VARIETIES. IMMORTALITY OF MIND.-When I consider the boundless activity of our minds, the remembrance we have of things past, our foresight of what is to come-when I reflect on the noble discoveries and vast improvements by which those minds have advanced arts and sciences-I am entirely persuaded, and out of all doubt, that a nature which has in itself a fund of so many excellent things cannot possibly be mortal. -Xenophon. FREE EXHIBITION OF PICTURES.-The Dudley Gallery of Pictures and Sculpture, containing the celebrated statue of the Greek Slave, by Hiram Power, also a Venus by Canova, is still open to the public (free), at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, without orders or cards, every day but Mondays. Visitors are only required to write their names in a book kept for that purpose. MORAL INFLUENCE OF LITERATURE.-He that can write a true book to persuade all England, is not he the bishop and archbishop, the primate of England, and of all England? I many a time say, the writers of newspapers, pamphlets, poems, books, these are the real working effective clergy of a modern country. Nay, not only our preaching, but even our worship, is it not too accomplished by means of printed books? The noble sentiments which the gifted soul has clothed for us in melodious words, which brings melody into our hearts-is not this essentially, if we will understand it, of the nature of worship? Fragments of a real "Church Liturgy" and " Body of Homilies," strangely disguised from the common eye, are to be found weltering in that huge froth-ocean of printed speech we loosely call literature! -Thos. Carlyle. A GRATEFUL DRAYMAN.-A retired drayman, in the employ of Messrs. Truman, Hanbury, Buxton and Co., came up from the country a few days ago and presented £50 to the London Hospital, in token, he said, of his gratitude for the kindness and attention he had received when an inmate of that Institution thirty years' ago. At the same time he gave £50 to the Licensed Victullers' Asylum. THE BEES OF GUILLIVELLE-A farmer at Guillivelle sent his carter, with a cart and five horses, to remove some rubbish from a wall near which he had 250 hives. Returning to the house for something, the carter tied his horses to a tree. The bees issued forth; the horses were covered with them, and even their nostrils filled. Coming back he found two dead, and three others rolling about in agony; and these also died soon after. The same swarms, sometime before, had stung to death eighteen goslings. ADVERSITY exasperates fools, dejects cowards, draws out the faculties of the wise and ingenious, puts the modest to the necessity of trying their skill, awes the opulent, and makes the idle industrious. WALNUTS AN EXCELLENT FAMILY MEDICINE.-Everybody eats walnuts, everybody knows how to make a pickle of walnuts; few, however, know the medicinal virtue of walnuts. Now, the fact is, walnuts, when prepared secundum artem are an excellent medicine and alterative; and this is the way to prepare them :-Get the green walnuts fit for pickling; put them in a stone jar filled up with moist sugar, to the proportion of half a pound to a score of walnuts; place the jar in a saucepan of boiling water for about three hours taking care the water does not get in, and keep it simmering during the operation. The sugar, when dissolved, should cover the walnuts; if it does not, add more, cover it close, and in six months it will be fit for use; the older it gets the better it is. One walnut is a dose for a child of six years of age as a purgative; and it has this great advantage over drugs, that whilst it is an excellent medicine, it is at the same time, very pleasant to the palate, and will be esteemed by the young folks as a great treat. Who can say as much of salts, jalap, and other doctor's stuffs? and in a large family it will abridge the doctor's bill 101. a-year. HOW THE QUEEN'S CHILDREN ARE TRAINED -We have found the children of the Queen at nine in the morning at the Museum of Practical Art; and on another occasion, at the same hour, amidst the Elgin marbles -not the only wise hint to the mothers of England to be found in the highest place. Accustom your children to find beauty in goodness and goodness in beauty. A CELEBRATED character, who was surrounded with enemies, used to remark :"They are sparks which, if you do not blow, will go out of themselves." Let this be your feeling while endeavouring to live down the scandal of those who are bitter against you. If you stop to dispute, you do but as they desire, and open the way for more abuse. THE wages of sin is