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How delightful is the pursuit of natural science! To study the habits and manners of ants,-to contemplate the industrious spider-little weaver that never starves for want of employ,-to observe the "busy bee," instinct with that appetite for sweets which it shares with the equally happy, but alas! the less industrious truant, collecting the saccharine principle "from every opening flower," ,"-to form a continually increasing circle of acquaintance with the verdant inhabitants of the vegetable kingdom, and the interesting inmates of the Zoological Gardens; these, indeed, are the occupations which render life one summer's day; which enhance the

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beatitude, and sweeten the tea-cup of domestic bliss. To the reflective and observant mind, the blow-fly, blue marauder, regaling itself on the sirloin destined to grace to-morrow the family board; the mouse, tiny thief, luxuriating in fancied secret on the new Stilton in the larder; nay, even the unbidden cockroach helping himself to the Christmas pie, become objects of instructive survey.

Actuated by an appetite for useful knowledge, which has prompted the foregoing reflections, I connected myself some years ago with a literary and scientific society, which had been formed at Islington, where I reside, among a small but re

spectable circle of friends. Our members are inclusive of several ladies-among them, of Mrs. Brown, the amiable partner of my lot, with whom I have lived in an uninterruped state of felicity for a longer time than, perhaps, she will allow me to state. The predilections of Mrs. B. are precisely similar to my own; and having no family, we are enabled to devote the greater part of our time to indulgence in our favorite pursuits.

Our society meets at the house of each member in rotation, at half-past six precisely. After an exhilarating cup of tea, we proceed to business, and a lecture is delivered by the host of the evening, on the composition of water, the nature and properties of steam, the construction of the barometer and thermometer, or some other improving and entertaining subject. Sometimes our recreations are diversified and enlivened by a discourse from one of our number, who is a young medical man, on the conformation of the skeleton, the circulation of the | blood, and the like arcana of the healing art. At our last meeting, we were gratified with a paper on hydraulics, as exemplified by the common pump.

One evening, our young professional friend, whose name I may mention is Mr. John Hunter Dummer, obliged us with a lecture on the sciences of mesmerism and phrenology. Never having had the means, previously, of acquiring any information on these subjects, I had formed no opinion respecting them; I therefore hailed the opportunity thus afforded me of enlarging my stock of ideas. Mr. Dummer very much disposed me to believe that there was something in the doctrines which he advocated, particularly as he appealed in confirmation of them to facts, which, as he with great truth remarked, were stubborn things. Resolved, as he recommended, to make observation of Nature the test of truth, I took home with me a phrenological bust, accompanied by a card, descriptive of the different organs, which he was so kind as to lend

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Very Large.-Extreme fondness for children and young creatures in general. Apt to lead to indulging and spoiling youth, also to petting and caressing small animals. Often occasions extreme desire for offspring, and regret at the non-enjoyment of that supposed blessing."

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I next remarked her considerable prominence at "Tune," and recollected with a fond sigh of retrospection, that the circumstance which, in youth's gay morn, fixed my destiny for life, was hearing her sing in a summer-house at Brixton, “O'tis the melody we heard in former years!"

I found, also, "Alimentiveness," or the organ of appetite for food, very highly developed, and remembered that she had that very morning inquired, with a languishing gaze upon vacancy, when ducks and green peas would be reasonable enough for our circumstances. Her predilection for bubble and squeak occurred, in addition, to my mind; as did moreover, ("Constructiveness" was large, too,) her proficiency in the preparation of jellies, pickles, preserves, and in the other mysteries of the culinary art.

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Causality," the organ of perceiving the relation of cause and effect, was moderate in size. Accordingly, Mrs. B. has always experienced a difficulty in understanding the dependence of the boiling point of water on elevation above the level of the sea, and the connection between lobster-salad and indigestion. She is moreover prone, when asked to assign a reason for such and such a fact, to answer, "Because it is." I had inquired of her a few days before, why corned beef was sometimes variegated on its exterior, and she gave me that reply.

These striking coincidences at once rendered me a zealous convert to phrenology. I then tried to mesmerize my partner, and she very soon became a sleeping one; but as in about half an hour she suddenly awoke with a start, and wanted to know if it was not almost supper time, I am not quite sure that the sleep was not simply natural.

