much better in the Price Current, and would as would suffice to float a first-rate frigate. make the total so much more easy to cast in In the course of about three hours, what with the account sales. His winning eloquence drugs, dyes and perfumery, fully fifty thousand was fruitless; the unpronounceable drug was pounds worth of property is disposed of, and knocked down at two-pence three-farthings. that, too, of articles which the world at large When I expressed my astonishment that men have no conception of, save as distributed by of such undoubted substance as I saw there, chemists and others in twopenny packets or should condescend to haggle, like any huck- sixpenny phials. Vast, indeed, must be the sters, at an odd farthing, I was told that trif- amount of mortal suffering and affluent luxling as the difference appeared by the single ury that can thus absorb, week by week, pound weight, the aggregate of the extra these gigantic cargoes of physic and fragrance. farthing upon the quantity offered for sale that From east and west the freighted ships arrive. day, would amount to some thousands of Every nook and corner, every mountain and pounds sterling; and that, at certain seasons, desert place, is scoured for contributions to some paltry odd farthing had realised or lost our Pharmacopoeia. Let any new disease fortunes. There were a few more unintelli- make its appearance among us, and immedigible things-Mincing Lane jargon-that re- ately the busy hand of science is at work, and quired interpretation. What "overtakers in some remote corner of this wondrous world, could mean, I was at a loss to know; but I some root, or seed, or oozing gum, is found, learnt that they were certain extra packages to battle with the newly-found enemy. Cost required to re-pack goods, after they had been is of little moment, so that the remedy be opened out in the dock warehouses. One efficacious. It was not very many months smart-looking seller astonished me by putting up what he termed a lot of "good handy sweeps!"—not climbing-boys, but the sweepings of the warehouses. since "Koussa," a new and valuable vegetable medicine from Abyssinia, was introduced; it was immediately bought up at a guinea an ounce, and that price drew such abundant supplies to this country, that the same article It may be truly observed that every nation under the sun is busily occupied in collecting products for our dispensaries and hospitals. In China, Tartary, Egypt, America, in the most southern isle of the South Pacific, on the loftiest peaks of the mighty Andes, in the hottest deserts of Arabia or Africa, in the most pestilential bunds of India, men are toiling for the inmates of the sick-room, to aid that high and holy art, whose noble aim is to win our bodies from the penalty of pain. THE DAYS GONE BY. When the day's work was over; when the last lot of "sweeps" was disposed of, and buy-is now selling at two shillings the ounce. ers and sellers, Lane men and Lane lads, once more mingled in Babel discord; the dense green fog in the narrow alley peeped in at the sooty windows; the hazy gas-light over the pulpit, winked at the murky fog through the glass, flickered, struggled, waned, and went out; we turned towards the old stair-case, slowly merging into the general crowd, and I again heard the names of strange chemicals, and gums, and substances, spoken of in kindly sympathising brotherhool. Cream of tartar had no doubt, felt rather poorly a short time since, for it was said to be "decidedly improving." Opium must have been in an undecided and vacillating mood during a long period, as I heard it reported to be "showing a little firmness at last." Scammon was said to be "drooping;" and as for castor-oil, there was not the slightest hope of its "recovering." It was curious to hear those articles destined for the cure of human maladies, or ease of human sufferings, thus intimately linked in their own capacities with wordly ailings and earthly infirmities. I almost expected to hear that some of the dyes had got the measles, or that hooping-cough had made its appearance in the younger branches of the drug family. A better estimate of the actual amount of potent medicine which the human family, somehow or other, contrives to imbibe, can scarcely be arrived at than by an attendance or two at these sales. Twice in every month on each alternate Thursday-whole fleetloads of deadly narcotics, drastic aperients, and nauseous tonics and febrifuge, are disposed of as sheer matter of course. At each of these auctions, as much castor-oil is sold India, The burthen of the world's old song, It is only Memory's cheat That prompts the heart's deep sigh, When, mid prosperity's defeat, We think of days gone by. A feeling