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+Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437
+       Volume 17, New Series, May 15, 1852
+
+Author: Various
+
+Editor: Robert Chambers and William Chambers
+
+Release Date: July 23, 2006 [EBook #18898]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Richard J. Shiffer and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                     CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL
+
+  CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF 'CHAMBERS'S
+  INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &c.
+
+
+  No. 437. NEW SERIES.   SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1852.   PRICE 1-1/2_d._
+
+
+
+
+LONDON CROSSING-SWEEPERS.
+
+
+There is no occupation in life, be it ever so humble, which is justly
+worthy of contempt, if by it a man is enabled to administer to his
+necessities without becoming a burden to others, or a plague to them
+by the parade of shoeless feet, fluttering rags, and a famished face.
+In the multitudinous drama of life, which on the wide theatre of the
+metropolis is ever enacting with so much intense earnestness, there
+is, and from the very nature of things there always must be, a
+numerous class of supernumeraries, who from time to time, by the force
+of varying circumstances, are pushed and hustled off the stage, and
+shuffled into the side-scenes, the drear and dusky background of the
+world's proscenium. Of the thousands and tens of thousands thus rudely
+dealt with, he is surely not the worst who, wanting a better weapon,
+shoulders a birch-broom, and goes forth to make his own way in the
+world, by removing the moist impediments of filth and refuse from the
+way of his more fortunate fellows. Indeed, look upon him in what light
+you may, he is in some sort a practical moralist. Though far remote
+from the ivy chaplet on Wisdom's glorious brow, yet his stump of
+withered birch inculcates a lesson of virtue, by reminding us, that we
+should take heed to our steps in our journeyings through the
+wilderness of life; and, so far as in him lies, he helps us to do so,
+and by the exercise of a very catholic faith, looks for his reward to
+the value he supposes us to entertain for that virtue which, from time
+immemorial, has been in popular parlance classed as next to godliness.
+
+Time was, it is said, when the profession of a street-sweeper in
+London was a certain road to competence and fortune--when the men of
+the brooms were men of capital; when they lived well, and died rich,
+and left legacies behind them to their regular patrons. These palmy
+days, at any rate, are past now. Let no man, or woman either, expect a
+legacy at this time of day from the receiver of his copper dole. The
+labour of the modern sweeper is nothing compared with his of half a
+century ago. The channel of viscous mud, a foot deep, through which,
+so late as the time when George the Third was king, the carts and
+carriages had literally to plough their way, no longer exists, and the
+labour of the sweeper is reduced to a tithe of what it was. He has no
+longer to dig a trench in the morning, and wall up the sides of his
+fosse with stiff earth, hoarded for the purpose, as we have seen him
+doing in the days when 'Boney' was a terror. The city scavengers have
+reduced his work to a minimum, and his pay has dwindled
+proportionately. The twopences which used to be thrown to a sweeper
+will now pay for a ride, and the smallest coin is considered a
+sufficient guerdon for a service so light. But what he has lost in
+substantial emolument, he has gained in _morale_; he is infinitely
+more polite and attentive than he was; he sweeps ten times as clean
+for a half-penny as he did for twopence or sixpence, and thanks you
+more heartily than was his wont in the days of yore. The truth is,
+that civility, as a speculation, is found to pay; and the want of it,
+even among the very lowest rank of industrials in London, is at the
+present moment not merely a rarity, but an actual phenomenon--always
+supposing that something is to be got by it.
+
+The increase of vehicles of all descriptions, but more especially
+omnibuses, which are perpetually rushing along the main thoroughfares,
+has operated largely in shutting out the crossing-sweepers from what
+was at one period the principal theatre of their industry.
+Independent, too, of the unbroken stream of carriages which renders
+sweeping during the day impossible, and the collection of small coin
+from the crowd who dart impatiently across the road when a practicable
+breach presents itself, equally so, it is found that too dense a
+population is less favourable to the brotherhood of the broom than one
+ever so sparse and thin. Had the negro of Waithman's obelisk survived
+the advent of Shillibeer, he would have had to shift his quarters, or
+to have drawn upon his three-and-a-half per cents. to maintain his
+position. The sweepers who work on the great lines of traffic from
+Oxford Street west to Aldgate, are consequently not nearly so numerous
+as they once were, though the members of the profession have probably
+doubled their numbers within the last twenty years. They exercise
+considerable judgment in the choice of their locations, making
+frequent experiments in different spots, feeling the pulse of the
+neighbourhood, as it were, ere they finally settle down to establish a
+permanent connection.
+
+We shall come to a better understanding of the true condition of these
+muddy nomads by considering them in various classes, as they actually
+exist, and each of which may be identified without much trouble. The
+first in the rank is he who is bred to the business, who has followed
+it from his earliest infancy, and never dreamed of pursuing any other
+calling. We must designate him as
+
+No. 1. _The Professional Sweeper_.--He claims precedence before all
+others, as being to the manner born, and inheriting his broom, with
+all its concomitant advantages, from his father, or mother, as it
+might be. All his ideas, interests, and affections are centered in one
+spot of ground--the spot he sweeps, and has swept daily for the last
+twenty or thirty years, ever since it was bequeathed to him by his
+parent. The companion of his childhood, his youth, and his maturer
+age, is the post buttressed by the curb-stone at the corner of the
+street. To that post, indeed, he is a sort of younger brother. It has
+been his friend and support through many a stormy day and blustering
+night. It is the confidant of his hopes and his sorrows, and
+sometimes, too, his agent and cashier, for he has cut a small basin in
+the top of it, where a passing patron may deposit a coin if he choose,
+under the guardianship of the broom, which, while he is absent for a
+short half-hour discussing a red herring and a crust for his dinner,
+leans gracefully against his friend the post, and draws the attention
+of a generous public to that as the deputy-receiver of the exchequer.
+Our professional friend has a profound knowledge of character: he has
+studied the human face divine all his life, and can read at a glance,
+through the most rigid and rugged lineaments, the indications of
+benevolence or the want of it; and he knows what aspect and expression
+to assume, in order to arouse the sympathies of a hesitating giver. He
+knows every inmate of every house in his immediate neighbourhood; and
+not only that, but he knows their private history and antecedents for
+the last twenty years. He has watched a whole generation growing up
+under his broom, and he looks upon them all as so much material
+destined to enhance the value of his estate. He is the humble
+pensioner of a dozen families: he wears the shoes of one, the
+stockings of another, the shirts of a third, the coats of a fourth,
+and so on; and he knows the taste of everybody's cookery, and the
+temper of everybody's cookmaid, quite as well as those who daily
+devour the one and scold the other. He is intimate with everybody's
+cat and everybody's dog, and will carry them home if he finds them
+straying. He is on speaking terms with everybody's servant-maid, and
+does them all a thousand kind offices, which are repaid with interest
+by surreptitious scraps from the larder, and jorums of hot tea in the
+cold wintry afternoons. On the other hand, if he knows so much, he is
+equally well known: he is as familiar to sight as the Monument on Fish
+Street Hill to those who live opposite; he is part and parcel of the
+street view, and must make a part of the picture whenever it is
+painted, or else it wont be like. You cannot realise the idea of
+meeting him elsewhere; it would be shocking to your nerves to think of
+it: you would as soon think of seeing the Obelisk walking up Ludgate
+Hill, for instance, as of meeting him there--it could not be. Where he
+goes when he leaves his station, you have not the least notion. He is
+there so soon as it is light in the morning, and till long after the
+gas is burning at night. He is a married man, of course, and his wife,
+a worthy helpmate, has no objection to pull in the same boat with him.
+When Goggs has a carpet to beat--he beats all the carpets on his
+estate--Mrs Goggs comes to console the post in his absence. She
+usually signalises her advent by a desperate assault with the broom
+upon the whole length of the crossing: it is plain she never thinks
+that Goggs keeps the place clean enough, and so she brushes him a
+hint. Goggs has a weakness for beer, and more than once we have seen
+him asleep on a hot thirsty afternoon, too palpably under the
+influence of John Barleycorn to admit of a doubt, his broom between
+his legs, and his back against his abstinent friend the post. Somehow,
+whenever this happens, Mrs G. is sure to hear of it, and she walks him
+off quietly, that the spectacle of a sweeper overtaken may not bring a
+disgrace upon the profession; and then, broom in hand, she takes her
+stand, and does his duty for the remainder of the day. The receipts of
+the professional sweeper do not vary throughout the year so much as
+might be supposed. They depend very little upon chance contributions:
+these, there is no doubt, fall off considerably, if they do not fail
+altogether, during a continuance of dry weather, when there is no need
+of the sweeper's services; but the man is remunerated chiefly by
+regular donations from known patrons, who form his connection, and
+who, knowing that he must eat and drink be the weather wet or dry,
+bestow their periodical pittances accordingly.
+
+No. 2 is the _Morning Sweeper_.--This is rather a knowing subject,
+one, at least, who is capable of drawing an inference from certain
+facts. There are numerous lines of route, both north and south of the
+great centres of commerce, and all converging towards the city as
+their nucleus, which are traversed, morning and evening, for two or
+three consecutive hours, by bands of gentlemanly-looking individuals:
+clerks, book-keepers, foremen, business-managers, and such like
+responsible functionaries, whose unimpeachable outer integuments
+testify to their regard for appearances. This current of
+respectability sets in towards the city at about half-past six in the
+morning, and continues its flow until just upon ten o'clock, when it
+may be said to be highwater. Though a large proportion of these agents
+of the world's traffic are daily borne to and from their destination
+in omnibuses, still the great majority, either for the sake of
+exercise or economy, are foot-passengers. For the accommodation of the
+latter, the crossing-sweeper stations himself upon the dirtiest
+portion of the route, and clearing a broad and convenient path ere the
+sun is out of bed, awaits the inevitable tide, which must flow, and
+which can hardly fail of bringing him some remuneration for his
+labour. If we are to judge from the fact, that along one line of route
+which we have been in the habit of traversing for several years, we
+have counted as many as fourteen of these morning sweepers in a march
+of little more than two miles, the speculation cannot be altogether
+unprofitable. In traversing the same route in the middle of the day,
+not three of the sweepers would be found at their post; and the reason
+would be obvious enough, since the streets are then comparatively
+deserted, being populous in the morning only, because they are so many
+short-cuts or direct thoroughfares from the suburbs to the city. The
+morning sweeper is generally a lively and active young fellow; often a
+mere child, who is versed in the ways of London life, and who, knowing
+well the value of money from the frequent want of it, is anxious to
+earn a penny by any honest means. Ten to one, he has been brought up
+in the country, and has been tutored by hard necessity, in this great
+wilderness of brick, to make the most of every hour, and of every
+chance it may afford him. He will be found in the middle of the day
+touting for a job at the railway stations, to carry a portmanteau or
+to wheel a truck; or he will be at Smithfield, helping a butcher to
+drive to the slaughterhouse his bargain of sheep or cattle; or in some
+livery-yards, currying a horse or cleaning out a stable. If he can
+find nothing better to employ him, he will return to his sweeping in
+the evening, especially if it be summer-time, and should set in wet at
+five or six o'clock. When it is dark early, he knows that it won't pay
+to resume the broom; commercial gentlemen are not particular about the
+condition of their Wellingtons, when nobody can see to criticise their
+polish, and all they want is to exchange them for slippers as soon as
+possible. If we were to follow the career of this industrious fellow
+up to manhood, we should in all probability find him occupying
+worthily a hard-working but decent and comfortable position in
+society.
+
+No. 3 is the _Occasional Sweeper_.--Now and then, in walking the
+interminable streets, one comes suddenly upon very questionable
+shapes, which, however, we don't question, but walk on and account for
+them mythically if we can. Among these singular apparitions which at
+times have startled us, not a few have borne a broom in their hands,
+and appealed to us for a reward for services which, to say the best of
+them, were extremely doubtful. Now an elderly gentleman in silver
+spectacles, with pumps on his feet, and a roquelaure with a fur-collar
+over his shoulders, and an expression of unutterable anguish in his
+countenance, holds out his hand and bows his head as we pass, and
+groans audibly the very instant we are within earshot of a groan;
+which is a distance of about ten inches in a London atmosphere. Now an
+old, old man, tall, meagre, and decrepit, with haggard eye and
+moonstruck visage, bares his aged head to the pattering rain--
+
+    'Loose his beard and hoary hair
+    Stream like a meteor to the troubled air.'
+
+He makes feeble and fitful efforts to sweep a pathway across the road,
+and the dashing cab pulls up suddenly just in time to save him from
+being hurled to the ground by the horse. Then he gives it up as a vain
+attempt, and leans, the model of despair, against the wall, and wrings
+his skeleton fingers in agony--when just as a compassionate matron is
+drawing the strings of her purse, stopping for her charitable purpose
+in a storm of wind and rain, the voice of the policeman is heard over
+her shoulder: 'What! you are here at it again, old chap? Well, I'm
+blowed if I think anything 'll cure you. You'd better put up your pus,
+marm: if he takes your money, I shall take him to the station-us,
+that's all. Now, old chap--trot, trot, trot!' And away walks the old
+impostor, with a show of activity perfectly marvellous for his years,
+the policeman following close at his heels till he vanishes in the
+arched entry of a court.
+
+The next specimen is perhaps a 'swell' out at elbows, a seedy and
+somewhat ragged remnant of a very questionable kind of gentility--a
+gentility engendered in 'coal-holes' and 'cider-cellars,' in 'shades,'
+and such-like midnight 'kens'--suckled with brandy and water and
+port-wine negus, and fed with deviled kidneys and toasted cheese. He
+has run to the end of his tether, is cleaned out even to the last
+disposable shred of his once well-stocked wardrobe; and after fifty
+high-flying and desperate resolves, and twice fifty mean and sneaking
+devices to victimise those who have the misfortune to be assailable by
+him, 'to this complexion he has come at last.' He has made a track
+across the road, rather a slovenly disturbance of the mud than a
+clearance of it; and having finished his performance in a style to
+indicate that he is a stranger to the business, being born to better
+things, he rears himself with front erect and arms a-kimbo, with one
+foot advanced after the approved statuesque model, and exhibits a face
+of scornful brass to an unsympathising world, before whom he stands a
+monument of neglected merit, and whom he doubtless expects to
+overwhelm with unutterable shame for their abominable treatment of a
+man and a brother--and a gentleman to boot. This sort of exhibition
+never lasts long, it being a kind of standing-dish for which the
+public have very little relish in this practical age. The 'swell'
+sweeper generally subsides in a week or two, and vanishes from the
+stage, on which, however ornamental, he is of very little use.
+
+The occasional sweeper is much oftener a poor countryman, who has
+wandered to London in search of employment, and, finding nothing else,
+has spent his last fourpence in the purchase of a besom, with which he
+hopes to earn a crust. Here his want of experience in town is very
+much against him. You may know him instantly from the old _habitué_ of
+the streets: he plants himself in the very thick and throng of the
+most crowded thoroughfare--the rapids, so to speak, of the human
+current--where he is of no earthly use, but, on the contrary, very
+much in the way, and where, while everybody wishes him at Jericho, he
+wonders that nobody gives him a copper; or he undertakes impossible
+things, such as the sweeping of the whole width of Charing Cross from
+east to west, between the equestrian statue and Nelson's Pillar,
+where, if he sweep the whole, he can't collect, and if he collect, he
+can't sweep, and he breaks his heart and his back too in a fruitless
+vocation. He picks up experience in time; but he is pretty sure to
+find a better trade before he has learned to cultivate that of a
+crossing-sweeper to perfection.--Many of these occasional hands are
+Hindoos, Lascars, or Orientals of some sort, whose dark skins,
+contrasted with their white and scarlet drapery, render them
+conspicuous objects in a crowd; and from this cause they probably
+derive an extra profit, as they can scarcely be passed by without
+notice. The sudden promotion of one of this class, who was hailed by
+the Nepaulese ambassador as he stood, broom in hand, in St Paul's
+Churchyard, and engaged as dragoman to the embassy, will be in the
+recollection of the reader. It would be impossible to embrace in our
+category even a tithe of the various characters who figure in London
+as occasional sweepers. A broom is the last resort of neglected and
+unemployed industry, as well as of sudden and unfriended
+ill-fortune--the sanctuary to which a thousand victims fly from the
+fiends of want and starvation. The broken-down tradesman, the artisan
+out of work, the decayed gentleman, the ruined gambler, the starving
+scholar--each and all we have indubitably seen brooming the muddy ways
+for the chance of a half-penny or a penny. It is not very long since
+we were addressed in Water Street, Blackfriars, by a middle-aged man
+in a garb of seedy black, who handled his broom like one who played
+upon a strange instrument, and who, wearing the words _pauper et
+pedester_ written on a card stuck in his hat-band, told us, in good
+colloquial Latin, a tale of such horrifying misery and destitution,
+that we shrink from recording it here. We must pass on to the next on
+our list, who is--
+
+No. 4, the _Lucus-a-non_, or a sweeper who never sweeps.--This fellow
+is a vagabond of the first-water, or of the first-mud rather. His
+stock in trade is an old worn-out broom-stump, which he has shouldered
+for these seven years past, and with which he has never displaced a
+pound of soil in the whole period. He abominates work with such a
+crowning intensity, that the very pretence of it is a torture to him.
+He is a beggar without a beggar's humbleness; and a thief, moreover,
+without a thief's hardihood. He crawls lazily about the public ways,
+and begs under the banner of his broom, which constitutes his
+protection against the police. He will collect alms at a crossing
+which he would not cleanse to save himself from starvation; or he will
+take up a position at one which a morning sweeper has deserted for the
+day, and glean the sorry remnants of another man's harvest. He is as
+insensible to shame as to the assaults of the weather; he will watch
+you picking your way through the mire over which he stands sentinel,
+and then impudently demand payment for the performance of a function
+which he never dreams of exercising; or he will stand in your path in
+the middle of the splashy channel, and pester you with whining
+supplications, while he kicks the mire over your garments, and bars
+your passage to the pavement. He is worth nothing, not even the short
+notice we have taken of him, or the trouble of a whipping, which he
+ought to get, instead of the coins that he contrives to extract from
+the heedless generosity of the public.
+
+No. 5 is the _Sunday Sweeper_.--This neat, dapper, and cleanly variety
+of the genus besom, is usually a young fellow, who, pursuing some
+humble and ill-paid occupation during the week, ekes out his modest
+salary by labouring with the broom on the Sunday. He has his regular
+'place of worship,' one entrance of which he monopolises every Sabbath
+morning. Long before the church-going bell rings out the general
+invitation, he is on the spot, sweeping a series of paths all
+radiating from the church or chapel door to the different points of
+the compass. The business he has cut out for himself is no sinecure;
+he does his work so effectually, that you marvel at the achievement,
+and doubt if the floor of your dwelling be cleaner. Then he is
+himself as clean as a new pin, and wears a flower in his button-hole,
+and a smile on his face, and thanks you so becomingly, and bows so
+gracefully, that you cannot help wishing him a better office; and of
+course, to prove the sincerity of your wish, you pay him at a better
+rate. When the congregation are all met, and the service is commenced,
+he is religious enough, or knowing enough, to walk stealthily in, and
+set himself upon the poor bench, where he sits quietly, well behaved
+and attentive to the end; for which very proper conduct he is pretty
+sure to meet an additional reward during the exit of the assembly, as
+they defile past him at the gate when all is over. In the afternoon,
+he is off to the immediate precinct of some park or public promenade;
+and selecting a well-frequented approach to the general rendezvous,
+will cleanse and purify the crossing or pathway in his own peculiar
+and elaborate style, vastly to the admiration of the gaily-dressed
+pedestrians, and it is to be supposed, to his own profit. Besides this
+really clever and enterprising genius, there is a numerous tribe of a
+very different description, who must sally forth literally by the
+thousand every Sunday morning when the weather is fine, and who take
+possession of every gate, stile, and wicket, throughout the widespread
+suburban districts of the metropolis in all directions. They are of
+both sexes and all ages; and go where you will, it is impossible to go
+through a gate, or get over a stile, without the proffer of their
+assistance, for which, of course, you are expected to pay, whether you
+use it or not. Some of these fellows have a truly ruffianly aspect,
+and waylay you in secluded lanes and narrow pathways; and carrying a
+broom-stump, which looks marvellously like a bludgeon, no doubt often
+levy upon the apprehensions of a timorous pedestrian a contribution
+which his charity would not be so blind as to bestow. The whole of
+this tribe constitute a monster-nuisance, which ought to be abated by
+the exertions of the police.
+
+No. 6 are the _deformed_, _maimed_, _and crippled sweepers_, of whom
+there is a considerable number constantly at work, and, to do them
+justice, they appear by no means the least energetic of the
+brotherhood. Nature frequently compensates bodily defects by the
+bestowal of a vigorous temperament. The sweeper of one leg or one arm,
+or the poor cripple who, but for the support of his broom, would be
+crawling on all-fours, is as active, industrious, and efficient as the
+best man on the road; and he takes a pride in the proof of his
+prowess, surveying his work when it is finished with a complacency too
+evident to escape notice. He considers, perhaps, that he has an extra
+claim upon the public on account of the afflictions he has undergone,
+and we imagine that such claim must be pretty extensively allowed: we
+know no other mode of accounting for the fact, that now and then one
+of these supposed maimed or halt performers turns out to be an
+impostor, who, considering a broken limb, or something tantamount to
+that, essential to the success of his broom, concocts an impromptu
+fracture or amputation to serve his purpose. Some few years ago, a
+lively, sailor-looking fellow appeared as a one-handed sweeper in a
+genteel square on the Surrey side of the water. The right sleeve of
+his jacket waved emptily in the wind, but he flourished his left arm
+so vigorously in the air, and completed the gyration of his weapon,
+when it stuck fast in the mud, so manfully by the impulse of his right
+leg, that he became quite a popular favourite, and won '_copper_
+opinions from all sorts of men,' to say nothing of a shower of
+sixpences from the ladies in the square. Unfortunately for the
+continuance of his prosperity, a gentleman intimate with one of his
+numerous patronesses, while musing in the twilight at an upstairs
+window, saw the fellow enter his cottage after his day's work, release
+his right arm from the durance in which it had lain beneath his jacket
+for ten or twelve hours, and immediately put the power of the
+long-imprisoned limb to the test by belabouring his wife with it. That
+same night every tenant in the square was made acquainted with the
+disguised arm, and the use for which it was reserved, and the
+ingenious performer was the next morning delivered over to the police.
+The law, however, allows a man to dispose of his limbs as he chooses;
+and as the delinquent was never proved to have _said_ that he had lost
+an arm; and as he urged that one arm being enough for the profession
+he had embraced, he considered he had a right to reserve the other
+until he had occasion for it--he was allowed to go about his business.
+
+No. 7, and the last in our classification, are the _Female
+Sweepers_.--It is singular, that among these we rarely if ever
+meet with young women, properly so called. The calling of a
+crossing-sweeper, so far as it is carried on by females, is almost
+entirely divided between children or young girls, and women above the
+age of forty. The children are a very wandering and fickle race,
+rarely staying for many weeks together in a single spot. This love of
+change must militate much against their success, as they lose the
+advantage of the charitable interest they would excite in persons
+accustomed to meet them regularly in their walks. They are not,
+however, generally dependent upon the produce of their own labours for
+a living, being for the most part the children of parents in extremely
+low circumstances, who send them forth with a broom to pick up a few
+halfpence to assist in the daily provision for the family. The older
+women, on the other hand, of whom there is a pretty stout staff
+scattered throughout the metropolis, are too much impressed with the
+importance of adhering constantly to one spot, capriciously to change
+their position. They would dread to lose a connection they have been
+many years in forming, and they will even cling to it after it has
+ceased to be a thoroughfare through the opening of a new route, unless
+they can discover the direction their patrons have taken. When a poor
+old creature, who has braved the rheumatism for thirty years or so,
+finds she can stand it no longer, we have known her induct a successor
+into her office by attending her for a fortnight or more, and
+introducing the new-comer to the friendly regard of her old patrons.
+The exceptions to these two classes of the old and the very juvenile,
+will be found to consist mostly of young widows left with the charge
+of an infant family more or less numerous. Some few of these there
+are, and they meet with that considerate reception from the public
+which their distressing cases demand. The spectacle of a young mother,
+with an infant on one arm muffled up from the driving rain, while she
+plies a broom single-handed, is one which never appeals in vain to a
+London public. With a keen eye for imposture, and a general
+inclination to suspect it, the Londoner has yet compassion, and coin,
+too, to bestow upon a deserving object. It is these poor widows who,
+by rearing their orphaned offspring to wield the broom, supplement the
+ranks of the professional sweepers. They become the heads of sweeping
+families, who in time leave the maternal wing, and shift for
+themselves. We might point to one whom we have encountered almost
+daily for the last ten years. In 1841, she was left a widow with three
+small children, the eldest under four, and the youngest in arms. Clad
+in deep mourning, she took up a position at an angular crossing of a
+square, and was allowed to accommodate the two elder children upon
+some matting spread upon the steps of a door. With the infant in one
+arm, she plied her broom with the other, and held out a small white
+hand for the reception of such charity as the passers-by might choose
+to bestow. The children grew up strong and hearty, in spite of their
+exposure to the weather at all seasons. All three of them are at the
+present moment sweepers in the same line of route, at no great
+distance from the mother, who, during the whole period, has scarcely
+abandoned her post for a single day. Ten years' companionship with sun
+and wind, and frost and rain, have doubled her apparent age, but her
+figure still shews the outline of gentility, and her face yet wears
+the aspect and expression of better days. We have frequently met the
+four returning home together in the deepening twilight, the elder boy
+carrying the four brooms strapped together on his shoulder.
+
+The sweeper does better at holiday seasons than at any other time. If
+he is blessed with a post for a companion, he decks it with a flower
+or sprig of green, and sweeps a clear stage round it, which is said to
+be a difficult exploit, though we have never tried it. At Christmas,
+he expects a double fee from his old patrons, and gets it too, and a
+substantial slice of plum-pudding from the old lady in the first floor
+opposite. He decks the entrance to his walk with laurel and holly, in
+honour of the day, and of his company, who walk under a triumphal arch
+of green, got up for that occasion only. He is sure of a good
+collection on that day, and he goes home with his pocket heavy and his
+heart light, and treats himself to a pot of old ale, warmed over a
+fire kindled with his old broom, and sipped sparingly to the melody of
+a good old song about the good old times, when crossing-sweepers grew
+rich, and bequeathed fortunes to their patrons.
+
+
+
+
+INSECT WINGS.
+
+
+Animals possess the power of feeling, and of effecting certain
+movements, by the exercise of a muscular apparatus with which their
+bodies are furnished. They are distinguished from the organisations of
+the vegetable kingdom by the presence of these attributes. Every one
+is aware, that when the child sees some strange and unknown object he
+is observing start suddenly into motion, he will exclaim: 'It is
+alive!' By this exclamation, he means to express his conviction that
+the object is endowed with _animal_ life. Power of voluntary and
+independent motion and animal organisation are associated together, as
+inseparable and essentially connected ideas, by even the earliest
+experience in the economy and ways of nature.
+
+The animal faculty of voluntary motion, in almost every case, confers
+upon the creature the ability to transfer its body from place to
+place. In some animals, the weight of the body is sustained by
+immersion in a fluid as dense as itself. It is then carried about with
+very little expenditure of effort, either by the waving action of
+vibratile cilia scattered over its external surface, or by the
+oar-like movement of certain portions of its frame especially adapted
+to the purpose. In other animals, the weight of the body rests
+directly upon the ground, and has, therefore, to be lifted from place
+to place by more powerful mechanical contrivances.
+
+In the lowest forms of air-living animals, the body rests upon the
+ground by numerous points of support; and when it moves, is wriggled
+along piecemeal, one portion being pushed forward while the rest
+remains stationary. The mode of progression which the little earthworm
+adopts, is a familiar illustration of this style of proceeding. In the
+higher forms of air-living animals, a freer and more commodious kind
+of movement is provided for. The body itself is raised up from the
+ground upon pointed columns, which are made to act as levers as well
+as props. Observe, for instance, the tiger-beetle, as it runs swiftly
+over the uneven surface of the path in search of its dinner, with its
+eager antennę thrust out in advance. Those six long and slender legs
+that bear up the body of the insect, and still keep advancing in
+regular alternate order, are steadied and worked by cords laid along
+on the hollows and grooves of their own substance. While some of them
+uphold the weight of the superincumbent body, the rest are thrown
+forwards, as fresh and more advanced points of support on to which it
+may be pulled. The running of the insect is a very ingenious and
+beautiful adaptation of the principles of mechanism to the purposes of
+life.
+
+But in the insect organisation, a still more surprising display of
+mechanical skill is made. A comparatively heavy body is not only
+carried rapidly and conveniently along the surface of the ground, it
+is also raised entirely up from it at pleasure, and transported
+through lengthened distances, while resting upon nothing but the thin
+transparent air. From the top of the central piece--technically termed
+thoracic--of the insect's body, from which the legs descend, two or
+more membraneous sails arise, which are able to beat the air by
+repeated strokes, and to make it, consequently, uphold their own
+weight, as well as that of the burden connected with them. These
+lifting and sustaining sails are the insect's wings.
+
+The wings of the insect are, however, of a nature altogether different
+from the apparently analogous organs which the bird uses in flight.
+The wings of the bird are merely altered fore-legs. Lift up the front
+extremities of a quadruped, keep them asunder at their origins by bony
+props, fit them with freer motions and stronger muscles, and cover
+them with feathers, and they become wings in every essential
+particular. In the insect, however, the case is altogether different.
+The wings are not altered legs; they are superadded to the legs. The
+insect has its fore-legs as well as its wings. The legs all descend
+from the under surface of the thoracic piece, while the wings arise
+from its upper surface. As the wings are flapping above during flight,
+the unchanged legs are dangling below, in full complement. The wings
+are, therefore, independent and additional organs. They have no
+relation whatever to limbs, properly so called. But there are some
+other portions of the animal economy with which they do connect
+themselves, both by structure and function. The reader will hardly
+guess what those wing-allied organs are.
+
+There is a little fly, called the May-fly, which usually makes its
+appearance in the month of August, and which visits the districts
+watered by the Seine and the Marne in such abundance, that the
+fishermen of these rivers believe it is showered down from heaven, and
+accordingly call its living clouds, manna. Reaumur once saw the
+May-flies descend in this region like thick snow-flakes, and so fast,
+that the step on which he stood by the river's bank was covered by a
+layer four inches thick in a few minutes. The insect itself is very
+beautiful: it has four delicate, yellowish, lace-like wings, freckled
+with brown spots, and three singular hair-like projections hanging out
+beyond its tail. It never touches food during its mature life, but
+leads a short and joyous existence. It dances over the surface of the
+water for three or four hours, dropping its eggs as it flits, and then
+disappears for ever. Myriads come forth about the hour of eight in the
+evening; but by ten or eleven o'clock not a single straggler can be
+found alive.
+
+From the egg which the parent May-fly drops into the water, a
+six-legged grub is very soon hatched. This grub proceeds forthwith to
+excavate for himself a home in the soft bank of the river, below the
+surface of the water, and there remains for two long years, feeding
+upon the decaying matters of the mould. During this aquatic residence,
+the little creature finds it necessary to breathe; and that he may do
+so comfortably, notwithstanding his habits of seclusion, and his
+constant immersion in fluid, he pushes out from his shoulders and back
+a series of delicate little leaf-like plates. A branch of one of the
+air-tubes of his body enters into each of these plates, and spreads
+out into its substance. The plates are, in fact, gills--that is,
+respiratory organs, fitted for breathing beneath the water. The
+little fellow may be seen to wave them backwards and forwards with
+incessant motion, as he churns up the fluid, to get out of it the
+vital air which it contains.
+
+When the grub of the May-fly has completed his two years of probation,
+he comes out from his subterranean and subaqueous den, and rises to
+the surface of the stream. By means of his flapping and then somewhat
+enlarged gills, he half leaps and half flies to the nearest rush or
+sedge he can perceive, and clings fast to it by means of his legs. He
+then, by a clever twist of his little body, splits open his old fishy
+skin, and slowly draws himself out, head, and body, and legs; and,
+last of all, from some of those leafy gills he pulls a delicate
+crumpled-up membrane, which soon dries and expands, and becomes
+lace-netted and brown-fretted. The membrane which was shut up in the
+gills of the aquatic creature, was really the rudiment of its now
+perfected wings.
+
+The wings of the insect are then a sort of external lungs, articulated
+with the body by means of a movable joint, and made to subserve the
+purposes of flight. Each wing is formed of a flattened bladder,
+extended from the general skin of the body. The sides of this bladder
+are pressed closely together, and would be in absolute contact but for
+a series of branching rigid tubes that are spread out in the
+intervening cavity. These tubes are air-vessels; their interiors are
+lined with elastic, spirally-rolled threads, that serve to keep the
+channels constantly open; and through these open channels the vital
+atmosphere rushes with every movement of the membraneous organ. The
+wing of the May-fly flapping in the air is a respiratory organ, of as
+much importance to the wellbeing of the creature in its way, as the
+gill-plate of its grub prototype is when vibrating under the water.
+But the wing of the insect is not the only respiratory organ: its
+entire body is one vast respiratory system, of which the wings are
+offsets. The spirally-lined air-vessels run everywhere, and branch out
+everywhere. The insect, in fact, circulates air instead of blood. As
+the prick of the finest needle draws blood from the flesh of the
+backboned creature, it draws air from the flesh of the insect. Who
+will longer wonder, then, that the insect is so light? It is aerial in
+its inner nature. Its arterial system is filled with the ethereal
+atmosphere, as the more stolid creature's is with heavy blood.
+
+If the reader has ever closely watched a large fly or bee, he will
+have noticed that it has none of the respiratory movements that are so
+familiar to him in the bodies of quadrupeds and birds. There is none
+of that heaving of the chest, and out-and-in movement of the sides,
+which constitute the visible phenomena of breathing. In the insect's
+economy, no air enters by the usual inlet of the mouth. It all goes in
+by means of small air-mouths placed along the sides of the body, and
+exclusively appropriated to its reception. Squeezing the throat will
+not choke an insect. In order to do this effectually, the sides of the
+body, where the air-mouths are, must be smeared with oil.
+
+In the vertebrated animals, the blood is driven through branching
+tubes to receptacles of air placed within the chest; the air-channels
+terminate in blood extremities, and the blood-vessels cover these as a
+net-work. The mechanical act of respiration merely serves to change
+the air contained within the air-receptacles. In the insects, this
+entire process is reversed; the air is carried by branching tubes to
+receptacles of blood scattered throughout the body; the blood-channels
+terminate in blood-extremities, and a capillary net-work of
+air-vessels is spread over these. Now, in the vertebrated creature,
+the chest is merely the grand air-receptacle into which the blood is
+sent to be aėrated; while in the insect, the chest contains but its
+own proportional share of the great air-system. In the latter case,
+therefore, there is a great deal of available space, which would have
+been, under other circumstances, filled with the respiratory
+apparatus, but is now left free to be otherwise employed. The thoracic
+cavity of the insect serves as a stowage for the bulky and powerful
+muscles that are required to give energy to the legs and wings. The
+portion of the body that is almost exclusively respiratory in other
+animals, becomes almost as exclusively motor in insects. It holds in
+its interior the chief portions of the cords by which the moving
+levers and membranes are worked, and its outer surface is adorned by
+those levers and membranes themselves. Both the legs and wings of the
+insect are attached to the thoracic segment of its body.
+
+The extraordinary powers of flight which insects possess are due to
+the conjoined influences of the two conditions that have been
+named--the lightness of their air-filled bodies, and the strength of
+their chest-packed muscles. Where light air is circulated instead of
+heavy blood, great vascularity serves only to make existence more
+ethereal. Plethora probably takes the insect nearer to the skies,
+instead of dragging it towards the dust. The hawk-moth, with its burly
+body, may often be seen hovering gracefully, on quivering wings, over
+some favourite flower, as if it were hung there on cords, while it
+rifles it of its store of accumulated sweets by means of its long
+unfolded tongue. The common house-fly makes 600 strokes every second
+in its ordinary flight, and gets through five feet of space by means
+of them; but when alarmed, it can increase the velocity of its
+wing-strokes some five or six fold, and move through thirty-five feet
+in the second. Kirby believed, that if the house-fly were made equal
+to the horse in size, and had its muscular power increased in the same
+proportion, it would be able to traverse the globe with the rapidity
+of lightning. The dragon-fly often remains on the wing in pursuit of
+its prey for hours at a stretch, and yet will sometimes baffle the
+swallow by its speed, although that bird is calculated to be able to
+move at the rate of a mile in a minute. But the dexterity of this
+insect is even more surprising than its swiftness, for it is able to
+do what no bird can: it is able to stop instantaneously in the midst
+of its most rapid course, and change the direction of its flight,
+going sideways or backwards, without altering the position of its
+body.
+
+As a general rule, insect wings that are intended for employment in
+flight are transparent membranes, with the course of the air-tubes
+marked out upon them as opaque nervures. These air-tubes, it will be
+remembered, are lined by spires of dense cartilage; and hence it is
+that they become nervures so well adapted to act like tent-lines in
+keeping the expanded membranes stretched. In the dragon-flies, the
+nervures are minutely netted for the sake of increased strength; in
+the bees, the nervures are simply parallel. Most insects have two
+pairs of these transparent membraneous wings; but in such as burrow,
+one pair is converted into a dense leather-like case, under which the
+other pair are folded away. In the flies, only one pair of wings can
+be found at all, the other pair being changed into two little
+club-shaped bodies, called balancers.
+
+Butterflies and moths are the only insects that fly by means of opaque
+wings; but in their case the opacity is apparent rather than real, for
+it is caused by the presence of a very beautiful layer of coloured
+scales spread evenly over the outer surface of the membranes. When
+these scales are brushed off, membraneous wings of the ordinary
+transparent character are disclosed. The scales are attached to the
+membrane by little stems, like the quill-ends of feathers, and they
+are arranged in overlapping rows. The variegated colours and patterns
+of the insects are entirely due to them. If the wings of a butterfly
+be pressed upon a surface of card-board covered with gum-water to the
+extent of their own outlines, and be left there until the gum-water is
+dry, the outer layer of scales may be rubbed off with a handkerchief,
+and the double membranes and intervening nervures may be picked away
+piecemeal with a needle's point, and there will remain upon the card a
+most beautiful representation of the other surface of the wings, its
+scales being all preserved by the gum in their natural positions. If
+the outlines of the wings be carefully pencilled first, and the
+gum-water be then delicately and evenly brushed on, just as far as the
+outlines, a perfect and durable fac-simile, in all the original
+variety of colour and marking, is procured, which needs only to have
+the form of the body sketched in, to make it a very pretty and
+accurate delineation of the insect.
+
+
+
+
+RUSTICATION IN A FRENCH VILLAGE.
+
+
+Poverty is difficult to bear under any circumstances, but when
+compelled entirely to alter our habits of life in the same place where
+we have lived differently, we certainly feel it more acutely than when
+we at once change the scene, and see around us nothing we can well
+compare with what is past. It is unnecessary to say by what means
+_our_ easy fortune was reduced to a mere pittance; but, alas! it _was_
+so, and we found ourselves forced to seek another dwelling-place.
+Following the example of most of our country-people in a similar
+situation, therefore, we resolved to go abroad; not, indeed, to enjoy
+society on an income which would in England totally shut us out from
+it, but to live in absolute retirement upon next to nothing. A cousin
+of mine--whose friend, Mlle de Flotte, long resident in England, had
+married a countryman of her own, and settled in Normandy--wrote to Mme
+de Terelcourt accordingly, to ask if there was a habitable hut in her
+neighbourhood where we might find shelter for three years, before
+which time we were told the settlement of our affairs could scarcely
+be completed. The answer was favourable: there was, she said, near the
+village of Flotte, a cottage which contained a kitchen, three rooms,
+and a garret where a _bonne_ might sleep. A large garden was attached
+to it full of fruit-trees, though in a most neglected condition, and
+even the house requiring to be made weather-tight; but as the landlord
+undertook this latter business, and the rent for the whole was only
+L.12 a year, we gladly closed with the offer, and at the end of the
+month of April proceeded to take possession of our new home.
