flocked in, and at last a very considerable crowd was collected. Muskets peeped out of every door, lane, and window from behind every lamp-post, balcony, and buttress, till at last they all took courage; a man with a wooden leg trundled a field-piece en avant, the mass shouted, and followed, an explosion took place, and the Dutch army retreated. Night fell, and when morning came, no enemy was to be found. The combatants were out of work; for it is odd enough, as they were almost all laborers and artizans, so did they keep workmanlike hours, going to their meals with wonderful regularity. As soon as the customary hour was ended, and nature satisfied, they returned to their occupation of popping. The greatest slaughter took place among the milk people, who made a point of supplying their customers, as usual; and in order to do this with security, they delivered their milk at a very early hour, before the fighting began. But many, not sufficiently active, or sufficiently early, were caught by the Dutch bullets in the street before all their pratique was supplied.

We would not wish to ridicule an event which is likely to be productive of great consequences, and which certainly was accompanied by much suffering; but the blame must lie at the door of those who puff the courageous exploits of the brave Bruxellois, and compare the battle to that of Paris.

When the victory was decided nay, indeed, when it appeared probable that it would turn in favor of the people, the authorities, the organs of the revolution, made their appearance. A Provisional Government was immediately patched up, and as soon as the arrival of the news at Paris informed M. de Potter of the state of things, he lost not a moment in returning to the country whence he had been so unjustly banished. He was immediately cooptated by the Provisional Government, since which time he has been

its soul, the spring on which it moved, its oracle, and its guide.

The situation of the Provisional Government was one of extreme difficulty; the interval between the victory of Bruxelles and the assembling of Congress, of extreme danger. All the strong places of the country were filled with Dutch troops; luckily, however, mixed with Belgians. A war was to be carried on without funds, and a starving and excited people to be kept in order without a police, with scarcely a single existing municipal authority. Troops were, however, set on foot, and the war successfully maintained, and the people, with a few exceptions, that of Bruges, for instance, hindered from breaking out into open sacking and plundering. In most towns there was nothing to prevent the numerous poor from rising upon the fewer rich, except their own notions of right and wrong, and also the conciliatory precautions taken by the wealthy, who were well aware of their danger. All this was done amidst the intrigues of the Dutch court, and the apprehensions of foreign intervention. Besides which, the Government found leisure greatly to ameliorate the existing laws, and by several popular and liberal enactments secured the favor of the country. They also organized the assembling of a Congress of Notables, by which the form and principles of the native constitution of the independent state should be decided upon. Up to the very meeting of this assembly, the Government ap pears to have gone on with unity of purpose, and in harmony of feeling. The course of procedure to be adopted by the Provisional Government, as respected the form of acknowledging the authority of the Congress, became a matter of cussion, and De Potter seems to have been left in a minority of one. The immediate consequence has been his retirement altogether from the management of affairs. What the future consequences of his se

MR. T, a young gentleman with a broken limb, which refused to heal long after the fracture, went to consult Mr. Abernethy; and, as usual, was entering into all the details of his complaint, when he was thus stopped almost in limine"Pray, sir, do you come here to talk, or to hear me ! If you want my advice, it is so and so-I wish you good morning."

A scene of greater length, and still greater interest and entertainment, took place between this eminent surgeon and the famous John Philpot Curran. Mr. Curran, it seems, being personally unknown to him, had visited Mr. Abernethy several times, without having had an opportunity of fully explaining (as he thought) the nature of his malady. At last, determined to have a hearing, when interrupted in his story he fixed his dark bright eye on the "doctor," and said"Mr. Abernethy, I have been here on eight different days, and I have paid you eight different guineas; but you have never yet listened to the symptoms of my complaint. I am resolved, sir, not to leave this room till you satisfy me by doing so." Struck by his manner, Mr. Abernethy threw himself back in his chair, and assuming the posture of a most indefatigable listener, exclaimed, in a tone of half surprise, half humor, "Oh, very well, sir, I am ready to hear you out. Go on, give me the whole-your birth, parentage, and education. I wait your pleasure; go on. Upon which, Curran, not a whit diconcerted, gravely began :- "My name is John Philpot Curran. My parents were poor, but I believe honest people, of the province of Munster, where also I was born, being a 42 ATHENEUM, VOL. 5, 3d series.

native of Newmarket, county of Cork, in the year one thousand seven hundred and fifty. My father being employed to collect the rents of a Protestant gentleman of small fortune, in that neighborhood, obtained my entrance into one of the Protestant Free-schools, where I obtained the first rudiments of my education. I was next enabled to enter Trinity College, Dublin, in the humble sphere of a sizer ”. and so he continued for several minutes, giving his astonished hearer a true, but irresistibly laughable account of his "birth, parentage, and education," as desired, till he came to his illness and sufferings, the detail of which was not again interrupted. It is hardly necessary to add, that Mr. Abernethy's atten tion to his gifted patient was, from that hour to the close of his life, assiduous, unremitting, and devoted.

Mrs. I. once consulted him on a nervous disorder, the minutiae of which appeared to be so fantastical, that Mr. Abernethy interrupted their frivolous detail, by holding out his hand for the fee. A one-pound note and a shilling were placed in it; upon which he returned the latter to his fair patient, with the angry exclamation of, "There, ma'am ! go and buy a skipping-rope that is all you want."

