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House of Commons; but it is not unlikely
that the revelations to be obtained by such
an inquiry might have some influence in cor-

rary suspension of our monetary system. Unsoundness at home must have been, both here and in Hamburg, the chief element in extending the mischief beyond the immedi-recting the system which has led to such ate circle of the. houses in direct connexion fatal results. America, having been first to with the United States. However high the yield to panic, is showing now the earliest rate of discount might have been raised by symptoms of revival. With a prudence foreign demand, there would have been no creditable to themselves, though indirectly panic here had the busniess of our own injurious to us, the suspended banks in New banks and analogous institutions been con- York and other States never for a moment ducted with reasonable prudence. relaxed their endeavors to prepare for a reThe same may probably be said of the sumption of specie payments. Already they Hamburg crash. In fact, from beginning to have recovered their normal stock of gold; end, it has been in a high degree a banking and, to use the graceful language of the New affair. Loose banking in America began it. York Herald, "We have Wall-street alive Bill-broking rashness and Scotch banking again-stocks going up like rockets, and brought on the climax with us, and now the speculators making money like dirt." We banks and discounters of Hamburg are fall- must beware, indeed, of relying too much on ing one after another. The prevalence of this estimable print, for it appears now to speculative money dealings, in all three have become, by an intelligible transition, as countries, destroys the value of the compari- enthusiastic in encouraging confidence as it son that might otherwise have been drawn was a month or two ago energetic and sucbetween the systems of currency adopted in cessful in creating panic. There is every America, England, and Hamburg. Notes appearance, however, of a decided recovery upon a basis of securities, with little or no in America, which will help our own progress gold, constitute the Transatlantic currency. towards a natural condition of trade. HamIn Hamburg every note is a representative burg alone has shown no sign of improve of so much actual bullion in deposit. We ment; but it is to be hoped that the worst have an intermediate system. Yet none has been reached, and that the steady co-ophave escaped; and if we can learn nothing eration of her citizens in their attempts to else from what has happened, we may be meet the panic will not long remain fruitless. assured of this-that it is possible for the. The formation of a discount bank to meet mischievous energies of speculators to derange the affairs of a country, whether its currency be governed by the wisest or the weakest regulations. It is some satisfaction to know that the root of the evil among ourselves will not be allowed to escape observation. We do not imagine that repressive legislation can be founded on any inquiry into banking practices by a Committe of the

men.

the emergency is certainly a safer and more rational form of relief than the step by which we have laid the foundation for a regular series of similar misfortunes. When things shall have taken a favorable turn in Hamburg, the crisis will be everywhere over, and the trade of the world will begin a fresh career-we wish we could say with some new store of wisdom gathered from the experience of recent calamities.

By far the most important animal in South | commences, and the animal pines away. The Africa is a little fly called the tsetse, which determines the fortunes and habits of thousands of It is not much larger than the common house-fly, and is nearly of the same brown color as the honey bee. Its bite is certain death to the ox, the horse, and the dog, but is entirely harmless to man, mules, asses, goats, swine, all wild animals, and even calves as long as they suck the cows. If a man is bitten, a slight irritation follows, but there are no further effects: nor are there any immediate effects when an ox is bitten, but a few days afterwards emaciation

poison operates on the blood, and is injected through the probosis, and not by a sting. Fortunately, the tsetse is local, and although found in one valley may never come near the next. But as there is no remedy known, and as a very. few flies will destroy a whole herd of oxen, there are many tribes that abandon any attempt to keep oxen or horses, and between contiguous tribes the possession of the localities free from tsetse is a constant object of jealousy and dispute.-Saturday Review.

I

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ON THE CULTIVATION OF TRUF-
FLES.

Up till a very recent date, it was universally
believed by naturalists that the truffle was a
purely vegetable production. Recent re-
searches have thrown considerable doubt
upon the subject, and one gentleman thinks
that he has demonstrated its animal origin.
The gentleman to whom we refer, M. Martin
Ravel, of Montagnac, near Riez, Basses
Alpes, is well known as one of the largest
truffle merchants in France; and as he com-
bines with his mercantile pursuits those of a
diligent and painstaking naturalist, his opin-
ions are entitled to the highest consideration,
although very decidedly at variance with the
views of naturalists in general. This fact,
however, would not justify a rejection of his
views, but p ints out the necessity of caution
`in receiving them.