The next day, I examined the heads of our domestics,-not without some opposition on the part of the cook, who, I imagine, at first misapprehended my object. She had a very large "Destructiveness," and, certainly, her temper is none of the most equable. The housemaid was deficient in "Order;" a defect which her stockings, exhibiting the chasm vulgarly called a potato-her shoes, which were down at heel

and the general hue of her visage, which once induced a wag, who visited at my house, to say, that she must have been cleaning her face with the blacking-brush-abundantly exemplified; and which the dusty condition of the mantelpiece, the litter usually observable in the passage, and the inadequately rinsed breakfast cups, had too often borne out before.

Our knife, errand, and foot-boy, or page, was endowed with an extraordinary "Locality," which, among other things, occasions a desire for change of place. I had never observed any indications of the faculty in the boy; but he came a few days afterwards to give warning, wishing to change his place, as he said, to better himself-but, as I am convinced, acting under the influence of his "Locality."

This was very singular. Mrs. B. had at that very moment Tiny, a little King Charles's spaniel, whom she washes and combs every morning with her own When he was gone, I made up my mind to choose hands, and has fed so bountifully that he has be- his successor on phrenological principles; one of the come quite corpulent in her lap; and Tib, her fa- chief uses of phrenology having been stated by Mr. vorite tortoise-shell, was purring behind her chair. Dummer to be, its applicability to the selection of The next evening the little Edwardses over the servants. Accordingly, I rejected numerous appliway, whom she is continually regaling with sugar- cants for his situation, who came with the best replums and raspberry jam, were coming to tea, to commendations, not finding their organizations in meet our little nephews and nieces; and I could conformity with their alleged character; and, finot but be interestingly reminded of the circum-nally, made choice of one, whose head, in my judgstance, that the sole affliction of my good lady is that no olive branches have graced our otherwise unique mahogany.

ment, was to be depended on. He seemed to have a fine moral development, with particularly large "Wit," "Form," "Imitation," "Constructive

ness,' ," "Adhesiveness," "Marvellousness," and, as I thought, "Ideality."

When I inquired what his name was, he answered, "Bill Summers." I considered his substitution of "Bill" for "William " as a proof of the facetious tendency of his mind-which, admiring innocent mirth rather than otherwise, I considered by no means a disqualification on his part for my service.

I soon found that the disposition to humorous manifestations was really very strong in this young gentleman, and was manifested in a variety of ways. If his fellow-servants asked him for any thing, he would often playfully demand whether they did not wish they might get it? At the same time, he generally put his thumb up to his nose, and twiddled his extended fingers. He would inquire of young passers-by at the area railings, of whom he had no previous acquaintance, the state of the health of their maternal parents? whether those relatives were aware of their being from home? if they had disposed of their mangles? and many similar questions, which, though they had rather the semblance of impertinence, were no doubt dictated by a pure love of drollery.

This "Wit" or "Mirthfulness," acting along with "Imitation," and perhaps "Tune," oftentimes occasioned him to indulge in the utterance of various noises, which I supposed were intended to resemble the cries of different animals. Of these, a favorite one was a note something like the call of the lapwing, another was similar to that of the turkey. The duck he imitated to perfection

"Constructiveness," the organ of manual adroitness, he evinced by a singular dexterity in flinging stones, which sometimes excited my admiration, in spite of my perception of the dangerous tendency of the amusement. He was very fond also of piling little grottos with oyster-shells, which he collected while going on errands. His "Marvellousness," or "Wonder," was very apt to make him loiter in order to stare at sights. This habit sometimes occasioned us a little inconvenience; but then how interesting it was to observe the exemplification of truth! He was always especially attracted by the performance of Punch, which gratified the dramatic turn arising from his "Imitation," and was also a rich treat to his "Mirthfulness."

The faculty last mentioned in him was eminently practical, and the cook and housemaid had often to complain of its results, which were, sticking needles point uppermost in their chairs, putting chopped horse-hair in their beds, insects on the sly down their backs, and other like pleasantries. A neighbor, an antiquated spinster, one day sent in to complain that he had singed her cat's whiskers, and shaved its tail; but upon a careful admeasurement, finding "Benevolence" to be decidedly large, I acquitted him of so cruel a joke.

