hæc, hoc. And we take this opportunity of protesting against the old and short-sighted system of teaching a boy only one thing at a time, which originated, no doubt, from the general ignorance of everything but the dead languages which prevailed in the monkish ages. We propose to make declensions, conjugations, &c., a vehicle for imparting something more than the mere dry facts of the immediate subject. And if we can occasionally inculcate an original remark, a scientific principle, or a moral aphorism, we shall, of course, think ourselves sufficiently rewarded by the consciousness—et cætera, et cætera, et cætera.

    Masc. hic. Fem. hæc.  Neut. hoc, &c.

     The nominative singular’s hic, hæc, and hoc,—

     Which to learn, has cost school boys full many a knock;

     The genitive ’s hujus, the dative makes huic,

     (A fact Mr. Squeers never mentioned to Smike);

     Then hunc, hanc, and hoc, the accusative makes,

     The vocative—caret—no very great shakes;

     The ablative case maketh hôc, hac, and hôc,

     A cock is a fowl—but a fowl ’s not a cock.

     The nominative plural is hi, hæ, and hæc,

     The Roman young ladies were dressed à la Grecque;

     The genitive case horum, harum, and horum,

     Silenus and Bacchus were fond of a jorum;

     The dative in all the three genders is his,

     At Actium his tip did Mark Antony miss:

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