Children who are brought up under such unfavorable circumstances are deprived of their natural powers of endurance, and are unable to resist even slight changes in temperature. The outings of such children are only of occasional occurrence, owing to their liability to contract colds-a result which may confidently be expected when careless attendants expose such sensitive persons to cold seats or draughts, and one can scarcely fail to meet examples of children so treated in any of our parks or thoroughfares. Adults, it may be remarked, are not exempt from the consequences of exposure when the laws of health are in this manner violated. the same unnatural manner. A child having these symptoms, in addition to deafness, is greatly to be pitied, for it is much of the time dumfounded. Even adults subject to this experience are incapable of comprehending the physiological abnormity to which it owes its origin; to the child it is, of course, inexplicable. That some children are dumb and stupid is not, therefore, surprising, when these facts are considered. This anomaly of hearing depends on alterations, by disease, in the conductive mechanism of the ear. From observations extending over a considerable period of time the writer has found that in our public schools many pupils so deaf as to hear shouting only are permitted to continue their attendance Those who live in rural habitations, with indefinitely an evil that could be easily open fires and free ventilation, who wear remedied by a proper examination of the such clothing as an active out-door life repupils' hearing at the time of their admis- quires, and who, in youth, often are baresion. In private educational establish- footed the greater part of the year, can be ments, however, such preliminary exami- studied with advantage by the denizen nations are not always reliable, for the in- of over-heated city houses of the present terests of the proprietor may require that day. These hardy people are said to suffer the number of scholars be not from any less from colds than those who are considcause lessened. Parents under these cir-ered to be by fortune more favored. cumstances are permitted to send partially deaf children to school, and when it is ascertained that they have made but little or no progress, and that their lives have been rendered unhappy by the jeers and neglect of playmates, the teacher meets the parent's inquiries by the statement that the pupil is dull or defective. It may now be ascertained that the pupil has been deaf-by these sea-side exposures, which, when perhaps the deafness has grown on him while under the teacher's eye-but the knowledge is gained too late, in many instances, to be of much avail. Parents should, therefore, attend to so simple a matter as the frequent examination of their children at home. A pernicious home and school hygiene favors the occurrence of diseases which are liable to be attended with prominent aural complications. Thus the living in overheated apartments during the cold season (the temperature greatly exceeding the healthy limit of 65° to 70° Fahrenheit) develops a sensitiveness of the system, and therefore predisposes to attacks of catarrh. An excess of clothing is no less obnoxious than the foregoing, furs being especially dangerous in our changeable climate, as they are liable to be worn about the chest and neck in moderate weather, overheating the body, and thus increasing the liability to colds. There are many individuals of a sensitive organization who may not with impunity allow a draught of air to blow strongly into their ears; such persons are compelled to exercise unusual care when exposed to the strong air of the sea, especially when they have a very free opening to the ears. Children are often affected slight, are overlooked; later on, however, their ears may be found sensitive to the touch, and, when examined, the results of the slight inflammation will be found. Boxing the ears would be considered among the obsolete customs of the past, were we not occasionally reminded of the continuance of the practice by meeting with injuries of the tympanic membrane from this cause. Sometimes the shock given to the ear is the cause of permanent deafness to a greater or less degree, and sometimes vertigo is liable to be established. There are a few well-authenticated instances of death having occurred from this barbarous custom. Discharges from the ears indicate the continuance of an unhealthy process, which is nearly always situated in the drum cavity; and owing in part to the thinness of the partition that separates this cavity from deeper and more vital parts, it is not an infrequent result to meet with The hygienic influences that are causal more or less active throughout life; but in addition to these the period of afterlife is fraught with other perils which hitherto have been of trifling significance. Our limited space, however, will permit of allusion to a few of the most important only. a fatal termination from neglect in arresting the disease. Under no circumstances, of aural diseases in childhood remain therefore, should a discharge be neglected, for, in addition to the danger incurred by neglect, it is well known that when permitted to become chronic, greater difficulty is experienced in its cure. It has heretofore been a reflection on the knowledge of the profession that so many persons would endure discharges of the most repulsive character rather than take any steps for their suppression. It is the belief of many-too often, I fear, based on the advice of physicians-that aural affections are liable to be "outgrown;" this belief, however, is not sustained by the facts, as such a course is known to be exceptional. Intemperance in the use of beverages into which alcohol enters as a constituent