66

Sometimes several drops of the milky fluid come in contact with each other, and unite to form those large, irregularly-shaped truffles so frequently seen their shape and size varying according to the number of drops so united. The incipient truffle being fully formed, the roots from which it sprang die; and the truffle left to itself increases and expands, in virtue of the nourishment it receives, both from the earth and the air.

It is considered an additional argument in favor of M. Ravel's theory, that naturalists have never been able to discover in it any germ or radicle which a true vegetable is always expected to possess. The following account of the truffle and its mode of reproduction is given in Cuthbert Johnson's « Farmer's Encyclopædia: "— The truffle (Tuber cibarium) is a round fungus growing under ground, destitute of roots and leafy M. Ravel thinks that the truffle is pro-appendages. It aborbs nutriment at every duced quite accidentally in the vegetation of point of its surface. The truffle is composed a peculiar kind of oak, by the puncture made of globular vesicles, destined for the reproby a fly. The tree he distinguishes as the duction of the vegetable, and short barren truffle-oak, and the fly as the truffigene. It filaments called tigellules; and the reproducis assuredly no new fact in natural history, tive bodies, trufinelles. Each globular vesicle that certain flies do puncture certain plants, is fitted to give origin to a multitude of rein order to produce excrescences in which to productive bodies, but only a few of them deposit their eggs; and that these excresperfect the young vegetable. The parent cences vary in their character according to dies: the trufinelles are nourished by its the nature of the plant and the insect. The dissolving substance, and the cavity it origingall-nut, or nut-gall, is a familiar example, ally filled becomes the abode of a multitude being produced by the prick of the gall-fly, of young truffles: but many of them die, the which causes the formation of gallic acid. M. stronger starving the weaker. Ravel assures us that the truffle is produced in a precisely similar manner by the truffigene

in the fibrous roots of the tree. He thinks

Neither the mode of propagating here described, nor any other, appears to have been very successful, and the dealers have had to that the truffle may be considered as a species depend for their supplies chiefly on the sponof gall: differing from it in being produced taneous productions of the soil; which were by a different insect, and in containing differ-scented out by dogs trained for the purpose, ent chemical elements; but resembling it in being produced by an insect in its effort to provide a nest for its eggs, and food for its larva. The manner in which the truffigene proceeds is minutely described by M. Ravel. It may be seen in great numbers in winter time flying about the truffle grounds, and especially in the vicinity of the oaks which bear the truffles: it penetrates the ground, and makes its way to the fibrous extremities of the roots of the tree, and puncturing them, deposits its eggs in e orifice. A drop of milky fluid immediately oozes out, which slowly enlarges by the addition of nitrogen, obtained from the roots of the tree on the one hand, and from the air on the other.

and afterwards scratched up by them, or dug up by their masters. In conformity with M. Ravel's theory, a new mode of propagating is now proposed, and he has issued a circular announcing that he is prepared to supply the acorns of the truffle oak to those who may feel inclined to carry his method into practice. The only kinds of soil suitable for the cultivation of this plant are those of a calcareous or sandy nature; into which the acorns should be sown in the manner described by

M. Ravel in his circular. He considers that at the end of five years the oaks will be ready for the larvae of the truffigene fly, which he will be then prepared to supply to those who have purchased acorns.- -Titan.

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LITTLE BELL.

He prayeth well who loveth well Both man, and bird, and beast. The Ancient Mariner. Little Bell sat down beneath the rocksTossed aside her gleaming, golden locks"Bonny bird! quoth she

"Sing me your best song before I go."
"Here's the very finest song I know,
Little Bell," said he.

And the Blackbird piped-you never heard
Half so gay a song from any bird-

Full of quips and wiles.

Now so round and rich, now so soft and slow: All for love of that sweet face below,

Dimpled o'er with smiles.

And the while that bonny bird did pour
His full heart out freely o'er and o'er,
'Neath the morning skies,

In the little childish heart below
All sweetness seemed to grow and grow,
And shine forth in happy overflow,

From the bright blue eyes.

Down the dell she tripped, and through the glade

Peeped the Squirrel from the hazel shade,
And from out that tree,

Swung and leaped, and frolicked, void of fear-
While bold Blackbird piped that all might

hear

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Little Bell looked up and down the gladeSquirrel, Squirrel, from the nut tree shade, Bonny Blackbird, if you're not afraid,

Come and share with me!" Down came Squirrel, cager for his fareDown came bonny Blackbird, I declare; Little Bell gave each his honest shareAh! the merry three!

And while the frolic playmates twain
Piped and frisked from bough again,
'Neath the morning skies,

In the little childish heart below,
All sweetness seemed to grow and grow,
And shine out in happy overflow,

From her blue, bright eyes.

