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Bedford fancied, that, by the captivity of that extraordinary woman, who had blasted all his successes, he should again recover his former ascendant over France; and, to push farther the present advantage, he purchased the captive from John of Luxembourg, and formed a prosecution against her, which, whether it proceeded from vengeance or policy, was equally barbarous and dishonourable. It was contrived, that the bishop of Beauvais, a man wholly devoted to the English interest, should present a petition against Joan, on pretence that she was taken within the bounds of his diocese; and he desired to have her tried by an ecclesiastical court, for sorcery, impiety, idolatry, and magic. The university of Paris was so mean as to join in the same request: several prelates, among whom the cardinal of Winchester was the only English

ed to be burned in the market-place of Rouen, and the infamous sentence was accordingly executed. This admirable heroine, to whom the more generous superstition of the ancients would have erected altars, was, on pretence of heresy and magic, delivered over alive to the flames, and expiated, by that dreadful punishment, the signal services which she had rendered to her native country. To the eternal infamy of Charles and his adherents, whom she had served and saved, they made not a single effort, either by force or negociation, to save this heroic girl from the cruel death to which she had been condemned. Hume says she was burnt on the 14th of June. According to Lingard she perished on the 30th of May.

St.

FLORAL DIRECTORY.

mula.

Dedicated to St. Ferdinand.

May 31.

Petronilla, 1st Cent. St. Cantius and Cantianus, brothers, and Cantianilla, their sister, A. D. 304.

St. Petronilla.

man, were appointed her judges: they Lesser Spearwort Ranunculus flamheld their court at Rouen, where the young king of England then resided: and the maid, clothed in her former military apparel, but loaded with irons, was produced before this tribunal. Surrounded by inveterate enemies, and brow-beaten and overawed by men of superior rank, and men invested with the ensigns of a sacred character, which she had been accustomed to revere, felt her spirit at last subdued; Joan gave way to the terrors of that punishment to which she was sentenced. She declared herself willing to recant; acknowledged the illusion of those revelations which the church had rejected; and promised never more to maintain them. Her sentence was mitigated: she was condemned to perpetual imprisonment, and to be fed during life on bread and water. But the barbarous vengeance of Joan's enemies was not satisfied with this victory. Suspecting that the female dress, which she had now consented to wear, was disagreeable to her, they purposely placed in her apartment a suit of men's apparel, and watched for the effects of that temptation upon her. On the sight of a dress in which she had acquired so much renown, and which, she once believed, she wore by the particular appointment of heaven, all her former ideas and passions revived; and she ventured in her solitude to clothe herself again in the forbidden garment. Her insidious enemies caught her in that situation: her fault was interpreted to be no less than a relapse into heresy: no recan- Yellow tation would now suffice, and no pardon could be granted her. She was condemn

"Her name," says Butler, "is the fesaid to have been a daughter of the apostle minine, and diminutive of Peter, and she is St. Peter, which tradition is confirmed by certain writings, quoted by the Manichees, that St. Peter had a daughter whom he in the time of St. Austin, which affirm, cured of the palsy; but it seems not cer ritual daughter of that apostle." Riba tain whether she was more than the spideneira refers to these Manichæan writings, by which, according to Butler, the "tradition is confirmed," and unluckily for Butler, he says, that St. Augustine calls these fully adds though, that Augustine "doth writings apocryphal. Ribadeneira carenot therefore reprove it as false." Yet it is curious to find this Jesuit telling of Augustine, that he teacheth, "that without prejudice of charity we may chastise the body of our enemy, the heretic, for the salvation of his soul." This saying of Augustine's is wholly uncalled for by any thing that Ribadeneira says regarding Petronilla; it is a hot puff of a fiery spirit.

FLORAL DIRECTORY.

Turkscap Lily. Lilium Pomponicum flavum.

Dedicated to St. Petronilla.

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And after her came jolly June, array'd
All in green leaves, as he a player were;
Yet in his time he wrought as well as play'd,
That by his plough-irons mote right well appeare.

Upon a crab he rode, that him did bare

With crooked crawling steps an uncouth pase, And backward-yode, as bargemen wont to fare Bending their force contrary to their face;

Like that ungracious crew which faines demurest grace. Spenser.

This is the sixth month of the year. According to an old author "unto June the Saxons gave the name of Weyd-monat, because their beasts did then weyd in the meddowes, that is to say, goe to feed there, and hereof a medow is also in the Tutonicke called a weyd, and of weyd we yet retaine our word wade, which we understand of going through watrie places, such as medowes are wont to be."* Another author likewise says, that "weyd is probably derived from weyden (German), to go about as if to pasture;" he further says, they called it Woedmonath, and that woed means "weed"; and that

* Verstegan.

they called it also by the following names: Medemonath, Midsumormonath, and Braeckmonath; thought to be so named from the breaking up of the soil from bræcan (Saxon), to break: they also named it Lida erra; the word Lida, or litha, signifying in Icelandic, " to move, or pass over," may imply the sun's passing its greatest height, and Lida erra consequently mean the first month of the sun's descent. Lida, it is added, has been deemed to signify smooth-air.*

Mr. Leigh Hunt observes, in his "Months," that "the name of June, and indeed that of May, gave rise to

Dr. F. Sayers.

various etymologies; but the most probable one derives it from Juno, in honour of whom a festival was celebrated at the beginning of the month." He says, "it is now complete summer :

• Summer is ycomen in,
Loud sing cuckoo ;
Groweth seed,

And bloweth mead,
And springeth the weed new.'