+
+The situation was most lovely. The garden surrounded three sides of
+the cottage, and a large green field, or rather thinly-planted
+apple-orchard, the other, where grazed four fine cows belonging to a
+farm on the opposite side of the lane, which supplied us with butter,
+eggs, and milk, and was near enough not to annoy but to gratify our
+ears with the country sounds so pleasant to those fond of rural
+things, and to give us the feeling of help at hand in case of any
+emergency. We were on the slope of a tolerably lofty hill; the
+high-road was below, where we could see and hear the diligence pass;
+but saving this, the farm-yard noises, and the birds and bees in the
+garden, were the only disturbers of our perfect quiet, except, indeed,
+the soothing sound of a small brook tinkling over a tiny waterfall,
+quite audible, although a good way on the other side of the _grande
+route_. The town of C---- was seen to our right, the sea glittering
+beyond; and a rocky, shrubby dell, through which the little stream
+above mentioned murmured merrily on its way, turning a rustic mill,
+was the prospect from the windows. Two lime-trees stood at the gate,
+inside of which we joyfully discovered an unexpected lodge or cottage,
+containing two little rooms and a large shed, which had not been
+mentioned in the description, and which we found most useful for
+stowing away packing-cases, hampers, and boxes, keeping potatoes and
+apples, and a hundred things besides. The short road--avenue, our
+landlord termed it--which led from this to the house, had a
+strawberry-bank on one side, a row of cherry-trees on the other; and
+the garden, although overgrown with weeds and sprawling shrubs, looked
+quite capable of being easily made very pretty indeed. The entrance to
+this our magnificent chāteau was through the kitchen only; for the
+room next it, although it could boast of an outside-door likewise, had
+none which opened into the interior of the house, was neither lathed
+nor plastered, and the bare earth was all there was to tread upon.
+Upstairs the flooring consisted merely of planks laid down; and you
+could hear when below the pins dropped from above, unless, indeed,
+they fell, as they generally did, into the large crevices. The bonne's
+_mansarde_ was but a garret, where, till you got into the very middle,
+you could not stand upright; and although the tiled roof had been just
+painted and repaired, the breath of heaven came wooingly in every
+direction, even through the thick-leaved vines which covered it,
+closely trained up there, to make room for the apricots that grew
+against the wall below. Close by, a little stair led you out upon a
+terrace, where a road, bordered by peach-trees and backed by plums,
+gave a dry walk in all weathers; but you could go higher, higher, and
+higher still, terrace after terrace, till it terminated in a rock
+covered with briers and brambles--the fruit of which latter were as
+large and as good as mulberries. This we called our garden-wall, and
+it had a sunny seat commanding an extensive view, and from which all
+we saw was beautiful. How often have I sat there dreaming, lulled by
+the murmur of the insect world around, till the merry fife of a band
+of conscripts on their march, or the distant boom of a cannon from the
+forts, restored me to a consciousness that I was still at least _in_
+the world, although not _of_ it.
+
+But now I am going to descend to figures, and can assure my
+incredulous English readers, that what I relate is strictly
+true--_vraie_, although not _vraisemblable_. We hired a stout girl to
+weed and wash, without food, at 2-1/2 d. a day; and another for L.5
+per annum undertook to be our sole servant--to clean, and cook, and
+dress madame, only stipulating that she was to have _soupe ą la
+graisse_ and brown bread _ą discrétion_ three times a day, two sous
+for cider, her aprons, and washing; but hoped if she gave
+satisfaction, that sometimes upon Sunday she might be allowed a bit of
+meat: on Fridays an egg and an apple contented her, and an occasional
+fish made her shout with joy. An old soldier, who had returned to his
+primitive employment of gardener, and lived near, undertook to dig,
+prune, and plant in the garden for a franc a day, during the time we
+ourselves were engaged with the inside of our mansion, and to come
+afterwards at 2d. an hour when we wanted him, either to go to C---- for
+marketing, or to do anything else we required, for the hamlet of
+Flotte did not possess many shops. At this hamlet, however, we
+obtained bread and a variety of small articles on very moderate terms.
+
+Having hired the requisite furniture, and papered the walls of our
+apartments, the humble tenement looked clean and comfortable. To get
+all into order, we both worked hard, and very soon could sit down by
+'our own fireside' in a quiet, cheerful house, almost the work of our
+own hands, and therefore every creek and cranny in it full of
+interest. Mme de Terelcourt, with refined politeness, did not attempt
+to visit us herself until she understood we could receive her _sans
+géne_; but she sent fruit and vegetables, and kind messages
+constantly, and at last a note intimating that she would, if
+convenient, call upon us after church next day. Strawberries and
+cream, butter, eggs, fresh bread, and the commonest _vin ordinaire_,
+were easily procured, of which our guest ate heartily, saying she
+would bring the rest of the family next day to partake of a similar
+feast. They came accordingly, and with them a cart loaded with shrubs,
+plants, flowers, and a whole hive of honeycomb, and various little
+comforts besides, pretending that they were thankful to us for
+receiving their superabundance, instead of obliging them to throw it
+away. This hospitable, unaffected kindness continued unabated the
+whole time of our stay, and the kind beings always contrived to make
+out that they were the obliged persons, and we so polite and
+condescending for deigning to receive such trifles. M. and Mme de
+Terelcourt lived with M. le Marquis de Flotte and his wife; and her
+brother, the Count de Belgravin, occupied a house a quarter of a mile
+distant, which, although by no means a comfortable residence, he
+rented purposely to be near his sister. These amiable people spent a
+part of every day together, for they did not associate much with the
+inhabitants of C----; and I look back with much pleasure to our social
+evenings, when light-hearted merriment constantly prevailed; and I
+often thought how few of the many who talk so gravely of patience and
+resignation to the will of God, could or would understand that
+cheerfulness is, in fact, but a different way of shewing that
+resignation.
+
+Our maid, Batilde, knew nothing about the _cuisine_ beyond a good
+_roux_ and a bad omelet; and except making a bed, appeared ignorant of
+all housework--even washing, dusting, or sweeping thoroughly. She,
+however, did everything we did not do for ourselves, and ironed the
+linen after a fashion. Tonette washed for us in the little river
+aforesaid, where she used an incredible quantity of soap, thumping our
+things with a piece of flat wood upon a great stone, most
+conveniently, as she observed, placed there for the purpose 'by the
+saints in heaven;' which method, if it hastened its wearing out, made
+our linen at least sweet and clean while it lasted. My husband shot
+and cultivated the garden in the respective seasons appropriate to
+these occupations, whilst I bought a cookery-book called 'Les
+Expériences de Mademoiselle Marguerite;' and pretending to be learning
+myself, taught Batilde to prepare our food a little better, without
+hurting her self-conceit, of which she possessed more than the average
+of her countrywomen. Our time, therefore, was fully occupied. Our
+health improved and our spirits rose with the excitement; we had
+agreeable society in the excellent people named above, meeting _sans
+faēon_, taking breakfast or luncheon with each other, instead of
+dinners, in winter, and in summer often spending the evening at one
+another's houses.
+
+At a distance not insurmountable there was an English chapel; but the
+character of the clergyman was not of a kind to recommend itself to
+persons who had some regard for the decencies of life; and so we
+contented ourselves with saying our prayers at home. The old curé of
+the place, with whom we became slightly acquainted, seemed to be a
+worthy sort of man, liberal in his ideas, and possessed of a
+considerable taste for music. He made rather an agreeable and obliging
+neighbour.
+
+Talking of curés, I may mention that one came from a distance of
+several miles to pay his respects to us, and offer welcome to France.
+He said, he desired to make our acquaintance because we came from
+England, where he had found 'rest for twenty years, and received much
+kindness.' He was a rich man, had a pretty little church, a
+picturesque house in a sort of park, which he had stocked with pigs
+instead of sheep; and every day that was not one of fasting or
+abstinence, he had pork for dinner. He took a great fancy to us, and
+wanted us to give up our cottage, and come and live with him, as he
+had plenty of room and desired society; but we declined. Had we done
+so, I doubt not that he would have left us his money, for he had no
+relations, and bequeathed the whole, for want of an heir, to his
+grocer. He grew cooler after our refusal, but still sometimes came to
+see us on a pot-bellied cart-horse--a most stolid-looking beast, but
+one which often took most laughably strange fits of friskiness. Once I
+saw the good curé's watch jump out of his pocket, fly over his head,
+and disappear amid a heap of nettles, where little Victor found it,
+and hoped for a rich reward; but he only received an old book of
+devotion, and a lecture on the duty of reading it.
+
+I must relate a little adventure which might have been written fifty
+years ago, when it would have obtained more credence than it will in
+the present day, from those travellers at least who have kept to the
+highways, and those residents who have lived only in the towns of
+France. One morning Batilde asked permission to visit a friend who had
+come to spend a day with her sister at C----. 'They breed poultry; and
+as madame likes a goose as soon as the fźte of St Michel comes, it
+would be worth her while to desire Mčre Talbot to feed one up against
+that time. They live a good way off,' pursued she, 'in a poor hamlet
+called Les Briares. It would be almost worth madame's while to go
+there some day, for it is such a primitive place, and they are such
+primitive people.' I liked the idea, and begged Mčre Talbot might be
+told that I would come and look out my goose for myself the following
+week.
+
+A fine Thursday morning dawned; and as early as we could get coffee
+made and taken, Batilde and I set out on our expedition, each, after
+the fashion of the canton, seated on a donkey, our feet in one pannier
+and a large stone to balance in the other. I took as an offering to
+the hope and heir of the Talbots a toy much like what we in England
+call Jack-in-a-box, but in France is termed a _Diable_, as it is
+intended to represent his Satanic majesty, and alarm the lifter of the
+lid by popping up a black visage. The rough roads shaded by high
+hedges, white and pink with hawthorn, and the wild apple-tree blossom,
+and redolent of early honeysuckle, reminded me of the secluded parts
+of England; while Scotland presented itself to my mind when we left
+these lanes and crossed still, rushy brooks, or dashing tiny torrents,
+climbed heather braes, pursuing the yellow-hammer and large
+mountain-bees as they flew on to the furze and broom-bushes, filling
+the air with their cheerful music; or when, again, we descended to
+birch-shaded hollows, refreshing ourselves from clear little
+spring-wells, that sparkled over white pebbles at the foot of a gray
+rock tufted over with blaeberry and foxglove leaves. The poor thing
+chatted away like a child, inspired by the pure air, bracing, yet
+mild, and lost herself amongst recollections of her country home,
+talking of buttercups, hedge-sparrows' eggs, and _demoiselles_ or
+dragon-flies.
+
+Several happy hours we spent _en route_; and at last, on turning down
+from a hilly road, we saw on a flat brown plain a collection of low
+cottages. The nearer we approached, the more Scotch everything
+appeared; in some cases I even saw my dear native 'middens afore the
+door:' the aspect of the houses and looks of the old women especially,
+with their stoups and country caps--so very like mutches--striped
+petticoats and short-gowns, brought northern climes before me vividly;
+and the children stared and shouted like true Scots callants. The very
+accent was so Scotch that I felt as though I was doing something
+altogether ridiculous in talking French.
+
+Upon entering Mčre Talbot's house, the resemblance became more real.
+The flags stuck here and there in the earthen floor, the form of the
+chairs and tables, the press-beds, large red-checked linen curtains,
+the 'rock and its wee pickle tow,' the reel, the bowls on the
+shelves--each and all recalled my native country; and I positively
+should have ended by believing myself there in a dream, if not in
+reality, had not a glance at the fireplace undeceived me: there was no
+fire--all was dim, dusky, and dark; no glowing embers and cheerful
+pipe-clayed hearth, but iron dogs and wood-ashes where blazing coals
+should be. Even here, however, I could not but think of 'Caledonia
+stern and wild,' for there stood a real Carron 'three-leggit pat,' to
+which my very heart warmed. I was asked to sit down; and soon the news
+spread that _une Anglaise_ was to be seen at Mčre Talbot's, and people
+glanced by the window, peeped in at the door, and came to speak upon
+one pretence or other, as if it was not an everyday sight. By and by a
+girl and man--whose names from their appearance might have been Jenny
+and Sawnie--arrived for their dinner--consisting of brown bread, an
+apple, and cider, which they discussed on their knees--not sitting
+down at the table--and when finished, returned to their field-labour
+without speaking. The little boy, meanwhile, had disappeared with his
+toy-box, which greatly delighted him, and elevated him for the nonce
+above his fellows; for he was the undisputed possessor of a curiosity
+imported from England itself, over the sea, by the very lady who was
+to be seen at his grandmother's house eating pancakes.
+
+The fire was lighted; it crackled and blazed in two minutes; a stand
+was placed over it, upon which they put what they called a _tuile_;
+eggs, flour, and milk were mixed, and a bit of butter, the size of a
+bean in the first instance, of a pea afterwards--_c'est de rigueur_,
+to hinder every fresh _crźpe_ thrown in from burning. Most capital
+pancakes they were; thin, crisp, hot, and sweet; and the kind people
+pressed them upon me so hospitably, that I ate till I felt I really
+could eat no longer, and was glad to finish with a draught of sour
+cider. I bought seven geese, to be brought to me one at a time, as
+_fat as caterpillars_, for two francs ten sous each. Mčre Talbot was
+content with her bargain, and so was I with mine. When I rose to take
+leave, I was reminded again of Scotland, for a large parcel of cakes
+was put into the off-pannier; and as I should have mortally offended
+the kind creatures by refusing their gift, I carried them home,
+toasted them on a fork, and found it made them eat quite as crisp and
+good as at first. This sketch may appear perhaps very odd to be taken
+from nature so late as the year 1840, but I can assure my readers it
+is 'no less strange than true.'
+
+All the summer we wandered about the woods and fields of Flotte,
+making little excursions in the neighbourhood, and sedulously avoiding
+the town; but after we had made ourselves acquainted with every
+beech-shaded hollow, every little fig-forest, every apple-orchard,
+climbed every broomy knowe, gathered heather from the highest rock and
+mushrooms from the oldest pasture, we turned our steps sometimes
+towards C---- in search of variety. There, every Thursday, the military
+band of the 44th Regiment played in the alley of the mountain-ash, and
+there all the dames and demoiselles assembled, dressed in a
+wonderfully neat way. We asked how these women, who were mostly in
+humble circumstances, were enabled to dress so finely. Batilde
+explained the phenomenon.
+
+'Ah! they have infinite merit,' responded the Frenchwoman; 'two of
+them, whom I chance to know, in order to be enabled to do so, live on
+eggs and bread, in one room, where they sit, eat, and sleep, nay,
+sometimes cook; and they have their just reward, for they are
+universally admired and respected.'
+
+This is a pretty fair specimen of the effort made by Frenchwomen of
+the humbler orders to maintain a tasteful exterior. To make themselves
+neat is a principle; and they seem to have an inherent perception of
+what constitutes taste. They may sometimes go too far in this
+direction, and think more of dress and ornaments than they should do.
+One can at least say, that they are on the safe side. Better to love
+outward show, than, as is often visible in Scotland, have no regard
+for appearances. Better cleanliness on any terms than utter
+slovenliness. I really must say, we saw some most creditable efforts
+in France to maintain self-respect, among the female population.
+
+About this time, an old gentleman, who was distantly related to
+us, died--without having, however, an idea of the extent of
+our poverty--leaving my husband L.50 for a ring. Here was
+riches--unexpected riches! and I verily believe few who succeed to
+L.50,000 ever felt more or as much rapture as we did; and we spent an
+evening very happily settling how we should employ the money. In the
+first place, we hired a good servant for L.8! and dismissed Batilde;
+we then, by paying half, induced the landlord to lath, plaster, paper,
+and paint the large lumber-room, and open a door of communication into
+the passage, by which we avoided entering through the kitchen. Our
+late sitting-room we dined in, and made the dining-room a
+dressing-room; got several small comforts besides; and though last not
+least, hired an old piano; and every evening enjoyed music in a degree
+none but real lovers of that delightful art, long deprived of it, can
+have the slightest conception of--and all this happiness and comfort
+for L.50! Think of that, ye ladies who give as much for a gown!
+
+Our new servant, Olive, was as clean, orderly, and active as our late
+one had been the reverse. The difference it made in our comfort was as
+great as if we had had our former establishment restored, and really
+our _bonne_ was a host within herself. The house was always clean, but
+we never saw her cleaning: she went to market, baked all our bread,
+yet never seemed oppressed with work: her cookery was capital; she
+made excellent dishes out of what Batilde would have wasted: went to
+mass every morning, and was back in time to prepare everything for our
+breakfast. After staying a month, she begged permission to leave the
+cockloft and bring her 'effects' to the gate-house, which we willingly
+permitted; and her wardrobe was worth a journey to see, when we
+remembered that her wages had never been quite L.8 until she came to
+us, and her age only thirty. I shall give the list I copied, hoping
+some of our English Betties may read and profit by her example:
+twenty-four good strong linen shifts, made and marked neatly by
+herself; two dozen worsted and thread stockings, knit by herself;
+twelve pocket-handkerchiefs; six stout petticoats; four flannel do.;
+six pair of shoes; eight caps; eight neck-frills; umbrella;
+prayer-book; gold earrings and cross--which two last, with a beautiful
+lace-cap, she inherited, but everything else was of her _own earning_.
+She bought a wardrobe and bedstead, and was by degrees getting
+furniture; and as I exacted no sewing, every leisure moment she was
+spinning her future sheets. With all this she was also very kind to a
+married sister, who had a large family; but she wore no flowers,
+flounces, nor finery; her six gowns were of a stuff the Scotch call
+linsey-woolsey; and so in sixteen years' services she had amassed what
+I have just described. Why can't our girls do as much where wages are
+higher and clothes cheaper?
+
+We spent three years in this happy solitude, and felt almost sorry
+when an unexpected legacy, and the settlement of our affairs together,
+enabled us to return to all the comforts and many of the luxuries of
+life. It gives me much pleasure to record the many kindnesses we
+received from all ranks of people. Upon one occasion we were forced to
+ask the butcher to wait three months longer for his bill: he not only
+consented, but his wife insisted upon lending us money, and was quite
+cross when we gratefully declined her kindness. Near the time of our
+departure, as we were paying a large account, the shopkeeper said: 'At
+this time you must have many calls upon you; transmit me the amount
+from England, for I can afford to wait.' Another of our tradesmen, a
+shoemaker, was a most singular character--a great physiognomist, and
+would not serve those he did not like. A dashing English family wished
+to employ him, but he fought shy, and made himself so disagreeable
+that they went to another: he told me this before his wife, who seemed
+annoyed at his conduct. He explained that he did not like their
+appearance, and was sure they would not pay for what they had. He was
+right; they left the place in debt to his _confrčre_ and everybody
+else. I rejoice in this opportunity of assuring my countrymen that
+there is as much true kindness to be met with in France as in England,
+and the selfishness we complain of in our neighbours on the other side
+of the Channel, is often but a preconceived fancy, or induced by our
+own cold behaviour. The above true sketch shews at least that _we_ met
+with substantial kindness, and I hope it also proves that we are
+sensible of it.
+
+
+
+
+PHANTOMS OF THE FAR EAST.
+
+
+The form assumed by superstition in India is not very different from
+the European type, otherwise than in a certain exaggeration, impressed
+on it, no doubt, by the grotesque grandeur of the mythology.
+Witchcraft is pretty nearly the same in both regions--the old women
+being the chief professors of the art; but in many districts of the
+former country, the evil power is bestowed upon _every_ old woman
+without exception. Girls will not marry into a family without a witch,
+for how could their infants be protected from the spells of the other
+old women? It is dangerous to jostle an old woman on the street,
+however accidentally, lest she take vengeance on the spot. A man came
+into this unpleasant contact while he was walking along, carelessly
+chewing a piece of sugar-cane; and hearing the muttered objurgations
+of the hag, as he turned round to apologise, he was not surprised to
+find the juice of the cane turned into blood. The spectators,
+likewise, recognised the metamorphosis as soon as it was pointed out
+to them; and when the terrified victim instantly leaped on his horse,
+and put ten or twelve miles between him and the sorceress before
+drawing bridle, he was believed to have saved his life by this
+dispatch.
+
+The operations of the men-sorcerers are less spontaneous and more
+scientific. They set about their work in a business-like way; and
+within sight of the house of their intended victim the mystic caldron
+begins to boil and bubble. The victim, however, is not to be terrified
+out of his senses. What are his enemy's fires and incantations to him?
+He will only just take no notice, and continue to live on as if there
+was not a sorcerer in the world. But that smoke: it meets his eye the
+first object every morning. That ruddy glare: it is the last thing he
+sees at night. That measured but inarticulate sound: it is never out
+of his ear. His thoughts dwell on the mystical business. He is
+preoccupied even in company. He wonders what they are now putting into
+the pot; and whether it has any connection with the spasm that has
+just shot through him. He becomes nervous; he feels unwell; he cannot
+sleep for thinking; he cannot eat for that horrid broth that bubbles
+for ever in his mind. He gets worse, and worse, and worse. He dies!
+
+But this empire of the imagination is beaten hollow in Java, where it
+is supposed that a housebreaker, by throwing a handful of earth upon
+the beds of the inmates, completely incapacitates them from moving to
+save their property. And this is no mere speculative belief, but an
+actual _fact_. The man who is to be robbed, on feeling the earth fall
+upon him, lies as motionless as if he was bound hand and foot. He is
+under a spell; a spell which, in our own country, even knowledge and
+refinement have power only to modify.
+
+In England, there is a large class of persons who believe that a
+certain pill is able to cure all diseases, however opposite their
+natures, and however different the constitutions of the patients. It
+is in vain the analytical chemist describes publicly the component
+parts and real qualities of the quack medicine--their faith is
+unshaken. In India, this low and paltry credulity acquires a character
+of the poetical; for there the popular confidence reposes--not more
+irrationally--on the prayers and incantations of the practitioner. But
+this sort of practice, in the wilder parts of the country, renders the
+medical profession somewhat unsafe to its professors; for the doctor
+is looked upon as a wizard, with _power_ to cure or kill as he
+chooses. In such places--the jungly districts--there are diseases of
+the liver and spleen, to which the children, more especially, are
+subject; and when so affected, the patient pines away and dies without
+any external token of disease. This result is, of course, attributed
+to preternatural means; and if there is not an old woman at hand
+obnoxious to suspicion, the doctor is set down as the murderer. 'I
+have in these territories,' says Colonel Sleeman, 'known a great many
+instances of medical practitioners being put to death for not curing
+young people for whom they were required to prescribe. Several cases
+have come before me as a magistrate, in which the father has stood
+over the doctor with a drawn sword, by the side of the bed of his
+child, and cut him down, and killed him the moment the child died, as
+he had sworn to do when he found the patient sinking under his
+prescriptions.'
+
+Another superstition of the country, originating no doubt in local
+circumstances, found its way into Europe, where no such circumstances
+existed. In India, a man suddenly vanishes. His family, perhaps, are
+expecting him at home, but from that moment he is never more heard of.
+He has been destroyed in the jungle by a tiger, and his remains so
+completely devoured by other animals, that there is scarcely a relic
+of his body left to give assurance of a man, far less as a proof of
+his identity. These mysterious disappearances, however, are connected
+with their real cause; and men are believed to be frequently
+metamorphosed--sometimes voluntarily, sometimes involuntarily--into
+tigers. The voluntary transformation is effected merely by eating a
+certain root, whereupon the man is instantly changed into a tiger; and
+when tired of his new character, he has only to eat another, when,
+_presto!_ he subsides from a tiger into a man. But occasionally
+mistakes happen. An individual of an inquiring disposition once felt a
+strong curiosity to know what were the sensations attendant on such a
+transformation; but being a prudent person, he set about the
+experiment with all necessary precaution. Having provided himself with
+
+              ----the insane root
+    That takes the reason prisoner,
+
+he gave one likewise to his wife, desiring her to stand by and watch
+the event, and as soon as she saw him fairly turned into a tiger, to
+thrust it into his mouth. The wife promised, but her nerves were not
+equal to the performance. As soon as she saw her husband fixed in his
+new form, she took to flight--carrying in her hand, in the confusion
+of her mind, the root that would have restored him to her faithful
+arms! And so it befell that the poor man-tiger was obliged to take to
+the woods, where for many a day he dined on his old neighbours of the
+village, till he was at length shot, and _recognised_! In this
+superstition will be seen the prototype of the wolf-mania of medięval
+Europe. In Brittany, men betook themselves to the forests in the shape
+of wolves, out of a morbid passion for the amusement of howling and
+ravening; but if they left in some secure place the clothes they had
+thrown off to prepare for the metamorphosis, they had only to reassume
+them in order to regain their natural forms. But sometimes a
+catastrophe like the above occurred: the wife discovered the hidden
+clothes, and carrying them home in the innocent carefulness of her
+heart, the poor husband lived and died a wolf.
+
+The Hindoos, like other ancient peoples, predict good or evil fortune
+from certain phenomena of nature; but one instance of this has been
+described to us in a communication from our Old Indian, which far
+excels in the poetical the finest fancies of the Greeks. We cannot
+undertake to say that the thing is new, although we ourselves never
+heard of it before; but as the knowledge of it was imparted to her by
+her moonshee as a profound secret, we present it as such to our
+readers, recommending them to make the experiment for themselves. At
+the initiation of our informant, she was about to undertake a distant
+journey, and the old moonshee was anxious to consult the fates as to
+the fortunes that might be in store for his beloved mistress. He,
+accordingly, prevailed upon her to walk forth one night from the
+veranda, and with many quaint expressions of respect and anxiety,
+besought her to follow his directions with an attentive mind,
+abstracted as much as possible from the common thoughts of life.
+
+It was a clear, calm night; the moon was full, and not the faintest
+speck in the sky disturbed her reign. The Ganges was like a flood of
+silver light, hastening on in charmed silence; while on the green
+smooth sward on which they walked, a tall shrub, here and there, stood
+erect and motionless. The young lady, whose impressions were probably
+deepened by the mystical words of the moonshee, felt a kind of awe
+stealing over her: she looked round upon the accustomed scene, as if
+in some new and strange world; and when the old man motioned her to
+stop, as they reached an open space on the sward, she obeyed with an
+indescribable thrill.
+
+'Look there,' said he, pointing to her shadow, which fell tall and
+dark upon the grass. 'Do you see it?'
+
+'Yes,' said she faintly, yet beginning to be ashamed. 'How sharply
+defined are its edges! It looks like something you could touch.'
+
+'But look longer--look better--look steadfastly. Is it still so
+definite?'
+
+'A kind of halo begins to gather round it: my eyes dazzle'----
+
+'Then raise them to the heavens; fix them on yonder blue sky. What do
+you see?'
+
+'I see it still! But it is as white as mist, and of a gigantic size.'
+
+'Has it a head?' asked the moonshee in an anxious whisper.
+
+'Yes; it is complete in all its parts: but now it
+melts--floats--disappears.'
+
+'Thank God!' said the old man: 'your journey shall be prosperous--such
+is the will of Heaven!' The experiment was tried on many other
+occasions by the young lady, and always with similar success, although
+never without a certain degree of trepidation, even after she had
+learned that the spectral appearance in the heavens was nothing more
+than the picture retained on the retina of the eye. She never saw the
+phantom without a head, which accounts for her being alive to this
+day; or even wanting a limb, although she has not been without her
+share of the trials of the world. It can easily be conceived, however,
+that certain conditions of the atmosphere may produce these phenomena,
+which are regarded by the Hindoo seer as sure tokens of death or
+disaster.
+
+This superstition is not more unreasonable than the mistakes of our
+early travellers, who were accustomed to attribute a meaning to the
+phenomena of nature, of which more accurate knowledge has entirely
+stripped them. But the notions of the Hindoo are always peculiar--his
+fancy, even in its wildest excursions, is bounded by the circle of his
+mythology. When our Old Indian's wanderings led her to Pinang, in the
+Straits of Malacca, she found a Hindoo convict there, trembling even
+in his chains as his fancy connected the wonders of the place with the
+dogmas in which he had been reared. This most beautiful island, as our
+readers may remember, came into the possession of an Englishman in the
+latter part of last century in rather a romantic way--forming the
+dowry of a native princess, the daughter of the king of Quedah, whom
+he married. Captain Light transferred it to the East India Company,
+who were not slow in discovering the advantages of its fine harbour,
+rich soil, and salubrious climate. Its inhabitants at that time were a
+few fishermen on the coast; and the interior was covered with an
+almost impervious forest; but now there is a population of Europeans
+and Americans, and Asiatics of almost all countries; and plantations
+of sugar, coffee, pepper, and other intertropical produce. Among the
+inhabitants are invalids, who proceed thither from continental India
+for the restoration of their health; and convicts, who are compelled
+to compensate by their labour the injuries they have inflicted on
+society.
+
+The man alluded to belonged to the latter class, having probably
+travelled for his country's good from the tamer lowlands of Bengal;
+and when the traveller asked him how he liked the region, he expressed
+the utmost awe, united with the bitterest condemnation of the
+Europeans, for desecrating by their roads and other works a place so
+obviously the abode of deutas and spirits. He said, that when they had
+begun to carry the up-hill road through these primeval forests, they
+were warned of their impiety by the voices of the gods themselves, in
+bursts of unearthly music, blasts of the trumpet, and the clash of
+cymbals and gongs.
+
+'The first tree we struck with the axe,' added he with a shudder, 'ran
+milk; and the second, blood!' Of these two substances, the former is
+still more ominous in the Brahminical faith than the latter, for
+everything connected with the cow is sacred and mysterious.
+
+'Well,' said the inquirer, 'what happened--since in spite of these
+omens you persisted in your task? Did the gods take vengeance?'
+
+'Yes,' said he solemnly; 'but _we_ were only instruments, like the
+axes in our hands; and the vengeance, therefore, fell upon the prime
+mover. The governor'--coming close up to the lady, and putting his
+mouth to her ear--'the governor died!' Now, all this was true--music,
+milk, blood, and death; and yet none of these was more the work of
+supernatural agency than any of the common circumstances of life.
+
+The supposed unearthly sounds proceed neither from birds nor men, and
+the effect is either pleasing or awful, according to the mood of the
+listener. Some, in such circumstances, instead of receiving
+impressions of awe, like the Hindoo convict, would exclaim:
+
+    Where should this music be--i' the air, or the earth?
+    It sounds no more: and sure it waits upon
+    Some god of the island.
+
+And again:
+
+                        ----The isle is full of noises,
+    Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
+    Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
+    Will hum about mine ears; and sometimes voices,
+    That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
+    Will make me sleep again.
+
+One would think Shakspeare had actually been in some tropical forest
+when the daylight began to fade, and the myriads of insects to take up
+their evening-song! One of these extraordinary musicians is
+distinguished as the trumpeter; another produces a tinkle like a bell;
+and a third gives forth a sound which the imagination may ascribe to
+any instrument, or band of instruments, it pleases. This species of
+cricket buries himself in a centre, to which converge seven holes,
+which he has drilled in a circle; and from these seven tubes a sound
+rushes forth, which almost stuns the passer-by. It may be conceived,
+therefore, that a forest peopled with myriads upon myriads of such
+'executants,' must have a strain for every ear, every mood, and every
+conscience.
+
+The tree which welled forth milk when struck by the axe was the _Ficus
+elastica_--a sort of gigantic vine, as thick as a man's arm, which
+creeps along the ground, sending forth new roots from the joint, and,
+climbing at length some lofty tree, expands in branches. This is the
+chief caoutchouc-plant, and its sap has not only the colour, but many
+of the chemical properties of animal milk, and is frequently drunk as
+food. The blood came from one of the _eucalypta_, popularly called the
+blue gum-tree. The governor did die soon after his arrival on the
+island, and no doubt _immediately_ after he had disturbed, in the
+manner related, the _genius loci_.
+
+Pinang contains about 160 square miles of surface, nearly the whole of
+which is laid out in hills and dales, the loftiest of the former
+reaching a height of 2500 feet above the sea-level. On the slopes of
+this hill are built the governor's rural residence, and a bungalow,
+where invalids resort for country air. It is possible that great
+changes may have taken place here of late years, when efforts have
+been made to dot the island with sugar-plantations; but at the time we
+speak of, this was a solitary spot, behind which dark forests
+stretched upwards to the summit. Among these forests, on the shoulder
+of the hill, there occurs an optical phenomenon, not unknown in
+Europe, which is here an object of superstitious terror to the
+natives.
+
+The first European who observed it was a gentleman who, taking
+advantage of the coolness of the hour, had strolled away in the early
+morning from the inhabited district, and was skirting round a deep
+valley, dotted at the bottom, and overhung at the sides with lofty
+trees. The beams of the sun had already begun to acquire some power,
+although his disk was scarcely yet above the horizon; and the
+traveller watched with interest the effect of the dawning light upon a
+sea of vapour which nearly filled the valley. This slowly-moving
+cloud, as it was acted upon by the sun, swelled higher and higher, and
+became whiter and whiter, till it finally settled, filling the whole
+valley with a substance that looked like alabaster, in the midst of
+which the topmost branches of the tall trees hung motionless. The
+scene was strangely beautiful; and the spectator, who was screened
+from the now risen sun by a belt of forest, lingered for awhile to
+contemplate it. When at length he resumed his walk, and, emerging from
+the trees, found himself in the full blaze of the rising sun, he
+turned once more to observe the effect on the vapour; and a cry of
+wonder which arose to his lips was only repressed by a feeling of awe,
+as he saw upon that alabaster surface a dark human figure of gigantic
+dimensions, surrounded by a halo that seemed formed of the rainbow. A
+confused rush of associations half acquainted him at the moment with
+the nature of the phenomenon; but giving way to the feeling of
+poetical delight, he clasped his hands above his head in admiration--a
+movement which the Phantom of the Alabaster Valley instantaneously
+imitated! It was indeed his own shadow--and a shadow he was not to
+recall, even when he turned away to journey homewards. There, in that
+lonely place, it seemed to him to remain for ever--a link connecting
+him with the spirit of nature, and ever and anon drawing him back into
+her domain from the meanness, and folly, and wickedness of the world.
+
+
+
+
+DECIMAL SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.
+
+
+The state of our national weights and measures has been a fertile
+subject of legislative enactment ever since the signing of the Magna
+Charta, which proclaims that 'there shall be one weight and one
+measure.' 'We will and establish,' said an act of Edward III. nearly
+500 years ago, 'that one weight, one measure, and one yard, be used
+throughout the land.' Act has followed act from that time to this, and
+still we have not only different weights and measures for different
+commodities, but for the same in different parts of the realm. An
+ounce means one thing to the grocer, another to the apothecary. A
+stone is 8 pounds to the London butcher or fishmonger, 14 to the
+provincial; 5 pounds to the dealer in glass, 16 to the cheesemonger,
+and 32 to the dealer in hemp. The corn-trade exhibits still greater
+varieties. Prices are quoted in official circulars in every fashion,
+from the Mark-Lane quarter to the Scotch boll, the firlot, the load
+(which may be of various dimensions), the coomb, the last, the barrel
+(which also may be various), the ton, the hundredweight, and the
+pound. We have seen an extract from an actual account-sales, by which
+it appeared, that at the same port the merchant had sold a cargo of
+foreign wheat by five different bushels according to the customs of
+the buyers. In paying the duty, these various bushels had to be
+converted into imperial quarters, and in calculating tonnage and other
+dues, it was necessary to reduce all to tons! Here is surely a source
+of endless confusion, if not an opening for fraud. Our legislature has
+gone on from century to century, mending or mutilating the statutes as
+the case might be, but laying down no principles scientific enough to
+command the approval of the educated, or simple enough to prevail over
+the established usages of the commonalty.
+
+Our neighbours in France, who are particularly fond of framing
+theories and experimenting on them for the edification of other
+nations, availed themselves of the general upturning of affairs in
+1789, to introduce a universal decimal system, to be applied to
+everything whatever that could be counted, weighed, or measured. They
+started from the measurement of the globe itself, and took as the
+basis of their whole system the ten-millionth part of a quadrant of a
+meridian, equal to 39-371/1000 inches English. This they called a
+mčtre (measure), and to it, as a unit, they prefixed the Greek
+numerals to express increase in the decimal ratio; thus decamčtres,
+tens of meters; hectamčtres, hundreds of meters; and so on. To express
+diminution in the decimal ratio, they used the Latin numerals; thus,
+decimčtres, tenths of meters; centimčtres, hundredths of meters;
+milliamčtres, thousandths of meters. The unit adopted for square
+measure was the _are_, equal to 100 square meters; for solid measure,
+the _stčre_, equal to one cubic meter; and for measure of capacity,
+the _litre_, a cubic decimeter. The weights were derived from these
+measures; the _gramme_ being the weight of one cubic centimeter of
+distilled water. The system of decimal gradation was applied to all of
+these; that is, each denomination represented a tenth part of the one
+above it, and ten times as much as the one next below it, the Latin
+and Greek numerals being prefixed as we have already described with
+reference to the meter. In conformity with this decimal law, the
+quadrant was divided, for astronomical purposes, into 100 degrees
+instead of 90; and the thermometer likewise into 100 degrees from the
+boiling to the freezing point. At the same time, a system of reckoning
+money by tens was introduced; and it must be owned, that the whole
+system of computation in weights, measures, and money established in
+France at this period, is one of the greatest triumphs of
+civilisation. In ordinary transactions, old denominations of money are
+still used by the French; the _sous_, in particular, being apparently
+ineradicable. But in book-keeping, the furnishing of accounts, and in
+literature, the modern and legal standards are invariably adhered to.
+
+About thirty years ago, the Americans took it into serious
+consideration whether they should adopt the ready-made scale of France
+entire. On that occasion (1821), Mr John Quincy Adams produced a most
+elaborate report to Congress, containing an immense amount of
+information on the subject of metrology. He found great fault with the
+French nomenclature, so puzzling to the unlearned. 'Give the people,'
+said he, 'but their accustomed _words_, and they will call 16 a dozen;
+120, 112, or any other number, a hundred.' He disapproved, likewise,
+of thrusting the decimal principle upon things incompatible with it.
+'Decimal arithmetic,' said he, 'is a contrivance of man for computing
+numbers, and not a property of time, space, or matter. It belongs
+essentially to the keeping of accounts, but is merely an incident to
+the transactions of trade. Nature has no partiality for the number 10;
+and the attempt to shackle her freedom with them [decimal gradations],
+will for ever prove abortive.' And again: 'To the mensuration of the
+surface and the solid, the number 10 is of little more use than any
+other. If decimal arithmetic is incompetent to give the dimensions of
+most artificial forms, the square and the cube, still more incompetent
+is it to give the circumference, the area, and the contents of the
+circle and the sphere.' And once more: 'The new metrology of France,
+after trying the principle of decimal division in its almost universal
+application, has been compelled to renounce it for all the measures of
+astronomy, geography, navigation, time, the circle, and the sphere; to
+modify it even for superficial and cubical linear measure.' The
+conclusion of the Americans was, that it was better to continue the
+use of the system of weights and measures inherited from the
+father-land. Partly on account of our intimate commercial relations
+with them, they are content to wait, and allow us to take the lead in
+the work of reform.