disturbs the normal balance of the nervous and circulatory systems, and observations plainly show that this state favors the occurrence of aural disease. The frequency of attacks of aural inflammation from bathing demands more than a mere mention, for complete deafness may result from the injuries to the ear from this cause, and partial impairment is frequent. The advice formerly given by some physicians, when the treatment of the ear was not so well understood as at present, was to "let it alone"; and when pressed These injuries from bathing are mainly by anxious parents or others for a less due to the fact that man is not afforded hopeless prospect, the good physician the protection to the ear which amphibious taught his patients to look forward to animals possess, and hence the water may some critical period of life when they act injuriously in various ways. In surf would "outgrow" the affection. An bathing the mere force of contact, when amusing instance of this expectant and the water flows into the ear, may injure evasive treatment was related by a wo- the tympanic membrane, and when an inman whose deaf daughter of twenty sum- coming wave dashes against the face, wamers was still disposed to look forward ter may freely enter the mouth or nose, for relief. The deafness in this instance and thus be driven into the ears through made its appearance in childhood. The the Eustachian tubes. The presence of doctor who was then consulted, possess cold water for a long time in the canal ing an imaginative as well as a learned leading to the ear, as when much diving mind, informed the anxious parent that is done, may set up inflammation in the a return of hearing could be anticipated canal or in the tympanic membrane, after the child had cut her second teeth; which may extend to the drum cavity itbut this anxiously looked for period self. Ill effects may be produced by albrought not the desired relief. The lowing the ears, head, and body to dry in mother again sought advice. The doc- a current of air after coming out of the tor now felt certain that the period of water. Sea-water is probably more obwomanhood would not be passed without noxious than fresh, on account of its comrecovery. That interesting epoch of life, paratively low temperature, and the large however, arrived without a cure. Faith quantity of salt it holds in solution. A in the healing art being unshaken, not- long continuance in the water should be withstanding a constant increase in the avoided. The Russian bath should not girl's deafness, the anxious mother again be taken without protecting the ears when presented herself with her daughter for the cold plunge is used. Diving is, howthe doctor's advice. That learned man was ever, the most dangerous practice conyet equal to the occasion, and with becom- nected with bathing, for it is difficult to ing gravity informed the confiding dame keep water from entering the ears, or nose that matrimony was an event that natural- and mouth. In diving, the pressure of ly came next in order, and that in it there water on the tympanic membrane from was hope. "Alas!" exclaimed the some- without may cause vertigo. Even sywhat discouraged mother to the writer, ringing the ears gently is known in some "she is now married, and her husband is instances to occasion decided dizziness, exhausted from his efforts to make him- Should vertigo come on while the diver is self heard by shouting into her ears." beyond the reach of those who could ren der succor, there would be danger of his been the means of injuring a great many drowning. Diseases of the teeth, through their nervous relationship with the ears, frequently cause disturbances that lead to deafness. The permanent teeth are subject to decay at a much earlier period than is generally supposed: sometimes they decay as early as the sixth year, and this process is liable to recur while any teeth remain in the jaws. The neuralgia that arises from inflamed teeth is often felt in the ears, and indeed it seldom fails to do some harm in that direction. In the endeavor to preserve the teeth it must be borne in mind that unskillful dentistry may not relieve the patient, but, on the contrary, harm may arise from incompetent work; thus cavities may not be properly prepared before they are filled, or deleterious substances may be inserted into them, such as amalgam. Unhealthful dental plates, especially those made of vulcanite, which contains vermilion-a form of mercury-are to be avoided. If plates fit the mouth badly, they are harmful. Throat troubles act much in the same way as diseased teeth, and affections of the mouth and throat are usually urged into greater activity by catarrhal attacks. When the wisdom-teeth, which are cut about the seventeenth year, are delayed in their appearance, they very often give rise to irritation of the ears. These sympathetic sources of aural trouble are not always attended with pain, or, indeed, with any pronounced symptom; but a sympathetic influence may exist for a long time before any disease in either the mouth or ears is suspected. Singing in the ears, heat, and itching may be unnoticed until there is deafness. There may also exist an increase of the ear-wax. Sooner or later, however, it is discovered that the ear has been affected. In the worst cases the person loses the ability to hear even a loud voice in the brief space of a few months. Pain not being present as a kind monitor, the subject of this chronic affection is beguiled into fancied security, and the disease receives no attention unless deafness be decided. The ear is liable to injury from loud sounds, such as discharges of artillery, blowing of high-pitched steam-whistles, and the like. The nasal douche, of late almost adopted as an article of domestic