While economy is the order of the day, it may not be amiss to point out an item of which it is believed a general ignorance prevails. It is well known to philosophers that when water commences to boil in the open air no additional fire can make it any hotter. A contrary opinion prevails, and those employed in cooking victuals, in order to accelerate the operation think that they cannot make the fire too intense. The fuel added for this purpose is, in fact, not only a wanton waste, but by causing a violent ebulition, it forces from the victuals, with the steam its finest flavour. How much fuel in families might be saved if, in cooking, no more were used than to keep the water that is used just at the boiling point, and it is certain the victuals would be the better for it.
[Ib.
Directions for making sweet, clear Cider, that shall retain its fine vinous flavour, and keep good for a long time in casks, like wine.
It is of importance in making cider, that the mill, the press, and all the materials be sweet and clean, and the straw clear from must. To make good cider, fruit should be ripe, (but not rotten) and when the apples are ground, if the juice is left in the pummice twenty-four hours, the cider will be richer, softer, and higher coloured; if fruit is all of the same kind, it is generally thought that the cider will be better; as the fermentation will certainly be more regular, which is of importance. The gathering and grinding of the apples, the pressing out of the juice, is a mere manual labour, performed with very little skill in the operation; but here the great art of making good cider commences; for as soon as the juice is pressed out, nature begins to work a wonderful change in it. The juice of fruit, if left to itself, will undergo three distinct fermentations, all of which change the quality and nature of this fluid. The first is the vinous; the second the acid, which makes it hard and prepares it for vinegar; by the third it becomes putrid. The first fermentation is the only one the juice of apples should undergo, to make good cider. It is this operation that separates the juice from the filth, and leaves it a clear, sweet, vinous liquor. To preserve it in this state is the grand secret; this is done by fumigating it with sulphur, which checks any further fermentation, and preserves it in its fine vinous state. It is to be wished that all cider makers would make a trial of this method; it is attended with no expense, and but little trouble, and will have the desired effect.
I would recommend that the juice as it comes from the press, be placed in open headed casks or vats: in this situation it is most likely to undergo a proper fermentation, and the person attending may with correctness ascertain when this fermentation ceases; this is of great importance, and must be particularly attended to. The fermentation is attended with a hissing noise, bubbles rising to the surface and there forming a soft spongy crust over the liquor. When this crust begins to crack, and white froth appears in the cracks level with the surface of the head, the fermentation is about stopping. At this time the liquor is in a fine, genuine, clear state, and must be drawn off immediately into clean casks: and this is the time to fumigate it with sulphur. To do this, take a strip of canvas or rag, about 2 inches broad and twelve long; dip this into melted sulphur, and when a few pails of worked cider are put into the cask, set this match on fire and hold it in the cask, till it is consumed, then bung the cask and shake it, that the liquor may incorporate with and retain the fumes; after this fill the cask and bung it up. The cider should be racked off again the latter part of February or first of March; and if not as clear as you wish it, put in isinglass to fine it, and stir it well; then put the cask in a cool place, where it will not be disturbed, for the fining to settle. Cider prepared in this manner will keep sweet for years.
It is certainly of great importance to the people of America to cultivate the fruit that is natural to the soil of their country, and to make the most of the fruit which the soil produces; especially, when its produce is an article of value and of great consumption in this country.
A Lover of Good Cider.
Am. D. Adv.]
Extract of a Letter.
Having been in England, I have had an opportunity of observing many improvements in agriculture, which, if I were to see them adopted here, would give me the sincerest pleasure. Among the number of them, I think the culture of cabbages for fattening of cattle stands in the first rank. From strong soils, it may fairly be questioned whether any kind of winter provision can be raised of such weight and quality per acre, as the larger kind of cabbages. For cows, they surpass all other kinds of vegetables, and probably some method may be thought of, by which they may be conveniently preserved through our long winters. The colewort cabbage used to be in most esteem, but I understand that a variety of the large red kind is coming into use, and bids fair to drive out the Scotch drumhead, it being much more hardy. They are exceedingly well adapted to wet land, and will prove very productive where turnips cannot be raised to any good purpose. It is, unquestionably, a crop of far more use and value than the mangel wurzel, which has, in England, within these few years, been in such fashionable culture.
In England and Scotland, I have seen the parings of potatoes planted as seed; and at the same time I was told that they yielded quite as plentifully as cuttings with three eyes, or even whole potatoes.
