AN AFRICAN DANCE-NEW ORLEANS.

you tink I drink punch, eh? No, Missa, beg pardon, Missa.

"One evening whilst sitting in the marble verandah at Enmore, and listening to the ceaseless hum of the insects and the gentle rustling of the trees, and thinking of again venturing on the treacherous deep, I heard the lively sound of a drum at some distance, and immediately repaired to where the negroes were amusing themselves under the mild rays of the Cynthian queen. On a level spot, surrounded by small houses of colored and black people, was a bench on which were seated two negro fiddlers, and a thin fellow beating a drum; behind stood a man shaking violently a calabash filled with small stones and reeds, and singing with contortions an African air. The crowd formed a ring, and those who wished to dance the Joan-Johnny stepped forward, presented the leader of the band with a bit, and he

Bid the fiddle to the banjar speak,

471

and masked balls are then given, which in all other cities of the Union are unknown.

66

"I visited the gaol, which is small, and though crowded with prisoners of all color, yet it is never known to have yellow fever within its walls; there was no classification of prisoners, who are turned out daily in gangs to work on the streets; they passed my window every day, marching two and two, with hoes, spades, and pickaxes on their shoulders, and chained loosely together; the whites led, then the mulattoes, and then the negroes. Among the former a white man was pointed out who was condemned to twenty years' imprisonment and hard labour for murdering his mother."

For the credit of human nature it may be wished the following anecdote may prove untrue:

"From the battle plain we continued our drive to visit some sugar estates farther down the river. At one of these, the proprietor of a comThe banjar to the calabash without,' fortable single-storied house came out to receive and a couple would twist their bodies, thump us, without either neck-cloth or stockings on, and the ground with their heels, and circle round his trowsers covered with blood. He had just one another to the inspiring strains. The little been inflicting a severe punishment on a poor black urchins, as usual, were setting to one negro, who was shoved out of sight on our apanother on the outskirts of the admiring crowd, proach. This man was not an American, but of or kneeling down behind their elders, who would foreign extraction; and a story was told of him, be pushed over amidst shouts of laughter, or that whilst Louisiana was under Spanish rule, mimicking the actions of the white lookers on. he wished to marry a neighboring planter's 1 was much amused with the scene, but a violent daughter, but, his savage disposition being well end was put to the entertainment, for a huge known, the parents refused to give their consent. stone was hurled at the musicians by some un-One day a message came for the old father to known hand, which wounded the leader's bow- visit a friend at some distance, and in passing arm. Immediately there was a great uproar, through a wood he was inhumanly murdered. and a second stone nearly demolishing an instru- Forty lawyers and their understrappers then sat ment, the party broke up, venting curses on the down in the house of the afflicted widow, on preunseen spoiler of the sport-probably some cho-tence of investigating whether or not she had leric freeman, who did not like sounds of ob- any hand in the crime; and after they had streperous mirth near his dwelling." preyed upon her for six months they left her en"As we rode past the sable blanchisseuses, they tirely ruined and heart-broken; the real murlaughed and joked with us. derer went unpunished, having amply revenged leave missus so early in the morning?' Alas! I himself for his rejected addresses."" had no wife to leave; for well has the Persian poet said

'What for massa

Is all thy day uneasy, be not afflicted Should thou at night have a sympathiser in thy bosom." " But we must refer to the volume for much valuable information, and journey with our traveller to the "States." At New Orleans the captain tarried some time, and has given a good description of the town. The annexed quotation, we should hope, is overwrought:

"The place of meeting in the evening, in New Orleans, is not a reading-room, but a coffeehouse, with a sanded floor, and some indelicate pictures on the walls. Here, after sundown, the merchants who lingered about this silent city, congregated to talk of cotton and sugar, new banks, speculations in canals and railroads, and, above all, of elections. Most of them wore striped jackets, cocked their hats on one side with an air of defiance, and swung a sword-stick between their extended legs. Up-stairs there were billiard and roulette tables with closed doors; the players scowled at me as I entered. Hard by there was the cockpit; neither the American nor French theatre was open, though they are all well attended in the healthy months;

Ascending the Mississippi we have the following graphic picture of the squatters:

Most of the squatters looked very sickly and emaciated, and were living beside swamps, in which alligators wallowed; and they said they were obliged to look sharp after their children, lest they should be snapt up by these devourers. At particular seasons of the year the alligators cry and lament at night like human beings in the greast distress, and the little ones whine like children. What a situation for a man to be placed in! A dark and swampy forest_around him, a deep and turbid river in front, and alligators crying all night long about the wretched dwelling!"

