Column for Mothers. WHENEVER mankind, in any of their systems, violate the laws of nature, nature works out her own revenge-punishes those who transgress the rules which she has obviously established for the govern. ment of her creatures. People see instances of this every day of their lives, but they pertinaciously abstain from avoiding errors which they perceive must in all likelihood end in misery of some kind or other: They see aged intemperates in a state of paralysissee the errors of one generation visited in the phy sical debility on the next, or, as the scriptures expresses it, "the sins of the fathers visited on the children"-see the improvident in destitution-see health destroyed by a too strict adherence to the frivolities of fashion in respect of dress-see the most

dismal disasters arising from imprudent matrimonial connections-see children ruined by the decidedly erroneous management of parents, coupled with an improper routine of miscalled education-these, and a thousand other things equally liable to censure, they are not so blind as not to perceive, and even condemn upon an occasion, and yet they go and do likewise. A momentary gratification of the baser sentiments, or an idle desire to act in conformity with some absurd conventional arrangement, banishes for the time every thing like a sober calculation of consequences of what is likely to be the penalty which will be ultimately exacted from them.

It is not our present desire to animadvert on conventional errors of this description, further than to allude to the injurious practice which is followed by many parents of dismissing their children from their domestic circle, for the sake of physical and mental culture during early life. Here we have a beautiful instance of necessary retribution. The dismissal of new-born infants from the maternal bosom is occasionally caused by inability to carry on the process of nursing, and in such cases it is no doubt excusable, if not advisable, although it is very clear that the mother who is incapable of suckling an infant should not have complained had it been her lot to be childless. Nature intended that every mother should be the nurse of her own children, and it is only in the case of inattention to the organic laws that nature fails to effect the accomplishment of her object-fails from the interposition of art on an irrational principle. We do not know that it is argued that a child thrives best in bodily health when it draws its support from the breast of its mother, but we feel perfectly convinced that nurture on the part of the parent is absolutely essential to produce feelings of lasting sympathy and affection towards her offspring. Can there be a sight more interesting within the scope of our daily observation, than that of a mother holding her darling babe to her bosom? With what affection does she look upon its innocent efforts!-how she rejoices in cherishing it!—the whole of her faculties are roused to save it from distress, to rear it with that depth of love which none but a mother in her situation can possibly experience! What can surpass a mother's love? It is the strong undying bond which links hearts together. The mother, however, who has not experienced the pleasures, the hopes, and the fears of a nurse, has rarely the power of loving her child with this ar. dour of attachment, it being the associations of sentiment with the period of infantile wants, not the mere circumstance of maternity, which form the foundation of that affection which lasts through the remainder of existence. If the mother, therefore, who does not nurse her children, be generally deprived of ardent love for her offspring which nature designed her to possess, so in the same respects are children who have never experienced a mother's tenderness in early youth, little animated in after-life with filial regard for the being from whom they sprung. It is apparent, that, in courses such as these, a serious violation of the moral and social duties is committed, and this sooner or later will be demonstrated, and perhaps felt with no small measure of mental anguish. Viewing the matter in the most favourable light in which it can possibly be beheld, there is an evil worthy of being deplored, and which should, if within the bounds of possibility, be avoided.

When one considers the responsibilities connected with the office of a mother, it seems strange that any could be found who would, on grounds the most specious, systematically leave the nurture and early cul ture of their children to strangers. But the claims of fashion are stronger than the demands of duty, There are thousands of mothers in the polite circles of society who can hardly say that they have ever be stowed one hour's serious attention on their offspring from the moment of their birth. They allow them to be nursed by strangers, cultivated by servants draughted from the inferior classes, and, lastly, educated at seminaries far distant from the paternal roof-altogether composing a series of practices, fatal, both as respects the mental affection which should always subsist be twixt parents and children, and the well-being of society. Outraged nature fails not to work out her The thoughtless parents reap a plentiful harvest of bitter fruits: disobedience, personal disre spect, misconduct, the formation of vicious habits, are

revenge.

a few of the rich rewards which they may calculate upon enjoying.

Mostly all men who have attained distinction from their abilities and behaviour, have been heard to declare that they owed every thing to their mother. It was she who first instilled into them the principles of virtue, who guided, advised, and amused them in their youthful years, who sustained them amidst the difficulties of their scholastic studies, and kept prompting them to persevere in well-doing, in order that they might finally gain those honours, of which talent and good conduct are every way deserving. Blessed has been the of existence, have been able to look back with gratisfate of those who, through all the changes and chances cation and exultation to that period of infancy when their footsteps were guided and their mind directed by a good mother. Hapless the condition of those whose recollections are not associated with such circumstances of pleasing remembrance! They have probably had many disagreeable obstacles to contend with; been subjected to many of those chills and misfortunes from which the arm of a fond mother could alone have shielded them.