I never had an opportunity of witnessing the result, but it may be worth while for some experimental agriculturist to plant some in this way, in order to prove or shew the fallacy of the assertion. I should recommend that they cut the parings about two-tenths of an inch in thickness, as those parings which I saw planted always had the eye left in them entire, and the root of the germ not in the least wounded.
[St. John's paper.
From William's Travels in Italy, Greece, &c.
Pompeii, which was entombed in a softer substance, is getting daily disencumbered, and a very considerable part of this Grecian city is unveiled. We entered by the Appian way, through a narrow street of marble tombs, beautifully executed, with the names of the deceased plain and legible. We looked into the columbary below that of Marius Arius Diomedes, and perceived jars containing the ashes of the dead, with a small lamp at the side of each. Arriving at the gate, we perceived a sentry box in which the skeleton of a soldier was found with a lamp in its hand: proceeding up the street beyond the gate, we went into several streets, and entered what is called a coffee house, the marks of cups being visible on the stone; we came likewise to a tavern, and found the sign (not a very decent one) near the entrance. The streets are lined with public buildings and private houses, most of which have their original painted decorations fresh and entire. The pavement of the streets is much worn by carriage wheels, and holes are cut through the side stones, for the purpose of fastening animals in the market place; and in certain situations are placed stepping stones, which give us rather unfavourable ideas of the state of the streets. We passed two beautiful little temples; went into a surgeon's house, in the operation room of which chirurgical instruments were found; entered an ironmonger's shop, where an anvil and hammer were discovered; a sculptor's and a baker's shop, in the latter of which may be seen an oven and grinding mills, like old Scotch querns. We examined likewise an oilman's shop, and a wine shop lately opened, where money was found in the till; a school in which was a small pulpit with steps up to it, in the middle of the apartment; a great theatre; a temple of justice; an amphitheatre, about 220 feet in length; various temples; a barrack for soldiers, the columns of which are scribbled with their names and jests; wells, cisterns, seats, tricliniums, beautiful Mosaic; altars, inscriptions, fragments of statues, and many other curious remains of antiquity. Among the most remarkable objects were an ancient wall, with a part of a still more ancient marble freze built in it as a common stone; and a stream which has flowed under this once subterraneous city, long before its burial; pipes of Terra Cotta to convey the water to the different streets; stocks for prisoners, in one of which a skeleton was found. All these things incline one almost to look for the inhabitants, and wonder at the desolate silence of the place.
The houses in general are very low, and the rooms are small, I should think not above ten feet high. Every house is provided with a well and a cistern. Every thing seems to be in proportion; the principal streets do not appear to exceed 16 feet in width, with side pavements of about three feet; some of the subordinate streets are from 6 to 10 feet wide, with side pavements in proportion; these are occasionally high, and are reached by steps. The columns of the barracks are about 15 feet in height; they are made of tuffa with stucco; one third of the shaft is smoothly plastered, the rest fluted to the capital. The walls of the houses are often painted red, and some of them have borders and antique ornaments, masks, and imitations of marbles, but in general poorly executed. I have observed, on the walls of an eating room, various kinds of food and game tolerably represented; one woman's apartment was adorned with subjects relative to love; and a man's with pictures of a martial character. Considering that the whole has been under ground upwards of seventeen centuries, it is certainly surprizing that they should be as fresh as at the period of their burial. The whole extent of the city, not half of which is excavated, may be about four miles. It is said that Murat employed no less than 2000 men in clearing Pompeii, and that Madame Murat attended the excavations in person every week. The present government have not retained above 100.
After visiting this extraordinary place, which certainly is the most interesting of all the wonders of Naples, we examined the museum of antiquities at Purtici. The collections of ancient paintings are curious and instructing, some of them containing exquisite pieces of art; one room is filled with representations of fruit and flowers, well painted and freely handled; some grapes in particular are remarkable for execution, quite transparent, with the touches of light on them judiciously placed to give effect and clearness. A second room contains various ornaments painted in a masterly manner, and with considerable ingenuity in the design. A third is covered with various animals and birds. Another apartment is filled with landscapes, but these are all extremely bad, having no perspective, nor any truth of colouring: indeed it would seem that the ancient painters had never given their mind to that delightful branch of the art. One landscape, however, with all its faults, interested me greatly, and that was a view of ancient Puteoli, (now Pozzuolo,) about six miles from Naples, supposed to have been painted before St. Paul landed there. The picture is, of course, very different from the present state of the city, but still a likeness may be traced, if we keep in view the site of the various temples and other objects, the foundations of which are still visible.