By her snow-white cot, at close of day,
Knelt sweet Bell, with folded arms to pray.
Very calm and clear

Rose the praying voice to where, unseen
In blue heaven, an angel shape serene
Paused awhile to hear.

"What good child is this," the angel said,

"

That with happy heart, beside her bed,

Prays so lovingly?"

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Low and soft, oh! very low and soft, Crooned the Blackbird in orchard croft, "Bell, dear Bell!" crooned he.

"Whom God's creatures love," the angel fair Murmured, "God doth bless with angel's care. Child, thy bed shall be

Folded safe from hom-love, deep and kind, Shall watch around and leave, good gifts behind,

Little Bell, for thee."

-Atheneum.

PALESTINE.

I TREAD where the twelve in their wayfaring trod;

I stand where they stood with the chosen of God

Where his blessings were heard and his lessons were taught,

Where the blind were restored and the healing was wrought.

O, here with his flock the sad wanderer cameThese hills he toiled over in grief are the sameThe founts which he drank by the wayside still

flow,

And the same airs are blowing which breathed on his brow.

And throned on her hills sits Jerusalem yet, But with dust on her forehead and chains on her feet;

For the crown of her pride to the mocker hath gone,

And the holy Shekinah-it's dark where it shone, But wherefore this dream of the earthly abode, Of humanity clothed in the brightness of God! Where my spirit but turned from the outward and dim,

It would gaze even now on the presence of him!

Not in clouds and in terrors, but gentle as when In love and in meekness he moved among men; And the voice which breathed peace to the waves

of the sea,

In the hush of my spirit would whisper to me. And what if my feet may not tread where he stood,

Nor my ears hear the dashing of Galilee's flood, Nor my eyes see the cross which he bowed him to bear,

Nor my knees press Gethsemane's garden in prayer!

Yet, Loved of the Father, thy Spirit is near
To the meek and the lowly and penitent here;
And the voice of thy love is the same even now,
As at Bethany's tomb, or on Olivet's brow.
Oh! the outward hath gone!-but in glory and

power

The Spirit surviveth the things of an hour;
Unchanged, undecaying, its pentecost flame
On the heart's secret altar is burning the same.
-J. G. Whittier.

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THE CHAPEL-BELL.

THE wintry winds blow wild and shrill,
Like ghosts they shriek across the moor,
Or howl beneath the window sill-

Or shake with gusty hands the door :-
And hour by hour from some lone bell
A wizard sound at night doth steal;
Sometimes 'tis like a funeral knell-
Sometimes 'tis like a marriage peal!
I know it is some fiend that stands

Within the Belfry's ghastly gloom,
And with its stark and fleshless hands
Rings out dead souls from tomb to tomb.
I long to weep-I pray to sleep-

But through the haunted house it sounds,
And through my flesh the chill veins creep
Like wintry worms in burial grounds.
A weight is on my heart, my brain;
A shadow flits across the floor;
And then I know it is in vain

To pine, or pray, or struggle more!-
Well let the foul fiend ring till morn;
Till the red sun awakens men ;-
Yet though thus tortur'd and forlorn,

What then I did-I'd do again!—
He thought 'twas fine to feign a love
Which wooed my spirit to his feet;
He rais'd his false, false eyes above,
And vowed-what's useless to repeat:
Whate'er he vowed, there is no name
So black on earth as his deceit ;
Whate'er he vowed, there is no shame
So vile as in his heart did beat!-
Ring out, thou bitter fiend, till morn
Awakes the prying eyes of men;
Yet prison'd-madden'd-and forlorn-
What then I did-I'd do again!
Not slightly was I wooed or won ;-
For years the whisp'ring false-one came,
And nought a saint might fear to shun
Forewarn'd me of the villain's aim:

I loved him-loved ?-I would have died
If dying aught to him might spare;
I would have every pain defied

To save him from a single care !—
Toll!-toll, thou fiend, ring out and tell
The murd'rous deed from goal to goal;
I know my name is writ in hell:

I feel there's blood upon my soul !
The dawn arose, but not for me

The bridal train did wait and smile; As slowly, stately, three by three,

They swept in beauty down the aisle: I crept behind the pillar'd baso,

The Bride's white garments fann'd my cheek; The blood rush'd madly to my face,

I dared not breathe I could not speak!
Langh out, thou fiend, laugh out and scorn,
With mocking sounds, my weary car;
Is there no other-lost-forlorn,

No other wretch whose life's a tear !
There rose a whisper-deep and low-
A sound that took away my sight;
All things around me seem'd to flow
And wander in a demon light!-
I nerved my hand to grasp the steel,

I stepp'd between him and his bride;-
Who'd think so black a heart could feel?—

Could pour so warm, so red a tide ?— Is there no sinful soul but mine,

Thou endless fiend, that thou must make
These serpent sounds to hiss and twine
Around me till my senses ache!

