value. Mr. Erasmus Wilson also states that it is wonderfully efficacious in many skin diseases. It has been objected that in all cases of disease of the heart the Turkish Bath would prove injurious; but Mr. Wilson, in a lecture lately delivered upon the use of the bath, energetically denies this statement. "I believe," he says, “just the less of mankind. If it be evening you are large, that it would seem to be a general further regaled by musical performances of specific. There can be no doubt that its no ordinary character. The half-hour thus virtues are very great in all cases where occupied I believe you will find the happiest there is a vitiated condition of the blood, in your life. You cannot feel dejected or arising from a languid condition of the skin sorrowful; you have shaken off the accumu- and circulation, or any specific poison lurklated crust of years; your skin is as supple ing within it. We have heard such miracas a youth's; you feel once more the elastic-ulous tales told respecting its powers in curity of a youth. I have seen a man take his ing rheumatism, that we cannot doubt its first bath the very picture of despondency; I could see, in addition, no small degree of timidity as to the result. He has sat down on the wooden bench in the first room in no enviable state, but as the skin began to glisten, one by one his humors fled away, and he leaves the place rejoicing as a strong man to run a race. The is no doubt about it-the Turkish Bath is a wonderful boon to this contrary-that many diseases of the heart country. It is needed especially in this age may be cured by a judicious use of the of anxiety, and in this city of dust, and Thermæ; and in the very worst cases it smoke, and dirt. I know I went from mine would prove to be the very best remedy the other day to a turtle lunch given by en- that could be employed." In some cases, ergetic Mr. Train, at St. James' Hall, with indeed, the heart's action is accelerated by an appetite which an epicure would have for- the use of the bath, but a moment's sojourn feited a thousand to possess an appetite in the Frigidarium, with its plentiful supply which would have made vinegar drink as the of pure oxygen, instantly calms any perturchoicest Falernian, and turned the coarsest bation. Those who have not accustomed crust into a delicacy worthy of that crew of themselves to the bath, sometimes complain epicures headed by Mark Antony and Cleo- of feeling a fulness in the head, but this obpatra, the company of the Inimitable Livers. jection can be met by simply wrapping a I now understand why the latter, as she was towel round the head. That the Turkish about to die, after lamenting over the body Bath will before long be esteemed a necesof her Roman lover, and embracing his cof-sary part of every gentleman's house is exfin, ordered a bath to be prepared for her. ceedingly probable. Plutarch tells us, "After bathing she lay down and enjoyed a splendid banquet." It was the bath that nerved her for her work, to apply to her bosom-on which an Imperator had reclined—an asp, and to fall down dead on her golden couch. I also understand how greatly the poet erred when he wrote, "The bath," says Mr. Erasmus Wilson, "promotes those changes in the blood for which fresh air is otherwise needful. The bath gives us appetite, and strengthens digestion." The bath serves us in lieu of exercise. "The people who use it," writes Mr. Urquhart, “do not require exercise for health, and can pass from the extreme of in"When the heart of man is oppressed with cares, dolence to that of toil." How glorious a Their weight is dispelled if a woman appears.' panacea for those home-loving matrons He should have said for "woman "Turk-whom no inducement can draw forth from ish Bath," and he would have been right. their Lares and Penates to enjoy a daily The philosophy of the Turkish or Roman wholesome exercise, and who, as a conseBath is not difficult to understand. Nature quence, become large, and full, and fat, and intends us to get rid of our waste through bilious, and wheezy, and who, in their breach the skin, but we clog it up, and have, in of Heaven's law, lay the foundation of heart consequence, more or less congestion of the disease. "A nation," says Mr. Urquhart, liver, intestines, and kidneys. The number" without the bath is deprived of a large of diseases for which the Turkish Bath is portion of the health, and inoffensive enjoyrecommended, even by medical men, is soment, within a man's reach; it therefore in creases the value of a people to itself, and its power as a nation over other people." as the cistus, sleek as satin, and soft as velvet." Nor will it end here. I see Admiral Rous maintains its use in getting racehorses into proper condition. sis, furnished by the City Turkish Baths, in South Street, Finsbury Pavement. The analysis extends to two hundred and twentyone baths, and shows Rheuma- Other tism and AilGout. We must quote here Mr. Wilson's summary of the benefits resulting from the use of the bath. "It is a preservative of health by maintaining a vigorous condition of the The objects now sought by the use of the body, a state the best suited for the happi- Turkish Bath are more numerous and diverness of the individual, as rendering him in sified than is generally supposed. This will the highest