of spirits is a considerable source of disease and death, in the lower classes of society. It is not a moral pestilence alone, but a physical scourge; and innumerable indeed have been the victims who have fallen beneath its power: many local diseases (even in surgery) are referable to the habitual use of spirits, and their destructive influence is constantly manifested in cases of sore legs; a complaint which afflicts a very great proportion of the inferior orders in this town: the worst specimens of this disease are to be traced to the inordinate use of spirituous liquors, and they are commonly cases which never completely get well; and the subjects of them drag out their existence in going from one hospital to another, while they are rendered incapable of laborious exertions when thrown upon the Country."-(Resumed at p. 266.)

THE

DOG-STAR AND DOG-DAYS.

The ancient Egyptians, in their observations on the stars, noticed that when a certain star of considerable magnitude first appeared above the horizon in the morning, just before dawn, the overflowing of the Nile immediately followed; warned by this precursor, they retired to the highlands to escape the inundation, carrying with them things necessary for their retreat. As this star performed for them the service of the house-dog, by warning them of approaching danger, they call it the dog-star, and supposing that this star was the cause of the extraordinary heat, which usually falls out in that season, they give the name of dog-days to six or eight weeks of the hottest part of the summer. They ascribe an extraordinary influence to this star, and paid to it divine honours, and from its colour formed prognostics, what the season would be. The Greeks and Romans also held the opinion that the dog-star was the cause of sultry heat, usually felt about this time.

Its influence was esteemed so great by the Romans, that they sacrificed a

brown dog to it every year to appease its rage.

All these notions of the ancients, and all similar opinions, that prevail at the present time on this subject, are mere idle fancies. The dog-star has no more influence in producing heat and sultriness than any other star that decks the sky, and the days usually denominated dog-days, might with as much propriety be said to begin on the 10th or 13 of July, as on the 25th. The atmosphere suffers no greater change on the 24th and 26th of July, nor on the 5th and 6th of September, than it does on other days preceding, and subsequent, to those days. If the term dog-days has any appropriate signification, it is because the word is intended to denote forty or fifty days of the most hot and sultry part of the year; but as these vary almost every year in their commencement and termination, any notice in the Almanack, or elsewhere, pretending to define the time when dog-days begin and end, is futile, and of no more importance than the predictions concerning the weather.

Dog-days in England have varied much, as appears from their calendar. Bede refers to a calendar which placed the beginning of dog-days on the 14th of July. In Queen Elizabeth's time they are said to commence on the 8th of July, and end on the 6th of September. From the Restoration of Charles II. to the correction of the British calendar, the beginning was placed on the 19th of July, and the end on the 28th of August. After the correction of the calendar, the beginning was placed on the 30th of July, and the end on the 7th of September. Of late the British almanacks have placed the beginning on the 3rd of July, and the end on the 11th of August.

When the ancients first observed the dog-star, it used to make its appearance in the morning, about the first of July, but by the precession of the equinoxes, it now rises hilically or is first discovered as late as the 14th of August, and in process of time it will be the harbinger, not offheat, but of frost and snow.

Che Wit's Nuuchion.

FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!

THIS cut illustrates one of the following anecdotes, selected from an extremely rare work, entitled "Droll Passages and Jests to make merrie withal. Imprinted at London, by T. K. for Amos Drew, dwelling neere the Mitre in Fleete St. 1637." 4to pp. 24.

"TOBACCO was brought into this countrey, by Sir Walter Rawleigh, in 1583. At first he did smoke thereof privately, being unwilling that it should be copyed; but sitting one day in a deep muse, he called unto his man to bring him presently a tankard of small ale. The fellow comming sodainley into the roome, cast all the liquor in his master's face, and running downe staires, bawled out

Fire! help! Sir Walter has studied till his head's on fire, and the smoke breaks forth of his nose and mouth.'

(Compare Nic-NAC, vol. i. p. 277.

excessive drynkin'g continually. Here's greevous clutter and talke," quoth Ben, concerning my drynkinge, but there's not a word of that THIRST which so miserably torments me night and day,'

"THE TOOTH-ACHE.

Mopsa had not (I heard her when she swore)

The tooth ache, not for twentie years and more.

And well may Mopsa sweare,and sweare but truth,

"Tis above twentie since she had a tooth."

"THE HEIR AT LAW. Fungus the usurer's dead, and no will made:

Whose are his goods?-They say no heire he had.

Sure I should think (and so both law asThey are the Devil's, for he's next of sign'd)

kinde."

quarrel ensued: after some altercation the fellow went away, and the door being made fast, all was quiet; but this execrable villain, to revenge the supposed incivility he had received from the showman, went to a heap of hay and straw, which stood close to the barn, and secretly set it on fire. The spectators of the show, who were in the midst of their entertainment, were soon alarmed by the flames, which communicated themselves to the barn in the sudden terror which instantly seized the whole

assembly, every one rushed to the door, but it happened trafortunately, that the door opened inwards, and the crowd that was behind, still urging those that were before, they pressed so violently against it, that it could not be opened; and being too well secured to give way, the whole company, consisting of more than 120 persons, were kept confined in the building till the roof fell in. This accident covered them with fire and smoke: some were suffocated in the smouldering thatch, and others were consumed alive in the fames. Six only escaped with life; the rest, among whom were several young ladies of fortune, and many little boys and girls were reduced to one undistinguishable heap of tangled bones and flesh, the bodies being half consumed, and totally disfigured. The surviving friends of the dead, not knowing which was the relic that they sought, a large hole was dug in the church-yard, and all were promiscuously interred together. It is not easy to conceive any eircum stances of greater horror, than those which attended this catastrophe, neither is it easy to conceive more aggravated wickedness than occurred in the perpetration of it. The favour which was refused was such as the wretch had neither pretence to ask, nor reason to expect. The barn did rot belong to the showman, and the spectators were admitted only upon terms, with which he refused to comply. The particulars of his punishment, or his escape, are not preserved with the story.

