By Earth, our common mother, to impart them!
B. Sir, you shall know at our great festival.
I was myself their hearer, and so much
As I there heard will presently disclose,
So you will give it ears, for I must speak

Of things perchance surpassing your belief,

So strange they will appear; but so it happened,
That these most sage academicians sate

In solemn consultation on a cabbage.

A. A cabbage! what did they discover there?
B. Oh, sir! your cabbage hath its sex and gender,
Its provinces, prerogatives, and ranks,

And, nicely handled, breeds as many questions
As it does maggots. All the younger fry

Stood dumb with expectation and respect,

Wond'ring what this same cabbage should bring forth;
The lecturer eyed them round, whereat a youth
Took heart, and breaking first the awful silence,
Humbly craved leave to think that it was round!
The cause was now at issue, and a second
Opined it was an herb- a third conceived
With due submission it might be a plant-
The difference methought was such that each
Might keep his own opinion and be right;
But soon a bolder voice broke up the council,
And, stepping forward, a Sicilian quack
Told them their question was abuse of time, -
It was a cabbage, neither more nor less,
And they were fools to prate so much about it.
Insolent wretch! amazement seized the troop,
Clamor and wrath and tumult raged amain,
Till Plato, trembling for his own philosophy,
And calmly praying patience of the court,
Took up the cabbage, and adjourned the cause.

ALEXIS.

[About B.C. 390-288; in his prime about Alexander's period, say 330. He was the model for Menander.]

How the Procuress doctors her Wares.

THEY fly at all, and as their funds increase,

With fresh recruits they still augment their stock,

Molding the young novitiate to her trade:

Form, feature, manners, everything so changed

That not a trace of former self is left.

Venetian Diploma of Semitecolo

(Sixteenth Century)

This specimen was selected from a fine collection of these documents in the British Museum, on account of the beautiful miniature painting of the illumination. The diploma to which this miniature is attached bears the date 1644, and is from the Doge Francesco Molino, appointing Semitecolo, a noble Venetian, Conte, or Governor, of Pago and Isola, on the coast of Dalmatia. The mystery of the connection of the miniature with the diploma may possibly be explained by supposing that when many of these documents were scattered at the time of the invasion of Venice by the French revolutionists, some person, having obtained possession of several, supplied the defect of a damaged miniature in the present book, from some other of the same description.

VENETIAN DIPLOMA OF SEMITECOLO. (Sixteenth Century.)

This specimen was selected from a fine collection of these documents in the British Museum, on account of the beautiful miniature painting of the illumination. The diploma to which this miniature is attached bears the

date 1644.