Of his well developed "Form," whereon the talent for drawing depends, I observed a manifestation very shortly after his arrival. I was looking out of a back window which commanded a view of the yard, and the knife-shed therein situated, where he had some work to do. This he had temporarily abandoned, and was engaged in making a sketch in white chalk upon the wall. First he drew a perpendicular line about two feet long, then a transverse one three-fourths shorter, at right angles with the top of it. The former 'he connected with the latter by a diagonal stroke, commencing at the termination of the one, and joining the other some

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Having completed this design, which, as will be seen, was a pictorial commentary on the law of capital punishment, he put his hands into his pockets under his apron, and fell to capering and whistling in high glee at the success of his performance; but, upon turning round, and catching sight of me at the window, he hastily resumed his employment. I had called Mrs. Brown, to show the amusement which I derived from witnessing his proceedings, and we both agreed that the subject which he had chosen for illustration-the tendency and reward of crime-was in complete harmony with his large "Conscientiousness," and strongly indicative of his moral sense.

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His "Adhesiveness was shown in the delight which he evidently derived from the interchange of ideas with the butcher and baker boys at the area, wherein he would sometimes spend more time than I quite approved of.

In one respect, however, I was at a loss to reconcile his character with his development. He seemed, as I said, to have large "Ideality," the protuberance indicative of the poet. Nevertheless, he never made any verses that I knew of, and though he knew a few songs, they were principally of the description termed "Negro Melodies," which can hardly be said to be of a poetical or sentimental character. Indeed, they were, for the most part, scarcely intelligible-there was one, in particular, in which one "Josey" was invited to "jim along." I could make no head or tail of it.

To make sure that my phrenological estimate had been correct, I induced him, by the present of five shillings, to allow his head to be shaved, and to let me trace out the different organs thereon in ink. I chose some of Mrs. Brown's marking ink for the

purpose, which being principally composed of nitrate of silver or lunar caustic, was ineffaceable by ablution. I mapped out the bare scalp in exact conformity with the bust, and was confirmed in the conviction that I had made no mistake.

Shortly afterwards, several spoons were missing. The cook and housemaid, on being taxed with the theft, indignantly denied it; and the idea that so well organized a boy as William was capable of such a delinquency, was preposterous. Mrs. B. had a tame magpie, and having read in various books of natural history of the propensity of this creature to pilfer and secrete such articles, we determined, not without great reluctance on my wife's part, that the bird's neck should be wrung-an operation which was performed by William, and which he appeared to undertake with greater readiness than could have been predicted from his large "Benevolence."

We had occasionally before observed the marks of smutty fingers on the exterior of mince and apple pies, and had fancied that an undue diminution had taken place in their contents during their reservation in the larder. At length, too, the beer, which it was William's province to fetch, began to assume a much more aqueous character than is consistent with Barclayian integrity. This circumstance, in spite of our preconceived opinion of the lad's honesty, gradually induced us to question his pretensions to that virtue; at last, Mrs. Brown, having lost a brooch, and a diligent search having been vainly instituted in the other servants' boxes, the bed-room of Master William was examined, under the auspices of F 34, when, to our astonishment

and confusion, the brooch and two or three of the spoons, with a pawnbroker's duplicate for the rest, were discovered behind a loose brick in the chimney.

The youth was with little loss of time conveyed, in the charge of F to the Clerkenwell Police-office, and thence in a van to Newgate. Before he left, we called in Mr. Dummer to look at his head, and explain its discordance with what he had turned out to be. And now comes the climax of my narration, which I record for the benefit of inexperienced phrenologists. What I had marked out as "Ideality" was declared by Mr. D. to be in reality "Acquisitiveness," which, in this instance was so large as to come three inches in advance of its legitimate boundary, and to occupy the place of the former organ. Here, therefore, as that gentleman remarked, was one of those beautiful exceptions which prove a rule.

William is now in Australia. I have determined, in future, not to trust to my own skill as a manipulator in determining on a servant's character; but, instead, shall have some recourse for that purpose to the assistance of a practised professor of phrenology. The guinea thus laid out will be well spent in the purchase of a guarantee against deception and loss.

