To weepe with her that wept with all narrow-minded woman. But we must not be led into doing injus- terms, with an exordium on "the incontice to Mrs. Hall. It is quite possible veniences of plays being very seriously that Cooke may have been mistaken in considered of, and their unlawfulness," the inference which he evidently intends and increasing the penalty to ten pounds. us to draw. We know that it is quite Stratford also in those days was greatly possible for even the largest-hearted and troubled and excited about the enclosmost sympathetic of women to be a dead ures. Combe and Mannering, two of the hand at a bargain, and after all there is largest landowners, wished to enclose a no crime in desiring to change a number part of the common-field, and the small of musty little manuscripts into current owners and the townsmen generally, havcoin of the realm. Mrs. Hall's tomb- ing probably certain rights at stake, restone in Stratford Church asks us— sisted vigorously. A portion of Shakespeare's estate would be injuriously affected by the change; and almost the only morsel of information left to us about his private life, except the will and the legal documents relating to his property, has reference to this agitation. It is a memorandum in the handwriting of the Town Clerk, to the effect that "Mr. Shakespeare told Mr. J. Greene that he was not able to beare the enclosing of Welcombe," and is dated September I, 1615, a few months only before his death. In the same year an application to restrain the enclosers was made to Lord Chief Justice Coke, at Warwick Assizes, and some idea of the temper of the townsmen may be obtained from the order of the Court, which censures Combe and his friends, and declares that the order is taken "for preventynge of tumults, whereof in this very towne of late, upon these occasions, there had been lyke to have been an evill begynninge of some great mischiefe." We have endeavoured in vain to discover some trace of Hall's parentage or extraction. His name does not occur upon the Register of the College of Physicians, or upon those of the Universities, and, as Cooke tells us that he was a good French scholar and had travelled, it is probable that his degree was from Leyden or Paris. There was a John Hall who practised at Maidstone about 1565, and published a translation of Lanfranc's famous Ars Chirurgica. This Hall also published some poetry of a religious cast, and was a very decided Puritan. Is it possible that our Dr. Hall could have been a son or nephew of his? There is certainly a curious intellectual relationship in the style of the two men. This was Arcadian Stratford. C. ELLIOT BROWNE. From Chambers' Journal. COLOUR IN ANIMALS. It is amusing, how the real state of affairs at Stratford, during the last years of Shakespeare's life, differed from that which has been pictured for us by the sentimental biographers who have surrounded the poet in his retirement with troops of admiring worshippers. The truth seems to be that Stratford was a perfect hotbed of religious and do- THE variety of colouring in animal life mestic strife. The municipal govern- is one of the marvels of nature, only now ment was in the hands of a narrow Puri- beginning to be studied scientifically. It tan majority, who administered the local is vain to say that an animal is beautiful, affairs in the spirit of a Scottish Kirk ses- either in symmetry or diversity of colour, sion, pretending to a strict control over in order to please the human eye. Fishes the personal morals of the inhabitants. in the depths of the Indian seas, where In 1602 we learn from the town records, no human eye can see them, possess the published from the originals by Mr. Hal- most gorgeous tints. One thing is reliwell, that amongst other attempts at markable: birds, fishes, and insects reformation they passed a resolution that alone possess the metallic colouring; "no plays should be played in the cham- whilst plants and zoophytes are without ber," and that any of the council who reflecting shades. The mollusca take a shall "give leave or license thereto " middle path with their hue of mother-ofshould forfeit ten shillings; and again in pearl. What is the reason of these ar1612, when their illustrious townsman rangements in the animal kingdom? It was in the very zenith of his fame, they is a question which cannot be satisfactorepeated the resolution in still stronger rily answered; but some observations have been made which throw light on the substances have it in themselves, owing subject. One is, that among animals, to molecular arrangement, but usually the part of the body turned towards the this is not the case; the liveliest colours earth is always paler than that which is are not bound up with the tissues. Someuppermost. The action of light is here times they arise from a phenomenon like apparent. Fishes which live on the side, that by which the soap-bubble shews its as the sole and turbot, have the left side, prismatic hues; sometimes there is a which answers to the back, of a dark special matter called pigment which is tint; whilst the other side is white. It united with the organic substance. Such may be noticed that birds which fly, as it is the brilliant paint, carmine, which is were, bathed in light do not offer the the pigment of the cochineal insect, and strong contrast of tone between the upper the red colour of blood, which may be and lower side. Beetles, wasps, and collected in crystals, separate from the flies have the metallic colouring of blue other particles to which it is united. and green, possess rings equally dark all round the body; and the wings of many butterflies are as beautifully feathered below as above. Even the powder not