred of the latter, he informed me, he had transported from Wales and Staffordshire, to his manufactory near La Charité: the rogues did well, but liked the wine too much. He spoke of England, and of Mr. Crachy, the roi de fer. The little man, and his little wife, talked, looked, and breathed nothing less than iron, which, with the brass of the corporal and the Breton, left us Englishmen to look rather soft in such metallic company. I never yet was in diligence, stage, or public vehicle, that each passenger did not vow, that it was the narrowest and most uncomfortable one he ever was in; this consequently was ejaculated and echoed, nem. con. the responses of the bodkins being the longest and most querulous. Last year, said the man of iron," there was delightful travelling, and cheap, by the voiture of the Master of the Posts, that brought one in two nights to Lyous; but our blessed government, which meddles with every thing, was bribed by a round sum of money from the Diligence-office to put a stop to the competition. So now we pay double, and take double the time-the blessed effects of legitimacy. This is not the way they inanage matters in England." The Breton being an Ultra and a Bourbonist, kindled at the word legitimacy, as did the corporal at the mention of England, and they growled their invec tives in such unison, that it was impossible to understand either. "It's the way with you all," continued the surviving voice of the Breton; "all you 'sacrés negocians et fabriquans,' damned merchants and manufacturers, are insurrectionists, and carbonari, and wish the downfall of your legitimate Sovereigns." The little man, instead of repelling the accusation, grinned assent, and began to open his case by the Guerre d'Espagne. Here they fell to it tooth and nail, the Breton quoting the Drapeau Blanc to prove that Bessières had taken Madrid, and his antagonist bringing forward the Constitutionnel to prove the fleets and armies that England was preparing to defend the Peninsula withal. Here the corporal broke in, "je voudrais bien voir Messieurs les Anglais encore une fois en Espagne.” I observed," he might perhaps have that pleasure." The corporal, skilled in his art, knew the ground he held was weak, so he took up an ironical position. "But the English, it must be allowed," said be, are good soldiers, they fight almost as well as the Russians." 64 66 Why," said I, with a lucky memory at the moment," which of your regiments was it, that beat so gallantly the Russian Imperial Guards at Austerlitz?" ""Twas my own." said the soldier with kindling enthusiasm; "it was the chasseurs of the imperial guard that culbutaient, upset, the Russians at Austerlitz."—"You yourself belonged to that regiment? then you must have been also in Portugal at the passage of the Esia?" The corporal answered Oh, oui," with a most involuntary accent, it being there that Lord Paget overthrew and cut up the said chasseurs with notable slaughter. "But we were outnumbered," continued he, as we always were when beaten-at Toulouse, for instance, were you not double our number?"—"Perhaps so, but you were beaten; at Talavera, you were double our number, yet were repulsed." The corporal was about to reply, when he was taken in flank by my dandy compatriot with a burst of French and English, but so mingled and so uncouthly pronounced, that neither of us knew what to make of it. It, however, interrupted an argument which might have gone farther than was agreeable. 66 Thus we jogged on through the wild and rocky tract beyond Fontainbleau, the beautiful town of Nemours, and Montargis, when night overtook us.Thence the next day, along the Loire to Nevers, where we were assailed by myriads of those manufacturers of bead purses, bead cords, and bead every thing, selling for sous what cost shillings in England. The Loire is broad and grand, but it possesses no beauty, -I was going to observe great rivers seldom do, but the Rhine occurred, and saved me from an assertion which France and Italy would allow. We had lost our bodkins, and here took in others, people of the country, who joined the corporal in relating feats of the French arms, and bearing testimony to each other's veracity mutually. Their vaunts, however, did not interfere with sagacity, and courage of the French peasantry. Roanne was generally the scene of these short and sanguinary struggles. Here we passed a beautiful bridge of Napoleon's, not yet over the Loire, but at the side of it. I forgot to mention that we had passed through Moulins, nay, through its very marketplace, as mean and dirty a hole as ever was hallowed by sentiment. To look for Maria was in vain; the girls of the Bourbonnais are not pretty, and French girls know how to console themselves in better ways than Maria with her pipe. Neither Dandy, Breton, nor Corporal, had ever read the Sentimental Journey; so I was left to a long soliloquy on Sterne and sentiment" all that sort of thing and every thing in the world." Mounting Tarare, and rolling down to Lyons, little conversation passed worth recording; we entered the second capital of France, and found it in a devil of an uproar-it was the funeral of the God Mercury, the Deity of Commerce, whose obsequies seven or eight hundred youths had followed, and they had finished by casting poor Commerce into the Rhone, to the great annoyance and occupation of the police.-New Monthly Magazine. HIGHLAND WEDDINGS. "Was ne'er in Scotland heard or seen Sic dancing and deray; Nouther at Falkland on the green, Nor Peebles at the play." KING JAMES I. If there is any thing under the sun in which true happiness really consists, we are told it is in the consummation of a marriage, where the parties, uninfluenced by sordid motives, are entirely brought together by the magnetic power of love. Of such a description the Highland marriages are in general. The lower classes, being pretty equal in their circumstances, policy and interest have less influence in their marriages than is the case with any other rank of people; and consequently the parties are left more to the unbiassed dictates of their own voluntary choice. When a couple of young lovers propose to get married, the nearest relations of both parties meet to take the case into consideration; and, in general, it is no difficult matter for the lovers and their advocates to get a decision consonant to their inclinations. This is called the booking (“ leuruch”) or contract, which is very often ratified by no other covenant than a few bottles |