degree susceptible of the enjoy-be seen from the following interesting analyment of life, and a state the most advantageous to social interests, as insuring the highest working condition. The bath is preventive of disease, by hardening the individual against the effects of variations and vicissitudes of temperature, by giving him power to resist miasmatic and zymotic affections, and by strengthening his system against aberrations of nutrition and the fecund train of ills that follow disturbance of the nutritive functions; namely, scrofula, consumption, gout, rheumatism, diseases of the digestive organs, cutaneous system, muscular system—including the heart, nervous system-including the brain, and reproductive system. The bath is a cure for disease when the latter state is already established. and is a powerful and effective medicine." The bath must be this, and more than this, if, as Mr. Urquhart tells us—" the body has come forth shining like alabaster, fragrant Bathers. Total, 221. Among the "other ailments" not especially classified above may be enumerated Dyspepsia, Sore Throat, Weakness in the Legs, General Debility, Epilepsy, and affections of the Liver and Kidneys. For all these ailments the Turkish Bath has already been used under medical direction, and with manifest advantage. Its value in cases of Gout and Rheumatism has now for some time been generally acknowledged. A PHYSICIAN, residing in the Philippine WE announce with much regret the premature Islands, has written home to say that on a re-death of one whose early promise gave high From his father, cent occasion, one of his attendants being bitten hopes of future eminence. with a very venomous serpent, and having tried Henry Nelson Coleridge, and his mother, Sarah Coleridge, the daughter of the poet and philosvarious remedies in vain, as a last resource he opher, Herbert Coleridge seemed to have inherbethought himself of giving him a bottle of cocoa ited all the genius of that gifted family. His wine (a strong alcoholic drink). In a short career at Oxford was crowned with the highest time after the wine was swallowed, and the man attainable honors. He took a double first in the became drunk, but seemed free from the agony Easter term of 1852. On leaving the University which he was previously suffering. As he be- he was called to the bar, but literature continued came sober, the pain re-appeared, so a second to occupy his leisure. He became secretary to bottle was given to him, and after that a third the Philological Society, and was associated with a like good effect. The swelling went with the Dean of Westminster in a project for down in his arm, and he was in a short time rescuing from oblivion and restoring to the Engcured. There is a saying in some countries that lish language words used by the best writers of drinking alcohol to intoxication is a specific the seventeenth century, but not acknowledged against the venom of serpents, but we have by Johnson and his successors. For the last never heard of so well-authenticated an instance five years, we believe, his life and energies have as this. The instance is the more remarkable been gradually undermined by the fatal disease as a bite from a similar species of serpent which which so often accompanies genius and sensibilbit the physician's attendant has been known to ity, and which has now brought him to an early be fatal in a few minutes. grave.-Guardian. From The Examiner. Memoirs of Royal Ladies. By Emily Sarah THIS book might have been shortened by omitting the first two of its ten biographies, which do not read well, and contain nothing at all interesting or instructive. The best that can be said of them is that Miss Holt has diligently connected some bare dates with a few monkish fables about two women who were not "royal ladies," and of whom one was a passable saint of the thirteenth century, and the other a confirmed sinner of the fourteenth. For Ela, Countess of Salisbury, place in the volume is claimed because her husband was son of Fair Rosamond, whom by the way Miss Holt would make a lawful queen of England, to the consequent bastardizing of Kings Richard and John. We are told that Ela was 66 one of those fair creatures who in the midst of gloom around them gleam forth as sparks of light in the dim expanse of the past," and that she was "an angel surrounded by demons." But all we learn about her is that she was the good wife of a brave soldier; that she was not willing to be run away with during her husband's lifetime by a wicked knight; that she is said to have had a wonderful dream which revealed her son's death to her; and that her last years of widowhood were spent in one of the abbeys which she gave her wealth to found. From her was descended Alicia, Countess of Lancaster. Miss Holt has been at pains to collect a few ugly illustrations of this woman's predilection for the poisoning of her own husbands, and other evil dealing with the husbands of others; not the sort of person of whose career one would expect to hear any thing from a lady who is at full liberty to please her taste in the selection of her subjects. Of the rest of the book we can speak more favorably. The story of Joan, wife of the Black Prince, for instance, was worth telling, and is here well told. There is just so much of the public