lost, we know not what, Yet, O my friends, if this be sooth, Yet faint not, but be sure 1851. H. G. K. THE BEAUTY OF OLD AGE. OLD age owes a portion of its dignity to the authority it has won from experience, and a still greater degree consists in its proximity to that great future which will soon resolve the eternal | destinies of men. Peace of soul beams uneclipsed from the brow of those devotees of excellence, who have preserved unstained the sacred treasure of moral virginity. Especially is its radiance majestically serene, as a halo of heavenly beams around the head of old age, when adorned with the attractiveness of frugal virtue and crowned with the memorials of a beneficent life. The termination of such an earthly sojourn is a repose calm and impressive, but a repose full of sublime vigour, like a mountain relieved against the clear evening sky, and radiant with the sun's richest splendours. The smile of heaven and the sweetest dews descend on brow and bosom, with the assurance that, though the shades of dun night are gathering round, the glories of a brighter morn will soon succeed. It is in relation to the same subject, that Wordsworth suggests: 'Rightly it is said That man descends into the vale of years; As of a final eminence, though bare On which 'tis not impossible to sit An aged man, in whose soul purity and piety constitute the chief springs of action, and whose life, therefore, has been upright and useful, exercises a mild but potent magistracy upon earth. We instinctively revere him, and, without being commanded so to do, we are obedient to his exalted thoughts. In his presence animosities are subdued, passionate desires are calmed, guilt is stricken with compunction, and innocence is for tified with augmented strength. This power of venerable virtue is the more real and praiseworthy, because its control is not ostentatiously exercised. It is spontaneous in its goodness, and, like the sun, shines abroad quietly only to bless. It is a power that we approach with involuntary delight; we consult the venerated patriarch in the atmosphere of his own integrity, and feel ourselves better for honouring him; we covet his esteem, and the profoundness of our regard for his worth | is the best commentary on the text, 'The beauty of old men is the grey head.' Purity of mind and habit is essential to vigour of body, manliness of soul, the greatest force of thought, and the longest duration of life. A chaste soul,' said Bernard, 'is by virtue that which an angel by nature; there is more happiness in the chastity of an angel, but there is more of courage in that of a man. The remark of Cicero on this subject is striking, if we consider the age and country in which it was made. This grand law,' says he, differs but a little from the religious institutions of Numa. It requires that one should approach the gods with a pure heart, the central sanctuary of a chaste body; but we should understand that, if the body is required to be chaste, the soul is vastly superior to the corporeal frame, and therefore has still greater need to be pure: the stains of the body will of themselves disappear in a few days, or may be washed off by a little water; but neither time nor the greatest rivers can remove stains from the soul." It is an interesting fact, that Providence allows only such creatures as are pure long to remain among mankind as the objects of their admiration, Corrupt genius, however potent, has never created a lasting work of art that is lascivious in character. The hand of violence or contempt, despite the depraved instincts of the heart, soon consigns such works to oblivion. Paris, Florence, Rome, have no productions of art essentially beautiful, grand, or sublime, that are of a nature to create on the cheek of a vestal the slightest blush. Many have attempted lewd subjects, but, by the conservative law of God's holy government, such nuisances are speedily driven into darkness and consigned to the worm; while those masterpieces which illustrate and edify virtue, like truth, live on for ever. The virgin mothers and cherubic youth of Murillo and Raphael are heavenly beings on canvass, and will perish only when matter itself must die, and even then the recollection of them will live in the memories of the sanctified as an element of immortal bliss. The group of Laocoon, which sends a thrill of emotion through one's soul years after it was first seen; Niobe, and her despairing children; Brutus, with his impressive mien; the Gladiator, sinking in his own heart's gore; Apollo, beaming with supernatural glory; and the exquisite work of Cleomenes, that bending statue that delights the world;' are all imperishable, not because they are cut in marble, but because the