+
+Taking our stand on the ground of mere practical utility, according to
+the views suggested, we do not advocate any interference with the
+foot, the rood, the acre, the mile, which would lead to the removal of
+old landmarks, and would render almost every chart and map and book in
+the country obsolete. But we suggest that the time has arrived when
+our national weights and measures may be finally adjusted on simple
+and scientific principles. Within the last thirty years, a principle
+that goes far towards clearing our way has been laid down, and in part
+carried into practice. By an act of the British legislature, which
+came into operation on the 1st January 1826, our standards were
+accurately adjusted, and certain rules were laid down, by which they
+could be restored if lost; while the uniform use of these in the
+business of the country was strictly enjoined. The imperial yard,
+which is the basis of the whole, is to be found in the following
+manner:--'Take a pendulum, vibrating seconds of time, in the latitude
+of London, in vacuum and at the level of the sea; divide all that part
+thereof which lies between the axis of suspension and the centre of
+oscillation into 391,393 equal parts; then will 10,000 of these parts
+be an imperial inch, 12 whereof make a foot, and 36 whereof make a
+yard.' All other measures of linear extension are to be computed from
+this. Thus, 'the foot, the inch, the pole, the furlong, and the mile,
+shall bear the same proportion to the imperial standard yard as they
+have hitherto borne to the yard measure in general use.' For the
+determination of weights, take a cube of an imperial inch of distilled
+water at 62 degrees Fahrenheit; let this be weighed with any weight,
+and let such weight be divided into 252,458 equal parts; then will a
+thousand of such parts be a _troy_ grain, of which 5760 make a pound
+troy, and 7000 a pound avoirdupois.
+
+'This troy-weight,' said the commissioners, 'appeared to us to be the
+ancient weight of this kingdom, having existed in the same state from
+the time of Edward the Confessor.' 'We were induced, moreover,' said
+they, 'to preserve the troy-weight, because all the coinage has been
+uniformly regulated by it, and all medical prescriptions and formulę
+have always been estimated by troy-weight, under a peculiar
+subdivision which the college of physicians have expressed themselves
+most anxious to preserve.' It was resolved, therefore, to continue the
+use of troy-weight for drugs, bullion, &c. and to raise the
+avoirdupois on its basis. The commissioners went on to say: 'The
+avoirdupois pound, by which all heavy goods have been for a long time
+weighed, seems not to have been preserved with such scrupulous
+accuracy as the troy, by which more precious articles have been
+weighed;' but it was so nearly equivalent to 7000 grains troy, that
+they determined this should be its standard for the future. Measures
+of capacity were to be based upon this weight, and not, as heretofore,
+on cubic inches. Ten lbs. avoirdupois of distilled water weighed in
+air at the temperature of 62 degrees Fahrenheit, and the barometer at
+30 inches, were henceforth to determine the imperial gallon, to the
+utter abolition of three distinct gallons for wine, ale, and corn,
+based respectively on the specific bulk and gravity of Bordeaux wine,
+English ale, and grains of wheat. All other measures were to be taken
+in parts or multiples of the said imperial standard gallon, according
+to the proportions hitherto in use. A great reform in this connection,
+was the obligation of dealers to sell most solid commodities--as coal,
+bread, potatoes, &c.--by weight and not by measure, which had been
+liable to great abuses. Corn, however, was not included in this
+provision; nor has even the use of the imperial bushel been
+universally enforced where it interfered with the long-established
+usages of corporate bodies.
+
+To carry thus far into effect these newly-established measures,
+required no common exercise of authority. Every dealer, wholesale or
+retail, was obliged to have his weights verified and stamped. The
+brewer was compelled to get new casks; the retailer new pots and
+pints; the farmer new bushels, and, consequently, new corn-sacks. The
+expense thus incurred was enormous, and the grumbling was of course in
+due proportion.
+
+It is believed that the units above mentioned--the yard, the pound
+avoirdupois, and the imperial gallon--cannot now be superseded by any
+other. It remains to shew, as Mr Taylor has very satisfactorily
+done,[1] how that which has been well begun may be followed out and
+completed by the establishment of more complete uniformity, and the
+legalisation of decimal gradations for facilitating calculation.
+
+The two co-existing pounds originally adjusted in relation to the
+specific gravities of wheat and spring-water, are now the sole remains
+and representatives of a fanciful theory spun in the middle ages; and
+the first question that occurs is, whether the pound troy, having
+served its purpose, might not be done away with, and the pound
+avoirdupois ascertained by reference to a cubic inch of distilled
+water. We were told forty years ago, that for the introduction of a
+uniform and scientific system, we must wait for the spread of
+education in the community; and we feel somewhat ashamed now to find
+that the members of the medical profession, which is understood to be
+one of the most highly-educated bodies, offer the most formidable
+opposition to reformation in this respect. 'The testimony, however,'
+says Mr Taylor, 'of many individuals of the medical profession,
+especially the younger portion, and certainly that of the retailers
+and dispensers of drugs, tends entirely to shew the practicability of
+a beneficial and convenient change. With all these, there appears no
+more serious difficulty to encounter than that involved in altered
+editions of their usual dispensatories, or books of reference'--an
+amount of trouble and expense, we should say, not greater, certainly,
+in proportion to the position of the parties concerned, than that
+which was forced on the poor chandlers and milkwomen by the act of
+1826.
+
+Then, to adapt the avoirdupois pound to the further objects in view,
+it must be reconstructed as to its divisional parts. In order to this,
+it is not necessary that the nomenclature should be changed, or that
+our poor people should be puzzled with the _decas_, and _hexas_, and
+_millias_ which has formed the greatest practical difficulty in the
+decimal system of France. It is proposed simply to divide the pound
+avoirdupois into 10,000 parts instead of 7000, and to employ names at
+present in use for the minor denominations; but if it be thought
+incongruous to retain the term _grain_, which had reference to the
+weight of wheat or barley, _minim_ might be substituted. Then the
+multiples of the pound, which have hitherto been so various, are to be
+decimally graduated--as, stones of 10 lbs., cwts. of 10 stone (or,
+literally, 100 lbs.), and tons of 10 cwt. The decimal measures below
+the gallon would correspond of course with the weights, as it is
+decided by the act, that a gallon is to contain ten pounds of water.
+The measures above gallons, it is proposed to call firkins and butts.
+
+It is taken for granted that quarts and pints, as well as half-pounds
+and quarter-pounds, would still be continued in use. In France, the
+government was obliged to relax its decimal principles in favour of
+permitting a partial return to the binary mode of subdivision. Mr
+Adams, who is high authority on such a point, avers that such
+divisions are 'as necessary to the practical use of weights and
+measures, as the decimal divisions are convenient for calculations
+resulting from them.' If this be admitted, almost the only change to
+retailers of ordinary commodities would be the introduction of the new
+ounce weight, altered to the tenth of a pound, with price in
+correspondence; and perhaps the fluid pound, or tenth of a gallon. If,
+however, the latter were likely to be generally used by the masses, it
+would be desirable that it should bear a more familiar name. But
+probably it would be little known, except as the highest denomination
+generally used by the apothecary; in which case the nomenclature would
+be all the better for expressing the value of the measure
+scientifically in relation to distilled water, as is now usually done
+by this class.
+
+It is easy to shew the practical advantages that would result in
+mercantile calculations if such a scale were adopted, and especially
+in connection with the decimal system of money advocated in a former
+number of this Journal.[2] If a parcel of goods weighs 13 cwt., 7
+stone, 8 lbs., and it be desired to know how many pounds it contains,
+it is unnecessary to change a single figure to shew that there are
+1378; an additional cipher gives the number of ounces (137,80);
+another the number of drachms (137,800), instead of requiring the
+present tedious process of reduction. Again: if any commodity costs,
+for instance, 2 fl. 3 cents per lb., we know without taking up a pen
+that it is 2 cents 3 mil. per ounce; that it is L.2, 3 fl. per stone;
+L.23 per cwt.; L.230 per ton; and so on. Here is a cargo--no matter of
+what--weighing 374 tons, 7 cwt. 4 st. If the value is, for instance,
+L.2, 3s. per ton, we have but to multiply the figures 37474 by 23, and
+_point_ the amount thus--L.861.9.0.2. If, however, the price be L.2,
+3s. per cwt., the point after the pounds, which is the only essential
+one, must be removed a step further to the right--thus, L.8619.0.2;
+and if L.2, 3s. per stone, it will be L.86190.2. Let any one try the
+difference between these operations and similar calculations according
+to our present system, and he will confess it is no mean advantage
+that the advocates of decimal gradations are seeking to obtain for the
+community.
+
+We are happy to add, that since our article on Decimal Coinage
+appeared, we have received numerous communications on the subject; and
+while there are minor differences of opinion as to the details, there
+appears to be perfect unanimity as to the desirableness of the system,
+and the possibility of bringing it into general use.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] _The Decimal System_. By Henry Taylor. London: Groombridge & Sons.
+
+[2] See No. 428.
+
+
+
+
+THE LITTLE GRAY GOSSIP.
+
+
+Soon after Cousin Con's marriage, we were invited to stay for a few
+weeks with the newly-married couple, during the festive winter season;
+so away we went with merry hearts, the clear frosty air and pleasant
+prospect before us invigorating our spirits, as we took our places
+inside the good old mail-coach, which passed through the town of
+P----, where Cousin Con resided, for there were no railways then.
+Never was there a kinder or more genial soul than Cousin Con; and
+David Danvers, the goodman, as she laughingly called him, was, if
+possible, kinder and more genial still. They were surrounded by
+substantial comforts, and delighted to see their friends in a
+sociable, easy way, and to make them snug and cosy, our arrival being
+the signal for a succession of such convivialities. Very mirthful and
+enjoyable were these evenings, for Con's presence always shed radiant
+sunshine, and David's honest broad face beamed upon her with
+affectionate pride. During the days of their courtship at our house,
+they had perhaps indulged in billing and cooing a little too freely
+when in company with others, for sober middle-aged lovers like
+themselves; thereby lying open to animadversions from prim spinsters,
+who wondered that Miss Constance and Mr Danvers made themselves so
+ridiculous. But now all this nonsense had sobered down, and nothing
+could be detected beyond a sly glance, or a squeeze of the hand now
+and then; yet we often quizzed them about by-gones, and declared that
+engaged pairs were insufferable--we could always find them out among a
+hundred!
+
+'I'll bet you anything you like,' cried Cousin Con, with a
+good-humoured laugh, 'that among our guests coming this evening'
+(there was to be a tea-junketing), 'you'll not be able to point out
+the engaged couple--for there will be only _one_ such present--though
+plenty of lads and lasses that would like to be so happily situated!
+But the couple I allude to are real turtledoves, and yet I defy you to
+find them out!'
+
+'Done, Cousin Con!' we exclaimed; 'and what shall we wager?'
+
+'Gloves! gloves to be sure!' cried David. 'Ladies always wager gloves;
+though I can tell you, my Con is on the safe side now;' and David
+rubbed his hands, delighted with the joke; and _we_ already, in
+perspective, beheld our glove-box enriched with half-a-dozen pair of
+snowy French sevens!
+
+Never had we felt more interested in watching the arrivals and
+movements of strangers, than on this evening, for our honour was
+concerned, to detect the lovers, and raise the veil. Papas and mammas,
+and masters and misses, came trooping in; old ladies, and middle-aged;
+old gentlemen, and middle-aged--until the number amounted to about
+thirty, and Cousin Con's drawing-rooms were comfortably filled. We
+closely scrutinised all the young folks, and so intently but covertly
+watched their proceedings, that we could have revealed several
+innocent flirtations, but nothing appeared that could lead us to the
+turtledoves and their engagement. At length, we really had hopes, and
+ensconced ourselves in a corner, to observe the more cautiously a
+tall, beautiful girl, whose eyes incessantly turned towards the door
+of the apartment; while each time it opened to admit any one, she
+sighed and looked disappointed, as if that one was not the one she
+yearned to see. We were deep in a reverie, conjuring up a romance of
+which she was the heroine, when a little lady, habited in gray, whose
+age might average threescore, unceremoniously seated herself beside
+us, and immediately commenced a conversation, by asking if we were
+admiring pretty Annie Mortimer--following the direction of our looks.
+On receiving a reply in the affirmative, she continued: 'Ah, she's a
+good, affectionate girl; a great favourite of mine is sweet Annie
+Mortimer.'
+
+'Watching for her lover, no doubt?' we ventured to say, hoping to gain
+the desired information, and thinking of our white kid-gloves. 'She is
+an engaged young lady?'
+
+'Engaged! engaged!' cried the little animated lady: 'no indeed. The
+fates forbid! Annie Mortimer is not engaged.' The expression of the
+little lady's countenance at our bare supposition of so natural a
+fact, amounted almost to the ludicrous; and we with some difficulty
+articulated a serious rejoinder, disavowing all previous knowledge,
+and therefore erring through ignorance. We had now time to examine our
+new acquaintance more critically. As we have already stated, she was
+habited in gray; but not only was her attire gray, but she was
+literally gray all over: gray hairs, braided in a peculiar obsolete
+fashion, and quite uncovered; gray gloves; gray shoes; and, above all,
+gray eyes, soft, large, and peculiarly sad in expression, yet
+beautiful eyes, redeeming the gray, monotonous countenance from
+absolute plainness. Mary Queen of Scots, we are told, had gray eyes;
+and even she, poor lady, owned not more speaking or history-telling
+orbs than did this little unknown gossip in gray. But our attention
+was diverted from the contemplation, by the entrance of another actor
+on the stage, to whom Annie Mortimer darted forward with an
+exclamation of delight and welcome. The new-comer was a slender,
+elderly gentleman, whose white hairs, pale face, and benignant
+expression presented nothing remarkable in their aspect, beyond a
+certain air of elegance and refinement, which characterised the whole
+outward man.
+
+'That is a charming-looking old gentleman,' said we to the gray lady;
+'is he Annie's father?'
+
+'Her father! O dear, no! That gentleman is a bachelor; but he is
+Annie's guardian, and has supplied the place of a father to her, for
+poor Annie is an orphan.'
+
+'Oh!' we exclaimed, and there was a great deal of meaning in our oh!
+for had we not read and heard of youthful wards falling in love with
+their guardians? and might not the fair Annie's taste incline this
+way? The little gray lady understood our thoughts, for she smiled, but
+said nothing; and while we were absorbed with Annie and her supposed
+antiquated lover, she glided into the circle, and presently we beheld
+Annie's guardian, with Annie leaning on his arm, exchange a few words
+with her in an undertone, as she passed them to an inner room.
+
+'Who is that pleasing-looking old gentleman?' said we to our hostess;
+'and what is the name of the lady in gray, who went away just as you
+came up? That is Annie Mortimer we know, and we know also that she
+isn't engaged!'
+
+Cousin Con laughed heartily as she replied: 'That nice old gentleman
+is Mr Worthington, our poor curate; and a poor curate he is likely
+ever to continue, so far as we can see. The lady in gray we call our
+"little gray gossip," and a darling she is! As to Annie, you seem to
+know all about her. I suppose little Bessie has been lauding her up to
+the skies.'
+
+'Who is little Bessie?' we inquired.
+
+'Little Bessie is your little gray gossip: we never call her anything
+but Bessie to her face; she is a harmless little old maid. But come
+this way: Bessie is going to sing, for they won't let her rest till
+she complies; and Bessie singing, and Bessie talking, are widely
+different creatures.'
+
+Widely different indeed! Could this be the little gray lady seated at
+the piano, and making it speak? while her thrilling tones, as she sang
+of 'days gone by,' went straight to each listener's heart, she herself
+looking ten years younger! When the song was over, I observed Mr
+Worthington, with Annie still resting on his arm, in a corner of the
+apartment, shaded by a projecting piece of furniture; and I also noted
+the tear on his furrowed cheek, which he hastily brushed away, and
+stooped to answer some remark of Annie's, who, with fond affection,
+had evidently observed it too, endeavouring to dispel the painful
+illusion which remembrances of days gone by occasioned.
+
+We at length found the company separating, and our wager still
+unredeemed. The last to depart was Mr Worthington, escorting Annie
+Mortimer and little Bessie, whom he shawled most tenderly, no doubt
+because she was a poor forlorn little old maid, and sang so sweetly.
+
+The next morning at breakfast, Cousin Con attacked us, supported by Mr
+Danvers, both demanding a solution of the mystery, or the scented
+sevens! After a vast deal of laughing, talking, and discussion, we
+were obliged to confess ourselves beaten, for there had been an
+engaged couple present on the previous evening, and we had failed to
+discover them. No; it was not Annie Mortimer: she had no lover. No; it
+was not the Misses Halliday, or the Masters Burton: they had flirted
+and danced, and danced and flirted indiscriminately; but as to serious
+engagements--pooh! pooh!
+
+Who would have conjectured the romance of reality that was now
+divulged? and how could we have been so stupid as not to have read it
+at a glance? These contradictory exclamations, as is usual in such
+cases, ensued when the riddle was unfolded. It is so easy to be wise
+when we have learned the wisdom. Yet we cheerfully lost our wager, and
+would have lost a hundred such, for the sake of hearing a tale so far
+removed from matter-of-fact; proving also that enduring faith and
+affection are not so fabulous as philosophers often pronounce them to
+be.
+
+Bessie Prudholm was nearly related to David Danvers, and she had been
+the only child of a talented but improvident father, who, after a
+short, brilliant career as a public singer, suddenly sank into
+obscurity and neglect, from the total loss of his vocal powers,
+brought on by a violent rheumatic cold and lasting prostration of
+strength. At this juncture, Bessie had nearly attained her twentieth
+year, and was still in mourning for an excellent mother, by whom she
+had been tenderly and carefully brought up. From luxury and indulgence
+the descent to poverty and privation was swift. Bessie, indeed,
+inherited a very small income in right of her deceased parent,
+sufficient for her own wants, and even comforts, but totally
+inadequate to meet the thousand demands, caprices, and fancies of her
+ailing and exigeant father. However, for five years she battled
+bravely with adversity, eking out their scanty means by her
+exertions--though, from her father's helpless condition, and the
+constant and unremitting attention he required, she was in a great
+measure debarred from applying her efforts advantageously. The poor,
+dying man, in his days of health, had contributed to the enjoyment of
+the affluent, and in turn been courted by them; but now, forgotten and
+despised, he bitterly reviled the heartless world, whose hollow meed
+of applause it had formerly been the sole aim of his existence to
+secure. Wealth became to his disordered imagination the desideratum of
+existence, and he attached inordinate value to it, in proportion as
+he felt the bitter stings of comparative penury. To guard his only
+child--whom he certainly loved better than anything else in the world,
+save himself--from this dreaded evil, the misguided man, during his
+latter days, extracted from her an inviolable assurance, never to
+become the wife of any individual who could not settle upon her,
+subject to no contingencies or chances, the sum of at least one
+thousand pounds.
+
+Bessie, who was fancy-free, and a lively-spirited girl, by no means
+relished the slights and privations which poverty entails. She
+therefore willingly became bound by this solemn promise; and when her
+father breathed his last, declaring that she had made his mind
+comparatively easy, little Bessie half smiled, even in the midst of
+her deep and natural sorrow, to think how small and easy a concession
+her poor father had exacted, when her own opinions and views so
+perfectly coincided with his. The orphan girl took up her abode with
+the mother of David Danvers, and continued to reside with that worthy
+lady until the latter's decease. It was beneath the roof of Mrs
+Danvers that Bessie first became acquainted with Mr Worthington--that
+acquaintance speedily ripening into a mutual and sincere attachment.
+He was poor and patronless then, as he had continued ever since, with
+slender likelihood of ever possessing L.100 of his own, much less
+L.1000 to settle on a wife. It is true, that in the chances and
+changes of this mortal life, Paul Worthington might succeed to a fine
+inheritance; but there were many lives betwixt him and it, and Paul
+was not the one to desire happiness at another's expense, nor was
+sweet little Bessie either.
+
+Yet was Paul Worthington rich in one inestimable possession, such as
+money cannot purchase--even in the love of a pure devoted heart, which
+for him, and for his dear sake, bravely endured the life-long
+loneliness and isolation which their peculiar circumstances induced.
+Paul did not see Bessie grow old and gray: in his eyes, she never
+changed; she was to him still beautiful, graceful, and enchanting; she
+was his betrothed, and he came forth into the world, from his books,
+and his arduous clerical and parochial duties, to gaze at intervals
+into her soft eyes, to press her tiny hand, to whisper a fond word,
+and then to return to his lonely home, like a second Josiah Cargill,
+to try and find in severe study oblivion of sorrow.
+
+Annie Mortimer had been sent to him as a ministering angel: she was
+the orphan and penniless daughter of Mr Worthington's dearest friend
+and former college-chum, and she had come to find a shelter beneath
+the humble roof of the pious guardian, to whose earthly care she had
+been solemnly bequeathed. Paul's curacy was not many miles distant
+from the town where Bessie had fixed her resting-place; and it was
+generally surmised by the select few who were in the secret of little
+Bessie's singular history, that she regarded Annie Mortimer with
+especial favour and affection, from the fact, that Annie enjoyed the
+privilege of solacing and cheering Paul Worthington's declining years.
+Each spoke of her as a dear adopted daughter, and Annie equally
+returned the affection of both.
+
+Poor solitaries! what long anxious years they had known, separated by
+circumstance, yet knit together in the bonds of enduring love!
+
+I pictured them at festive winter seasons, at their humble solitary
+boards; and in summer prime, when song-birds and bright perfumed
+flowers call lovers forth into the sunshine rejoicingly. They had not
+dared to rejoice during their long engagement; yet Bessie was a
+sociable creature, and did not mope or shut herself up, but led a life
+of active usefulness, and was a general favourite amongst all classes.
+They had never contemplated the possibility of evading Bessie's solemn
+promise to her dying father; to their tender consciences, that fatal
+promise was as binding and stringent, as if the gulf of marriage or
+conventual vows yawned betwixt them. We had been inclined to indulge
+some mirth at the expense of the little gray gossip, when she first
+presented herself to our notice; but now we regarded her as an object
+of interest, surrounded by a halo of romance, fully shared in by her
+charming, venerable lover. And this was good Cousin Con's elucidation
+of the riddle, which she narrated with many digressions, and with
+animated smiles, to conceal tears of sympathy. Paul Worthington and
+little Bessie did not like their history to be discussed by the rising
+frivolous generation; it was so unworldly, so sacred, and they looked
+forward with humble hope so soon to be united for ever in the better
+land, that it pained and distressed them to be made a topic of
+conversation.
+
+Were we relating fiction, it would be easy to bring this antiquated
+pair together, even at the eleventh hour; love and constancy making up
+for the absence of one sweet ingredient, evanescent, yet
+beautiful--the ingredient we mean of youth. But as this is a romance
+of reality, we are fain to divulge facts as they actually occurred,
+and as we heard them from authentic sources. Paul and Bessie, divided
+in their lives, repose side by side in the old church-yard. He dropped
+off first, and Bessie doffed her gray for sombre habiliments of darker
+hue. Nor did she long remain behind, loving little soul! leaving her
+property to Annie Mortimer, and warning her against long engagements.
+
+The last time we heard of Annie, she was the happy wife of an
+excellent man, who, fully coinciding in the opinion of the little gray
+gossip, protested strenuously against more than six weeks' courtship,
+and carried his point triumphantly.
+
+
+
+
+THE WET SHROUD.
+
+    'Ach, Sohn! was hält dich zurück?'
+    'Siehe, Mutter, das sind die Thränen.'
+
+                          MUTTERTHRÄNEN.
+
+
+      They gave her back again:
+    They never asked to see her face;
+    But gazed upon her vacant place,
+      Moaning, like those in pain.
+
+      There was a brief hot thirst;
+    A thirsting of the heart for streams
+    Which never more save in sweet dreams
+      From that lost fount should burst.
+
+      There was a frightful cry,
+    As if the whole great earth were dead;
+    Yet was one arrow only sped,
+      One, only, called to die.
+
+      Then all grew calm as sleep;
+    And they in household ways once more
+    Did go: the anguish half was o'er,
+      For they had learned to weep.
+
+      They stood about her bed,
+    And whispered low beneath their cloud;
+    For she might hear them speaking loud--
+      She was so near, they said.
+
+      Softly her pillow pressing,
+    With reverent brows they mutely lay;
+    They scarcely missed the risen clay
+      In her pure soul's caressing.
+
+      Last, from their eyes were driven
+    Those heart-drops, lest--so spoke their fears--
+    Her robes all heavy with their tears
+      Might clog her flight to Heaven!
+
+                                    E.L.H.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Printed and Published by W. and R. CHAMBERS, High Street, Edinburgh.
+Also sold by W. S. ORR, Amen Corner, London; D. N. CHAMBERS, 55 West
+Nile Street, Glasgow; and J. M'GLASHAN, 50 Upper Sackville Street,
+Dublin.--Advertisements for Monthly Parts are requested to be sent to
+MAXWELL & Co., 31 Nicholas Lane, Lombard Street, London, to whom all
+applications respecting their insertion must be made.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
+
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+
+
+<pre>
+
+Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437
+       Volume 17, New Series, May 15, 1852
+
+Author: Various
+
+Editor: Robert Chambers and William Chambers
+
+Release Date: July 23, 2006 [EBook #18898]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Richard J. Shiffer and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<h1>CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL</h1>
+
+<h2><a name="Contents" id="Contents">CONTENTS</a></h2>
+
+<div class="contents">
+
+<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. -->
+<p>
+<a href="#LONDON_CROSSING-SWEEPERS"><b>LONDON CROSSING-SWEEPERS.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#INSECT_WINGS"><b>INSECT WINGS.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#RUSTICATION_IN_A_FRENCH_VILLAGE"><b>RUSTICATION IN A FRENCH VILLAGE.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#PHANTOMS_OF_THE_FAR_EAST"><b>PHANTOMS OF THE FAR EAST.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#DECIMAL_SYSTEM_OF_WEIGHTS_AND_MEASURES"><b>DECIMAL SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#THE_LITTLE_GRAY_GOSSIP"><b>THE LITTLE GRAY GOSSIP.</b></a><br />
+<a href="#THE_WET_SHROUD"><b>THE WET SHROUD.</b></a><br />
+</p>
+<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. -->
+</div>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[pg 305]</a></span></p>
+
+<img src="images/banner.png"
+          width="100%"
+          alt="Banner: Chambers' Edinburgh Journal" />
+
+<h4>CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF 'CHAMBERS'S
+INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &amp;c.</h4>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+<table width="100%"
+        summary="Volume, Date and Price">
+<tr>
+<td align="left"><b><span class="sc">No.</span> 437.&nbsp;&nbsp; <span class="sc">New Series.</span></b></td>
+<td align="left"><b>SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1852.</b></td>
+<td align="right"><b><span class="sc">Price</span> 1&frac12;<i>d</i>.</b></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+
+<h2><a name="LONDON_CROSSING-SWEEPERS" id="LONDON_CROSSING-SWEEPERS"></a>LONDON CROSSING-SWEEPERS.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>There is no occupation in life, be it ever so humble, which is justly
+worthy of contempt, if by it a man is enabled to administer to his
+necessities without becoming a burden to others, or a plague to them
+by the parade of shoeless feet, fluttering rags, and a famished face.
+In the multitudinous drama of life, which on the wide theatre of the
+metropolis is ever enacting with so much intense earnestness, there
+is, and from the very nature of things there always must be, a
+numerous class of supernumeraries, who from time to time, by the force
+of varying circumstances, are pushed and hustled off the stage, and
+shuffled into the side-scenes, the drear and dusky background of the
+world's proscenium. Of the thousands and tens of thousands thus rudely
+dealt with, he is surely not the worst who, wanting a better weapon,
+shoulders a birch-broom, and goes forth to make his own way in the
+world, by removing the moist impediments of filth and refuse from the
+way of his more fortunate fellows. Indeed, look upon him in what light
+you may, he is in some sort a practical moralist. Though far remote
+from the ivy chaplet on Wisdom's glorious brow, yet his stump of
+withered birch inculcates a lesson of virtue, by reminding us, that we
+should take heed to our steps in our journeyings through the
+wilderness of life; and, so far as in him lies, he helps us to do so,
+and by the exercise of a very catholic faith, looks for his reward to
+the value he supposes us to entertain for that virtue which, from time
+immemorial, has been in popular parlance classed as next to godliness.</p>
+
+<p>Time was, it is said, when the profession of a street-sweeper in
+London was a certain road to competence and fortune&mdash;when the men of
+the brooms were men of capital; when they lived well, and died rich,
+and left legacies behind them to their regular patrons. These palmy
+days, at any rate, are past now. Let no man, or woman either, expect a
+legacy at this time of day from the receiver of his copper dole. The
+labour of the modern sweeper is nothing compared with his of half a
+century ago. The channel of viscous mud, a foot deep, through which,
+so late as the time when George the Third was king, the carts and
+carriages had literally to plough their way, no longer exists, and the
+labour of the sweeper is reduced to a tithe of what it was. He has no
+longer to dig a trench in the morning, and wall up the sides of his
+fosse with stiff earth, hoarded for the purpose, as we have seen him
+doing in the days when 'Boney' was a terror. The city scavengers have
+reduced his work to a minimum, and his pay has dwindled
+proportionately. The twopences which used to be thrown to a sweeper
+will now pay for a ride, and the smallest coin is considered a
+sufficient guerdon for a service so light. But what he has lost in
+substantial emolument, he has gained in <i>morale</i>; he is infinitely
+more polite and attentive than he was; he sweeps ten times as clean
+for a half-penny as he did for twopence or sixpence, and thanks you
+more heartily than was his wont in the days of yore. The truth is,
+that civility, as a speculation, is found to pay; and the want of it,
+even among the very lowest rank of industrials in London, is at the
+present moment not merely a rarity, but an actual phenomenon&mdash;always
+supposing that something is to be got by it.</p>
+
+<p>The increase of vehicles of all descriptions, but more especially
+omnibuses, which are perpetually rushing along the main thoroughfares,
+has operated largely in shutting out the crossing-sweepers from what
+was at one period the principal theatre of their industry.
+Independent, too, of the unbroken stream of carriages which renders
+sweeping during the day impossible, and the collection of small coin
+from the crowd who dart impatiently across the road when a practicable
+breach presents itself, equally so, it is found that too dense a
+population is less favourable to the brotherhood of the broom than one
+ever so sparse and thin. Had the negro of Waithman's obelisk survived
+the advent of Shillibeer, he would have had to shift his quarters, or
+to have drawn upon his three-and-a-half per cents. to maintain his
+position. The sweepers who work on the great lines of traffic from
+Oxford Street west to Aldgate, are consequently not nearly so numerous
+as they once were, though the members of the profession have probably
+doubled their numbers within the last twenty years. They exercise
+considerable judgment in the choice of their locations, making
+frequent experiments in different spots, feeling the pulse of the
+neighbourhood, as it were, ere they finally settle down to establish a
+permanent connection.</p>
+
+<p>We shall come to a better understanding of the true condition of these
+muddy nomads by considering them in various classes, as they actually
+exist, and each of which may be identified without much trouble. The
+first in the rank is he who is bred to the business, who has followed
+it from his earliest infancy, and never dreamed of pursuing any other
+calling. We must designate him as</p>
+
+<p>No. 1. <i>The Professional Sweeper</i>.&mdash;He claims precedence before all
+others, as being to the manner born, and inheriting his broom, with
+all its concomitant advantages, from his father, or mother, as it
+might be. All his ideas, interests, and affections are centered in one
+spot of ground&mdash;the spot he sweeps, and has swept daily for the last
+twenty or thirty years, ever since it was bequeathed to him by his
+parent. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[pg 306]</a></span> companion of his childhood, his youth, and his maturer
+age, is the post buttressed by the curb-stone at the corner of the
+street. To that post, indeed, he is a sort of younger brother. It has
+been his friend and support through many a stormy day and blustering
+night. It is the confidant of his hopes and his sorrows, and
+sometimes, too, his agent and cashier, for he has cut a small basin in
+the top of it, where a passing patron may deposit a coin if he choose,
+under the guardianship of the broom, which, while he is absent for a
+short half-hour discussing a red herring and a crust for his dinner,
+leans gracefully against his friend the post, and draws the attention
+of a generous public to that as the deputy-receiver of the exchequer.
+Our professional friend has a profound knowledge of character: he has
+studied the human face divine all his life, and can read at a glance,
+through the most rigid and rugged lineaments, the indications of
+benevolence or the want of it; and he knows what aspect and expression
+to assume, in order to arouse the sympathies of a hesitating giver. He
+knows every inmate of every house in his immediate neighbourhood; and
+not only that, but he knows their private history and antecedents for
+the last twenty years. He has watched a whole generation growing up
+under his broom, and he looks upon them all as so much material
+destined to enhance the value of his estate. He is the humble
+pensioner of a dozen families: he wears the shoes of one, the
+stockings of another, the shirts of a third, the coats of a fourth,
+and so on; and he knows the taste of everybody's cookery, and the
+temper of everybody's cookmaid, quite as well as those who daily
+devour the one and scold the other. He is intimate with everybody's
+cat and everybody's dog, and will carry them home if he finds them
+straying. He is on speaking terms with everybody's servant-maid, and
+does them all a thousand kind offices, which are repaid with interest
+by surreptitious scraps from the larder, and jorums of hot tea in the
+cold wintry afternoons. On the other hand, if he knows so much, he is
+equally well known: he is as familiar to sight as the Monument on Fish
+Street Hill to those who live opposite; he is part and parcel of the
+street view, and must make a part of the picture whenever it is
+painted, or else it wont be like. You cannot realise the idea of
+meeting him elsewhere; it would be shocking to your nerves to think of
+it: you would as soon think of seeing the Obelisk walking up Ludgate
+Hill, for instance, as of meeting him there&mdash;it could not be. Where he
+goes when he leaves his station, you have not the least notion. He is
+there so soon as it is light in the morning, and till long after the
+gas is burning at night. He is a married man, of course, and his wife,
+a worthy helpmate, has no objection to pull in the same boat with him.
+When Goggs has a carpet to beat&mdash;he beats all the carpets on his
+estate&mdash;Mrs Goggs comes to console the post in his absence. She
+usually signalises her advent by a desperate assault with the broom
+upon the whole length of the crossing: it is plain she never thinks
+that Goggs keeps the place clean enough, and so she brushes him a
+hint. Goggs has a weakness for beer, and more than once we have seen
+him asleep on a hot thirsty afternoon, too palpably under the
+influence of John Barleycorn to admit of a doubt, his broom between
+his legs, and his back against his abstinent friend the post. Somehow,
+whenever this happens, Mrs G. is sure to hear of it, and she walks him
+off quietly, that the spectacle of a sweeper overtaken may not bring a
+disgrace upon the profession; and then, broom in hand, she takes her
+stand, and does his duty for the remainder of the day. The receipts of
+the professional sweeper do not vary throughout the year so much as
+might be supposed. They depend very little upon chance contributions:
+these, there is no doubt, fall off considerably, if they do not fail
+altogether, during a continuance of dry weather, when there is no need
+of the sweeper's services; but the man is remunerated chiefly by
+regular donations from known patrons, who form his connection, and
+who, knowing that he must eat and drink be the weather wet or dry,
+bestow their periodical pittances accordingly.</p>
+
+<p>No. 2 is the <i>Morning Sweeper</i>.&mdash;This is rather a knowing subject,
+one, at least, who is capable of drawing an inference from certain
+facts. There are numerous lines of route, both north and south of the
+great centres of commerce, and all converging towards the city as
+their nucleus, which are traversed, morning and evening, for two or
+three consecutive hours, by bands of gentlemanly-looking individuals:
+clerks, book-keepers, foremen, business-managers, and such like
+responsible functionaries, whose unimpeachable outer integuments
+testify to their regard for appearances. This current of
+respectability sets in towards the city at about half-past six in the
+morning, and continues its flow until just upon ten o'clock, when it
+may be said to be highwater. Though a large proportion of these agents
+of the world's traffic are daily borne to and from their destination
+in omnibuses, still the great majority, either for the sake of
+exercise or economy, are foot-passengers. For the accommodation of the
+latter, the crossing-sweeper stations himself upon the dirtiest
+portion of the route, and clearing a broad and convenient path ere the
+sun is out of bed, awaits the inevitable tide, which must flow, and
+which can hardly fail of bringing him some remuneration for his
+labour. If we are to judge from the fact, that along one line of route
+which we have been in the habit of traversing for several years, we
+have counted as many as fourteen of these morning sweepers in a march
+of little more than two miles, the speculation cannot be altogether
+unprofitable. In traversing the same route in the middle of the day,
+not three of the sweepers would be found at their post; and the reason
+would be obvious enough, since the streets are then comparatively
+deserted, being populous in the morning only, because they are so many
+short-cuts or direct thoroughfares from the suburbs to the city. The
+morning sweeper is generally a lively and active young fellow; often a
+mere child, who is versed in the ways of London life, and who, knowing
+well the value of money from the frequent want of it, is anxious to
+earn a penny by any honest means. Ten to one, he has been brought up
+in the country, and has been tutored by hard necessity, in this great
+wilderness of brick, to make the most of every hour, and of every
+chance it may afford him. He will be found in the middle of the day
+touting for a job at the railway stations, to carry a portmanteau or
+to wheel a truck; or he will be at Smithfield, helping a butcher to
+drive to the slaughterhouse his bargain of sheep or cattle; or in some
+livery-yards, currying a horse or cleaning out a stable. If he can
+find nothing better to employ him, he will return to his sweeping in
+the evening, especially if it be summer-time, and should set in wet at
+five or six o'clock. When it is dark early, he knows that it won't pay
+to resume the broom; commercial gentlemen are not particular about the
+condition of their Wellingtons, when nobody can see to criticise their
+polish, and all they want is to exchange them for slippers as soon as
+possible. If we were to follow the career of this industrious fellow
+up to manhood, we should in all probability find him occupying
+worthily a hard-working but decent and comfortable position in
+society.</p>
+
+<p>No. 3 is the <i>Occasional Sweeper</i>.&mdash;Now and then, in walking the
+interminable streets, one comes suddenly upon very questionable
+shapes, which, however, we don't question, but walk on and account for
+them mythically if we can. Among these singular apparitions which at
+times have startled us, not a few have borne a broom in their hands,
+and appealed to us for a reward for services which, to say the best of
+them, were extremely doubtful. Now an elderly gentleman<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[pg 307]</a></span> in silver
+spectacles, with pumps on his feet, and a roquelaure with a fur-collar
+over his shoulders, and an expression of unutterable anguish in his
+countenance, holds out his hand and bows his head as we pass, and
+groans audibly the very instant we are within earshot of a groan;
+which is a distance of about ten inches in a London atmosphere. Now an
+old, old man, tall, meagre, and decrepit, with haggard eye and
+moonstruck visage, bares his aged head to the pattering rain&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">'Loose his beard and hoary hair<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Stream like a meteor to the troubled air.'<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>He makes feeble and fitful efforts to sweep a pathway across the road,
+and the dashing cab pulls up suddenly just in time to save him from
+being hurled to the ground by the horse. Then he gives it up as a vain
+attempt, and leans, the model of despair, against the wall, and wrings
+his skeleton fingers in agony&mdash;when just as a compassionate matron is
+drawing the strings of her purse, stopping for her charitable purpose
+in a storm of wind and rain, the voice of the policeman is heard over
+her shoulder: 'What! you are here at it again, old chap? Well, I'm
+blowed if I think anything 'll cure you. You'd better put up your pus,
+marm: if he takes your money, I shall take him to the station-us,
+that's all. Now, old chap&mdash;trot, trot, trot!' And away walks the old
+impostor, with a show of activity perfectly marvellous for his years,
+the policeman following close at his heels till he vanishes in the
+arched entry of a court.</p>
+
+<p>The next specimen is perhaps a 'swell' out at elbows, a seedy and
+somewhat ragged remnant of a very questionable kind of gentility&mdash;a
+gentility engendered in 'coal-holes' and 'cider-cellars,' in 'shades,'
+and such-like midnight 'kens'&mdash;suckled with brandy and water and
+port-wine negus, and fed with deviled kidneys and toasted cheese. He
+has run to the end of his tether, is cleaned out even to the last
+disposable shred of his once well-stocked wardrobe; and after fifty
+high-flying and desperate resolves, and twice fifty mean and sneaking
+devices to victimise those who have the misfortune to be assailable by
+him, 'to this complexion he has come at last.' He has made a track
+across the road, rather a slovenly disturbance of the mud than a
+clearance of it; and having finished his performance in a style to
+indicate that he is a stranger to the business, being born to better
+things, he rears himself with front erect and arms a-kimbo, with one
+foot advanced after the approved statuesque model, and exhibits a face
+of scornful brass to an unsympathising world, before whom he stands a
+monument of neglected merit, and whom he doubtless expects to
+overwhelm with unutterable shame for their abominable treatment of a
+man and a brother&mdash;and a gentleman to boot. This sort of exhibition
+never lasts long, it being a kind of standing-dish for which the
+public have very little relish in this practical age. The 'swell'
+sweeper generally subsides in a week or two, and vanishes from the
+stage, on which, however ornamental, he is of very little use.</p>
+
+<p>The occasional sweeper is much oftener a poor countryman, who has
+wandered to London in search of employment, and, finding nothing else,
+has spent his last fourpence in the purchase of a besom, with which he
+hopes to earn a crust. Here his want of experience in town is very
+much against him. You may know him instantly from the old <i>habitu&eacute;</i> of
+the streets: he plants himself in the very thick and throng of the
+most crowded thoroughfare&mdash;the rapids, so to speak, of the human
+current&mdash;where he is of no earthly use, but, on the contrary, very
+much in the way, and where, while everybody wishes him at Jericho, he
+wonders that nobody gives him a copper; or he undertakes impossible
+things, such as the sweeping of the whole width of Charing Cross from
+east to west, between the equestrian statue and Nelson's Pillar,
+where, if he sweep the whole, he can't collect, and if he collect, he
+can't sweep, and he breaks his heart and his back too in a fruitless
+vocation. He picks up experience in time; but he is pretty sure to
+find a better trade before he has learned to cultivate that of a
+crossing-sweeper to perfection.&mdash;Many of these occasional hands are
+Hindoos, Lascars, or Orientals of some sort, whose dark skins,
+contrasted with their white and scarlet drapery, render them
+conspicuous objects in a crowd; and from this cause they probably
+derive an extra profit, as they can scarcely be passed by without
+notice. The sudden promotion of one of this class, who was hailed by
+the Nepaulese ambassador as he stood, broom in hand, in St Paul's
+Churchyard, and engaged as dragoman to the embassy, will be in the
+recollection of the reader. It would be impossible to embrace in our
+category even a tithe of the various characters who figure in London
+as occasional sweepers. A broom is the last resort of neglected and
+unemployed industry, as well as of sudden and unfriended
+ill-fortune&mdash;the sanctuary to which a thousand victims fly from the
+fiends of want and starvation. The broken-down tradesman, the artisan
+out of work, the decayed gentleman, the ruined gambler, the starving
+scholar&mdash;each and all we have indubitably seen brooming the muddy ways
+for the chance of a half-penny or a penny. It is not very long since
+we were addressed in Water Street, Blackfriars, by a middle-aged man
+in a garb of seedy black, who handled his broom like one who played
+upon a strange instrument, and who, wearing the words <i>pauper et
+pedester</i> written on a card stuck in his hat-band, told us, in good
+colloquial Latin, a tale of such horrifying misery and destitution,
+that we shrink from recording it here. We must pass on to the next on
+our list, who is&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>No. 4, the <i>Lucus-a-non</i>, or a sweeper who never sweeps.&mdash;This fellow
+is a vagabond of the first-water, or of the first-mud rather. His
+stock in trade is an old worn-out broom-stump, which he has shouldered
+for these seven years past, and with which he has never displaced a
+pound of soil in the whole period. He abominates work with such a
+crowning intensity, that the very pretence of it is a torture to him.
