The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 12, No. 334, October 4, 1828

(For the Mirror.)

The Popinjay or Popingo (signifying painted bird) is a very favourite and popular diversion in Denmark, and of which it may be interesting to give some account. A society is constituted of various members, called the "King's Shooting Club," who have a code of laws and regulations drawn up for their observance; and are under the direction of nine managers. The entrance-money is 60 dollars. Members are admitted by ballot, and on election receive a diploma on parchment, with the seal of the society.

The meetings are held in a large building in the environs, and members are decorated with an order or badge of distinction, which is the figure of a gilded bird with outstretched wings, perching on a branch of laurel. This is worn on the left breast, and attached to a button-hole of the waistcoat by a green silk riband. On the breast are marked the letters "D.C." meaning "Danish Company." On one side of the branch is the date 1542, and on the other 1739.[2 - I imagine this to mean the time of the introduction of the sport, and the year when the company was instituted.] In the month of August, when the amusement commences, the members meet in their hall, and proceed in formal procession to an adjoining field on the western side of the city; where arrangements are previously made for the numerous spectators. The bird to be shot at is about the size of a parrot, gilded, and placed on the top of a high pole. On their way to the field they are attended by a band of music, which precedes the members as they march with their pieces over their shoulders.

According to a law of the institution, the competitors fire at this mark with large rifle pieces charged with balls, and rested on triangular stands. Whoever is so fortunate as to strike the wing of the Popingo first, is entitled to a prize. This is sometimes a pair of handsome candlesticks, or a silver tea-pot and spoons. Whoever hits the tail is entitled to another prize not inferior to the last; but he who wounds the body of the bird is complimented with the principal one which weighs at least 65 ounces of silver, and is honoured with the title of the "BIRD KING." These prizes are surmounted with the royal cipher and crown. His Danish majesty opens this ceremony in person, and is entitled to the first shot, and the queen to the second, then they are followed by the other branches of the royal family in succession. The firing continues until the bird falls. In returning to the hall, the "Bird King," accompanied by the procession, first enters the room, and is placed at the head of the table laid out for an entertainment, even in the presence of his majesty. On this occasion he is understood to be invested with peculiar privileges, such as proposing toasts, directing the order of the feast, &c. and his own health is first given by the judges. The members pay 100 dollars each. The festival is honoured by the presence of the royal family, and no person excepting the members, the foreign ministers, and other distinguished persons, who are specially invited, can be admitted.

The practice of shooting at the Popingo or Popinjay, however, is not peculiar to Denmark. In Scotland a nearly similar amusement is observed, where the head marksman receives the title of "Captain." In a future paper, perhaps, I may notice the subject again, as it may prove interesting.

W.H.H

IMMENSE TROUT

(To the Editor of the Mirror.)

In No. 331 of the MIRROR, I observed an article on Trout-fishing in Westmoreland. The writer states, that the largest trout ever caught in that county weighed four pounds and a half. This circumstance induces me to send you the annexed account respecting trout in Kent.

The county of Kent affords a vast number of trout-streams, which are nowhere surpassed in England; and fish of extraordinary size and beauty have frequently been caught in them. Some years ago, at Farningham, (a village through which a noble trout-stream takes its course), stood a flour-mill, the proprietor of which informed my father, that he had often observed an enormous trout in the stream, near the mill-head, and that he would endeavour to catch it, in order to ascertain its real dimensions, as he was very desirous to have a picture done from it. My father having consented to undertake the picture, the proprietor caused the trout, though with much difficulty, to be caught in a stub-net. It appeared of a most beautiful colour, and was finely variegated with spots; but it possessed such exceeding strength, that the assistance of two men was necessary to hold it down on a table while the measurement was made. It proved to be twenty-six inches in length, and weighed nine pounds. The proprietor returned it to the water unhurt, for he would by no means suffer it to be killed, but caused food from time to time to be thrown into the stream. This food chiefly consisted of meal and flour, made into small balls, which allured the trout to remain near the mill-head. When the particulars concerning this remarkable fish were circulated, many persons came from different parts of Kent, and even from London, to obtain a sight of it.

Numerous individuals now living at Farningham can attest the truth of this account; and, probably, the painting may still be seen at that place. September 20, 1828.

G.W.N

INSCRIPTION FOR A BROOK

(For the Mirror.)