ideas they embody are divinely pure. But if sculptured excellence is worthy of admiration, how much more so is living worth. A virtuous and enlightened old man is the noblest object to be contemplated on earth. Says Solomon, Children's children are the crown of old men; and the glory of children are their fathers.' Prian, venerable in aspect as Mount Ida, like the bleached oaks of Gargara, hoary headed, and seated on his throne in the midst of an august court and his numerous household; and Plato, in the grove, or on the point of that cape, his favourite seat, where dashed the billows of the sea, bending his broad, venerable brow to teach throngs of youth the nature of God and eternal bliss, were among the ancient specimens of beautiful old age which we should do well to emulate. When the affections have early been divorced from earth, and the wings of the mind have been accustomed through succeeding years to stretch further and further above the rank vapours of vice, they are prepared, when the ties of earth are sundered, to scar in triumph to the infinite expanse of immortal joys. As in the ashes lives the wonted fire, so, in the persons of the virtuous, the bright lamp which spiritual purity has kindled never grows dim. Mammon has not prestituted it; Bacchus has not obscured it; and though its light expires to our limited vision, it is not extinguished: angels have raised it to a higher sphere, where it forever shines in unclouded day. Hogg's Instructor. A DISH OF VEGETABLES. FROM the moss to the palm-tree, the number of contributions made by the vegetable world towards the sustenance of man, would make a bulky list of benefactors. We have not room to advertise them all, still less to talk about them all. It may be well, however, and only grateful in us as human beings and recipients of vegetable bounty, to do a little trumpeting in honour of the great families of plants, which have contributed with more especial liberality towards the colonization of the world by man. For example, there is, in the first place, the POTATO family, famous for its liberal principles, and the wide sphere over which its influence is spread. The members of this family, with equal generosity, are prompt to place a luxury upon the rich man's gravy, or a heap of food beside the poor man's salt. The Potato family has been for many years one of the noblest benefactors to the human colony, and when it was prevented lately, by ill-health, from the fulfilment of its good intentions, great was the anxiety of men, and many were the bulletins of health sought for and issued. Its constitution still appears to be a little shaken, and we all still hope for the complete recovery of so sincere and influential a friend. not indeed by calling him Potato, but by calling Potatoes by his name, Parmentiers. The benerolent exertions made by the Potato family on behalf of France, during the famine of 1793, completely established it in favour with the grateful people. Potatoes, though so widely spread, are unable to maintain their health under too warm a climate. On the Andes, they fix their abode at a height of ten or thirteen thousand feet; in the Swiss Alps, they are comfortable on the mountain sides, and spread in Berne to a height of five thousand feet, or not very much less. Over the north of Europe the Potato family extends its labours farther on into the cold than even Barley, which is famous as the hardiest of grain. There are Potatoes settled in Iceland, though that is a place in which barley declines to live. The Potato is so nutritious, and can be cultivated with so little skill and labour, that it tempts some nations to depend solely on it for sustenance. The recent blight, especially in Ireland, consequently occasioned the most disastrous effects. The BARLEY branch of the Grass family has, however, a large establishment in Scotland, even to the extreme north, in the Orkneys, Shetland, and, in fact, even in the Faroe Islands. They who are in the secrets of the Barleys, hint that they would be very glad to settle in the southern districts of Iceland-say about Reikiavik-if it were not for the annoyance of unseasonable rains. In Western Lapland, there may be found heads of the house of Barley as far north as Cape North, which is the most northern point of the continent of Europe. It has a settlement in Russia on the shores of the White Sea, beyond Archangel. Over a great mass of northern Siberia, no Barley will undertake to live, and as the Potatoes have found their way into such barren districts only here and there, the country that is too far north for Barley, is too far north for agriculture. There the people live a nomad life, and owe obligation in the world of plants, to lichens for their