warm.

newspapers, in German as well as English-and an P. S.-My bill for two nights' lodging and endless variety of circus and steamboat handbills. several meals is ninety cents ! Notwithstanding forming a sort of steamboat album, which may be the terms are reasonable, I caution the reader of value hereafter. Add to this a negro servant, against wharf-boat entertainment. and a small dog, visible, and any quantity of rats and mice invisible, (though noisy,) and you have the whole of this room.

YE SHIP-BUILDERS OF ENGLAND. While making this survey, and desiring very

(AFTER CAMPBELL.) much to retire, mine host says—" When you feel Ye ship-builders of England, like laying down you can take that bed," pointing

That load our native seas to the is high post” by the white curtain. This

With craft not fit to brave a year was a new position to me. I have always found a

The battle or the breeze : partition, though sometimes temporary and frail. Such rubbish do not launch agair. However, there was no retreat. I had decided to

Top-heavy, dull, and slow, stay, so I turned to my section of the room, and

As they creep through the deep, at the suggestion of the good lady, began “ to see

Whatever wind may blow. if I wanted more clothes." I found enough, and was greatly relieved when I found only one sheet. The spirits of retrenchment From this I inferred what was intended by “ lay

Shall start from every wave, ing down." Doffing coat and boots, I retired.

For in the sea economy As soon as I was quiet, the mother began to look

Through you has found a grave. after her litile ones, to see that they were safe and Thousands and thousands you have sunk John, what do you mean getting the

In ships that will not go ; clothes all off from George Washington ? don't you For they creep through the deep do that again.” Geo. W. wakes up—"Ma, John

Whatever wind may blow. Wesley keeps a kicking me. "_" John Wesley, you go to sleep, and don't you kick George Wash- The costly ships of England ington any more. Now be good hoys and go

For fire-wood yet may burn, sleepin.” Some sort of a stew was in the stove,

Till to the models of the past and presently out of the cradle the mother brings

Her shipwrights shall return. the youngest child, who is not a little disturbed by Then, then, ye clumsy ship-builders, the change from the cradle to his mother's arms.

Our song no more will throw “ Clay want some pretty?” The child cries—the

All the blame on your name, coaxing continues, but to no purpose-patience is

Which now merits every blow.—Punch gone. “Now, Henry Clay, you must drink this." Little “ Harry” surrenders--and all is quiet. Mother and child pass behind the curtain at my feet, wanting to sell spectacles in London, petitions the

WATT.-A young man, (says Sir R. Kane,) and Huldah, the servant, alone remains. She lights corporation to allow him to open a little shop, withher pipe and smokes as if she enjoyed it. I sneeze out paying the fees of freedom, and he is refused. a little and she quits. I feel a movement at my He goes to Glasgow, and the corporation refuse feet, and if Huldah did not rob me of a straw bed, hiin there. He makes acquaintance with some she came very near it. This bed is thrown upon members of the university, who find him very inte! the floor, the light is extinguished, and the crack- ligent, and permit him to open his shop within ling of the straw leads me to believe that Huldah, (their walls. He does not sell spectacles and magic though a slave, is now free from the cares and toils lanterns enough to occupy all his time; he occupies of the day-free to look back upon her deeds and himself at intervals in taking asunder and re-makthoughts—free to lift up her heart to Him who ing all the machines he can come at. He finds hath power to forgive all her errors, and to intro- there are books on mechanics written in foreign duce her to that perfect freedom which the gospel languages; he borrows a dictionary, and learne promises. With such thoughts as these I go to those languages to read those books. The universleep. . The morning dawns, and each in regular sity people wonder at him, and are fond of dropsuccession awakes from slumber and prepares for ping into his little room in the evenings, to tell him breakfast. On my return to the river, while waiting a boat, struments he constructs. A machine in the uni

what they are doing, and to look at the queer init was my pleasure to spend another night at this versity collection wants repairing, and he is emplace, having as company two highly interesting

ployed. He makes it a new machine. The and intelligent young ladies, and a gentleman. Steam-engine is constructed : and the giant mind 'Tis now morning, as mild and pleasant as May ; of Watt stands out before the world—the author of we sit upon the wharf-boat, with our heads uncov- the industrial supremacy of this country, the herald ered, and yet not too cool. The boys, who are of a new force of civilization. But was Watt edudamed, as their father said, “ after three of the cated? Where was he educated ? At his own greatest men ever in this country,” are playing workshop, and in the best manner. Watt learned about the edge of this boat at the peril of their Latin when he wanted it for his business. He lives. Several times Geo. Washington has been learned French and German ; but these things overboard, and as often saved by those who were

were tools, not ends. He used them to promote near at the time. John Wesley is nine years old his engineering plans, as he used lathes and lovers. and cannot read. No church in the town, no Sabbath school, and a day school only now and then. PURE ARTIFICIAL Light.-Mr. Brande has The ladies discover a steamer some four miles off. shown that artificial light may imitate that of the They protest against further letter-writing. I close sun in purity, by obtaining a Talbotype in less than to pay my bill and prepare for leaving in the ap- a minute, by the light of phosphorus burnt in oxyproaching boat.

