be had been connected. The epistle concluded by a hope, very earnestly expressed, that if, as common report went, Frank had gone up to London, he might not meet with Hester, and begging, if he attempted to renew the acquaintance, a stop should be put to it at once. It was proved that Hester had met this young man several times in secret, the last in defiance of her aunt's express prohibition; that, instead of going to church, she had met him, and he had been seen leaving the house with all possible haste about the very time the murder had been committed, and he was traced to the river side. Two vessels had that evening sailed for America, but it was impossible to learn whether he was a passenger in either. Hester's own exclamation, too, seemed to confirm every suspicion; so did her terror, her confusion, and bewildered manner. Every body said that she looked so guilty, and the coroner's inquest brought in a verdict for her committal. It was a fine summer evening when Mr Malpas and his family were seated, some in the porch of the cottage, while the younger children were scattered about the garden. There was an expression of cheerfulness in the face of the parents, very different to the harsh, hard despondency of a twelvemonth since; and Hester, as her mother always prognosticated she would, had indeed brought a blessing on her family. Many an anxious glance was cast down the road, for to-day the post came in, and one of the boys had been dispatched to the village to see if there was a letter from Hester. The child was soon discovered running at full speed, and a letter was in his hand. It is not my sister's handwriting,' said he, with a blank look of disappointment. Mr Malpas opened the epistle, which was from Lowndes, and broke kindly, though abruptly, his daughter's dreadful situation. The unhappy father sunk back senseless in his seat, and in care for his recovery, Mrs Malpas had a brief respite—but she, too, had to learn the wretched truth. How that miserable day passed no words may tell. Early next morning Mr Malpas awoke from the brief but heavy sleep of complete exhaustion; the cold grey light glared in from the window-he started from his seat, for he had never gone to bed; it was but a moment's oblivion, for the whole truth rose terrible and distinct. In such a state solitude was no relief, and he sought his wife to consult with her on the necessity of his going to London. He found only his other daughter, who had scarcely courage to tell him that her mother had already departed for town, and to give him the few scarcely legible lines which his wife had left. The next evening, and Mrs Malpas had found her way to the cell of her unhappy child. All was over-she had been tried and found guilty, not of actual murder, but of abetting and concealing it, and the following morning was the one appointed when the sentence of the law was to be carried into effect. This is not Hester!' exclaimed Mrs Malpas, when she entered the cell and even from a mother's lips the ejaculation might be excused, so little resemblance was there between the pale emaciated creature before her, and the bright blooming girl with whom she had parted. Hester was seated on the side of the iron bedstead her hands clasping her knees, rocking herself to and fro, with a low monotonous moan, which would rather have seemed to indicate bodily pain than mental anguish. Her long hair-that long and beautiful brown hair of which her mother had been so proud-hung dishevelled over her shoulders, but more than half of it was grey. Her eyes were dim and sunk in her head, and looked straight forward, with a blank stupid expression. Her mother whispered her name-Hester made no answer; she took one of her hands-the prisoner drew it pettishly away. That live-long night the mother watched by her child-but that child never knew her again. After some time she seemed soothed by those kind and gentle caresses, but she never gave the slightest token of knowing from whom they came. Morning arrived at last. With what loathing horror did Mrs Malpas watch the dim grey light mark the dull outline of the grated window! The morning reddened, and as the first crimson touched Hester's face as it rested sleeping on her mother's shoulder, somewhat of its former beauty came back to that fair young face. She slept long, though it was a disturbed and convulsive slumber. She was roused by a noise in the passage-bolt and bar fell heavily; there was the sound of many steps-strange dark faces appeared at the door. They came to take the prisoner to the place of execution. The men approached Hester-they raised her from her seat-they bound her round childish arms behind her. The mother clung to her child, but that child clung not in return. Mrs Malpas sunk, though still retaining her hold, on the floor. what humanity such an office permitted, they disengaged her grasp-they bore away the unresisting prisoner-the door closed, and the wretched mother had looked upon her child for the last time. With It was about a twelvemonth after the execution of Hester Malpas that the family were seated again, on a fine summer evening, round the door of their cottage; but