Mother Shipton

As wc' published the prophecy ot this ramoui huinbug recently, we think it but (air to our readers that they should be gíven the following account of that celebrated document, froin the N. Y. Journal of ('.munerce, as a Christmas present. It is too bad to have such ¦ nicely worded i re knooked so square in the head : Motlier Shiptoa was a vcritablc character, who lived more tlian tlnee hundred v ¦ ago, and uttered a number of so1 prophecies. Tlicy wcre.for the most part, a vague, untucaning juuible of seeming prcdictions appUoable U no special evcnt, and without point 01 ,'encral intere,-t. hl ItUl, a pamphlet contuioing a medley öf Eni soit, ohiefly in halting verse, was printed in London, and her "Life and (';irioui Prophecies" werc given to the public in liiTT. In 1862, Mr. Charlea Hindley, of Bnghton, EJogland, issued wliat pturpvrted to bc M ed reprint of "A t.'hap bouk Yersion ofMother Shipton'a l'ropliecies, froni the Kdition of 1 sis." In tliis, for the Bral time, thcre was pitb and point, and .il tpnlicatioD. All modern discoverrere plaioly deaoribed, and om prophecy whicb began, without kprtta thU go," aad Mi forth the railroadc, telegraphs, gteamen, and other modern inventions, wound u with : 11 rhe vorld to m enil shall come In eightctn hundred anil eightvunc." This üt' i-ourse, quite startled the pul. lic. If all other important uvents of the aineteeoth aentary had been so aptly de: 1, why sbonld nol the lat prediction be ralfilléa! We oopied the prophecy, and without kuowing anytbiog of i t s soutoe, denoonosd it. as i Sirgeiy. An KngUsh paper replied that it was an exact reprint of tho oíd cdition lor nearly two hundred and lil'ty yean on (ile in the British Mttsenm. Wa ent our correspondent to the Museum, and learned that thewwu a chap-book of that t i tic bearin,' data 16.41 ; another of 1642, conUining what parported tobe Mothor Shipton's portrait; other oarious prophecies dated Itits, 1607; and '' Mother Shipton's Life and Curious Prophecies," complete inan octave edition of 1797. We then purebased the reprint, and aenl tn have them compared. Tbi i)t-oved that i fraud had lx;cn committed. The old prophecies wcre a vague juinblc of local prediouona that might have been fulülled at any and every decade since their date. All the pointed and interesting predietions in the uew issue wcre not in the o)d book, and wcre eitber interlineations, interpolated, or entire ncw fragmenta, evidently wriltcn aftcr tbc events they were aupposed to prediot. Ve presscd tbc point, and then the secret came out. In the spring of 1873 Mr. llimlley wrote a letter, confessing that he ii id (abiicated the prophecy above quoted and ten others, in order to render his httle tniok salable.