Of the western people in general our author gives a tolerably correct picture, though a little disposed to caricature; a short extract is all in which we can indulge:

"The people in the west are very plain in their manners, and dislike all pretensions to singularity, or to superior refinement. Thus a general from the eastward, in passing up the Mississippi, made use of a silver fork to eat his meals with-(hay-makers,' or two-pronged forks, are as yet only used there, and both these and the knives are set in carved buckhorn handles); and

PENURY OF THE GREAT-MATRIMONY.

That hides the past from every heart,

Ambition finds its grave.

Oh, Life! how vain a thing art thou,
If in thy little span

The spirit feels no heavenward glow
Above the world of man!

A waste thou art--where storm and gloom
With light and joy contend;

Where sickness steals o'er youthful bloom,
And friend departs from friend!

C.

473

MARRIAGES IN AMERICA.-The conditions of life being perfectly equal, parents have nothing to oppose to the choice their daughters may make of a husband. Thus it is a received maxim throughout the Union, that this choice only concerns the young ladies, and it is therefore for them to be prudent enough not to enter into engagements unworthy of their hands. But it would be considered almost as an act of indiscretion, on the part of the parents, to wish to influence their choice. Nothing in the world can be so happy as the situation of an American young lady, from fifteen to twenty-five, particularly if she is pretty, as almost all are, and has some fortune. She finds herself the centre of general admiration and homage; her PENURY OF THE GREAT.-Col. Frederick, whom I have contradiction, still more to refusals. She has only to life passes in holidays and pleasures; she is a stranger to mentioned before, as the son of Theodore, king of Corsi- choose, among a hundred adorers, the one she thinks most ca, was a particular friend of mine. He told me he was likely to ensure her future happiness; for every body maronce in so much distress, that when he waited the result ries, and every body is happy in marriage. This state of of a petition at the court of Vienna, he had actually been "belle," as it is called, is too attractive to make young latwo days without food. On the third day a lady in attend- dies consent to quit it too soon; accordingly, it is not, in ance on the court, whom he had previously addressed on general, until after rejecting many offers, and when they the subject of his petition, observing his languid and ex-perceive that their charms are beginning to lose somehausted state, ordered him some refreshment; he of course thing of their empire, that they conclude by choosing a consenting, she ordered him a dish of chocolate, with liege lord. It is to Washington, in particular, that the fine some cakes, which rendered him more able to converse with her; in a short time they conceived a regard for each Congress, in which the charms of every part of the Union women of all the states come to shine; a sort of female other, and were afterwards married. * that while his father was in Fleet prison for debt, Sir John captivated by the modest charms of a beauty from the ** He said are represented. An ardent deputy from the South is Stewart was a fellow prisoner on the same account. The East, while a damsel from Carolina rejects the overtures latter had a turkey presented to him by a friend, and he of a Senator from the North. All, however, are not reinvited king Theodore and his son to partake of it. Lady jected; for at the end of every session, a certain number Jane Douglass was of the same party. She had her child, of marriages is declared. They serve to strengthen furand a girl with her as a maid servant, to carry the child; ther the union of the states, and multiply the ties which she lived in an obscure lodging in Chelsea. In the even- unite all parts of this great whole in an indissoluble maning, Col. Frederick offered to attend her home, and she ner-Murat's United States. accepted his courtesy. The child was carried in turn by the mother, the girl, and the Colonel. On their journey he said there was a slight rain, and common civility would have induced him to call a coach, but that he had no money in his pocket. and he was afraid Lady Jane was in the same predicament. He was therefore obliged to submit to the suspicion of churlish meanness or poverty, and content himself with occasionally carrying the child to the end of the journey. The Colonel used to consider that child as the rightful claimant of the property on which he was opposed by the guardians of the duke of Hamilton.