a dreadful alteration had taken place in all. The father and mother looked bowed to the very earth-the very children shrunk away if a stranger passed by. Mr Malpas had inherited his sister's property, much more considerable than had ever been supposed; but though necessity forced its use, he loathed it like a curse. An unusual sight now-the postman was seen approaching-he brought Mr Malpas a newspaper. He shuddered as he took it, for he knew Mr Lowndes's handwriting again. He opened it mechanically, and a large read this' directed his attention to a particular paragraph. It was the confession of a Jew watchmaker, who had just been executed for burglary; and, among other crimes, he stated that he was the real murderer of Mrs Hester Malpas, for which a young woman, her niece, had been executed. He had entered the window by means of a plank thrown from the garden railing to the casement, when with one blow he stunned the old lady, who was reading. Mr Malpas went no further-the thick and blinding tears fell heavily on the paper-he could not read it aloud, but he put it into his wife's hand, with a broken ejaculation, 'Thank God, she was innocent!' RAMBLES IN LONDON. THE THAMES TUNNEL. THE history of the Thames Tunnel is not a twice told tale,' like that of the Tower of London, the menagerie of which has formed an object of attraction so long as to have actually founded the proverbial saying-Have you seen the Lions ?' We record this fact, in passing, for the benefit of future etymologists of the Captain Grose class, who might otherwise be at a loss to comprehend the meaning of the now household word, 'Lionizing,' or seeing the Lions. The Tunnel is in truth a noble lion; and, to continue the metaphor, may be said to have a mane like a comet's tail, and a roar like thunder. Almost every one knows in part the purposes for which this great sub-aqueous bore was projected and formed. The vast increase of the city below the London bridge, and other circumstances, rendered a mode of transit in that quarter extremely desirable, but the amount of shipping, of large tonnage, passing by and lying there, put a bridge so far down the river out of the question, the commercial conveniences of London being even hampered by the lowest existing bridge already. When a tunnel was first thought of, so early as the year 1799, Gravesend was the site fixed on, but the work seemed impracticable on full examination. Then Rotherhithe and Limehouse formed the proposed situation of a new tunnel in 1804, and a small drift-way was in effect carried across for 923 feet, and to within 150 feet of the opposite shore; but both the shareholders and the engineer, meeting new difficulties, lost heart at once, and the scheme was given up, after a vast outlay of time and money. When Mr (now Sir I.) Brunel came forward with a new plan of a tunnel in 1823, he had many difficulties to from the foot passengers' shaft at Rotherhithe to the shaft at Wapping, is twelve hundred feet. The original dimensions of the excavation were thirty-eight feet of breadth by twentytwo in height. This measurement includes both archways, and also the space now occupied by the enclosing walls, which are three feet in thickness. As finally left by the building and division, each archway (the foot passenger shaft, that is to say, and the carriage shaft) measures sixteen feet four inches in height, by thirteen feet nine inches in breadth. The form of the whole bore is that of a horse-shoe, or a segment of a circle exceeding one-half in dimensions. Having mentioned that the perpendicular descending columns, stated already to divide at intervals the two archways from end to end (with arches again between each column), are four feet in breadth, we have given all the minute details that are necessary. contend with; but he had matured his project so well, A word here on the actual dimensions of the tunnel. The that those best competent to judge gave it their hearty base of the excavation, at the deepest part of the river, is sanction. He proposed a line crossing between Rother-seventy-six feet below high-water mark. The entire length, hithe and Wapping as the site of his excavation, about two miles below London Bridge, and below the Indian and other great docks lying low on the river, to which it was so essential to leave free access. In the summer of 1824, Sir I. Brunel commenced operations, and, with the close of 1843, he brought them to a successful issue, though not without having encountered almost unparalleled obstacles. The water from the land soaked in on one hand, while twice, if not three times, the river broke through, filling completely the excavation, endangering life, and threatening utterly to ruin the undertaking. But the moral courage of the engineer was great, and his confidence in his resources, as well as in the practicability of his plans, remained unshaken; and, notwithstanding that shareholders grew alarmed, and the press began to sneer at the enterprise as a thing likely to terminate with the Greek Kalends, he held on his way undaunted, and was ultimately rewarded by the successful termination of a work of art and science, before which