Читать книгу: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 533, February 11, 1832», страница 4

The Praepositus of the Exploratores, whose office was to discover the state and motions of the enemy, and who was certainly in this part of Sussex, could be no where more advantageously placed than in the elevated situations of the strong camps at Hollingsbury and White-Hawke, commanding a most extensive view of the whole coast from Beachy-Head to the Isle of Wight. The form of this town is almost a perfect square; the streets are built at right angles to each other, and its situation is to the south east, the favourite one among the Romans. To these may be added, that an urn has been some time ago dug up in this neighbourhood, containing a thousand silver denarii marked from Antoninus Pius to Philip, during which tract of time Britain was probably a Roman province. And, lastly, the vestiges of a true Roman via running from Shoreham towards Lewes, at a small distance above this town have been lately discovered by an ingenious gentleman truly conversant in matters of this nature.

The light sometimes obtained in these dark matters from a similitude of sounds in the ancient and modern names of places, is not to be had in assisting the present conjecture. Its ancient one, as far as I can learn, is no way discoverable; and its modern one may be owing either to this town's belonging formerly to, or being countenanced in a particular manner by a Bishop Brighthelm, who, during the Saxon government of the island, lived in this neighbourhood: or perhaps may be deduced from the ships of this town having their helms better ornamented than those of their neighbouring ones.

It is true here are no hypocausts, Mosaic pavements, inscriptions, or any other delicate monuments of Roman antiquity,⁵ that might corroborate in a stronger manner this supposition: these, if any such existed here, have been defaced by time, or destroyed by the undiscerning inhabitants of the place.

During the Saxon aera, this town was almost the centre of the kingdom of the South Saxons; and consequently could not be the scene of much action. It submitted to the various revolutions which prevailed at different times, until the Norman conquest.

The conqueror landed at Hastings forty miles distant to the east of this town; so that his troops never came near it. Yet, the fate of England being decided by the bloody engagement at Battel, this town, with many other large possessions in the county, was granted to William de Warren, who married the Conqueror's daughter: and he soon made it part of the endowment of that rich priory, which he founded at Lewes.

This resigning of the town into the hands of monks was a fatal stroke to its ancient greatness. Too attentive to their own immediate interest, and too regardless of that of their vassals, as soon as they were in possession of it, they laboured, and with success, to obtain an exemption for it from supplying the king with ships, or affording him such other succour, as a large and powerful maritime town ought to have done, on the pretence of its being part of a religious estate.

(To be concluded in our next.)

FINE ARTS

LARGE PAINTED WINDOW OF THE CRUCIFIXION

Mr. Wilmshurst has nearly completed a fine copy, on glass, of Mr. Hilton's celebrated picture of the Crucifixion. It consists of 118 squares, 15 by 21 inches each, fitted into copper frames, in a large centre and two sides; in all 19 feet high, and 15 feet wide, intended for a Venetian window-case in St. George's Church, Liverpool. The original picture was painted for this purpose, by commission from the Corporation, in the year 1826, for which the artist received 1,000 guineas. Perhaps in all the productions of British art there is not a more appropriate subject for the embellishment of a church, than Hilton's representation of this sublime event. The countenance and figure of the crucified Saviour are admirably drawn: his placid resignation is finely contrasted with the muscular figures of the two thieves struggling in the last agonies of torture: the spike-nails and blood-drops of the hands and feet, and the title on the cross are closely preserved. The group of women at the foot of the cross, the lifeless form, drooping hand, anxious eye, and gushing tear, the terrified and afflicted populace, and the unperturbed devotional gaze of a few by-standers are too among the masterly beauties of this composition. The lights are well kept, and the entire effect of the Window is that of awe-inspiring grandeur.

It is somewhat curious, that on the evening Mr. Wilmshurst put together his Liverpool Window, his larger Window of the Field of Cloth of Gold, was totally destroyed by fire, and by the next morning all its glories were melted (or vitrified) into tears.

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

THE TWA BURDIES.
BY THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD

 
When the winter day had past an' gane,
Twa wee burdies came into our hearth stane;
An' they lookit a'round them wi' little din,
As if they had living souls within.
 