Seeing that it is to the attention of mothers that children have frequently to attribute their success and happiness in life, it is a matter of deep importance that such attention should be substantially bestowed. Should the mother be unable to nurse her infant, she should at least spare no pains to compensate so great an evil by subsequent superintendence. No one can training so well as herself. In doing so, and in watchbe expected to perform the duties attendant on moral ing over the growth of the juvenile mind, she must necessarily sacrifice many of her own pleasures and inclinations; but she is engaged in a solemn duty the forming of the character of a human being; and this is a task which no conscientious parent can safely trifle with. No mother will be able to act her part satisfactorily who does not obtain a powerful hold on the affections of her child, as well as its respect for her admonitions. Having gained these points, others will be of comparatively easy attainment. We would say to mothers so circumstanced, commence by giving your children habits of strict cleanliness and propriety of behaviour. Do not scold or frighten them, or show any indulgence of partiality. Be gentle, yet firm, in manner, and accustom them to show kind and joyful looks for the attention bestowed upon them. While some children are encouraged to be pert and forward, others are so much dashed by neglect as to be perfectly sheepish and sulky when brought into the presence of strangers. These extremes are equally condemnable, and should be carefully avoided. You should take great care to impress on your children the conviction, that what you promise you will perform. If you say that they shall not have a thing, do not give it to them because they cry. When a child knows that it can get what it likes by crying, it soon learns to make use of its powers: crying becomes its engine of perpetual annoyance. It must, however, be taught self-denial, and be convinced that its will is not to be a law.

You cannot take sufficient pains to prevent your children taking up prejudices, antipathies, and superstitions. The human being seems to possess a natural disposition to destroy and to kill, which ought, if possible, to be suppressed; yet this is seldom done. They are allowed to perpetrate cruelties on insects and other kinds of animals, also to hate some and love others, and to assume prejudices which will adhere to them through life. "I think I may say (says John Locke, the author of the Treatise of the Human Understanding), that of all the men we meet with, nine parts of ten are what they are, good or evil, useful or not, by their education. It is that which makes the great difference in mankind. The little or almost insensible impressions on our tender infancies have very important consequences; and there it is, as in the fountains of rivers, where a gentle application of the hand turns the flexible waters into channels, that make them take quite contrary courses; and by this little direction given them at first in the source, they receive different tendencies, and arrive at last at very remote and distant places; imagine the minds of chil dren as easily turned, this way or that, as water itself.”

of the infant mind might be rendered subservient, not only to moral improvement, but to the enlargement and multiplication of our capacities of enjoyment.

Our daily experience shows us how susceptible the tender mind is of deep impressions, and what permanent effects are produced on the character and happiness of individuals, by the casual associations formed in childhood among the various ideas, feelings, and affections, with which they were habitually occupied. If it be possible for the influence of fashion to veil the natural deformity of vice, and to give to low and cri minal indulgences the appearances of spirit, of ele connecting in the tender mind these pleasing associa gance, and of gaiety, can we doubt the possibility of tions with pursuits truly worthy and honourable? By far the greater part of the opinions on which we act in life are not the result of our own investigations, but are adopted implicitly in infancy and youth upon the authority of others. When a child hears either a speculative absurdity, or an erroneous principle of action, recommended and enforced daily by the same voice which first conveyed to it those simple and su blime lessons of morality and religion which are con. genial to its nature, is it to be wondered at that in future life it should find it so difficult to eradicate

prejudices which have twined their roots with all the essential principles of the human frame ?"

Here, then, is perceived the necessity for preventing your children from acquiring erroneous opinions and prejudices, or fostering uncontrollable appetites lectual welfare. But long and watchful must be your for that which is injurious to their moral and intelendeavours to banish the innate or acquired propensity to evil, and to cultivate benevolence and gentleness along with force of character. Half-a-dozen words uttered by an ignorant domestic, may in a moment plant a superstition or a prejudice, which not all your exertions, nor even the power of reason in after-life, will be able entirely to eradicate.