unknown to ladies of fashion is one of Nature's beautifying means. That which is left on the hands of the ruthless boy when he has caught a butterfly, is a common instance; but there are birds, such as the large white cockatoo, which leave a white powder on the hands. An African traveller speaks of his astonishment on a rainy day to see his hands reddened by the moist plumage of a bird he had just killed. The most ordinary way, however, in which the pigment is found is when it exists in the depths of the tissues, re On the other hand, mollusca which live in an almost closed shell, like the oyster, are nearly colourless; the larvae of insects found in the ground or in wood have the same whiteness, as well as all intestinal worms shut up in obscurity. Some insects whose life is spent in darkness keep this appearance all their lives; such as the curious little beetles inhabiting the inaccessible crevasses of snowy mountains, in whose depths they are hid-duced to very fine particles, best seen den. They seem to fly from light as from death, and are only found at certain seasons, when they crawl on the flooring of the caves like larvæ, without eyes, which would be useless in the retreats where they usually dwell. under the microscope. When scattered, they scarcely influence the shade; but when close together, they are very perceptible. This explains the colour of the negro: under the very delicate layer of skin which is raised by a slight burn This relation between colouring and there may be seen abundance of brown light is very evident in the beings which pigment in the black man. It is quite inhabit the earth and the air; those are superficial, for the skin differs only from the most brilliant which are exposed to that of the European in tone; it wants the sun; those of the tropics are brighter the exquisite transparency of fair races. than in the regions around the North Among these, the colours which impress Pole, and the diurnal species than the the eye do not come from a flat surface, nocturnal; but the same law does not but from the different depths of layers apparently belong to the inhabitants of in the flesh. Hence the variety of rose the sea, which are of a richer shade and lily tints according as the blood where the light is more tempered. The circulates more or less freely; hence the most dazzling corals are those which blue veins, which give a false appearhang under the natural cornices of the ance, because the blood is red; but the rocks and on the sides of submarine grot-skin thus dyes the deep tones which lie toes; while some kinds of fish which are beneath it; tattooing with Indian ink is found on the shores as well as in depths blue, blue eyes owe their shade to the requiring the drag-net, have a bright red brown pigment which lines the other side purple in the latter regions, and an insig- of the iris, and the muscles seen under the nificant yellow brown in the former. skin produce the bluish tone well known Those who bring up gold-fish know well to painters. that to have them finely coloured, they The chemical nature of pigment is litmust place them in a shaded vase, where tle known; the sun evidently favours its aquatic plants hide them from the ex-development in red patches. Age takes treme solar heat. Under a hot July sun they lose their beauty. The causes to which animal colouring is due are very various. Some living it away from the hair when it turns white, the colouring-matter giving place to very small air-bubbles. The brilliant white of feathers is due to the air which fills them. Age, and domestic habits ex- tent of the chromatic scale. Whilst the changed for a wild state, alter the ap- humming-bird partakes in its colours of pearance of many birds and animals; in some species the feathers and fur grow white every year before falling off and being renewed; as in the ermine, in spring the fur which is so valued assumes a yellow hue, and after a few months, becomes white before winter. the whole of the spectrum from the violet to the red, passing through green, those of the butterflies prefer the more refrangible ones from green to violet, passing through blue. The admirable lilac shade of the Morpho menelas and the Morpho cypris is well known, and the wings of these butterflies have been used by the jewellers, carefully laid under a thin plate of mica, and made into ornaments. A bright green is not uncommon, but the metallic red is rare, excepting in a beautiful butterfly of Madagascar, closely allied to one found in India and Ceylon. The latter has wings of a velvet black with brilliant green spots; in the former, these give place to a mark of fiery red. It would, however, be an error to suppose that all the exquisite metallic shades which diaper the feathers of birds and the wings of butterflies arise from pigments; it was a dream of the alchemists to try to extract them. Their sole cause is the play of light, fugitive as the sparkles of the diamond. When the beautiful feathers on the breast of a humming-bird are examined under the microscope, it is astonishing to see none of There is the same difference between the shades the mystery of which you the metallic hues of creatures endowed would penetrate. They are simply made with flight and the iris shades of fishes, of a dark-brown opaque substance not that there is between crystallized bisunlike those of a black duck. There is, muth and the soft reflections of the however, a remarkable arrangement; the changing opal.. To have an idea of the barb of the feather, instead of being a richness of the fish, it is only necessary fringed stem, offers a series of small to see a net landed filled with shad or squares of horny substance placed point other bright