the seven wonders of the old world sink into insignificance. Suppose, reader-now that you have an idea of the purposes of this renowned tunnel-suppose that you sail with us down the river from London Bridge in one of these countless steamers now plying on the Thames, at all points from Chelsea to the river mouth, at fares varying from one penny to fourpence. You pass hosts of ships of all classes and sizes, bearing the flags of every nation under the sun, and all of them bringing the choicest products of their various countries to the metropolitan mart of the world, and receiving our national products in return. The noble river flows and swells around you, cradling her heavy loads on her bosom as lightly as loving mothers bear their children. You land at a little quay, pass inwards from it, and, in a few steps, find yourself in front of a gateway, where sits a personage who holds out his hand for a penny, and, having had his palm oiled therewith, signs to you to pass forwards through a door at the back of the small lobby in which he is stationed. You do so, and find yourself at the head of a large and roomy flight of open stairs, circling downwards for several storeys. These traversed, the wondrous tunnel is before you, presenting a long line of lamps, like Prince's Street from the Calton Hill. There are two roadways along the whole line; that is to say, the great bore is divided into two halves, by a succession of strongly built square columns, dipping perpendicularly downwards in the middle from top to base, throughout the whole line. One of these arched ways was meant for foot passengers, and is used by them. The other arched way was intended for carriage travel; and though it has remained yet unemployed, from various difficulties having arisen, it is about not only to be applied to its original purpose, but is to be connected, it is said, with the Blackwall railway. Rails are to be laid down throughout, making the tunnel not a common road but a railroad. By using circular descents, the slope will not exceed that of Ludgate Hill, or the North Bridge Street in Edinburgh. Along a narrow slip of pavement, then, placed close to the line of intermediate columns alluded to, and under the lamps, the visiter moves on, gazing along the twilight vista that stretches before him into the far distance, and admiring the strong solid white arch above his head. But he does not advance far until a new set of objects arrest his attention. A quick, but bland and insinuating female voice, at his very ear, comes out with-- What will you buy, sir? A beautiful view of the tunnel in glass, sir? Just have the goodness to look into this small bottle, sir? Pray, just look ?' The voice issues from one of the recesses betwixt the medial columns, and there is to be seen a little shop or stand, dazzling from the display of ornamental glass articles; there can be no harm in a peep, and the visiter takes up a small trumpet-shaped phial of obscured glass, with a flat thin top of the same material, and behold! he does see a singularly beautiful view of the tunnel, ingeniously painted on a piece of red velvet, and to which the tube gives all the effect of perfect perspective. This must be purchased, the cost being but a shilling. A multitudinous variety of similar articles are then exhibited; all, or nearly all, have some reference to the tunnel. But we shall suppose the satisfied visiter to pass on. At the second or third next recess, lo! he is again hailed, and called upon to patronise a small confectioner's shop, where sweet breads, fruits, and lemonade are proffered to his acceptance, for a consideration,' as old Trapbois hath it. In another recess is a stand with various plates and engravings of the tunnel; a fourth recess furnishes room for a book stall; and so on, at intervals, through the whole tunnel, from Rotherhithe to Wapping. All this is mighty pleasant, and enlivens greatly the subaqueous exploration, Now let us look around, and see if there is anything else deserving notice. In the first place, it ought to be added to what has been already said, that there is a slight dip or curve in the centre of the tunnel line, for the purpose, we suppose, of allowing any permeating moisture to sink more readily into the strata beneath. Other inge nious contrivances have been used by Sir Isambert Brunel for the same purpose. For example, a portion of those Though both archways are before you, then, you enter perpendicular columns betwixt the two archways is hollow, the foot passenger line, and look along it, which alone is to allow the water, which drains through from the rivernow lighted. The first impression on the mind is a feel- bed, to pass directly into the soil beneath the tunnel. On ing of wonder, almost of awe. You have just left the the whole, however, there is a sense of cold and dampness broad light of day; the rushing of the deep and wide perceptible in passing through, which we think artificial river, and the hissing and groaning of the steam-boats, means might obviate such as heated steam-pipes or some with the bawling of the sailors, were but now in your provision of the kind. At present, the small