ling boy, had induced him to forego all thoughts of remaining in India, and at once to give up an honourable and a lucrative situation for the sake of those with whose existence his own might be said to have been identified. Though no uncommon circumstance during an India voyage, the death of a child, who had become an object of deep interest to all, caused a general gloom to prevail on board; and it was curious to remark how, even among the kind but light-hearted seamen, the striking event subdued for a time spirits prone to be merry rather than wise into a settled calm, contrasting strangely with the natural dispositions of the men. Our noble ship was an Indiaman of the largest class, and every convenience and luxury, everything that could minister to the comfort of the poor invalids, on whose shattered frames an eastern clime had done its work, were to be found within her. She was wending her way through the waste of waters, full of passengers, for merry England,' from the shores of which not a few of my companions had for many years been absent. The sallow faces and emaciated forms of some told of toil and suffering under a tropical sun; and as I gazed on one wretched invalid, whose once manly frame was now in the last state of exhaustion and atrophy, and saw him carried up from his cot by half-a-dozen of black servants, in order that he might enjoy the renovating influence of the cool evening breeze, I could not help thinking that the land to which his affections were turned would never see him alive. Nor was I wrong; he died on our entering the Channel, when within sight of his native county, the lovely Devonshire.

It was the day after that on which the child had expired, and at two o'clock, that was fixed on for its funeral. The necessary preparations had been completed during the night, and the mortal remains, shrouded in the garments of death, deposited in a plain but neatly-finished coffin, made by the ship's carpenter. This man had, for a number of years, been employed in India traders, and the manner in which he had executed the task assigned him, afforded melancholy proof of his experience in a calling which, properly speaking, was none of his. The faint breeze, which the officer on watch had whistled for during the night, and which had sprung up towards morning, died away almost altogether by twelve o'clock; and so clear was the firmament, in which a scorching and almost vertical sun blazed, and so limpid and still were the mighty waters, that, as I gazed on the scene, it required no great strength of fancy to believe that the sky and ocean were united, and that our huge and magnificent vessel had been, by some unknown agency, dragged from her natural position, and now hung midway between the heavens and the ocean.

The last sad ceremony-the committing of the body to the deep-was conducted with becoming solemnity. As is frequently the case on such occasions, letters of invitation to the funeral from the captain of the ship were sent to all the passengers, and, in consequence, every one capable of coming upon deck was present, dressed of course in the manner which such a ceremony required. The sailors, too, had received their instructions; and, equipped in their best clothes, and all clean and neat, arranged themselves on the deck according to their respective stations. The large watch-bell had continued to toll for about half an hour previous, a flag was hoisted half-mast high, and exactly at two o'clock the little coffin, across which the ship's colours were thrown, was carried out of the cabin by two of the seamen, who, followed by the captain and the passengers, slowly advanced to that part of the vessel at which the sad ceremony was to take place. One of the cannonades to leeward had been detached from its fastenings, and removed midships; and the top slip of the bulwark, immediately over the port-hole, being also removed, a considerable space was thus left open, near to which the coffin was placed. A commodious awning had been erected across a portion of the deck, and on the captain opening the prayer-book of the church of England for the purpose of reading the funeral service, every head became uncovered, while the most perfect silence prevailed. That beautiful and impressive service was delivered in a solemn and affecting

manner; and at that part of it when the body is committed to the dust, the coffin was gently raised, then slowly lowered over the vessel's side, and the rope by which it was held being detached, it, with its little occupant, sunk at once into the fathomless abyss. Two pieces of iron kentledge were fastened to the bottom of the coffin, so that it, with its light contents-for the poor child had been sadly wasted by suffering-were soon and for ever hid from sight.

That spectacle I shall not easily forget; it was a truly impressive and affecting one. Many an eye, 'albeit unused to the melting mood,' was bathed in tears, while the father, stout-hearted and manly as he had proved himself on many a trying occasion, was carried rather than led to his cabin. That noble heart strove with emotions which were ready to burst it: he wept not, he spoke not; but the sorrow, the heart-lacerating sorrow within, was too big for utterance.