SUR UN RUISSEAU

Coule gentil ruisseau, sous cet épais fouillage:
Ton bruit charme les sens—il attendrit le coeur.
Coule gentil ruisseau, car ton cours est l'image
D'un beau jour écoulé dans le sein du bonheur.

J. J. ROUSSEAU

IMITATED FROM THE ABOVE

Flow, gentle stream, thy course pursue
Beneath the shade of waving bowers,
Where sunbeams lightly glancing through,
The dew-drops kiss from off the flowers.

Thy murmurs charm the list'ning ear,
And soothe the senses to repose—
No wayward passion rages here,
The heart no throbbing tumult knows.

Thy waters, as they glide along,
Reflect but images of peace,
Emblem of days, too swiftly flown,
Pass'd in the midst of happiness.

Flow on, fair stream, thy course pursue
Beneath the shade of waving bowers,
Where sunbeams lightly glancing through,
Kiss the bright dew from off the flowers.

    S.N.

NATIONAL VARIETIES

(Continued from page 165.)

It is almost impossible to lay down any rule which would define the variations of national manners as having any reference to climate. We frequently find that the passage of a river, or a chain of mountains, dividing countries of the same natural features, brings us among an entirely new people, and presents us with a fresh scene in the melodrama of life. The inhabitants of Languedoc and Gascony, and the southern parts of France, are the gayest and most lively of the subjects of Charles X.; but the moment we have crossed the Pyrenees, we are among one of the gravest nations in the world, the Spaniards. Again, contrast the solemnity and deep sense of honour of the Turks, with the vivacity and, we regret to add, the deceit and bad faith of the unfortunate modern Greeks. The virtuous spirit will, we trust, revive in the Morea with the return of civilization and freedom; for, as no one will attribute the degradation of the modern Greeks from the high moral cultivation of their ancestors, to any alteration in the climate of their country, so let us never despair of the return of virtue, of poetry, of the arts and sciences, whilst Parnassus and Helicon still enjoy the same glorious sun, and whilst the Isles are still gilded by eternal summer. We want no proofs that patriotism still lives in Greece, and with that feeling will ever be associated the powers that are able to invigorate a nation.

Although a mountainous country like Greece, situated in the loveliest climate in the world, must of course have some effect on the spirit of the people, yet the degree of it seems extremely uncertain. The Swiss seem in a great measure to have lost their renown for patriotism, by their slavish submissions to foreign yokes during the late war, and by the apathy with which they allow their rights to be trampled on at this day by a tyrannical aristocracy at home. There is now a proverb of "Point d'argent, point de Suisse!"—a melancholy reflection for a land where Tell drew his unerring shaft in the cause of freedom—where, so late as 1798, a patriot of the canton of Schwyz concluded an address with these words:—"The dew of the mountain may still moisten its verdure—the sweets of the valley may still shed their fragrance around you—the purple grape may still mingle with the green vine—the note of the maiden may still sound sweetly to the ear of her lover—the soft cry of the infant charm the feelings of the father—the confiding wife may yet gladden the home of her husband—but the heart of man will be rotten—the spirit of your ancestors extinguished—Switzerland no more, if you submit to the French. If you love your country, and value your honour, be men, and resist. If not, prove cowards, and obey."

Patriotism, however, does not confine itself to mountains, as witness the history of the ancient and modern republics of Italy; of the resistance of Holland and Belgium to their oppressors; of the English and French revolutions. It is unnecessary to look across the Atlantic, to prove the existence of the pure plant in its most healthy and vigorous growth. The new world is dedicated to the cause of liberty, and from that good seed is now springing forth fruit an hundred fold; the progress of civilization, of knowledge, of virtue, and happiness in the United States, is, by every recent traveller there, proved to be immense. The example of her own children is becoming an additional security for right principles to the mother country; and long may it so continue:

Yes! in that generous cause, for ever strong,
The patriot's virtue and the poet's song,
Still as the tide of ages rolls away,
Shall charm the world, unconscious of decay!

