book, the main purpose of which was to prove that the distemper in question is from an infectious atmosphere, and from that alone. So far from going these lengths, I have supposed, and will still presume upon the possibility, that some contagion may find its way to our shores, but I hope not with sufficient intensity, as to measure or quality, for the production of any very serious disorder. Preventives, however, may very properly be had recourse to, if they can be instituted without filling the imagination with direful forebodings; and, under this impression, I will close my paper with an extract from a small volume on Cholera, lately published, by Mr. Searle, the extract itself, however, being one from Mr. Annesley's splendid work on Indian Diseases. I will mark in italics the points which I deem of the greatest practical importance. "All that I can say under this head may be comprehended under the general injunction of avoiding the predisposing and exciting causes of the disease. Whatever tends, directly or indirectly, to debilitate or fatigue the system; whatever lowers its vital energy, as excess of every description, disposes to the tion of the efficient cause of the malady. On the other hand, I am fully persuaded, that whatever tends to preserve this energy, serves to render the system impregnable to its operations. opera Exposure to cold, to chills, to the night dew, and to wet and moisture, ought carefully to be avoided; and if at any time these exposures are inevitable, the system should be fortified against their effects. But the mode of fortifying the system requires consideration. This should not be attempted unless better means are not within reach, by wines or spirits: these generally leave the system, as soon as their stimulating effects have passed off, more exposed than before to the invasion of disease. Permanent tonics, however, and those more especially which determine to the surface of the body, at the same time that they improve the tone of the digestive viscera, and promote the regular functions of the bowels and biliary organs, may be resorted to on such occasions. For this purpose, infusion or decoction of bark, or of calumba, may be taken with the spiritus mindereri, or any warm stomachic; or the powdered bark may be administered, combined with the spicy aromatics. The same medicinal means may also be attended to whenever the disease prevails at the place where the individual resides, and should be put in practice when he retires to sleep, and as soon as he rises in the morning, before he leaves his apartment. He should avoid also sleeping in low and ill ventilated apartments, and be equally distrustful of sleeping near, or even of passing through, in the night time, marshy or swampy districts. If, however, these latter precautions cannot be taken, the medicinal means already suggested should be adopted. "The bowels should be attended to, and their functions regulated; but in no case should this be attempted by debilitating purgatives, or by salts. The warm stomachic laxatives, and these combined with tonics, may be adopted with advantage as occasion may require. The surface of the body should be kept in a warm perspirable state: but excessive perspirations should be avoided. "The diet should be regular, moderate, and easy of digestion. Whilst low living ought to be shunned, its opposite should never be indulged in. The stomach ought to have no more to do than what it can perfectly accomplish without fatigue to itself, and to the promotion of its own energies. It must never be roused to a state of false energy by means of palatable excitants, or weakened by distending it with too copious draughts of weak diluents. "The state of mind ought to be regulated in such a manner as not to be excited much above, nor lowered beneath its usual tenor. The imagination should not for a moment be allowed to dwell upon the painful consideration which the disease is calculated to bring before the mind; and least of all, ought the dread of it to be encouraged. Those who dread not diseases, and who yet possess sufficient prudence to avoid unnecessary exposure to their predisposing and ex citing causes, may generally be considered as subjected to comparatively little risk from them. This, I am persuaded, is particularly the case as respects epidemic Cholera; and I wish to impress it upon the minds of those whom the observation concerns." Since the above was written, I perceive that the College of Physicians has been acting under the commands of Government in instituting preventive measures, founded upon the contagious nature of the disorder in question. All this is exceedingly proper, and nothing, of course, will be left undone which it shall seem expedient to adopt by the gentlemen who compose the commission. But I would still wish the public mind, while it is on the alert, not to be upon the alarm. Let not every bilious attack (and, as the hot weather has set in sooner than common, we shall be likely to have these attacks in a proportionate measure sooner,)—let not, I say, every bilious derangement be put down to the score of epidemic Cholera. Let us not frighten each other into malignant disease, nor succumb to the depressing apprehension that is abroad. On this day, (June 23rd,) we find the death confirmed of the Russian General Diebitsch. "It would appear," says "The Times" newspaper, "that he died of the Cholera ; and it may be presumed, that his death will thus tend to increase the alarm which that disease has already inspired in the north of Europe." To me, however, the event in question does not seem at all to militate against the opinions I have above expressed. We can easily conceive that Diebitsch was in that state of mind which rendered him vulnerable to the shafts of disease. He found that Poland was no bed of roses; that he had something more to do than when he directed his hostile steps eastward; and the discouragements and disappointments of the campaign were just such circumstances as we should expect would wound the spirit and debilitate the frame of a man who set out under the impression that conquest was at his command. In the same paper, (" The Times" of the 23rd of June,) we find some rumours reported of the Cholera having visited Dublin: these reports will very likely be multiplied and added to every day. We hope, however, that in a city like Dublin, which has been, for a long time, proverbial for medical skill and science, every care will be taken, even in the event of Cholera appearing, against permitting it to spread through the island. If once a disorder of a contagious nature were to make good its footing among the famished poor of the sister country, then, indeed, we should have just ground for alarm. But this, I trust, will, as there is every reason to hope it may be, averted. I will take occasion to intimate, that contagion of all kinds makes its way into the system with much more readiness through the medium of the lungs than the skin. I am doubtful, indeed, whether, while the outer skin is whole or unabraded, any thing of a poisonous nature can be introduced by it. I merely throw out this hint in order that care, should its exercise be at all necessary, may be rather directed against inhaling the exhalations of the sick, than of coming in contact with the infected person. All the reputed antidotes to contagion are worse than nugatory. Covering the surface of the body with any material is a proposal childish in the extreme. ODE TO THE OURANG-OUTANGS AT THE EGYPTIAN HALL. "A LIKENESS for a shilling!"