Among the innumerable pictures which are crowded in several rooms, I shall mention the following, which, on slight examination, appeared to be among the best: Sophonisba drinking the juice of Hemlock, admirable in expression; an Infant Hercules strangling Serpents; Jove; Leda and the Swan; the Graces; a Venus; Education of Bacchus; a Medusa's Head:—these are all slight, but it is that slightness which conveys character and refinement of taste; a Theseus as large as life, in a fine attitude and good expression: Two allegorical figures, representing the river Nile and Egypt; the Education of Achilles; a beautiful Female suckling an aged Man, (corresponding to the Roman Charity,) most delicately expressed: An Academy of Music, the figures small, exquisitely painted; harps and flageolets are the only instruments. Among the curious pictures is the interior of a school, in which the master is represented flogging a boy, who is upon another boy's back; so that the practice of horsing is sanctioned by very ancient authority. Our attention was likewise attracted by a shoemaker's and a cook's shop; these last are but indifferently designed and painted; a Wilkie or an Allan would smile at such productions. All these are in fresco, on stucco grounds, and with a considerable polish on the surface. It does not seem that any glazing colours have been used, the effect being produced entirely by body colour. The ancients, however, as Pliny informs us, had a dark, yet transparent mixture, which they laid over their highly finished works, to give the delusion required. From the freshness and clearness of the colouring, they seem to have had the advantage of painting in oil, so far, at least, as durability is of advantage.
The museum at Portici likewise contains many statues and busts of considerable merit; besides a great variety of culinary articles, and specimens, of calcined barley, beans, paste for bread, part of a roll, mustard-seed, straw, rye, pine tops, figs, cloth like tinder, fish nets, with corks attached to them, spunge, soap, rings, earrings, combs, thimbles, looking-glasses of polished metal, and a variety of emblems of luxury and taste, admirably executed. We examined them all with the keenest interest, though the impression would have been more gratifying, had they been left in the ancient towns in which they were discovered.
From the Pennsylvania Gazette, Nov. 18, 1736.
BY. DR. FRANKLIN.
Anergus was a gentleman of a good estate, he was bred to no business, and could not contrive how to waste his hours agreeably; he had no relish for any of the proper works of life, nor any taste at all for the improvements of the mind; he spent generally ten hours of the four and twenty in bed; he dozed away two or three more on his couch, and as many were dissolved in good liquor every evening, if he met with company of his own humour. Five or six of the rest he sauntered away with much indolence: the chief business of them was to contrive his meals, and to feed his fancy beforehand, with the promise of a dinner and supper; not that he was so very a glutton, or so entirely devoted to appetite; but chiefly because he knew not how to employ his thoughts better, he let them rove about the sustenance of his body. Thus he had made a shift to wear off ten years since the paternal estate fell into his hands: and yet, according to the abuse of words in our day, he was called a man of virtue, because he was scarce ever known to be quite drunk, nor was his nature much inclined to lewdness.
One evening, as he was musing alone, his thoughts happened to take a most unusual turn, for they cast a glance backward, and began to reflect on his manner of life. He bethought himself what a number of living beings had been made a sacrifice to support his carcase, and how much corn and wine had been mingled with those offerings. He had not quite lost all the arithmetic that he learned when he was a boy, and he set himself to compute what he had devoured since he came to the age of man.
"About a dozen feathered creatures, small and great, have one week with another (said he) given up their lives to prolong mine, which in ten years amounts to at least six thousand.
"Fifty sheep have been sacrificed in a year, with half a hecatomb of black cattle, that I might have the choicest part offered weekly upon my table. Thus a thousand beasts out of the flock and the herd have been slain in ten years' time to feed me, besides what the forest has supplied me with. Many hundreds of fishes have, in all their varieties, been robbed of life for my repast, and of the smaller fry as many thousands.
"A measure of corn would hardly afford fine flour enough for a month's provision, and this arises to above six score bushels; and many hogsheads of ale and wine, and other liquors, have passed through this body of mine, this wretched strainer of meat and drink.
"And what have I done all this time for God or man? What a vast profusion of good things upon a useless life, and a worthless liver! There is not the meanest creature among all these which I have devoured, but hath answered the end of its creation better than I. It was made to support human nature, and it hath done so. Every crab and oyster I have eat, and every grain of corn I have devoured, hath filled up its place in the rank of beings with more propriety and honour than I have done: O shameful waste of life and time!"