"Thus sings the oldest English song extant, in a measure which is its own music.-The temperature of the air, however, is still mild, and in our climate sometimes too chilly; but when the season is fine, this is, perhaps, the most delightful month of the year. The hopes of spring are realized, yet the enjoyment is but commenced: we have all summer before us; the cuckoo's two notes are now at what may be called their ripest,-deep and loud; so is the hum of the bee; little clouds lie in lumps of silver about the sky, and sometimes fall to complete the growth of the herbage; yet we may now lie down on the grass, or the flowering banks, to read or write; the grasshoppers click about us in the warming verdure; and the fields and hedges are in full blossom with the clover, the still more exquisite bean, the pea, the blue and yellow nightshade, the fox-glove, the mailow, white briony, wild honeysuckle, and the flower of the hip or wild rose, which blushes through all the gradations of

delicate red and white. The leaves of the hip, especially the young ones, are as beautiful as those of any garden rose. Towards evening, the bat and the owl venture forth, flitting through the glimmering quiet; and at night, the moon looks silveriest, the sky at once darkest and clearest; and when the nightingale, as well as the other birds have done singing, you may hear the undried brooks of the spring running and panting through their leafy channels. 'It ceased,' says the poet, speaking of a sound of heavenly voices about a ship,

It ceased; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook,
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.

Coleridge.

"There is a greater accession of flowers,

in this month than in any other. In addition to those of the last, the garden sparkles with marygolds, golden-road, larkspur, sun-flowers, amarynths, (which Milton intermingles with sun-beams for his angel's hair,) lupins, carnations, Chinese pinks, holyhocks, ladies' slipper, annual stocks, campanulas, or little bells, martagons, periwinkles, wall-flower, snapdragon, orchis, nasturtium, apocynum, chrysanthemum, cornflower, gladiolus, and convolvulus. The reader who is

fond of poetry, and of the Greek fables, and does not happen to be acquainted with professor Martyn's notes upon Virgil, should here be informed, that the species of red lily, called the martagon or Turk's-cap, has been proved by that writer, at least to our satisfaction, to be the real ancient hyacinth, into which the youth of that name was turned by Apollo. The hyacinth, commonly so called, has nothing to show for its being the ancient one, which should be of a blood colour, Greek exclamation of sorrow AI, AI. and was said to be inscribed with the Now, we were struck with the sort of literal black marks with which the Turk's

cap is speckled, and on reading the professor's notes, and turning to the flower again, we could plainly see, that with come allowance, quite pardonable in a then fall together, so as to indicate those superstition, the marks might now and characters. It is a most beautiful, glowing flower; and shoots gracefully forth in a vase or glass from among white lilies, and the double narcissus :

Νυν ακίνθε, λαλει τα σα γραμματα, και πλεον Αι Αι

Λαμβανε σοις πετάλοισι.

Moschus.

'Now tell your story, Hyacinth; and show Ai Ai the more amidst your sanguine woe.'

"The rural business of this month is

made up of two employments, as beautiful to look at as they are useful,-sheepshearing and hay-making. Something like a holiday is still made of the former, and in the south-west of England, the cus tom, we believe, is still kept up, of throwing flowers into the streams, an evident relic of paganism; but, altogether, the holiday is but a gleam of the same merry period in the cheap and rural time of our ancestors."

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CHRONOLOGY.

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This grand festival of the Romish church is held on the Thursday next after Trinity Sunday, in which order it also

stands in the church of England calendar, and in the English almanacs. It celebrates

1794. Lord Howe's memorable vic- the doctrine of transubstantiation. In all tory by sea over the French fleet.

1814. A newspaper of this day notices that the Tuesday preceding was observed at Burton, in Dorsetshire, as a great festival, in consequence of the arrival at that place of a vat of Hambro' yarn, from London, being the first that had come into the town for many years. The inhabitants met the waggon, took out the horse, decorated the vat with ribands, and various emblems of peace, plenty, trade and commerce, and drew the same through the village, preceded by a flag and band of music, amidst the acclamations of thousands, many of whom were regaled with bread, cheese, and strong beer: one loaf (among others) baked for the occasion, claimed the admiration of every one present; its length being six feet three inches, breadth twenty-one inches, depth fourteen inches, and its weight considerably above 100 lbs. To explain the occasion of this rejoicing, it is necessary to state that Burton, as a manufacturing place, had suffered under the privation which was felt more or less throughout the British dominions, by Buonaparte declaring them to be in a state of blockade. By this decree, from the continent of Europe being within his power, he was enabled to injure and derange the industry and commerce of our artisans and merchants to an extent that was not contemplated. They have happily been liberated by an unlooked-for, and wonderful, combination of circumstances; nor so long as good faith and wise dispositions prevail, can they be prevented from arriving to a height of prosperity unparalleled in our annals.