history of the time worked into the narrative as will suffice to make the private story clear. Joan's life was a remarkable one. In childhood she had been betrothed to the Earl of Salisbury. But he went abroad and seemed to have forgotten his intended bride; so in her twenty-fourth year there was made for her 66 Joan did not exactly say, "Why don't you speak for yourself, John?" but she made answer to her visitor, "Lord Prince and fair cousin, I cannot cease to remember that I am of the blood royal of England, wherefore I have determined never to marry again, save unto a prince renowned for quality and virtue-like yourself." The chronicle tells of a kiss which followed this frank statement, and presently the Lady Joan became Princess of Wales. She was well fitted for her station. At one time, when her husband was fighting in Spain, and she was left Regent of Aquitaine, she took wise measures to defend the territory from the attacks of the Spaniard, Enrique de Trastamare. After the prince's death she applied herself to the education of their little boy, King Richard. She was not a wise instructress. It is likely that the luckless king owed much of his haughtiness and waywardness, and not a few of his false notions of kingship, to her influence. It was Joan who, together with John of Gaunt, gave encouragement to Wyclif. In 1378—not in 1382, the date given by Miss Holt-when the Reformer had been brought up for trial at Lambeth, she sent a messenger to the judges, and bade them desist from all further measures, if they loved the widow of the Black Prince and the mother of the king. The last chapter in her life is a sad one. trained in sorrow. In 1385 her son, Sir John Holland, picked a quarrel with a nobleman and killed him. The king, when he heard of it, condemned his brother to death. The princess, after vainly suing for reversal of the sentence, went down to her Castle of Wallingford, and died within four days. Next to her account of the Princess Joan, we like best Miss Holt's memoir of Jane of Valois, daughter of Lewis the Eleventh of France. Born in 1464, Jane had a hard life to live. Ugly and even deformed, her father hated her from her childhood, his hatred being increased by that strong devotional bias in her which Romish writers exaggerated into a miraculous piety. When she was five years old, it is recorded, the king sternly enjoined her to spend less time over her prayers. "The little princess gently, though firmly, refused to obey." As usually happened in such cases, but not till next year, the Virgin Mary appeared for her consolation. For political purposes she was married, when thirteen years old, to Lewis of Orleans, and her husband followed the example of her father. When he was in prison she begged him to let her share and so relieve his misery, and when refused she pawned her jewels that he might have better food and shelter, till her perseverance had procured his freedom. Yet his treatment of his ugly wife was uniformly brutal. While duke he barely tolerated her; as soon as he became king he discarded her with papal sanction, so to make room for a younger and handsomer, although less pious, queen. At this change, indeed, she was not altogether sorry. She could have no pleasure in the life of a dissolute court, and it was a small loss to be parted from a husband who had ill-used her for a score of years. She devoted herself to religious offices and to the consummation of that saintly character for which she had at any rate been In company with four high-born ladies, like-minded with herself, she visited hospitals, tending the sick and feeding the poor. Her own food generally consisted of a few ill-dressed herbs. Good cookery might have produced sinful indulgence. Every day she beat her breast with flint stones, and through a wooden cross of her own making she drove five silver nails, which had formerly belonged to her favorite lute, and wore it next to her body, so that she might be continually pricked and scratched. She liked to be despised, and enjoyed insult as much as other women relish flattery. The happiest day of her life was one on which she heard that she was "an ugly, ill-shapen creature, and one of the most disagreeable women in the world." So at least says the pious author of "La Vie Merveilleuse de Jeane de Valois," who also recounts many edifying miracles attendant on her death and burial. Of the six other memoirs here given we need not say much. One relates to Constance, the gentle wife of John of Gaunt, and contains some passages which may contribute to an understanding of her husband's public life. In writing of Jona, Queen of Spain, Miss Holt, without assigning any proper reason, falls foul of the current judgment concerning Ferdinand and Isabella. Indeed, she seems to have been unacquainted with the late Mr. Prescott's brilliant history of those sovereigns. But she is thoroughly at home in tracing the life of Margaret of Austria, a notable woman, who aptly indicated her career in the odd motto which she chose: "Fortune infortune fort une." Before she was full twenty-five she had been successively Queen of France, Princess of the Asturias, and Duchess of Savoy; once divorced and twice widowed; the other quarter century being occupied with the governing of Flanders, quibbling with her father and