+He is a beggar without a beggar's humbleness; and a thief, moreover,
+without a thief's hardihood. He crawls lazily about the public ways,
+and begs under the banner of his broom, which constitutes his
+protection against the police. He will collect alms at a crossing
+which he would not cleanse to save himself from starvation; or he will
+take up a position at one which a morning sweeper has deserted for the
+day, and glean the sorry remnants of another man's harvest. He is as
+insensible to shame as to the assaults of the weather; he will watch
+you picking your way through the mire over which he stands sentinel,
+and then impudently demand payment for the performance of a function
+which he never dreams of exercising; or he will stand in your path in
+the middle of the splashy channel, and pester you with whining
+supplications, while he kicks the mire over your garments, and bars
+your passage to the pavement. He is worth nothing, not even the short
+notice we have taken of him, or the trouble of a whipping, which he
+ought to get, instead of the coins that he contrives to extract from
+the heedless generosity of the public.</p>
+
+<p>No. 5 is the <i>Sunday Sweeper</i>.&mdash;This neat, dapper, and cleanly variety
+of the genus besom, is usually a young fellow, who, pursuing some
+humble and ill-paid occupation during the week, ekes out his modest
+salary by labouring with the broom on the Sunday. He has his regular
+'place of worship,' one entrance of which he monopolises every Sabbath
+morning. Long before the church-going bell rings out the general
+invitation, he is on the spot, sweeping a series of paths all
+radiating from the church or chapel door to the different points of
+the compass. The business he has cut out for himself is no sinecure;
+he does his work so effectually, that you marvel at the achievement,
+and doubt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[pg 308]</a></span> if the floor of your dwelling be cleaner. Then he is
+himself as clean as a new pin, and wears a flower in his button-hole,
+and a smile on his face, and thanks you so becomingly, and bows so
+gracefully, that you cannot help wishing him a better office; and of
+course, to prove the sincerity of your wish, you pay him at a better
+rate. When the congregation are all met, and the service is commenced,
+he is religious enough, or knowing enough, to walk stealthily in, and
+set himself upon the poor bench, where he sits quietly, well behaved
+and attentive to the end; for which very proper conduct he is pretty
+sure to meet an additional reward during the exit of the assembly, as
+they defile past him at the gate when all is over. In the afternoon,
+he is off to the immediate precinct of some park or public promenade;
+and selecting a well-frequented approach to the general rendezvous,
+will cleanse and purify the crossing or pathway in his own peculiar
+and elaborate style, vastly to the admiration of the gaily-dressed
+pedestrians, and it is to be supposed, to his own profit. Besides this
+really clever and enterprising genius, there is a numerous tribe of a
+very different description, who must sally forth literally by the
+thousand every Sunday morning when the weather is fine, and who take
+possession of every gate, stile, and wicket, throughout the widespread
+suburban districts of the metropolis in all directions. They are of
+both sexes and all ages; and go where you will, it is impossible to go
+through a gate, or get over a stile, without the proffer of their
+assistance, for which, of course, you are expected to pay, whether you
+use it or not. Some of these fellows have a truly ruffianly aspect,
+and waylay you in secluded lanes and narrow pathways; and carrying a
+broom-stump, which looks marvellously like a bludgeon, no doubt often
+levy upon the apprehensions of a timorous pedestrian a contribution
+which his charity would not be so blind as to bestow. The whole of
+this tribe constitute a monster-nuisance, which ought to be abated by
+the exertions of the police.</p>
+
+<p>No. 6 are the <i>deformed</i>, <i>maimed</i>, <i>and crippled sweepers</i>, of whom
+there is a considerable number constantly at work, and, to do them
+justice, they appear by no means the least energetic of the
+brotherhood. Nature frequently compensates bodily defects by the
+bestowal of a vigorous temperament. The sweeper of one leg or one arm,
+or the poor cripple who, but for the support of his broom, would be
+crawling on all-fours, is as active, industrious, and efficient as the
+best man on the road; and he takes a pride in the proof of his
+prowess, surveying his work when it is finished with a complacency too
+evident to escape notice. He considers, perhaps, that he has an extra
+claim upon the public on account of the afflictions he has undergone,
+and we imagine that such claim must be pretty extensively allowed: we
+know no other mode of accounting for the fact, that now and then one
+of these supposed maimed or halt performers turns out to be an
+impostor, who, considering a broken limb, or something tantamount to
+that, essential to the success of his broom, concocts an impromptu
+fracture or amputation to serve his purpose. Some few years ago, a
+lively, sailor-looking fellow appeared as a one-handed sweeper in a
+genteel square on the Surrey side of the water. The right sleeve of
+his jacket waved emptily in the wind, but he flourished his left arm
+so vigorously in the air, and completed the gyration of his weapon,
+when it stuck fast in the mud, so manfully by the impulse of his right
+leg, that he became quite a popular favourite, and won '<i>copper</i>
+opinions from all sorts of men,' to say nothing of a shower of
+sixpences from the ladies in the square. Unfortunately for the
+continuance of his prosperity, a gentleman intimate with one of his
+numerous patronesses, while musing in the twilight at an upstairs
+window, saw the fellow enter his cottage after his day's work, release
+his right arm from the durance in which it had lain beneath his jacket
+for ten or twelve hours, and immediately put the power of the
+long-imprisoned limb to the test by belabouring his wife with it. That
+same night every tenant in the square was made acquainted with the
+disguised arm, and the use for which it was reserved, and the
+ingenious performer was the next morning delivered over to the police.
+The law, however, allows a man to dispose of his limbs as he chooses;
+and as the delinquent was never proved to have <i>said</i> that he had lost
+an arm; and as he urged that one arm being enough for the profession
+he had embraced, he considered he had a right to reserve the other
+until he had occasion for it&mdash;he was allowed to go about his business.</p>
+
+<p>No. 7, and the last in our classification, are the <i>Female
+Sweepers</i>.&mdash;It is singular, that among these we rarely if ever
+meet with young women, properly so called. The calling of a
+crossing-sweeper, so far as it is carried on by females, is almost
+entirely divided between children or young girls, and women above the
+age of forty. The children are a very wandering and fickle race,
+rarely staying for many weeks together in a single spot. This love of
+change must militate much against their success, as they lose the
+advantage of the charitable interest they would excite in persons
+accustomed to meet them regularly in their walks. They are not,
+however, generally dependent upon the produce of their own labours for
+a living, being for the most part the children of parents in extremely
+low circumstances, who send them forth with a broom to pick up a few
+halfpence to assist in the daily provision for the family. The older
+women, on the other hand, of whom there is a pretty stout staff
+scattered throughout the metropolis, are too much impressed with the
+importance of adhering constantly to one spot, capriciously to change
+their position. They would dread to lose a connection they have been
+many years in forming, and they will even cling to it after it has
+ceased to be a thoroughfare through the opening of a new route, unless
+they can discover the direction their patrons have taken. When a poor
+old creature, who has braved the rheumatism for thirty years or so,
+finds she can stand it no longer, we have known her induct a successor
+into her office by attending her for a fortnight or more, and
+introducing the new-comer to the friendly regard of her old patrons.
+The exceptions to these two classes of the old and the very juvenile,
+will be found to consist mostly of young widows left with the charge
+of an infant family more or less numerous. Some few of these there
+are, and they meet with that considerate reception from the public
+which their distressing cases demand. The spectacle of a young mother,
+with an infant on one arm muffled up from the driving rain, while she
+plies a broom single-handed, is one which never appeals in vain to a
+London public. With a keen eye for imposture, and a general
+inclination to suspect it, the Londoner has yet compassion, and coin,
+too, to bestow upon a deserving object. It is these poor widows who,
+by rearing their orphaned offspring to wield the broom, supplement the
+ranks of the professional sweepers. They become the heads of sweeping
+families, who in time leave the maternal wing, and shift for
+themselves. We might point to one whom we have encountered almost
+daily for the last ten years. In 1841, she was left a widow with three
+small children, the eldest under four, and the youngest in arms. Clad
+in deep mourning, she took up a position at an angular crossing of a
+square, and was allowed to accommodate the two elder children upon
+some matting spread upon the steps of a door. With the infant in one
+arm, she plied her broom with the other, and held out a small white
+hand for the reception of such charity as the passers-by might choose
+to bestow. The children grew up strong and hearty, in spite of their
+exposure to the weather at all seasons. All three of them are at the
+present moment sweepers in the same line of route, at no great
+distance from the mother, who, during the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[pg 309]</a></span> whole period, has scarcely
+abandoned her post for a single day. Ten years' companionship with sun
+and wind, and frost and rain, have doubled her apparent age, but her
+figure still shews the outline of gentility, and her face yet wears
+the aspect and expression of better days. We have frequently met the
+four returning home together in the deepening twilight, the elder boy
+carrying the four brooms strapped together on his shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>The sweeper does better at holiday seasons than at any other time. If
+he is blessed with a post for a companion, he decks it with a flower
+or sprig of green, and sweeps a clear stage round it, which is said to
+be a difficult exploit, though we have never tried it. At Christmas,
+he expects a double fee from his old patrons, and gets it too, and a
+substantial slice of plum-pudding from the old lady in the first floor
+opposite. He decks the entrance to his walk with laurel and holly, in
+honour of the day, and of his company, who walk under a triumphal arch
+of green, got up for that occasion only. He is sure of a good
+collection on that day, and he goes home with his pocket heavy and his
+heart light, and treats himself to a pot of old ale, warmed over a
+fire kindled with his old broom, and sipped sparingly to the melody of
+a good old song about the good old times, when crossing-sweepers grew
+rich, and bequeathed fortunes to their patrons.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="INSECT_WINGS" id="INSECT_WINGS"></a>INSECT WINGS.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>Animals possess the power of feeling, and of effecting certain
+movements, by the exercise of a muscular apparatus with which their
+bodies are furnished. They are distinguished from the organisations of
+the vegetable kingdom by the presence of these attributes. Every one
+is aware, that when the child sees some strange and unknown object he
+is observing start suddenly into motion, he will exclaim: 'It is
+alive!' By this exclamation, he means to express his conviction that
+the object is endowed with <i>animal</i> life. Power of voluntary and
+independent motion and animal organisation are associated together, as
+inseparable and essentially connected ideas, by even the earliest
+experience in the economy and ways of nature.</p>
+
+<p>The animal faculty of voluntary motion, in almost every case, confers
+upon the creature the ability to transfer its body from place to
+place. In some animals, the weight of the body is sustained by
+immersion in a fluid as dense as itself. It is then carried about with
+very little expenditure of effort, either by the waving action of
+vibratile cilia scattered over its external surface, or by the
+oar-like movement of certain portions of its frame especially adapted
+to the purpose. In other animals, the weight of the body rests
+directly upon the ground, and has, therefore, to be lifted from place
+to place by more powerful mechanical contrivances.</p>
+
+<p>In the lowest forms of air-living animals, the body rests upon the
+ground by numerous points of support; and when it moves, is wriggled
+along piecemeal, one portion being pushed forward while the rest
+remains stationary. The mode of progression which the little earthworm
+adopts, is a familiar illustration of this style of proceeding. In the
+higher forms of air-living animals, a freer and more commodious kind
+of movement is provided for. The body itself is raised up from the
+ground upon pointed columns, which are made to act as levers as well
+as props. Observe, for instance, the tiger-beetle, as it runs swiftly
+over the uneven surface of the path in search of its dinner, with its
+eager antenn&aelig; thrust out in advance. Those six long and slender legs
+that bear up the body of the insect, and still keep advancing in
+regular alternate order, are steadied and worked by cords laid along
+on the hollows and grooves of their own substance. While some of them
+uphold the weight of the superincumbent body, the rest are thrown
+forwards, as fresh and more advanced points of support on to which it
+may be pulled. The running of the insect is a very ingenious and
+beautiful adaptation of the principles of mechanism to the purposes of
+life.</p>
+
+<p>But in the insect organisation, a still more surprising display of
+mechanical skill is made. A comparatively heavy body is not only
+carried rapidly and conveniently along the surface of the ground, it
+is also raised entirely up from it at pleasure, and transported
+through lengthened distances, while resting upon nothing but the thin
+transparent air. From the top of the central piece&mdash;technically termed
+thoracic&mdash;of the insect's body, from which the legs descend, two or
+more membraneous sails arise, which are able to beat the air by
+repeated strokes, and to make it, consequently, uphold their own
+weight, as well as that of the burden connected with them. These
+lifting and sustaining sails are the insect's wings.</p>
+
+<p>The wings of the insect are, however, of a nature altogether different
+from the apparently analogous organs which the bird uses in flight.
+The wings of the bird are merely altered fore-legs. Lift up the front
+extremities of a quadruped, keep them asunder at their origins by bony
+props, fit them with freer motions and stronger muscles, and cover
+them with feathers, and they become wings in every essential
+particular. In the insect, however, the case is altogether different.
+The wings are not altered legs; they are superadded to the legs. The
+insect has its fore-legs as well as its wings. The legs all descend
+from the under surface of the thoracic piece, while the wings arise
+from its upper surface. As the wings are flapping above during flight,
+the unchanged legs are dangling below, in full complement. The wings
+are, therefore, independent and additional organs. They have no
+relation whatever to limbs, properly so called. But there are some
+other portions of the animal economy with which they do connect
+themselves, both by structure and function. The reader will hardly
+guess what those wing-allied organs are.</p>
+
+<p>There is a little fly, called the May-fly, which usually makes its
+appearance in the month of August, and which visits the districts
+watered by the Seine and the Marne in such abundance, that the
+fishermen of these rivers believe it is showered down from heaven, and
+accordingly call its living clouds, manna. Reaumur once saw the
+May-flies descend in this region like thick snow-flakes, and so fast,
+that the step on which he stood by the river's bank was covered by a
+layer four inches thick in a few minutes. The insect itself is very
+beautiful: it has four delicate, yellowish, lace-like wings, freckled
+with brown spots, and three singular hair-like projections hanging out
+beyond its tail. It never touches food during its mature life, but
+leads a short and joyous existence. It dances over the surface of the
+water for three or four hours, dropping its eggs as it flits, and then
+disappears for ever. Myriads come forth about the hour of eight in the
+evening; but by ten or eleven o'clock not a single straggler can be
+found alive.</p>
+
+<p>From the egg which the parent May-fly drops into the water, a
+six-legged grub is very soon hatched. This grub proceeds forthwith to
+excavate for himself a home in the soft bank of the river, below the
+surface of the water, and there remains for two long years, feeding
+upon the decaying matters of the mould. During this aquatic residence,
+the little creature finds it necessary to breathe; and that he may do
+so comfortably, notwithstanding his habits of seclusion, and his
+constant immersion in fluid, he pushes out from his shoulders and back
+a series of delicate little leaf-like plates. A branch of one of the
+air-tubes of his body enters into each of these plates, and spreads
+out into its substance. The plates are, in fact, gills&mdash;that is,
+respiratory organs, fitted for breathing beneath the water. The
+little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[pg 310]</a></span> fellow may be seen to wave them backwards and forwards with
+incessant motion, as he churns up the fluid, to get out of it the
+vital air which it contains.</p>
+
+<p>When the grub of the May-fly has completed his two years of probation,
+he comes out from his subterranean and subaqueous den, and rises to
+the surface of the stream. By means of his flapping and then somewhat
+enlarged gills, he half leaps and half flies to the nearest rush or
+sedge he can perceive, and clings fast to it by means of his legs. He
+then, by a clever twist of his little body, splits open his old fishy
+skin, and slowly draws himself out, head, and body, and legs; and,
+last of all, from some of those leafy gills he pulls a delicate
+crumpled-up membrane, which soon dries and expands, and becomes
+lace-netted and brown-fretted. The membrane which was shut up in the
+gills of the aquatic creature, was really the rudiment of its now
+perfected wings.</p>
+
+<p>The wings of the insect are then a sort of external lungs, articulated
+with the body by means of a movable joint, and made to subserve the
+purposes of flight. Each wing is formed of a flattened bladder,
+extended from the general skin of the body. The sides of this bladder
+are pressed closely together, and would be in absolute contact but for
+a series of branching rigid tubes that are spread out in the
+intervening cavity. These tubes are air-vessels; their interiors are
+lined with elastic, spirally-rolled threads, that serve to keep the
+channels constantly open; and through these open channels the vital
+atmosphere rushes with every movement of the membraneous organ. The
+wing of the May-fly flapping in the air is a respiratory organ, of as
+much importance to the wellbeing of the creature in its way, as the
+gill-plate of its grub prototype is when vibrating under the water.
+But the wing of the insect is not the only respiratory organ: its
+entire body is one vast respiratory system, of which the wings are
+offsets. The spirally-lined air-vessels run everywhere, and branch out
+everywhere. The insect, in fact, circulates air instead of blood. As
+the prick of the finest needle draws blood from the flesh of the
+backboned creature, it draws air from the flesh of the insect. Who
+will longer wonder, then, that the insect is so light? It is aerial in
+its inner nature. Its arterial system is filled with the ethereal
+atmosphere, as the more stolid creature's is with heavy blood.</p>
+
+<p>If the reader has ever closely watched a large fly or bee, he will
+have noticed that it has none of the respiratory movements that are so
+familiar to him in the bodies of quadrupeds and birds. There is none
+of that heaving of the chest, and out-and-in movement of the sides,
+which constitute the visible phenomena of breathing. In the insect's
+economy, no air enters by the usual inlet of the mouth. It all goes in
+by means of small air-mouths placed along the sides of the body, and
+exclusively appropriated to its reception. Squeezing the throat will
+not choke an insect. In order to do this effectually, the sides of the
+body, where the air-mouths are, must be smeared with oil.</p>
+
+<p>In the vertebrated animals, the blood is driven through branching
+tubes to receptacles of air placed within the chest; the air-channels
+terminate in blood extremities, and the blood-vessels cover these as a
+net-work. The mechanical act of respiration merely serves to change
+the air contained within the air-receptacles. In the insects, this
+entire process is reversed; the air is carried by branching tubes to
+receptacles of blood scattered throughout the body; the blood-channels
+terminate in blood-extremities, and a capillary net-work of
+air-vessels is spread over these. Now, in the vertebrated creature,
+the chest is merely the grand air-receptacle into which the blood is
+sent to be a&euml;rated; while in the insect, the chest contains but its
+own proportional share of the great air-system. In the latter case,
+therefore, there is a great deal of available space, which would have
+been, under other circumstances, filled with the respiratory
+apparatus, but is now left free to be otherwise employed. The thoracic
+cavity of the insect serves as a stowage for the bulky and powerful
+muscles that are required to give energy to the legs and wings. The
+portion of the body that is almost exclusively respiratory in other
+animals, becomes almost as exclusively motor in insects. It holds in
+its interior the chief portions of the cords by which the moving
+levers and membranes are worked, and its outer surface is adorned by
+those levers and membranes themselves. Both the legs and wings of the
+insect are attached to the thoracic segment of its body.</p>
+
+<p>The extraordinary powers of flight which insects possess are due to
+the conjoined influences of the two conditions that have been
+named&mdash;the lightness of their air-filled bodies, and the strength of
+their chest-packed muscles. Where light air is circulated instead of
+heavy blood, great vascularity serves only to make existence more
+ethereal. Plethora probably takes the insect nearer to the skies,
+instead of dragging it towards the dust. The hawk-moth, with its burly
+body, may often be seen hovering gracefully, on quivering wings, over
+some favourite flower, as if it were hung there on cords, while it
+rifles it of its store of accumulated sweets by means of its long
+unfolded tongue. The common house-fly makes 600 strokes every second
+in its ordinary flight, and gets through five feet of space by means
+of them; but when alarmed, it can increase the velocity of its
+wing-strokes some five or six fold, and move through thirty-five feet
+in the second. Kirby believed, that if the house-fly were made equal
+to the horse in size, and had its muscular power increased in the same
+proportion, it would be able to traverse the globe with the rapidity
+of lightning. The dragon-fly often remains on the wing in pursuit of
+its prey for hours at a stretch, and yet will sometimes baffle the
+swallow by its speed, although that bird is calculated to be able to
+move at the rate of a mile in a minute. But the dexterity of this
+insect is even more surprising than its swiftness, for it is able to
+do what no bird can: it is able to stop instantaneously in the midst
+of its most rapid course, and change the direction of its flight,
+going sideways or backwards, without altering the position of its
+body.</p>
+
+<p>As a general rule, insect wings that are intended for employment in
+flight are transparent membranes, with the course of the air-tubes
+marked out upon them as opaque nervures. These air-tubes, it will be
+remembered, are lined by spires of dense cartilage; and hence it is
+that they become nervures so well adapted to act like tent-lines in
+keeping the expanded membranes stretched. In the dragon-flies, the
+nervures are minutely netted for the sake of increased strength; in
+the bees, the nervures are simply parallel. Most insects have two
+pairs of these transparent membraneous wings; but in such as burrow,
+one pair is converted into a dense leather-like case, under which the
+other pair are folded away. In the flies, only one pair of wings can
+be found at all, the other pair being changed into two little
+club-shaped bodies, called balancers.</p>
+
+<p>Butterflies and moths are the only insects that fly by means of opaque
+wings; but in their case the opacity is apparent rather than real, for
+it is caused by the presence of a very beautiful layer of coloured
+scales spread evenly over the outer surface of the membranes. When
+these scales are brushed off, membraneous wings of the ordinary
+transparent character are disclosed. The scales are attached to the
+membrane by little stems, like the quill-ends of feathers, and they
+are arranged in overlapping rows. The variegated colours and patterns
+of the insects are entirely due to them. If the wings of a butterfly
+be pressed upon a surface of card-board covered with gum-water to the
+extent of their own outlines, and be left there until the gum-water is
+dry, the outer layer of scales may be rubbed off with a handkerchief,
+and the double membranes and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[pg 311]</a></span> intervening nervures may be picked away
+piecemeal with a needle's point, and there will remain upon the card a
+most beautiful representation of the other surface of the wings, its
+scales being all preserved by the gum in their natural positions. If
+the outlines of the wings be carefully pencilled first, and the
+gum-water be then delicately and evenly brushed on, just as far as the
+outlines, a perfect and durable fac-simile, in all the original
+variety of colour and marking, is procured, which needs only to have
+the form of the body sketched in, to make it a very pretty and
+accurate delineation of the insect.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="RUSTICATION_IN_A_FRENCH_VILLAGE" id="RUSTICATION_IN_A_FRENCH_VILLAGE"></a>RUSTICATION IN A FRENCH VILLAGE.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>Poverty is difficult to bear under any circumstances, but when
+compelled entirely to alter our habits of life in the same place where
+we have lived differently, we certainly feel it more acutely than when
+we at once change the scene, and see around us nothing we can well
+compare with what is past. It is unnecessary to say by what means
+<i>our</i> easy fortune was reduced to a mere pittance; but, alas! it <i>was</i>
+so, and we found ourselves forced to seek another dwelling-place.
+Following the example of most of our country-people in a similar
+situation, therefore, we resolved to go abroad; not, indeed, to enjoy
+society on an income which would in England totally shut us out from
+it, but to live in absolute retirement upon next to nothing. A cousin
+of mine&mdash;whose friend, M<sup>lle</sup> de Flotte, long resident in England,
+had married a countryman of her own, and settled in Normandy&mdash;wrote to
+M<sup>me</sup> de Terelcourt accordingly, to ask if there was a habitable hut
+in her neighbourhood where we might find shelter for three years,
+before which time we were told the settlement of our affairs could
+scarcely be completed. The answer was favourable: there was, she said,
+near the village of Flotte, a cottage which contained a kitchen, three
+rooms, and a garret where a <i>bonne</i> might sleep. A large garden was
+attached to it full of fruit-trees, though in a most neglected
+condition, and even the house requiring to be made weather-tight; but
+as the landlord undertook this latter business, and the rent for the
+whole was only L.12 a year, we gladly closed with the offer, and at
+the end of the month of April proceeded to take possession of our new
+home.</p>
+
+<p>The situation was most lovely. The garden surrounded three sides of
+the cottage, and a large green field, or rather thinly-planted
+apple-orchard, the other, where grazed four fine cows belonging to a
+farm on the opposite side of the lane, which supplied us with butter,
+eggs, and milk, and was near enough not to annoy but to gratify our
+ears with the country sounds so pleasant to those fond of rural
+things, and to give us the feeling of help at hand in case of any
+emergency. We were on the slope of a tolerably lofty hill; the
+high-road was below, where we could see and hear the diligence pass;
+but saving this, the farm-yard noises, and the birds and bees in the
+garden, were the only disturbers of our perfect quiet, except, indeed,
+the soothing sound of a small brook tinkling over a tiny waterfall,
+quite audible, although a good way on the other side of the <i>grande
+route</i>. The town of C&mdash;&mdash; was seen to our right, the sea glittering
+beyond; and a rocky, shrubby dell, through which the little stream
+above mentioned murmured merrily on its way, turning a rustic mill,
+was the prospect from the windows. Two lime-trees stood at the gate,
+inside of which we joyfully discovered an unexpected lodge or cottage,
+containing two little rooms and a large shed, which had not been
+mentioned in the description, and which we found most useful for
+stowing away packing-cases, hampers, and boxes, keeping potatoes and
+apples, and a hundred things besides. The short road&mdash;avenue, our
+landlord termed it&mdash;which led from this to the house, had a
+strawberry-bank on one side, a row of cherry-trees on the other; and
+the garden, although overgrown with weeds and sprawling shrubs, looked
+quite capable of being easily made very pretty indeed. The entrance to
+this our magnificent ch&acirc;teau was through the kitchen only; for the
+room next it, although it could boast of an outside-door likewise, had
+none which opened into the interior of the house, was neither lathed
+nor plastered, and the bare earth was all there was to tread upon.
+Upstairs the flooring consisted merely of planks laid down; and you
+could hear when below the pins dropped from above, unless, indeed,
+they fell, as they generally did, into the large crevices. The bonne's
+<i>mansarde</i> was but a garret, where, till you got into the very middle,
+you could not stand upright; and although the tiled roof had been just
+painted and repaired, the breath of heaven came wooingly in every
+direction, even through the thick-leaved vines which covered it,
+closely trained up there, to make room for the apricots that grew
+against the wall below. Close by, a little stair led you out upon a
+terrace, where a road, bordered by peach-trees and backed by plums,
+gave a dry walk in all weathers; but you could go higher, higher, and
+higher still, terrace after terrace, till it terminated in a rock
+covered with briers and brambles&mdash;the fruit of which latter were as
+large and as good as mulberries. This we called our garden-wall, and
+it had a sunny seat commanding an extensive view, and from which all
+we saw was beautiful. How often have I sat there dreaming, lulled by
+the murmur of the insect world around, till the merry fife of a band
+of conscripts on their march, or the distant boom of a cannon from the
+forts, restored me to a consciousness that I was still at least <i>in</i>
+the world, although not <i>of</i> it.</p>
+
+<p>But now I am going to descend to figures, and can assure my
+incredulous English readers, that what I relate is strictly
+true&mdash;<i>vraie</i>, although not <i>vraisemblable</i>. We hired a stout girl to
+weed and wash, without food, at 2&frac12; d. a day; and another for L.5
+per annum undertook to be our sole servant&mdash;to clean, and cook, and
+dress madame, only stipulating that she was to have <i>soupe &agrave; la
+graisse</i> and brown bread <i>&agrave; discr&eacute;tion</i> three times a day, two sous
+for cider, her aprons, and washing; but hoped if she gave
+satisfaction, that sometimes upon Sunday she might be allowed a bit of
+meat: on Fridays an egg and an apple contented her, and an occasional
+fish made her shout with joy. An old soldier, who had returned to his
+primitive employment of gardener, and lived near, undertook to dig,
+prune, and plant in the garden for a franc a day, during the time we
+ourselves were engaged with the inside of our mansion, and to come
+afterwards at 2d. an hour when we wanted him, either to go to C&mdash;&mdash;
+for marketing, or to do anything else we required, for the hamlet of
+Flotte did not possess many shops. At this hamlet, however, we
+obtained bread and a variety of small articles on very moderate terms.</p>
+
+<p>Having hired the requisite furniture, and papered the walls of our
+apartments, the humble tenement looked clean and comfortable. To get
+all into order, we both worked hard, and very soon could sit down by
+'our own fireside' in a quiet, cheerful house, almost the work of our
+own hands, and therefore every creek and cranny in it full of
+interest. M<sup>me</sup> de Terelcourt, with refined politeness, did not
+attempt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[pg 312]</a></span> to visit us herself until she understood we could receive her
+<i>sans g&eacute;ne</i>; but she sent fruit and vegetables, and kind messages
+constantly, and at last a note intimating that she would, if
+convenient, call upon us after church next day. Strawberries and
+cream, butter, eggs, fresh bread, and the commonest <i>vin ordinaire</i>,
+were easily procured, of which our guest ate heartily, saying she
+would bring the rest of the family next day to partake of a similar
+feast. They came accordingly, and with them a cart loaded with shrubs,
+plants, flowers, and a whole hive of honeycomb, and various little
+comforts besides, pretending that they were thankful to us for
+receiving their superabundance, instead of obliging them to throw it
+away. This hospitable, unaffected kindness continued unabated the
+whole time of our stay, and the kind beings always contrived to make
+out that they were the obliged persons, and we so polite and
+condescending for deigning to receive such trifles. M. and M<sup>me</sup> de
+Terelcourt lived with M. le Marquis de Flotte and his wife; and her
+brother, the Count de Belgravin, occupied a house a quarter of a mile
+distant, which, although by no means a comfortable residence, he
+rented purposely to be near his sister. These amiable people spent a
+part of every day together, for they did not associate much with the
+inhabitants of C&mdash;&mdash;; and I look back with much pleasure to our social
+evenings, when light-hearted merriment constantly prevailed; and I
+often thought how few of the many who talk so gravely of patience and
+resignation to the will of God, could or would understand that
+cheerfulness is, in fact, but a different way of shewing that
+resignation.</p>
+
+<p>Our maid, Batilde, knew nothing about the <i>cuisine</i> beyond a good
+<i>roux</i> and a bad omelet; and except making a bed, appeared ignorant of
+all housework&mdash;even washing, dusting, or sweeping thoroughly. She,
+however, did everything we did not do for ourselves, and ironed the
+linen after a fashion. Tonette washed for us in the little river
+aforesaid, where she used an incredible quantity of soap, thumping our
+things with a piece of flat wood upon a great stone, most
+conveniently, as she observed, placed there for the purpose 'by the
+saints in heaven;' which method, if it hastened its wearing out, made
+our linen at least sweet and clean while it lasted. My husband shot
+and cultivated the garden in the respective seasons appropriate to
+these occupations, whilst I bought a cookery-book called 'Les
+Exp&eacute;riences de Mademoiselle Marguerite;' and pretending to be learning
+myself, taught Batilde to prepare our food a little better, without
+hurting her self-conceit, of which she possessed more than the average
+of her countrywomen. Our time, therefore, was fully occupied. Our
+health improved and our spirits rose with the excitement; we had
+agreeable society in the excellent people named above, meeting <i>sans
+fa&ccedil;on</i>, taking breakfast or luncheon with each other, instead of
+dinners, in winter, and in summer often spending the evening at one
+another's houses.</p>
+
+<p>At a distance not insurmountable there was an English chapel; but the
+character of the clergyman was not of a kind to recommend itself to
+persons who had some regard for the decencies of life; and so we
+contented ourselves with saying our prayers at home. The old cur&eacute; of
+the place, with whom we became slightly acquainted, seemed to be a
+worthy sort of man, liberal in his ideas, and possessed of a
+considerable taste for music. He made rather an agreeable and obliging
+neighbour.</p>
+
+<p>Talking of cur&eacute;s, I may mention that one came from a distance of
+several miles to pay his respects to us, and offer welcome to France.
+He said, he desired to make our acquaintance because we came from
+England, where he had found 'rest for twenty years, and received much
+kindness.' He was a rich man, had a pretty little church, a
+picturesque house in a sort of park, which he had stocked with pigs
+instead of sheep; and every day that was not one of fasting or
+abstinence, he had pork for dinner. He took a great fancy to us, and
+wanted us to give up our cottage, and come and live with him, as he
+had plenty of room and desired society; but we declined. Had we done
+so, I doubt not that he would have left us his money, for he had no
+relations, and bequeathed the whole, for want of an heir, to his
+grocer. He grew cooler after our refusal, but still sometimes came to
+see us on a pot-bellied cart-horse&mdash;a most stolid-looking beast, but
+one which often took most laughably strange fits of friskiness. Once I
+saw the good cur&eacute;'s watch jump out of his pocket, fly over his head,
+and disappear amid a heap of nettles, where little Victor found it,
+and hoped for a rich reward; but he only received an old book of
+devotion, and a lecture on the duty of reading it.</p>
+
+<p>I must relate a little adventure which might have been written fifty
+years ago, when it would have obtained more credence than it will in
+the present day, from those travellers at least who have kept to the
+highways, and those residents who have lived only in the towns of
+France. One morning Batilde asked permission to visit a friend who had
+come to spend a day with her sister at C&mdash;&mdash;. 'They breed poultry; and
+as madame likes a goose as soon as the f&ecirc;te of St Michel comes, it
+would be worth her while to desire M&egrave;re Talbot to feed one up against
+that time. They live a good way off,' pursued she, 'in a poor hamlet
+called Les Briares. It would be almost worth madame's while to go
+there some day, for it is such a primitive place, and they are such
+primitive people.' I liked the idea, and begged M&egrave;re Talbot might be
+told that I would come and look out my goose for myself the following
+week.</p>
+
+<p>A fine Thursday morning dawned; and as early as we could get coffee
+made and taken, Batilde and I set out on our expedition, each, after
+the fashion of the canton, seated on a donkey, our feet in one pannier
+and a large stone to balance in the other. I took as an offering to
+the hope and heir of the Talbots a toy much like what we in England
+call Jack-in-a-box, but in France is termed a <i>Diable</i>, as it is
+intended to represent his Satanic majesty, and alarm the lifter of the
+lid by popping up a black visage. The rough roads shaded by high
+hedges, white and pink with hawthorn, and the wild apple-tree blossom,
+and redolent of early honeysuckle, reminded me of the secluded parts
+of England; while Scotland presented itself to my mind when we left
+these lanes and crossed still, rushy brooks, or dashing tiny torrents,
+climbed heather braes, pursuing the yellow-hammer and large
+mountain-bees as they flew on to the furze and broom-bushes, filling
+the air with their cheerful music; or when, again, we descended to
+birch-shaded hollows, refreshing ourselves from clear little
+spring-wells, that sparkled over white pebbles at the foot of a gray
+rock tufted over with blaeberry and foxglove leaves. The poor thing
+chatted away like a child, inspired by the pure air, bracing, yet
+mild, and lost herself amongst recollections of her country home,
+talking of buttercups, hedge-sparrows' eggs, and <i>demoiselles</i> or
+dragon-flies.</p>
+
+<p>Several happy hours we spent <i>en route</i>; and at last, on turning down
+from a hilly road, we saw on a flat brown plain a collection of low
+cottages. The nearer we approached, the more Scotch everything
+appeared; in some cases I even saw my dear native 'middens afore the
+door:' the aspect of the houses and looks of the old women especially,
+with their stoups and country caps&mdash;so very like mutches&mdash;striped
+petticoats and short-gowns, brought northern climes before me vividly;
+and the children stared and shouted like true Scots callants. The very
+accent was so Scotch that I felt as though I was doing something
+altogether ridiculous in talking French.</p>
+
+<p>Upon entering M&egrave;re Talbot's house, the resemblance became more real.
