by the hypochondriac gloom that surrounds himself. Even the pleasures of his guttling propensities must be remembered by way of contrast with his present. He tells you that he remembers when London porter was meat and drink; but it is now no better than bilge water; he tells you that Burton ale used to draw out in shreds between the fingers; but now it was a villanous compound of sugar, water, and coculus indicus. In fact nothing does Captain Caleb Croak touch upon, in his delectable Screech-owl conversation, but, like the tropedo, he chills all around him. -Is he not a genuine gossip? Mr. Horatio Simper is an effeminate nondescript but he is a Gossip. He is so deeply in love with his own beardless face, that the young ladies laught at his tender passion, and cut his figure out in pieces of paper. His chief conceit is to talk idly and look demurely. He makes an antitheses of common propensities. He laughs for love, weeps for wine, and mourns for mischief. As verse and gossip go together, he is extensively partial to crambo; and could devise an extemporaneous dozen couplets on a lady's pincushion. Besides his qualifications in fiction he has an excellent turn for daubing, so that Mr. Simper is a painter, poet, and historian. With the possession of these accomplishments he is considered a rising member of the Gossip Club. Biography. ECCENTRIC CHARACTER. Menalcas (says La Bruyere) comes down in a morning, opens his door to go out, but shuts it again, because he perceives that he has his night-cap on : and on examining himself further, finds that he is but half shaved, that he has stuck his sword on the right side, that his stockings are about his heels and that his shirt is over his breeches. As he walks the street, he receives a violent blow in the face, he cannot conceive whence it proceeds, till opening his eyes he finds himself opposite the shaft of a cart, or a porter's load. He looks about, he grows warm, he raves, calls all his servants together with cries of 'All's ruined, all's lost,' then asks for the gloves which are on his hands. He walks out; after traversing one street, he loses his way, he is terrified, he inquires of the passengers where he is; they tell him precisely; at length he enters his own house, whence he immediately rushes out with the greatest precipitation, imagining that he has been deceived. He goes to visit a lady, and being perfectly convinced that he is in his own house, he plants himself in his arm-chair, without a thought of leaving it; he begins to think that the lady makes long visits, he expects every moment that she will rise and leave him to himself; but as the time grows late, and he finds himself hungry, he asks her to supper; she bursts out into a fit of laughter, and loud enough to wake him. He marries in the morning, in the evening he forgets it, and sleeps abroad on his wedding night. Some years afterwards, his wife dies in his arms; he goes to the funeral, and the next day, when his servants announce dinner, he demands if his wife is ready and apprized of it. He asks you a question, and when you think to answer him, he is gone: he asks you how your father is, you tell him that he is very ill, he exclaims that he is very glad to hear it. Another time he meets you, he is delighted at the rencontre, he has something of the utmost moment to communicate; he looks at your hand, asks you where you got that beautiful ruby, he then leaves you and walks on: such is the important business which he had to treat of. In conversation with a young widow, he talks to her of her deceased husband, inquires the manner of his death; the lady, whose anguish is renewed by such discourse, weeps, sobs, but is forced to repeat all the minutiae of her husband's illness, from first to last. Madam (asks Menalcas, who has apparently been listening, with the utmost attention) is that all?' 1 He never knows his company; he calls his lacquey 'Sir,' and his friend Sirrah;' he says' Friend' to a prince of the blood, and your Highness' to a Quaker. A Magistrate, venerable for his age and dignity, questions him respecting an event, and asks him if it is so and so; 'Yes, Miss,' replies Menalcas. Miscellanous. Repartee. A gentleman, travelling in a stage-coach, had been greatly annoyed with the grimaces and conundrums of a puppyish dandy. The dandy made one of his low jokes, and accompanied it, as usual, with his own loud laugh; instead of joining in which, his fellowtraveller very leisurely took a pinch of snuff, when the dandy exclaimed "Law! Sir, do you take snuff?" The gentleman very composedly, and in a certain tone of voice replied (offering his box at the same time,)" Yes --blackguard." Curious Remedies.-Among the various writings of that extraordinary man, John Wesley, there is one entitled "Primitive Physic." Under the heads of the different diseases to which the human body is subject, arranged alphabetically, are directions for their cure in English. This little book has gone through no less than thirty editions, the last dated 1824. This looks as if it were still extensively circulated, and read; but if it be really attended to in the treatment of the sick, the patients are sometimes subjected to most whimsical remedies. For an ague, we are directed, at the approach of the fit, to lay pounded and salted flowers to the sutures of the head. In an apoplexy, a pint of salt and water, if it can be got down into the stomach, will certainly bring the patient out of the fit. For a violent bleeding from the nose, a piece of white paper is to be put under the tongue; for a cancer in the breast, the patient is to drink an infusion of warts, off the legs of a horse, in ale; for a cold in the head, the rind of an orange is to be turned inside out, and to be thrust up the nostrils; for a consumption the patient is to cut a hole in fresh turf, and breathe into it a quarter of an hour every morning; for a fresh cut, we are to apply toasted cheese; for the gout, we are to lay a beef-steak upon the swelled-toe; for a cancer, we are to apply goose's dung; for a speck in the eye, we are to blow into it-what dost thou think, gentle reader?-the dried and fine powder of zibethum occidentale? Art thou so ignorant as not to know what this is?-stercus humanum-a madman is to be put under, not a pump, but a large waterfall (Corra Linn, or Schaff-hausen?) Poetrg. NAPOLEON'S DESTINY. I saw Napoleon in his pride, Was theirs who dared to meet him: He beard their war cry-greet him. Stood in imperial splendour drest To be ambition's future jest! Next in the battle field he stood- 'Twas Moscow's field of fire and blood- And then the Conqueror should have died; Is destiny the champion's guide? A powerless sceptre's in thy gripe,* Napoleon! that "name of thine, On Elba's iron-bound shore stands Louis where were thy CHOSEN bands They fled with thee! What! no one stands, But 'tis not treachery in men, Who were untrue to thee, for when Next on thy plains red Waterloo, Whose bones the storied field bestrew As he amid the battle shock, So thou thy waves look on! *Macbeth, Act III. Sc. 1. The Economist. NEWSPAPER ECONOMY. The term Economy has been already defined in this work. It is a term of such very general import, that nothing in human life is well conducted, unless the principles of the comprehensive system implied by this term be applied to it. From the management of a nation to the management of an estate-from the management of an estate to the management of a negro's hut, the term is equally applicable in the light of managing well. Nothing that is of use, and which has cost money or labour to attain, should be neglected, thrown away, or destroyed; and this reminds us to call the attention of our readers to the preservation of our own pages, and to that of newspapers in general. Many subscribers who are not at the pains to preserve newspapers, are sometimes compelled to have recourse to those of a more careful neighbour, when the least pains would obviate such an inconvenience. Important things are frequently recorded in them; and, |