paved way ears; and before your eyes lay hosts of tall-masted ves- excepted, the road way is but cold damp clay. But we sels, with their pennons fluttering idly in the breeze. have another observation to make, more seriously affectHaving left the upper world, you stand now in the midst ing the interests of the tunnel, and touching on its conof perfect silence, full seventy feet below the scenes just version to the really useful purposes for which it was left. And yet the sounds and sights mentioned are not intended. The majority of those who traverse it, and out of your recollection. You cannot forget the deep who pay the toll on which the remuneration of the sharewaters and the tall ships that are resting or moving above holders depends, come to it, we fear, merely as to a show. your head. Then indeed, as this thought gains force, do Doubtless, there are many passengers of a different class you begin to feel that the tunnel is truly a noble work-in that populous region, but what we have stated seems noble in conception, as difficult of execution. only too true. The remedy is, the introduction of the carriage way into use. Until that be effected, the Thames Tunnel, marvel as it is of scientific skill, must remain comparatively useless. Let us hope that the proposition for carrying a railway through it will be found practicable. The slope is no objection, as already hinted; and indeed, whatever the slope might be, the use of Coleman's invention for ascending and descending inclined planes on railways would overcome all difficulties. In the Polytechnic Institution is now to be seen a working model of this apparatus, the principle of which is the employment of a screw-line, laid down betwixt the common rails, and which, being acted on by a corresponding screw descending (at will) from the bottom of the steam-carriage, gives a perfect command over the motion even on the steepest hill. We have seen it in action, and with admiration. THE MISFORTUNES OF AUTHORS. 'Look on this Picture.'-Shakspeare. THE misfortunes, poverty, and trials, of authors, form a melancholy and sickening chapter in the history of man. Strange that with all the misery which some of the most gifted sons of genius had to encounter, and the melancholy and untimely end of others of them, staring us full in the face, there is yet no apparent likelihood of any effective measures being put in requisition with a view to the amelioration of the condition of existing talent-talent, struggling, too often unsuccessfully, to extricate itself from the depths of poverty! Strange that we so often allow those whose writings shall be a source of unalloyed delight to present and future ages, to be consigned to their last narrow resting-place, ere we think of appreciating their sterling worth-leaving them to live how they may, and die how they might. The march of intellect appears, indeed, to have become a type of innate ingratitude and meanness. And yet Britain-Scotland-can afford a woman, in gauze petticoats, £120 a-night to exhibit herself upon a stage! A few of the 'Misfortunes of Authors,'' at random strung,' may not be without use. We will advert to ancients and moderns-Englishmen and foreigners indiscriminately. Men of genius belong to all times, to all countries, and to all men. Dante had many misfortunes to encounter: he was imprisoned, then banished-and if he returned to his own country he was doomed to death. Camoens-read his epitaph, 'Here lies Luiz De Camoens. He excelled all the poets of his time. He lived poor and miserable, and so he died.' This was written upon the tomb of the author of the Lusiad.' This great poet and warrior was allowed to die in an alms-house, a prey to penury and disease of every kind, and supported by charity. Every school-boy knows about Homer: he was a beggar; he lived all his life in misery, and died starving. Seven cities claim the birth of Homer, dead, Through which he, living, beggd for bread. The poverty and ruined hopes of Spenser, form a long and melancholy chapter. Aristotle's life was a burden to him. He was so much persecuted that he thought it better to kill himself than to drag on the miserable existence he did. Milton did not wholly depend upon his poetry for bread; had he done so he must have starved. His long life of literary labour procured him nothing beyond the means of existence. Some men-Gibbon for instance-it is said, received large sums for their labours. But Gibbon's Rome was the work of years, and the library used by him while writing it, cost, it is believed, double the sum which he received for his imperishable work. Chaucer was terribly harassed for his writings: he was obliged to fly the country, and upon his return he was thrown into prison. Socrates, Seneca, Longinus, Boetius, and many other men of celebrity, were murdered, with great cruelty; their only crimes being their many virtues. These unnatural tragedies, however well known, cannot be too often mentioned. Anaxagoras, for his attempts to promulgate a higher opinion of the divine mind than heathenism tolerated, was condemned to die. His sentence was, however, converted to banishment. Demosthenes, Cicero, and