The Colonel related to me another curious anecdote, on which I rely, as I always found him consistent in his narrations. When Prince Poniatowski, who was afterwards Stanislaus, the last king of Poland, was in this country, his chief, I might perhaps truly say, his only companion, was Col. Frederick. They were accustomed to walk together round the suburbs of the town, and to dine at a tavern or common eating-house. On one occasion the prince had some bills to discount in the city, and took Frederick with him to transact the business. The prince remained at Batson's coffee-house, Cornhill, while Frederick was employed on the bills. Some impediment occurred, which prevented the affair from being settled that day, and they proceeded on their usual walk before dinner, round Islington. After their walk they went to Dolly's, in Paternoster row. Their dinner was beef-steaks, a pot of porter, and a bottle of port. The bill was presented to the prince, who, on looking over it, said it was reasonable, and handed it to Frederick, who concurred in the same opinion, and returned it to the prince, who desired him to pay. "I have no money," said Frederick. "Nor have 1," said the prince. "What are we to do?" he added. Frederick paused a few moments, then desiring the prince to remain until he returned, left the place, pledged his watch at the nearest pawnbroker's and thus discharged the reckoning. *** The prince, after he became monarch of Poland, occasionally kept up an intercourse with Frederick, and in one of his letters asked if he remembered when they were "in pawn at a London tavern."-[Records of my life, by the late John Taylor.]

DEBATES IN CONGRESS.-I served, [says Jefferson in his Memoirs) with General Washington in the Legislature of Virginia before the revolution, and during it with Dr. Franklin in Congress. I never heard either of them speak ten minutes at a time, nor to any but the main point which was to decide the queston. They laid their shoulders to the great points, knowing that the little ones would follow of themselves.

40*

A VIEW OF MATRIMONY IN THREE DIFFERENT LIGHTS. happy condition. The first is, when two persons of no The marriage life is always an insipid, a vexatious, or a taste meet together, upon such a settlement as has been thought reasonable by parents and conveyancers, from an exact valuation of the land and cash of both parties. In this case, the young lady's person is no more regarded than the house and improvements in purchase of an estate; but she goes with her fortune, rather than her fortune with her. These make up the crowd or vulgar of the rich, and fill up the lumber of the human race, without benefiabove them; and lead a despicable, independent and usecence towards those below them, or respect towards those less life, without sense of the laws of kindness, good nature, mutual offices, and the elegant satisfactions which flow from reason and virtue.

The vexatious life arises from a conjunction of two persons of quick taste and resentment, put together for reasons well known to their friends, in which especial care is taken to avoid (what they think the chief of evils, poverty; and ensure to them riches, with every evil beside. These good people live in a constant restraint before com duct. In company they are in purgatory; when by thempany, and when alone revile each other's person and con

selves, in torment.

The happy marriage is, where two persons meet and voluntarily make choice of each other, without fortune or sickness. The former we may in some measure defend beauty. These may still love in spite of adversity or ourselves from; the other is the common lot of humanity. Love has nothing to do with riches or state. Solitude. with the person beloved, has a pleasure even in a woman's mind, beyond show or pomp.

M.

agreeably to the arrangement already mentioned, to deliROBERT HALL'S FIRST SERMON.--"He was appointed, ver an address in the vestry of Broadmead Chapel, on 1 Tim. iv. 10. "Therefore, we both labour and suffer reproach because we trust in the living God, who is the Saproceeding for a short time, much to the gratification of viour of all men: specially of those that believe." After his auditory, he suddenly paused, covered his face with his hands, exclaimed, "Oh! I have lost all my ideas," and sat down, his hands still hiding his face. The failure. however, painful as it was to his tutors, and humiliating to himself, was such as rather augmented than diminished their persuasion of what he could accomplish, if once he acquired self-possession. He was, therefore, appointed to

474

WATER SPOUTS—A REPROOF-PHILOSOPHY-FIDELITY.

WATER SPOUTS.

When a whirlwind occurs at sea, it sometimes carries a column of water into the air; and this is called a water spout. Some have doubted the existence of any such thing, but it is now found that they really exist. They may be described thus:

