and at those seasons of fasting when meat is forbidden, bishops and other religious persons feed on these birds, because they are not fish, nor to be regarded as flesh meat.  And who can marvel that this should be so?  When our first parent was made of mud, can we be surprised that a bird should be born of a tree?”

The notion of the barnacle being considered a fish is, I am aware, one that still prevails on the western coast of Ireland; for I remember a friend of mine, who had spent a few weeks in Kerry, telling me of the astonishment he experienced upon seeing pious Roman Catholics eating barnacles on Fridays, and being assured that they were nothing else than fishes!  My friend added that they had certainly a most “fish-like flavour,” and were, therefore, very nasty birds.

W.B.  MACCABE.

* * * * *

DORNE THE BOOKSELLER.

Mr. Editor,—­I beg to add my protest to your own, respecting the conclusion drawn by your valuable correspondent W. as to his competency to his arduous task, which no person could doubt who knows him.  My remarks had reference to the supposed scribe of the catalogue, whose brains, according to W., were in some degree of confusion at times.  His name is still in obscuro, it seems.  “Henno Rusticus” is clear.  W., I trust, will accept my apology.  I say with Brutus, verbis paulo mutatis—­

  “By heaven, I had rather coin my heart,
  And drop my blood for drachmas, than to plant
  In the kind bosom of a friend a thorn,
  By any indirection.”

J.I.

* * * * *

REV.  WM. STEPHENS’ SERMONS.

Sir,—­Amongst the books wanted in your sixth number is “a Tract or Sermon” of the Rev. Wm. Stephens.  It is a sermon, and one of four, all of which are far above the ordinary run of sermons, and deserving of a place in every clergyman’s library.  They are rarely met with together, though separately they turn up now and then upon book stalls amongst miscellaneous sermons; it is a pity they are not better known, and much is every day republished less deserving of preservation.  The author’s widow published her husband’s sermons in two volumes; but, strange to say, these, which are worth all the rest, are not included in the collection.  The titles of the four sermons are—­

“The Personality and Divinity of the Holy Ghost proved from Scripture, and the Anti-Nicene Fathers.”  Preached before the University of Oxford, St. Matthias’ Day, 1716-17.  Third Edition, 1725.

     “The Catholic Doctrine concerning the Union of the Two Natures in
     the One Person of Christ stated and vindicated.”  Preached at the
     visitation of the Bishop of Oxford, 1719.  Second Edition, 1722.

     “The Divine Persons One God by an Unity of Nature:  or, That Our
     Saviour is One God with His Father, by an External Generation from
     His Substance, asserted from Scripture and the Anti-Nicene
     Fathers.”  Preached before the University of Oxford, 1722.  Second
     Edition, 1723.