-Vide Records of Fine Arts. OH! dumb philosophers!-oh! sages mute!— For ye are "links" between them! Beings whom Bond-street in her brightest days But rather call upon that monster, Man, His disappointed and dislaurell'd brow; Queerest of quadrupeds, that you are ess Here, pulpit prodigies and peerless peers And gaze upon you with a blank despair, Will Paganini boast his length of arm, Of mould or motion with the Simian queen? But then the latter, As fascinating quite, is somewhat fatter. Oh! for thy chisel, Chantrey-thine, oh, Behnes !— That seems a wizard—just like Paganini's! Twins, before whom the youthful Siamese Here grateful Fashion greets you on its knees, Is there a Revolution in the Wood? Come you to give your "Lives" to that variety In literature, for sayings versus doings, Call'd Cam.'s or Sham.'s ENCOURAGEMENT SOCIETY, The Wit-bred vat for literary brewings? Or were you caught By any "M. P.-Candidate" Committee, For making members quite as quick as thought, And digging up debaters-in the City? Too late, and Parliament has lost, I fear, The world is weary of Orang-harangues; How should your silence shame the wight No coronet, of course, adorns your brows, You live, it seems, as courtiers do-on boughs, For laughing London's pleasures? Will you to theatres repair, and see Objects that have full oft your hearts inspired? Or do your souls for sunnier landscapes burn, (Like Viscount Lowther) to the " Woods and Forests." What I fain would know, ere yet you go, you I have seen in those same distant dales? In those wild lands untrod by human feet, The good Lord Londonderry's wits? Or have you, for your eyes are clear, Hark! break we off-what wild and sudden wail Is hither wafted by the western gale? THE MEETING OF PARLIAMENT. , WELL, Parliament has assembled-the King has addressed "My Lords and Gentlemen" in person, and an address responsive has been agreed to in both Houses without any formal opposition. So far so good. But still the question is, "Will The Bill pass the Lords?" We answer,-it will, it must! As well might one expect, Canute-like, to see the ocean-tide arrest its progress at the bidding of a maniac-my Lord - for example-as that the great current of public opinion should be now stayed in its course by the faction of Noble and Right Reverend anti-reformers, of which his Royal Highness Ernest Duke of Cumberland is the venerated chieftain. The mighty stream may be here and there impeded by temporary obstacles-the sediment and growth of time-but systematic opposition can now only serve to invest it with the fury of the mountain torrent. The schoolmaster is, indeed, abroad; and that which has been so often spoken is of a verity about to be fulfilled. We will not stop-we had almost said condescend-at this twelfth hour, to repeat, for the hundred and first time within the last few months, all that has been said on the side of good government. That the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the sole end of all civil institutions, is now felt to be a selfevident maxim;-that a representative form of government is an essential means to this end; and that it is a mockery, hardly to be surpassed in mendacious audacity by the heroes of the Pitt Club themselves, to consider the nominees of some 140 boroughmongers as the faithful trustees of the wants and interests of the Commons of England, are propositions which every man in the empire (always excepting the divinity graduates of Cambridge and Oxford) feels to be self-evident. As was observed in a recent number of the "New Monthly," were the question merely one of principle and expediency, the controversy would have been long since at an end; but as it is a contest of right versus usurpation,-of the right of the middle classes-the wealth and intelligence and main-stay of the British name-to have a voice in the election of those who are to hold their purses and properties, and, in degree, their lives and persons, in their own hands, other arguments than those which reason and justice would suggest are thought to be more applicable to the proceedings in the House of Lords, so far as they may affect the success of the Reform Bill. Hence the several appeals to the passions of their Lordships-to their self-interest, their hopes and fears, upon which the press has been ringing the changes since the dissolution-among which, a pamphlet, entitled "Friendly Advice to the Lords on the Reform Bill," from the celebrity of its imputed author, has attracted most attention. We must confess that these appeals have struck us as very unsatisfactory, and that the main argument by which we may count on their Lordships' inveterate hostility to every measure tending to the amelioration of the political condition of the people being overcome, has been overlooked; and that argument is contained in the answer to the simple question, What would be the consequence to themselves of their Lordships' placing themselves in direct hostility to the King in his regal and individual capacity, to the King's Government, and, above all, to the unanimous acclaim of the people for Reform, as speaking through the large majority in favour of the Bill which they have returned at the late election, and through that most influential of organs in these days of the schoolmasterthe Press? Supposing, for a moment, that the Lords threw out the Bill, where is there to be found, outside of the walls of Bedlam, the anti-reformer daring enough to meet the present House of Commons in the character of Minister? Even a Tory House of Commons rejected Sir R. Peel and his imbeciles with contempt; and, if black differs at all from white, it is to be presumed, that the feeble self-sufficiency of Mr. Goulbourn and his well-paired colleague will be no great additional recommendation to a majority chosen for the express purpose of bruising the serpent's head of Toryism for ever. To any man at a loss for a proof of the irresistible unanimity of the wealth and intelligence of the country on the side of pure representation, and, as a consequence, of the mischievous folly, the fatal madness, of all attempts to persist in practically maintaining the Wellington doctrine of the constitutional excellence of rotten boroughs, let him |