measure, be estimated, from the circumstance of the whole distance being accomplished by one of the party in an hour and five, and by another in an hour and ten, minutes. The water was extremely cold, from the melting of the mountain snows. About three weeks before, we had made an attempt; but having ridden all the way from the Troad the same morning, and the water being of an icy chillness, we found it necessary to postpone the completion till the frigate anchored between the castles, when we swam the Straits, as just stated, entering a considerable way above the European, and landing below the Asiatic, fort. Chevalier says, that a young Jew swam the same distance for his mistress; and Olivier mentions its having also been done by a Neapolitan; but our Consul at Tarragona remembered neither of those circumstances, and tried to dissuade us from the attempt. A number of the Salsette's crew were known to have accomplished a greater distance; and the only thing that surprised me was, that, as doubts had been entertained of the truth of Leander's story, no traveller had ever endeavoured to ascertain its practicability."

This notable adventure was, however, followed by a fit of the ague.

CHAUCER.

Of the history of Geoffrey Chaucer, who has been called "the Morning Star of English Poetry," and whom his contemporaries and immediate successors denominate "the flower of eloquence,"-"superlative in eloquence," &c. it is astonishing that we should know almost nothing. His very descent is involved in impenetrable obscurity; for while one of his biographers asserts that he was of a noble stock, another declares that he was the son of a knight; a third, that his father was a vintner, and a fourth, that he was a merchant: there is a fifth opinion, which seems best entitled to credit, viz. that nothing can be said with any certainty respecting his origin.

The place of his birth, likewise, is equally a matter of dispute; for while some maintain, and, apparently, on his own authority, that he was born in London, others have brought what, to them, have appeared very conclusive arguments, that he was a Berkshire man; while a

third party have strenuously maintained, that the honour of his nativity belongs to the county of Oxford. Amidst these discrepancies, which encumber almost every circumstance connected with the Poet's life, it is difficult to know what to believe: we must, therefore, content ourselves with the information furnished by his tombstone, and various other records; from the first of which, it appears, that he was born in 1328, and that he died in 1400; and from the latter, that he was closely connected with John of Gaunt, to whose second wife he was related by marriage; that he was, at one time, in high favour at Court, where he enjoyed several lucrative offices; but that he afterwards, it is conjectured on account of his attachment to the doctrines of Wickliffe, forfeited his places, and was compelled to fly the kingdom; and that, after his return to his native land, he terminated his life in literary retirement.

On the accession to the throne of Henry IV., the son of his great patron, he quitted his peaceable retirement, and travelled to London; and this journey is supposed to have hastened his end, the near approach of which, if we may judge from the following Ode, which he is said

to have composed in his last agonies, he bore with Roman fortitude. The reader will observe, that the phraseology of this little piece has been modernised, in order to obviate the obscurity of the old language.

THE POET'S LAST ADVICE.

Fly from the crowd and be to virtue true,
Content with what thou hast, tho' it be small;
To hoard brings hate: nor lofty thoughts pursue;
He who climbs high endangers many a fall.
Envy's a shade that ever waits on fame,

And oft the sun that raises it will hide;
Trace not in life a vast expensive scheme,
But be thy wishes to thy state allied;
Be mild to others, to thyself severe,

So truth shall shield thee or from hurt or fear.

Think not of bending all things to thy will,

Nor vainly hope that fortune shall befriend;
Inconstant she, but be thou constant still,
Whate'er betide, unto an honest end.
Yet needless dangers never madly brave,
Kick not thy naked foot against a nail;
Or from experience the solution crave,

If wall and pitcher strive, which shall prevail.
Be in thy cause, as in thy neighbour's, clear,
So truth shall shield thee or from hurt or fear.

Whatever happens, happy in thy mind,

Be thou serene, nor at thy lot repine;

He 'scapes all ill whose bosom is resign'd,

Nor way nor weather will be always fine.
Beside, thy home's not here, a journey this,

A pilgrim thou, then hie thee on thy way;
Look up to GOD, intent on heav'nly bliss,

Take what the road affords, and praises pay. Shun brutal lusts, and seek thy soul's high sphere, So truth shall shield thee or from hurt or fear.

TAM O'SHANTER.

THOMAS REID, so celebrated as Tam O'Shanter, by Burns, was born in Kyle, in Ayrshire. His first entrance into active life, was in the capacity of plough-boy to William Burns, the father of the poet, whom Thomas described as a man of great capacity, as being very fond of an argument, of rigid morals, and a strict disciplinarian -so much so, that when the labours of the day were over, the whole family sat down by the blazing "ha'ingle," upon no pretence whatever could any of the inmates leave the house after night. This was a circumstance that was not altogether to Thomas's liking. He had heard other plough-boys with rapture recount scenes of rustic jollity, which had fallen in their way, while out on nocturnal visits to the fair daughters or servant girls of the neighbouring