The cook and housemaid, who, indignant at having been suspected, had given us warning, both declared that the boy was not only a thief, but an incorrigible storyteller. This feature of his character was beautifully accordant with his great "Marvellousness." On the whole, I consider my phrenological experiment to have been highly satisfactory.

SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF GRIMALDI.

ANONYMOUS.

AN attempt to describe Mr. Grimaldi's Clown has always proved a failure: his humor could not be tied down to pen, ink, and paper; it was an essence too subtle to yield to mere phraseology. His eyes, large, globular, and sparkling, rolled in a riot of joy; his mouth, capacious, yet with a never-ending power of extension, could convey all sorts of physical enjoyment and distaste; his nose was not the mere bowsprit appendage we find that respectable feature to be in general: it was a vivacious excrescence capable of exhibiting disdain, fear, anger, even joy. We think we see him now screwing it on one side; his eyes, nearly closed, but twinkling forth his rapture; and his tongue a little extended in the fulness of his enjoyment; his chin he had a power of lowering, we will not say to what button of his waistcoat, but certainly the drop was an alarming one.

white: see how mincingly he puts forth his foot, and passes his hand over his garments; he must woo in another shape; he turns round in utter bewilderment; anon, a boy passes-he plays at marbles with him, first for money, then for his jacket; he wins it: a dandy passes-he abstracts his coat tails: a miller-he steals a sack: he has stolen yonder chimney-pot, and made a hat; taken that dan dizette's shawl, and converted it into a waistcoat: the sack becomes white ducks; the tails render the jacket a coat; a cellar-door iron ring forms an eyeglass; and he moves, an admirable caricature of the prevailing fashion of the day.

Then, was there ever such a coach-builder? Go to school, Mr. Houlditch; for, with a coal-scuttle and a few cheeses, Grimaldi would construct you a vehicle at a moment's notice. Is his vegetable man unforgotten? He was no paltry humorist who conIt always appeared to us that Grimaldi moved his ceived the notion of making a melon into a head, ears; and this, anatomically speaking, is not an im- and turnips and radishes do the duty of hands and possibility. Be it as it may, the way in which he fingers. His love-making-what infinite variety in drew down his lower jaw on any sudden surprise his approaches? His boisterous freedom with the gave this effect to the auricular organs. Speech | London fish-dealer; his sailor-like jollity at Portswould have been thrown away in his performance mouth; his exquisite nonchalant air when attired of Clown; every limb of him had a language. as a dandy; and his undeniable all-overishness when What eloquent legs were his! Look at him approaching that cottage of gentility; the man is changed: see how he stands looking at the window, at which hangs a bonnet: his back is toward you; but it tells the tale, the lady within is to be won. Look how he bends toward the balcony-Romeo in red and

as Clown, he meant to impress, being suddenly smitten by the beauty of his fair enslaver. It was all what we had an hundred times seen, without the innate ridiculousness of the things being made apparent to us. Grimaldi had looked on the follies of humanity, and fairly turned the seamy side without.

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Then, his treatment of that old man villanous, | "yclept Pantaloon," whom, old and infirm as he is, no one pities at all, though he is treated by all the persons of the medley drama in a way that no elderly gentleman should be expected to endure. We applauded and rejoiced in those vices in Grimaldi that we hated in the Pantaloon; here is a bone for your metaphysicians to pick: we were quite blind to the moral delinquency of Mons. Clown's habits; he was a thief-we loved him, nevertheless; a coward, a most detestable coward-still we loved him: he was cruel, treacherous, unmanly, ungenerous, greedy, and the truth was not in him-yet, for all this, multiplied up to murder, if you would, we loved him, and rejoiced in his successes. Clown, (Grimaldi's Clown we mean,) Punch, and Falstaff (Shakspere can afford to be put in any company), are all darlings of our souls, though, if we reason about the matter, we find them to be all most incomprehensible vagabonds. Grimaldi had certainly studied the gamut of merriment, and knew every note of its compass, and could discourse most excellent music. He was the finest practical satirist we ever had, -Hogarth in action ;* during his day there were an

* Remember his scene when he opens three oysters, and finds an apt excuse for eating them all; his dagger scene; his ducl; his skeleton scene, cum multis aliis.

hundred clever men, but no single Clown. Follet was a jumper only; Laurent was ingenious, not humorous; Bradbury was a man of great strength, but his was very dreary merriment; Kirby was too confined; Bristow, Hartland, and that school, were mere imitators of the great original; Paulo and Southby, both clever, never stood the slightest chance in competition with him; and young Joe was only the shadow of the shade of that Grimaldi that our boyhood recalls; he only approached to an imitation of the style of his father in his latter and weaker day.