In short, he carried on his moral reflections with so just and severe a force of reason, as constrained him to change his whole course of life, to break off his follies at once, and to apply himself to gain some useful knowledge, when he was more than thirty years of age; he lived many following years with the character of a worthy man, and an excellent Christian; he performed the kind offices of a good neighbour at home, and made a shining figure as a patriot in the senate-house; he died with a peaceful conscience, and the tears of his country were dropped upon his tomb.
The world, that knew the whole series of his life, stood amazed at the mighty change. They beheld him as a wonder of reformation, while he himself confessed and adored the divine power and mercy, which had transformed him from a brute to a man.
But this was a single instance; and we may almost venture to write MIRACLE upon it. Are there not numbers of both sexes among our young gentry, in this degenerate age, whose lives thus run to utter waste, without the least tendency to usefulness!
When I meet with persons of such a worthless character as this, it brings to my mind some scraps of Horace,
PARAPHRASE.
There are other fragments of that heathen poet, which occur on such occasions; one in the first of his satires, the other in the first of his epistles, which seem to represent life only as a season of luxury.
Which may be thus put into English:
Published for general benefit, by a Member of the Save-all Club.
The caprice of men at different periods has delighted to make much of some darling qualities idolized as virtues, while others, which could not be mistaken for vices, have been tacitly scorned as only fit to occupy grovelling minds, and avert reproach from those who could not aspire to praise.
Among the latter we discover Frugality. What writer has ever thought of making his hero an economist? With a disposition to avoid unnecessary expense, it has long been assumed that a sordid and despicable parsimony must invariably be found, and the world has been accustomed to bestow its tenderest sympathies on the gay, florid, open-hearted rake, who having manifested a disposition to give, where he had nothing of his own to bestow, ruined those honest tradesmen who were credulous enough to trust him, and qualified himself for genteel society by visiting the King's Bench or the Fleet; while the man who disdained to be generous at the expense of others, who would not affect splendour which his means were inadequate to sustain, in fine, who denied himself enjoyments for which he could not honestly pay, has been treated with unsparing ridicule as a mean and pitiful plodder. Our citizens and traders have wisely joined to laugh this character out of countenance, and to applaud the swindling pleasantries of a profligate. Let them look to the effects of this—let them look to their legers, and see if they have not been merry at their own expense.
If there be any truth in the remark dropped by one of the greatest ornaments of British literature, that "it would be well if fewer possessed the superfluities, and more the comforts of life;" in times like the present, it is desirable that mankind should be weaned from the admiration of that which ought never to have been defended—that madness and dishonesty should no longer be depicted as the gracefully irregular flow of youthful gayety; and that the modest virtues which find a friend in the author of "Lessons on Thrift," should be recalled from that exile to which they were doomed by sordid dissipation and unreflecting folly.
But we must explain, as we proceed, to guard against mistake or representation. We do not wish to return to that enviable state, which we suppose some of our radical neighbours contemplate, when they talk of a "state of nature;" namely, that in which the first inhabitants of this island found themselves embowered in their native woods. We do not sigh for that economical simplicity which, according to Richard de Cirencester, made blue paint, applied to the human body, a substitute for clothing; nor do we even lift our voices against that most effeminate piece of luxury, as it was considered by some at the commencement of Queen Elizabeth's reign—the introduction of chimneys to houses. The votaries of luxury may think that, in the last instance, we make but a very slight concession; but the frightful effects of that departure from old English habits was once thought very alarming. We read in Hollingshed:—"Now have we many chimneys; and yet our tender limbs complain of rheums, catarrhs, and pozes; then had we none but reredosses, and our heads did never ache. For as the smoke in those days was supposed to be a sufficient hardening for the timber of the house, so it was reputed a far better medicine to keep the good man and his family from the quack or poze, wherewith, as then, very few were acquainted."
With all our reverence for economy, assuredly there are practitioners of the present day whom we would prefer to Dr. Smoke; even though calling in the former, we must submit to the inconvenience of offering a fee. We do not sigh for the return of those golden days, when our wise progenitors made the same aperture act the double part of a window and a chimney, and when a log of wood was considered an excellent pillow; but sometimes when our reluctant hands are a little embarrassed to find the expected fee, or our purses feel most awkwardly convenient for the pocket, after settling the lengthened bill, we do regret that those who prescribe for us, when indisposed, must at the same time prescribe for their own horses and carriages, and that the period is gone by when a sufferer could hope for relief from the pill of a pedestrian.