I have watched over the bed of the dying, and beheld disease in its most appalling forms-I have seen it commit its ravages on the old, the young, and the lovely. I have gazed on the pallid cheek and the wasted form of consumption's victim-been present when, maddened by raging fever, reason had lost its sway-seen the sufferer in the last stage of that scourge of the East, Asiatic cholera, and beheld death doing its work promptly when hope beat high and fortune was most lavish of her giftshave witnessed interments in many countries, and under many circumstances, but few occurrences have struck me more forcibly than the funeral of that poor infant. It was committed to the dark and deep blue ocean,' and sleeps well,' far from parents and from friends. The sea has entombed it, and the surge alone sings its requiem. No tears can bedew its grave-no tombstone nor inscription marks its resting-place. Its dust mingles not with that of its relations; it is apart from them-solitaryalone. The sea-bird screams, the wild wave roars, and the tempest howls its funeral dirge; and in lieu of the sweet flowers, emblems of its innocence, which, under other circumstances, would have bedecked its little grave, nought but the furious and the dashing billow is there.

There is something particularly striking and imposing in a funeral at sea. Those who have never witnessed can form no adequate idea of the sentiments it calls forth, and of the solemn associations it is so well calculated to awaken. There is something fearfully sublime in committing the body to the deep-something which makes the most inconsiderate reflect, and calls the attention of the most thoughtless. Funerals on land we are too apt to regard thoughtlessly, as every-day occurrences. We pass them heedlessly, as things of course, or follow the hearse, the nodding black plumes, and the other trappings of wo, as a form which the usages of society, and a proper respect for the departed, require of us. At sea it is different: there, away from everything that familiarises and too often sears the feelings to those sentiments which ought to affect, the melancholy ceremony strikes with irresistible force. Surrounded by the heaving billow, and in the midst of ocean's roar, the committing of a body to the deep is strikingly imposing and impressive, and cannot fail to remind us of our own insignificance, and the power of Him who can still its thunders and arrest its waves.

PUBLIC HEALTH.

IT gives us pleasure to perceive that the subject of Public Health, to which we have frequently directed attention, is not losing any of its interest with the inhabitants of our larger towns-that section of the population to whom it is most immediately important. The members of the Liverpool Mechanics' Institution, it appears, have recently been favoured with a course of lectures on the subject by Dr Guy of King's College, London-a gentleman already well known by his efforts to improve the sanitary condition of the English metropolis. His remarks On the influence of trades and professions on the duration of life,' as given in the newspaper abstracts, contain some statistical information deserving of the widest circulation.

LONGEVITY.

Forming a sanitary scale for the higher classes, we have to place at the bottom of it, as having the shortest lives, the very class which, in every other respect, is raised so high above the common run of mankind-kings. Their lives are even shorter than the average of the great mass of their subjects. The average age at death of all the several classes dying, of 31 years and upwards, is as follows:-Kings of England, 59 years; members of royal houses, not being crowned heads, 64; members of the families of the peerage and baronetage, 67; English gentry, 70. The general opinion which prevailed of the longevity of the peerage and baronetage is decidedly erroneous. If we compare the aristocracy with the members of the several professions, we find them shorter-lived than the clergy, than physicians and surgeons, than barristers; they are also shorter-lived than literary and scientific men, than men engaged in the pursuits of trade and commerce, than officers in the navy; but they have a slight advantage over the officers of the army-a class which is largely recruited from the ranks of the aristocracy. Amongst the professions, the clergy rank first as being most healthy, next physicians and surgeons, and lastly lawyers; but the last two are nearly on a par. Are the aristocracy longer-lived than the working-classes? Ninety-nine out of a hundred would answer yes; but this, however, is very far from being the case. At 30 years of age, the aristocracy have an expectation of 31 years. The expectation for all England is upwards of 34 years, while that for the agricultural labourer is nearly 41 years. It is true there are many members of the aristocracy who live to a great age-so there are of all other classes; but the average, and not extremes, should be our guide. These results show that bodily labour is in the highest degree conducive to health. There are honourable exceptions, but the majority of the aristocracy of all countries yield to the temp tations to bodily and mental inactivity, to sloth and luxury, which are so thickly scattered in their path, and the consequences are feeble health and short life. It is the chase, the struggle, the contest, the labour, which is the wholesome and the pleasant thing. Though possession is ninetenths of the law, it is not a tithe of the pleasure or the profit of the effort by which it is obtained. Labour, then -the labour of the body in the greatest degree, mental exertion to a less extent-is one of the chief elements, indeed the chief element, of health and long life. Bodily labour in pure air is the combination which carries health and physical development to its highest pitch of perfection; and this is the fountain from which the community at large draw a perennial supply of strength and vigour. It is from the rural districts that the large towns draw their recruits to fill up the wide gaps which disease is always making in their ranks; and it was from the warriors of old that our noble families derived the vigour which has enabled them to continue through successive generations the possessors of hereditary rank and fortune. So, too, the rude health and vigour which exercise alone can produce is constantly forcing its way upwards from the lowest to the highest places in the social scale, to supply the waste of life which luxury is constantly making among the higher classes of the community.

