"It was the English," Kaspar cried, "Who put the French to rout; But what they kill'd each other for, I could not well make out.

But every body said," quoth he, "That 'twas a famous victory.

My father lived at Blenheim then,
Yon little stream hard by ;

They burnt his dwelling to the ground,
And he was forced to fly;

So with his wife and child he fled,

Nor had he where to rest his head.

"With fire and sword the country round

Was wasted far and wide,

And many a childing mother then,

And new-born baby died.

But things like that, you know, must be

At every famous victory.

"They say it was a shocking sight

For

After the field was won;

many thousand bodies here

Lay rotting in the sun;

But things like that, you know, must be

After a famous victory.

"Great praise the Duke of Marlbro' won,

And our good Prince Eugene."

"Why 'twas a very wicked thing!"

Said little Wilhelmine.

"Nay.. nay.. my little girl," quoth he,

"It was a famous victory.

"And every body praised the Duke

Who this great fight did win."

"But what good came of it at last?"

Quoth little Peterkin.

"Why that I cannot tell," said he,

"But 'twas a famous victory."

1798.

A TRUE BALLAD

OF

ST. ANTIDIUS, THE FOPE, AND THE DEVIL.

e

Deste Alendio cuentan las estorias que le avino, que el martes despues de Ramos, passo por la puente de un rio que ha nombre Divino; e vio en un campo gran compana de diablos que estavan contando a sus principes los males que fazien por los tierras; e entre todos los otros estava un negro a manera de Etyopiano alabava se que avie siete anos que andava lidiando con el Papa por le fazer pecar, e nunca pudiera sy non entonces que le fiziera fazer ya que pecado muy grave; e esto provava lo por la sanda_ lia del apostoligo que traye. E Sant Atendio que vido aquello, llamo aquel diablo, e conjurol por la virtud de Dios e por la Santa Cruz que lo llevasse a Roma; e cavalgo en el; e llevol a Roma. El jueves de la cena a hora de missa, el Papa que querie revestirse para dezir missa; dexo sant Atendio al diablo a la puerta e dixol que lo atendiese; e el entro dentro el saco e Papa aparte, e dixol que fiziesse penitencia de aquel pecado; e el quiso lo negar, mas fizo gelo otorgar el santo obispo con a sandalia que le dio. E fizo el Papa penitencia; e dixo sant Atendio la missa en su logar, e consagro la crisma; e tomo una partida della para sy; e despediosse del Papa, e salio fuera, e cavalgo en el diablo, e llevo lo a su arzobispado el sabado de pascua a hora de missa.

CORONICA DE ESPANA, ff. 139.

This Saint Atendio, according to the Chronica General, was Bishop of Vesytana in Gaul, and martyred by the Vandals in the year 411. The Spaniards have a tradition that he was bishop of Jaen; they say, "that as the devil was crossing the sea with this unwelcome load upon his back, he artfully endeavoured to make Atendio pronounce the name of Jesus, which, as it breaks all spells, would have enabled him to throw him off into the water; but that the Bishop, understanding his intent, only replied, Arre Diablo, "Gee-up, Devil!" and they add, "that when he arrived at Rome, his hat was still covered with the snow which had fallen upon it while he was passing the Alps, and that the hat is still shown at Rome in confirmation of the story and the miracle." Feyjoo has two letters upon this whimsical legend among his Cartas Eruditas. In the first (T. 1. Carta 24.) he replies to a correspondent who had gravely enquired his opinion upon the story," De buen humor," says he, "estaba V. md. quando le ocurrió inquirir mi dictamen, sobre la Historieta de el Obispo de Jahen, de quien se cuenta, que fue a Roma en una noche, caballero sobre la espalda de un Diablo de alquiler: Triste de mi, si essa curiosidad se hace contagiosa, y dan muchos en seguir el exemplo de V. md. consultandome sobre cuentos de nínos y viejas." Nevertheless, though he thus treats the story as an old wife's tale, he bestows some reasoning upon it. "As he heard it," he "it did not apsays, pear whether the use which the Bishop made of the Devil were licit or illicit; that is, whether he made use of him as a wizard, by virtue of a compact, or by virtue of authority, having the permission of the Most High so to do. In either case there is a great incongruity. In the first, inasmuch as it is not credible that the Devil should voluntarily serve the Bishop for the purpose of preventing a great evil to the church:- I say voluntarily, because the notion that a com

pact is so binding upon the Devil that he can in no ways resist the pleasure of the person with whom he has contracted es cosa de Theologos de Vade à la cinta. In the second, be-' cause the journey being designed for a holy purpose, it is more conformable to reason that it should have been executed by the ministry of a good angel than of a bad one; as, for instance, Habakkuk was transported by the ministry of a good angel from Judæa to Babylon, that he might carry food to the imprisoned Daniel. If you should oppose to me the example of Christ, who was carried by the Devil to the pinnacle of the Temple, I reply, that there are two manifest disparities. The first, that Christ conducted himself in this case passively and permissively; the second, that the Devil placed him upon the pinnacle of the Temple, not for any good end, but with a most wicked intention. "But," pursues the good Benedictine, “why should I fatigue myself with arguing? I hold the story unworthy of being critically examined till it be shown me written in some history, either ecclesiastical or profane, which is entitled to some credit."

Soon after this letter was published, another correspondent informed Feyjoo, that the story in question was written in the General Chronicle of King D. Alphonso the Wise. This incited him to farther enquiry. He found the same legend in the Speculum Historiale of Vincentius Belovacensis, and there discovered that the saint was called Antidius, not Athendius, and that the scene lay upon the river Dunius instead of the river Divinus. Here too he found a reference to Sigebertus Gemblacensis; and in that author, the account which the Chronicler had followed and the explanation of his errors in the topography: his Vesytania proving to be Besançon, and the river the Doux, which the Romans called Dubius, Dubis, and Aduadubis. But he found also to his comfort, that though Jean Jacques Chiflet,