Our author, to show the evil effects of luxury and extravagance, even in a national point of view, gives the following narrative:
"The Seven United Provinces were at the height of their power and prosperity about 1650, before England, recovering from a destructive civil war, began to reclaim the dominion of the ocean.
"But in their successful periods the private virtues had also their share, and parsimony, as usual produced wealth and industry. In a conversation at Rotterdam this subject was discussed; and as the parties mostly imputed the decline of their republic to political causes, an opulent merchant said, that if the company would dine with him on such a day, he would convince them that there were other causes more in their power.
"The invitation was accepted, and it was hoped that the merchant would explain his sentiments, by which they might improve their speculations in commerce over a glass of wine, after an elegant repast as he was accustomed to give. But what was their surprise to find nothing on the table but salted herrings and table beer! They ate, however, a morsel in silence and dissatisfaction, which the master seemed not to observe, praying them repeatedly to eat and push the glass. At length, when they began to look at their watches, the master ordered in the dinner. At this word they brightened up, when in came a leg of mutton, boiled with turnips, and a pot or two of strong beer. This dish was little more satisfactory than the other, as they expected very different fare in such a magnificent house. There was, however, a great sacrifice of conscience and veracity in praising the mutton and the beer. But some yawned, and half the gigot remained even among a numerous company, when the master, seeing their distress, nodded unnoticed to an old hoary-headed domestic, who alone had appeared along with the mutton, and who stood respectfully at the sideboard to serve the bread or the beer. He went out, and the company was left to a languid conversation; their eyes saying more than their tongues.
"On a sudden the folding doors opened, and a train of twelve servants entered, bearing on massy plate the choicest fish, flesh, fowl, all the delicacies of the season. Two without livery took their places behind their master; the others in splendid uniform behind the guests. The number of wines presented was computed at fifteen, and even the richest guests were astonished at the splendour and variety of the festival.
"When an equal dessert was served, and the wine began to circulate, a prudent and wary guest thought it was time to request our opulent merchant to explain his sentiments, as he had promised. All were fixed in mute attention when he made this memorable answer: 'Gentlemen, my sentiments are already explained; the lesson is already given. When our ancestors were gradually rising to wealth under the yoke of Burgundy, Austria, Spain, their frugality was contented with our first dish, and they even blessed the inventor. In their second period, when the noble house of Orange, when Maurice of Nassau was establishing our power in the East and West Indies, and commercial wealth began to overflow all our ports and canals, still habits of prudence occasioned economy, and our rich senators dined on plain mutton, and drank wholesome beer. The dinner I have had the honour to give you is a very moderate specimen of our present existence. Add the luxury and pomp of houses, furniture and equipages, and judge, as you well can, of the difference of expense—a difference which, I would venture to say, would have, even for one year, been regarded as a fortune by our bearded ancestors.'"
Nothing can be more curious than the appearance exhibited by mouldiness, when viewed through a microscope. If looked at by the naked eye, it seems nothing but an irregular tissue of filaments; but the magnifying glass shows it to be a forest of small plants, which derive their nourishment from the moist substance which serves them as a base. The stems of these plants may be plainly distinguish; and sometimes their buds, some shut and some open. They have much similarity to mushrooms, the tops of which, when they come to maturity, emit an exceedingly fine dust which is their seed. Mushrooms, it is well known, are the growth of a single night; but those in miniature, of which we are speaking, seem to come to perfection in a much less space of time than that; hence we account for the extraordinary progress which mouldiness makes in a few hours. Another curious observation of the same kind is, that M. Ahlefeld, seeing some stones covered with a sort of dust, had the curiosity to examine it with a microscope, and he found that it consisted of small microscopic mushrooms, raised on pedicles, the heads of which, round the middle, were turned up at the edges. They were striated also from the centre to the circumference, as certain kinds of mushrooms are. He further remarked, that they contained, above their upper covering, a multitude of small grains shaped like cherries somewhat flattened, which he suspected were the seeds; and finally he observed, among the forest of mushrooms, several small red insects, which probably fed upon them.