TOWNS'-PEOPLE.

Dr Guy next compares the three classes which may be said to make up the sum-total of our towns'-population-namely, the gentry, including professional persons; the trading and mercantile class; and the operatives. Some time since, he had been at some pains to extract from the mortuary registers of the metropolis for the year 1839, the ages at death of the three classes of society-gentry, tradesmen, and operatives-dying aged 15 years and upwards; and he found, taking the average, that the gentry lived 59 years, the tradesmen lived only 49, and the labouring class 48: that was to say, the gentry live 11 years longer than the Labouring population, and 10 years longer than tradesmen; and this, it should be recollected, in spite of the circumstance that the labouring classes, when favourably placed, live much longer than the higher classes. How unfavourable, then, to health and life must be the circumstances by which they are surrounded in our large towns, to give rise to so very great a disparity! Tables, carefully compiled, went to prove that the tradesman himself is shorterlived than the working man by one or two years, and much shorter-lived than the members of the higher classes; but the families of tradesmen have some advantage over those of the working-classes. The lecturer confessed that,

for his part, he was not displeased with this result, for it might induce the middle classes to bring their influence to bear on the legislature to adopt sanitary measures for the good of themselves, their dependants, their workmen, and the nation at large. It was also satisfactory to observe that the lives of the higher classes were shortened, and their health impaired, in all those towns in which the other orders of the community are placed in unfavourable circumstances. The tradesman occupies an intermediate place, in a sanitary point of view, between those of the working-class who are employed out of doors and those who work in. In Leeds, the gentry live 44 years, the tradesmen 27, and operatives 19; in Preston, the gentry live 47 years, the tradesmen 32, and operatives 18; in Bolton, the ages for the three classes are 34 years, 23 years, and 18 years; in Manchester, the average age for the gentry is 38 years, for tradesmen 20 years, and for operatives 17 years. This was bad enough, but Liverpool was worse. Its gentry live on an average 35 years, its tradesmen 22, and its operatives (it scarcely seemed credible) 15 years! The average for the whole town is only 17 years, which is precisely the average for the operative class alone in the most unhealthy parish in London!

CONSUMPTION.

It was

The three classes of society-gentry, tradesmen, and operatives-were then contrasted in reference to their liability to consumption. While 1 death out of every 6 occurring in the gentry, 15 years of age and upwards, was due to consumption, 1 out of every 3 occurring among tradesmen of the same ages, and 1 out of every 31 occurring in the labouring class, is traceable to that cause. not uninteresting to observe also that consumption, when it does occur, takes place later in life among the gentry than among tradesmen, and later among tradesmen than among the operative and labouring class. Persons employed in-doors die earlier, attain a lower average age, are more liable to consumption (and those who die of it, die at an earlier age), than persons working in the open air. Some might perhaps be inclined to attribute this superior wholesomeness of out-door occupations not to the purer air, but to the exercise which often accompanied them; but that this was not the case, might be inferred from the circumstance, that the hawker, who sits or stands about in our streets and markets, and certainly uses quite as little exertion as the majority of persons employed within doors, enjoys the same comparative immunity from consumption, and this in spite of his constant exposure to one of its most exciting causes-cold. He had found, from experience, that the liability to consumption was inversely as to the amount of exertion; that consumption occurs earlier in sedentary employments than in those requiring more exertion; and in the latter, again, than in those requiring great exertion; that the deaths from all causes follow the same rule; and that the average age at death is lowest in the sedentary class. There was then abundant proof that in employments carried on in-doors, exercise has a most beneficial effect. This was illustrated by the case of the compositor and pressman. They both breathe the same kind of air, in rooms similarly constructed, warmed, and lighted; they resembled each other, in fact, in everything but the amount of exertion which they employ. A comparison gave the striking result, that while the compositor suffers from attacks of consumption in about 3 of all other diseases, the pressman is liable to only 1 in 5. Then the question suggested itself, Was exercise in all its degrees conducive to health? Could a man not use too much exertion? Undoubtedly he might. Too much exertion, like too little, tended to shorten life. The result of an accurate comparison which he had made was, that the average age of pressmen is 34 years, that of compositors 28. It was a fair inference, then, that the pressman lives on an average six years longer than the compositor; and yet it was a curious fact that the compositor attains, in rare instances, a much greater age than the pressman. Thus, while the oldest pressman whom he had found at work was 60, the oldest compositor was 72. This apparent anomaly was easily explained. Men who work hard, begin, towards 50 years of age, to suffer from diseases produced by over-exertion, which diseases, if they continue their employment, are sure to prove fatal before many years have passed: but, on the other hand, those who lead a sedentary life, having resisted the unwholesome influences to which they are exposed, continue to live on in the use of a degree of exertion quite compatible with diminished strength, and may attain a good old age. In conclusion, Dr Guy alluded to the relative amount of injury

