mind tells me have excited the same sensations in almost every bosom that beats around this table. Mr. President, I shall not waste breath in the vain endeavour to express an indignation, which is too big for utterance, too full for words. I shall sit down, with proposing, that the gentleman who delivered this essay receive from the chair a warning to consider better with himself before he again presumes to insult the Speculative Society of Edinburgh, with the crude and hasty suggestions of a mind, that, I am sorry to say, does not seem to be filled with proper ideas concerning the nature, the objects, and the duties of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh." (Hear! hear! hear!)

A small creaking voice arose from the right side of the President, on the conclusion of this harangue, and its proprietor proceeded in a tone of quiet, feeble, and querulous hesitation, (which afforded an irresistibly ludicrous contrast to the manner of his fiery and foaming predecessor,) to "reprobate, the idea of the warmth-the unnecessary-the improper-and, he must add, the disagreeable warmth, with which his honourable and learned friend, who had just sat down, had expressed himself. The merits of an essay, such as his honourable and learned friend on the opposite side of the house had this evening delivered, were not to be annihilated by such an effusion of invective as that which his honourable and learned friend in his eye had thought proper to make use of. The essay of his honourable friend had probably been produced at the expense of very great labour and exertion of body and mind. The midnight oil had been wasted in the composition of his honourable friend's essay. His honourable friend had, to his certain knowledge, absented himself from all parties of pleasure to which he had been invited during the greater part of this spring, in order to collect materials, and facts, and illustrations, for the essay, which they had that night heard from his friend. The honourable gentleman in his eye should have recollected, that it is not to be expected that every member of this society should possess the same rapidity of genius as he (the gentleman in his eye) possessed. He should have considered, that the question of the corn bill is one attended with infinite difficulty in all its branches; that it is necessary, in order to write an essay on this subject, to undergo the fatigue of examining into a vast variety of documents and treatises, and to study what all the

great authors on political economy, from Adam Smith downwards, have written concerning the nature of the sources of national wealth and prosperity, and to decide among the conflicting opinions of a vast variety of the most eminent persons who were at this moment occupied with the study of the whole question, both within and without the pale of the Speculative Society of Edinburgh. For himself, he had not come to this house with the view of merely criticising the production of his honourable and learned friend, the Essayist, but rather of laying before the society the results of his own investigations on the same highly interesting topic; and the first of these results, to which he begged to call the attention of the house, was a view of the effects which were produced on Hamburgh, by the occupation of that port and city by Marshal Davoust. It would be found, that no subject could be attended with greater difficulties than that now upon the table of the society; they ought to enter upon the inquiry with all the calmness which subjects of that imperative interest demand; and he must say, that he expected, after they should have gone over the thirteen heads of argument which he had marked out for the subject of his present address, he expected the society would come to the conclusion, that the question of the corn-bill was one, which at least required to be studied before it could be expected to be solved.

"The first topic to which I shall call the notice of this house," said he, "is that of the true nature of corn-corn, Mr. President

corn-is not to be regarded," &c. &c. &c.-But I think it would be rather too much, were I to trouble you with the rest of the silly, confused, unintelligible string of hackneyed facts, and hackneyed conclusions, with which this young gentleman troubled his audience for at least an hour and a half.-At the end of that period, one half of the company were fast asleep; the rest yawning and fidgetting, and now and then shuffling with their feet. No hints, however, could produce the least effect on the unwearied indefatigable listlessness of their apathetic orator. Whole pages from the Parliamentary Debates, mixed up with whole pages from Malthus, and these again intermingled with endless trite disquisitions, stolen from

Reviews, Magazines, and Weekly Papers-the whole mighty mass of dullness intermingled, with not one ray either of novelty or ingenuity-power or elegance-the dose proved too much even for my iron nerves. My uneasiness was such, that at last I fairly lost temper, and seizing my hat, escaped, as best I might, from the Speculative Society of Edinburgh. My companions on each side of me had been asleep for an hour, but my removal awakened them; and, after rubbing their eyes, and looking round them for a moment, they both had the good sense to follow my example.

On looking at my watch, I found it was eleven o'clock, and I could not help reproaching myself a good deal for the time I had been wasting. The transition from this scene of solemn and stupid drivelling, to the warm fire side of Mrs. Barclay her broiled haddocks, her scolloped oysters, and her foaming tankards, was one of the most refreshing things I have ever experienced. But I see it is now late; so adieu for the present.

P. M.

LETTER XXIII.

TO THE SAME.