A HYMN AT SUNSET AMONG The Alps.
Oh Thou who hast thine altar made
On every mountain's brow;
Whose temple is the forest's shade,
Its arch, the forest bough;
Thou hast ever listened when we prayed,
And thou wilt hear us now.

Full kingly is thy royal grace

On the wide world poured forth;
From the sunny south, "in pride of place,"
To the icy-girded north;
The glorious beauty of thy face
Doth shine upon the earth.

To each to all-thy bounty flows

Full, boundless, deep, and free;
Thou hast flowers for earth, and stars for heaven,
And gems for the blue sea;

And for us our everlasting hills,

And hearts which dauntless be.
More hast though given, oh God! yet more
Than our spirits true and bold;
And our mighty mountain sentinels,
Those watchers stern and old-
The shadow of a glorious past
Our memory doth enfold.
That little band of shepherd men

Who left their flocks with Thee,
And, strong in heart, went boldly forth
To make our mountains free-
Thy hand was with their steadfast worth,
And they won the victory.

And they the saints of later time,
Who dwell in places lone,
And wandering exiles for their faith,
Through toil and famine, fight and death
Their martyry crowns have won.-
'Twas thou received their fleeting breath
And they sit beneath thy throne.
Forsake us not, but as of old

So let our spirits be;
And give us still the courage bold
To keep our mountains free;
And our ancestral faith to hold,

Wherewith we worship thee.
The cattle on a thousand hills,

The feeble and the small-
We leave throughout the silent night,
Nor fear lest harm befal;

For thou who blessed the patriarch's store,
Wilt guard and keep them all.
Praise from the mountain's lordly crest,
Praise from the valley lone,
For all our daily blessedness,
For our bright ones who are gone,
To thee, the mightiest, wisest, best,
The great Eternal One!

LONDON: Published, with Permission of the Proprietors, by ORR & SMITH, Paternoster Row; and sold by G. BERGER, Holywell Street, Strand : BANs & Co., Manchester: WRIGHTSON & WEBB, Birmingham: WILLMER & SMITH, Liverpool; W. E. SOMERSCALE, Leeds; C. N. WRIGHT, Nottingham; M. BINGHAM. Bristol: S. SIMMS, Bath; C. GAIN, Exeter: J. PUR DON, Hull: A. WHITTAKER, Sheffield; H. BELLERDY, Yorkt J. TAYLOR, Brighton: GEORGE YOUNG, Dublin; and all other Booksellers and Newsmen in Great Britain and Ireland, Canada, Nova Scotia. and United States of America.

Complete sets of the work from its commencement, or num. iers to complete sets, may at all times be obtained from the Pubishers or their Agents.

Stereotyped by A. Kirkwood, Edinburgh, Printed by Bradbury and Evans (late T. Davison), Whitefriară.

ridicule those who are zealous for public ends, and when a well-intentioned man asks what will become of their posterity, reply, Then as now.

If this epidemical and intellectual disorder could be corrected, whose bad effects are already visible, those evils might still be prevented; but if it proceeds in its growth, Providence will correct man by the very revolution which must spring from it." A writer named Guibert, in 1727, gave notice of the secret advance of those popular sentiments which such conduct in public men is apt to excite. "The sovereigns of Europe," said he, "wear very bad spectacles. A conspiracy is actually forming, by means at once so subtle and efficacious, that I am sorry not to have come into the world thirty years later to witness its result. The proofs of it are mathematical, if such proofs ever were, of a conspiracy." Rousseau also predicted those terrible revenges of outraged human nature. In his Emile, he advised the higher classes of society to have their children taught some useful trade; a notion," says D'Israeli, "highly ridiculed at the time of its appearance; but at its hour, the awful truth struck." "I hold it impossible," said the Genevan philosopher, about 1760,"for the great European monarchies to last much longer: we approach the age of revolutions."

In reference to the French Revolution, we may notice the prognostications of Robert Fleming, which, though certainly made upon less philosophical grounds, happened to have a more exact fulfilment than any other. Fleming, who was minister of the presbyterian congregation of Lothbury, in London, wrote in 1701 a work entitled The Rise and Fall of the Papacy. Proceeding upon his own interpretation of the Apocalypse, and perhaps some unavowed perception of that tendency of affairs which impressed the mind of Leib. nitz, he announced in this pamphlet that, about the year 1794, it was very probable that the French monarchy, which he considered a prime supporter of antichrist, would receive a mortification or humbling.