Mr. Abernethy's strong point in prescribing is generally addressed to the relief of the bowels, and to the lowering and regulation of diet and regimen. He is, consequently, much sought in dyspeptic disorders; and, it is stated, often refers to such or such a page in one of his books, where he has already given the remedy. The patients have only to buy the work, where they will find an exact description of their symp

Ir is a curious fact, though the people of Geneva have such a beautiful lake that foreigners flock to it from all parts of the world, yet they themselves derive but little or no enjoyment from it. Versoix, Coppet, Nyon, Rolles, Ouchy, Cully, V Vevey, Villeveuve, and, on the Savoy side, Evian and Thonon, have delightful walks along its shore Geneva has none. This has not always been the case. It is known from documents, and old books, and drawings, that, a hundred years ago, there were foot paths running along the southern and northern side, and that the people of Geneva were fond of walking there in the evening. These paths have all disappeared: enclosed gardens, and plots of ground, frequently separated from each other by walls, extend to the water's edge. Would you know how this has happened, you need only look at the water in calm serene weather, and you will see heaps of stones lying in the lake, and posts standing up in it to a considerable distance from the bank. If records did not inform us, we have ocular demonstration that, on the south west, where the current of the Rhone is very impetuous, the water has gradually washed away the bank, undermined and overthrown the stone dykes, along which the foot-paths were carried, and advanced to the margin of the gardens and private enclosures.

Perhaps, however, it is a fortunate circumstance that the Genevese cannot get at their lake without some trouble; otherwise the practice of drowning themselves might be more common than it is at present. One might almost say that it has become the fashion, especially with the female sex, who in other respects cannot justly be charged with any excesses of passion. A milliner resolves to take a hand

some shop; some one anticipates her, and away she runs to the water: another fair lady cannot raise the money to buy a handsome shawl, which she covets, and plunges forthwith into the lake. One of these determined females recently met with a most severe disappointment, for she was fished out again in spite of herself, and carried on shore. I know not whether my British countrywomen have such a decided horror of what Toricelli calls a vacuum. Here, at any rate, that horror is entertained. Hence the women eke themselves out at all points with buckram, whalebone, cork, and wadding, and with these aids they produce beautiful contours, and an appearance of plumpness, where there is scarcely more than skin and bone. These imitations are so perfect, and the additions so admirably rounded, as to deceive even the eye of the connoisseur. But to the point-One of these becorked and be-wadded females, having had a tiff with her lover, found life absolutely intolerable, and away she posted to the water. To her no small discomfiture, however, two prodigious gigots, and a vast cork tournure, kept her upright. She made the most furious exertions to sink herself but the thing was impossible. The two gigots floated like blown bladders on the surface of the lake, and the cork below forcibly propelled her upward. In this awkward predicament, she fell to scolding and raving at such a rate as to attract the notice of some fishermen, who hastened to her assistance. Chance led me to the spot just as they were bringing this lady of the lake" ashore. She presented a most pitiable sight; for the whole curious fabric was now visible through her wet and closely adhering garments, and plainly showed what a difference there is between nature and art,

WE have, in truth, the same kind of evidence for the existence of mind, that we have for the existence of matter; namely, from its properties-and of the two, the former appears to be the least liable to deception. "Of all the truths we know," says Mr. Stewart, "the existence of mind is the most certain. Even the system of Berkeley concerning the non-existence of matter, is far more conceivable than that nothing but matter exists in the universe.' A similar mode of reasoning may be applied to the modification of materialism more prevalent in modern times, by which mind is considered as a result of organisation, or, in other words, a function of the brain; and upon which has been founded the conclusion, that, like our bodily senses, it will cease to be, when the bodily frame is dissolved. The brain, it is true, is the centre of that influence on which depend sensation and motion. There is a remarkable connexion between this organ and the manifestations of mind; and by various diseases of the brain these manifestations are often modified, impaired, or suspended. We shall afterwards see that these results are very far from being uniform; but even if they were uniform, the facts would warrant no other conclusion than that the brain is the organ of communication between the mind and the external world. When the materialist advances a single step beyond this, he plunges at once into conclusions, which are entirely gratuitous and unwarranted. We rest nothing more upon this argument, than that these conclusions are unwarranted; but we might go farther than this, and contend, that the presumption is clearly on the other side, when we consider the broad and obvious distinction which exists between the peculiar phenomena of mind, and those functions which are exercised

through the means of bodily organisation. They do not admit of being brought into comparison, and have nothing in common. The most exquisite of our bodily senses are entirely dependent for their exercise upon impressions from external things. We see not without the presence both of light and a body reflecting it; and if we could suppose light to be annihilated, though the eye were to retain its perfect condition, sight would be extinguished. But mind owns no such dependence on external things, except in the origin of its knowledge in regard to them. When this knowledge has once been acquired, it is retained and recalled at pleasure; and mind exercises its various functions without any dependence upon impressions from the external world. That which has long ceased to exist is still distinctly before it; or is recalled, after having been long forgotten, in a manner even still more wonderful; and scenes, deeds, or beings, which never existed, are called up in long and harmonious succession, invested with all the characters of truth, and all the vividness of present existence. The mind remembers, conceives, combines, and reasons; it loves, and fears, and hopes, in the total absence of any impression from without that can influence, in the smallest degree, these emotions; and we have the fullest conviction that it would continue to exercise the same functions in undiminished activity, though all material things were at once annihilated. This ar gument, indeed, may be considered as only negative; but this is all that the subject admits of. For when we endeavor to speculate directly on the essence of mind, we are immediately lost in perplexity, in consequence of our total ignorance of the subject, and the use of terms borrowed from analogies with material things. Hence the unsatis