DEAR DAVID,

I AM extremely delighted to observe how much effect the craniological remarks, so liberally, yet so modestly, distributed over the surface of my correspondence, have been able to produce upon you. I once thought you had the organ of stubborness and combativeness very luxuriantly brought out, but shall from henceforth be inclined to think I had been mistaken in my observation of your head. My best advice to you in the mean time is, to read daily with diligence, but not with blind credulity, in Dr. Spurzheim's book, which I rejoice to hear you have purchased. Pass your fingers gently around the region of your bead, whenever any new idea is suggested to you by his remarks, and I doubt not you will soon be a firm believer, that "there are more things in heaven and earth than we once dreamt of in our philosophy."

The aversion which you say you at first felt for the science

is, however, a natural, and therefore I cannot help regarding it as a very excusable sort of prejudice. The very names which have been bestowed upon the science-Cranioscopy and Craniology-to say nothing of the still coarser Schadellehre (or skull-doctrine) of its first doctor and professor, are disagreeable terms, on account of their too direct and distinct reference to the bones. They bring at once before the imagination a naked skull, and in persons who have not been trained to the callousness of the dissecting-room, conceptions of a nature so strictly anatomical, can never fail to excite a certain feeling of horror and disgust. I am glad to find that this feeling had been sanctioned by antiquity; for, in some quotations from Athenæus, which fell casually into my hands the other day, it is expressly mentioned, that the Greeks considered it as "improper to speak of the physical substances of the head." 1 perfectly enter into the spirit of tastefulness and wisdom, which suggested such a maxim to that most intellectual people. Among them the doctrine of pure materialism had not merely been whispered in mystery in the contemplative gardens of Epicurus; it had gone abroad over the surface of the people, and contaminated and debased their spirit. The frail fabric of their superstitious faith presented but too obvious a mark for the shafts of infidel wit, and it was no wonder that they who were wise enough to feel the necessity of guarding this fabric, should have possessed no very accurate notions concerning the true limits of its bulwarks. In our days, however, there is assuredly no reason for being so very timorous; and I think a philosophical person like you should, bona fide, set yourself to get rid of a prejudice which is no longer entitled to be regarded as either a necessary or a convenient one.

It is much to be wished, notwithstanding, that some name could be found for this admirable science, which would give less offence even to those who are rather disposed than otherwise to give it its fair chance of thriving in the world. I have been thinking a great while on this subject, and have balanced in my own mind the merits of more oscopies and ologies, than I care to trouble you with repeating. Craniology itself, over and above the general and natural prejudice I have already talked of, labours under a secondary, an adventitious, and a merely vulgar prejudice, derived from the ignorant and blundering jokes which have been connected with it by the writers of Reviews and Magazines. It is won

;

derful how long such trifling things retain their influence but I would hope this noble science is not to be utterly hanged (like a dog,) because an ill name has been given to it. Sometimes, after the essence of a man's opinion has been proved to be false and absurd, even to his own satisfaction, it is necessary, before he can be quite persuaded to give it up, that we should allow a few words to be sacrificed. These are the scape-goats which are tossed relentlessly over the rock, after they are supposed to be sufficiently imbued and burthened with the sins of the blundering intellect that dictated them. And such, I doubt not, will, in the issue, be the fortune of poor, derided, despised, but innocent, although certainly somewhat rude and intractable Craniology-Cranioscopy, (particularly since Dr. Roget has undertaken to blacken its reputation in the Supplement to the Encyclopædia Britannica,) may be pretty sure of sharing the same melancholy fate. There is no doubt that Jack and Gill must tumble down the hill in company.

Anthropology pleased me very much for a few days; but it is certainly too vague. It does not sit close enough to show the true shape and character of that which it would clothe. Cephalology and Cephaloscopy would sound uncouth, and neither of them would much improve the original bargain with which we are quarrelling. Organology shares in something of the same defect with Anthropology. In short, as yet, I have not been able to hit on any thing which exactly pleases on reflection. Although a worse cranioscopist, you are a better linguist than I am; so I beg you to try your hand at the coining of a phrase. A comparatively unconcerned person may perhaps be more fortunate than a zealous lover like myself; for it is not in one respect only that women are like words. In the mean time, when it is necessary to mention any person's brain, it may be best to call it his Organization. It is perhaps impossible altogether to avoid employing expressions of an anatomical cast; but the more these can be avoided, the better chance there will most assuredly be of rendering the science popular. It is one in which the ladies have quite as much interest as we have; and I think every thing should be done, therefore, that may tend to smooth and soften their reception of it. In its essence, it possesses many, very many, points of captivation, which I should think were likely to operate with wonderful success on the imagination of the female The best and the wisest of the sex, with whom I ever

sex.