brother, and treating with a great number of suitors, chief of whom was our English Henry the Seventh. M. OTTO STURVE, surprised at the impor- Ararat, near Tiflis. This proposal was favortant results obtained by the expedition to the ably received, and the sum of £5,000 appropriPeak of Teneriffe, under the direction of Mr.ated for the necessary constructions, and half Piazzi Smith, proposed to the Emperor of Russia that sum for the purchase of instruments. to establish a permanent observatory on Mount From The Saturday Review. CROCHET-WORK AND NOVEL-WRITING. SOME ten or fifteen years ago, when crochet came into fashion, no one would have been rash enough to predict that it was to exercise a material influence on literature. And yet it was written in the book of fate that such was to be the effect of this trifling though elegant accomplishment. Before the crochet period there was a vast field for industry open to female fingers and mindsBerlin wool. In many houses relics of that age, as the old ballad puts it:"Still for a monument doe lye, And there exposed to lookers' viewe As wondrous strange they may espye-" and now and then you find yourself sitting on a cushion of roses so glowing red that they almost scorch your pantaloons, while for a support to your back you have the ruins of Pæstum or the Temple of Baalbec. But the manufacture is no longer carried on, except in remote districts; the discovery of crochet banished the art, and in so doing seriously affected the industrial resources of the fancy-working classes. cal pathology as a Craving for the Ideal. It may be all very well for the mentally weaker sisters, who find that to weave the warp and weave the woof in strict accordance with the directions and patterns given in the Ladies' Newspaper is a sufficient demand upon their intellectuality; but with these higher natures such an occupation could only end in spiritual atrophy. Thus thrown out of employment, what could be more natural than that they should take to novel-writing? The craft was one which presented many analogies to the lost art of working in Berlin wool, and with a little dexterity might be conducted upon precisely the same principles. It was only necessary to go to the nearest library, instead of to an embroidery shop on Ludgate-hill, for a pattern and materials, to employ a good stout serviceable commonplace instead of coarse canvas for a basis, and then, having set up in boldly with words instead of with worsted. the frame and got every thing ready, to fill There was also this pleasant fiction common to both processes-that the work, although apparently taken up as a mere agreeable pastime, was in reality useful. The bandit or beggar was to form the seat of a chair is true that the chair when finished was not the novel was written "with a purpose." It very generally sat upon, while the novel very frequently was at least in the metaphorical or slang sense of the expression-but these untoward results have nothing to do with the original intention of the artist. Berlin wool, considered as an occupation, had this special virtue, that it suited every possible variety of temperament, and was adaptable to minds of all calibres. For matter-of-fact Marthas, whose leanings were of the practical and utilitarian order, there were slippers, and kettleholders, and other articles belonging to the prosaic department Arguments are scarcely necessary in such of fancy-work; while for "burning Sappho " a case, but if any proof of all this be rethere were shepherds, and bandits, and taste- quired, we simply refer to the facts that the discovery of crochet synchronises in a most fully tattered beggars, upon which she might remarkable manner with the gushing forth expend her superfluous ideality. Crochet, of that torrent of female novels which still on the other hand, is not a soul-satisfying pours steadily upon us, and that a large propursuit. It appeals rather to the mechan- portion of these productions will be found ical than to the imaginative faculties of the on examination to furnish ample internal evimind. There is, perhaps, a certain rhyth-dence of the Berlin-wool mind. There are mical charm about the language in which its principles are conveyed, and on some ears the cadences of "loop six, drop one, chain three," etc., may fall quite as soothingly as a good deal of the verse that is turned out every day by our minor minstrels. But there is also a "damnable iteration "knaves" as the First Gravedigger. All we mean to say is that we believe there are a about it, and it is obviously an employment great many novels which would never have wholly inadequate to meet the requirements been written had working in Berlin-wool of a being afflicted with what, in the lan- continued to be a fashionable employment, guage of the intense school, is called a and which are, in effect, the cries of croYearning after the Infinite, or even with the cheted-out embroidresses, complaining that milder form of the disease known in psychi- they have no fancy-work to do. some who will wax indignant at this, and fling such works as Jane Eyre and Adam Bede in our teeth, but they need not hope to entrap us into platitudes about genius being of no sex. We are not going to be as weak as Hamlet and speak to them" by the card," "absolute because they happen to be as |