Ovid, were banished. The former was eventually driven to poison himself. Stone, the learned antiquary and chronicler, was so poor that he was thankful for a license to become a beggar. Plautus, the comic poet, lived by turning a mill-wheel. Xelander sold his Commentary on Dion Cassius' for a little broth. Cardinal Bentivoglio, the ornament of Italy and the belles lettres, and also a great benefactor to his poorer brethren, after many services to the public, languished in poverty in his old age, and, when he died, left nothing wherewith to bury him. Aldus Manutius was poor, very poor; so much so, that he was rendered insolvent by a small sum he had borrowed to enable him to transport his library from Venice to Rome. Sigismund Salenius, Archbishop Walker, Ludovico Castelvetro, Lelio Giraldo, and many other men of worth and genius died in poverty. Cicero's letters to his family are very painful. There is a passage in one of them where he says, in writing to his wife :-'I wish for nothing but to see you, and to expire in your arms, since both gods and men are equally insensible.' Voltaire was imprisoned in the Bastile, where he wrote many of his works, more especially the greater part of the Henriade.' Vaugelas, the elegant and learned scholar, left his corpse to be dissected for the benefit of his creditors. Although Corneille met considerable reward for his writings, he died steeped to the lips in poverty. Paul Borghese had fourteen different trades, and yet starved with them all. Cervantes died from starvation. Fielding died in a charity hospital. He lies in the burying-ground of the English Factory at Lisbon, without a stone to mark the spot. Savage died in a jail at Bristol, where he was confined for a debt of eight pounds. Tasso was shut up in a cell of the monastery of St Anne, at Ferrara, under the imputation of being deranged, when he produced several of the ablest of his minor pieces both in prose and verse. Butler, the author of Hudibras,' lived in penury and died poor. Terence was a slave. Chatterton, the child of genius and misfortune, destroyed himself. Otway died prematurely and through hunger. Steele lived a live of perfect warfare with his creditors. The Vicar of Wakefield' was sold for a trifle to save its author from a prison. De Lolme, the author of the excellent work on the English Constitution, was frequently in prison for debt. The above mentioned work met no encouragement from either publishers or public. Raleigh's History of the World' was written in a jail, where for many years its accomplished author was confined. Bunyan also was long in a prison. His 'Pilgrim's Progress' was written while in confinement. Ockley, the Orientalist, was in confinement for debt; he lived miserably, died in misery, and left his family with nothing for an inheritance but his name. We select a few extracts from the Index to D'Israeli's Calamities of Authors: Collins, publishes his odes without success, and afterward indignantly burns the edition.-Cowley, his remarkable lamentation for having written poetry.-Dryden, in his old age, complains of over-study; regrets he was born among Englishmen. Grainger's complaint of not receiving half the pay of a scavenger.-Sale, the learned, often wanted a meal while translating the Koran.-Logan, the history of his literary disappointments; dies broken-hearted.' 'So much for authors.' Let no one become an author by profession, thinking he is thereby to be lapped in ease and luxury for the remainder of his days. Their labours are more grievous in many respects than the humblest occupations of mankind. The weaver who drives away at his loom for sixteen hours a-day, striving to better his circumstances, never began with the hopes of an authornever had such prospects shadowed forth in imagination man of genius' conjures up in his mind's eye.-Alloa Monthly Advertiser. as a 6 CHRISTIANITY THE TRUE CIVILIZER. Does it appear that civilization alone, with its intercourse and traffic; its arts, and its useful sciences; its town-crowding industry, and its disorderly peopling of wildernesses; its hurry and impatience of restraint; its intensity and individual will, and its contempt of authority; its uncontrollable sway of the masses; its unlooked for upturns and reverses; its passionate pursuit of momentary advantages, and its appetite for such gratifications as may be snatched in all haste-does it appear that civilization alone (Christian influence not considered), is likely much to promote the personal and home felicity of the millions it is summoning into life? Judging of what is future from what we see around us, dare we look to mere civilization as worthy to be trusted with the moral or even the physical well-being of the human family, and with the guardianship of the generation next coming up? Dare we, if we had the infant human race in our arms- -dare we turn ourselves to that careworn personage, our modern civilization, sitting at her factory gate, and say to her, 'Take this child, and nurse it for me?'