fish. It is one immense to point. These plates, of infinitesimal opal, with the same transparency of shade size, are extremely thin, brown, and, to all seen through the scales, which afford the appearance, exactly alike, whatever may only means of imitating pearls. It is due, be the reflection they give. The brilliant however, not to the scales, but to exlarge feathers of the peacock are the tremely thin layers lying below the scales same; the plates are only at a greater under the skin and round the blooddistance, and of less brightness. They vessels, which look like so many threads have been described as so many little of silver running through the flesh. mirrors, but that comparison is not cor- Réaumur first noticed and described rect, for then they would only give back them; sometimes their form is as regulight without colouring it. Neither do lar as that of a crystal, and of infinitesithey act by decomposing the rays which mal size and thickness. The art of the pass through them, for then they would makers of false pearls is to collect these not lose their iris tints under the micro-plates in a mass from the fish, and make scope. It is to metals alone that the me- a paste of them with the addition of glue, tallic plumage of the humming-birds can which is pompously named "Eastern be compared; the effects of the plates in Essence." This is put inside glass a feather are like tempered steel or crys- beads, and gives them the native whitetallized bismuth. Certain specimens emit ness of pearls. colours very variable under different angles, the same scarlet feather becoming, when turned to ninety degrees, a beautiful emerald green. The same process which nature has followed in the humming-bird is also found in the wing of the butterfly. It is covered with microscopic scales, which play the part of the feather, arranged like the tiles of a house, and taking the most elegant forms. They also lose their colour under magnifying power, and the quality of reflection shews that the phenomena are the same as in feathers. There is, however, a difference in the ex Many observations have been made lately by our naturalists as to the defence which colour supplies to animals: hares, rabbits, stags, and goats possess the most favourable shade for concealing them in the depths of the forest or in the fields. It is well known that when the Volunteer corps were enrolled, and the most suitable colour for the riflemen was discussed, it was supposed to be green. Soldiers dressed in different shades were placed in woods and plains, to try which offered the best concealment. Contrary to expectation, that which escaped the eyes of the enemy was not green, but the fawn colour of the doe. Among | It is undoubtedly the nerves which hunting quadrupeds, such as the tiger, connect the brain with organs where the the leopard, the jaguar, the panther, there pigment is retained. By cutting a nerve, is a shade of skin which man has always the colouring-matter is paralyzed in that been anxious to appropriate for his own portion of the skin through which the use. The old Egyptian tombs have nerve passes, just as a muscle is isolated paintings of the negroes of Sudan, their by the section of its nerve. If this operaloins girt with the fine yellow skins for tion be performed on a turbot when in a which there is still a great sale. All the dark state, and thrown into a sandy botbirds which prey upon the smaller tribes, tom, the whole body grows paler, exceptand fishes like the shark, are clothed in ing the part which cannot receive ceredead colours, so as to be the least seen bral influence. The nerves have, in genby their victims. eral, a very simple and regular distribution: if two or three of these are cut in the body of the fish, a black transversal band following the course of the nerve will be seen; whilst, if the nerve which animates the head is thus treated, the turbot growing paler on the sand, keeps a kind of black mask, which has a very curious effect. There is an animal which, for two thousand years, has excited the curiosity and superstition of man by its change of colour that is, the chameleon. No reasonable observation was ever made upon it, until Perrault instituted some experiments in the seventeenth century. He observed that the animal became pale at night, and took a deeper colour when in the sun, or when it was teased; whilst the idea that it took its colour from surrounding objects was simply fabulous. He wrapped it in different kinds of cloth, and once only did it become paler when in white. Its colours were very limited, varying from gray to green and greenish brown. : Little more than this is known in the present day under our skies it soon loses its intensity of colour. Beneath the African sun, its livery is incessantly changing; sometimes a row of large patches appears on the sides, or the skin is spotted like a trout, the spots turning to the size of a pin's head. At other times, the figures are light on a brown ground, which a moment before were brown on a light ground, and these last during the day. A naturalist speaks of two chameleons which were tied together on a boat in the Nile, with sufficient length of string to run about, and so always submissive to the same influences of light, &c. They offered a contrast of colour, though to a certain degree alike; but when they slept under the straw chair which they chose for their domicile, they were exactly of the same shade during the hours of rest - a fine sea-green that never changed. The skin rested, as did the brain, so that it seemed probable that central activity, thought, will, or whatever name is given, has some effect in the change of colour. The probability is, that as they become