+The flags stuck here and there in the earthen floor, the form of the
+chairs and tables, the press-beds, large red-checked linen curtains,
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[pg 313]</a></span> 'rock and its wee pickle tow,' the reel, the bowls on the
+shelves&mdash;each and all recalled my native country; and I positively
+should have ended by believing myself there in a dream, if not in
+reality, had not a glance at the fireplace undeceived me: there was no
+fire&mdash;all was dim, dusky, and dark; no glowing embers and cheerful
+pipe-clayed hearth, but iron dogs and wood-ashes where blazing coals
+should be. Even here, however, I could not but think of 'Caledonia
+stern and wild,' for there stood a real Carron 'three-leggit pat,' to
+which my very heart warmed. I was asked to sit down; and soon the news
+spread that <i>une Anglaise</i> was to be seen at M&egrave;re Talbot's, and people
+glanced by the window, peeped in at the door, and came to speak upon
+one pretence or other, as if it was not an everyday sight. By and by a
+girl and man&mdash;whose names from their appearance might have been Jenny
+and Sawnie&mdash;arrived for their dinner&mdash;consisting of brown bread, an
+apple, and cider, which they discussed on their knees&mdash;not sitting
+down at the table&mdash;and when finished, returned to their field-labour
+without speaking. The little boy, meanwhile, had disappeared with his
+toy-box, which greatly delighted him, and elevated him for the nonce
+above his fellows; for he was the undisputed possessor of a curiosity
+imported from England itself, over the sea, by the very lady who was
+to be seen at his grandmother's house eating pancakes.</p>
+
+<p>The fire was lighted; it crackled and blazed in two minutes; a stand
+was placed over it, upon which they put what they called a <i>tuile</i>;
+eggs, flour, and milk were mixed, and a bit of butter, the size of a
+bean in the first instance, of a pea afterwards&mdash;<i>c'est de rigueur</i>,
+to hinder every fresh <i>cr&ecirc;pe</i> thrown in from burning. Most capital
+pancakes they were; thin, crisp, hot, and sweet; and the kind people
+pressed them upon me so hospitably, that I ate till I felt I really
+could eat no longer, and was glad to finish with a draught of sour
+cider. I bought seven geese, to be brought to me one at a time, as
+<i>fat as caterpillars</i>, for two francs ten sous each. M&egrave;re Talbot was
+content with her bargain, and so was I with mine. When I rose to take
+leave, I was reminded again of Scotland, for a large parcel of cakes
+was put into the off-pannier; and as I should have mortally offended
+the kind creatures by refusing their gift, I carried them home,
+toasted them on a fork, and found it made them eat quite as crisp and
+good as at first. This sketch may appear perhaps very odd to be taken
+from nature so late as the year 1840, but I can assure my readers it
+is 'no less strange than true.'</p>
+
+<p>All the summer we wandered about the woods and fields of Flotte,
+making little excursions in the neighbourhood, and sedulously avoiding
+the town; but after we had made ourselves acquainted with every
+beech-shaded hollow, every little fig-forest, every apple-orchard,
+climbed every broomy knowe, gathered heather from the highest rock and
+mushrooms from the oldest pasture, we turned our steps sometimes
+towards C&mdash;&mdash; in search of variety. There, every Thursday, the military
+band of the 44th Regiment played in the alley of the mountain-ash, and
+there all the dames and demoiselles assembled, dressed in a
+wonderfully neat way. We asked how these women, who were mostly in
+humble circumstances, were enabled to dress so finely. Batilde
+explained the phenomenon.</p>
+
+<p>'Ah! they have infinite merit,' responded the Frenchwoman; 'two of
+them, whom I chance to know, in order to be enabled to do so, live on
+eggs and bread, in one room, where they sit, eat, and sleep, nay,
+sometimes cook; and they have their just reward, for they are
+universally admired and respected.'</p>
+
+<p>This is a pretty fair specimen of the effort made by Frenchwomen of
+the humbler orders to maintain a tasteful exterior. To make themselves
+neat is a principle; and they seem to have an inherent perception of
+what constitutes taste. They may sometimes go too far in this
+direction, and think more of dress and ornaments than they should do.
+One can at least say, that they are on the safe side. Better to love
+outward show, than, as is often visible in Scotland, have no regard
+for appearances. Better cleanliness on any terms than utter
+slovenliness. I really must say, we saw some most creditable efforts
+in France to maintain self-respect, among the female population.</p>
+
+<p>About this time, an old gentleman, who was distantly related to us,
+died&mdash;without having, however, an idea of the extent of our
+poverty&mdash;leaving my husband L.50 for a ring. Here was
+riches&mdash;unexpected riches! and I verily believe few who succeed to
+L.50,000 ever felt more or as much rapture as we did; and we spent an
+evening very happily settling how we should employ the money. In the
+first place, we hired a good servant for L.8! and dismissed Batilde;
+we then, by paying half, induced the landlord to lath, plaster, paper,
+and paint the large lumber-room, and open a door of communication into
+the passage, by which we avoided entering through the kitchen. Our
+late sitting-room we dined in, and made the dining-room a
+dressing-room; got several small comforts besides; and though last not
+least, hired an old piano; and every evening enjoyed music in a degree
+none but real lovers of that delightful art, long deprived of it, can
+have the slightest conception of&mdash;and all this happiness and comfort
+for L.50! Think of that, ye ladies who give as much for a gown!</p>
+
+<p>Our new servant, Olive, was as clean, orderly, and active as our late
+one had been the reverse. The difference it made in our comfort was as
+great as if we had had our former establishment restored, and really
+our <i>bonne</i> was a host within herself. The house was always clean, but
+we never saw her cleaning: she went to market, baked all our bread,
+yet never seemed oppressed with work: her cookery was capital; she
+made excellent dishes out of what Batilde would have wasted: went to
+mass every morning, and was back in time to prepare everything for our
+breakfast. After staying a month, she begged permission to leave the
+cockloft and bring her 'effects' to the gate-house, which we willingly
+permitted; and her wardrobe was worth a journey to see, when we
+remembered that her wages had never been quite L.8 until she came to
+us, and her age only thirty. I shall give the list I copied, hoping
+some of our English Betties may read and profit by her example:
+twenty-four good strong linen shifts, made and marked neatly by
+herself; two dozen worsted and thread stockings, knit by herself;
+twelve pocket-handkerchiefs; six stout petticoats; four flannel do.;
+six pair of shoes; eight caps; eight neck-frills; umbrella;
+prayer-book; gold earrings and cross&mdash;which two last, with a beautiful
+lace-cap, she inherited, but everything else was of her <i>own earning</i>.
+She bought a wardrobe and bedstead, and was by degrees getting
+furniture; and as I exacted no sewing, every leisure moment she was
+spinning her future sheets. With all this she was also very kind to a
+married sister, who had a large family; but she wore no flowers,
+flounces, nor finery; her six gowns were of a stuff the Scotch call
+linsey-woolsey; and so in sixteen years' services she had amassed what
+I have just described. Why can't our girls do as much where wages are
+higher and clothes cheaper?</p>
+
+<p>We spent three years in this happy solitude, and felt almost sorry
+when an unexpected legacy, and the settlement of our affairs together,
+enabled us to return to all the comforts and many of the luxuries of
+life. It gives me much pleasure to record the many kindnesses we
+received from all ranks of people. Upon one occasion we were forced to
+ask the butcher to wait three months longer for his bill: he not only
+consented, but his wife insisted upon lending us money, and was quite
+cross when we gratefully declined her kindness. Near the time of our
+departure, as we were paying a large account, the shopkeeper said: 'At
+this time you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[pg 314]</a></span> must have many calls upon you; transmit me the amount
+from England, for I can afford to wait.' Another of our tradesmen, a
+shoemaker, was a most singular character&mdash;a great physiognomist, and
+would not serve those he did not like. A dashing English family wished
+to employ him, but he fought shy, and made himself so disagreeable
+that they went to another: he told me this before his wife, who seemed
+annoyed at his conduct. He explained that he did not like their
+appearance, and was sure they would not pay for what they had. He was
+right; they left the place in debt to his <i>confr&egrave;re</i> and everybody
+else. I rejoice in this opportunity of assuring my countrymen that
+there is as much true kindness to be met with in France as in England,
+and the selfishness we complain of in our neighbours on the other side
+of the Channel, is often but a preconceived fancy, or induced by our
+own cold behaviour. The above true sketch shews at least that <i>we</i> met
+with substantial kindness, and I hope it also proves that we are
+sensible of it.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="PHANTOMS_OF_THE_FAR_EAST" id="PHANTOMS_OF_THE_FAR_EAST"></a>PHANTOMS OF THE FAR EAST.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>The form assumed by superstition in India is not very different from
+the European type, otherwise than in a certain exaggeration, impressed
+on it, no doubt, by the grotesque grandeur of the mythology.
+Witchcraft is pretty nearly the same in both regions&mdash;the old women
+being the chief professors of the art; but in many districts of the
+former country, the evil power is bestowed upon <i>every</i> old woman
+without exception. Girls will not marry into a family without a witch,
+for how could their infants be protected from the spells of the other
+old women? It is dangerous to jostle an old woman on the street,
+however accidentally, lest she take vengeance on the spot. A man came
+into this unpleasant contact while he was walking along, carelessly
+chewing a piece of sugar-cane; and hearing the muttered objurgations
+of the hag, as he turned round to apologise, he was not surprised to
+find the juice of the cane turned into blood. The spectators,
+likewise, recognised the metamorphosis as soon as it was pointed out
+to them; and when the terrified victim instantly leaped on his horse,
+and put ten or twelve miles between him and the sorceress before
+drawing bridle, he was believed to have saved his life by this
+dispatch.</p>
+
+<p>The operations of the men-sorcerers are less spontaneous and more
+scientific. They set about their work in a business-like way; and
+within sight of the house of their intended victim the mystic caldron
+begins to boil and bubble. The victim, however, is not to be terrified
+out of his senses. What are his enemy's fires and incantations to him?
+He will only just take no notice, and continue to live on as if there
+was not a sorcerer in the world. But that smoke: it meets his eye the
+first object every morning. That ruddy glare: it is the last thing he
+sees at night. That measured but inarticulate sound: it is never out
+of his ear. His thoughts dwell on the mystical business. He is
+preoccupied even in company. He wonders what they are now putting into
+the pot; and whether it has any connection with the spasm that has
+just shot through him. He becomes nervous; he feels unwell; he cannot
+sleep for thinking; he cannot eat for that horrid broth that bubbles
+for ever in his mind. He gets worse, and worse, and worse. He dies!</p>
+
+<p>But this empire of the imagination is beaten hollow in Java, where it
+is supposed that a housebreaker, by throwing a handful of earth upon
+the beds of the inmates, completely incapacitates them from moving to
+save their property. And this is no mere speculative belief, but an
+actual <i>fact</i>. The man who is to be robbed, on feeling the earth fall
+upon him, lies as motionless as if he was bound hand and foot. He is
+under a spell; a spell which, in our own country, even knowledge and
+refinement have power only to modify.</p>
+
+<p>In England, there is a large class of persons who believe that a
+certain pill is able to cure all diseases, however opposite their
+natures, and however different the constitutions of the patients. It
+is in vain the analytical chemist describes publicly the component
+parts and real qualities of the quack medicine&mdash;their faith is
+unshaken. In India, this low and paltry credulity acquires a character
+of the poetical; for there the popular confidence reposes&mdash;not more
+irrationally&mdash;on the prayers and incantations of the practitioner. But
+this sort of practice, in the wilder parts of the country, renders the
+medical profession somewhat unsafe to its professors; for the doctor
+is looked upon as a wizard, with <i>power</i> to cure or kill as he
+chooses. In such places&mdash;the jungly districts&mdash;there are diseases of
+the liver and spleen, to which the children, more especially, are
+subject; and when so affected, the patient pines away and dies without
+any external token of disease. This result is, of course, attributed
+to preternatural means; and if there is not an old woman at hand
+obnoxious to suspicion, the doctor is set down as the murderer. 'I
+have in these territories,' says Colonel Sleeman, 'known a great many
+instances of medical practitioners being put to death for not curing
+young people for whom they were required to prescribe. Several cases
+have come before me as a magistrate, in which the father has stood
+over the doctor with a drawn sword, by the side of the bed of his
+child, and cut him down, and killed him the moment the child died, as
+he had sworn to do when he found the patient sinking under his
+prescriptions.'</p>
+
+<p>Another superstition of the country, originating no doubt in local
+circumstances, found its way into Europe, where no such circumstances
+existed. In India, a man suddenly vanishes. His family, perhaps, are
+expecting him at home, but from that moment he is never more heard of.
+He has been destroyed in the jungle by a tiger, and his remains so
+completely devoured by other animals, that there is scarcely a relic
+of his body left to give assurance of a man, far less as a proof of
+his identity. These mysterious disappearances, however, are connected
+with their real cause; and men are believed to be frequently
+metamorphosed&mdash;sometimes voluntarily, sometimes involuntarily&mdash;into
+tigers. The voluntary transformation is effected merely by eating a
+certain root, whereupon the man is instantly changed into a tiger; and
+when tired of his new character, he has only to eat another, when,
+<i>presto!</i> he subsides from a tiger into a man. But occasionally
+mistakes happen. An individual of an inquiring disposition once felt a
+strong curiosity to know what were the sensations attendant on such a
+transformation; but being a prudent person, he set about the
+experiment with all necessary precaution. Having provided himself with</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4">&mdash;&mdash;the insane root<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That takes the reason prisoner,<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>he gave one likewise to his wife, desiring her to stand by and watch
+the event, and as soon as she saw him fairly turned into a tiger, to
+thrust it into his mouth. The wife promised, but her nerves were not
+equal to the performance. As soon as she saw her husband fixed in his
+new form, she took to flight&mdash;carrying in her hand, in the confusion
+of her mind, the root that would have restored him to her faithful
+arms! And so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[pg 315]</a></span> it befell that the poor man-tiger was obliged to take to
+the woods, where for many a day he dined on his old neighbours of the
+village, till he was at length shot, and <i>recognised</i>! In this
+superstition will be seen the prototype of the wolf-mania of medi&aelig;val
+Europe. In Brittany, men betook themselves to the forests in the shape
+of wolves, out of a morbid passion for the amusement of howling and
+ravening; but if they left in some secure place the clothes they had
+thrown off to prepare for the metamorphosis, they had only to reassume
+them in order to regain their natural forms. But sometimes a
+catastrophe like the above occurred: the wife discovered the hidden
+clothes, and carrying them home in the innocent carefulness of her
+heart, the poor husband lived and died a wolf.</p>
+
+<p>The Hindoos, like other ancient peoples, predict good or evil fortune
+from certain phenomena of nature; but one instance of this has been
+described to us in a communication from our Old Indian, which far
+excels in the poetical the finest fancies of the Greeks. We cannot
+undertake to say that the thing is new, although we ourselves never
+heard of it before; but as the knowledge of it was imparted to her by
+her moonshee as a profound secret, we present it as such to our
+readers, recommending them to make the experiment for themselves. At
+the initiation of our informant, she was about to undertake a distant
+journey, and the old moonshee was anxious to consult the fates as to
+the fortunes that might be in store for his beloved mistress. He,
+accordingly, prevailed upon her to walk forth one night from the
+veranda, and with many quaint expressions of respect and anxiety,
+besought her to follow his directions with an attentive mind,
+abstracted as much as possible from the common thoughts of life.</p>
+
+<p>It was a clear, calm night; the moon was full, and not the faintest
+speck in the sky disturbed her reign. The Ganges was like a flood of
+silver light, hastening on in charmed silence; while on the green
+smooth sward on which they walked, a tall shrub, here and there, stood
+erect and motionless. The young lady, whose impressions were probably
+deepened by the mystical words of the moonshee, felt a kind of awe
+stealing over her: she looked round upon the accustomed scene, as if
+in some new and strange world; and when the old man motioned her to
+stop, as they reached an open space on the sward, she obeyed with an
+indescribable thrill.</p>
+
+<p>'Look there,' said he, pointing to her shadow, which fell tall and
+dark upon the grass. 'Do you see it?'</p>
+
+<p>'Yes,' said she faintly, yet beginning to be ashamed. 'How sharply
+defined are its edges! It looks like something you could touch.'</p>
+
+<p>'But look longer&mdash;look better&mdash;look steadfastly. Is it still so
+definite?'</p>
+
+<p>'A kind of halo begins to gather round it: my eyes dazzle'&mdash;&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>'Then raise them to the heavens; fix them on yonder blue sky. What do
+you see?'</p>
+
+<p>'I see it still! But it is as white as mist, and of a gigantic size.'</p>
+
+<p>'Has it a head?' asked the moonshee in an anxious whisper.</p>
+
+<p>'Yes; it is complete in all its parts: but now it
+melts&mdash;floats&mdash;disappears.'</p>
+
+<p>'Thank God!' said the old man: 'your journey shall be prosperous&mdash;such
+is the will of Heaven!' The experiment was tried on many other
+occasions by the young lady, and always with similar success, although
+never without a certain degree of trepidation, even after she had
+learned that the spectral appearance in the heavens was nothing more
+than the picture retained on the retina of the eye. She never saw the
+phantom without a head, which accounts for her being alive to this
+day; or even wanting a limb, although she has not been without her
+share of the trials of the world. It can easily be conceived, however,
+that certain conditions of the atmosphere may produce these phenomena,
+which are regarded by the Hindoo seer as sure tokens of death or
+disaster.</p>
+
+<p>This superstition is not more unreasonable than the mistakes of our
+early travellers, who were accustomed to attribute a meaning to the
+phenomena of nature, of which more accurate knowledge has entirely
+stripped them. But the notions of the Hindoo are always peculiar&mdash;his
+fancy, even in its wildest excursions, is bounded by the circle of his
+mythology. When our Old Indian's wanderings led her to Pinang, in the
+Straits of Malacca, she found a Hindoo convict there, trembling even
+in his chains as his fancy connected the wonders of the place with the
+dogmas in which he had been reared. This most beautiful island, as our
+readers may remember, came into the possession of an Englishman in the
+latter part of last century in rather a romantic way&mdash;forming the
+dowry of a native princess, the daughter of the king of Quedah, whom
+he married. Captain Light transferred it to the East India Company,
+who were not slow in discovering the advantages of its fine harbour,
+rich soil, and salubrious climate. Its inhabitants at that time were a
+few fishermen on the coast; and the interior was covered with an
+almost impervious forest; but now there is a population of Europeans
+and Americans, and Asiatics of almost all countries; and plantations
+of sugar, coffee, pepper, and other intertropical produce. Among the
+inhabitants are invalids, who proceed thither from continental India
+for the restoration of their health; and convicts, who are compelled
+to compensate by their labour the injuries they have inflicted on
+society.</p>
+
+<p>The man alluded to belonged to the latter class, having probably
+travelled for his country's good from the tamer lowlands of Bengal;
+and when the traveller asked him how he liked the region, he expressed
+the utmost awe, united with the bitterest condemnation of the
+Europeans, for desecrating by their roads and other works a place so
+obviously the abode of deutas and spirits. He said, that when they had
+begun to carry the up-hill road through these primeval forests, they
+were warned of their impiety by the voices of the gods themselves, in
+bursts of unearthly music, blasts of the trumpet, and the clash of
+cymbals and gongs.</p>
+
+<p>'The first tree we struck with the axe,' added he with a shudder, 'ran
+milk; and the second, blood!' Of these two substances, the former is
+still more ominous in the Brahminical faith than the latter, for
+everything connected with the cow is sacred and mysterious.</p>
+
+<p>'Well,' said the inquirer, 'what happened&mdash;since in spite of these
+omens you persisted in your task? Did the gods take vengeance?'</p>
+
+<p>'Yes,' said he solemnly; 'but <i>we</i> were only instruments, like the
+axes in our hands; and the vengeance, therefore, fell upon the prime
+mover. The governor'&mdash;coming close up to the lady, and putting his
+mouth to her ear&mdash;'the governor died!' Now, all this was true&mdash;music,
+milk, blood, and death; and yet none of these was more the work of
+supernatural agency than any of the common circumstances of life.</p>
+
+<p>The supposed unearthly sounds proceed neither from birds nor men, and
+the effect is either pleasing or awful, according to the mood of the
+listener. Some, in such circumstances, instead of receiving
+impressions of awe, like the Hindoo convict, would exclaim:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Where should this music be&mdash;i' the air, or the earth?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">It sounds no more: and sure it waits upon<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Some god of the island.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>And again:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i8">&mdash;&mdash;The isle is full of noises,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Will hum about mine ears; and sometimes voices,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That, if I then had waked after long sleep,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Will make me sleep again.<br /></span>
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[pg 316]</a></span></div></div>
+
+<p>One would think Shakspeare had actually been in some tropical forest
+when the daylight began to fade, and the myriads of insects to take up
+their evening-song! One of these extraordinary musicians is
+distinguished as the trumpeter; another produces a tinkle like a bell;
+and a third gives forth a sound which the imagination may ascribe to
+any instrument, or band of instruments, it pleases. This species of
+cricket buries himself in a centre, to which converge seven holes,
+which he has drilled in a circle; and from these seven tubes a sound
+rushes forth, which almost stuns the passer-by. It may be conceived,
+therefore, that a forest peopled with myriads upon myriads of such
+'executants,' must have a strain for every ear, every mood, and every
+conscience.</p>
+
+<p>The tree which welled forth milk when struck by the axe was the <i>Ficus
+elastica</i>&mdash;a sort of gigantic vine, as thick as a man's arm, which
+creeps along the ground, sending forth new roots from the joint, and,
+climbing at length some lofty tree, expands in branches. This is the
+chief caoutchouc-plant, and its sap has not only the colour, but many
+of the chemical properties of animal milk, and is frequently drunk as
+food. The blood came from one of the <i>eucalypta</i>, popularly called the
+blue gum-tree. The governor did die soon after his arrival on the
+island, and no doubt <i>immediately</i> after he had disturbed, in the
+manner related, the <i>genius loci</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Pinang contains about 160 square miles of surface, nearly the whole of
+which is laid out in hills and dales, the loftiest of the former
+reaching a height of 2500 feet above the sea-level. On the slopes of
+this hill are built the governor's rural residence, and a bungalow,
+where invalids resort for country air. It is possible that great
+changes may have taken place here of late years, when efforts have
+been made to dot the island with sugar-plantations; but at the time we
+speak of, this was a solitary spot, behind which dark forests
+stretched upwards to the summit. Among these forests, on the shoulder
+of the hill, there occurs an optical phenomenon, not unknown in
+Europe, which is here an object of superstitious terror to the
+natives.</p>
+
+<p>The first European who observed it was a gentleman who, taking
+advantage of the coolness of the hour, had strolled away in the early
+morning from the inhabited district, and was skirting round a deep
+valley, dotted at the bottom, and overhung at the sides with lofty
+trees. The beams of the sun had already begun to acquire some power,
+although his disk was scarcely yet above the horizon; and the
+traveller watched with interest the effect of the dawning light upon a
+sea of vapour which nearly filled the valley. This slowly-moving
+cloud, as it was acted upon by the sun, swelled higher and higher, and
+became whiter and whiter, till it finally settled, filling the whole
+valley with a substance that looked like alabaster, in the midst of
+which the topmost branches of the tall trees hung motionless. The
+scene was strangely beautiful; and the spectator, who was screened
+from the now risen sun by a belt of forest, lingered for awhile to
+contemplate it. When at length he resumed his walk, and, emerging from
+the trees, found himself in the full blaze of the rising sun, he
+turned once more to observe the effect on the vapour; and a cry of
+wonder which arose to his lips was only repressed by a feeling of awe,
+as he saw upon that alabaster surface a dark human figure of gigantic
+dimensions, surrounded by a halo that seemed formed of the rainbow. A
+confused rush of associations half acquainted him at the moment with
+the nature of the phenomenon; but giving way to the feeling of
+poetical delight, he clasped his hands above his head in admiration&mdash;a
+movement which the Phantom of the Alabaster Valley instantaneously
+imitated! It was indeed his own shadow&mdash;and a shadow he was not to
+recall, even when he turned away to journey homewards. There, in that
+lonely place, it seemed to him to remain for ever&mdash;a link connecting
+him with the spirit of nature, and ever and anon drawing him back into
+her domain from the meanness, and folly, and wickedness of the world.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="DECIMAL_SYSTEM_OF_WEIGHTS_AND_MEASURES" id="DECIMAL_SYSTEM_OF_WEIGHTS_AND_MEASURES"></a>DECIMAL SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>The state of our national weights and measures has been a fertile
+subject of legislative enactment ever since the signing of the Magna
+Charta, which proclaims that 'there shall be one weight and one
+measure.' 'We will and establish,' said an act of Edward III. nearly
+500 years ago, 'that one weight, one measure, and one yard, be used
+throughout the land.' Act has followed act from that time to this, and
+still we have not only different weights and measures for different
+commodities, but for the same in different parts of the realm. An
+ounce means one thing to the grocer, another to the apothecary. A
+stone is 8 pounds to the London butcher or fishmonger, 14 to the
+provincial; 5 pounds to the dealer in glass, 16 to the cheesemonger,
+and 32 to the dealer in hemp. The corn-trade exhibits still greater
+varieties. Prices are quoted in official circulars in every fashion,
+from the Mark-Lane quarter to the Scotch boll, the firlot, the load
+(which may be of various dimensions), the coomb, the last, the barrel
+(which also may be various), the ton, the hundredweight, and the
+pound. We have seen an extract from an actual account-sales, by which
+it appeared, that at the same port the merchant had sold a cargo of
+foreign wheat by five different bushels according to the customs of
+the buyers. In paying the duty, these various bushels had to be
+converted into imperial quarters, and in calculating tonnage and other
+dues, it was necessary to reduce all to tons! Here is surely a source
+of endless confusion, if not an opening for fraud. Our legislature has
+gone on from century to century, mending or mutilating the statutes as
+the case might be, but laying down no principles scientific enough to
+command the approval of the educated, or simple enough to prevail over
+the established usages of the commonalty.</p>
+
+<p>Our neighbours in France, who are particularly fond of framing
+theories and experimenting on them for the edification of other
+nations, availed themselves of the general upturning of affairs in
+1789, to introduce a universal decimal system, to be applied to
+everything whatever that could be counted, weighed, or measured. They
+started from the measurement of the globe itself, and took as the
+basis of their whole system the ten-millionth part of a quadrant of a
+meridian, equal to 39-371/1000 inches English. This they called a
+m&egrave;tre (measure), and to it, as a unit, they prefixed the Greek
+numerals to express increase in the decimal ratio; thus decam&egrave;tres,
+tens of meters; hectam&egrave;tres, hundreds of meters; and so on. To express
+diminution in the decimal ratio, they used the Latin numerals; thus,
+decim&egrave;tres, tenths of meters; centim&egrave;tres, hundredths of meters;
+milliam&egrave;tres, thousandths of meters. The unit adopted for square
+measure was the <i>are</i>, equal to 100 square meters; for solid measure,
+the <i>st&egrave;re</i>, equal to one cubic meter; and for measure of capacity,
+the <i>litre</i>, a cubic decimeter. The weights were derived from these
+measures; the <i>gramme</i> being the weight of one cubic centimeter of
+distilled water. The system of decimal gradation was applied to all of
+these; that is, each denomination represented a tenth part of the one
+above it, and ten times as much as the one next below it, the Latin
+and Greek numerals being prefixed as we have already described with
+reference to the meter. In conformity with this decimal law, the
+quadrant was divided, for astronomical purposes, into 100 degrees
+instead of 90; and the thermometer likewise into 100 degrees from the
+boiling to the freezing point. At the same time, a system of reckoning
+money by tens was introduced; and it must be owned, that the whole<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[pg 317]</a></span>
+system of computation in weights, measures, and money established in
+France at this period, is one of the greatest triumphs of
+civilisation. In ordinary transactions, old denominations of money are
+still used by the French; the <i>sous</i>, in particular, being apparently
+ineradicable. But in book-keeping, the furnishing of accounts, and in
+literature, the modern and legal standards are invariably adhered to.</p>
+
+<p>About thirty years ago, the Americans took it into serious
+consideration whether they should adopt the ready-made scale of France
+entire. On that occasion (1821), Mr John Quincy Adams produced a most
+elaborate report to Congress, containing an immense amount of
+information on the subject of metrology. He found great fault with the
+French nomenclature, so puzzling to the unlearned. 'Give the people,'
+said he, 'but their accustomed <i>words</i>, and they will call 16 a dozen;
+120, 112, or any other number, a hundred.' He disapproved, likewise,
+of thrusting the decimal principle upon things incompatible with it.
+'Decimal arithmetic,' said he, 'is a contrivance of man for computing
+numbers, and not a property of time, space, or matter. It belongs
+essentially to the keeping of accounts, but is merely an incident to
+the transactions of trade. Nature has no partiality for the number 10;
+and the attempt to shackle her freedom with them [decimal gradations],
+will for ever prove abortive.' And again: 'To the mensuration of the
+surface and the solid, the number 10 is of little more use than any
+other. If decimal arithmetic is incompetent to give the dimensions of
+most artificial forms, the square and the cube, still more incompetent
+is it to give the circumference, the area, and the contents of the
+circle and the sphere.' And once more: 'The new metrology of France,
+after trying the principle of decimal division in its almost universal
+application, has been compelled to renounce it for all the measures of
+astronomy, geography, navigation, time, the circle, and the sphere; to
+modify it even for superficial and cubical linear measure.' The
+conclusion of the Americans was, that it was better to continue the
+use of the system of weights and measures inherited from the
+father-land. Partly on account of our intimate commercial relations
+with them, they are content to wait, and allow us to take the lead in
+the work of reform.</p>
+
+<p>Taking our stand on the ground of mere practical utility, according to
+the views suggested, we do not advocate any interference with the
+foot, the rood, the acre, the mile, which would lead to the removal of
+old landmarks, and would render almost every chart and map and book in
+the country obsolete. But we suggest that the time has arrived when
+our national weights and measures may be finally adjusted on simple
+and scientific principles. Within the last thirty years, a principle
+that goes far towards clearing our way has been laid down, and in part
+carried into practice. By an act of the British legislature, which
+came into operation on the 1st January 1826, our standards were
+accurately adjusted, and certain rules were laid down, by which they
+could be restored if lost; while the uniform use of these in the
+business of the country was strictly enjoined. The imperial yard,
+which is the basis of the whole, is to be found in the following
+manner:&mdash;'Take a pendulum, vibrating seconds of time, in the latitude
+of London, in vacuum and at the level of the sea; divide all that part
+thereof which lies between the axis of suspension and the centre of
+oscillation into 391,393 equal parts; then will 10,000 of these parts
+be an imperial inch, 12 whereof make a foot, and 36 whereof make a
+yard.' All other measures of linear extension are to be computed from
+this. Thus, 'the foot, the inch, the pole, the furlong, and the mile,
+shall bear the same proportion to the imperial standard yard as they
+have hitherto borne to the yard measure in general use.' For the
+determination of weights, take a cube of an imperial inch of distilled
+water at 62 degrees Fahrenheit; let this be weighed with any weight,
+and let such weight be divided into 252,458 equal parts; then will a
+thousand of such parts be a <i>troy</i> grain, of which 5760 make a pound
+troy, and 7000 a pound avoirdupois.</p>
+
+<p>'This troy-weight,' said the commissioners, 'appeared to us to be the
+ancient weight of this kingdom, having existed in the same state from
+the time of Edward the Confessor.' 'We were induced, moreover,' said
+they, 'to preserve the troy-weight, because all the coinage has been
+uniformly regulated by it, and all medical prescriptions and formul&aelig;
+have always been estimated by troy-weight, under a peculiar
+subdivision which the college of physicians have expressed themselves
+most anxious to preserve.' It was resolved, therefore, to continue the
+use of troy-weight for drugs, bullion, &amp;c. and to raise the
+avoirdupois on its basis. The commissioners went on to say: 'The
+avoirdupois pound, by which all heavy goods have been for a long time
+weighed, seems not to have been preserved with such scrupulous
+accuracy as the troy, by which more precious articles have been
+weighed;' but it was so nearly equivalent to 7000 grains troy, that
+they determined this should be its standard for the future. Measures
+of capacity were to be based upon this weight, and not, as heretofore,
+on cubic inches. Ten lbs. avoirdupois of distilled water weighed in
+air at the temperature of 62 degrees Fahrenheit, and the barometer at
+30 inches, were henceforth to determine the imperial gallon, to the
+utter abolition of three distinct gallons for wine, ale, and corn,
+based respectively on the specific bulk and gravity of Bordeaux wine,
+English ale, and grains of wheat. All other measures were to be taken
+in parts or multiples of the said imperial standard gallon, according
+to the proportions hitherto in use. A great reform in this connection,
+was the obligation of dealers to sell most solid commodities&mdash;as coal,
+bread, potatoes, &amp;c.&mdash;by weight and not by measure, which had been
+liable to great abuses. Corn, however, was not included in this
+provision; nor has even the use of the imperial bushel been
+universally enforced where it interfered with the long-established
+usages of corporate bodies.</p>
+
+<p>To carry thus far into effect these newly-established measures,
+required no common exercise of authority. Every dealer, wholesale or
+retail, was obliged to have his weights verified and stamped. The
+brewer was compelled to get new casks; the retailer new pots and
+pints; the farmer new bushels, and, consequently, new corn-sacks. The
+expense thus incurred was enormous, and the grumbling was of course in
+due proportion.</p>
+
+<p>It is believed that the units above mentioned&mdash;the yard, the pound
+avoirdupois, and the imperial gallon&mdash;cannot now be superseded by any
+other. It remains to shew, as Mr Taylor has very satisfactorily
+done,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> how that which has been well begun may be followed out and
+completed by the establishment of more complete uniformity, and the
+legalisation of decimal gradations for facilitating calculation.</p>
+
+<p>The two co-existing pounds originally adjusted in relation to the
+specific gravities of wheat and spring-water, are now the sole remains
+and representatives of a fanciful theory spun in the middle ages; and
+the first question that occurs is, whether the pound troy, having
+served its purpose, might not be done away with, and the pound
+avoirdupois ascertained by reference to a cubic inch of distilled
+water. We were told forty years ago, that for the introduction of a
+uniform and scientific system, we must wait for the spread of
+education in the community; and we feel somewhat ashamed now to find
+that the members of the medical profession, which is understood to be
+one of the most highly-educated bodies, offer the most formidable
+opposition to reformation in this respect. 'The testimony,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[pg 318]</a></span> however,'
+says Mr Taylor, 'of many individuals of the medical profession,
+especially the younger portion, and certainly that of the retailers
+and dispensers of drugs, tends entirely to shew the practicability of
+a beneficial and convenient change. With all these, there appears no
+more serious difficulty to encounter than that involved in altered
+editions of their usual dispensatories, or books of reference'&mdash;an
+amount of trouble and expense, we should say, not greater, certainly,
+in proportion to the position of the parties concerned, than that
+which was forced on the poor chandlers and milkwomen by the act of
+1826.</p>
+
+<p>Then, to adapt the avoirdupois pound to the further objects in view,
+it must be reconstructed as to its divisional parts. In order to this,
+it is not necessary that the nomenclature should be changed, or that
+our poor people should be puzzled with the <i>decas</i>, and <i>hexas</i>, and
+<i>millias</i> which has formed the greatest practical difficulty in the
+decimal system of France. It is proposed simply to divide the pound
+avoirdupois into 10,000 parts instead of 7000, and to employ names at
+present in use for the minor denominations; but if it be thought
+incongruous to retain the term <i>grain</i>, which had reference to the
+weight of wheat or barley, <i>minim</i> might be substituted. Then the
+multiples of the pound, which have hitherto been so various, are to be
+decimally graduated&mdash;as, stones of 10 lbs., cwts. of 10 stone (or,
+literally, 100 lbs.), and tons of 10 cwt. The decimal measures below
+the gallon would correspond of course with the weights, as it is
+decided by the act, that a gallon is to contain ten pounds of water.
+The measures above gallons, it is proposed to call firkins and butts.</p>
+
+<p>It is taken for granted that quarts and pints, as well as half-pounds
+and quarter-pounds, would still be continued in use. In France, the
+government was obliged to relax its decimal principles in favour of
+permitting a partial return to the binary mode of subdivision. Mr
+Adams, who is high authority on such a point, avers that such
+divisions are 'as necessary to the practical use of weights and
+measures, as the decimal divisions are convenient for calculations
+resulting from them.' If this be admitted, almost the only change to
+retailers of ordinary commodities would be the introduction of the new
+ounce weight, altered to the tenth of a pound, with price in
+correspondence; and perhaps the fluid pound, or tenth of a gallon. If,
+however, the latter were likely to be generally used by the masses, it
+would be desirable that it should bear a more familiar name. But
+probably it would be little known, except as the highest denomination
+generally used by the apothecary; in which case the nomenclature would
+be all the better for expressing the value of the measure
+scientifically in relation to distilled water, as is now usually done
+by this class.</p>
+
+<p>It is easy to shew the practical advantages that would result in
+mercantile calculations if such a scale were adopted, and especially
+in connection with the decimal system of money advocated in a former
+number of this Journal.<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> If a parcel of goods weighs 13 cwt., 7
+stone, 8 lbs., and it be desired to know how many pounds it contains,
+it is unnecessary to change a single figure to shew that there are
+1378; an additional cipher gives the number of ounces (137,80);
+another the number of drachms (137,800), instead of requiring the
+present tedious process of reduction. Again: if any commodity costs,
+for instance, 2 fl. 3 cents per lb., we know without taking up a pen
+that it is 2 cents 3 mil. per ounce; that it is L.2, 3 fl. per stone;
+L.23 per cwt.; L.230 per ton; and so on. Here is a cargo&mdash;no matter of
+what&mdash;weighing 374 tons, 7 cwt. 4 st. If the value is, for instance,
+L.2, 3s. per ton, we have but to multiply the figures 37474 by 23, and
+<i>point</i> the amount thus&mdash;L.861.9.0.2. If, however, the price be L.2,
+3s. per cwt., the point after the pounds, which is the only essential
+one, must be removed a step further to the right&mdash;thus, L.8619.0.2;
+and if L.2, 3s. per stone, it will be L.86190.2. Let any one try the
+difference between these operations and similar calculations according
+to our present system, and he will confess it is no mean advantage
+that the advocates of decimal gradations are seeking to obtain for the
+community.</p>
+
+<p>We are happy to add, that since our article on Decimal Coinage
+appeared, we have received numerous communications on the subject; and
+while there are minor differences of opinion as to the details, there
+appears to be perfect unanimity as to the desirableness of the system,
+and the possibility of bringing it into general use.</p>
+
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>The Decimal System</i>. By Henry Taylor. London:
+Groombridge &amp; Sons.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> See No. 428.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="THE_LITTLE_GRAY_GOSSIP" id="THE_LITTLE_GRAY_GOSSIP"></a>THE LITTLE GRAY GOSSIP.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<p>Soon after Cousin Con's marriage, we were invited to stay for a few
+weeks with the newly-married couple, during the festive winter season;
+so away we went with merry hearts, the clear frosty air and pleasant
+prospect before us invigorating our spirits, as we took our places
+inside the good old mail-coach, which passed through the town of
+P&mdash;&mdash;, where Cousin Con resided, for there were no railways then.
+Never was there a kinder or more genial soul than Cousin Con; and
+David Danvers, the goodman, as she laughingly called him, was, if
+possible, kinder and more genial still. They were surrounded by
+substantial comforts, and delighted to see their friends in a
+sociable, easy way, and to make them snug and cosy, our arrival being
+the signal for a succession of such convivialities. Very mirthful and
+enjoyable were these evenings, for Con's presence always shed radiant
+sunshine, and David's honest broad face beamed upon her with
+affectionate pride. During the days of their courtship at our house,
+they had perhaps indulged in billing and cooing a little too freely
+when in company with others, for sober middle-aged lovers like
+themselves; thereby lying open to animadversions from prim spinsters,
+who wondered that Miss Constance and Mr Danvers made themselves so
+ridiculous. But now all this nonsense had sobered down, and nothing
+could be detected beyond a sly glance, or a squeeze of the hand now
+and then; yet we often quizzed them about by-gones, and declared that
+engaged pairs were insufferable&mdash;we could always find them out among a
+hundred!</p>
+
+<p>'I'll bet you anything you like,' cried Cousin Con, with a
+good-humoured laugh, 'that among our guests coming this evening'
+(there was to be a tea-junketing), 'you'll not be able to point out
+the engaged couple&mdash;for there will be only <i>one</i> such present&mdash;though
+plenty of lads and lasses that would like to be so happily situated!
