imply the same meaning as that of "coming a
day after the fair." To come at the end of a feast when the various
viands (always including mutton as being easy of digestion for dyspeptic
people) were still warm, though cut pretty near to the bone, would, by
most persons, particularly aldermanic "bodies," be considered
sufficiently vexatious; how doubly annoying then must it be to come so
late as to find the meats more than half cold, and, perhaps, but little
of them left even in that anti-epicurean state! Whoever has been
unfortunate enough to miss a fine fat haunch either of venison or
mutton, which, smoking on the board, even Dr. Kitchiner would have
pronounced fit for an emperor, cannot but enter deeply and feelingly
into the disappointment of that guest who, arriving, through some
misdate of the invitation card, on the day subsequent to the feast,
finds but, _horribile dictu_, cold lean ham, cold pea-soup, cold
potatoes, and finally, _cold mutton_. Goldsmith's idea certainly was
that Burke was never able to say, in the words of the Roman adage, _in
tempore veni quod rerum omnium est primum_; but rather in plain English,
"confound my ill luck, I never yet was invited to a feast but I either
missed it in toto, or came so late as to be obliged to eat my mutton
cold, a thing, which of all others, I most abhor." HEN. B.

* * * * *

POOL'S HOLE, DERBYSHIRE.

(_For the Mirror_.)

This cave is said to have taken its title from a notorious robber of
that name, who being declared an outlaw, found in this hole a refuge
from justice, where he carried on his nocturnal depredations with
impunity. Others insist that this dismal hole was the habitation of a
hermit or anchorite, of the name of Pool. Of the two traditions, I
prefer the former. It is situated at the bottom of _Coitmos_, a lofty
mountain near Buxton. The entrance is by a small arch, so low that you
are forced to creep on hands and knees to gain admission; but it
gradually opens into a vault above a quarter of a mile in length, and as
some assert, a quarter of a mile high. It is certainly very lofty, and
resembles the roof of a Gothic edifice. In a cavern to the right called
Pool's Chamber, there is a fine echo, and the dashing of a current of
water, which flows along the middle of the great vault, very much
heightens the wonder.

On the floor are great ridges of stone--water is perpetually distilling
from the roof and sides of thi