from want of exercise and foul air. It was an acknowledged fact, that consumption could be produced in animals by confining them in a hot and foul atmosphere; which was equivalent to consigning human beings, and especially the young, to sedentary occupations in ill-ventilated workshops. The labourer at 30 years of age has an expectation of 40 years; the clerk of only 27 years-a difference of no less than 13 years: and does not this speak volumes in favour of air and exercise? and does it not force upon us the duty of striving, with all our might and means, to secure for the poorer inhabitants of large towns facilities for exercise and pure air, of which a long course of negligence has deprived them?

GAS-BURNING.

In the state in which it is commonly used, the gas consumed in our large towns is very far from pure its disagreeable odour is evidence of this. But in its purest state, it creates a poisonous gas, which diffuses itself into the apartment where it is burned. This poisonous gas-carbonic acid-is the same that issues from the lungs of animals, and renders the air they have breathed unfit for the support of life. The carbonic acid gas thrown off by one gas-light of the ordinary size, is equal to the products of the respiration of three or four human beings. The use of gas within doors, without making any provision for carry ing off the poisonous products of combustion, is one of those barbarisms with which, in these days of semi-civilisation, we are surrounded. Respiration being merely a process of combustion, and the human body a furnace of Hesh, the products of respiration are the same as those of combustion, and the human body has the same effect on the air of an apartment as a gas-light or a furnace, and employing men in over-crowded apartments, without making provision for ventilation, is like filling a room with gas-light or charcoal choffers.

CAUSES OF DISEASE IN LARGE TOWNS.

Having stated that England is naturally the most healthy kingdom in Europe, the lecturer went on to show that the amount of disease which prevailed in large towns was not natural; and that it was to be attributed mainly, if not entirely, to the impurity of the air, caused by the dense clouds of smoke from chimneys, and the exhalations arising from refuse matter, slaughter-houses, gas-works, cess-pools, &c. &c. It could not be said that the habits of the population of large towns are not as good as those of the inha bitants of rural districts. Some part of the evil had been attributed to intemperance, but the large amount of mortality among children, who certainly are not the victims of intemperance, showed that this cause had little to do with it. Again, the excess of mortality in towns could not be attributed to low wages, or scanty food, or deficient clothing, or want of shelter from the weather. In all these respects the agricultural labourers were in a much worse position. All comparisons led to the same conclusion-that the excess of disease was mainly attributable to impure air. A large city, as things now were, was a huge manufactory of foul air, where disease was always busy, and pestilence never absent. What with the over-crowding of the inhabitants, the absence of efficient sewerage, the almost total want of ventilation of houses and workshops, the too prevalent use of stoves, added to the national horror of draughts, the air was rendered a subtle and deadly poison, of which the labouring-classes, and persons following sedentary occupations, were the first and most numerous victims. The remedies necessary for the removal of this evil were broad, straight thoroughfares, with here and there large open spaces; in other words, wide streets, and large squares and public gardens, conjoined with an abundant supply of pure water, efficient sewerage for the removal of dirty

water and other refuse; and last, but not least, clean and well-aired habitations.

