Is this year resumed, but we think it is not so successful as, were its previous fasciculi.  The “literary” is a good epithet for its sale among would-be authors, like the “Gentleman’s” Magazine among a certain class of worthies.  But of what use are such articles as the following to literary men:—­The Seasons, by a Man of Taste, (like the carte of a restaurateur;) Sayings of a Man about Town; Remonstrance with J.F.  Newton; Lines on Crockford’s &c.—­all amusing enough in their way, but, in a literary pocket-book, out of place, and not in good taste.  The “lists,” too, the only useful portion of the volume, are, in many instances, very incorrect.  Apropos, how long has Morris Birbeck been dead?  Our Illinois friend might be alive when the editor published his last pocket-book; but if he stands still, time does not.  There is, too, an affectation of fashion about the work which does not suit our sober taste; but as a seasonable Christmas extract, we are induced to quote Winter from the Seasons:—­

Now is the high season of beef; beef, which Prometheus killed for us at first, ere he filched the fire from heaven, with which to constitute it a beef-steak—­that foundation of the most delightful of clubs, and origin of the most delightful of all memoirs of them.  Nor be the sirloin, boast of Englishmen, forgot! nor its vaunted origin; which proves that the age of chivalry, despite of Burke, is not yet gone!  Stewed beef too, and ample round, and filet de boeuf saute dans sa glace, and stewed rump-steaks, and ox-tail soup.

“Spirits of beef, where are ye? are ye all fled?” Henry the Eighth.

No—­when beef flies the English shores, then you may, as the immortal bard exquisitely expresses it, “make a silken purse out of a sow’s ear.”  But mutton, too, invites my Muse.  It is calculated that fifteen hundred thousand sheep are annually sacrificed in London to the carnivorous taste of John Bull.  “Of roast mutton (as Dr. Johnson says) what remains for me to say?  It will be found sometimes succous, and sometimes defective of moisture; but what palate has ever failed to be pleased with a haunch which has been duly suspended? what appetite has not been awakened by the fermentation that glitters on its surface, when it has been reposing for the requisite number of hours before a fire equal in its fervency?”

We quite agree with Dr. Johnson; but a boiled leg of mutton, its whiteness transparent through the verdant capers that decorate its candour, is not to be despised; nor is a hash, whether celebrated as an Irish stew, or a hachis de mouton, most relishing of rifacciamenti!  Chops and garlic a la Francaise are exquisite; and the saddle, cut learnedly, is the Elysium of a gourmand.

Now also is the time of house-lamb and of doe-venison.  Now is the time of Christmas come, and the voice of the turkey is heard in our land!  This is the period of their annual massacre—­a new slaughter of the innocents!  The Norwich coaches are now laden with mortals; that, while alive, shared with their equally intelligent townsmen, fruges consumere nati, the riches of their agricultural county.