We cannot even contend that the sun has the effect of inflaming the imaginations of men, and infusing into them either vivacity or a poetic spirit. The French, Greeks, Egyptians, and Persians are all remarkable for gaiety; while the Spaniards, Turks, and Chinese, the latitudes of whose countries vary but little, are noted for a grave and serious deportment. The land that has given birth to Shakspeare and Milton has no reason to complain of the want of warmth of imagination. Klopstock and Goëthe,—the latter now allowed to be first of the living poets,—are instances of the wide range of the spirit of poetry. Shall we, who have seen Byron writing, as it were, in the midst of us, yield assent to calling Greece and Italy the countries of imagination, par excellence, because they have produced Homer and Dante? Assuredly not. We cannot even admit, as a general proposition, that the languages of the south are always the smoothest and most melodious, and the northern ones harsh, and not adapted for music. The liquid, smooth, and effeminate language of modern Italy is totally different from the strong, energetic, and harsh Latin used by the ancient Romans. The Arabic will be immediately admitted, by any who has heard a page of it read, to be extremely uncouth and disagreeable. The Russian, on the contrary, is soft and musical. And to recur to a more familiar instance, we shall find the Welsh tongue, on examination, to be in fact very poetic, and peculiarly capable of giving force and expression—whether of grandeur, of terror, or of melody—to the idea the words are intended to convey. Let the reader who understands the Welsh pronunciation, judge whether the following distich is not an echo to, and as it were a picture of, the sense of the majestic sound of thunder:—

"Tân a dwr y'n ymwriaw,
Yw'r taranau dreigiau draw."

The roaring thunder, dreadful in its ire,
Is water warring with aërial fire.

The next specimen will show the capability of the Welsh to express soft and melodious sounds:—

"Mae mil o leisian meluson,
Mai mêl o hyd ym mola hon."

The mellifluence of these lines, written on a harp, is totally lost in the translation:—

Within the concave of its womb is found
The magic scale of soul-enchanting sound.

The best illustration of the comparative degree of mental excellence between the southern and northern nations, is, perhaps, that of Bishop Berkeley, who compares the southern wits to cucumbers, which are commonly all good of their kind, but at best an insipid fruit; while the northern geniuses are like melons, of which not one in fifty is good; but when it is so, it has an excellent relish. Now it is not probable that the same climate which is favourable to the study of the sciences and to the reasoning powers, would prevent their being pushed to the utmost extent; and the solution of this difference may, perhaps, depend on the question, whether a general diffusion of learning among a people is a state of things usually accompanied by a remarkable perfection in particular persons. A man of ordinary acquirements in the present day might have passed for a prodigy in the thirteenth century; and the novelty and distinction attaching to one who rises above the rest, is, of course, more difficult to attain in an age where knowledge is possessed universally. Inasmuch, therefore, as the liberal arts have been imported to us from the south, and their progress is as yet not so extensive in cold countries, the stimulus to their cultivation in the latter is so much the greater; which is one way of accounting for the giants in science that have appeared in the north, It is moreover remarkable, that the northern nations have a stronger apprehension of abstract propositions, and a greater fondness for generalizing, than seems to be the case in the south. The difference between a Frenchman and a German is observable in this particular, by any one who attends to their manner of telling stories. The former, in giving you an account of his being robbed by a servant to whom he had been particularly kind, first tells you the facts, and concludes with a reflection, "Voila que le monde est ingrât!" The German, on the other hand, in order to prove to you the general proposition of the unthankfulness of men to their benefactors, gives you the instance that has recently happened. To the one, the fact is interesting, because it proves the proposition; to the other, the proposition is a conclusion, which he hastily draws from an individual occurrence that has suggested it.

The climate does not appear to affect even the bodies of men to any great degree. We cannot pronounce that it is the sun which makes the African black, when we see the same heat pouring down on the copper-coloured American, in the same degree of latitude, though in another longitude. The inhabitants of Terra del Fuego are of a very dark hue, approaching to black; and yet that island experiences as severe cold as any part of the earth, as Sir Joseph Banks and Dr. Solander have testified. The complexion and appearance of the Jews, and other emigratory races, is the same in all parts of the world. And a stronger proof cannot be given, than the marked distinction which still exists among the three great families that divide Europe. These three have been for the last 2,500 years, and still are, the Celts, the Teutonic race, and the Slavonic race.

The Celts have black hair and eyes, and a white skin, verging to brown. They chiefly inhabit the west of Europe, viz. the south of France, (called by M. Dupin, France obscure,) Spain, Portugal, and the greatest part of Italy. To them also belong the ancient Britons, the Welsh, Bretons, Irish, Highland Scotch, and the Manks, or people of the Isle of Man. The great German race, with blue eyes, yellow or reddish hair, and a fair and red skin, occupies the middle of Europe. It includes the Swedes, Norwegians, Icelanders, Danes, ancient and modern Germans, Saxons and English, Caledonians and Lowland Scotch, the Belgians, the Vandals, and the Goths.