death. O think! VARIETIES. THE LESSON THE OLD WOULD TEACH US. It is astonishing how chilling the words of age fall upon the glowing enthusiasm of youth. As we go on through life, doubtless we gather all the same cold truths, but it is by degrees, not all at once, as when the freezing experience of many years is poured forth like a sudden fall of snow upon our hearts. Lucky, most lucky is it, that we cannot believe the lesson which the old would teach us: for certainly if we were as wise when we came unto life as when we go out of it, there would be nothing great, and very little good done in the world; we mean that there would be no enthusiasm of wish or of demeanour. LONGEVITY OF QUAKERS.-Quakerism is favourable to longevity. According to late English census returns, the average age attained by members of this peaceful sect in Great Britain, is fifty-one years, two months, and twenty-one days. Half of the population of the country die before reaching the age of twenty-one, and the average duration of life the world over is but thirty-three years; Quakers therefore, live a third longer than the rest of us. Quakers are temperate and prudent, are seldom in a hurry, and never in a passion. The journey of life to them is a walk of peaceful meditation. They neither suffer nor enjoy intensity, but preserve a composed demeanour always. THE CRYPT OF ST. PAUL'S.-We have reached the spot shown, and see in long perspective the glimmering sunbeam. We are now under the south aisle of the church-the monument on the right, of white marble, on which is represented a female seated at the organ, is to the memory of the daughter of Sir Christopher Wren, who, besides being a good musician, has the credit of having designed several of the City churches. On the left, the famous architect lies buried-next him his son; and a new white marble tablet is in memory of the great grand-daughter of Wren, who died at the age of 95 (Sir Christopher was 91, and his son 97 at the time of their deaths.) On opening the Wren tomb, to receive the body of the above-mentioned lady, the last of the race, the coffin of the architect was distinctly visible in good preservation. Close to the Wren monuments, under an unlettered slab, lies J. M. W. Turner, the greatest landscape painter of this or any other country. Close by are Sir Joshua Reynolds, Lawrence, Opie, Barry, Mylne, Fusseli, and a few others who have been equally distinguished in their walks with the warriors who are gathered in another 223 part of the crypt. The sun-light gleams amongst their graves. From the minds which dwell in the dust here gathered what splendid fancies and lessons have been embodied and passed amongst the multitude. Few could be left on this spot, where the roaring of the traffic outside exactly resembles the distant sound of the sea in times of storm, and not be impressed with a host of associations. The men themselves rise up like a reality to the mind's eye. Their glorious works seem in the darkness to form an exhibition; and the companions of the men, Johnson, Newton, and a score of others, fill up the picture. It is greatly to be hoped that no other body may be interred within the cathedral. So long as burial within churches be made a mark of honour, so long will the injurious and improper practice be generally persevered in. It was thus, indeed, that it arose.-Builder. A PATERNAL GOVERNMENT. -By a decree of the 2nd, the Grand Duke of Tuscany has enacted that all young men leading an irregular life, or having contracted habits of rioting and debauchery, shall be subjected to military discipline. DUTY OF PARENTS.-The last duty of parents to their children is that of giving them an education suitable to their station in life-a duty pointed out by reason and for the greatest importance of any. For as Puffendorf very justly observes, it is not easy to imagine or allow, that a parent has conferred any considerable benefit on his child by bringing him into the world, if he afterwards entirely neglects his culture and education, and suffers him to grow up like a beast, to lead a life useless to others and shameful to himself. GREAT MINDS.-How many minds-almost all the great ones-were formed in secrecy and solitude, without knowing whether they should ever make a figure or not! All they knew was, that they liked what they were about, and gave their whole souls to it. HER MAJESTY'S HOUSEKEEPING.