-Isaac Taylor. PRIDE. There is no vice to which the human race are so prone, and none so unsuitable to their nature and condition, as pride that self-love which springs up so rapidly in our souls, and leads us to view our own qualifications through a magnifying medium, which gives existence and reality to the phantoms of imagination. Pride commences with our life, grows with our growth, and spreads through all our conversation and conduct. She accompanies us through every stage, condition, and circumstance of our terrestrial course. She intermingles with almost every action we perform, and every pursuit in which we engage. She attends us to the grave, in all the pomp, solemnity, and expense of funeral. She engraves her ostentatious inscriptions on the stone that covers the mouldering body; and when that copy is incorporated with its original dust, and these words of vanity are no longer legible, she attempts, by escutcheons and pedigrees and genealogical legends, to perpetuate the name which wisdom had perhaps consigned to oblivion. This is more or less the foible, this the deformity, this the deep-rooted vice, of all mankind. Pride appears in the cottage as well as in the palace; she sits on the workman's bench as well as on the monarch's throne; she struts driving a flock of sheep as well as marching at the head of a victorious army.-Dr W. L. Brown. TRUE ECONOMY. To dispense our wealth liberally is the best way to preserve it, and to continue masters thereof; what we give is not thrown away, but saved from danger: while we detain it at home (as it seems to us) it really is abroad, and at adventures; it is out at sea, sailing perilously in storms, near rocks and shelves, amongst pirates; nor can it ever be safe, till it is brought into this port, or ensured this way when we have bestowed it on the poor, then we have lodged it in unquestionable safety-in a place where no rapine, no deceit, no mishap, no corruption, can ever by any means come at it. All our doors and bars, *This cheap periodical is conducted with much spirit and taste. all our forces and guards, all the circumspection and vigilancy we can use, are no defence or security at all i comparison to this disposal thereof: the poor man's st mach is a granary for our corn, which never can be ehausted; the poor man's back is a wardrobe for our clothes, which never can be pillaged; the poor man pocket is a bank for our money, which never can disappoint or deceive us all the rich traders in the world may desas and break; but the poor man can never fail, except Go himself turn bankrupt; for what we give to the poor, we deliver and intrust in his hands, out of which no fore can wring it, no craft can filch it; it is laid up in heaven whither no thief can climb, where no moth or rust és abide. In despite of all the fortune, of all the might, of all the malice in the world, the liberal man will ever be rich: for God's providence is his estate; God's wisdom. and power are his defence; God's love and favour are his reward; God's word is his assurance, who hath said that he which giveth to the poor shall not lack.' N vicissitude, therefore, of things can surprise him, or fir him unfurnished; no disaster can impoverish him; 1 adversity can overwhelm him.-Dr Isaac Barrow. THE MITHERLESS BAIRN.* When a' ither bairnies are hush'd to their hame, • From 'Songs for the Nursery,' a new and enlarged edition of which was inhly published by Mr David Robertson of Glasgow. This little work, which will son find its way into every nursery, is admirably fitted to effect the purpose for whe it is intended-the fostering in the infant mind those sympathies and sentimeraa which do honour to human nature, and which, when fully developed in after-lift, promote the best interests of society. The pieces it contains are by differs: authors; and though they be of varied merit, it may be enough, in the shape of praise, to quote the opinion of one of the ablest of living crities (Lord J. firty m specting the work as a whole. Says his lordship:- There are more touches of images, and, above all, more sweet and engaging pictures of what is pecubar ʼn the depth, softness, and thoughtfulness of our Scotch domestic affections in the extraordinary little volume, than I have met with in anything like the same co genuine pathos, more felicities of idiomatic expression, more happy pott pass, since the days of Burns. We may add, that the Songs for the Nursery' maj be had for a few pence. MAN IMPROVABLE. rudely trampled down and desolated; storms waste! The Eden of human nature has indeed long ago beer continually; nevertheless the soil is rich with the gerus of its pristine beauty; all the colours of Paradise are sleeping in the clods: and a little favour, a little protection, a little culture, shall show what was once there.Isaae Taylor. Printed and published by JAMES HOGG, 122 Nicolson Street, The INSTRUCTOR' being printed from Stereotype Plates, the No. 43. EDINBURGH, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1845. ILLUSTRATIONS OF LONGEVITY. NO. II. THERE are certain constitutions formed by nature so robust, with all the animal organs so perfect, that they endure to a great age even in defiance of all rules of regimen. They can bear both excess and privation; a mode of living that would be too rich and