We have some fears, in coming down to a later age, lest, by touching upon questions which are as yet agi. tated by living men, we should do that which we are 80 anxious to avoid doing-awaken controversial feelings among our readers. Protesting, at least, against every suspicion of such an intention, we venture to recal to the public mind the vaticinations of Mr Coleridge respecting the termination of the great Napoleonic wars in the restoration of the Bourbons. This prophecy Mr Coleridge gave forth many years before the event, at a time when all the powers of Europe were cowed by the French emperor; and it was "in the state of Rome under the first Cæsars," as he informs us, that he discovered the grounds of his conclusion. In like manner, he found, in the rebellion of the United Provinces against Philip II., a precedent for the revolt of the Spanish American colonies; an event which accordingly happened in due time. The fall of Bonaparte was also foretold, at his highest pitch of pride, by the Marquis of Wellesley :-"His love of power," said this statesman in the sublime language of philosophical prophecy,* "is so inordinate; his jealousy of independence so fierce; his keenness of appetite so feverish in all that touched his ambition, even in the most trifling things, that he must plunge into dreadful difficulties. He is one of an order of minds that by nature make for themselves great reverses."

Our civil wars of the seventeenth century were strikingly prefigured in the history of "the League:" the Scottish Covenanters even borrowed the form of their celebrated bond of resistance from documents supplied by that history. "We are struck," says D'Israeli, by the similar occurrences performed by the same political characters who played their part in both those great theatres of human action. A satirical royalist of those times has commemorated the motives, the incidents, and the personages in the Satire Menippée de la Vertu du Catholicon d'Espagne;' and this famous satire is a perfect Hudibras in prose. The writer discovers all the bitter ridicule of Butler in his ludicrous and severe exhibition of the Etats de Paris, while the artist who designed the plates becomes no contemptible Hogarth." Again, the history of England from the commencement of the civil wars to the Revolution of 1688, gave a wonderfully exact presage of the whole series of events in France between 1789 and 1830. For every transaction which took place in the latter period-almost for every character who

This expression is Mr D'Israeli's.

came upon the scene-a prototype was to be found in whom the small foci of mental light and social polity the British annals. The resemblance of the fate of which formerly existed, were at all times liable to be Louis XVI. to that of Charles I., the unsettlement of overwhelmed. It is evident that, to form a clear and all former fixed notions of rule and polity, the subju. feasible anticipation of the future, the mind must be gation of the two convulsed countries respectively under of large grasp, capable of appreciating and arrang. a Cromwell and a Bonaparte, the temporary restora- ing the materials of great and complicated questions, tion of the Stuarts and the Bourbons, and, finally, the and perfectly free from those magnifying and obscur. displacement of the heads of those families in favouring mists which the present raises around the paths of cadets who promised to act with a more limited of men.* authority, are but the outlines of a parallel in which innumerable subordinate circumstances and personages would be found to tally. But, as already hinted, precedents for the events of the French revolutionary history were also to be found in the histories of ancient Greece and Rome. This strikingly appeared in a volume published at Paris in 1801, under the title of an Essay on the History of the French Revolution, by a society of Latin authors; in which the recent events were described at once appositely and minutely by a collection of passages copied without alteration from the Roman historians.

IMPROVEMENT IN THE IRON
MANUFACTURE.

WE have great pleasure in making our readers acquainted with a remarkable improvement which, within the last few years, has been unostentatiously effected in the process of manufacturing iron. It is perhaps generally known that iron is produced by the smelting of iron ore in furnaces, the ore being mingled with charred coal, and certain ingredients called fluxes, to cause the metal to flow. When the ore is fused, it is permitted to flow in streams into fosses of cold sand in the floor. After being cooled in this manner, it possesses the character of cast-iron, and is technically called pig-iron. Its manufacture into a malleable state is a subsequent process. The furnaces employed for the purpose of smelting the ore are usually called blast furnaces, from the strong application of blasts of air from large-sized bellows. It is in the application of the blasts that the improvement has been effected, a circumstance which, though well known to professional persons, the bulk of the people, we are persuaded, are still ignorant of. The following is the account of the new plan of blowing, as given under the head Glasgow, in the 10th volume of the new edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica; and it cannot be perused without leading to the conviction that science is one of the main ingredients of national greatness :—

"In 1824, an iron maker asked Mr Neilson [an engineer in Glasgow] if he thought it possible to pu rify the air blown into blast furnaces, in a manner similar to that in which carburetted hydrogen gas is purified; and from this conversation Mr Neilson per. ceived that he imagined the presence of sulphur in the air to be the cause of blast furnaces working irre gularly, and making bad iron in the summer months, Subsequently to this conversation, which had in some measure directed his thoughts to the subject of blast furnaces, he received information that one of the