pale, the pigment does not leave the skin, but that it is collected in spheres too small to affect our retina, which will be impressed by the same quantity of pigment when more extended. These marks will remain for many weeks, and what may be called paralysis of colour has been remarked in consequence of illness or accident. Such was seen in the head of a large turbot, the body being of a different colour. It was watched, and died after a few days, evidently of some injury which it had received. The subject offers a field of immense inquiry: the chemical and physical study of pigments, the conditions which regulate their appearance, their intensity, and variations under certain influences; the want of them in albinos, and the exaggerated development in other forms of disease. To Mr. Darwin, in England, and to M. Ponchet, in France, the subject is indebted for much research, which will no doubt be continued as occasion offers. IN turning through some files of old newspapers, we have been surprised to notice that the question as to the propriety of women taking a more prominent part in public affairs was quite as diligently discussed a century ago as it is now-a-days. A few extracts which we have made will furnish somewhat curious illustrations of this. The Morning Post of April 14, 1780, contains the following announcement:— "Casino, no. 43 Great Marlborough Street, this evening, the 14th inst., will commence the First Sessions of the FE MALE PARLIAMENT. The Debate to be carried on by Ladies only, and a Lady to preside in the chair. Question Is that assertion of Mr. Pope's founded in justice, which says Every woman is at heart a rake?' On the Sunday evening a theological question to be discussed." 7. On quacks and empirics, including those of the State, the Church, and the Bar, etc., etc." About this time, too, we find the following ingenious problem propounded for the solution of a like gathering in "The Large Hall, Cornhill: "Which is the happiest period of a man's life: when courting a wife, when married to a wife, or when burying a bad wife.” In succeeding issues of the paper, formal reports of the proceedings of this parliament in petticoats are published, such as: — " Friday, April 21. The Speak- In 1788 an advertisement appears of er having taken the chair, it was resolved the proposed opening, on March 17, of nem. con. that the assertion of Mr. Pope's, Rice's elegant rooms (late Hickford's), which says,Every woman is at heart a Brewer Street, Golden Square, for public rake' is not founded in justice. A mem-debate by ladies only. The first subject ber presented to the House several peti- suggested seems quite as comprehensive tions from men milliners, men mantua in the matter of women's rights as the makers, &c., &c., against a bill entitled most zealous advocate of them in our own 'An Act to prevent men from monopo- day could desire. This is it: "Do not lizing women's professions.' Resolved the extraordinary abilities of the ladies in that said bill and said petitions be con- the present age demand academical honsidered." ours from the Universities, a right to vote at elections, and to be returned members of parliament?" "Such is the universal rage for public speaking," writes the Morning Post, of May 20, 1780, "that the honourable Mrs. L possessed of no less than two thousand pounds a year, constantly speaks at the Casino Rooms on the nights of the ladies' debates." In the Morning Post of March 9, 1781, we meet with this report:-"La Belle Assemblée - Budget. The opening of the Budget, and the debate which ensued upon the taxes that were proposed by the female Premier, as the Ways and Means for procuring the supplies for the present year, afforded such high and uncommon amusement to the numerous and splendid company in the Rooms, that a general request was made that on the subsequent Friday the Ladies should resume the consideration of the Budget, in preference to the question given out from the chair. In obedience, therefore, to the desire of the public, the Ladies mean this evening to resume the debate on the following taxes, viz. : I. Old maids and bachelors over a certain age. 2. Ön men milliners, men mantua makers, men marriage brokers. 3. On female foxes, female dragoons, female playwrights, and females of all descriptions who usurp the occupations of the men. 4. On monkies, lap-dogs, butterflies, parrots, and puppies, including those of the human species. 5. On made-up complexions. 6. On French dancers, French frizeurs, French cooks, French milliners, and French fashion mongers. WE have been favoured with the following remarks concerning Colonel Gordon's journey to Gondokoro. Colonel Gordon, "His excellency, the Governorgeneral of the equator!" arrived at Khartoum on March 13, and had with him a Pall Mall Gazette of Feb. 13; he writes on the 17th from Khartoum as follows: "At this season of the year the air is so dry that animal matter does not decay or smell, it simply dries up hard; for instance, a dead camel becomes in a short time a drum. "The Nile, flowing from the Albert Nyanza below Gondokoro, spreads out into two lakes; on the edge of these lakes aquatic plants, with roots extending 5 ft. into the water, flourish; the natives burn the tops when dry, and thus form soil for grass to grow on; this is again burnt, and it becomes a compact mass. The Nile rises and floats out portions, which, being checked in a curve of the channel, are joined by other masses, and eventually the river is completely bridged over for several miles, and all navigation is sopped. Last year the governor of Khartoum went up with three companies and two steamers, and cut away large blocks of the vegetation; at last one night the water |