furniture, has ears from the entrance into the drum, per the Eustachian tube, of the fluids used. Noises in the head are pretty constantly experienced in all affections of the ear, some of which have been alluded to as accompanying these ailments in childhood. The lives of old people are often made wretched by these strange and alarming phenomena; in some instances the sufferer is even demented. This is not strange, for the simple-minded have no conception of the origin of these noises, and regard them as forebodings of evil. In some instances persons in the prime of life can not endure the wearing distress which deprives them of rest at night, and occupies all their thoughts by day; such individuals have sought relief in suicide, or have become insane. In instances where, in addition to noises in the head, the patient experiences the autophony before alluded to, the distress is increased. Those who are competent to explain these phenomena can often convince the sufferer of their harmless nature, and teach him to endure what would otherwise be intolerable. Emergencies will arise when competent aid can not be obtained for the relief of painful affections of the ear, or the removal of foreign bodies; an ad interim treatment then becomes necessary, and the advice of sympathizers abounds, one recommending that spirits of camphor be dropped into the ear, another urging the advantages of coal oil or chloroform, while still another brings his experience to bear on the case with a vial of carbolic acid solution or camphorated oil; should the neighboring druggist be consulted, even more vigorous measures may be advised. These, and the other substances usually put into the ear when it aches, are unadvisable. Generally speaking, earache is ameliorated by the application of warmth to the region of the ear, used either as dry heat in the shape of heated woollens, cotton-wool, bags of hops, bran, or meal, etc., or as wet applications, when the same articles recommended for use in the dry state are heated by immersion in hot water, and afterward wrung partially dry. In certain instances the suffering is relieved by pouring water, hot as can be borne, into the ear. Heated air or steam, where such conveniences are at hand, conveyed into the meatus, is found to be serviceable. Should living insects gain admission to | hearing power of an individual, it will the ear, the organ is to be turned upward sometimes be ascertained that one ear is in a good light, the ear (auricle) gently much more defective than the other-a pulled upward and backward until the fact tending to show that deafness had opening is free, when the canal is to be been advancing longer than suspected, filled with warm water poured from a but that nevertheless one may get on fairspoon. The intruder will now either es- ly well with one good ear. It is when cape or be drowned. Foreign bodies, the better ear begins to fail that the deafsuch as beads, cherry-pits, and other ob- ness in a considerable number is ascerjects, when lodged in the ear, should tained. never be touched by incompetent hands. Where such objects give rise to pain, and can not be extracted by the fingers alone, they may be compelled to change their position, or even be driven out of the ear, by turning the ear downward, and gently but firmly shaking or jarring the head. It is certainly wiser and safer to permit these bodies to remain indefinitely than to run the risk of injury to the ear by unskillful efforts at removal. Instances are well authenticated where fatal results have ensued from injuries to the ear by attempts to remove simple objects, whose presence was not attended with danger or even pain. An examina-ined. tion, after death from the inflammation such violent attempts have induced, in more than one instance has demonstrated the fact that the ear contained no foreign body whatever. Syringing the ears is not advisable, unless done by a person well trained, or by a competent surgeon, as much harm can be done by careless efforts in this direction. Water or soap for cleansing had best be entirely excluded from the ear, and the use of scoops and aurilanes, etc., is likewise unadvisable. In certain anomalous conditions of the Eustachian tubes air is admitted too freely to the drum cavity. This is observable when blowing the nose, or even during the act of swallowing. The forcible entrance of air into the drum cavity is liable to do injury to the ear, especially by unduly stretching the tympanic membrane. The inflation of the ear, therefore, should be avoided, unless practiced under the direct supervision of one competent to determine the necessity for its use. The temporary stretching of the membrane is attended with temporary improvement in hearing, but a continuance of the practice in some diseased conditions of the membrane results in a permanent relaxation, which is ir remediable. Allusion has been made to testing the hearing. The best method for this purpose is the use of the human voice. Place the person to be examined at a distance of fifteen or twenty feet from the one who speaks, testing one ear while the other is closed by pressure of the finger. Words should be plainly spoken, while the patient is required to look away from the speaker. Five tones will be found to be a convenient number for use in testing; they are whispered words, and low, ordinary, loud, and shouted words. deaf person should repeat the words heard. Infants can not of course be so exam The Their hearing can be tested by standing behind them, and sounding a whistle or bell while their attention is attracted by some person in front of them. Infants have at best but a crude appreciation of sound, and in most cases of deafness it must be loud to be detected by them. HONORIA. WRITE this in sunbeams on Honoria's