QUACK ADVERTISEMENTS. In a late number of Blackwood's Magazine, appears a eulogy on the newspaper press of Great Britain not less eloquent than just. It is very true that this press is an honour to the country, if only for its abstinence from slander, ribaldry, and other ministrations to the meaner part of our nature; we can also prize its ceaseless vigilance in denouncing corruption, oppression, wickedness, and fraud, wheresoever they exist; nor can we withhold our admiration and wonder at the activity

It will immediately occur to every one that we allude to the unscrupulous admission of advertisements of quack medicines and quack-medical books into the columns of our newspapers. The gross deception and falsehood, the scandalous impurity, not to say the revolting indecency, of these advertisements, ought assuredly, and at whatever pecuniary sacrifice, to prevent their circulation. Some newspapers there are which systematically, and on principle, repudiate this class of announcements; but these are intrepid and honourable exceptions to what would seem a universal rule. The Lancet the other day took occasion to allude to the subject, and disclosed some of the statistics, as well as injurious results, of these infamous advertisements.

For the purpose of scrutiny, we took five of these quack names [in London], and found that, on an average, three advertisements per diem appear in each of the seven daily papers; this makes twenty-one per day, or one hundred and twenty-six per week. The weekly journals of various kinds number nearly one hundred, and in one week these five advertisements appeared upwards of two hundred and fifty' times. This was exclusive of magazines, monthlies, and quarterlies, with miscellaneous publications, and exclusive of the country newspapers, in nearly all of which the whole of these advertisements appear. Taking the advertisements from these sources altogether, they may be fairly computed at another two hundred and fifty. This would make for the five six hundred and twenty-six per week, or thirtytwo thousand six hundred and fifty per annum! The advertisements are known to be lengthy, and a respectable news-agent whom we applied to, assured us they could not cost less than 10s. each. This calculation gives upwards of L.16,000 a-year as the expenditure of these five quacks in advertising alone!* These persons live in expensive houses, and it is not unusual to see them calling in their carriages with advertisements at the newspaper offices, so that their entire incomes must be enormous, and all filched from the profession in cases of real illness, or extorted from the public where disease is only fancied!

"These quacks greatly affect religious and well-reputed publications; it gives them, as it were, character to appear constantly in these pages. With a keen eye to business, they are also delighted at having a nextdoor advertisement to a respectable book. They are, it is true, generally consigned to the bottom of the page; but as newspapers cannot draw a quarantine quite round them, some one or other must daily see their works advertised in contact with these abominations. This is a point worth the notice of those papers who will continue to circulate the pestilent humbug. They should, at least, place blocks of non-conducting puffs between them and the better sort of advertisements.

'We have said they greatly value the religious publications; they are now kicked out of nearly all the weekly newspapers of this class. Some, however, there are where Mammon prevails over decency.

Enormous as are the sums spent in advertising, they would be much greater but for a system which obtains in the provinces of compounding for payment. These people are permitted to send down to country papers a quantity of their books and medicines with their advertisements; the books and medicines are sold at the newspaper office, or by some druggist or stationer in the neighbourhood, and the puffs are paid for out of the proceeds. In this way it is, or by direct payment, that in almost every provincial journal in the kingdom,

* As we observe that the same quack advertisements regularlyappear in the colonial papers, this sum must be considerably understated.-ED. C. E. J.

the physical results of human iniquity are blazoned forth with all that prominency of type-setting of which George Robins was the proud inventor. This will scarcely be believed of such a class of men as provincial newspaper editors, publishers, and proprietors. But the fact is so.

'One might pursue these creatures through the deceptions of their disgusting traffic, but the task is irksome, and we will add but one or two more glaring instances. Doubtless respectable readers are startled to see critiques of books of this class advertised, purporting to come from respectable papers.' But often the names of fictitious newspapers are employed; and so likewise are the names of respectable medical men simulated, as guaranteeing cures. 'Somewhat remains to be said about the more immediate depredations of these wretches upon the poor flies who become entangled in their webs. Like Peter Schlemihl's fiend, they hold him firmly if they have but his shadow in their grasp, and in most instances the price of silence is paid. We have known them reduce their dupes to beggary and to the madhouse.

The whole question has its bearing on the medical profession, and forcibly urges the necessity of defending the faculty and the public from quackery by legal enactments; but it has, too, a still more important relation to public and social morality. It can scarcely be wondered at, when the young and the ignorant are exposed to the continual taint of these prurient advertisements-when the disgusting anatomy of vice is every where paraded with but the flimsiest covering-and the very debris of the grossest of our animal passions are thrust before the pure and the impure alike, irrespective of either sex or age. It is impossible that the continued exposure of such things to the curiosity of young people can be without a baleful effect. We are persuaded that they are a prolific source of the evils they falsely profess to remedy. The fabric we have attempted to expose, based as it is on lying, fraud, and every imaginable form of deceit, must be brought to the ground. We commend the subject to all those who desire to act as conservators of public morals; but, above all, the bringing public opinion to bear upon its indirect supporters is what we would aim at. Public opinion is the great lictor, and never were the axe and the fasces more imperatively required.'