speak again on the same subject, at the same place, the A REPROOF.-"You remember Mr., Sir," said Roensuing week. This second attempt was accompanied bert Hall to Dr. Gregory. "Yes, very well." "Were you by a second failure, still more painful to witness, and still aware of his fondness for brandy-and-water?" "No." more grievous to bear. He hastened from the vestry, and "It was a sad habit; but it grew out of his love of storyon retiring to his room, exclaimed, "if this does not hum-telling; and that, also, is a bad habit, a very bad habit, for ble me the devil must have me!" Such were the early ef- a minister of the gospel. As he grew old his animal spirits forts of him whose humility afterwards became as conspi- flagged, and his stories became defective in vivacity; he, cuous as his talents, and who, for nearly half a century, therefore, took to brandy-and-water; weak enough, it is excited universal attention and admiration by the splendor true, at first, but soon nearly half-and half." Ere long he of his pulpit eloquence."--[From Dr. Gregory's Life of indulged the habit in a morning; and when he came to Robert Hall.] Cambridge he would call upon me, and before he had been with me five minutes, ask for a little brandy-and-water, which was, of course, to give him artificial spirits, to render him agreeable in his visits to others. I felt great difficulty; for he, you know, Sir, was much older than I was, yet, being persuaded that the ruin of his character, if not of his peace, was inevitable, unless something was done, I resolved upon one strong effort for his rescue. So the next time that he called, and, as usual, said "Friend Hall, I will thank you for a glass of brandy-and-water." ! replied-"call things by their right names, and you shall have as much as you please," Why, don't I employ the right name? I ask for a glass of brandy-and-water." That is the current, but not the appropriate name: ask for a glass of liquid fire and distilled damnation, and you shall have a gallon." Poor man, he turned pale, and for a moment seemed struggling with anger. But, knowing that I did not mean to insult him, he stretched out his hand, and said-" Brother Hall. I thank you from the bottom of iny heart." From that time he ceased to take braudy-and-water.

A thick cloud, in the form of a cone, or trumpet, with the small end downwards, hangs down from the sky, and at the same time the surface of the sea under it is agitated and whirled round, till the waters are converted into a kind of vapor, and ascend with a spiral (screw like) motion, till they unite with the cone proceeding from the cloud. They are sometimes dispersed, however, before they unite. Both columns grow smaller as they approach each other. At their junction, they are sometimes no more than three or four feet in diameter.

In the middle of them there is to be seen, when at a distance, a white transparent tube. It consists of a vacant space, in which none of the small particles of water as cend. In calm weather, water spouts are perpendicular in their motion: but in a wind they are sloping or oblique. Sometimes they disperse suddenly, at other times they pass rapidly along the surface a quarter of an hour or more, before they disappear.

DESCRIPTION OF AN AMIABLE WIFE. Dodsley, in his Economy of Human Life, has finely depicted a valuable woman, pronouncing her with the wise man of old, the first and noblest of human benedictions; winding up his eulogiums with these remarkable lines: Happy the man that shall call her wife, Happy the child that calls her mother. Among other merits which he celebrates, are the follow

A notion has prevailed that these water spouts might sink a vessel, when they meet and break directly over it; but this is not true, for the water descends only in the form of heavy rain. Small vessels, if they carry much sail, do, it is true, run some risk of being overset by them, be-ing: cause sudden gusts of wind from all points of the compass are apt to accompany them.

A late number of the Long Island Farmer contains an account of a meeting with one of these water spouts, yet without names, or dates, or latitude, or longitude. We are not quite sure the story is true, yet such as it is we present it to our readers; begging them to remember that whether true or not, it is an undoubted fact that the firing of a gun produces a slight change in the surrounding atmosphere.

She presides in her house and there is peace; she commands with judgment and is obeyed. The law of love is in her servants' hearts; her children reverence her precepts and her husband with rapture hears her praise in the gate-she is the best counsellor, example, friend."— What higher felicity can be imagined than a union with so amiable a creature; and notwithstanding the degeneracy of the times, many, very many are to be found by those who seek them worthily.

WONDERS OF PHILOSOPHY.-The polypus receives new The men on board a vessel suddenly heard a loud hiss- life from the knife which is lifted to destroy it. The fly. ing noise, and looking round, saw the sea bubbling and spider lays an egg, (or rather a collection of eggs.] as large foaming, and rising up in hundreds of little sharp pyra- as itself. There are 4041 muscles in a caterpillar. Hook mids, to various heights; alternately falling and rising on discovered 14,000 mirrors in the eyes of a drone; and to a spot of the sea's surface not larger than the vessel, and effect the respiration of a carp, 13,300 arteries, vessels, only half the vessel's length from it. Believing that it was veins, and bones. &c. are necessary. The body of every a water spout, all was alarm and confusion on the deck, spider contains four little masses pierced with a multitude but neither the captain nor any other person knew what of imperceptible holes, each hole emitting a single to do. The sea boiled up with increasing rage and height, thread; all the threads, to the amount of 1000 to each mass, whirling round with great swiftness and much loud hiss-join together, when they come out, and make this single ing. At times, the water was raised as high as the foreyard of the vessel, then it would sink again.