tomb, "Daughter of Helpfulness, she ever strove, lived That others might be happy, and deserve Hark how the blithe birds When it becomes desirable to test the And Human Love. IT Editor's Easy Chair. Florence, or of the Venetians to Venice; of Sam Adams and his friends to Boston, or of Lamb and the Sons of Liberty to the New York of a hundred years ago. It is a cosmopolitan caravansary, a vast camp of crusaders from every land, bound on the Quest of the Golden Dollar, and resolved to redeem their fortunes from the hands of those who hold them in thrall. It is a quarry, a mine, a placer, an exchange; but that high municipal pride, the emulation of its best citizens for its government, the spirit which built the great monuments of art, the true civic patriotism-it is an interesting inquiry what has become of it. T was recently said that the public is losing | have not the loyalty of the old Florentines to its interest in magazines. But it is curious that the decline of interest should be coincident with the publication of more and better and very much more costly magazines than ever before, and with a profusion and excellence of illustration which is producing a new school of engraving. For our own part, such is the necessity of going early to press which the urgency of the demand for Harper's occasions, that it is only now when the new year is well advanced that reflections upon the new year are practicable. The old Dutch custom of universal calling, which was long peculiar to New York, formerly made the day especially a New York day. But it has long since lost that character, and it is now one of the pleasantest holidays of the year, suggesting, like every holiday, the inquiry why people of our race find it necessary to make a mere loud noise to testify their joy. The reader of 2880 will be amused to learn that the passage from the old year to the new on the midnight of the last day of 1879 was signalized by a universal discordant shriek of all the steam-whistles in the city. The old Frenchman insisted that we English-speaking people do not know how to enjoy ourselves, and that we actually suppose making a loud, unmeaning noise, and getting drunk, and eating half-cooked masses of beef or mutton, is pleasure. Indeed, it is easy to see in Taine that the genuine Frenchman thinks that the veneer of civilization upon the Eng-with provisions, with two horses to each, eslish race is exceedingly thin. But the new year always turns the mind backward rather than forward, and if the pious "caller" on the happy anniversary, in the intervals of saying, as he gropes into the drawing-room, "Wish you a happy new year -Madam, I have made calls every new year for forty years, and now I bring my sonsGood-morning, madam," could collect his wits a little, he would recall some of the mighty | changes in the great city. The saddest, perhaps at least to the social mood of the new year is the loss of the distinctive character of the metropolis. Despite the varied sources of its original population, the Dutch element prevailed, and gave character to the whole. It was a snug little city, with a distinctive flavor, so to speak; but it is no longer homogeneous in any sense whatever. It has ex- | panded into a magnificent sea-port, but with little collective or distinctive character. Mr. Eugene Lawrence, in a recent pleasant paper, retouched the New York of a century ago. It was the cold winter. Both rivers were frozen, and the bay was solidly closed, so that men and teams and even cannon passed over the ice from the city to Staten Island, and the British were in constant fear that the daring Yankees would steal over from Paulus Hook (now Jersey City) and attempt the capture of the city. Lord Sterling, the American general, with two thousand men, did cross the Kills, or strait between New Jersey and Staten Island, but the island Tories were on the alert, and the Americans were baffled. Judge Jones, in his Tory history of New York, says that "no man living ever before saw this bay frozen up," and adds that two hundred sleighs laden corted by two hundred light-horse, passed upon the ice from New York to Staten Island. Rivington's Gazette, of the 29th of January, 1780, says that "this day several persons came over on the ice from Staten Island," and on February 1 a four-horse sleigh crossed over. Snow fell upon the 10th of November, and lay almost continuously until the middle of the next March. In the woods it was four feet upon a level. New York was then a city of thirty thousand inhabitants, and the "hard winter," as it was afterward called, was not only one of intense cold, but of famine and of fire. But the city, of which Hanover Square was the literary centre, in whose book-shop, as Mr. Lawrence narrates, Miss Burney's Evelina and Dr. Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides, and the works of "the great Dr. Goldsmith" were advertised, was a compact community with a distinctive character and spirit. It was, in fact, an English coDuring the social season the Sons of Saint | lonial town with a certain popular independNicholas, the Sons of New England, the Friend-ence which was still evident, however suply Sons of Saint Patrick, the Sons of Saint pressed in expression. Many of the inhabitGeorge, the Sons of Saint Andrew, gay and gal-ants took the oath of allegiance, but their lant gentlemen all, dine in state and splendor, and charm the night with wit and eloquence. They all have their part in the greatness of the city. But not many of them have a deep sense of pride and responsibility in it. They hearts were with the blue and buff while the scarlet made merry around them. For the town in which Sir Henry Clinton held his mimic court was gay with the careless revel│ry of a military society. Amid the cold and |