The lycoperdon, or puff-ball, is a plant of the fungus kind, which grows in the form of a tubercle, covered with small grains, very like chagreen. If pressed, it bursts, and emits an exceedingly fine kind of dust, which flies off under the appearance of smoke. If some of the dust be examined with the microscope, it appears to consist of perfectly round globules, of an orange colour, the diameter of which is only about the 1-50th part of the thickness of a hair, so that each grain of this dust is but the 1-125000th part of a globule, equal in diameter to the breadth of a hair.
The farina of flowers is found to be regularly and uniformly organized in each kind of plant. In the mallow, for example, each grain is an opaque ball, covered over with small points. The farina of the tulip, and of most of the liliaceous kind of flowers, bears a striking resemblance to the seeds of a cucumber: that of the poppy is very like grains of barley, with a longitudinal groove in them.
There are certain plants, the leaves of which seem to be pierced with a multitude of small holes. Of this kind is the hypericum, or St. John's wort. Now, if a fragment of this be viewed with a good microscope, the supposed holes are found to be vesicles, contained in the thickness of the leaf, and covered with an extremely thin membrane; and these are thought to be the receptacles which contain the essential and aromatic oil peculiar to the plant.
The view exhibited by those plants which have down, such as borage, nettles, &c. is exceedingly curious.—When examined by a microscope, they appear to be covered with spikes. Those of borage are, for the most part, bent so as to form an elbow; and though really very close, they appear by the microscope, to be at a considerable distance from each other. The entire appearance is very similar to that of the skin of the porcupine.
If a needle be viewed through a microscope, though exceedingly fine, it is well known the point will appear quite blunt, more like a peg, broken at the end, than a sharp pointed steel needle. The edge of the finest set razor, when seen through a microscope, will appear more like the back of a penknife, full of irregularities, than what it really is. In these respects the works of art, when carried to the highest pitch of perfection, will not bear to be compared with the operations of nature. The latter, exposed to the microscope, instead of losing their lustre and high polish, appear so much the more beautiful and perfect in regularity and order. When the eyes of a fly are illuminated by means of a lamp or candle, and viewed through this instrument, each of them shows an image of the taper with a precision and vivacity which nothing can equal.
There are two kinds of sand, viz. the calcareous and the vitrifiable: the former, examined with a microscope, resembles large irregular fragments of rock; but the latter appears like so many rough diamonds. In some instances, the particles of sand seem to be highly polished and brilliant, like an assemblage of diamonds, rubies, and emeralds.
Charcoal is a fine object for the microscope. It is found full of pores, regularly arranged, and passing through its whole length.
[English Magazine.
The following melancholy letter alludes to Accum's "Treatise on Adulterations of Food and Culinary Poisons."
From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine.
From an elderly Gentlewoman to Mr. Christopher North.
My dear Mr. North—I much fear that this is the last letter you will ever receive from your old friend. "I'm wearin' awa, Kit! to the land o' the leal!" and that, too, under the influence of a complication of disorders, which have been undermining my constitution (originally a sound and stout one) for upwards of half a century. Look to yourself my much respected lad—and think no more of your rheumatism. That, believe me, is a mere trifle; but think of what you have been doing, since the peace of 1763, (in that year were you born,) in the eating and drinking way, and tremble. I know, my dear Kit, that you never were a gormandizer, nor a sot; neither surely was I—but it matters not—the most abstemious of us all have gone through fearful trials, and I have not skill in figures to cast up the poisonous contents of my hapless stomach for nearly threescore years. You would not know me now; I had not the slightest suspicion of myself in the looking-glass this morning. Such a face! so wan and wobegone! No such person drew Priam's curtains at dead of night, or could have told him half his Troy was burned.
Well—hear me come to the point. I remember now, perfectly well, that I have been out of sorts all my lifetime; and the causes of my continual illness have this day been revealed to me. May my melancholy fate be a warning to you, and all your clear contributors, a set of men whom the world could ill spare at this crisis. Mr. Editor—I have been poisoned.
You must know that I became personally acquainted a few weeks ago, quite accidentally, with that distinguished chymist, well known in our metropolis by the name of "Death in the Pot."[7] He volunteered a visit to me at breakfast, last Thursday, and I accepted him. Just as I had poured out the first cup of tea, and was extending it graciously towards him, he looked at me, and with a low, hoarse, husky voice, like Mr. Kean's, asked me if I were not excessively ill? I had not had the least suspicion of being so—but there was a terrible something in "Death in the Pot's" face which told me I was a dead woman. I immediately got up—I mean strove to get up, to ring the bell for a clergyman—but I fainted away. On awaking from my swoon, I beheld "Death in the Pot" still staring with his fateful eyes—and croaking out, half in soliloquy, half in tête-a-tête, "There is not a life in London worth ten year's purchase." I implored him to speak plainly, and for God's sake not to look at me so malagrugorously—and plainly enough he did then speak to be sure—"Mrs. Trollope, you are poisoned."