The same sagacity which judges of future events from the tendency of the popular mind, is sometimes able to trace the destiny of individuals from a perception of their dispositions. Lorenzo de Medici had studied the character of his son Piero, and foretold that he should prove the ruin of his family. Marshal Biron, amid the glory of his son, foresaw what would be the result of his fiery passions, and told him to go and plant cabbages in his garden, as, otherwise, he should lose his head upon a scaffold. James I. having penetrated the character of Laud, was with great dif ficulty prevailed on to give him promotion. "I find," said the king," he hath a restless spirit, and cannot see when matters are well, but loves to toss and change, and to bring things to a pitch of reformation floating in his own brain, which endangers the stead fastness of that which is in a good pass." When he finally yielded to the urgency of Archbishop Williams, he said, "Then take him to you !—but you will repent it." The future character of Cromwell was apparent to two of our great politicians. "This coarse unpromising man," said Lord Falkland, "will be the first person in the kingdom, if the nation comes to blows!" And Archbishop Williams told Charles I. confidentially, that "there was that in Cromwell which foreboded something dangerous, and wished Muirkirk iron furnaces, situated at a considerable his majesty would either win him over to him, or get distance from the engine, did not work so well as the him taken off." The fiery and vaulting spirit of others; which led him to conjecture that the friction Montrose was also seen, at an early period of the equal volume of the air getting to the distant furnace of the air, in passing along the pipe, prevented an troubles, to forebode a fatal end. While as yet a Co- with that which reached to the one situated close by venanter, standing one day on a scaffold at the Cross the engine; and he at once came to the conclusion, of Edinburgh, where a protest against a royal procla- that by heating the air at the distant furnace, he mation was in the course of being read, he mounted should increase its volume in the ratio of the known on a puncheon which stood there, in order perhaps if 1000 cubic feet, say at 50° of Fahrenheit, were law according to which air and gases expand. Thus, that he might the better hear the speaker. The pe-pressed by the engine in a given time, and heated to culiar conspicuousness which he thus carelessly assumed in an act which might soon be pronounced treasonable, and on the spot where traitors usually expiated their offences, caused the facetious Earl of Rothes to say to him—" James, you will never be at rest till you be lifted up there above the rest in a rope." There, accordingly, twelve years after, he was hanged on a gallows elevated to an unusual height, and, aecording to a superstitious historian, upon a scaffold, of which the posts were the same which had supported

him on the former occasion.

It may be remarked in conclusion, that, for every prognostication which has been justified by time, there must have been many which, not coming to pass, sank out of observation. Of those which were made upon proper grounds, and with an unprejudiced allowance for circumstances apt to derange the conclusion, comparatively few may have proved false. But it must be owned that there has always been much prediction of a different kind. Partisans are perpetually foretelling that which they only wish to come to pass, or the foreboding of which may help to avert events which they dread. They can trace deeds and dates, but they cannot or will not allow for differences of situation and circumstance infinitely transcending and overbearing all points of resemblance. For instance, the fall of modern states which have reached a high degree of prosperity, is often foretold from the fall of the similarly prosperous states of antiquity, though no modern prosperous state can possibly resemble an ancient one in many things over and above the

appearance of prosperity. No allowance is made in such cases for the extension of intellectual culture and personal freedom from the few to the many, and the absence of comparatively barbarous neighbours, by

The

600° of Fahrenheit, it would then be increased in vo lume to 21,044, and so on for every thousand feet that would be blown into the furnace. In prosecut cumstances, however, convinced him that heating the ing the experiments which this idea suggested, cir. air introduced for supporting combustion into air fur. naces would materially increase its efficacy in this respect; and with the view of putting his suspicions on this point to the test, he instituted the following smith's bellows he attached a cast-iron vessel, heated experiments :-To the nozle of a pair of common from beneath in the manner of a retort for generating gas, and to this vessel the blowpipe by which the air from the bellows having thus to pass through the forge or furnace was blown was also attached. heated vessel above mentioned, was consequently heated to a high temperature before it entered the forge fire, and the result produced in increasing the intensity of the heat in the furnace was far beyond his expectation, whilst it made apparent the fallacy of the generally received theory, that the coldness of the air of the atmosphere in the winter months was the cause of the best iron being then produced. But in overthrowing the old theory, he had also established new principles and facts in the process of iron making; and by the advice and assistance of Mr Charles Mackintosh of Crossbasket, he applied for and obtained a patent, as the reward of his discovery and improvement.

