Aut puteis manare cruor cessavit; et alte Prodigies following Caesar's Death. In the most high and palmy state of Rome, The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands, Calphurnia's Address to Caesar on the Prodigies seen the Night before his Death. Cal. Caesar, I never stood on ceremonies And graves have yawned, and yielded up their dead: In ranks, and squadrons, and right form of war, The noise of battle hurtled in the air, Horses did neigh, and dying men did groan; And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets. And I do fear them. Caes. What can be avoided, Are to the world in general, as to Caesar. Cal. When beggars die, there are no Comets seen; The Heavens themselves blaze forth the death of Princes. March 16. St. Julian, of Cillisia. St. Finian Loblar. rises at vI. 6'. and sets at v. 54. Scorpius oritur.-Rom. Cal. Ovid thus notices the rising of the Scorpion this morning: On the peculiar Twinkling of Antares in Corde Scorpii. Whose changing colours on a Summer's night, And twinkling change with red and silver light. Antares, or the bright star in the heart of the Scorpion, is, according to Helvetius, in longitude # 4° 58′ 48", latitude South 4° 27′ 19′′; consequently, the best time for viewing this constellation is about Midsummer, when it culminates or passes the meridian soon after it gets dark. CHRONOLOGY.--King of Sweden murdered in 1792. The murder of the King of Sweden recorded today reminds us of some quaint and impressive lines on Death by Shakespeare, which we shall here insert : Apostrophe to Death. O amiable, lovely Death! Thou odoriferous stench! sound rottenness! And I will kiss thy detestable bones; And ring these fingers with thy household worms; And be a carrion monster like thyself: Come, grin on me; and I will think thou smilest, O, come to me! Lines on a favourite Mouse killed by accident, from a MS. said to be by Alas! wee cow'rin donsie Mouse, Yestreen about my lowlie house And pick't the crumbs o' Barley Cake Nae scared by Flunkie's sounding bell; A myrmidon at Fortune's foot To cringe and fawn my life away. On youth its balmy fragrance spending : Then let me drown my cares in wine, March 17. St. Patrick, Apostle of Ireland. rises at vi. 4. and sets at v. 56'. CHRONOLOGY.-Shock of an Earthquake at Lincoln in 1816. St. SS. The Liberalia were festivals yearly celebrated in honour of Bacchus on the 17th of March. Slaves were then permitted to speak with freedom, and every thing bore the appearance of independence. They were much the same as the Dionysia of the Greeks.-Varro. The Agonalia and Agonia were festivals in Rome, celebrated three times a year in honour of Janus, or Agonius. They were instituted by Numa, and on the festive days the Chief Priest used to offer a ram.-Ovid. Fast. i. v. 317.— Varro. de L. L. v. Ovid observes of the rising of Milvius:— Stella Lycaoniam vergit proclinis ad Arcton One may see aloft this night The Star that Fable calls the Kyte, Scanding the Welkin to Heaven's height. The tutelar Saint of Ireland was born in the year 371, in a village called Bonaven Taberniae, probably Kilpatrick, in Scotland, between Dunbriton and Glasgow. Being successively ordained deacon, priest, and bishop, he received the apostolical benediction from Pope Celestine, and was sent by him, about the beginning of the year 432, to preach the gospel in Ireland. He died at the good old age of 123, and was buried at Down, in Ulster. The Order of St. Patrick was instituted by his late Majesty George III. in the year 1783. On St. Patrick's Day, from Brand." The Shamrock is said to be worn by the Irish, upon the anniversary of this Saint, for the following reason :-When the Saint preached the Gospel to the pagan Irish, he illustrated the doctrine of the Trinity by showing them a trefoil, or three leaved grass with one stalk, which operating to their conviction, the Shamrock, which is a bundle of this grass, was ever afterwards worn upon this Saint's anniversary, to commemorate the event." "Mr. Jones, in his Historical Account of the Welsh Bards, fol. Lond. 1794, p. 13, tells us, in a note, that St. Patrick, the Apostle of Ireland, is said to be the son of Calphurnius and Concha. He was born in the Vale of Rhôs, in Pembrokeshire, about the year 373.' Mr. Jones, however, gives another pedigree of this Saint, and makes him of Caernarvonshire. He adds: His original Welsh name was Maenwyn, and his ecclesiastical name of Patricius was given him by Pope Celestine, when he consecrated him a Bishop, and sent him missioner into Ireland, to convert the Irish, in 433. When St. Patrick landed near Wicklow, the inhabitants were ready to stone him for attempting an innovation in the religion of their ancestors. He requested to be heard, and explained unto them that God is an omnipotent, sacred Spirit, who created heaven and earth, and that the Trinity is contained in the Unity; but they were reluctant to give credit to his words. St. Patrick, therefore, plucked a trefoil from the ground, and expostulated with the Hibernians: Is it not as possible for the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as for these three leaves, to grow upon one stalk?' The Irish were immediately convinced." If the weather be fine and warm, the croaking of Frogs begins now to be heard from the pools, ponds, and stagnant waters, where a great number of them being assembled together, the noise they make may be heard a great way off: and we hail another sign of Spring, and perhaps acknowledge also a foreboding of the equinoctial showers, saying, Et veterem in limo ranae cecinere querelam. March 18. St. Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem, M. St. Cyril, Archbishop of Jerusalem, C. St. Edward the King. St. Anselm, Bp. C. St. Fridian, Bp. C. Orises at vi. 2'. and sets at v. 58'. In the account of St. Cyril, in Butler's Lives of the Saints, this day is recorded a very good and instructive account of the attempt made by the Emperor Julian to rebuild the Temple of Jerusalem, and of the remarkable miracle by which the attempt was foiled, and the incipient temple destroyed. CHRONOLOGY.-John Horne Tooke, the etymological Philosopher, died in 1812. Sol in Ariete.- Rom. Cal. At the time the Roman Calendar was formed, the first point of the real constellation Aries agreed with the equinoctial point; but since that time, owing to the precession of the equinox, the aforesaid point of equal day and night takes place in Pisces. For this reason it is better not to use the names of the signs in writing of the longitude of the heavenly bodies, but to designate them by their number of degrees of longitude from the vernal equinox. The month of March was anciently said to be under the protection of Minerva: a fable, the origin of which is more difficult than that which relates to the tutelary deities of the other months, thus described : On the Tutelary Deities of the Months. By Juno January 's ruled and driven, March to Minerva, may whose wisdome screen us Which mythists make to be the same as Vulcan : And makes the mangled Hares her shafts remember, The above, and various other verses taken from the old Anthologies and Horilegiums of the 17th century, are curious as subjects of antiquarian research, but possess little poetical beauties. Early poetry, relating to the ancient months and to their patron deities, is however, perhaps, one of the most interesting subjects of research. "The names of the angels and of the months, such as Gabriel, Michael, Yar, Nisan, &c. came from Babylon with the Jews," says expressly the Talmud of Jerusalem.-See Beausob. Hist. du Manich. vol. ii. p. 624. where he proves that the Saints of the Almanack are in imitation of the 365 angels of the Persians, and Iamblicus in his Egyptian Mysteries, sect. ii. c. 3. speaks of angels, archangels, seraphims, &c. like a true Christian. Ovid thus notices the sign Aries, into which the Sun entered on this day, at the time in which he wrote :— Nunc potes ad solemn sublato dicere vultu, Hic heri Phryxeae vellera pressit ovis. |