+But the couple I allude to are real turtledoves, and yet I defy you to
+find them out!'</p>
+
+<p>'Done, Cousin Con!' we exclaimed; 'and what shall we wager?'</p>
+
+<p>'Gloves! gloves to be sure!' cried David. 'Ladies always wager gloves;
+though I can tell you, my Con is on the safe side now;' and David
+rubbed his hands, delighted with the joke; and <i>we</i> already, in
+perspective, beheld our glove-box enriched with half-a-dozen pair of
+snowy French sevens!</p>
+
+<p>Never had we felt more interested in watching the arrivals and
+movements of strangers, than on this evening, for our honour was
+concerned, to detect the lovers, and raise the veil. Papas and mammas,
+and masters and misses, came trooping in; old ladies, and middle-aged;
+old gentlemen, and middle-aged&mdash;until the number amounted to about
+thirty, and Cousin Con's drawing-rooms were comfortably filled. We
+closely scrutinised all the young folks, and so intently but covertly
+watched their proceedings, that we could have revealed several
+innocent flirtations, but nothing appeared that could lead us to the
+turtledoves and their engagement. At length, we really<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[pg 319]</a></span> had hopes, and
+ensconced ourselves in a corner, to observe the more cautiously a
+tall, beautiful girl, whose eyes incessantly turned towards the door
+of the apartment; while each time it opened to admit any one, she
+sighed and looked disappointed, as if that one was not the one she
+yearned to see. We were deep in a reverie, conjuring up a romance of
+which she was the heroine, when a little lady, habited in gray, whose
+age might average threescore, unceremoniously seated herself beside
+us, and immediately commenced a conversation, by asking if we were
+admiring pretty Annie Mortimer&mdash;following the direction of our looks.
+On receiving a reply in the affirmative, she continued: 'Ah, she's a
+good, affectionate girl; a great favourite of mine is sweet Annie
+Mortimer.'</p>
+
+<p>'Watching for her lover, no doubt?' we ventured to say, hoping to gain
+the desired information, and thinking of our white kid-gloves. 'She is
+an engaged young lady?'</p>
+
+<p>'Engaged! engaged!' cried the little animated lady: 'no indeed. The
+fates forbid! Annie Mortimer is not engaged.' The expression of the
+little lady's countenance at our bare supposition of so natural a
+fact, amounted almost to the ludicrous; and we with some difficulty
+articulated a serious rejoinder, disavowing all previous knowledge,
+and therefore erring through ignorance. We had now time to examine our
+new acquaintance more critically. As we have already stated, she was
+habited in gray; but not only was her attire gray, but she was
+literally gray all over: gray hairs, braided in a peculiar obsolete
+fashion, and quite uncovered; gray gloves; gray shoes; and, above all,
+gray eyes, soft, large, and peculiarly sad in expression, yet
+beautiful eyes, redeeming the gray, monotonous countenance from
+absolute plainness. Mary Queen of Scots, we are told, had gray eyes;
+and even she, poor lady, owned not more speaking or history-telling
+orbs than did this little unknown gossip in gray. But our attention
+was diverted from the contemplation, by the entrance of another actor
+on the stage, to whom Annie Mortimer darted forward with an
+exclamation of delight and welcome. The new-comer was a slender,
+elderly gentleman, whose white hairs, pale face, and benignant
+expression presented nothing remarkable in their aspect, beyond a
+certain air of elegance and refinement, which characterised the whole
+outward man.</p>
+
+<p>'That is a charming-looking old gentleman,' said we to the gray lady;
+'is he Annie's father?'</p>
+
+<p>'Her father! O dear, no! That gentleman is a bachelor; but he is
+Annie's guardian, and has supplied the place of a father to her, for
+poor Annie is an orphan.'</p>
+
+<p>'Oh!' we exclaimed, and there was a great deal of meaning in our oh!
+for had we not read and heard of youthful wards falling in love with
+their guardians? and might not the fair Annie's taste incline this
+way? The little gray lady understood our thoughts, for she smiled, but
+said nothing; and while we were absorbed with Annie and her supposed
+antiquated lover, she glided into the circle, and presently we beheld
+Annie's guardian, with Annie leaning on his arm, exchange a few words
+with her in an undertone, as she passed them to an inner room.</p>
+
+<p>'Who is that pleasing-looking old gentleman?' said we to our hostess;
+'and what is the name of the lady in gray, who went away just as you
+came up? That is Annie Mortimer we know, and we know also that she
+isn't engaged!'</p>
+
+<p>Cousin Con laughed heartily as she replied: 'That nice old gentleman
+is Mr Worthington, our poor curate; and a poor curate he is likely
+ever to continue, so far as we can see. The lady in gray we call our
+"little gray gossip," and a darling she is! As to Annie, you seem to
+know all about her. I suppose little Bessie has been lauding her up to
+the skies.'</p>
+
+<p>'Who is little Bessie?' we inquired.</p>
+
+<p>'Little Bessie is your little gray gossip: we never call her anything
+but Bessie to her face; she is a harmless little old maid. But come
+this way: Bessie is going to sing, for they won't let her rest till
+she complies; and Bessie singing, and Bessie talking, are widely
+different creatures.'</p>
+
+<p>Widely different indeed! Could this be the little gray lady seated at
+the piano, and making it speak? while her thrilling tones, as she sang
+of 'days gone by,' went straight to each listener's heart, she herself
+looking ten years younger! When the song was over, I observed Mr
+Worthington, with Annie still resting on his arm, in a corner of the
+apartment, shaded by a projecting piece of furniture; and I also noted
+the tear on his furrowed cheek, which he hastily brushed away, and
+stooped to answer some remark of Annie's, who, with fond affection,
+had evidently observed it too, endeavouring to dispel the painful
+illusion which remembrances of days gone by occasioned.</p>
+
+<p>We at length found the company separating, and our wager still
+unredeemed. The last to depart was Mr Worthington, escorting Annie
+Mortimer and little Bessie, whom he shawled most tenderly, no doubt
+because she was a poor forlorn little old maid, and sang so sweetly.</p>
+
+<p>The next morning at breakfast, Cousin Con attacked us, supported by Mr
+Danvers, both demanding a solution of the mystery, or the scented
+sevens! After a vast deal of laughing, talking, and discussion, we
+were obliged to confess ourselves beaten, for there had been an
+engaged couple present on the previous evening, and we had failed to
+discover them. No; it was not Annie Mortimer: she had no lover. No; it
+was not the Misses Halliday, or the Masters Burton: they had flirted
+and danced, and danced and flirted indiscriminately; but as to serious
+engagements&mdash;pooh! pooh!</p>
+
+<p>Who would have conjectured the romance of reality that was now
+divulged? and how could we have been so stupid as not to have read it
+at a glance? These contradictory exclamations, as is usual in such
+cases, ensued when the riddle was unfolded. It is so easy to be wise
+when we have learned the wisdom. Yet we cheerfully lost our wager, and
+would have lost a hundred such, for the sake of hearing a tale so far
+removed from matter-of-fact; proving also that enduring faith and
+affection are not so fabulous as philosophers often pronounce them to
+be.</p>
+
+<p>Bessie Prudholm was nearly related to David Danvers, and she had been
+the only child of a talented but improvident father, who, after a
+short, brilliant career as a public singer, suddenly sank into
+obscurity and neglect, from the total loss of his vocal powers,
+brought on by a violent rheumatic cold and lasting prostration of
+strength. At this juncture, Bessie had nearly attained her twentieth
+year, and was still in mourning for an excellent mother, by whom she
+had been tenderly and carefully brought up. From luxury and indulgence
+the descent to poverty and privation was swift. Bessie, indeed,
+inherited a very small income in right of her deceased parent,
+sufficient for her own wants, and even comforts, but totally
+inadequate to meet the thousand demands, caprices, and fancies of her
+ailing and exigeant father. However, for five years she battled
+bravely with adversity, eking out their scanty means by her
+exertions&mdash;though, from her father's helpless condition, and the
+constant and unremitting attention he required, she was in a great
+measure debarred from applying her efforts advantageously. The poor,
+dying man, in his days of health, had contributed to the enjoyment of
+the affluent, and in turn been courted by them; but now, forgotten and
+despised, he bitterly reviled the heartless world, whose hollow meed
+of applause it had formerly been the sole aim of his existence to
+secure. Wealth became to his disordered imagination the desideratum of
+existence, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[pg 320]</a></span> he attached inordinate value to it, in proportion as
+he felt the bitter stings of comparative penury. To guard his only
+child&mdash;whom he certainly loved better than anything else in the world,
+save himself&mdash;from this dreaded evil, the misguided man, during his
+latter days, extracted from her an inviolable assurance, never to
+become the wife of any individual who could not settle upon her,
+subject to no contingencies or chances, the sum of at least one
+thousand pounds.</p>
+
+<p>Bessie, who was fancy-free, and a lively-spirited girl, by no means
+relished the slights and privations which poverty entails. She
+therefore willingly became bound by this solemn promise; and when her
+father breathed his last, declaring that she had made his mind
+comparatively easy, little Bessie half smiled, even in the midst of
+her deep and natural sorrow, to think how small and easy a concession
+her poor father had exacted, when her own opinions and views so
+perfectly coincided with his. The orphan girl took up her abode with
+the mother of David Danvers, and continued to reside with that worthy
+lady until the latter's decease. It was beneath the roof of Mrs
+Danvers that Bessie first became acquainted with Mr Worthington&mdash;that
+acquaintance speedily ripening into a mutual and sincere attachment.
+He was poor and patronless then, as he had continued ever since, with
+slender likelihood of ever possessing L.100 of his own, much less
+L.1000 to settle on a wife. It is true, that in the chances and
+changes of this mortal life, Paul Worthington might succeed to a fine
+inheritance; but there were many lives betwixt him and it, and Paul
+was not the one to desire happiness at another's expense, nor was
+sweet little Bessie either.</p>
+
+<p>Yet was Paul Worthington rich in one inestimable possession, such as
+money cannot purchase&mdash;even in the love of a pure devoted heart, which
+for him, and for his dear sake, bravely endured the life-long
+loneliness and isolation which their peculiar circumstances induced.
+Paul did not see Bessie grow old and gray: in his eyes, she never
+changed; she was to him still beautiful, graceful, and enchanting; she
+was his betrothed, and he came forth into the world, from his books,
+and his arduous clerical and parochial duties, to gaze at intervals
+into her soft eyes, to press her tiny hand, to whisper a fond word,
+and then to return to his lonely home, like a second Josiah Cargill,
+to try and find in severe study oblivion of sorrow.</p>
+
+<p>Annie Mortimer had been sent to him as a ministering angel: she was
+the orphan and penniless daughter of Mr Worthington's dearest friend
+and former college-chum, and she had come to find a shelter beneath
+the humble roof of the pious guardian, to whose earthly care she had
+been solemnly bequeathed. Paul's curacy was not many miles distant
+from the town where Bessie had fixed her resting-place; and it was
+generally surmised by the select few who were in the secret of little
+Bessie's singular history, that she regarded Annie Mortimer with
+especial favour and affection, from the fact, that Annie enjoyed the
+privilege of solacing and cheering Paul Worthington's declining years.
+Each spoke of her as a dear adopted daughter, and Annie equally
+returned the affection of both.</p>
+
+<p>Poor solitaries! what long anxious years they had known, separated by
+circumstance, yet knit together in the bonds of enduring love!</p>
+
+<p>I pictured them at festive winter seasons, at their humble solitary
+boards; and in summer prime, when song-birds and bright perfumed
+flowers call lovers forth into the sunshine rejoicingly. They had not
+dared to rejoice during their long engagement; yet Bessie was a
+sociable creature, and did not mope or shut herself up, but led a life
+of active usefulness, and was a general favourite amongst all classes.
+They had never contemplated the possibility of evading Bessie's solemn
+promise to her dying father; to their tender consciences, that fatal
+promise was as binding and stringent, as if the gulf of marriage or
+conventual vows yawned betwixt them. We had been inclined to indulge
+some mirth at the expense of the little gray gossip, when she first
+presented herself to our notice; but now we regarded her as an object
+of interest, surrounded by a halo of romance, fully shared in by her
+charming, venerable lover. And this was good Cousin Con's elucidation
+of the riddle, which she narrated with many digressions, and with
+animated smiles, to conceal tears of sympathy. Paul Worthington and
+little Bessie did not like their history to be discussed by the rising
+frivolous generation; it was so unworldly, so sacred, and they looked
+forward with humble hope so soon to be united for ever in the better
+land, that it pained and distressed them to be made a topic of
+conversation.</p>
+
+<p>Were we relating fiction, it would be easy to bring this antiquated
+pair together, even at the eleventh hour; love and constancy making up
+for the absence of one sweet ingredient, evanescent, yet
+beautiful&mdash;the ingredient we mean of youth. But as this is a romance
+of reality, we are fain to divulge facts as they actually occurred,
+and as we heard them from authentic sources. Paul and Bessie, divided
+in their lives, repose side by side in the old church-yard. He dropped
+off first, and Bessie doffed her gray for sombre habiliments of darker
+hue. Nor did she long remain behind, loving little soul! leaving her
+property to Annie Mortimer, and warning her against long engagements.</p>
+
+<p>The last time we heard of Annie, she was the happy wife of an
+excellent man, who, fully coinciding in the opinion of the little gray
+gossip, protested strenuously against more than six weeks' courtship,
+and carried his point triumphantly.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr />
+<h2><a name="THE_WET_SHROUD" id="THE_WET_SHROUD"></a>THE WET SHROUD.</h2>
+
+<p class="returnTOC"><a href="#Contents">Return to Table of
+    Contents</a></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">'Ach, Sohn! was h&auml;lt dich zur&uuml;ck?'<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Siehe, Mutter, das sind die Thr&auml;nen.'<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i12"><span class="smcap">Mutterthr&auml;nen</span>.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+
+<span class="i1">They gave her back again:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They never asked to see her face;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But gazed upon her vacant place,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Moaning, like those in pain.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">There was a brief hot thirst;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A thirsting of the heart for streams<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Which never more save in sweet dreams<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">From that lost fount should burst.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">There was a frightful cry,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">As if the whole great earth were dead;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Yet was one arrow only sped,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">One, only, called to die.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">Then all grew calm as sleep;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And they in household ways once more<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Did go: the anguish half was o'er,<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">For they had learned to weep.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">They stood about her bed,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And whispered low beneath their cloud;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">For she might hear them speaking loud&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">She was so near, they said.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">Softly her pillow pressing,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With reverent brows they mutely lay;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They scarcely missed the risen clay<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">In her pure soul's caressing.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i1">Last, from their eyes were driven<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Those heart-drops, lest&mdash;so spoke their fears&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Her robes all heavy with their tears<br /></span>
+<span class="i1">Might clog her flight to Heaven!<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i15">E.L.H.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+<p>Printed and Published by W. and R. <span class="smcap">Chambers</span>, High Street, Edinburgh.
+Also sold by W. S. <span class="smcap">Orr</span>, Amen Corner, London; D. N. <span class="smcap">Chambers</span>, 55 West
+Nile Street, Glasgow; and J. <span class="smcap">M'Glashan</span>, 50 Upper Sackville Street,
+Dublin.&mdash;Advertisements for Monthly Parts are requested to be sent to
+<span class="smcap">Maxwell</span> &amp; Co., 31 Nicholas Lane, Lombard Street, London, to whom all
+applications respecting their insertion must be made.</p>
+
+<hr class="full" />
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
+
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+Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437
+       Volume 17, New Series, May 15, 1852
+
+Author: Various
+
+Editor: Robert Chambers and William Chambers
+
+Release Date: July 23, 2006 [EBook #18898]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Malcolm Farmer, Richard J. Shiffer and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net.
+
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+
+
+
+                     CHAMBERS' EDINBURGH JOURNAL
+
+  CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF 'CHAMBERS'S
+  INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE,' 'CHAMBERS'S EDUCATIONAL COURSE,' &c.
+
+
+  No. 437. NEW SERIES.   SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1852.   PRICE 1-1/2_d._
+
+
+
+
+LONDON CROSSING-SWEEPERS.
+
+
+There is no occupation in life, be it ever so humble, which is justly
+worthy of contempt, if by it a man is enabled to administer to his
+necessities without becoming a burden to others, or a plague to them
+by the parade of shoeless feet, fluttering rags, and a famished face.
+In the multitudinous drama of life, which on the wide theatre of the
+metropolis is ever enacting with so much intense earnestness, there
+is, and from the very nature of things there always must be, a
+numerous class of supernumeraries, who from time to time, by the force
+of varying circumstances, are pushed and hustled off the stage, and
+shuffled into the side-scenes, the drear and dusky background of the
+world's proscenium. Of the thousands and tens of thousands thus rudely
+dealt with, he is surely not the worst who, wanting a better weapon,
+shoulders a birch-broom, and goes forth to make his own way in the
+world, by removing the moist impediments of filth and refuse from the
+way of his more fortunate fellows. Indeed, look upon him in what light
+you may, he is in some sort a practical moralist. Though far remote
+from the ivy chaplet on Wisdom's glorious brow, yet his stump of
+withered birch inculcates a lesson of virtue, by reminding us, that we
+should take heed to our steps in our journeyings through the
+wilderness of life; and, so far as in him lies, he helps us to do so,
+and by the exercise of a very catholic faith, looks for his reward to
+the value he supposes us to entertain for that virtue which, from time
+immemorial, has been in popular parlance classed as next to godliness.
+
+Time was, it is said, when the profession of a street-sweeper in
+London was a certain road to competence and fortune--when the men of
+the brooms were men of capital; when they lived well, and died rich,
+and left legacies behind them to their regular patrons. These palmy
+days, at any rate, are past now. Let no man, or woman either, expect a
+legacy at this time of day from the receiver of his copper dole. The
+labour of the modern sweeper is nothing compared with his of half a
+century ago. The channel of viscous mud, a foot deep, through which,
+so late as the time when George the Third was king, the carts and
+carriages had literally to plough their way, no longer exists, and the
+labour of the sweeper is reduced to a tithe of what it was. He has no
+longer to dig a trench in the morning, and wall up the sides of his
+fosse with stiff earth, hoarded for the purpose, as we have seen him
+doing in the days when 'Boney' was a terror. The city scavengers have
+reduced his work to a minimum, and his pay has dwindled
+proportionately. The twopences which used to be thrown to a sweeper
+will now pay for a ride, and the smallest coin is considered a
+sufficient guerdon for a service so light. But what he has lost in
+substantial emolument, he has gained in _morale_; he is infinitely
+more polite and attentive than he was; he sweeps ten times as clean
+for a half-penny as he did for twopence or sixpence, and thanks you
+more heartily than was his wont in the days of yore. The truth is,
+that civility, as a speculation, is found to pay; and the want of it,
+even among the very lowest rank of industrials in London, is at the
+present moment not merely a rarity, but an actual phenomenon--always
+supposing that something is to be got by it.
+
+The increase of vehicles of all descriptions, but more especially
+omnibuses, which are perpetually rushing along the main thoroughfares,
+has operated largely in shutting out the crossing-sweepers from what
+was at one period the principal theatre of their industry.
+Independent, too, of the unbroken stream of carriages which renders
+sweeping during the day impossible, and the collection of small coin
+from the crowd who dart impatiently across the road when a practicable
+breach presents itself, equally so, it is found that too dense a
+population is less favourable to the brotherhood of the broom than one
+ever so sparse and thin. Had the negro of Waithman's obelisk survived
+the advent of Shillibeer, he would have had to shift his quarters, or
+to have drawn upon his three-and-a-half per cents. to maintain his
+position. The sweepers who work on the great lines of traffic from
+Oxford Street west to Aldgate, are consequently not nearly so numerous
+as they once were, though the members of the profession have probably
+doubled their numbers within the last twenty years. They exercise
+considerable judgment in the choice of their locations, making
+frequent experiments in different spots, feeling the pulse of the
+neighbourhood, as it were, ere they finally settle down to establish a
+permanent connection.
+
+We shall come to a better understanding of the true condition of these
+muddy nomads by considering them in various classes, as they actually
+exist, and each of which may be identified without much trouble. The
+first in the rank is he who is bred to the business, who has followed
+it from his earliest infancy, and never dreamed of pursuing any other
+calling. We must designate him as
+
+No. 1. _The Professional Sweeper_.--He claims precedence before all
+others, as being to the manner born, and inheriting his broom, with
+all its concomitant advantages, from his father, or mother, as it
+might be. All his ideas, interests, and affections are centered in one
+spot of ground--the spot he sweeps, and has swept daily for the last
+twenty or thirty years, ever since it was bequeathed to him by his
+parent. The companion of his childhood, his youth, and his maturer
+age, is the post buttressed by the curb-stone at the corner of the
+street. To that post, indeed, he is a sort of younger brother. It has
+been his friend and support through many a stormy day and blustering
+night. It is the confidant of his hopes and his sorrows, and
+sometimes, too, his agent and cashier, for he has cut a small basin in
+the top of it, where a passing patron may deposit a coin if he choose,
+under the guardianship of the broom, which, while he is absent for a
+short half-hour discussing a red herring and a crust for his dinner,
+leans gracefully against his friend the post, and draws the attention
+of a generous public to that as the deputy-receiver of the exchequer.
+Our professional friend has a profound knowledge of character: he has
+studied the human face divine all his life, and can read at a glance,
+through the most rigid and rugged lineaments, the indications of
+benevolence or the want of it; and he knows what aspect and expression
+to assume, in order to arouse the sympathies of a hesitating giver. He
+knows every inmate of every house in his immediate neighbourhood; and
+not only that, but he knows their private history and antecedents for
+the last twenty years. He has watched a whole generation growing up
+under his broom, and he looks upon them all as so much material
+destined to enhance the value of his estate. He is the humble
+pensioner of a dozen families: he wears the shoes of one, the
+stockings of another, the shirts of a third, the coats of a fourth,
+and so on; and he knows the taste of everybody's cookery, and the
+temper of everybody's cookmaid, quite as well as those who daily
+devour the one and scold the other. He is intimate with everybody's
+cat and everybody's dog, and will carry them home if he finds them
+straying. He is on speaking terms with everybody's servant-maid, and
+does them all a thousand kind offices, which are repaid with interest
+by surreptitious scraps from the larder, and jorums of hot tea in the
+cold wintry afternoons. On the other hand, if he knows so much, he is
+equally well known: he is as familiar to sight as the Monument on Fish
+Street Hill to those who live opposite; he is part and parcel of the
+street view, and must make a part of the picture whenever it is
+painted, or else it wont be like. You cannot realise the idea of
+meeting him elsewhere; it would be shocking to your nerves to think of
+it: you would as soon think of seeing the Obelisk walking up Ludgate
+Hill, for instance, as of meeting him there--it could not be. Where he
+goes when he leaves his station, you have not the least notion. He is
+there so soon as it is light in the morning, and till long after the
+gas is burning at night. He is a married man, of course, and his wife,
+a worthy helpmate, has no objection to pull in the same boat with him.
+When Goggs has a carpet to beat--he beats all the carpets on his
+estate--Mrs Goggs comes to console the post in his absence. She
+usually signalises her advent by a desperate assault with the broom
+upon the whole length of the crossing: it is plain she never thinks
+that Goggs keeps the place clean enough, and so she brushes him a
+hint. Goggs has a weakness for beer, and more than once we have seen
+him asleep on a hot thirsty afternoon, too palpably under the
+influence of John Barleycorn to admit of a doubt, his broom between
+his legs, and his back against his abstinent friend the post. Somehow,
+whenever this happens, Mrs G. is sure to hear of it, and she walks him
+off quietly, that the spectacle of a sweeper overtaken may not bring a
+disgrace upon the profession; and then, broom in hand, she takes her
+stand, and does his duty for the remainder of the day. The receipts of
+the professional sweeper do not vary throughout the year so much as
+might be supposed. They depend very little upon chance contributions:
+these, there is no doubt, fall off considerably, if they do not fail
+altogether, during a continuance of dry weather, when there is no need
+of the sweeper's services; but the man is remunerated chiefly by
+regular donations from known patrons, who form his connection, and
+who, knowing that he must eat and drink be the weather wet or dry,
+bestow their periodical pittances accordingly.
+
+No. 2 is the _Morning Sweeper_.--This is rather a knowing subject,
+one, at least, who is capable of drawing an inference from certain
+facts. There are numerous lines of route, both north and south of the
+great centres of commerce, and all converging towards the city as
+their nucleus, which are traversed, morning and evening, for two or
+three consecutive hours, by bands of gentlemanly-looking individuals:
+clerks, book-keepers, foremen, business-managers, and such like
+responsible functionaries, whose unimpeachable outer integuments
+testify to their regard for appearances. This current of
+respectability sets in towards the city at about half-past six in the
+morning, and continues its flow until just upon ten o'clock, when it
+may be said to be highwater. Though a large proportion of these agents
+of the world's traffic are daily borne to and from their destination
+in omnibuses, still the great majority, either for the sake of
+exercise or economy, are foot-passengers. For the accommodation of the
+latter, the crossing-sweeper stations himself upon the dirtiest
+portion of the route, and clearing a broad and convenient path ere the
+sun is out of bed, awaits the inevitable tide, which must flow, and
+which can hardly fail of bringing him some remuneration for his
+labour. If we are to judge from the fact, that along one line of route
+which we have been in the habit of traversing for several years, we
+have counted as many as fourteen of these morning sweepers in a march
+of little more than two miles, the speculation cannot be altogether
+unprofitable. In traversing the same route in the middle of the day,
+not three of the sweepers would be found at their post; and the reason
+would be obvious enough, since the streets are then comparatively
+deserted, being populous in the morning only, because they are so many
+short-cuts or direct thoroughfares from the suburbs to the city. The
+morning sweeper is generally a lively and active young fellow; often a
+mere child, who is versed in the ways of London life, and who, knowing
+well the value of money from the frequent want of it, is anxious to
+earn a penny by any honest means. Ten to one, he has been brought up
+in the country, and has been tutored by hard necessity, in this great
+wilderness of brick, to make the most of every hour, and of every
+chance it may afford him. He will be found in the middle of the day
+touting for a job at the railway stations, to carry a portmanteau or
+to wheel a truck; or he will be at Smithfield, helping a butcher to
+drive to the slaughterhouse his bargain of sheep or cattle; or in some
+livery-yards, currying a horse or cleaning out a stable. If he can
+find nothing better to employ him, he will return to his sweeping in
+the evening, especially if it be summer-time, and should set in wet at
+five or six o'clock. When it is dark early, he knows that it won't pay
+to resume the broom; commercial gentlemen are not particular about the
+condition of their Wellingtons, when nobody can see to criticise their
+polish, and all they want is to exchange them for slippers as soon as
+possible. If we were to follow the career of this industrious fellow
+up to manhood, we should in all probability find him occupying
+worthily a hard-working but decent and comfortable position in
+society.
+
+No. 3 is the _Occasional Sweeper_.--Now and then, in walking the
+interminable streets, one comes suddenly upon very questionable
+shapes, which, however, we don't question, but walk on and account for
+them mythically if we can. Among these singular apparitions which at
+times have startled us, not a few have borne a broom in their hands,
+and appealed to us for a reward for services which, to say the best of
+them, were extremely doubtful. Now an elderly gentleman in silver
+spectacles, with pumps on his feet, and a roquelaure with a fur-collar
+over his shoulders, and an expression of unutterable anguish in his
+countenance, holds out his hand and bows his head as we pass, and
+groans audibly the very instant we are within earshot of a groan;
+which is a distance of about ten inches in a London atmosphere. Now an
+old, old man, tall, meagre, and decrepit, with haggard eye and
+moonstruck visage, bares his aged head to the pattering rain--
+
+    'Loose his beard and hoary hair
+    Stream like a meteor to the troubled air.'
+
+He makes feeble and fitful efforts to sweep a pathway across the road,
+and the dashing cab pulls up suddenly just in time to save him from
+being hurled to the ground by the horse. Then he gives it up as a vain
+attempt, and leans, the model of despair, against the wall, and wrings
+his skeleton fingers in agony--when just as a compassionate matron is
+drawing the strings of her purse, stopping for her charitable purpose
+in a storm of wind and rain, the voice of the policeman is heard over
+her shoulder: 'What! you are here at it again, old chap? Well, I'm
+blowed if I think anything 'll cure you. You'd better put up your pus,
+marm: if he takes your money, I shall take him to the station-us,
+that's all. Now, old chap--trot, trot, trot!' And away walks the old
+impostor, with a show of activity perfectly marvellous for his years,
+the policeman following close at his heels till he vanishes in the
+arched entry of a court.
+
+The next specimen is perhaps a 'swell' out at elbows, a seedy and
+somewhat ragged remnant of a very questionable kind of gentility--a
+gentility engendered in 'coal-holes' and 'cider-cellars,' in 'shades,'
+and such-like midnight 'kens'--suckled with brandy and water and
+port-wine negus, and fed with deviled kidneys and toasted cheese. He
+has run to the end of his tether, is cleaned out even to the last
+disposable shred of his once well-stocked wardrobe; and after fifty
+high-flying and desperate resolves, and twice fifty mean and sneaking
+devices to victimise those who have the misfortune to be assailable by
+him, 'to this complexion he has come at last.' He has made a track
+across the road, rather a slovenly disturbance of the mud than a
+clearance of it; and having finished his performance in a style to
+indicate that he is a stranger to the business, being born to better
+things, he rears himself with front erect and arms a-kimbo, with one
+foot advanced after the approved statuesque model, and exhibits a face
+of scornful brass to an unsympathising world, before whom he stands a
+monument of neglected merit, and whom he doubtless expects to
+overwhelm with unutterable shame for their abominable treatment of a
+man and a brother--and a gentleman to boot. This sort of exhibition
+never lasts long, it being a kind of standing-dish for which the
+public have very little relish in this practical age. The 'swell'
+sweeper generally subsides in a week or two, and vanishes from the
+stage, on which, however ornamental, he is of very little use.
+
+The occasional sweeper is much oftener a poor countryman, who has
+wandered to London in search of employment, and, finding nothing else,
+has spent his last fourpence in the purchase of a besom, with which he
+hopes to earn a crust. Here his want of experience in town is very
+much against him. You may know him instantly from the old _habitue_ of
+the streets: he plants himself in the very thick and throng of the
+most crowded thoroughfare--the rapids, so to speak, of the human
+current--where he is of no earthly use, but, on the contrary, very
+much in the way, and where, while everybody wishes him at Jericho, he
+wonders that nobody gives him a copper; or he undertakes impossible
+things, such as the sweeping of the whole width of Charing Cross from
+east to west, between the equestrian statue and Nelson's Pillar,
+where, if he sweep the whole, he can't collect, and if he collect, he
+can't sweep, and he breaks his heart and his back too in a fruitless
+vocation. He picks up experience in time; but he is pretty sure to
+find a better trade before he has learned to cultivate that of a
+crossing-sweeper to perfection.--Many of these occasional hands are
+Hindoos, Lascars, or Orientals of some sort, whose dark skins,
+contrasted with their white and scarlet drapery, render them
+conspicuous objects in a crowd; and from this cause they probably
+derive an extra profit, as they can scarcely be passed by without
+notice. The sudden promotion of one of this class, who was hailed by
+the Nepaulese ambassador as he stood, broom in hand, in St Paul's
+Churchyard, and engaged as dragoman to the embassy, will be in the
+recollection of the reader. It would be impossible to embrace in our
+category even a tithe of the various characters who figure in London
+as occasional sweepers. A broom is the last resort of neglected and
+unemployed industry, as well as of sudden and unfriended
+ill-fortune--the sanctuary to which a thousand victims fly from the
+fiends of want and starvation. The broken-down tradesman, the artisan
+out of work, the decayed gentleman, the ruined gambler, the starving
+scholar--each and all we have indubitably seen brooming the muddy ways
+for the chance of a half-penny or a penny. It is not very long since
+we were addressed in Water Street, Blackfriars, by a middle-aged man
+in a garb of seedy black, who handled his broom like one who played
+upon a strange instrument, and who, wearing the words _pauper et
+pedester_ written on a card stuck in his hat-band, told us, in good
+colloquial Latin, a tale of such horrifying misery and destitution,
+that we shrink from recording it here. We must pass on to the next on
+our list, who is--
+
+No. 4, the _Lucus-a-non_, or a sweeper who never sweeps.--This fellow
+is a vagabond of the first-water, or of the first-mud rather. His
+stock in trade is an old worn-out broom-stump, which he has shouldered
+for these seven years past, and with which he has never displaced a
+pound of soil in the whole period. He abominates work with such a
+crowning intensity, that the very pretence of it is a torture to him.
+He is a beggar without a beggar's humbleness; and a thief, moreover,
+without a thief's hardihood. He crawls lazily about the public ways,
+and begs under the banner of his broom, which constitutes his
+protection against the police. He will collect alms at a crossing
+which he would not cleanse to save himself from starvation; or he will
+take up a position at one which a morning sweeper has deserted for the
+day, and glean the sorry remnants of another man's harvest. He is as
+insensible to shame as to the assaults of the weather; he will watch
+you picking your way through the mire over which he stands sentinel,
+and then impudently demand payment for the performance of a function
+which he never dreams of exercising; or he will stand in your path in
+the middle of the splashy channel, and pester you with whining
+supplications, while he kicks the mire over your garments, and bars
+your passage to the pavement. He is worth nothing, not even the short
+notice we have taken of him, or the trouble of a whipping, which he
+ought to get, instead of the coins that he contrives to extract from
+the heedless generosity of the public.
+
+No. 5 is the _Sunday Sweeper_.--This neat, dapper, and cleanly variety
+of the genus besom, is usually a young fellow, who, pursuing some
+humble and ill-paid occupation during the week, ekes out his modest
+salary by labouring with the broom on the Sunday. He has his regular
+'place of worship,' one entrance of which he monopolises every Sabbath
+morning. Long before the church-going bell rings out the general
+invitation, he is on the spot, sweeping a series of paths all
+radiating from the church or chapel door to the different points of
+the compass. The business he has cut out for himself is no sinecure;
+he does his work so effectually, that you marvel at the achievement,
+and doubt if the floor of your dwelling be cleaner. Then he is
+himself as clean as a new pin, and wears a flower in his button-hole,
+and a smile on his face, and thanks you so becomingly, and bows so
+gracefully, that you cannot help wishing him a better office; and of
+course, to prove the sincerity of your wish, you pay him at a better
+rate. When the congregation are all met, and the service is commenced,
+he is religious enough, or knowing enough, to walk stealthily in, and
+set himself upon the poor bench, where he sits quietly, well behaved
+and attentive to the end; for which very proper conduct he is pretty
+sure to meet an additional reward during the exit of the assembly, as
+they defile past him at the gate when all is over. In the afternoon,
+he is off to the immediate precinct of some park or public promenade;
+and selecting a well-frequented approach to the general rendezvous,
+will cleanse and purify the crossing or pathway in his own peculiar
+and elaborate style, vastly to the admiration of the gaily-dressed
+pedestrians, and it is to be supposed, to his own profit. Besides this
+really clever and enterprising genius, there is a numerous tribe of a
+very different description, who must sally forth literally by the
+thousand every Sunday morning when the weather is fine, and who take
+possession of every gate, stile, and wicket, throughout the widespread
+suburban districts of the metropolis in all directions. They are of
+both sexes and all ages; and go where you will, it is impossible to go
+through a gate, or get over a stile, without the proffer of their
+assistance, for which, of course, you are expected to pay, whether you
+use it or not. Some of these fellows have a truly ruffianly aspect,
+and waylay you in secluded lanes and narrow pathways; and carrying a
+broom-stump, which looks marvellously like a bludgeon, no doubt often
+levy upon the apprehensions of a timorous pedestrian a contribution
+which his charity would not be so blind as to bestow. The whole of
+this tribe constitute a monster-nuisance, which ought to be abated by
+the exertions of the police.
+
+No. 6 are the _deformed_, _maimed_, _and crippled sweepers_, of whom
+there is a considerable number constantly at work, and, to do them
+justice, they appear by no means the least energetic of the
+brotherhood. Nature frequently compensates bodily defects by the
+bestowal of a vigorous temperament. The sweeper of one leg or one arm,
+or the poor cripple who, but for the support of his broom, would be
+crawling on all-fours, is as active, industrious, and efficient as the
+best man on the road; and he takes a pride in the proof of his
+prowess, surveying his work when it is finished with a complacency too
+evident to escape notice. He considers, perhaps, that he has an extra
+claim upon the public on account of the afflictions he has undergone,
+and we imagine that such claim must be pretty extensively allowed: we
+know no other mode of accounting for the fact, that now and then one
+of these supposed maimed or halt performers turns out to be an
+impostor, who, considering a broken limb, or something tantamount to
+that, essential to the success of his broom, concocts an impromptu
+fracture or amputation to serve his purpose. Some few years ago, a
+lively, sailor-looking fellow appeared as a one-handed sweeper in a
+genteel square on the Surrey side of the water. The right sleeve of
+his jacket waved emptily in the wind, but he flourished his left arm
+so vigorously in the air, and completed the gyration of his weapon,
+when it stuck fast in the mud, so manfully by the impulse of his right
+leg, that he became quite a popular favourite, and won '_copper_
+opinions from all sorts of men,' to say nothing of a shower of
+sixpences from the ladies in the square. Unfortunately for the
+continuance of his prosperity, a gentleman intimate with one of his
+numerous patronesses, while musing in the twilight at an upstairs
+window, saw the fellow enter his cottage after his day's work, release
+his right arm from the durance in which it had lain beneath his jacket
+for ten or twelve hours, and immediately put the power of the
+long-imprisoned limb to the test by belabouring his wife with it. That
+same night every tenant in the square was made acquainted with the
+disguised arm, and the use for which it was reserved, and the
+ingenious performer was the next morning delivered over to the police.
+The law, however, allows a man to dispose of his limbs as he chooses;
+and as the delinquent was never proved to have _said_ that he had lost
+an arm; and as he urged that one arm being enough for the profession
+he had embraced, he considered he had a right to reserve the other
+until he had occasion for it--he was allowed to go about his business.
+
+No. 7, and the last in our classification, are the _Female
+Sweepers_.--It is singular, that among these we rarely if ever
+meet with young women, properly so called. The calling of a
+crossing-sweeper, so far as it is carried on by females, is almost
+entirely divided between children or young girls, and women above the
+age of forty. The children are a very wandering and fickle race,
+rarely staying for many weeks together in a single spot. This love of
+change must militate much against their success, as they lose the
+advantage of the charitable interest they would excite in persons
+accustomed to meet them regularly in their walks. They are not,
+however, generally dependent upon the produce of their own labours for
+a living, being for the most part the children of parents in extremely
+low circumstances, who send them forth with a broom to pick up a few
+halfpence to assist in the daily provision for the family. The older
+women, on the other hand, of whom there is a pretty stout staff
+scattered throughout the metropolis, are too much impressed with the
+importance of adhering constantly to one spot, capriciously to change
+their position. They would dread to lose a connection they have been
+many years in forming, and they will even cling to it after it has
+ceased to be a thoroughfare through the opening of a new route, unless
+they can discover the direction their patrons have taken. When a poor
+old creature, who has braved the rheumatism for thirty years or so,
+finds she can stand it no longer, we have known her induct a successor
+into her office by attending her for a fortnight or more, and
+introducing the new-comer to the friendly regard of her old patrons.