Experiments on a large scale to reduce iron ore in a founder's cupola were forthwith commenced at lop, and were completely successful; in consequence the Clyde Iron Works, belonging to Mr Colin Dunof which, the invention of Mr Neilson was immediately adopted at the Calder Iron Works, the property of Mr William Dixon, where the blast, by being made to pass through two retorts, placed on each side of

The above article may be described as in a great measure a cento formed from the ingenious and eloquent paper of Mr D'Israeli. With some additional facts, and a new arrangement of those supourselves to our own remarks. plied in the Curiosities of Literature, we have chiefly confined

one of the large furnaces, before entering the furnace, effected an instantaneous change both in the quantity and quality of iron produced, and a considerable savThe whole of the furnaces at Calder ing of fuel. and Clyde Iron Works were in consequence immediately fitted up on the principle of the hot blast, and its use at these works continues to be attended with the utmost success. It has also been adopted at Wilsontown and Gartsherrie works in Scotland, and at several works in England and France. The air, at first raised to 250° of Fahrenheit, produced a saving of three-sevenths in every ton of pig-iron made; and the heating apparatus having since been enlarged, so as to increase the temperature of the blast to 600° of Fahrenheit and upwards, a proportionate saving of fuel is effected; and an immense additional saving is also acquired by the use of raw coal instead of coke, which may now be adopted by thus increasing the heat of the blast, the whole waste incurred in burning the coal into coke being thus also avoided in the process of iron making. By the use of this invention, with three-sevenths of the fuel which he formerly employed in the cold air process, the iron maker is now enabled to make one-third more iron of a superior quality. Were the hot blast generally adopted, the saving to the country in the article of coal would be immense. In Britain about 700,000 tons of iron are made annually, of which 55,500 tons only are produced in Scotland. On these 55,500 tons his invention would save, in the process of manufacture, 222,000 tons of coal annually. In England the saving would be in proportion to the strength and quality of the coal, and cannot be computed at less than 1,320,000 tons annually; and taking the price of coals at the low rate of 4s. per ton, a yearly saving of L.308,400 sterling would be effected. Nor are the advantages of this invention solely confined to iron making. By its use the founder can cast into goods an equal quantity of iron in greatly less time, and with a saving of nearly half the fuel employed in the cold air process; and the blacksmith can produce in the same time onethird more work with much less fuel than he formerly required. In all the processes of metallurgical science, it will be found of the utmost importance in reducing the ores to a metallic state.

Previously to the use of Neilson's hot blast, 6000 tons of iron were made at Clyde Iron Works in a year. In the formation of each ton of iron, eight tons of coal and fifteen tons of limestone were required. In 1833, when the hot blast was applied, the same steam-engine made 12,500 tons of iron, each ton requiring only three tons of coal and eight tons of limestome. The whole of the Scotch iron works are using the hot blast in all their furnaces, excepting the Carron Company, who have only yet taken out a licence for one of their furnaces.

In France the use of the hot blast has been adopted to an extent which contrasts singularly with the tardiness displayed by some of the English and Welsh iron masters in regard to it, and which would seem to encourage the idea of the probability of the French soon outrivalling us in this important staple. In 1834, the well-known engineer, Monsieur Dufresncy, published an elaborate report in recommendation of the use of the hot blast,' by order of the minister director-general of the mines of France. From this report it appears that in France advantages analogous to those obtained in Scotland have resulted from the use of the hot blast' in iron making; in the kingdom of Wurtemberg this has also been the case; and its adoption in Sweden, Saxony, and the states of the king of Sardinia, bears testimony to the merits of this Scottish invention."

THE RESOLVE,

A STORY FROM THE FRENCH.*

A NUMBER of years ago I had occasion to depart from Paris, and make a short journey into Holland, with the view of settling some commercial transactions in which I was concerned. In the course of my tour, I arrived at Amsterdam, a city renowned for the honour and opulence of its merchants, and to one of whose principal citizens, Mynheer Ödelman, I bore letters of introduction. The attentions shown me by this wealthy merchant, it would be useless to describe.

His domestic arrangements were on a scale of princely splendour-his hospitality unbounded. During my visits both to the counting-house and table of Odelman, I noticed a young Frenchman, of a prepossess. ing appearance, and uncommon modesty of deportment, who appeared to go by no other name than that of Sebastian. In vain Odelman, his master, treated him like a friend, and almost an equal. Sebastian, with a certain respectful dignity, always kept at his proper distance.