"Who," cried I out convulsively, "who has perpetrated the foul deed? On whose guilty head will lie my innocent blood? Has it been from motives of private revenge? Speak, Mr. Accum[8]—speak! Have you any proofs of a conspiracy?" "Yes, Madam, I have proofs, damning proofs. Your wine merchant, your brewer, your baker, your confectioner, your grocer, aye, your very butcher, are in league against you; and, Mrs. Trollope, YOU ARE POISONED!"—"When!—Oh! when was the fatal dose administered? Would an emetic be of no avail? Could you not yet administer a——" But here my voice was choked, and nothing was audible, Mr. North, but the sighs and sobs of your poor Trollope.
At last I became more composed—and Mr. Accum asked me what was, in general, the first thing I did on rising from bed in the morning. Alas! I felt that it was no time for delicacy, and I told him at once, that it was to take off a bumper of brandy for a complaint in my stomach. He asked to look at the bottle. I brought it forth from the press in my own number, that tall square tower-like bottle, Mr. North, so green to the eye and smooth to the grasp. You know the bottle well—it belonged to my mother before me. He put it to his nose—he poured out a driblet into a teaspoon as cautiously as if it had been the black drop—he tasted it—and again repeated these terrible words, "Mrs. Trollope, you are poisoned. It has," he continued, "a peculiar disagreeable smell, like the breath of habitual drunkards." "Oh! thought I, has it come to this! The smell ever seemed to my unsuspecting soul most fragrant and delicious." "Death in the Pot" then told me, that the liquid I had been innocently drinking every morn for thirty years was not brandy at all, but a vile distillation of British molasses over wine lees, rectified over quick lime, and mixed with saw-dust. And this a sad, solitary, unsuspecting spinster had been imbibing as brandy for so many years! A gleam of comfort now shot across my brain—I told Mr. Accum that I had, during my whole life, been in the habit of taking a smallish glass of Hollands before going to bed, which I fain hoped might have the effect of counteracting the bad effects of the forgery that had been committed against me. I produced the bottle—the white globular one you know. "Death in the Pot" tried and tasted—and alas! instead of Hollands, pronounced it vile British malt spirit, fined by a solution of sub-acetate of lead, and then a solution of alum—and strengthened with grains of paradise, Guinea pepper, capsicum, and other acrid and aromatic substances. These are learned words—but they made a terrible impression upon my memory. Mr. Accum is a most amiable man, I well believe—but he is a stranger to pity. "Mrs. Trollope, YOU HAVE BEEN POISONED," was all he would utter. Had the brandy and Hollands been genuine, there would have been no harm—but they were imitation, and "YOU ARE POISONED."
Feeling myself very faint, I asked, naturally enough for a woman in my situation, for a glass of wine. It was brought—but Mr. Accum was at hand to snatch the deadly draught from my lips. He tasted what used to be called my genuine old port,
"It is spoiled elder wine—rendered astringent by oak-wood, saw-dust, and the husks of filberts—lead and arsenic, madam, are——" but my ears tingled, and I heard no more. I confessed to the amount of six glasses a day of this hellish liquor—pardon my warmth—and that such had been my allowance for many years. My thirst was now intolerable, and I beseeched a glass of beer. It came, and "Death in the Pot" detected at once the murderous designs of the brewer. Coculus indicus, Spanish juice, hartshorn shavings, orange powder, copperas, opium, tobacco, nux vomica—such were the shocking words he kept repeating to himself—and then again, "Mrs. Trollope is poisoned."—"May I not have a single cup of tea, Mr. Accum," I asked imploringly, and the chymist shook his head. He then opened the tea-caddy, and emptying its contents, rubbed my best green tea between his hard horny palms. "Sloe-leaves, and white-thorn leaves, madam, coloured with Dutch pink, and with the fine green bloom of verdigris! Much, in the course of your regular life, you must have swallowed!" "Might I try the coffee?" Oh! Mr. North, Mr. North, you know my age, and never once, during my whole existence, have I tasted coffee. I have been deluded by pease and beans, sand, gravel, and vegetable powder! Mr. Accum called it sham coffee, most infamous stuff, and unfit for human food! Alas! the day that I was born! In despair I asked for a glass of water, and just as the sparkling beverage was about to touch my pale quivering lips, my friend, for I must call him so in spite of every thing, interfered, and tasting it, squirted out of his mouth, with a most alarming countenance. "It comes out of a lead cistern—it is a deadly poison." Here