The accounts are many and authentio as to the atrocious act itself, and though diversified, and apparently written by different authors, agree in the truth of the story.

A dreadful accident arising from a similar cause, happened at Stirbitch

ja 1802.

(Compare Nic-Nac, vol. i. p. 170.)

DRAM-DRINKING.
(Concluded from page 263).

"A niedical man, who has been in extensive practice in and about the metropolis for about thirty years,

recently made me the following report of the result of his experience. Copy of & Report from James Upton, of Throgmorton Street, Esq. April

14. 1817.

Your request has been upon my mind ever since you made it to me, on account of the magnitude and enormity of the evil alluded to; I am really at a loss where to begin and where to end; the vital interests, both of nations and individuals, are involved in it; no less so the domestic and publie peace and general safety. Idleness is the remote, and passions unrestrained, either by education or religious principle, are the acting and immediate causes of the habit of dram-drinking. The evil is far more extensive than can be conceived by common minds of superficial observers: its operation, I had almost said, is felt more or less in every family; and germs of it, to appear afterwards in disastrous and disappointing seasons like these, have been sown unperceived in the lower classes of society. My attention was first led to this subject, when a student at Edinburgh, in 1784. The quantity of whisky and new malt spirit, drank by the lower orders in Scotland at that time, exceeded the gin-drinking of this country, in the same or even lower classes of society; its destructive consequences were more marked on that account, aided, possibly, by their not being able to procure animal food, living chiefly upon fish and oatmeal. From this cause I witnessed the fatal consequences, in the Infirmary there, by an enlargement of the liver to an extent almost unprecedented in this country; its figure could be distinctly traced on the parietes of the abdomen with a pencil; the other contents of the belly being pressed down into the pelvis by its magnitude; always proving fatal, and the instances very numerous indeed. The diseases induced by this fatal habit vary much, according to the proportions of ardent spirits taken, in the quality also, as well as the constitutions of the parties drinking it. Many very excellent men have become the subjects of

incurable stomach complaints, and wasted away in middle life, where there has been counting-house application, with only one or two glasses at most of diluted spirit and water, taken every night at the coffee-house or at home, who would have been shocked to be considered otherwise than sober men, thinking they were rather benefiting than injuring their health. Travellers, again, go much further; they generally die of brandied stomachs and there is not the least power of either taking or keeping nourishment. The next degree is diseased liver, with deranged functions of stomach and brain, dropsy, arterial ossifications, mental derangement, paralysis, serious apoplexy, and death. In this incurable state of things, all social, parental, fililial, and religious feeling, if the latter ever existed, are completely destroyed, and every possible immorality is let loose to occupy their place. Such is the dreadful vacuum and craving sensation of stomach which dram-drinking produces, that I have no doubt, in order to quiet it, a man will and has sacrificed every thing dear to man. This is not all; this mode of life excites artificial venereal appetite; and you have an offspring possessing only half animal life. A vast num ber of women have been taught to drink, in the middle and in the higher classes, by taking indiscriminately quack medicines, containing alcohol, hot seeds, and essential oils; such as Rymer's tincture for gout in the stomach, Solomon's balm of Gilead, &c. I have professionally known those articles taken to a degree of intoxication, and inducing habits of dram-drinking. I have been informed, from very good authority, that Dr. Solomon has laid the foundation of this destructive habit in some thousands of people in Liverpool and its environs. I have known many respectable characters who have, I believe from ignorance, fallen into this snare, where close application to any particular pursuit, which has a tendency to produce sinking in the stomach, has led imperceptibly to an indulgence in this bewitching liquor.

Medical men generally avoid this evil, as a body, perhaps more than most others, from their knowledge of its pernicious consequences; and I have no doubt are daily checking its growth, whenever opportunity offers. In this respect I have the satisfaction of knowing, that many families have left off the use of spirits altogether. It is not in my department to propose a remedy for this growing evil, an evil which leads to Sabbath breaking, thieving, murder, and cruelties of every description; and which of late have been so awfully conspicuous in our once comparatively innocent and happy country. I have often wished that greater facilities had been given to the poor, either for making, or buying at a reasonable rate, their own English beverage-mild and good ale; and that fewer facilities had been given for procuring the three which are termed genuine spirits, brandy, rum, and gin; and that no other compound, of any other name, should be manufactured, which imitations and substitutes are equally injurious to the constitution. But, of late, it has appeared, that the whole strength of a state is not in its inhabitants, but in a revenue drawn from their actual destruction of body and soul. I might add, there is one hope that has lately cheered my mind, from which I anticipate much good, viz. the present National Schools. If the rising generation of the lower orders of society are not essentially benefited by the present mode of education, combined with religious instruction, I shall despair of any stop being put to the dreadful catalogue of crimes, which, for the last few years especially, have deluged this country. I confess, I augur much from this source, as long as it is conducted upon the present rational principles. The Bible Society also will, 1 trust, have its share, but not so extensively where instruction and explanation are necessary, If you can cull any thing useful out of these hasty outlines, I shall be glad; but they have been written in the night, after a hard day's fatigue. Such as they are, they are much at your service; and if the