_Adrian the Fourth._--Adrian the Fourth was the only Englishman who ever filled the Papal chair. His name was Nicholas Breakspeare, and he was born at Abbot's Langley, a village in Herts. Such was the unbounded pride of this pontiff, that when the Emperor Frederick the First went to Rome, in 1155, to receive the imperial diadem, the Pope, after many difficulties concerning the ceremonial of investiture, insisted that the emperor should prostrate himself before him, kiss his feet, hold his stirrup, and lead the white palfrey on which the holy father rode. Frederick did not submit to this humiliation without reluctance; and as he took hold of the stirrup, he observed that "he had not yet been taught the profession of a groom." In a letter to his old friend, John of Salisbury, he says that St. Peter's Chair was the most uneasy seat in the world, and that his crown seemed to be clapped burning on his head. Yet did this haughty Pope (according to Dr. Cave) allow his mother to be maintained by the alms of the church of Canterbury. P.T.W. _Quid pro quo._--A peasant of Burgundy, whom Louis XI. had taken some notice of, while Dauphin, appeared before him when he ascended the throne, and presented him with an extraordinary large radish; Louis received it with much goodwill, and handsomely repaid the peasant. The great man of the place, to whom the countryman related his good fortune, imagined that if he were to offer Louis something, he would, at any rate, make him a prince. Accordingly he went to court, and presented his finest horse to the king. Louis received his present as graciously as he had before taken the radish, and after he had sufficiently praised the horse, "See here," said he, taking the radish in his hand, "here is a radish, which, like your horse, is one of the rarest of its kind; I present it to you with many thanks." Iota. _Muswell Hill_ derives its name from a famous well on the hill, where, formerly, the fraternity of St. John of Jerusalem, in Clerkenwell, had their dairy, with a large farm adjacent. Here they built a chapel for the benefit of some nuns, in which they fixed the image of our Lady of Muswell. These nuns had the sole management of the dairy: and it is singular, that the said well and farm do, at this time, belong to the parish of St. James, Clerkenwell. The water of this spring was then deemed a miraculous cure for scrofulous and cutaneous disorders. For that reason it was much resorted to; and, as tradition says, a king of Scotland made a pilgrimage hither, and was perfectly cured. * * * * * _Printed and Published by J. LIMBIRD, 143, Strand, London; sold by ERNEST FLEISCHER, 626, New Market, Leipsic; and by all Newsmen and Booksellers._ End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, by Various