My curiosity was excited, and I endeavoured to ascertain what induced him to reside in Holland; he answered "it was misfortune," and in every question that related to himself, I perceived it was his wish not to come to any satisfactory explanation. How. ever, we spent together all the time he was able to spare, and with a complaisance that my curiosity might sometimes fatigue but never exhausted, he gave me information relative to whatever was interesting in Holland. You may be sure I began to conceive a particular affection for him. "This is an entertain

Slightly altered from a translation in the ninth volume of the Pocket Magazine.

The last article of his eulogium was not exactly to my taste, and, in excuse of him, I observed, that it was allowable in the unfortunate to be avaricious. "Avaricious! he is not so," replied the Dutchman; "he is not solicitous for riches. Never, I am well assured, did he desire the wealth of another; he is only careful of his own, which is no more than he should be. But what is most surprising is, the secrecy with which he conceals, even from me, the use he makes of his money."

Before my departure, I became better acquainted with this uncommon and virtuous young man. "My dear fellow," said I, the day that I was taking my leave, "I am going back to Paris. Am I to be so unfortunate as to be of no service to you there? I have given you the pleasure of obliging me as much and as often as you pleased; do not refuse me an opportunity of returning the obligation." "No, sir," said he, " I will not refuse you ; and in exchange for my little services, which you are pleased to overrate, I will see you this evening, and request one from you which is of the most material consequence to me. I must observe, that what I am about to communicate to you is a secret; but I can be under no apprehen. sion on that account. Your name alone is a sufficient guarantee." Of course I promised to keep it faithfully, and that very evening he came to my house with a casket full of gold in his hand.

"Here," said he, "are four hundred louis d'ors, arising from three years' savings, and a paper signed by my hand that will indicate the use to which I wish them to be put." It was signed SEBASTIAN SALVARY. How great was my surprise to find the contents of the casket destined for nothing but objects of luxury!-a thousand crowns to a jeweller, the same to a cabinetmaker, a hundred louis for millinery, as much for laces, and the remainder to a perfumer.

“I surprise you," said he; "yet you do not see all. I have already paid three hundred louis for the like fooleries, and I have much yet to pay before every thing will be discharged. I must inform you, sir, that I am a disgraced man in my own country, and I am labouring here to wipe away a stain which I have brought upon my name. In the meantime I may die, and die insolvent. I wish to make you a witness of my good intention, and the efforts which I am making to repair my misfortunes and my shame. What I am about relating to you may be considered as my testament, which I request you to receive, that, in case of my death, you may take the necessary pains to restore my lost character."

"I hope you will live long enough," said I, "to efface the remembrance of the misfortunes of your youth. But if, in order to make you easy, you want nothing but a faithful witness of your sentiments and conduct, I am better informed on that subject than you imagine, and you may with all confidence lay your heart open to me."

"I begin then," he replied, "by confessing that my misfortunes are entirely owing to myself, and that my errors are without excuse. My profession was one of those that required the strictest probity: and the first law of probity is, to dispose of nothing that is not our own. I made calculations, but those calculations were erroneous. My imprudence was not the less criminal; but I will tell you how I was involved in it.

A reputable family, an unsullied reputation, the esteem of the public, transmitted from my ancestors to their children, my youth, some success, in which I had been much favoured by circumstances, all seemed to promise that I should make a rapid fortune by my profession. This was the very rock on which I split.

Monsieur D'Amene, a man of fortune, and who build his daughter's happiness upon those delusive considered my prospects as infallible, ventured to hopes. He offered me her hand, and as soon as we were acquainted, we formed a mutual attachment. She is no more! Were she still living, and were I again to choose a wife, she alone should be the object of my choice. Let no one impute to her any thing that I have done. The innocent cause of my misfortune, she never even suspected me; and in the midst of the illusions with which she was surrounded, she was far from perceiving the abyss to which I was leading her over a path strewed with flowers. Enamoured of her before I married her, more so afterwards, I thought I could never do enough to make her happy; and, compared to my ardent love for her, her timid tenderness and her sensibility, which were tempered by modesty, had an appearance of coldness. To make myself beloved as much as I loved her, I spared no expense in the purchase of luxuries for her use.

