_Modern Cincinnatus._--Near Bordentown, in the state of New Jersey is the seat of the Count de Survilliers, elder brother of Napoleon Buonaparte, and formerly King of Spain. He has effected great improvements on this estate, and is now actively employed in others. It is most gratifying to see this amiable nobleman withdrawing himself from the busy scene of politics into retirement, and expending his princely fortune in rural improvements. _Fiddling Poetry._--The following may be seen in the first volume of Purcell's _Catches_, on two persons of the name of Young, father and son, who lived in St. Paul's Churchyard; the one was an instrument maker, and the other an excellent performer on the violin:-- "You scrapers that want a good fiddle well strung, You must go to the man that is old while he's Young, But if this same fiddle you fain would play bold, You must go to his son, who'll be Young when he's old. There's old Young and young Young, both men of renown, Old sells, and Young plays, the best fiddle in town; Young and old live together, and may they live long, Young to play an old fiddle, old to sell a new song." P.T.W. _Greenwich Hospital._--The foundation-stone of this magnificent building was laid June 30, 1696, by John Evelyn (the treasurer), with a select committee of the commissioners, and Sir Christopher Wren, the architect, precisely at five in the evening, _after they had dined together_! Flamstead, the royal astronomer, observing the punctual time by instruments. The time is not unworthy of remark. The King (Charles II.) subscribed 2,000_l._; the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Keeper Sommers, Dukes of Leeds, Pembroke, Devonshire, Shrewsbury, and Earls of Dorset and Portland, 500_l._ each; with others amounting to upwards of 9,000_l_. According to a note by the Treasurer, four months after the foundation, the work done amounted to upwards of 5,000_l._ towards which the treasurer had received only 800_l._, there being among the defaulters the king's 2,000_l._, paid by exchequer tallies on the post-office, "which," says he, "nobody will take at 30 per cent discount:" so that we see the suspension of great works for want of friends was never uncommon; though this was a "season of debt and disgrace" in England. The sum paid in Evelyn's time towards building Greenwich Hospital, seems to have been upwards of 69,000_l_.