FLORAL DIRECTORY.
Yellow Rose. Rosa lutea.
Dedicated to St. Justin.

Roman catholic countries it is observed with music, lights, flowers strewed in the street, rich tapestries hung upon the walls, and with other demonstrations of rejoicing:* this is the usage still. Anciently in this country, as well as abroad, it was the custom to perform plays on this day, representing scripture subjects. From an author before cited, the following verses relating to these manners are extracted :

"Then doth ensue the solemne feast

of Corpus Christi Day, Who then can shewe their wicked use, and fond and foolish play? The hallowed bread, with worship great, in silver pix they beare About the church, or in the citie

passing here and theare.

His armes that beares the same two of
the welthiest men do holde,
And over him a canopey

of silke and cloth of golde.
Christe's passion here derided is,

with sundrie maskes and playes, Faire Ursley, with hir maydens all,

doth passe amid the wayes: Aud, valiant George, with speare thou killest the dreadfull dragon here, The Devil's house is drawne about, wherein there doth appere

A

with foule and fearefull looke, Great Christopher doth wade and passe with Christ amid the brooke:

wondrous sort of damned sprites,

Sebastian full of feathred shaftes,
the dint of dart doth feele,
There walketh Kathren, with hir sworde
in hand, and cruel wheele :
The Challis and the singing Cake

with Barbara is led,
And sundrie other pageants playde,
in worship of this bred.

Brand.

The common ways with bowes are strawde,
and every streete beside,
And to the walles and windowes all

are boughes and braunches tide. The monkes in every place do roame, the nonnes abrode are sent,

The priestes and schoolmen lowd do rore,
some use the instrument.

The straunger passing through the streete,
upon his knees doe fall:
And earnestly upon this bread,

as on his God, doth call.

For why, they counte it for their Lorde, and that he doth not take

The form of flesh, but nature now of breade that we do bake.

A number great of armed men
here all this while do stande,
To looke that no disorder be,
nor any filching hande:

For all the church-goodes out are brought,
which certainly would bee
A bootie good, if every man
might have his libertie."

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The Religious Plays performed on Corpus Christi Day, in the times of superstition, were such as were represented at other periods, though with less ceremony. From a volume on the subject, by the editor of the Every-Day-book he, relates so much as may set forth their origin and the nature of the performances.

Origin of Religious Plays. A Jewish play, of which fragments are still preserved in Greek iambics, is the first drama known to have been written on a scripture subject. It is taken from Exodus: a performer, in the character of Moses, delivers the prologue in a speech of sixty lines, and his rod is turned into a serpent on the stage. The play is posed to have been written at the close of the second century, by one Ezekiel, a Jew, as a political spectacle to animate his dispersed brethren with the hopes of a future deliverance from their captivity.

sup

The emperor Julian made a law that no Christian should be taught in the heathen schools, or make use of that learning; but there were two men living at that time, who exerted their talents to supply the deficiency of instruction and entertainment that the Christians experienced from Julian's edict: these were Apollinarius, bishop of Laodicea, and his father, a priest of the same city; they were both scholars, well skilled in oratory and the rules of composition, and of high literary

Naogeorgus, by Googe.

renown. Apollinarius, the elder, a profound philologer, translated the five books of Moses into heroic verse, and in the same manner composed the history of the Israelites to the time of Saul, into a poem of twenty-four books, in imitation of Homer. He also wrote religious odes, and turned particular histories and portions of the Old and New Testament into comedies and tragedies, after the manner of Menander, Euripides, and Pindar. His son the bishop, an eloquent rhetorician, and already an antagonist of Julian's, anxious that the Christians might not be ignorant of any species of Greek composition, formed the writings of the evangelists, and the works of the apostles, into dialogues, in the manner of Plato.

About the same time, Gregory Nazianzen, patriarch and archbishop of Constantinople, one of the fathers of the church, and master to the celebrated Jerome, composed plays from the Old and New Testament, which he substituted for the plays of Sophocles and Euripides at Constantinople, where the old Greek stage had flourished until that time. The ancient Greek tragedy was a religious spectacle; and the sacred dramas of Gregory Nazianzen were formed on the same model; he transformed the choruses into Christian hymns. One only of the archbishop's plays is extant: it is a tragedy cailed "Christ's Passion;" the prologue calls it an imitation of Euripides; the play is preserved in Gregory Nazianzen's works. The remainder of his dramas have not survived those inimitable compositions over which they triumphed for a

time.

It is not known whether the religious dramas of the Apollinarii perished so early as some of their other writings, that were ordered to be destroyed for, a crime common in all ages, heresy; but this is certain, that the learning they endeavoured to supply gradually disappeared before the progress of Constantine's establishment. Suddenly acquiring power, and finally assuming infallibility, observing pagan feasts as religious festivals, consecrating heathen rites into christian solemnities, and transforming the non-observances of primitive simplicity into precedents for gorgeous ceremony, the church blazed with a scorching splendour that withered up the heart of man. accession to the dominion of its ecclesiastics over his property and intellect induced self-relaxation and sloth; to the boldness

Every

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