food, er to such families as offer them the contribution of roots, bark, or a few scraps of fruit. The family seat of the Potatoes is well known to be in America. They are a comparatively new race in our own country, since they did not come over until some time after the Conqueror. The genealogists have nearly settled, after much discussion, that all members of this family spread over the world, are descended from the Potatoes of Chili. Their town seat is in the neighbourhood of Valparaiso, upon hills facing the sea. The Potatoes were early spread over many portions of America, on missions for the benefit of man, who had not been long in discovering that they were friends worth cultivating properly. It is said that the first Potato who visited Europe, came over with Sir Francis Drake, in 1573; it is said, also, that some of the family had accompanied Sir John Hawkins, in 1563; it is certain that a body of Potatoes quitted Virginia, in 1586, and came to It is not much that Barley asks as a condition England with Sir Walter Raleigh. M. Dunal, who of its gifts to any member of the human colony. has written an elaborate history of the Potato It wants a summer heat, averaging about forty-six family, shows it to be extremely probable that, degrees, and it does not want to be perpetually before the time of Raleigh, a settlement of Pota- moistened. If it is to do anything at all in moist toes had been formed in Spain. Reaching England places, like islands, it must have three degrees in 1586, the benevolent Potato family was wel-added to the average allowance of summer heat, comed into Belgium in 1590. In 1610, the first with which it would otherwise be content. Potatoes went to Ireland, where they eventually for your broiling hot weather, no Barley will multiplied and grew, to form one of the most im- stand it. Other grasses may tolerate the tropics portant branches of this worthy race. The Scotch if they please; Barley refuses to be baked while Potatoes date their origin as a distinct branch, it is growing. The Barleys are known to be setfrom 1728. It was at dates not very different tled as an old native family in Tartary and Sicily, from this, that other branches of the family set-two places very far apart. Their pedigree, howtled in Germany. The Potatoes of Switzerland ever, and indeed the pedigrees of all the branches first settled in 1730, in the Canton of Berne. In of the great Grass family, must remain a subject 1738, the thriving family extended its benevolent wrapt in uncertainty, buried in darkness, and lost assistance to the Prussians; but it was not until in a great fog of conjecture. 1767 that its aid was solicited in Tuscany. In We find Oars spread over Scotland to the France, the kindly efforts of this family were not extreme north point, and settled in Norway appreciated, until, in the middle of the last cen- and Sweden to the latitudes sixty-three and sixtytury, there arose a man, Parmentier, who backed five. Both Oats and Rye extend in Russia the introduction of Potatoes into France with re- to about the same latitude of sixty-three decommendations so emphatic, that it was designed grees. The benevolent exertion of Oats is put to impute to him the interest of Lear relationship, forth on behalf not only of men, but also As of their horses. In Scotland and Lancashire, in some countries of Germany, especially south of Westphalia, the people look to Oats for sustenance. Scotch bone and muscle are chiefly indebted to oatmeal; for porridge (which consists of oatmeal and water, and is eaten with milk) is the staplealmost the only-food of the sturdy Scottish peasantry. Qatcake, a kind of mash, such as horses are fed on occasionally in this country, made into a thin cake and baked, is also much relished north of the Tweed. South of the parallel of Paris, however, the friendship of Oats is little cultivated. In Spain and Portugal nobody knows anything about Cats, except as a point of curiosity. The RYE branch of the Grass family travels more to the north than Oats in Scandinavia. In our own country we decline to receive gifts from Rye: we succeed so well in the cultivation of more wealthy benefactors, that we consider the Ryes poor friends; and, like good Britons, hold them at arm's length accordingly. In countries where the land is poor, poor Rye is welcome to a settlement upon it. Rye is in great request in Russia, Germany, and parts of France, and one third of the population of Europe look to its help for daily bread The most numerous and respectable members of the great Grass family, are those which bear the name of WHEAT. There are an immense number of different Wheats; as many Wheats among the grasses as there are in this country Smiths among the men. We