-' Do you think,' said Mr. Denison, M.P., at Wakefield, 'that Her Majesty is anxious that her sugar should cost her 10d. per lb., when she may get it for 5d.? I can assure you, and I do not speak off the book, that Her Majesty pays her bills as regularly as any man I address. Nay, I tell you more. She knows the price of every article she orders before she orders it. She does not order on oredit and take the chance of being able to pay; and she sets her subjects in this respect, a most excellent example, which I wish they would all follow.' MRS. BEECHER STOWE, HER FAMILY, AND CLIENTS.-The November Number of Fraser's Magazine contains "Some Account of Mrs. Beecher Stowe and her Family." Mrs. Stowe is one of a family of twelve. Her father is Dr. Lyman Beecher, late pastor of a Presbyterian church in Ohio. Five of her brothers are pastors of Presbyterian churches-a sixth, killed by the accidental discharge of a gun some years since, was one of the most eminent ministers of the Western church. A seventh brother is a Boston merchant. One sister conducts a flourishing female school: the other two are married to lawyers. It is a remarkably "talented family." Nearly every one of its members has contributed to perpetuate and widen the renown conferred upon it by the eloquence and energy of the father himself the son of a New England blacksmith. He was of mature age before he quitted the anvil for the college. Ten years later, he was pastor of a church at Litchfield. Thence he removed to Boston; which he quitted in 1832 to take the charge of Lane Seminary, Cincinnati-an institution intended to combine self-supporting labour with collegiate studies. He retired from the post in 1849 or 1850. Harriet was born at Litchfield in 1812. In Boston, she received the best education that scholastic city cobld afford, and at an early age began to aid her sister in the conduct of a training-school for female teachers. She removed with her father to Cincinnati, and married the Rev. Calvin E. Stowe, Professor of Biblical Literature in the College. She is the mother of a numereus progeny, of whom five are living. [Every woman who has read "Uncle Tom" knows that the writer is a mother, and a bereaved one.] Entrusting household cares to a relative, she devoted herself to the education of her children and the instruction of the public, chiefly by imaginative contributions to the periodical press. It was her experience of slavery at Cincinnati, however, that determined the bent of her genius. STATISTICS. IMPORTATION OF EGGS. There were 10,205,787 eggs imported into this country in the month ending the 5th ult. NEARLY £19,000 was received in 1851 from soldiers who purchased their discharge from the British army. HUMAN MORTALITY.-According to the most accurate calculation an astronomical year contains 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 48 seconds. Suppose one individual to die every second, then we have 60 every minute, 300 every five minutes, 3,600 every hour, 86,400 every day, and 31,586,928 every year; and in thirty years 946,707,140. As this last number is equal to the present population of the earth, and as thirty years are calculated to be the period of one generation, it seems probable that one death every second is as accurate a calculation of human mortality as can be made. THE immigration into New York during July was 29,401 persons; since January 1, and up to August 1, 179,051, being an increase of 16,472 over the immigration for the same period in 1851. THERE is a cab-driver in London who once held a commisson in the army, and had property to the amount of £1,500,000. COST OF NATIONAL FUNERALS.-The supplies granted by Parliament for the year 1806, include the following items under the head "Miscellaneous Services"-the information is of some interest at the present moment: For the funeral of Viscount Nelson, £14,698 11s. 6d. For the funeral of Mr. Pitt, £6,045 2s. 6d. The cost of the funerals of statesmen may be nearly calculated by reference to the above estimate. It is probable that the funeral of the Duke of Wellington will not exceed that of the great Nelson. CHESHIRE SALT.-60,000 tons of salt are annually obtained from the Cheshire mines, which are worked in a similar manner to coal mines. THE revenue of the Money Order Office exceeded its expenses in the year 1851, by more than £7,000 of profit. The same office, before the important improvements of the last few years had been effected, cost the country a Loss of £10,600. In 1850 the doors of the Museum admitted 1,098,863 visitors; and in 1851 the same doors admitted 2,524,754 visitors, or above a million more. The Taxes repealed during the last six years amounted to £5,859,373. Printed by JOHN KENNEDY, of 32 Alpha Road, Regent's Park, at his Printing Office, |