are increasing for the sale of the necessaries and luxuries of life; the Haymarket has been removed from a fashionable quarter to the suburbs, that loaded carts may not obstruct carriages in their road to St. James’s, the Houses of Parliament, and the Opera—­yet, not a single, Abattoir—­for the health of the people—­exists near the metropolis.  The King and the Court patronize and plan horse-racing, throwing the lasso, and, if recent report be true, hawking; the Parliament legislate, a bill is “ordered to be printed”—­yet, the inconsistency and tardiness of these proceedings compel us to ask, where is the truth of the motto—­Salus populi suprema lex.  Convictions before magistrates for acts of cruelty are not uncommon; yet, it is in this, as in many other laws, the poor are caught, while the rich break through the meshes of the net.  In the work before us are recorded Mr. Osbaldeston’s matches, including “the cold-blooded cruelty towards the generous and heart-broken Rattler, in riding him thirty-four miles in the space of 2 hours, 18 min., and 56 sec.”  Next are four police cases of cruelties towards horses, bullocks, and cats, the persons convicted being “of low estate.”  Yet there follows the fact of a respectable woman boiling a cat to death! and next is this quotation from the Gentleman’s Magazine for April, 1789:—­

“Died, April 4, at Tottenham, John Ardesoif, Esq.; a young man of large fortune, and in the splendour of his carriages and horses rivalled by few country gentlemen.  His table was that of hospitality, where it may be said he sacrificed too much to conviviality.  Mr. Ardesoif was fond of cock-fighting, and he had a favourite cock upon which he had won many profitable matches.  The last bet he made upon this cock he lost; which so enraged him, that he had the bird tied to a spit, and roasted alive before a large fire.  The screams of the miserable animal were so affecting, that some gentlemen who were present attempted to interfere, which so exasperated Mr. Ardesoif, that he seized the poker; and, with the most furious vehemence, declared that he would kill the first man who interfered; but, in the midst of his passionate assertions, he fell down dead upon the spot!”

If we be asked whether it be proper to regard all such dispensations as judicial inflictions, we reply in the words of Cowper above: 

  “’Tis not for us, with rash surmise,
  To point the judgments of the skies,
    But judgments plain as this,
  That, sent for man’s instruction, bring
  A written label on their wing,
    ’Tis hard to read amiss.”

[A contribution full of touching simplicity follows:]

THE WORM.

  Turn, turn, thy hasty foot aside
    Nor crush that helpless worm;
  The frame thy wayward looks deride,
    Required a God to form.

  The common Lord of all that move,
    From whom thy being flowed,
  A portion of his boundless love
    On that poor worm bestowed.