+The exceptions to these two classes of the old and the very juvenile,
+will be found to consist mostly of young widows left with the charge
+of an infant family more or less numerous. Some few of these there
+are, and they meet with that considerate reception from the public
+which their distressing cases demand. The spectacle of a young mother,
+with an infant on one arm muffled up from the driving rain, while she
+plies a broom single-handed, is one which never appeals in vain to a
+London public. With a keen eye for imposture, and a general
+inclination to suspect it, the Londoner has yet compassion, and coin,
+too, to bestow upon a deserving object. It is these poor widows who,
+by rearing their orphaned offspring to wield the broom, supplement the
+ranks of the professional sweepers. They become the heads of sweeping
+families, who in time leave the maternal wing, and shift for
+themselves. We might point to one whom we have encountered almost
+daily for the last ten years. In 1841, she was left a widow with three
+small children, the eldest under four, and the youngest in arms. Clad
+in deep mourning, she took up a position at an angular crossing of a
+square, and was allowed to accommodate the two elder children upon
+some matting spread upon the steps of a door. With the infant in one
+arm, she plied her broom with the other, and held out a small white
+hand for the reception of such charity as the passers-by might choose
+to bestow. The children grew up strong and hearty, in spite of their
+exposure to the weather at all seasons. All three of them are at the
+present moment sweepers in the same line of route, at no great
+distance from the mother, who, during the whole period, has scarcely
+abandoned her post for a single day. Ten years' companionship with sun
+and wind, and frost and rain, have doubled her apparent age, but her
+figure still shews the outline of gentility, and her face yet wears
+the aspect and expression of better days. We have frequently met the
+four returning home together in the deepening twilight, the elder boy
+carrying the four brooms strapped together on his shoulder.
+
+The sweeper does better at holiday seasons than at any other time. If
+he is blessed with a post for a companion, he decks it with a flower
+or sprig of green, and sweeps a clear stage round it, which is said to
+be a difficult exploit, though we have never tried it. At Christmas,
+he expects a double fee from his old patrons, and gets it too, and a
+substantial slice of plum-pudding from the old lady in the first floor
+opposite. He decks the entrance to his walk with laurel and holly, in
+honour of the day, and of his company, who walk under a triumphal arch
+of green, got up for that occasion only. He is sure of a good
+collection on that day, and he goes home with his pocket heavy and his
+heart light, and treats himself to a pot of old ale, warmed over a
+fire kindled with his old broom, and sipped sparingly to the melody of
+a good old song about the good old times, when crossing-sweepers grew
+rich, and bequeathed fortunes to their patrons.
+
+
+
+
+INSECT WINGS.
+
+
+Animals possess the power of feeling, and of effecting certain
+movements, by the exercise of a muscular apparatus with which their
+bodies are furnished. They are distinguished from the organisations of
+the vegetable kingdom by the presence of these attributes. Every one
+is aware, that when the child sees some strange and unknown object he
+is observing start suddenly into motion, he will exclaim: 'It is
+alive!' By this exclamation, he means to express his conviction that
+the object is endowed with _animal_ life. Power of voluntary and
+independent motion and animal organisation are associated together, as
+inseparable and essentially connected ideas, by even the earliest
+experience in the economy and ways of nature.
+
+The animal faculty of voluntary motion, in almost every case, confers
+upon the creature the ability to transfer its body from place to
+place. In some animals, the weight of the body is sustained by
+immersion in a fluid as dense as itself. It is then carried about with
+very little expenditure of effort, either by the waving action of
+vibratile cilia scattered over its external surface, or by the
+oar-like movement of certain portions of its frame especially adapted
+to the purpose. In other animals, the weight of the body rests
+directly upon the ground, and has, therefore, to be lifted from place
+to place by more powerful mechanical contrivances.
+
+In the lowest forms of air-living animals, the body rests upon the
+ground by numerous points of support; and when it moves, is wriggled
+along piecemeal, one portion being pushed forward while the rest
+remains stationary. The mode of progression which the little earthworm
+adopts, is a familiar illustration of this style of proceeding. In the
+higher forms of air-living animals, a freer and more commodious kind
+of movement is provided for. The body itself is raised up from the
+ground upon pointed columns, which are made to act as levers as well
+as props. Observe, for instance, the tiger-beetle, as it runs swiftly
+over the uneven surface of the path in search of its dinner, with its
+eager antennae thrust out in advance. Those six long and slender legs
+that bear up the body of the insect, and still keep advancing in
+regular alternate order, are steadied and worked by cords laid along
+on the hollows and grooves of their own substance. While some of them
+uphold the weight of the superincumbent body, the rest are thrown
+forwards, as fresh and more advanced points of support on to which it
+may be pulled. The running of the insect is a very ingenious and
+beautiful adaptation of the principles of mechanism to the purposes of
+life.
+
+But in the insect organisation, a still more surprising display of
+mechanical skill is made. A comparatively heavy body is not only
+carried rapidly and conveniently along the surface of the ground, it
+is also raised entirely up from it at pleasure, and transported
+through lengthened distances, while resting upon nothing but the thin
+transparent air. From the top of the central piece--technically termed
+thoracic--of the insect's body, from which the legs descend, two or
+more membraneous sails arise, which are able to beat the air by
+repeated strokes, and to make it, consequently, uphold their own
+weight, as well as that of the burden connected with them. These
+lifting and sustaining sails are the insect's wings.
+
+The wings of the insect are, however, of a nature altogether different
+from the apparently analogous organs which the bird uses in flight.
+The wings of the bird are merely altered fore-legs. Lift up the front
+extremities of a quadruped, keep them asunder at their origins by bony
+props, fit them with freer motions and stronger muscles, and cover
+them with feathers, and they become wings in every essential
+particular. In the insect, however, the case is altogether different.
+The wings are not altered legs; they are superadded to the legs. The
+insect has its fore-legs as well as its wings. The legs all descend
+from the under surface of the thoracic piece, while the wings arise
+from its upper surface. As the wings are flapping above during flight,
+the unchanged legs are dangling below, in full complement. The wings
+are, therefore, independent and additional organs. They have no
+relation whatever to limbs, properly so called. But there are some
+other portions of the animal economy with which they do connect
+themselves, both by structure and function. The reader will hardly
+guess what those wing-allied organs are.
+
+There is a little fly, called the May-fly, which usually makes its
+appearance in the month of August, and which visits the districts
+watered by the Seine and the Marne in such abundance, that the
+fishermen of these rivers believe it is showered down from heaven, and
+accordingly call its living clouds, manna. Reaumur once saw the
+May-flies descend in this region like thick snow-flakes, and so fast,
+that the step on which he stood by the river's bank was covered by a
+layer four inches thick in a few minutes. The insect itself is very
+beautiful: it has four delicate, yellowish, lace-like wings, freckled
+with brown spots, and three singular hair-like projections hanging out
+beyond its tail. It never touches food during its mature life, but
+leads a short and joyous existence. It dances over the surface of the
+water for three or four hours, dropping its eggs as it flits, and then
+disappears for ever. Myriads come forth about the hour of eight in the
+evening; but by ten or eleven o'clock not a single straggler can be
+found alive.
+
+From the egg which the parent May-fly drops into the water, a
+six-legged grub is very soon hatched. This grub proceeds forthwith to
+excavate for himself a home in the soft bank of the river, below the
+surface of the water, and there remains for two long years, feeding
+upon the decaying matters of the mould. During this aquatic residence,
+the little creature finds it necessary to breathe; and that he may do
+so comfortably, notwithstanding his habits of seclusion, and his
+constant immersion in fluid, he pushes out from his shoulders and back
+a series of delicate little leaf-like plates. A branch of one of the
+air-tubes of his body enters into each of these plates, and spreads
+out into its substance. The plates are, in fact, gills--that is,
+respiratory organs, fitted for breathing beneath the water. The
+little fellow may be seen to wave them backwards and forwards with
+incessant motion, as he churns up the fluid, to get out of it the
+vital air which it contains.
+
+When the grub of the May-fly has completed his two years of probation,
+he comes out from his subterranean and subaqueous den, and rises to
+the surface of the stream. By means of his flapping and then somewhat
+enlarged gills, he half leaps and half flies to the nearest rush or
+sedge he can perceive, and clings fast to it by means of his legs. He
+then, by a clever twist of his little body, splits open his old fishy
+skin, and slowly draws himself out, head, and body, and legs; and,
+last of all, from some of those leafy gills he pulls a delicate
+crumpled-up membrane, which soon dries and expands, and becomes
+lace-netted and brown-fretted. The membrane which was shut up in the
+gills of the aquatic creature, was really the rudiment of its now
+perfected wings.
+
+The wings of the insect are then a sort of external lungs, articulated
+with the body by means of a movable joint, and made to subserve the
+purposes of flight. Each wing is formed of a flattened bladder,
+extended from the general skin of the body. The sides of this bladder
+are pressed closely together, and would be in absolute contact but for
+a series of branching rigid tubes that are spread out in the
+intervening cavity. These tubes are air-vessels; their interiors are
+lined with elastic, spirally-rolled threads, that serve to keep the
+channels constantly open; and through these open channels the vital
+atmosphere rushes with every movement of the membraneous organ. The
+wing of the May-fly flapping in the air is a respiratory organ, of as
+much importance to the wellbeing of the creature in its way, as the
+gill-plate of its grub prototype is when vibrating under the water.
+But the wing of the insect is not the only respiratory organ: its
+entire body is one vast respiratory system, of which the wings are
+offsets. The spirally-lined air-vessels run everywhere, and branch out
+everywhere. The insect, in fact, circulates air instead of blood. As
+the prick of the finest needle draws blood from the flesh of the
+backboned creature, it draws air from the flesh of the insect. Who
+will longer wonder, then, that the insect is so light? It is aerial in
+its inner nature. Its arterial system is filled with the ethereal
+atmosphere, as the more stolid creature's is with heavy blood.
+
+If the reader has ever closely watched a large fly or bee, he will
+have noticed that it has none of the respiratory movements that are so
+familiar to him in the bodies of quadrupeds and birds. There is none
+of that heaving of the chest, and out-and-in movement of the sides,
+which constitute the visible phenomena of breathing. In the insect's
+economy, no air enters by the usual inlet of the mouth. It all goes in
+by means of small air-mouths placed along the sides of the body, and
+exclusively appropriated to its reception. Squeezing the throat will
+not choke an insect. In order to do this effectually, the sides of the
+body, where the air-mouths are, must be smeared with oil.
+
+In the vertebrated animals, the blood is driven through branching
+tubes to receptacles of air placed within the chest; the air-channels
+terminate in blood extremities, and the blood-vessels cover these as a
+net-work. The mechanical act of respiration merely serves to change
+the air contained within the air-receptacles. In the insects, this
+entire process is reversed; the air is carried by branching tubes to
+receptacles of blood scattered throughout the body; the blood-channels
+terminate in blood-extremities, and a capillary net-work of
+air-vessels is spread over these. Now, in the vertebrated creature,
+the chest is merely the grand air-receptacle into which the blood is
+sent to be aerated; while in the insect, the chest contains but its
+own proportional share of the great air-system. In the latter case,
+therefore, there is a great deal of available space, which would have
+been, under other circumstances, filled with the respiratory
+apparatus, but is now left free to be otherwise employed. The thoracic
+cavity of the insect serves as a stowage for the bulky and powerful
+muscles that are required to give energy to the legs and wings. The
+portion of the body that is almost exclusively respiratory in other
+animals, becomes almost as exclusively motor in insects. It holds in
+its interior the chief portions of the cords by which the moving
+levers and membranes are worked, and its outer surface is adorned by
+those levers and membranes themselves. Both the legs and wings of the
+insect are attached to the thoracic segment of its body.
+
+The extraordinary powers of flight which insects possess are due to
+the conjoined influences of the two conditions that have been
+named--the lightness of their air-filled bodies, and the strength of
+their chest-packed muscles. Where light air is circulated instead of
+heavy blood, great vascularity serves only to make existence more
+ethereal. Plethora probably takes the insect nearer to the skies,
+instead of dragging it towards the dust. The hawk-moth, with its burly
+body, may often be seen hovering gracefully, on quivering wings, over
+some favourite flower, as if it were hung there on cords, while it
+rifles it of its store of accumulated sweets by means of its long
+unfolded tongue. The common house-fly makes 600 strokes every second
+in its ordinary flight, and gets through five feet of space by means
+of them; but when alarmed, it can increase the velocity of its
+wing-strokes some five or six fold, and move through thirty-five feet
+in the second. Kirby believed, that if the house-fly were made equal
+to the horse in size, and had its muscular power increased in the same
+proportion, it would be able to traverse the globe with the rapidity
+of lightning. The dragon-fly often remains on the wing in pursuit of
+its prey for hours at a stretch, and yet will sometimes baffle the
+swallow by its speed, although that bird is calculated to be able to
+move at the rate of a mile in a minute. But the dexterity of this
+insect is even more surprising than its swiftness, for it is able to
+do what no bird can: it is able to stop instantaneously in the midst
+of its most rapid course, and change the direction of its flight,
+going sideways or backwards, without altering the position of its
+body.
+
+As a general rule, insect wings that are intended for employment in
+flight are transparent membranes, with the course of the air-tubes
+marked out upon them as opaque nervures. These air-tubes, it will be
+remembered, are lined by spires of dense cartilage; and hence it is
+that they become nervures so well adapted to act like tent-lines in
+keeping the expanded membranes stretched. In the dragon-flies, the
+nervures are minutely netted for the sake of increased strength; in
+the bees, the nervures are simply parallel. Most insects have two
+pairs of these transparent membraneous wings; but in such as burrow,
+one pair is converted into a dense leather-like case, under which the
+other pair are folded away. In the flies, only one pair of wings can
+be found at all, the other pair being changed into two little
+club-shaped bodies, called balancers.
+
+Butterflies and moths are the only insects that fly by means of opaque
+wings; but in their case the opacity is apparent rather than real, for
+it is caused by the presence of a very beautiful layer of coloured
+scales spread evenly over the outer surface of the membranes. When
+these scales are brushed off, membraneous wings of the ordinary
+transparent character are disclosed. The scales are attached to the
+membrane by little stems, like the quill-ends of feathers, and they
+are arranged in overlapping rows. The variegated colours and patterns
+of the insects are entirely due to them. If the wings of a butterfly
+be pressed upon a surface of card-board covered with gum-water to the
+extent of their own outlines, and be left there until the gum-water is
+dry, the outer layer of scales may be rubbed off with a handkerchief,
+and the double membranes and intervening nervures may be picked away
+piecemeal with a needle's point, and there will remain upon the card a
+most beautiful representation of the other surface of the wings, its
+scales being all preserved by the gum in their natural positions. If
+the outlines of the wings be carefully pencilled first, and the
+gum-water be then delicately and evenly brushed on, just as far as the
+outlines, a perfect and durable fac-simile, in all the original
+variety of colour and marking, is procured, which needs only to have
+the form of the body sketched in, to make it a very pretty and
+accurate delineation of the insect.
+
+
+
+
+RUSTICATION IN A FRENCH VILLAGE.
+
+
+Poverty is difficult to bear under any circumstances, but when
+compelled entirely to alter our habits of life in the same place where
+we have lived differently, we certainly feel it more acutely than when
+we at once change the scene, and see around us nothing we can well
+compare with what is past. It is unnecessary to say by what means
+_our_ easy fortune was reduced to a mere pittance; but, alas! it _was_
+so, and we found ourselves forced to seek another dwelling-place.
+Following the example of most of our country-people in a similar
+situation, therefore, we resolved to go abroad; not, indeed, to enjoy
+society on an income which would in England totally shut us out from
+it, but to live in absolute retirement upon next to nothing. A cousin
+of mine--whose friend, Mlle de Flotte, long resident in England, had
+married a countryman of her own, and settled in Normandy--wrote to Mme
+de Terelcourt accordingly, to ask if there was a habitable hut in her
+neighbourhood where we might find shelter for three years, before
+which time we were told the settlement of our affairs could scarcely
+be completed. The answer was favourable: there was, she said, near the
+village of Flotte, a cottage which contained a kitchen, three rooms,
+and a garret where a _bonne_ might sleep. A large garden was attached
+to it full of fruit-trees, though in a most neglected condition, and
+even the house requiring to be made weather-tight; but as the landlord
+undertook this latter business, and the rent for the whole was only
+L.12 a year, we gladly closed with the offer, and at the end of the
+month of April proceeded to take possession of our new home.
+
+The situation was most lovely. The garden surrounded three sides of
+the cottage, and a large green field, or rather thinly-planted
+apple-orchard, the other, where grazed four fine cows belonging to a
+farm on the opposite side of the lane, which supplied us with butter,
+eggs, and milk, and was near enough not to annoy but to gratify our
+ears with the country sounds so pleasant to those fond of rural
+things, and to give us the feeling of help at hand in case of any
+emergency. We were on the slope of a tolerably lofty hill; the
+high-road was below, where we could see and hear the diligence pass;
+but saving this, the farm-yard noises, and the birds and bees in the
+garden, were the only disturbers of our perfect quiet, except, indeed,
+the soothing sound of a small brook tinkling over a tiny waterfall,
+quite audible, although a good way on the other side of the _grande
+route_. The town of C---- was seen to our right, the sea glittering
+beyond; and a rocky, shrubby dell, through which the little stream
+above mentioned murmured merrily on its way, turning a rustic mill,
+was the prospect from the windows. Two lime-trees stood at the gate,
+inside of which we joyfully discovered an unexpected lodge or cottage,
+containing two little rooms and a large shed, which had not been
+mentioned in the description, and which we found most useful for
+stowing away packing-cases, hampers, and boxes, keeping potatoes and
+apples, and a hundred things besides. The short road--avenue, our
+landlord termed it--which led from this to the house, had a
+strawberry-bank on one side, a row of cherry-trees on the other; and
+the garden, although overgrown with weeds and sprawling shrubs, looked
+quite capable of being easily made very pretty indeed. The entrance to
+this our magnificent chateau was through the kitchen only; for the
+room next it, although it could boast of an outside-door likewise, had
+none which opened into the interior of the house, was neither lathed
+nor plastered, and the bare earth was all there was to tread upon.
+Upstairs the flooring consisted merely of planks laid down; and you
+could hear when below the pins dropped from above, unless, indeed,
+they fell, as they generally did, into the large crevices. The bonne's
+_mansarde_ was but a garret, where, till you got into the very middle,
+you could not stand upright; and although the tiled roof had been just
+painted and repaired, the breath of heaven came wooingly in every
+direction, even through the thick-leaved vines which covered it,
+closely trained up there, to make room for the apricots that grew
+against the wall below. Close by, a little stair led you out upon a
+terrace, where a road, bordered by peach-trees and backed by plums,
+gave a dry walk in all weathers; but you could go higher, higher, and
+higher still, terrace after terrace, till it terminated in a rock
+covered with briers and brambles--the fruit of which latter were as
+large and as good as mulberries. This we called our garden-wall, and
+it had a sunny seat commanding an extensive view, and from which all
+we saw was beautiful. How often have I sat there dreaming, lulled by
+the murmur of the insect world around, till the merry fife of a band
+of conscripts on their march, or the distant boom of a cannon from the
+forts, restored me to a consciousness that I was still at least _in_
+the world, although not _of_ it.
+
+But now I am going to descend to figures, and can assure my
+incredulous English readers, that what I relate is strictly
+true--_vraie_, although not _vraisemblable_. We hired a stout girl to
+weed and wash, without food, at 2-1/2 d. a day; and another for L.5
+per annum undertook to be our sole servant--to clean, and cook, and
+dress madame, only stipulating that she was to have _soupe a la
+graisse_ and brown bread _a discretion_ three times a day, two sous
+for cider, her aprons, and washing; but hoped if she gave
+satisfaction, that sometimes upon Sunday she might be allowed a bit of
+meat: on Fridays an egg and an apple contented her, and an occasional
+fish made her shout with joy. An old soldier, who had returned to his
+primitive employment of gardener, and lived near, undertook to dig,
+prune, and plant in the garden for a franc a day, during the time we
+ourselves were engaged with the inside of our mansion, and to come
+afterwards at 2d. an hour when we wanted him, either to go to C---- for
+marketing, or to do anything else we required, for the hamlet of
+Flotte did not possess many shops. At this hamlet, however, we
+obtained bread and a variety of small articles on very moderate terms.
+
+Having hired the requisite furniture, and papered the walls of our
+apartments, the humble tenement looked clean and comfortable. To get
+all into order, we both worked hard, and very soon could sit down by
+'our own fireside' in a quiet, cheerful house, almost the work of our
+own hands, and therefore every creek and cranny in it full of
+interest. Mme de Terelcourt, with refined politeness, did not attempt
+to visit us herself until she understood we could receive her _sans
+gene_; but she sent fruit and vegetables, and kind messages
+constantly, and at last a note intimating that she would, if
+convenient, call upon us after church next day. Strawberries and
+cream, butter, eggs, fresh bread, and the commonest _vin ordinaire_,
+were easily procured, of which our guest ate heartily, saying she
+would bring the rest of the family next day to partake of a similar
+feast. They came accordingly, and with them a cart loaded with shrubs,
+plants, flowers, and a whole hive of honeycomb, and various little
+comforts besides, pretending that they were thankful to us for
+receiving their superabundance, instead of obliging them to throw it
+away. This hospitable, unaffected kindness continued unabated the
+whole time of our stay, and the kind beings always contrived to make
+out that they were the obliged persons, and we so polite and
+condescending for deigning to receive such trifles. M. and Mme de
+Terelcourt lived with M. le Marquis de Flotte and his wife; and her
+brother, the Count de Belgravin, occupied a house a quarter of a mile
+distant, which, although by no means a comfortable residence, he
+rented purposely to be near his sister. These amiable people spent a
+part of every day together, for they did not associate much with the
+inhabitants of C----; and I look back with much pleasure to our social
+evenings, when light-hearted merriment constantly prevailed; and I
+often thought how few of the many who talk so gravely of patience and
+resignation to the will of God, could or would understand that
+cheerfulness is, in fact, but a different way of shewing that
+resignation.
+
+Our maid, Batilde, knew nothing about the _cuisine_ beyond a good
+_roux_ and a bad omelet; and except making a bed, appeared ignorant of
+all housework--even washing, dusting, or sweeping thoroughly. She,
+however, did everything we did not do for ourselves, and ironed the
+linen after a fashion. Tonette washed for us in the little river
+aforesaid, where she used an incredible quantity of soap, thumping our
+things with a piece of flat wood upon a great stone, most
+conveniently, as she observed, placed there for the purpose 'by the
+saints in heaven;' which method, if it hastened its wearing out, made
+our linen at least sweet and clean while it lasted. My husband shot
+and cultivated the garden in the respective seasons appropriate to
+these occupations, whilst I bought a cookery-book called 'Les
+Experiences de Mademoiselle Marguerite;' and pretending to be learning
+myself, taught Batilde to prepare our food a little better, without
+hurting her self-conceit, of which she possessed more than the average
+of her countrywomen. Our time, therefore, was fully occupied. Our
+health improved and our spirits rose with the excitement; we had
+agreeable society in the excellent people named above, meeting _sans
+facon_, taking breakfast or luncheon with each other, instead of
+dinners, in winter, and in summer often spending the evening at one
+another's houses.
+
+At a distance not insurmountable there was an English chapel; but the
+character of the clergyman was not of a kind to recommend itself to
+persons who had some regard for the decencies of life; and so we
+contented ourselves with saying our prayers at home. The old cure of
+the place, with whom we became slightly acquainted, seemed to be a
+worthy sort of man, liberal in his ideas, and possessed of a
+considerable taste for music. He made rather an agreeable and obliging
+neighbour.
+
+Talking of cures, I may mention that one came from a distance of
+several miles to pay his respects to us, and offer welcome to France.
+He said, he desired to make our acquaintance because we came from
+England, where he had found 'rest for twenty years, and received much
+kindness.' He was a rich man, had a pretty little church, a
+picturesque house in a sort of park, which he had stocked with pigs
+instead of sheep; and every day that was not one of fasting or
+abstinence, he had pork for dinner. He took a great fancy to us, and
+wanted us to give up our cottage, and come and live with him, as he
+had plenty of room and desired society; but we declined. Had we done
+so, I doubt not that he would have left us his money, for he had no
+relations, and bequeathed the whole, for want of an heir, to his
+grocer. He grew cooler after our refusal, but still sometimes came to
+see us on a pot-bellied cart-horse--a most stolid-looking beast, but
+one which often took most laughably strange fits of friskiness. Once I
+saw the good cure's watch jump out of his pocket, fly over his head,
+and disappear amid a heap of nettles, where little Victor found it,
+and hoped for a rich reward; but he only received an old book of
+devotion, and a lecture on the duty of reading it.
+
+I must relate a little adventure which might have been written fifty
+years ago, when it would have obtained more credence than it will in
+the present day, from those travellers at least who have kept to the
+highways, and those residents who have lived only in the towns of
+France. One morning Batilde asked permission to visit a friend who had
+come to spend a day with her sister at C----. 'They breed poultry; and
+as madame likes a goose as soon as the fete of St Michel comes, it
+would be worth her while to desire Mere Talbot to feed one up against
+that time. They live a good way off,' pursued she, 'in a poor hamlet
+called Les Briares. It would be almost worth madame's while to go
+there some day, for it is such a primitive place, and they are such
+primitive people.' I liked the idea, and begged Mere Talbot might be
+told that I would come and look out my goose for myself the following
+week.
+
+A fine Thursday morning dawned; and as early as we could get coffee
+made and taken, Batilde and I set out on our expedition, each, after
+the fashion of the canton, seated on a donkey, our feet in one pannier
+and a large stone to balance in the other. I took as an offering to
+the hope and heir of the Talbots a toy much like what we in England
+call Jack-in-a-box, but in France is termed a _Diable_, as it is
+intended to represent his Satanic majesty, and alarm the lifter of the
+lid by popping up a black visage. The rough roads shaded by high
+hedges, white and pink with hawthorn, and the wild apple-tree blossom,
+and redolent of early honeysuckle, reminded me of the secluded parts
+of England; while Scotland presented itself to my mind when we left
+these lanes and crossed still, rushy brooks, or dashing tiny torrents,
+climbed heather braes, pursuing the yellow-hammer and large
+mountain-bees as they flew on to the furze and broom-bushes, filling
+the air with their cheerful music; or when, again, we descended to
+birch-shaded hollows, refreshing ourselves from clear little
+spring-wells, that sparkled over white pebbles at the foot of a gray
+rock tufted over with blaeberry and foxglove leaves. The poor thing
+chatted away like a child, inspired by the pure air, bracing, yet
+mild, and lost herself amongst recollections of her country home,
+talking of buttercups, hedge-sparrows' eggs, and _demoiselles_ or
+dragon-flies.
+
+Several happy hours we spent _en route_; and at last, on turning down
+from a hilly road, we saw on a flat brown plain a collection of low
+cottages. The nearer we approached, the more Scotch everything
+appeared; in some cases I even saw my dear native 'middens afore the
+door:' the aspect of the houses and looks of the old women especially,
+with their stoups and country caps--so very like mutches--striped
+petticoats and short-gowns, brought northern climes before me vividly;
+and the children stared and shouted like true Scots callants. The very
+accent was so Scotch that I felt as though I was doing something
+altogether ridiculous in talking French.
+
+Upon entering Mere Talbot's house, the resemblance became more real.
+The flags stuck here and there in the earthen floor, the form of the
+chairs and tables, the press-beds, large red-checked linen curtains,
+the 'rock and its wee pickle tow,' the reel, the bowls on the
+shelves--each and all recalled my native country; and I positively
+should have ended by believing myself there in a dream, if not in
+reality, had not a glance at the fireplace undeceived me: there was no
+fire--all was dim, dusky, and dark; no glowing embers and cheerful
+pipe-clayed hearth, but iron dogs and wood-ashes where blazing coals
+should be. Even here, however, I could not but think of 'Caledonia
+stern and wild,' for there stood a real Carron 'three-leggit pat,' to
+which my very heart warmed. I was asked to sit down; and soon the news
+spread that _une Anglaise_ was to be seen at Mere Talbot's, and people
+glanced by the window, peeped in at the door, and came to speak upon
+one pretence or other, as if it was not an everyday sight. By and by a
+girl and man--whose names from their appearance might have been Jenny
+and Sawnie--arrived for their dinner--consisting of brown bread, an
+apple, and cider, which they discussed on their knees--not sitting
+down at the table--and when finished, returned to their field-labour
+without speaking. The little boy, meanwhile, had disappeared with his
+toy-box, which greatly delighted him, and elevated him for the nonce
+above his fellows; for he was the undisputed possessor of a curiosity
+imported from England itself, over the sea, by the very lady who was
+to be seen at his grandmother's house eating pancakes.
+
+The fire was lighted; it crackled and blazed in two minutes; a stand
+was placed over it, upon which they put what they called a _tuile_;
+eggs, flour, and milk were mixed, and a bit of butter, the size of a
+bean in the first instance, of a pea afterwards--_c'est de rigueur_,
+to hinder every fresh _crepe_ thrown in from burning. Most capital
+pancakes they were; thin, crisp, hot, and sweet; and the kind people
+pressed them upon me so hospitably, that I ate till I felt I really
+could eat no longer, and was glad to finish with a draught of sour
+cider. I bought seven geese, to be brought to me one at a time, as
+_fat as caterpillars_, for two francs ten sous each. Mere Talbot was
+content with her bargain, and so was I with mine. When I rose to take
+leave, I was reminded again of Scotland, for a large parcel of cakes
+was put into the off-pannier; and as I should have mortally offended
+the kind creatures by refusing their gift, I carried them home,
+toasted them on a fork, and found it made them eat quite as crisp and
+good as at first. This sketch may appear perhaps very odd to be taken
+from nature so late as the year 1840, but I can assure my readers it
+is 'no less strange than true.'
+
+All the summer we wandered about the woods and fields of Flotte,
+making little excursions in the neighbourhood, and sedulously avoiding
+the town; but after we had made ourselves acquainted with every
+beech-shaded hollow, every little fig-forest, every apple-orchard,
+climbed every broomy knowe, gathered heather from the highest rock and
+mushrooms from the oldest pasture, we turned our steps sometimes
+towards C---- in search of variety. There, every Thursday, the military
+band of the 44th Regiment played in the alley of the mountain-ash, and
+there all the dames and demoiselles assembled, dressed in a
+wonderfully neat way. We asked how these women, who were mostly in
+humble circumstances, were enabled to dress so finely. Batilde
+explained the phenomenon.
+
+'Ah! they have infinite merit,' responded the Frenchwoman; 'two of
+them, whom I chance to know, in order to be enabled to do so, live on
+eggs and bread, in one room, where they sit, eat, and sleep, nay,
+sometimes cook; and they have their just reward, for they are
+universally admired and respected.'
+
+This is a pretty fair specimen of the effort made by Frenchwomen of
+the humbler orders to maintain a tasteful exterior. To make themselves
+neat is a principle; and they seem to have an inherent perception of
+what constitutes taste. They may sometimes go too far in this
+direction, and think more of dress and ornaments than they should do.
+One can at least say, that they are on the safe side. Better to love
+outward show, than, as is often visible in Scotland, have no regard
+for appearances. Better cleanliness on any terms than utter
+slovenliness. I really must say, we saw some most creditable efforts
+in France to maintain self-respect, among the female population.
+
+About this time, an old gentleman, who was distantly related to
+us, died--without having, however, an idea of the extent of
+our poverty--leaving my husband L.50 for a ring. Here was
+riches--unexpected riches! and I verily believe few who succeed to
+L.50,000 ever felt more or as much rapture as we did; and we spent an
+evening very happily settling how we should employ the money. In the
+first place, we hired a good servant for L.8! and dismissed Batilde;
+we then, by paying half, induced the landlord to lath, plaster, paper,
+and paint the large lumber-room, and open a door of communication into
+the passage, by which we avoided entering through the kitchen. Our
+late sitting-room we dined in, and made the dining-room a
+dressing-room; got several small comforts besides; and though last not
+least, hired an old piano; and every evening enjoyed music in a degree
+none but real lovers of that delightful art, long deprived of it, can
+have the slightest conception of--and all this happiness and comfort
+for L.50! Think of that, ye ladies who give as much for a gown!
+
+Our new servant, Olive, was as clean, orderly, and active as our late
+one had been the reverse. The difference it made in our comfort was as
+great as if we had had our former establishment restored, and really
+our _bonne_ was a host within herself. The house was always clean, but
+we never saw her cleaning: she went to market, baked all our bread,
+yet never seemed oppressed with work: her cookery was capital; she
+made excellent dishes out of what Batilde would have wasted: went to
+mass every morning, and was back in time to prepare everything for our
+breakfast. After staying a month, she begged permission to leave the
+cockloft and bring her 'effects' to the gate-house, which we willingly
+permitted; and her wardrobe was worth a journey to see, when we
+remembered that her wages had never been quite L.8 until she came to
+us, and her age only thirty. I shall give the list I copied, hoping
+some of our English Betties may read and profit by her example:
+twenty-four good strong linen shifts, made and marked neatly by
+herself; two dozen worsted and thread stockings, knit by herself;
+twelve pocket-handkerchiefs; six stout petticoats; four flannel do.;
+six pair of shoes; eight caps; eight neck-frills; umbrella;
+prayer-book; gold earrings and cross--which two last, with a beautiful
+lace-cap, she inherited, but everything else was of her _own earning_.
+She bought a wardrobe and bedstead, and was by degrees getting
+furniture; and as I exacted no sewing, every leisure moment she was
+spinning her future sheets. With all this she was also very kind to a
+married sister, who had a large family; but she wore no flowers,
+flounces, nor finery; her six gowns were of a stuff the Scotch call
+linsey-woolsey; and so in sixteen years' services she had amassed what
+I have just described. Why can't our girls do as much where wages are
+higher and clothes cheaper?
+
+We spent three years in this happy solitude, and felt almost sorry
+when an unexpected legacy, and the settlement of our affairs together,
+enabled us to return to all the comforts and many of the luxuries of
+life. It gives me much pleasure to record the many kindnesses we
+received from all ranks of people. Upon one occasion we were forced to
+ask the butcher to wait three months longer for his bill: he not only
+consented, but his wife insisted upon lending us money, and was quite
+cross when we gratefully declined her kindness. Near the time of our
+departure, as we were paying a large account, the shopkeeper said: 'At
+this time you must have many calls upon you; transmit me the amount
+from England, for I can afford to wait.' Another of our tradesmen, a
+shoemaker, was a most singular character--a great physiognomist, and
+would not serve those he did not like. A dashing English family wished
+to employ him, but he fought shy, and made himself so disagreeable
+that they went to another: he told me this before his wife, who seemed
+annoyed at his conduct. He explained that he did not like their
+appearance, and was sure they would not pay for what they had. He was
+right; they left the place in debt to his _confrere_ and everybody
+else. I rejoice in this opportunity of assuring my countrymen that
+there is as much true kindness to be met with in France as in England,
+and the selfishness we complain of in our neighbours on the other side
+of the Channel, is often but a preconceived fancy, or induced by our
+own cold behaviour. The above true sketch shews at least that _we_ met
+with substantial kindness, and I hope it also proves that we are
+sensible of it.
+
+
+
+
+PHANTOMS OF THE FAR EAST.
+
+
+The form assumed by superstition in India is not very different from
+the European type, otherwise than in a certain exaggeration, impressed
+on it, no doubt, by the grotesque grandeur of the mythology.
+Witchcraft is pretty nearly the same in both regions--the old women
+being the chief professors of the art; but in many districts of the
+former country, the evil power is bestowed upon _every_ old woman
+without exception. Girls will not marry into a family without a witch,
+for how could their infants be protected from the spells of the other
+old women? It is dangerous to jostle an old woman on the street,
+however accidentally, lest she take vengeance on the spot. A man came
+into this unpleasant contact while he was walking along, carelessly
+chewing a piece of sugar-cane; and hearing the muttered objurgations
+of the hag, as he turned round to apologise, he was not surprised to
+find the juice of the cane turned into blood. The spectators,
+likewise, recognised the metamorphosis as soon as it was pointed out
+to them; and when the terrified victim instantly leaped on his horse,
+and put ten or twelve miles between him and the sorceress before
+drawing bridle, he was believed to have saved his life by this
+dispatch.
+
+The operations of the men-sorcerers are less spontaneous and more
+scientific. They set about their work in a business-like way; and
+within sight of the house of their intended victim the mystic caldron
+begins to boil and bubble. The victim, however, is not to be terrified
+out of his senses. What are his enemy's fires and incantations to him?
+He will only just take no notice, and continue to live on as if there
+was not a sorcerer in the world. But that smoke: it meets his eye the
+first object every morning. That ruddy glare: it is the last thing he
+sees at night. That measured but inarticulate sound: it is never out
+of his ear. His thoughts dwell on the mystical business. He is
+preoccupied even in company. He wonders what they are now putting into
+the pot; and whether it has any connection with the spasm that has
+just shot through him. He becomes nervous; he feels unwell; he cannot
+sleep for thinking; he cannot eat for that horrid broth that bubbles
+for ever in his mind. He gets worse, and worse, and worse. He dies!
+
+But this empire of the imagination is beaten hollow in Java, where it
+is supposed that a housebreaker, by throwing a handful of earth upon
+the beds of the inmates, completely incapacitates them from moving to
+save their property. And this is no mere speculative belief, but an
+actual _fact_. The man who is to be robbed, on feeling the earth fall
+upon him, lies as motionless as if he was bound hand and foot. He is
+under a spell; a spell which, in our own country, even knowledge and
+refinement have power only to modify.
+
+In England, there is a large class of persons who believe that a
+certain pill is able to cure all diseases, however opposite their
+natures, and however different the constitutions of the patients. It
+is in vain the analytical chemist describes publicly the component
+parts and real qualities of the quack medicine--their faith is
+unshaken. In India, this low and paltry credulity acquires a character
+of the poetical; for there the popular confidence reposes--not more
+irrationally--on the prayers and incantations of the practitioner. But
+this sort of practice, in the wilder parts of the country, renders the
+medical profession somewhat unsafe to its professors; for the doctor
+is looked upon as a wizard, with _power_ to cure or kill as he
+chooses. In such places--the jungly districts--there are diseases of
+the liver and spleen, to which the children, more especially, are
+subject; and when so affected, the patient pines away and dies without
+any external token of disease. This result is, of course, attributed
+to preternatural means; and if there is not an old woman at hand
+obnoxious to suspicion, the doctor is set down as the murderer. 'I
+have in these territories,' says Colonel Sleeman, 'known a great many
+instances of medical practitioners being put to death for not curing
+young people for whom they were required to prescribe. Several cases
+have come before me as a magistrate, in which the father has stood
+over the doctor with a drawn sword, by the side of the bed of his
+child, and cut him down, and killed him the moment the child died, as
+he had sworn to do when he found the patient sinking under his
+prescriptions.'
+
+Another superstition of the country, originating no doubt in local
+circumstances, found its way into Europe, where no such circumstances
+existed. In India, a man suddenly vanishes. His family, perhaps, are
+expecting him at home, but from that moment he is never more heard of.
+He has been destroyed in the jungle by a tiger, and his remains so
+completely devoured by other animals, that there is scarcely a relic
+of his body left to give assurance of a man, far less as a proof of
+his identity. These mysterious disappearances, however, are connected
+with their real cause; and men are believed to be frequently
+metamorphosed--sometimes voluntarily, sometimes involuntarily--into
+tigers. The voluntary transformation is effected merely by eating a
+certain root, whereupon the man is instantly changed into a tiger; and
+when tired of his new character, he has only to eat another, when,
+_presto!_ he subsides from a tiger into a man. But occasionally
+mistakes happen. An individual of an inquiring disposition once felt a
+strong curiosity to know what were the sensations attendant on such a
+transformation; but being a prudent person, he set about the
+experiment with all necessary precaution. Having provided himself with
+
+              ----the insane root
+    That takes the reason prisoner,
+
+he gave one likewise to his wife, desiring her to stand by and watch
+the event, and as soon as she saw him fairly turned into a tiger, to
+thrust it into his mouth. The wife promised, but her nerves were not
+equal to the performance. As soon as she saw her husband fixed in his
+new form, she took to flight--carrying in her hand, in the confusion
+of her mind, the root that would have restored him to her faithful
+arms! And so it befell that the poor man-tiger was obliged to take to
+the woods, where for many a day he dined on his old neighbours of the
+village, till he was at length shot, and _recognised_! In this
+superstition will be seen the prototype of the wolf-mania of mediaeval
+Europe. In Brittany, men betook themselves to the forests in the shape
+of wolves, out of a morbid passion for the amusement of howling and
+ravening; but if they left in some secure place the clothes they had
+thrown off to prepare for the metamorphosis, they had only to reassume
+them in order to regain their natural forms. But sometimes a
+catastrophe like the above occurred: the wife discovered the hidden
+clothes, and carrying them home in the innocent carefulness of her
+heart, the poor husband lived and died a wolf.