An elegant house, expensive furniture, whatever fashion and taste could procure in the article of dress, to flatter in young minds the propensities of self-love, by affording new splendour or new attractions to beauty-all this anticipated my wife's desires; and

there also poured in upon her, as it were spontane ously, a select society, formed by her own inclination, which showed her the most flattering attentions; no thing, in short, that could render home agreeable, was ever wanting.

She

My wife was too young to consider it necessary to regulate and reduce my expenses. Had she known how much I risked to please her, with what resolution would she not have opposed it! But as she brought me a handsome fortune, it was natural for her to conclude that I also was in affluent circumstances. imagined, at least, that my situation in life allowed me to place my establishment upon a genteel footing; she perceived nothing in it that was unsuitable to my profession; and on consulting her female friends, she was told that all this was highly proper-all this was no more than decent.' I said so too, and Adriana alone, in her modest and sweetly ingenuous manner, asked me if I conceived it necessary to incur such expenses to render myself amiable in her eyes. 'I cannot be insensible,' said she, to the pains you take to render me happy; and I should be so, without that unnecessary trouble. You love me, and that is enough. Let the frivolity of taste, let whim and vain super. fluity, be the delight of others. Love and happiness shall be mine.'

The moment of my becoming a father drew nigh; but that moment, which promised to be the happiest I had ever experienced, proved to be the most fatal. It deprived me of both the mother and child. This stroke plunged me into an abyss of sorrow. I will not tell you how heart-breaking it was-none but those who experience such sorrows can imagine what they are.

I was still in the height of my affliction, when my wife's father sent his notary with the information, accompanied with a few words of slight condolence, that the writings were drawn up to transfer back into his hands the fortune* which I had received from him. Indignant at this indecent precipitation, I answered that I was quite prepared, and the next day the fortune was returned. The jewels that I had given to his daughter, and the other articles of value for her own particular use, became also his property, for he had a legal right to them. I represented the inhumanity of requiring me, after eighteen months' marriage, to submit to so severe a law; but, with all the impatience of a greedy claimant, he insisted upon it as his right. I submitted; and this severe exaction made some noise in the world. Then did the envy my happiness had excited, hasten to punish me for my short-lived felicity, and, under the disguise of pity, took great care to divulge my ruin, which it seemed to deplore. My friends were less zealous to serve, than my enemies to injure me. They agreed that I had been too much in haste to live. They were very right, but they were so too late: it should have been at my entertainments that such observations should have been made. But you, sir, who are well acquainted with the world, know also with what indulgence spendthrifts are treated until the period of their ruin. Mine was now made public; and my creditors being alarmed, came in crowds to my desolate dwelling. I was determined not to deceive any one of them, and, making them acquainted with my unpleasant situa tion, I offered them all that I had remaining, and only required them to give me time to discharge the Some were accommodating; others, alleging the wealthy circumstances of my father-in-law, observed, that he was the person who ought to have given me indulgence, and that, in seizing the spoils of his daughter, it was their property which he had plundered. In a word, I saw no other alternative than of escaping from their pursuits by suicide, or of being shut up in prison.

rest.

That night, sir, which I passed in the agonies of shame and despair, with death on one hand, and ruin on the other, ought to serve as an eternal lesson and example. An honest and inoffensive man, whose only crime was his dependence upon slight hopes-this man, hitherto esteemed and honoured, in an easy and sure way to fortune, all on a sudden branded with infamy, condemned either to cease to live, or to live in disgrace, in exile, or in prison; discountenanced by his father-in-law, abandoned by his friends, no longer daring to appear abroad, and desirous of finding some him from pursuit. It was in the midst of these troubled solitary and inaccessible retreat that would conceal

reflections that I passed the longest of nights: the remembrance of it still makes me shudder, and neither my head nor my heart has yet recovered the shock which I felt at this dreadful reverse of fortune. At

last, this long conflict having overcome my spirits, my exhausted strength sunk into a calm more dreadful. I considered the depth of the abyss into which I had fallen, and I began to conceive the cool resolution of putting an end to my existence. Let me weigh,' said I, 'my last determination. If I submit to be dragged to prison, I must perish there with disgrace, without resource or hope. It is doubtless a thousand times better to get rid of an insupportable existence, and to throw myself on the mercy of God, who will perhaps pardon me for not being able to survive misfortune combined with dishonour.' My pistols were cocked; they lay on the table; and as I fixed my eyes upon them, nothing appeared to me more easy than to put an end to my life. But oh! how many villains have done the same!-how many worthless minds have

* By the laws of France, on the death of the mother and issue, her fortune reverts back to her family.