Part 4

With a view to have the most perfect security against cold blasts and fluctuation of temperature in rooms intended for invalids, and still to retain the so much valued appearance of the open fire, a glazed frame or window may be placed at the entrance of the chimney, so as completely to prevent the passage of air from the room to the fire. The close room will then be warmed by the fire through the glass, as a green-house is warmed by the rays of the sun. It is true, that the heat of combustion does not pass through glass so readily as the heat of the sun; but the difference is not important. The glass of such a window must, of course, be divided into small panes, and supported by a metallic frame work; and there must be a flap or door in the frame work, for the purpose of admitting the fuel and stirring the fire. Air must be supplied to the fire as described above, by a tube leading directly from the external atmosphere. The ventilation of the room may be effected by an opening into the chimney near the ceiling; and the temperature may be regulated with great precision by a valve placed in this opening, and made to obey the dilatation and contraction of a piece of wire affixed to it, the exact length of which at any time will depend on the temperature of the room. The author first imagined such an arrangement of rooms for the winter residence of a person who was threatened with consumption; and the happy issue of the case, and of others treated on similar principles, has led him to doubt, whether many of the patients with incipient consumption, who are usually sent to warmer climates, and who die there after hardships on the journey, and mental distress from the banishment sufficient to shake even strong health, might not be saved, by judicious treatment in properly warmed and ventilated apartments, under their own roofs, and in the midst of affectionate kindred.

_Arnott's Elements of Physics._

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LORD ORFORD'S DESCRIPTION OF THE DEATH OF GENERAL WOLFE.

The rapidity with which our arms had prevailed in every quarter of the globe, made us presume that Canada could not fail of being added to our acquisitions; and, however arduously won, it would have sunk in value if the transient cloud that overcast the dawn of this glory had not made it burst forth with redoubled lustre. The incidents of dramatic fiction could not be conducted with more address to lead an audience from despondency to sudden exultation, than accident prepared to excite the passions of a whole people. They despaired--they triumphed--and they wept--for Wolfe had fallen in the hour of victory! Joy, grief, curiosity, astonishment were painted in every countenance; the more they inquired, the higher their admiration rose. Not an incident but was heroic and affecting! Wolfe between persuasion of the impracticability, unwillingness to leave any attempt untried that could be proposed, and weariness and anxiety of mind and body, had determined to make one last effort above the town. He embarked his forces at one in the morning, and passed the French sentinels in silence that were posted along the shore. The current carried them beyond the destined spot. They found themselves at the foot of a precipice, esteemed so impracticable, that only a slight guard of one hundred and fifty men defended it. Had there been a path, the night was too dark to discover it. The troops, whom nothing could discourage, for these difficulties could not, pulled themselves and one another up by stumps and boughs of trees. The guard hearing a rustling, fired down the precipice at random, as our men did up into the air; but, terrified by the strangeness of the attempt, the French picquet fled--all but the captain, who, though wounded, would not accept quarter, but fired at one of our officers at the head of five hundred men. This, as he staked but a single life, was thought such an unfair war, that, instead of honouring his desperate valour, our men, to punish him, cut off his croix de St. Louis before they sent him to the hospital. Two of our officers, however, signed a certificate of his courage, lest the French should punish him as corrupted--our enterprises, unless facilitated by corruption, being deemed impossible to have taken place. Day-break discovered our forces in possession of the eminence. Montcalm could not credit it when reported to him--but it was too late to doubt, when nothing but a battle could save the town. Even then he held our attempt so desperate, that being shown the position of the English, he said, "Oui, je les vois où ils ne doivent pas être." Forced to quit his intrenchments, he said, "S'il faut done combattre, je vais les écraser." He prepared for engagement, after lining the bushes with detachments of Indians. Our men according to orders, reserved their fire with a patience and tranquillity equal to the resolution they had exerted in clambering the precipice--but when they gave it, it took place with such terrible slaughter of the enemy, that half an hour decided the day. The French fled precipitately, and Montcalm, endeavouring to rally them, was killed on the spot. General Monckton was wounded early, and obliged to retire. The fall of Wolfe was noble indeed. He received a wound in the head, but covered it from his soldiers with his handkerchief. A second ball struck him in the belly, that too he dissembled. A third hitting him in the breast, he sunk under the anguish, and was carried behind the ranks. Yet, as fast as life ebbed out, his whole anxiety centred on the fortune of the day. He begged to be borne nearer to the action; but his sight being dimmed by the approach of death, he entreated to be told what they who supported him saw; he was answered that the enemy gave ground. He eagerly repeated the question, heard the enemy was totally routed, cried, "I am satisfied!"--and expired--_Thackeray's Life of the Earl of Chatham_.

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SYRIAN LOOKING GLASSES.

The Damascus blades are the handsomest and best of all Syria; and it is curious to observe their manner of burnishing them. This operation is performed before tempering, and they have for this purpose a small piece of wood, in which is fixed an iron, which they run up and down the blade, and thus clear off all inequalities, as a plane does to wood: they then temper and polish it. This polish is so highly finished, that when any one wants to arrange his turban, he uses his sword for a looking-glass. As to its temper it is perfect, and I have nowhere seen swords that cut so excellently. There are made at Damascus and in the adjoining country mirrors of steel, that magnify objects like burning-glasses. I have seen some that, when exposed to the sun, have reflected the heat so strongly as to set fire to a plant fifteen or sixteen feet distant!--_Broquiere's Travels to Jerusalem in 1432._

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AUSTRALIAN PATRIOTISM.