+
+The Hindoos, like other ancient peoples, predict good or evil fortune
+from certain phenomena of nature; but one instance of this has been
+described to us in a communication from our Old Indian, which far
+excels in the poetical the finest fancies of the Greeks. We cannot
+undertake to say that the thing is new, although we ourselves never
+heard of it before; but as the knowledge of it was imparted to her by
+her moonshee as a profound secret, we present it as such to our
+readers, recommending them to make the experiment for themselves. At
+the initiation of our informant, she was about to undertake a distant
+journey, and the old moonshee was anxious to consult the fates as to
+the fortunes that might be in store for his beloved mistress. He,
+accordingly, prevailed upon her to walk forth one night from the
+veranda, and with many quaint expressions of respect and anxiety,
+besought her to follow his directions with an attentive mind,
+abstracted as much as possible from the common thoughts of life.
+
+It was a clear, calm night; the moon was full, and not the faintest
+speck in the sky disturbed her reign. The Ganges was like a flood of
+silver light, hastening on in charmed silence; while on the green
+smooth sward on which they walked, a tall shrub, here and there, stood
+erect and motionless. The young lady, whose impressions were probably
+deepened by the mystical words of the moonshee, felt a kind of awe
+stealing over her: she looked round upon the accustomed scene, as if
+in some new and strange world; and when the old man motioned her to
+stop, as they reached an open space on the sward, she obeyed with an
+indescribable thrill.
+
+'Look there,' said he, pointing to her shadow, which fell tall and
+dark upon the grass. 'Do you see it?'
+
+'Yes,' said she faintly, yet beginning to be ashamed. 'How sharply
+defined are its edges! It looks like something you could touch.'
+
+'But look longer--look better--look steadfastly. Is it still so
+definite?'
+
+'A kind of halo begins to gather round it: my eyes dazzle'----
+
+'Then raise them to the heavens; fix them on yonder blue sky. What do
+you see?'
+
+'I see it still! But it is as white as mist, and of a gigantic size.'
+
+'Has it a head?' asked the moonshee in an anxious whisper.
+
+'Yes; it is complete in all its parts: but now it
+melts--floats--disappears.'
+
+'Thank God!' said the old man: 'your journey shall be prosperous--such
+is the will of Heaven!' The experiment was tried on many other
+occasions by the young lady, and always with similar success, although
+never without a certain degree of trepidation, even after she had
+learned that the spectral appearance in the heavens was nothing more
+than the picture retained on the retina of the eye. She never saw the
+phantom without a head, which accounts for her being alive to this
+day; or even wanting a limb, although she has not been without her
+share of the trials of the world. It can easily be conceived, however,
+that certain conditions of the atmosphere may produce these phenomena,
+which are regarded by the Hindoo seer as sure tokens of death or
+disaster.
+
+This superstition is not more unreasonable than the mistakes of our
+early travellers, who were accustomed to attribute a meaning to the
+phenomena of nature, of which more accurate knowledge has entirely
+stripped them. But the notions of the Hindoo are always peculiar--his
+fancy, even in its wildest excursions, is bounded by the circle of his
+mythology. When our Old Indian's wanderings led her to Pinang, in the
+Straits of Malacca, she found a Hindoo convict there, trembling even
+in his chains as his fancy connected the wonders of the place with the
+dogmas in which he had been reared. This most beautiful island, as our
+readers may remember, came into the possession of an Englishman in the
+latter part of last century in rather a romantic way--forming the
+dowry of a native princess, the daughter of the king of Quedah, whom
+he married. Captain Light transferred it to the East India Company,
+who were not slow in discovering the advantages of its fine harbour,
+rich soil, and salubrious climate. Its inhabitants at that time were a
+few fishermen on the coast; and the interior was covered with an
+almost impervious forest; but now there is a population of Europeans
+and Americans, and Asiatics of almost all countries; and plantations
+of sugar, coffee, pepper, and other intertropical produce. Among the
+inhabitants are invalids, who proceed thither from continental India
+for the restoration of their health; and convicts, who are compelled
+to compensate by their labour the injuries they have inflicted on
+society.
+
+The man alluded to belonged to the latter class, having probably
+travelled for his country's good from the tamer lowlands of Bengal;
+and when the traveller asked him how he liked the region, he expressed
+the utmost awe, united with the bitterest condemnation of the
+Europeans, for desecrating by their roads and other works a place so
+obviously the abode of deutas and spirits. He said, that when they had
+begun to carry the up-hill road through these primeval forests, they
+were warned of their impiety by the voices of the gods themselves, in
+bursts of unearthly music, blasts of the trumpet, and the clash of
+cymbals and gongs.
+
+'The first tree we struck with the axe,' added he with a shudder, 'ran
+milk; and the second, blood!' Of these two substances, the former is
+still more ominous in the Brahminical faith than the latter, for
+everything connected with the cow is sacred and mysterious.
+
+'Well,' said the inquirer, 'what happened--since in spite of these
+omens you persisted in your task? Did the gods take vengeance?'
+
+'Yes,' said he solemnly; 'but _we_ were only instruments, like the
+axes in our hands; and the vengeance, therefore, fell upon the prime
+mover. The governor'--coming close up to the lady, and putting his
+mouth to her ear--'the governor died!' Now, all this was true--music,
+milk, blood, and death; and yet none of these was more the work of
+supernatural agency than any of the common circumstances of life.
+
+The supposed unearthly sounds proceed neither from birds nor men, and
+the effect is either pleasing or awful, according to the mood of the
+listener. Some, in such circumstances, instead of receiving
+impressions of awe, like the Hindoo convict, would exclaim:
+
+    Where should this music be--i' the air, or the earth?
+    It sounds no more: and sure it waits upon
+    Some god of the island.
+
+And again:
+
+                        ----The isle is full of noises,
+    Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
+    Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
+    Will hum about mine ears; and sometimes voices,
+    That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
+    Will make me sleep again.
+
+One would think Shakspeare had actually been in some tropical forest
+when the daylight began to fade, and the myriads of insects to take up
+their evening-song! One of these extraordinary musicians is
+distinguished as the trumpeter; another produces a tinkle like a bell;
+and a third gives forth a sound which the imagination may ascribe to
+any instrument, or band of instruments, it pleases. This species of
+cricket buries himself in a centre, to which converge seven holes,
+which he has drilled in a circle; and from these seven tubes a sound
+rushes forth, which almost stuns the passer-by. It may be conceived,
+therefore, that a forest peopled with myriads upon myriads of such
+'executants,' must have a strain for every ear, every mood, and every
+conscience.
+
+The tree which welled forth milk when struck by the axe was the _Ficus
+elastica_--a sort of gigantic vine, as thick as a man's arm, which
+creeps along the ground, sending forth new roots from the joint, and,
+climbing at length some lofty tree, expands in branches. This is the
+chief caoutchouc-plant, and its sap has not only the colour, but many
+of the chemical properties of animal milk, and is frequently drunk as
+food. The blood came from one of the _eucalypta_, popularly called the
+blue gum-tree. The governor did die soon after his arrival on the
+island, and no doubt _immediately_ after he had disturbed, in the
+manner related, the _genius loci_.
+
+Pinang contains about 160 square miles of surface, nearly the whole of
+which is laid out in hills and dales, the loftiest of the former
+reaching a height of 2500 feet above the sea-level. On the slopes of
+this hill are built the governor's rural residence, and a bungalow,
+where invalids resort for country air. It is possible that great
+changes may have taken place here of late years, when efforts have
+been made to dot the island with sugar-plantations; but at the time we
+speak of, this was a solitary spot, behind which dark forests
+stretched upwards to the summit. Among these forests, on the shoulder
+of the hill, there occurs an optical phenomenon, not unknown in
+Europe, which is here an object of superstitious terror to the
+natives.
+
+The first European who observed it was a gentleman who, taking
+advantage of the coolness of the hour, had strolled away in the early
+morning from the inhabited district, and was skirting round a deep
+valley, dotted at the bottom, and overhung at the sides with lofty
+trees. The beams of the sun had already begun to acquire some power,
+although his disk was scarcely yet above the horizon; and the
+traveller watched with interest the effect of the dawning light upon a
+sea of vapour which nearly filled the valley. This slowly-moving
+cloud, as it was acted upon by the sun, swelled higher and higher, and
+became whiter and whiter, till it finally settled, filling the whole
+valley with a substance that looked like alabaster, in the midst of
+which the topmost branches of the tall trees hung motionless. The
+scene was strangely beautiful; and the spectator, who was screened
+from the now risen sun by a belt of forest, lingered for awhile to
+contemplate it. When at length he resumed his walk, and, emerging from
+the trees, found himself in the full blaze of the rising sun, he
+turned once more to observe the effect on the vapour; and a cry of
+wonder which arose to his lips was only repressed by a feeling of awe,
+as he saw upon that alabaster surface a dark human figure of gigantic
+dimensions, surrounded by a halo that seemed formed of the rainbow. A
+confused rush of associations half acquainted him at the moment with
+the nature of the phenomenon; but giving way to the feeling of
+poetical delight, he clasped his hands above his head in admiration--a
+movement which the Phantom of the Alabaster Valley instantaneously
+imitated! It was indeed his own shadow--and a shadow he was not to
+recall, even when he turned away to journey homewards. There, in that
+lonely place, it seemed to him to remain for ever--a link connecting
+him with the spirit of nature, and ever and anon drawing him back into
+her domain from the meanness, and folly, and wickedness of the world.
+
+
+
+
+DECIMAL SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.
+
+
+The state of our national weights and measures has been a fertile
+subject of legislative enactment ever since the signing of the Magna
+Charta, which proclaims that 'there shall be one weight and one
+measure.' 'We will and establish,' said an act of Edward III. nearly
+500 years ago, 'that one weight, one measure, and one yard, be used
+throughout the land.' Act has followed act from that time to this, and
+still we have not only different weights and measures for different
+commodities, but for the same in different parts of the realm. An
+ounce means one thing to the grocer, another to the apothecary. A
+stone is 8 pounds to the London butcher or fishmonger, 14 to the
+provincial; 5 pounds to the dealer in glass, 16 to the cheesemonger,
+and 32 to the dealer in hemp. The corn-trade exhibits still greater
+varieties. Prices are quoted in official circulars in every fashion,
+from the Mark-Lane quarter to the Scotch boll, the firlot, the load
+(which may be of various dimensions), the coomb, the last, the barrel
+(which also may be various), the ton, the hundredweight, and the
+pound. We have seen an extract from an actual account-sales, by which
+it appeared, that at the same port the merchant had sold a cargo of
+foreign wheat by five different bushels according to the customs of
+the buyers. In paying the duty, these various bushels had to be
+converted into imperial quarters, and in calculating tonnage and other
+dues, it was necessary to reduce all to tons! Here is surely a source
+of endless confusion, if not an opening for fraud. Our legislature has
+gone on from century to century, mending or mutilating the statutes as
+the case might be, but laying down no principles scientific enough to
+command the approval of the educated, or simple enough to prevail over
+the established usages of the commonalty.
+
+Our neighbours in France, who are particularly fond of framing
+theories and experimenting on them for the edification of other
+nations, availed themselves of the general upturning of affairs in
+1789, to introduce a universal decimal system, to be applied to
+everything whatever that could be counted, weighed, or measured. They
+started from the measurement of the globe itself, and took as the
+basis of their whole system the ten-millionth part of a quadrant of a
+meridian, equal to 39-371/1000 inches English. This they called a
+metre (measure), and to it, as a unit, they prefixed the Greek
+numerals to express increase in the decimal ratio; thus decametres,
+tens of meters; hectametres, hundreds of meters; and so on. To express
+diminution in the decimal ratio, they used the Latin numerals; thus,
+decimetres, tenths of meters; centimetres, hundredths of meters;
+milliametres, thousandths of meters. The unit adopted for square
+measure was the _are_, equal to 100 square meters; for solid measure,
+the _stere_, equal to one cubic meter; and for measure of capacity,
+the _litre_, a cubic decimeter. The weights were derived from these
+measures; the _gramme_ being the weight of one cubic centimeter of
+distilled water. The system of decimal gradation was applied to all of
+these; that is, each denomination represented a tenth part of the one
+above it, and ten times as much as the one next below it, the Latin
+and Greek numerals being prefixed as we have already described with
+reference to the meter. In conformity with this decimal law, the
+quadrant was divided, for astronomical purposes, into 100 degrees
+instead of 90; and the thermometer likewise into 100 degrees from the
+boiling to the freezing point. At the same time, a system of reckoning
+money by tens was introduced; and it must be owned, that the whole
+system of computation in weights, measures, and money established in
+France at this period, is one of the greatest triumphs of
+civilisation. In ordinary transactions, old denominations of money are
+still used by the French; the _sous_, in particular, being apparently
+ineradicable. But in book-keeping, the furnishing of accounts, and in
+literature, the modern and legal standards are invariably adhered to.
+
+About thirty years ago, the Americans took it into serious
+consideration whether they should adopt the ready-made scale of France
+entire. On that occasion (1821), Mr John Quincy Adams produced a most
+elaborate report to Congress, containing an immense amount of
+information on the subject of metrology. He found great fault with the
+French nomenclature, so puzzling to the unlearned. 'Give the people,'
+said he, 'but their accustomed _words_, and they will call 16 a dozen;
+120, 112, or any other number, a hundred.' He disapproved, likewise,
+of thrusting the decimal principle upon things incompatible with it.
+'Decimal arithmetic,' said he, 'is a contrivance of man for computing
+numbers, and not a property of time, space, or matter. It belongs
+essentially to the keeping of accounts, but is merely an incident to
+the transactions of trade. Nature has no partiality for the number 10;
+and the attempt to shackle her freedom with them [decimal gradations],
+will for ever prove abortive.' And again: 'To the mensuration of the
+surface and the solid, the number 10 is of little more use than any
+other. If decimal arithmetic is incompetent to give the dimensions of
+most artificial forms, the square and the cube, still more incompetent
+is it to give the circumference, the area, and the contents of the
+circle and the sphere.' And once more: 'The new metrology of France,
+after trying the principle of decimal division in its almost universal
+application, has been compelled to renounce it for all the measures of
+astronomy, geography, navigation, time, the circle, and the sphere; to
+modify it even for superficial and cubical linear measure.' The
+conclusion of the Americans was, that it was better to continue the
+use of the system of weights and measures inherited from the
+father-land. Partly on account of our intimate commercial relations
+with them, they are content to wait, and allow us to take the lead in
+the work of reform.
+
+Taking our stand on the ground of mere practical utility, according to
+the views suggested, we do not advocate any interference with the
+foot, the rood, the acre, the mile, which would lead to the removal of
+old landmarks, and would render almost every chart and map and book in
+the country obsolete. But we suggest that the time has arrived when
+our national weights and measures may be finally adjusted on simple
+and scientific principles. Within the last thirty years, a principle
+that goes far towards clearing our way has been laid down, and in part
+carried into practice. By an act of the British legislature, which
+came into operation on the 1st January 1826, our standards were
+accurately adjusted, and certain rules were laid down, by which they
+could be restored if lost; while the uniform use of these in the
+business of the country was strictly enjoined. The imperial yard,
+which is the basis of the whole, is to be found in the following
+manner:--'Take a pendulum, vibrating seconds of time, in the latitude
+of London, in vacuum and at the level of the sea; divide all that part
+thereof which lies between the axis of suspension and the centre of
+oscillation into 391,393 equal parts; then will 10,000 of these parts
+be an imperial inch, 12 whereof make a foot, and 36 whereof make a
+yard.' All other measures of linear extension are to be computed from
+this. Thus, 'the foot, the inch, the pole, the furlong, and the mile,
+shall bear the same proportion to the imperial standard yard as they
+have hitherto borne to the yard measure in general use.' For the
+determination of weights, take a cube of an imperial inch of distilled
+water at 62 degrees Fahrenheit; let this be weighed with any weight,
+and let such weight be divided into 252,458 equal parts; then will a
+thousand of such parts be a _troy_ grain, of which 5760 make a pound
+troy, and 7000 a pound avoirdupois.
+
+'This troy-weight,' said the commissioners, 'appeared to us to be the
+ancient weight of this kingdom, having existed in the same state from
+the time of Edward the Confessor.' 'We were induced, moreover,' said
+they, 'to preserve the troy-weight, because all the coinage has been
+uniformly regulated by it, and all medical prescriptions and formulae
+have always been estimated by troy-weight, under a peculiar
+subdivision which the college of physicians have expressed themselves
+most anxious to preserve.' It was resolved, therefore, to continue the
+use of troy-weight for drugs, bullion, &c. and to raise the
+avoirdupois on its basis. The commissioners went on to say: 'The
+avoirdupois pound, by which all heavy goods have been for a long time
+weighed, seems not to have been preserved with such scrupulous
+accuracy as the troy, by which more precious articles have been
+weighed;' but it was so nearly equivalent to 7000 grains troy, that
+they determined this should be its standard for the future. Measures
+of capacity were to be based upon this weight, and not, as heretofore,
+on cubic inches. Ten lbs. avoirdupois of distilled water weighed in
+air at the temperature of 62 degrees Fahrenheit, and the barometer at
+30 inches, were henceforth to determine the imperial gallon, to the
+utter abolition of three distinct gallons for wine, ale, and corn,
+based respectively on the specific bulk and gravity of Bordeaux wine,
+English ale, and grains of wheat. All other measures were to be taken
+in parts or multiples of the said imperial standard gallon, according
+to the proportions hitherto in use. A great reform in this connection,
+was the obligation of dealers to sell most solid commodities--as coal,
+bread, potatoes, &c.--by weight and not by measure, which had been
+liable to great abuses. Corn, however, was not included in this
+provision; nor has even the use of the imperial bushel been
+universally enforced where it interfered with the long-established
+usages of corporate bodies.
+
+To carry thus far into effect these newly-established measures,
+required no common exercise of authority. Every dealer, wholesale or
+retail, was obliged to have his weights verified and stamped. The
+brewer was compelled to get new casks; the retailer new pots and
+pints; the farmer new bushels, and, consequently, new corn-sacks. The
+expense thus incurred was enormous, and the grumbling was of course in
+due proportion.
+
+It is believed that the units above mentioned--the yard, the pound
+avoirdupois, and the imperial gallon--cannot now be superseded by any
+other. It remains to shew, as Mr Taylor has very satisfactorily
+done,[1] how that which has been well begun may be followed out and
+completed by the establishment of more complete uniformity, and the
+legalisation of decimal gradations for facilitating calculation.
+
+The two co-existing pounds originally adjusted in relation to the
+specific gravities of wheat and spring-water, are now the sole remains
+and representatives of a fanciful theory spun in the middle ages; and
+the first question that occurs is, whether the pound troy, having
+served its purpose, might not be done away with, and the pound
+avoirdupois ascertained by reference to a cubic inch of distilled
+water. We were told forty years ago, that for the introduction of a
+uniform and scientific system, we must wait for the spread of
+education in the community; and we feel somewhat ashamed now to find
+that the members of the medical profession, which is understood to be
+one of the most highly-educated bodies, offer the most formidable
+opposition to reformation in this respect. 'The testimony, however,'
+says Mr Taylor, 'of many individuals of the medical profession,
+especially the younger portion, and certainly that of the retailers
+and dispensers of drugs, tends entirely to shew the practicability of
+a beneficial and convenient change. With all these, there appears no
+more serious difficulty to encounter than that involved in altered
+editions of their usual dispensatories, or books of reference'--an
+amount of trouble and expense, we should say, not greater, certainly,
+in proportion to the position of the parties concerned, than that
+which was forced on the poor chandlers and milkwomen by the act of
+1826.
+
+Then, to adapt the avoirdupois pound to the further objects in view,
+it must be reconstructed as to its divisional parts. In order to this,
+it is not necessary that the nomenclature should be changed, or that
+our poor people should be puzzled with the _decas_, and _hexas_, and
+_millias_ which has formed the greatest practical difficulty in the
+decimal system of France. It is proposed simply to divide the pound
+avoirdupois into 10,000 parts instead of 7000, and to employ names at
+present in use for the minor denominations; but if it be thought
+incongruous to retain the term _grain_, which had reference to the
+weight of wheat or barley, _minim_ might be substituted. Then the
+multiples of the pound, which have hitherto been so various, are to be
+decimally graduated--as, stones of 10 lbs., cwts. of 10 stone (or,
+literally, 100 lbs.), and tons of 10 cwt. The decimal measures below
+the gallon would correspond of course with the weights, as it is
+decided by the act, that a gallon is to contain ten pounds of water.
+The measures above gallons, it is proposed to call firkins and butts.
+
+It is taken for granted that quarts and pints, as well as half-pounds
+and quarter-pounds, would still be continued in use. In France, the
+government was obliged to relax its decimal principles in favour of
+permitting a partial return to the binary mode of subdivision. Mr
+Adams, who is high authority on such a point, avers that such
+divisions are 'as necessary to the practical use of weights and
+measures, as the decimal divisions are convenient for calculations
+resulting from them.' If this be admitted, almost the only change to
+retailers of ordinary commodities would be the introduction of the new
+ounce weight, altered to the tenth of a pound, with price in
+correspondence; and perhaps the fluid pound, or tenth of a gallon. If,
+however, the latter were likely to be generally used by the masses, it
+would be desirable that it should bear a more familiar name. But
+probably it would be little known, except as the highest denomination
+generally used by the apothecary; in which case the nomenclature would
+be all the better for expressing the value of the measure
+scientifically in relation to distilled water, as is now usually done
+by this class.
+
+It is easy to shew the practical advantages that would result in
+mercantile calculations if such a scale were adopted, and especially
+in connection with the decimal system of money advocated in a former
+number of this Journal.[2] If a parcel of goods weighs 13 cwt., 7
+stone, 8 lbs., and it be desired to know how many pounds it contains,
+it is unnecessary to change a single figure to shew that there are
+1378; an additional cipher gives the number of ounces (137,80);
+another the number of drachms (137,800), instead of requiring the
+present tedious process of reduction. Again: if any commodity costs,
+for instance, 2 fl. 3 cents per lb., we know without taking up a pen
+that it is 2 cents 3 mil. per ounce; that it is L.2, 3 fl. per stone;
+L.23 per cwt.; L.230 per ton; and so on. Here is a cargo--no matter of
+what--weighing 374 tons, 7 cwt. 4 st. If the value is, for instance,
+L.2, 3s. per ton, we have but to multiply the figures 37474 by 23, and
+_point_ the amount thus--L.861.9.0.2. If, however, the price be L.2,
+3s. per cwt., the point after the pounds, which is the only essential
+one, must be removed a step further to the right--thus, L.8619.0.2;
+and if L.2, 3s. per stone, it will be L.86190.2. Let any one try the
+difference between these operations and similar calculations according
+to our present system, and he will confess it is no mean advantage
+that the advocates of decimal gradations are seeking to obtain for the
+community.
+
+We are happy to add, that since our article on Decimal Coinage
+appeared, we have received numerous communications on the subject; and
+while there are minor differences of opinion as to the details, there
+appears to be perfect unanimity as to the desirableness of the system,
+and the possibility of bringing it into general use.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES:
+
+[1] _The Decimal System_. By Henry Taylor. London: Groombridge & Sons.
+
+[2] See No. 428.
+
+
+
+
+THE LITTLE GRAY GOSSIP.
+
+
+Soon after Cousin Con's marriage, we were invited to stay for a few
+weeks with the newly-married couple, during the festive winter season;
+so away we went with merry hearts, the clear frosty air and pleasant
+prospect before us invigorating our spirits, as we took our places
+inside the good old mail-coach, which passed through the town of
+P----, where Cousin Con resided, for there were no railways then.
+Never was there a kinder or more genial soul than Cousin Con; and
+David Danvers, the goodman, as she laughingly called him, was, if
+possible, kinder and more genial still. They were surrounded by
+substantial comforts, and delighted to see their friends in a
+sociable, easy way, and to make them snug and cosy, our arrival being
+the signal for a succession of such convivialities. Very mirthful and
+enjoyable were these evenings, for Con's presence always shed radiant
+sunshine, and David's honest broad face beamed upon her with
+affectionate pride. During the days of their courtship at our house,
+they had perhaps indulged in billing and cooing a little too freely
+when in company with others, for sober middle-aged lovers like
+themselves; thereby lying open to animadversions from prim spinsters,
+who wondered that Miss Constance and Mr Danvers made themselves so
+ridiculous. But now all this nonsense had sobered down, and nothing
+could be detected beyond a sly glance, or a squeeze of the hand now
+and then; yet we often quizzed them about by-gones, and declared that
+engaged pairs were insufferable--we could always find them out among a
+hundred!
+
+'I'll bet you anything you like,' cried Cousin Con, with a
+good-humoured laugh, 'that among our guests coming this evening'
+(there was to be a tea-junketing), 'you'll not be able to point out
+the engaged couple--for there will be only _one_ such present--though
+plenty of lads and lasses that would like to be so happily situated!
+But the couple I allude to are real turtledoves, and yet I defy you to
+find them out!'
+
+'Done, Cousin Con!' we exclaimed; 'and what shall we wager?'
+
+'Gloves! gloves to be sure!' cried David. 'Ladies always wager gloves;
+though I can tell you, my Con is on the safe side now;' and David
+rubbed his hands, delighted with the joke; and _we_ already, in
+perspective, beheld our glove-box enriched with half-a-dozen pair of
+snowy French sevens!
+
+Never had we felt more interested in watching the arrivals and
+movements of strangers, than on this evening, for our honour was
+concerned, to detect the lovers, and raise the veil. Papas and mammas,
+and masters and misses, came trooping in; old ladies, and middle-aged;
+old gentlemen, and middle-aged--until the number amounted to about
+thirty, and Cousin Con's drawing-rooms were comfortably filled. We
+closely scrutinised all the young folks, and so intently but covertly
+watched their proceedings, that we could have revealed several
+innocent flirtations, but nothing appeared that could lead us to the
+turtledoves and their engagement. At length, we really had hopes, and
+ensconced ourselves in a corner, to observe the more cautiously a
+tall, beautiful girl, whose eyes incessantly turned towards the door
+of the apartment; while each time it opened to admit any one, she
+sighed and looked disappointed, as if that one was not the one she
+yearned to see. We were deep in a reverie, conjuring up a romance of
+which she was the heroine, when a little lady, habited in gray, whose
+age might average threescore, unceremoniously seated herself beside
+us, and immediately commenced a conversation, by asking if we were
+admiring pretty Annie Mortimer--following the direction of our looks.
+On receiving a reply in the affirmative, she continued: 'Ah, she's a
+good, affectionate girl; a great favourite of mine is sweet Annie
+Mortimer.'
+
+'Watching for her lover, no doubt?' we ventured to say, hoping to gain
+the desired information, and thinking of our white kid-gloves. 'She is
+an engaged young lady?'
+
+'Engaged! engaged!' cried the little animated lady: 'no indeed. The
+fates forbid! Annie Mortimer is not engaged.' The expression of the
+little lady's countenance at our bare supposition of so natural a
+fact, amounted almost to the ludicrous; and we with some difficulty
+articulated a serious rejoinder, disavowing all previous knowledge,
+and therefore erring through ignorance. We had now time to examine our
+new acquaintance more critically. As we have already stated, she was
+habited in gray; but not only was her attire gray, but she was
+literally gray all over: gray hairs, braided in a peculiar obsolete
+fashion, and quite uncovered; gray gloves; gray shoes; and, above all,
+gray eyes, soft, large, and peculiarly sad in expression, yet
+beautiful eyes, redeeming the gray, monotonous countenance from
+absolute plainness. Mary Queen of Scots, we are told, had gray eyes;
+and even she, poor lady, owned not more speaking or history-telling
+orbs than did this little unknown gossip in gray. But our attention
+was diverted from the contemplation, by the entrance of another actor
+on the stage, to whom Annie Mortimer darted forward with an
+exclamation of delight and welcome. The new-comer was a slender,
+elderly gentleman, whose white hairs, pale face, and benignant
+expression presented nothing remarkable in their aspect, beyond a
+certain air of elegance and refinement, which characterised the whole
+outward man.
+
+'That is a charming-looking old gentleman,' said we to the gray lady;
+'is he Annie's father?'
+
+'Her father! O dear, no! That gentleman is a bachelor; but he is
+Annie's guardian, and has supplied the place of a father to her, for
+poor Annie is an orphan.'
+
+'Oh!' we exclaimed, and there was a great deal of meaning in our oh!
+for had we not read and heard of youthful wards falling in love with
+their guardians? and might not the fair Annie's taste incline this
+way? The little gray lady understood our thoughts, for she smiled, but
+said nothing; and while we were absorbed with Annie and her supposed
+antiquated lover, she glided into the circle, and presently we beheld
+Annie's guardian, with Annie leaning on his arm, exchange a few words
+with her in an undertone, as she passed them to an inner room.
+
+'Who is that pleasing-looking old gentleman?' said we to our hostess;
+'and what is the name of the lady in gray, who went away just as you
+came up? That is Annie Mortimer we know, and we know also that she
+isn't engaged!'
+
+Cousin Con laughed heartily as she replied: 'That nice old gentleman
+is Mr Worthington, our poor curate; and a poor curate he is likely
+ever to continue, so far as we can see. The lady in gray we call our
+"little gray gossip," and a darling she is! As to Annie, you seem to
+know all about her. I suppose little Bessie has been lauding her up to
+the skies.'
+
+'Who is little Bessie?' we inquired.
+
+'Little Bessie is your little gray gossip: we never call her anything
+but Bessie to her face; she is a harmless little old maid. But come
+this way: Bessie is going to sing, for they won't let her rest till
+she complies; and Bessie singing, and Bessie talking, are widely
+different creatures.'
+
+Widely different indeed! Could this be the little gray lady seated at
+the piano, and making it speak? while her thrilling tones, as she sang
+of 'days gone by,' went straight to each listener's heart, she herself
+looking ten years younger! When the song was over, I observed Mr
+Worthington, with Annie still resting on his arm, in a corner of the
+apartment, shaded by a projecting piece of furniture; and I also noted
+the tear on his furrowed cheek, which he hastily brushed away, and
+stooped to answer some remark of Annie's, who, with fond affection,
+had evidently observed it too, endeavouring to dispel the painful
+illusion which remembrances of days gone by occasioned.
+
+We at length found the company separating, and our wager still
+unredeemed. The last to depart was Mr Worthington, escorting Annie
+Mortimer and little Bessie, whom he shawled most tenderly, no doubt
+because she was a poor forlorn little old maid, and sang so sweetly.
+
+The next morning at breakfast, Cousin Con attacked us, supported by Mr
+Danvers, both demanding a solution of the mystery, or the scented
+sevens! After a vast deal of laughing, talking, and discussion, we
+were obliged to confess ourselves beaten, for there had been an
+engaged couple present on the previous evening, and we had failed to
+discover them. No; it was not Annie Mortimer: she had no lover. No; it
+was not the Misses Halliday, or the Masters Burton: they had flirted
+and danced, and danced and flirted indiscriminately; but as to serious
+engagements--pooh! pooh!
+
+Who would have conjectured the romance of reality that was now
+divulged? and how could we have been so stupid as not to have read it
+at a glance? These contradictory exclamations, as is usual in such
+cases, ensued when the riddle was unfolded. It is so easy to be wise
+when we have learned the wisdom. Yet we cheerfully lost our wager, and
+would have lost a hundred such, for the sake of hearing a tale so far
+removed from matter-of-fact; proving also that enduring faith and
+affection are not so fabulous as philosophers often pronounce them to
+be.
+
+Bessie Prudholm was nearly related to David Danvers, and she had been
+the only child of a talented but improvident father, who, after a
+short, brilliant career as a public singer, suddenly sank into
+obscurity and neglect, from the total loss of his vocal powers,
+brought on by a violent rheumatic cold and lasting prostration of
+strength. At this juncture, Bessie had nearly attained her twentieth
+year, and was still in mourning for an excellent mother, by whom she
+had been tenderly and carefully brought up. From luxury and indulgence
+the descent to poverty and privation was swift. Bessie, indeed,
+inherited a very small income in right of her deceased parent,
+sufficient for her own wants, and even comforts, but totally
+inadequate to meet the thousand demands, caprices, and fancies of her
+ailing and exigeant father. However, for five years she battled
+bravely with adversity, eking out their scanty means by her
+exertions--though, from her father's helpless condition, and the
+constant and unremitting attention he required, she was in a great
+measure debarred from applying her efforts advantageously. The poor,
+dying man, in his days of health, had contributed to the enjoyment of
+the affluent, and in turn been courted by them; but now, forgotten and
+despised, he bitterly reviled the heartless world, whose hollow meed
+of applause it had formerly been the sole aim of his existence to
+secure. Wealth became to his disordered imagination the desideratum of
+existence, and he attached inordinate value to it, in proportion as
+he felt the bitter stings of comparative penury. To guard his only
+child--whom he certainly loved better than anything else in the world,
+save himself--from this dreaded evil, the misguided man, during his
+latter days, extracted from her an inviolable assurance, never to
+become the wife of any individual who could not settle upon her,
+subject to no contingencies or chances, the sum of at least one
+thousand pounds.
+
+Bessie, who was fancy-free, and a lively-spirited girl, by no means
+relished the slights and privations which poverty entails. She
+therefore willingly became bound by this solemn promise; and when her
+father breathed his last, declaring that she had made his mind
+comparatively easy, little Bessie half smiled, even in the midst of
+her deep and natural sorrow, to think how small and easy a concession
+her poor father had exacted, when her own opinions and views so
+perfectly coincided with his. The orphan girl took up her abode with
+the mother of David Danvers, and continued to reside with that worthy
+lady until the latter's decease. It was beneath the roof of Mrs
+Danvers that Bessie first became acquainted with Mr Worthington--that
+acquaintance speedily ripening into a mutual and sincere attachment.
+He was poor and patronless then, as he had continued ever since, with
+slender likelihood of ever possessing L.100 of his own, much less
+L.1000 to settle on a wife. It is true, that in the chances and
+changes of this mortal life, Paul Worthington might succeed to a fine
+inheritance; but there were many lives betwixt him and it, and Paul
+was not the one to desire happiness at another's expense, nor was
+sweet little Bessie either.
+
+Yet was Paul Worthington rich in one inestimable possession, such as
+money cannot purchase--even in the love of a pure devoted heart, which
+for him, and for his dear sake, bravely endured the life-long
+loneliness and isolation which their peculiar circumstances induced.
+Paul did not see Bessie grow old and gray: in his eyes, she never
+changed; she was to him still beautiful, graceful, and enchanting; she
+was his betrothed, and he came forth into the world, from his books,
+and his arduous clerical and parochial duties, to gaze at intervals
+into her soft eyes, to press her tiny hand, to whisper a fond word,
+and then to return to his lonely home, like a second Josiah Cargill,
+to try and find in severe study oblivion of sorrow.
+
+Annie Mortimer had been sent to him as a ministering angel: she was
+the orphan and penniless daughter of Mr Worthington's dearest friend
+and former college-chum, and she had come to find a shelter beneath
+the humble roof of the pious guardian, to whose earthly care she had
+been solemnly bequeathed. Paul's curacy was not many miles distant
+from the town where Bessie had fixed her resting-place; and it was
+generally surmised by the select few who were in the secret of little
+Bessie's singular history, that she regarded Annie Mortimer with
+especial favour and affection, from the fact, that Annie enjoyed the
+privilege of solacing and cheering Paul Worthington's declining years.
+Each spoke of her as a dear adopted daughter, and Annie equally
+returned the affection of both.
+
+Poor solitaries! what long anxious years they had known, separated by
+circumstance, yet knit together in the bonds of enduring love!
+
+I pictured them at festive winter seasons, at their humble solitary
+boards; and in summer prime, when song-birds and bright perfumed
+flowers call lovers forth into the sunshine rejoicingly. They had not
+dared to rejoice during their long engagement; yet Bessie was a
+sociable creature, and did not mope or shut herself up, but led a life
+of active usefulness, and was a general favourite amongst all classes.
+They had never contemplated the possibility of evading Bessie's solemn
+promise to her dying father; to their tender consciences, that fatal
+promise was as binding and stringent, as if the gulf of marriage or
+conventual vows yawned betwixt them. We had been inclined to indulge
+some mirth at the expense of the little gray gossip, when she first
+presented herself to our notice; but now we regarded her as an object
+of interest, surrounded by a halo of romance, fully shared in by her
+charming, venerable lover. And this was good Cousin Con's elucidation
+of the riddle, which she narrated with many digressions, and with
+animated smiles, to conceal tears of sympathy. Paul Worthington and
+little Bessie did not like their history to be discussed by the rising
+frivolous generation; it was so unworldly, so sacred, and they looked
+forward with humble hope so soon to be united for ever in the better
+land, that it pained and distressed them to be made a topic of
+conversation.
+
+Were we relating fiction, it would be easy to bring this antiquated
+pair together, even at the eleventh hour; love and constancy making up
+for the absence of one sweet ingredient, evanescent, yet
+beautiful--the ingredient we mean of youth. But as this is a romance
+of reality, we are fain to divulge facts as they actually occurred,
+and as we heard them from authentic sources. Paul and Bessie, divided
+in their lives, repose side by side in the old church-yard. He dropped
+off first, and Bessie doffed her gray for sombre habiliments of darker
+hue. Nor did she long remain behind, loving little soul! leaving her
+property to Annie Mortimer, and warning her against long engagements.
+
+The last time we heard of Annie, she was the happy wife of an
+excellent man, who, fully coinciding in the opinion of the little gray
+gossip, protested strenuously against more than six weeks' courtship,
+and carried his point triumphantly.
+
+
+
+
+THE WET SHROUD.
+
+    'Ach, Sohn! was haelt dich zurueck?'
+    'Siehe, Mutter, das sind die Thraenen.'
+
+                          MUTTERTHRAeNEN.
+
+
+      They gave her back again:
+    They never asked to see her face;
+    But gazed upon her vacant place,
+      Moaning, like those in pain.
+
+      There was a brief hot thirst;
+    A thirsting of the heart for streams
+    Which never more save in sweet dreams
+      From that lost fount should burst.
+
+      There was a frightful cry,
+    As if the whole great earth were dead;
+    Yet was one arrow only sped,
+      One, only, called to die.
+
+      Then all grew calm as sleep;
+    And they in household ways once more
+    Did go: the anguish half was o'er,
+      For they had learned to weep.
+
+      They stood about her bed,
+    And whispered low beneath their cloud;
+    For she might hear them speaking loud--
+      She was so near, they said.
+
+      Softly her pillow pressing,
+    With reverent brows they mutely lay;
+    They scarcely missed the risen clay
+      In her pure soul's caressing.
+
+      Last, from their eyes were driven
+    Those heart-drops, lest--so spoke their fears--
+    Her robes all heavy with their tears
+      Might clog her flight to Heaven!
+
+                                    E.L.H.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Printed and Published by W. and R. CHAMBERS, High Street, Edinburgh.
+Also sold by W. S. ORR, Amen Corner, London; D. N. CHAMBERS, 55 West
+Nile Street, Glasgow; and J. M'GLASHAN, 50 Upper Sackville Street,
+Dublin.--Advertisements for Monthly Parts are requested to be sent to
+MAXWELL & Co., 31 Nicholas Lane, Lombard Street, London, to whom all
+applications respecting their insertion must be made.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 437, by Various
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