 
"O, bonny burdies, come tell to me
If ye are twa burdies o' this countrye?
An' where ye were gaun when ye tint your gate,
A-winging the winter shower sae late?"
 
 
"We are cauld, we are cauld—ye maun let us bide,
For our father's gane, an' our mother's a bride:
But in her bride's bed though she be,
We would rather cour on the earth wi' thee!"
 
 
"O, bonny burdies, my heart is sair
To see twa motherless broods sae fair.
But flee away, burdies! flee away!
For I darenae bide wi' you till day."
 
 
"Ye maun let us bide till our feathers dry,
For the time of our trial's drawing nigh.
A voice will call at the hour eleven,
An' a naked sword appear in heaven!
 
 
"There's an offering to make, but not by men,
On altar as white as the snow of the glen—
There's a choice to be made, and a vow to pay,
And blood to spill ere the break of day."
 
 
"O, tell me, beings of marvellous birth,
If ye are twa creatures of heaven or earth?
For ye look an' ye speak, I watnae how—
But I'm fear'd, I'm fear'd, little burdies for you!"
 
 
"Ye needna be fear'd, for it's no our part
To injure the kind and the humble heart;
And those whose trust is in heaven high,
The Angel of God will aye be nigh.
 
 
We were twa sisters bred in a bower,
As gay as the lark an' as fair as the flower;
But few of the ills of this world we proved,
Till we were slain by the hands we loved.
 
 
Our bodies into the brake were flung,
To feed the hawks and the ravens young;
And there our little bones reclined,
And white they bleach'd in the winter wind.
 
 
Our youngest sister found them there,
And wiped them clean wi' her yellow hair;
And every day she sits and grieves,
And covers them o'er wi' the wabron leaves.
 
 
Then our twin souls they sought the sky,
And were welcome guests in the heavens high;
And we gat our choice through all the spheres
What lives to lead for a thousand years.
 
 
Then humble, old matron, lend us thine aid,
For this night the choice is to be made;
And we have sought thy lowly hearth
For the last advice thou giv'st on earth.
 
 
Say, shall we skim o'er this earth below,
Beholding its scenes of joy and woe;
And try to reward the virtuous heart,
And make the unjust and the sinner smart?
 
 
Or shall we choose the star of love,
In a holy twilight still to move;
Or fly to frolic, light and boon,
On the silver mountains of the moon?
 
 
O, tell us, for we hae nane beside!
Our daddy's gane, and our mammy's a bride.
She is blitliely laid in her bridal sheet,
But a spirit stands at her bed feet.
 
 
Ay, though she be laid in her bridal bed,
There is guiltless blood upon her head;
And on her soul the hue of a crime,
That will never wash out till the end of time.
 
 
Advise, advise! dear matron, advise!
For you are humble, devout, and wise.
We ask a last advice from you—
Our hour is come—what shall we do?"
 
 
"O, wondrous creatures, ye maun allow
I naething can ken of beings like you;
But ere the voice calls at eleven,
Go ask your Father who is in heaven."
 
 
Away, away, the burdies flew
Aye singing, "Adieu, kind heart, adieu!
They that hae blood on their hands may rue
Afore the day-beam kiss the dew.
 
 
There's naught sae heinous in human life
As taking a helpless baby's life;
There's naething sae kind aneath the sky
As cheering the heart that soon maun die."
 
 
The morning came wi' drift an' snaw,
And with it news frae the bridal-ha',
That death had been busy, and blood was spilt,
May Heaven preserve us all from guilt!
 
 
They tell of a deed—Believe't who can?
Such tale was never told by man;
The bridegroom is gone in fire and flood,
And the bridal-bed is steep'd with blood!
 
 
The poor auld matron died ere day,
And was found as life was passing away;
And twa bonny burdies sang in the bed,
The one at the feet, the other the head.
 
 
Now I have heard tales, and told them too,
Hut this is beyond what I could do;
And far hae I ridden, and far hae I gane,
But burdies like these I never saw nane.
 

Fraser's Magazine.