"Ever truly yours, Henry Owen Millington. "P.S. Capital shooting hereabout--can't you slip over for a few days?" Poor Julia! I certainly am not clear that I shall not marry her myself; but as for that scoundrel Millington, he had better take care how he comes in my way--that's all. M.L.B. * * * * * Manners & Customs of all Nations. * * * * * WHITSUN ALE. (_For the Mirror_.) On the Coteswold, Gloucester, is a customary meeting at Whitsuntide, vulgarly called an _Ale_, or _Whitsun Ale_, resorted to by numbers of young people. Two persons are chosen previous to the meeting, to be Lord and Lady of the Ale or Yule, who dress as suitably as they can to those characters; a large barn, or other building is fitted up with seats, &c. for the lord's hall. Here they assemble to dance and regale in the best manner their circumstances and the place will afford; each man treats his sweetheart with a ribbon or favour. The lord and lady attended by the steward, sword, purse, and mace-bearer, with their several badges of office, honour the hall with their presence; they have likewise, in their suit, a page, or train-bearer, and a jester, dressed in a parti-coloured jacket. The lord's music, consisting of a tabor and pipe, is employed to conduct the dance. Companies of morrice-dancers, attended by the jester and tabor and pipe, go about the country on Monday and Tuesday in Whitsun week, and collect sums towards defraying the expenses of the Yule. All the figures of the lord, &c. of the Yule, handsomely represented in basso-relievo, stand in the north wall of the nave of Cirencester Church, which vouches for the antiquity of the custom; and, on many of these occasions, they erect a may-pole, which denotes its rise in Druidism. The mace is made of silk, finely plaited with ribbons on the top, and filled with spices and perfumes for such of the company to smell to as desire it. Halbert H. * * * * * ANCIENT FUNERAL RITES AMONG THE GREEKS. (_For the Mirror_.)