know them best as summer and winter Wheats. The family seat of the Wheats, most probably will never be discovered. There is reason to believe that Tartary and Persia are the native countries of Wheat, Oats, and Rye. Strabo says that Wheat is native on the banks of the Indus. Probably, wherever the old seats may be, all trace of them was destroyed in very ancient times, when even a thousand years ago and more, the plough passed over them. The settlements of Wheat in Scotland extend to the north of Inverness; in Norway, to Drontheim; in Russia, to St. Petersburg. How far north the Wheats would consent to extend the sphere of their influence in America, it is not possible to tell, because enough attempt at cultivation has not yet been made there in the northern regions. Winter cold does not concern the Wheats. The springsown Wheat escapes it, and that sown in autumn is protected by a covering of snow. Wheat keeps a respectful distance of twenty degrees from the Equator. Indeed in the warm latitudes, new combinations of heat and moisture, grateful to new and very beautiful members of the vegetable world, who suit their gifts more accurately to the wishes of the people whom they feed, would cause the kind offices of Wheat to be rejected, even if they could be offered there. On mountains in warm climates, settlements of Wheat of course exist. On the north side of the Himalaya mountains Wheat and Barley flourish at a height of thirteen thousand feet. The well-known name of RICE carries our thoughts to Asia. The family seat is somewhere in Asia, doubtless; but all trace of it is lost. The family has always lived in Southern Asia, where it supplies food, probably, to more men than any other race of plants has ever had occasion to support. No Rice can enjoy good health without much heat and much moisture. If these could be found everywhere, everybody would cultivate a valuable friend, that is supposed to scatter over a given surface of ground more than a common share of nourishment. Most liberal of all vegetables, however, in this respect, are the BANANAS. Humboldt tells us, that they spread over the said given extent of ground, forty-four times more nutritive matter than the Potatoes, and a hundred and thirty-three times more than any Wheat. Where the benevolent among our Grasses cease to grow, because it is too far south, there it is just far enough north for the CocoA-NUTS, who, within their limited sphere, supply a vast contribution towards the maintenance of man, that very wise and very independent creature. Very nearly three million of Cocoa-Nuts have been exported in one year from the Island of Ceylon. Then there is in Brazil that excellent vegetable friend MANIOC, a shrub, whose roots yield almost the only kind of meal there used. An acre of Maniec is said to yield as much food as six acres of wheat. And to come nearer home, there is a largehearted plant, bearing the name of MAIZE, and the nickname of Turkish Wheat. Its native seat has not been fixed yet by the genealogist. It grows at a good height above the sea in tropical America, and it occurs in Eastern Europe on the banks of the Dniester, in latitude forty-nine. Maize does not care about the winter; it wants nothing but summer-heat, in a country which it is to choose as a congenial habitation. It will do, also, with less heat than the vine, for it has been grown in the Lower Pyrenees, at three thousand two hundred and eighty feet above the level of the sea, the vine stopping at two thousand six hundred and twenty. We have here spoken only of a few of the great liberal families belonging to the world of plants; families, to which the human colony looks for support; upon whose aid we, in fact, depend for our existence. The whole list of our vegetable patrons would be very long. Respectable names must crowd down upon every memory, and take us off to "Citron groves; To where the lemon and the piercing lime, in fact take us a long dance among roots, and fruits, and vegetables. It must be enough, therefore, that we have here briefly expressed a general sense of obligation to our vegetable friends, and hinted at a fact which, in our high philosophy, we now and then forget, that the outer world may be a shadow, or a reflex of our own minds, or anything you please to call it; but that we, poor fellows, should be rather at a loss for dinner, if the earth did not send up for us, out of a kitchen that we did not build, our corn, and wine, aud oil.-Household Words. ENJOYMENT FROM STIMULANTS.-The enjoyment of persons who are in the habit of using stimulants is frantic while it lasts, but exceedingly shortlived. It is not the steady sunlight of the spirit, but the flash of the lightning passing from cloud to cloud. |