Pantomimes are now virtually extinct; Stanfield and Roberts have made picture galleries of them. Be it so. Grimaldi will in a few years be but a name; and our children's children must be content to take the tale of his merits on the credit of their ancestors. We believe in Garrick, whom we never saw, and those to come may believe in Grimaldi; for, though in a low department of art, he was the most wonderful creature of his day, and far more unapproachable in his excellence than Kean or Kemble in theirs. He sleeps well, and had happily quitted the stage ere pantomimes had been driven from it he was a harmless, and a kind man, had many friends, and few enemies.-Sit tibi terra levis !

THEODORE HOOK.

FROM THE MEMOIR OF THE REV. RICHARD HARRIS BARHAM.

ABOUT this time Mr. Barham found opportunities | of renewing his acquaintance with one who, in many respects, was to be ranked among the most extraor dinary men of his age, the late Mr. Theodore Hook. To say nothing of this gentleman's unequalled happiness in impromptu versification, conveying, as he not unfrequently did, a perfect epigram in every stanza a talent, by the way, which sundry rivals have affected to consider mere knack, and one of whom still bears in his side the lethalis arundo of James Smith, for his bungling effort at imitation; to pass by that particular province of practical humor* with which his name is so commonly associated, and in which he was facilè princeps, Mr. Hook yet possessed depth and originality of mind, little dreamed of, probably, by those who were content to bask in the sunshine of his wit, and to gaze with wonder at the superficial talents which he exhibited at table, but sufficient, nevertheless, to place

* Much as Mr. Barham, with all reasonable and rightthinking people, condemned this practice of playing practical jokes, there was something so original and irresistibly ludicrous in the positions brought about by Theodore Hook's humor, as to draw a smile from the most unbending. The only thing of the kind in which Mr. B. was ever personally engaged was as a boy at Canterbury, when, with a schoolfellow, now a gallant major, "famed for deeds of arms," he entered a Quakers' meeting-house: looking round at the grave assembly, the latter held up a penny tart, and said solemnly, "Whoever speaks first shall have this pie."-"Go thy way," commenced a drab-colored gentleman, rising, 'go thy way, and" "The pie's yours, sir," exclaimed D- placing it before the astounded speaker, and hastily effecting his escape.

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him far beyond the station of a mere sayer of good things, or diner-out of the first water." To those indeed who have never been fortunate enough to witness those extraordinary displays, no description can convey even a faint idea of the brilliancy of his conversational powers, of the inexhaustible prodigality with which he showered around puns, bon mots, apt quotations, and every variety of anecdote; throwing life and humor into all by the exquisite adaptation of eye, tone, and gesture to his subject. His writings fail to impress one in any way commensurate with his society.

Of the few sketches of him that have been given in novels, not one can claim the merit of being more than a most shadowy resemblance. It needs a graphic skill, surpassing his own, to draw his portrait with any approach to correctness: indeed, it were well nigh as easy to depict on canvas the diamond's blaze, as to portray that intensity of genius, that dazzling vivacity of spirit, which distinguished him even among the peers of intellect. Nowhere, perhaps, is failure more conspicuous than in the miserable and meagre attempt in "Coningsby." Not the faintest glow of humor, not one flash of wit, not an ebullition of merriment breaks forth from first to last; the author, in utter incapacity for the task, contents himself with simply observing, "Here Mr. Lucian Gay (the name under which Hook is introduced) was vastly amusing-there he made the table roar," etc., much in the manner of the provident artist, who, to obviate mistake, affixed the notice to his painting: "This is the lion-this is the dog." Of the moral portraiture, we will venture to say that it is as unjust as the material is weak. For a more accurate estimate of his character and position, and for an account of the main incidents of his life,

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