They had all heard of firing guns at water spouts; and accordingly orders were given to load and fire the guns. But all the people on board, except the mate, were so riveted and fixed with gaping astonishment, and the guns were in such bad order, that it was impossible to have it done. While they were trying to get the guns ready, the Captain and another person thought they would try the plan of making an impression upon the air, by getting all the people to make loud cheers. This they thought did little good. By this time the mate had loaded one of the guns, with which they fired two or three salutes, when the agitation of the sea began to subside. Whether it would not have subsided just at this time without the firing or cheering, is unknown.

a

REAL RELIGION. A poor slave was once thus addressed by a lively gentleman, in a jocular way: "Well uncle, I hear you have become very religious lately, and I want to know what religion you are of." "Why massa," said he, "my religion is, to cease to do evil, and learn to do well What religion are you of?" Could any one have returned a more appropriate answer?

thread with which the spider spins its web; so that what we call a spider's thread consists of more than 1000 united. Lewenhock, by means of microscopes, observed spiders no bigger than a grain of sand, who spun threads so fine that it took 4000 of them to equal in magnitude a single hair.

FIDELITY."After the execution of Sabinus, the Roman general, who suffered death for his attachment to the family of Germanicus, his body was exposed upon the preci pice of the Gemoniæ, as a warning to all who should dare to befriend the house of Germanicus. No friend had courage to approach the body, one friend only remained true-his faithful dog. For three days the animal continued to watch the body. His pathetic howlings awakened the sympathy of every heart. Food was brought him, which he was kindly encouraged to eat: but on taking the bread, instead of obeying the impulse of hunger, he fondly laid it on his master's mouth, and renewed his lamenta tions, but did not quit the body.

The corpse was at length thrown into the Tiber, and the generous creature leaped into the water after it and clasped it, between his paws, vainly endeavoring to pre serve it from sinking."

PROVERBS-FORTUNE-FISH-LAST OF THE SARPINTS.

475

tacked by them, they will strip the limb of flesh in a surprisingly short time; for the taste of the blood spreading in the water collects them by myriads.-Campaigns and Cruizes in Venezuela.

REVERSE OF FORTUNE-Taylor, in the records of his life, relates that Madame Marya, with whom he was intimately acquainted, as a great singer, told him that she saw a woman sweeping the streets at Berlin, who had been the chief singer at the opera in Madrid. A rich jewel had been offered to the Queen of Spain, who admired it much, but declared she could not afford to purchase it. The opera singer bought it, for the foolish vanity of showing that she was richer than the Queen. This act was deemed so presumptuous that the royal family withdrew all patronage from the opera house, till this woman was dismissed. sure I will, by all manner of means; but, you see, I hav'n't Let you out, my darling?" says St. Patrick, 'to be The common people of course imitated the Court, and ex-time now, so you must wait till to-morrow.' And he took pressed their disgust wherever she appeared. She was the iron chest, with the sarpint in it, and pitched it into therefore oblged to leave Madrid, but the story followed the lake here, where it is to this hour, for certain; and 'tis her wherever she went, and though her vocal talents the sarpint struggling down at the bottom that makes the were great, she was every where so ill received, that at waves upon it. Many is the living man, continued Picket, length all her pecuniary resources were exhausted, and besides myself, has hard the sarpint crying out, from she sunk into the low condition of a street sweeper. within the chest under the water, Is it to-morrow yet? Is and that's the way St. Patrick settled the last of the sarit to-morrow yet?"--which, to be sure, it never can be: pints, sir."-Croker's Legends of Killarney.

SINGULAR FISH.-Many of the men were severely bit in their legs and thighs by a small fish called the Carribi. These are never more than three or four inches in length, and are shaped like a gold.fish, which they also resemble in the brilliant orange hue of their scales. Although they are so small, their exceeding voraciousness, and the incalculable numbers in which they swarm, render them very dangerous. They are, indeed, to the full as much dreaded, if not more so, by a Llanero than the cayman. Their mouth is very large in proportion to their size, and opens much in the same manner as a bullet-mould. It is furnished with broad and sharp teeth, like those of a shark in miniature; so that wherever they bite, they take away a piece of flesh. When once either man or beast is at

"nothing appears to gratify Turkish ladies more than to
LADIES.-A recent writer from Constantinople, says that
be looked at and admired."
nature differs but little the world over; at any rate the
same remark might be justly made of American ladies-
We apprehend that female
even of the flowers that bloom in the Valley of the "Far
West." From the age of fourteen to twenty, to be "look-
ed at and admired," appears to be their highest ambition.
After this time, they are either beginning to think about
something else, or have already something else to occupy
their thoughts.