A young Australian, on being once asked his opinion of a splendid shop on Ludgate-hill, replied, in a disappointed tone, "It is not equal to _Big Cooper's_," (a store-shop in Sidney,) while Mrs. Rickards' _Fashionable Repository_ is believed to be unrivalled, even in Bond-street. Some of them also contrive to find out that the English cows give _less_ milk and butter than the Australian, and the choicest Newmarket racers possess _less_ beauty and swiftness than _Junius_, _Modus_, _Currency Lass_, and others of Australian turf pedigree; nay, even a young girl, when asked how she would like to go to England, replied with great _naiveté_, "I should be afraid to go, from the _number of thieves_ there," doubtless conceiving England to be a downright hive of such, that threw off its annual swarms to people the wilds of this colony. Nay, the very miserable looking trees that cast their annual coats of bark, and present to the eye of a raw European the appearance of being actually dead, I have heard praised as objects of incomparable beauty! and I myself, so powerful is habit, begin to look upon them pleasurably. Our ideas of beauty are, in truth, less referrable to a _natural_ than an _artificial_ standard, varying in every country according to what the eye has been habituated to, and fashion prescribes.--_Cunningham's Two Years in New South Wales_.

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THE LECTURER.

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MENTAL DERANGEMENT.

The term _melancholia_ is applied to _insanity_, when attended with depression of spirits, arising commonly from some supposed impending evil; but sometimes it takes place without any such error of judgment, and is altogether unaccountable. As far as I have seen, this depression of spirits is in no wise essentially connected with, far less dependent upon, bodily weakness, as its cause. On the contrary, you will often find such patients to be of full habit, and complaining of throbbing headach, with flushing of the face, a full and strong pulse, though sometimes the pulse is preternaturally slow; the tongue is often white and dry, as in inflammation in general. These symptoms, considered in themselves, would call for _antiphlogistic_ measures, such as _bleeding_ and _purging_; and these are not at all the less necessary because the patient is in a low and desponding state of mind. In short, I know of no difference in the medical treatment of _mania_ and _melancholia_, merely as such; you must look to the state of vascular action, both local and general, in order to lay down a proper plan of cure.

_Hypochondriasis_ is a still slighter form of _mental derangement_, and which is characterized by a preposterous anxiety and solicitude with regard to the patient's own health, which in these cases is often little if at all disturbed, with the exception of occasional uneasiness at the stomach, arising from flatulency and other effects of indigestion. This disorder in the state of the digestive function, is generally considered by the patient as the real and primary disease, though 99 times in 100 it is merely secondary, the result of torpor of the alimentary canal altogether. This torpor is the consequence of an oppressed condition of brain, proceeding, for the most part, from increased arterial action in this organ. Thus the effect is taken for the cause, and a treatment directed in conformity with this mistaken notion. Happily, the practice usually pursued on those occasions, and which is directed to the state of the stomach and intestinal canal, is, as far as it goes, beneficial to the primary disease; for occasional _purging_, whether with the _blue pill_ or _Plummer's pill_, and the use of a simple and abstemious mode of living, are as well calculated to relieve affections of the brain, as those of the stomach. But the fault of such a mistaken view of the subject is, that the treatment is confined too exclusively to one organ, and that the one not primarily affected; to the neglect of other means that may be as much or more required for the relief of the head. Where, for example, the patient complains of throbbing headach, with other marks of increased arterial action in and about the brain, it is dangerous to rely solely upon _cathartics_, and to neglect _bleeding_, a neglect, which, I have more than once seen reason to believe, has been the occasion of fatal apoplexy ensuing.

The precise difference in the condition of the brain, in the three forms of _insanity_ now mentioned, is not at all known. Dissection hitherto has not thrown any light upon the subject; nor is it probable that it will do so hereafter. The derangement of intellect in all of them, and the mutual convertibility of one into the other, prove that there is no essential or fundamental difference between them; and the same is true with regard to their medical treatment. The moral management of the patient calls for nicer discrimination, and requires much penetration and judgment on the part of the practitioner, as well as extensive experience in mental disorders altogether--_Clutterbuck's Lectures on the Nervous System_.

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THE GATHERER.

"I am but a Gatherer and disposer of other men's stuff."--_Wotton_.

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A celebrated comedian dining at a tavern in the neighbourhood of Covent-garden, after asking the waiter several times for a glass of water without obtaining it, rang the bell violently, and swore "He would knock his eye out, if he did not immediately bring some." A gentleman present remonstrated, and said, "He would be less likely of getting it, if he did so." "Oh dear, no, sir; for if you take eye (i) from waiter, you will get water directly."

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Closterman painted the duke and duchess of Marlborough, and all their children, in one picture. The duke was represented on horseback; a position which formed the subject of so many disputes with the duchess, that the duke said, "It has given me more trouble to reconcile my wife to you, than to fight a battle."

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During the time that his late majesty George III. was indisposed at Windsor, it was frequently his custom to amuse himself with a game of cards. On one occasion, while playing at picquet with Dr. Keate, one of his physicians, the doctor was about to lay down his hand, saying, as he wanted but twelve of being out, he had won the game; for, added he, "I have a quatorze of tens."--The king bade him keep his cards. _Tens_ were good for nothing just then; "for," said his majesty, looking significantly at Dr. Keate, and laying down four knaves, "Here are my four physicians."

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A married lady, alluding in conversation to the 148th Psalm, observed, that while "young men and maidens, old men and children," were expressly mentioned, not a word was said about _married women_. An old clergyman, whom she was addressing, assured her that they had not been omitted, and that she would find them included in one of the preceding verses under the description of _vapours_ and _storm_.

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_Printed and published by J. LIMBIRD, 143. Strand, (near Somerset House,) and sold by all Newsmen and Booksellers._

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