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JUGGLERS.

road, called Aslleys Amphitheatre. Tliere are also generallyone or more very learned swine, learned dogs, &c. toamlnierous to particularize their various peculiarities. Wehave in London most things the world affords; even some-times the homo which was the object of the philosopher'ssearch, with his lantern, may be found.

To place men upon the shoulders of each other in such amanner as to form a pyramid, that each row consists of oneman less, till a single man or boy crowns the whole, is apiece of dexterity extremely ancient. It has some resem-blance to the Grecian mode of warfare usually employedin scaling walls, which they called % e^euvn tesludo, becausethe men usually supported their shields upon their heads ;thus, they considered them armed like a tortoise, whenceits name; the second men, who mounted upon the heads ofthe soldiers forming the ground plan, used their shields in.the same manner ; another party then mounted upon them,and so on, until they had arrived at the height they wanted.Their shields, covering them like a pent-house, served toward off such missile annoyances as the besieged mightdefend themselves with. But a singular, and one of themost extraordinary circumstances of this description wehave met with, occurs in the history of the Saracens , who,,when the Mahometan army was besieging Aleppo , in thecaliphate of Omar, a man, whose name was Dames , ofgigantic stature, and possessing remarkable cunning,who, when they had lain a long time before the place,discovered they could not force the walls, from their greatstrength, requested of the commander, Abu Obediah,.the assistance of thirty other men; which being grantedhim, he then requested the commander to raise the siege,andremove with his army to about a league distance. In thenight Dames went out several times, and brought in five orsix of the besieged. He afterwards takes from his knap-sack, a goat’s skin, with which he covered, his back andshoulders ; took a dry crust in his hand, crept as near tothe castle as he could; if he heard any noise, or sus-

f >ected any person to be near, to prevent being discovered,le could make such a noise with his crust, as a dog makesthat is gnawing a bone ; the rest of his company came after,sometimes sculking and often creeping along, at other timeswalking. About sun-rise he sent to his commander to sendhim some horse; when they came to the castle, they foundit inaccessible. However, Dames was resolved to leaveliothing untried, and before the next night surveyed the walls;and having found a place where he thought he could easiest