stimulating for ordinary frames, only conduces to their perfect health and vigour, while out of poor materials their vigorous digestion can concoct a wholesome nourishment on which weaker stomachs would be thrown into disease and atrophy. It does not follow from this, however, as we formerly remarked, that a strict regimen is useless, or that excess to the generality of men is not highly injurious. A happily constituted temperament may be independent of rules, and may resist the effects of their infringement; while, on the other hand, the observance of rules of sobriety and moderation will have a decided and wonderful effect on those constitutions in which there are such weaknesses as produce the tendency to disease. Generally speaking, too, it will be found that the most perfect temperaments are less disposed to excess or irregularities than feebler ones. There is a happy condition of existence in which the enjoyment of health, of simple fare, and of the free air of heaven, are all the stimulants necessary; while a craving for undue excitement is too frequently the characteristic of an irregular physical as well as mental constitution. The effect of regimen on health and longevity is in no instance, perhaps, more strikingly exhibited than in the celebrated and often quoted example of Cornaro. Previous to detailing this case, however, it must be remarked that Cornaro's constitution appears to have been naturally of a peculiar kind, so that the strict regimen which he practised is not intended to be held up as a model for all ordinary livers; his case affords, however, an instructive example of the effects of diet and regimen both on the body and the mind, and in this view cannot be too frequently appealed to. Lewis Cornaro was of a noble Venetian family, and was born about the middle of the fifteenth century. He appears originally to have been of an ardent sanguine disposition, fond of pleasure, and of excitable passions. This temperament, joined to the chagrin of being deprived of his nobility in consequence of the bad conduct of some of his relations, hurried him into a career of dissipation and sensual enjoyment which he pursued till his thirtyfifth year. About this period his constitution gave way; pains in his side and stomach tormented him; symptoms of gout made their appearance, with irregular appetite, PRICE 1d. thirst, and a slow consuming fever. In this wretched condition he struggled on for some time, trying the effect of medicines without any benefit, while, his constitution sunk more and more, till at last his physicians declared that nothing could rescue him but a total change of his mode of life and a rigid restriction of his diet and regimen. Cornaro had sufficient strength of mind and firmness of purpose at last to adopt this advice. He restricted his diet to the simplest fare, and took of this a very moderate allowance; renounced his irregular mode of life; avoided excess of heat, cold, and extraordinary fatigue; took timely repose, and, in short, observed a strict and proper regimen. In a very short time he was astonished at the beneficial change which took place in his system, and in less than a year he found his health completely restored. He ever after most rigidly adhered to his spare diet, which amounted to twelve ounces in all daily, and consisted of bread, meat of the simplest kind, yolk of eggs, and soup, with fourteen ounces of a mild wine. On this allowance he enjoyed perfect bodily health and vigour, and a freedom from all physical ailments. His mind, too, seemed to share in the beneficial regimen. His passions became less irritable, his spirits more buoyant, and his judgment more cool and considerate. Not only did this regimen procure him the enjoyment of excellent health, but on two trying occasions it enabled him to sustain disasters which have proved fatal to many others. While a grievous and protracted lawsuit was carried on against him by powerful rivals, by which his patrimonial estate was imminently endangered, he remained cool and undisturbed till an honourable decision was at last given in his favour, whereas his brother and some other relations sank under the prosecution and died. On another occasion, he was thrown from his carriage, and, besides being much bruised, had his leg and arm dislocated. The most serious apprehensions for his life were entertained by his friends and physicians, and the most active treatment was urged upon him; but confident in his own constitution, he would not even allow bleeding or other evacuations, and by the most simple means recovered in a very short time. At the age of seventy-eight, in compliance with the entreaties of his friends, he increased his allowance both of solid and liquid food by the addition of four ounces daily. Even this slight change he found had such an effect upon him, that in eight days, from his usual cheerful active habits he became peevish and melancholy, so that nothing could please him, and he was so strangely disposed that he knew not what to say to others or what to do with himself. On the twelfth day he was attacked with a most violent pain in the side, which continued for many hours, |