I threw myself on my knees before this inexorable man, and cried, "Mr. Death in the Pot, is there in heaven, on earth, or the waters under the earth, any one particle of matter that is not impregnated with death? What means this desperate mockery? For mercy's sake give me the very smallest piece of bread and cheese, or I can support myself no longer. Are we, or are we not, to have a morsel of breakfast this day?" He cut off about an inch long piece of cheese from that identical double Gloucester that you yourself, Mr. North, chose for me, on your last visit to London, and declared that it had been rendered most poisonous by the anotta used to colour it. "There is here, Mrs. Trollope, a quantity of red lead—Have you, madam, never experienced after devouring half a pound of this cheese, an indescribable pain in the region of the abdomen and of the stomach, accompanied with a feeling of tension, which occasioned much restlessness, anxiety, and repugnance to food? Have you never felt, after a Welsh rabbit of it, a very violent cholic?" "Yes! yes!—often, often!" I exclaimed. "And did you use pepper and mustard?" "I did even so." "Let me see the castors." I rose from my knees—and brought them out. He puffed out a little pepper into the palm of his hand, and went on as usual. "This, madam, is spurious pepper altogether—it is made up of oil cakes, (the residue of linseed, from which the oil has been pressed,) common clay, and, perhaps, a small portion of Cayenne pepper, (itself probably artificial or adulterated,) to make it pungent. But now for the mustard"—at this juncture the servant maid came in, and I told her that I was poisoned—she set up a prodigious scream, and Mr. Accum let fall the mustard pot on the carpet. But it is needless for me to prolong the shocking narrative. They assisted me to get into bed, from which I never more expect to rise. My eyes have been opened, and I see the horrors of my situation. I now remember the most excruciating cholic, and divers other pangs which I thought nothing of at the time, but which must have been the effect of the deleterious solids and liquids which I was daily introducing into my stomach.—It appears that I have never, so much as once, either eat or drank a real thing—that is, a thing being what it pretended to be. Oh! the weight of lead and copper that has passed thro' my body! Oh! too, the gravel and the sand! But is impossible to deceive me now. This very evening some bread was brought to me—Bread! I cried out indignantly—Take the vile deception out of my sight. Yes, my dear Kit, it was a villanous loaf of clay and alum! But my resolution is fixed, and I hope to die in peace. Henceforth, I shall not allow one particle of matter to descend into my stomach! Already I feel myself "of the earth, earthy."—Mr. Accum seldom leaves my bedside—and yesterday brought with him several eatables and drinkables, which he assured me he had analyzed, subjected to the test-act, and found them to be conformists. But I have no trust in chymistry. His quarter-loaf looked like a chip cut off the corner of a stone block. It was a manifest sham loaf. After being deluded in my Hollands, bit in my brandy, and having found my muffins a mockery, never more shall I be thrown off my guard. I am waxing weaker and weaker—so farewell! Bewildering indeed has been the destiny of
Susanna Trollope.
P.S.—I have opened my mistress' letter to add, that she died this evening about a quarter past eight, in excruciating torments.
Sally Rogers.
It is thought by some surveyors that a change has taken place in the variation of the needle, and that the power of attraction is returning to the east or right hand. For my own satisfaction, I have for some years past been endeavouring to ascertain the truth of the fact, and my observations for the last ten years past require only 20' to be added to strike the former object. It is well known that formerly surveyors made an allowance to the west or left hand, of one degree, for every 10 or 11 years for variation, and it now comes short 40' of the common allowance, so that from the result of my observations it appears evidently that the variation is not on the return, but still increasing, but so slow and variable every year, that it cannot be ascertained, unless by a series of experiments. To corroborate the following observations, I would remark, that I have lately read (I think in the Encyclopædia) of a curious gentlemen in London, who with a nice instrument, monthly for a number of years, made observations upon the variation, and he seldom found the needle cut the same degree and minutes, but varying sometimes to the right, others to the left: sometimes more, sometimes less, which shows that the attractive power is variable.
On the 18th of July, 1810, an object on the North mountain, 3 and a half miles off, bore