I had not stabb'd him-but I saw
My noble father's thin gray hairs;
And that, perchance, which tears might draw
Drew blood upon me unawares:

I flung the shrieking bride apart,

I sprang before him in his guiltThe steel went quivering to his heart:Would God my own blood had been spilt! Laugh out, dark fiend; beside me then

A wilder sound than thine was spread; A cry I ne'er shall hear again

Till every grave gives up its dead! Twelve months-dark months-I groan'd in pain,

A curse lay heavy on my head;
They tell me I have ne'er been sane
Since that wild hour the bridegroom bled!
They say no shadow stalks the room-

No midnight tolling haunts the air;-
'Tis false-you hear it through the gloom!-
And see the phantom passes-there!
Mad-mad?-'twere blissful but to lose
One hour from self;-one moment free
From thoughts that every hope refuse;
From life whose lot is misery!
Mad-mad? as if the sense could leave
The form it tortur'd!-never more
Shall I do ought but rave and grieve,
And wish-vain wish-this life were o'er!
Away!-a thousand lives have gone,
A thousand phantoms glide in hell;
But not one perish'd-no, not one
So black in guilt as he who fell!
Night after night, 'mid sounds aghast,
That fiend, that spectre, haunts my way;
What shall I see when life hath past,,
And Night is mine that knows no day?
CHARLES SWAIN.

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POETRY.-Funeral of Crawford, 280. Geo. Levison, 288. Sewing Machine, 290. Enigma, 290. Little Bell, 318. Palestine, 318. The Chapel Bell, 319. To George W. Curtis,

319.

SHORT ARTICLES.-Moss-Side, 287. Life in Israel, 293. A Woman with Wrongs, 293. Chambers' Youth's Companion, 299. Siberia, Oriental and Western, 301. The Eye, as an Illustration, 301. Tsetse, 316.

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LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.

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WASHINGTON, 27 Dec., 1845.

Or all the Periodical Journals devoted to literature and science which abound in Europe, and in this country, this has appeared to me the most useful. It contains indeed the exposition only of the current literature of the English Language; but this, by its immense extent and comprehension, includes a portraiture of the human mind, in the utmost expansion of the present age. J. Q. ADAMS.

This work is made up of the elaborate and stately essays of the Edinburgh, Quarterly, Westminster, North Brit ish, British Quarterly, New Quarterly, London Quarterly, Christian Remembrancer, and other Reviews; and Black wood's noble criticisms on Poetry, his keen political Commentaries, highly wrought Tales, and vivid descriptions of rural and mountain Scenery; and contributions to Literature, History and Common Life, by the sagacious Spectator, the sparkling Examiner, the judicious Athenaeum, the busy and industrious Literary Gazette, the learned and sedate Saturday Review, the studious and practical Economist, the keen tory Press, the sober and respectable Christian Observer; these are intermixed with the Military and Naval reminiscences of the United Service, and with the best articles of the Dublin University, New Monthly, Fraser's, Tait's, Ainsworth's, Hood's and Sporting Maga zines, and of Chambers' admirable Journal, and Dickens' Household Words. We do not consider it beneath our dignity to borrow wit and wisdom from Punch; and, when we think it good enough, make use of the thunder of The Times. We shall increase our variety by importations from the continent of Europe, and from the new growth of the British colonies.

Published every Saturday, by LITTELL, SON & COMPANY, Boston. Price 12 cents a number, or six dollars a.year. Remittances for any period will be thankfully received and promptly attended to.

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We will send the Living Age, postage free, to all subscribers within the United States, who remit in advance, directly to the office of publication, the sum of six dollars; thus placing our distant subscribers on the same footing as those nearer to us, and making the whole country our neighborhood.

Complete sets, handsomely bound, packed in neat boxes, and delivered in all the principal cities, free of expense of freight, are for sale at two dollars a volume.

ANY VOLUME may be had separately, at two dollars, bound, or a dollar and a half in numbers.

ANT NUMBER may be had for 12 cents; and it may be worth while for subscribers or purchasers to complete any broken volumes they may have, and thus greatly enhance their value.

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