YEAR BOOK

OP

DAILY RECREATION AND INFORMATION;

CONCERNING

REMARKABLE MEN AND MANNERS,

TIMES AND SEASONS,

OLEMNITIES AND MERRY-MAKINGS,

ANTIQUITIES AND NOVELTIES,

ON THE PLAN OF THE

EVERY-DAY BOOK AND TABLE BOOK,

OR

EVERLASTING CALENDAR OF POPULAR AMUSEMENTS, SPORTS, PASTIMES,
CEREMONIES, CUSTOMS, AND EVENTS, INCIDENT TO EACH OF
THE THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTY-FIVE DAYS

IN PAST AND PRESENT TIMES;

PRNTED FOR THOMAS TEGG AND SON, 73, CHEAPSIDE;

R. GRIFFIN AND CO. GLASGOW ; T. T. AND H. TEGG, DUBLIN :

ALSO, J. AND S. A. TEGG, SYDNEY AND HOBART TOWN.

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10-24-58

Alfred the Great was twelve years old before he could read. He had admired a beautifully illuminated book of Saxon poetry in his mother's hands, and she allured him to learn by promising him the splendid volume as a reward. From that hour he diligently improved himself; and, in the end, built up his mind so strongly, and so high, and applied its powers so beneficially to his kingdom, that no monarch of the thousand years since his rule attained to be reputed, and called, like Alfred, the great. He always carried a book in his bosom, and amidst the great business and hurries of government, snatched moments of leisure to read. In the early part of his reign, he was

Cast from the pedestal of pride by shocks,

Which Nature gently gave, in woods and fields.
Invaded, overwhelmed, and vanquished by foreign enemies, he was com-
pelled to fly for personal safety, and to retreat alone, into remote wastes and
forests :-" learning policy from adversity, and gathering courage from
misery,"

Where living things, and things inanimate,
Do speak, at Heaven's command, to eye and ear,
And speak to social reason's inner sense,
With inarticulate language.

-For the man
Who, in this spirit, communes with the formu
Of Nature, who, with understanding heart,
Doth know and love such objects as excite
No morbid passions, no disquietude,
No vengeance, and no hatred, needs must feel
The joy of the pure principle of Love
So deeply, that, unsatisfied with aught
Less pure and exquisite, he cannot choose
But seek for objects of a kindred love
In fellow nature, and a kindred joy.-

-Contemplating these forms,
In the relation which they bear to man,
He shall discern, how, through the various means
Which silently they yield, are multiplied
The spiritual presences of absent things,
Convoked by knowledge ; and for his delight
Still ready to obey the gentle call.-
Thus deeply drinking in the Soul of Things
We shall be wise perforce; and while inspired
By choice, and conscious that the will is free,
Unswerving shall we move, as if impelled
By strict necessity, along the path
of order and of good. Whate ei we see,
Whate'er we feel, by agency direct
Or indirect shall tend to feed ar,d nurse
Our faculties, shall fix in calmer seats
Of moral strength, and raise to loftier heights
Of Love Divine, our Intellectual Soui.

Wordsworth. Alfred became our greatest legislator, and pre-eminently our patriot king : for when he had secured the independence of the nation, he rigidly enforced an impartial administration of justice; renovated the energies of his subjects by popular institutions for the preservation of life, property and order ; secured public liberty upon the basis of law; lived to see the prosperity of the people, and to experience their affection for the commonwealth of the

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