Inveterate cigar

usual quantity from two to three ounces. smokers will consume from four to five dozen per week. The first morbid result is an inflammatory condition of the mucous membrane of the lips and tongue; then the tonsils and pharynx suffer the mucous membrane becoming dry and congested. If the thorax be examined well, it will be found slightly swollen, with congested veins meandering over the surface, and here and there a streak of mucus. Action ascends upwards into the posterior nares. The eye becomes affected with heat, slight redness, lachrymation, and a peculiar spasmodic action of the orbicularis muscle, experienced with intolerance of light on awaking in the morning. The frontal sinuses do not escape, but there is a heavy dull ache in their region. Descending down the alimentary canal, we come to the stomach, where the results in extreme cases are symptoms of gastritis. Pain, tenderness, and a constant sensation of sickliness, and desire to expectorate, belong to this affection. The action of the cotic on the nervous system; but a morbid state of the heart and lungs is impaired by the influence of the narlarynx, trachea, and lungs results from the direct action of the smoke. The voice is observed to be rendered hoarser, and with a deeper tone. Sometimes a short cough results, and a case of ulceration in the cartilages of the larynx came under the doctor's notice. The patient was such a slave to the habit, that he hardly ever had the pipe out of his mouth. Similar sufferings have been caused by similar practices in other instances. Another form is a slight tickling, low down in the pharynx or trachea, and the patient coughs, or rather hawks up, a grumous-looking blood. It is so alarming, as to be mistaken for pulmonary hæmoptysis. The action of tobacco-smoking on the heart is depressing; and some individuals who feel it in this organ more than others, complain of an uneasy sensation about the left nipple-a distressing feeling, not amounting to faintness, but allied to it. The action of the heart is observed to be feeble and .irregular. An uneasy feeling is also experienced in or beneath the pectoral muscles, and oftener on the right side than on the left. On the brain the use of tobacco appears to diminish the rapidity of cerebral action, and check the flow of ideas through the excites to wakefulness, like green tea, than composes to mind. It differs from opium and henbane, and rather sleep; induces a dreaminess which leaves no impression on the memory, leaving a great susceptibility, indicated by a trembling of the hands and irritability of temper. Such are secondary results of smoking; so are blackness of teeth and gum-boils. There is also a sallow paleness of the complexion, an irresoluteness of disposition, a want of life and energy, and, in constant smokers who do not drink, a tendency to pulmonary phthisis. Dr Wright of Birmingham, in a communication to the author, fully corrogastric disorders, coughs, and inflammatory affections of borates his opinions; and both agree that smoking produces the larynx and pharynx; diseases of the heart, and lowness of the spirits; and, in short, is very injurious to the respiratory, circulating, alimentary, and nervous systems.— Literary Gazette.

A HINDOO GENIUS.

THE CONSEQUENCES OF SMOKING.

The wide-spread habit of smoking has not yet had due medical attention paid to it and its consequences. It is only by two or three years' observations that Dr Laycock had become fully aware of the great changes induced in the system by the abuse of tobacco, and of the varied and obscure forms of disease to which especially excessive smoking gave origin. He proceeded to state some of them as they were met with in the pharyngical mucous membrane, the stomach, the lungs, the heart, the brain, and the nervous system. The tobacco consumed by habitual smokers varied from half an ounce to twelve ounces per week, the

which had a remarkable run. Soon after this he began to engrave on lead pictures of the gods and goddesses of the Hindoo Pantheon, of which hundreds of thousands were struck off on inferior paper, and obtained a ready sale. Some of them were afterwards adorned by the art of the limner, and being set in frames, sold of course for a higher price. Hawkers were employed in traversing the country with packs of these mythological prints, both on account of our Serampore printer, and others who soon found it advantageous to imitate his example in Calcutta. Hence there are few villages to be found in a circle of many miles round the country in which the cottages of perhaps the poorest individual is not supplied with the veritable effigy of some one of the popular gods. The supply, however, soon became too great for the demand, and his competitors relinquished the trade, which has since languished, and is now confined to a very limited extent.