LETTERS FROM THE ISLAND OF JAMAICA.

calculate his courses with such accuracy, for a dis

tance of 1200 miles, as to come within half a mile [This series of letters is begun in the New York Even of the point, towards which he laid the course of ing Post; probably from Mr. W. C. Bryant himself.) his ship, when he took his last departure from Bar

negat. We fortunately arrived at this point during Kingston, Jan. Ilth, 1850.

daylight; had we reached it in the night we should It is not easy to imagine a more delightful series have been compelled to lie-too, till morning, the of sensations than one experiences in passing at the channel is so narrow and tortuous. In passing it rate of two hundred and fifty miles a day, in a first from the south, the captain says that he always class steamship like the Empire City, from the keeps on, by night or day, for he is enabled to get rigors of a northern winter, to the soft and genial a "departure," so recently, froin the headlands of temperature of the tropics. Eight days ago, we St. Domingo, that, in the absence of all currents, sailed from pier No. 3, leaving New York city be- he can navigate the passage without difficulty, but hind us all ice-bound, her streets covered with snow in coming from the north, owing to the variety of and resonant with sleigh-bells. Furs and woollens currents which one encounters in the Atlantic, it is enveloped her population, and thermometers of impossible for the navigator to calculate his posievery sect and denomination were agreed that the tion with such accuracy as to make the passage weather was very cold. A good part of the fol- in the night safe. An error of half a mile in his lowing night I passed in walking the deck of the reckoning might be fatal. Empire City, without an overcoat of any kind, and At seven o'clock on the morning of the 10th we was warm and comfortable, as if it were an even- were boarded by a pilot, as we entered Kingston ing in June. In two days more linen clothing was harbor. He was a mulatto, intelligent looking, gladly substituted by the less prudent of our com- and about 25 years of age. He seemed rather pany, including myself, for flannels, and the pitch overcome by the good luck which had befallen him trickled from the seams of the ship, and from her in getting so big a ship. He soon, however, recovrigging, under the unrelenting heat of a tropical ered his self-possession, gave his orders to the man sun. But the air was always pure, soft and exhil- at the wheel, and conducted us safely up in front arating, the heat not in the least enervating, and the of Port Royal. effect of the gradual transition was not unlike the Before the ship had fairly stopped we were surdelightful sensations of a warm bath, protracted rounded with boats filled with negroes, some dressed through a series of days instead of minutes. No decently and some indecently, and some not at all. stimulants afford such delightful sensations. I They all talked at once, what they designed for had small occasion for sleep, to which I did not English, but as it would have been unintelligible devote on an average more than three hours out of to me under the most favorable circumstances, of every twenty-four, nor did I suffer any inconven- course it was like the apostle's preaching to this ience from the want of it. Philosophers could Greeks—foolishness. probably explain this very easily, by reference to Some of the boats were filled with oranges, banathe difference in the weight of the atmosphere, or nas and star-apples and other fruits, which our pasto the more rapid motion of the earth near the sengers were expected to purchase. The empty equator, or in a variety of other ways, all equally boats were waiting for a fare. All such as pra beyond my comprehension. It satisfied me that posed to land at Jamaica, including myself, soon with less than half my usual allowance of the made a selection from the group, and disembarked “ balmy,” I always rose perfectly refreshed. ourselves and baggage with as little delay as pos

In six days from the period of our departure we sible. Before we reached the shore the steamer were entering the harbor of Port Royal, having was ploughing her way again across the bay, on made the voyage in less time than it had ever been her route to Chagres. made before. From the time we parted with our We were compelled to stop at Port Royal to have pilot off Sandy Hook until we stopped at Jamaica, our baggage inspected by the custom-house officers our wheels never stopped. By night and by day, before going over to Kingston. The revenue offiwhether we were sleeping or waking, whether cers were mostly colored people. I saw but one watching or dreaming, ihe massive engine beneath white oarsman in any of the revenue boats, and in us, like an imprisoned giant, with arms of iron and that one the coxswain was a colored man. The breath of fame, toiled on without fatigue and with officer who examined our trunks is said to be a out repose. The weather was uniformly fine, and nephew of Lord Elgin. He did not appear to be all the incidents of the voyage conspired to make it very bright; his complexion was a little ambiguous, pleasant.

and his hair seemed to have belonged once to a The interior accommodations of the Empire City negro, if it did not then. are palatial. I enjoyed the exclusive use of a state When the ceremony of inspection was over, we room, most eligibly situated with a sitting-room redistributed ourselves in our boat, and bore away adjacent, luxuriously furnished. Our table abound- for Kingston, about six miles distant, on the oppo ed with all the luxuries of the New York market, site side of the bay. We had four colored oars and our company was exceedingly pleasant in spite men, under the command of Commodore Brooks, of all the trying familiarities to which one is ex- himself a very black man with very white linen, posed in the cabins of populous ships.

whose broad pennant of red, with a white ball, The first land we made, after taking leave of the swung at the mast-head, to indicate that he was heights of Neversink, was the point of Mayaguana, senior officer of the port. He told me that he re about 1200 miles from New York. A dangerous ceived his commission from the Admiral on the coral reef which projects from the island gives this station, and that no other boatmen were at liberty point some consequence, as it has been more fatal to raise the red flag but himself. I was amused at to navigators than any other point, I believe, among the style in which these pretensions were asserted, the West India Islands.

and asked him what he would do, if one were so It is a striking illustration of the triumphs of irreverent as to appropriate his color. He said he modern navigation that Capt. Wilson was able to would go and pull it down, but added that no one

a

and cunning features of Isaac with the thick-lipped, for nothing. Those that were prowling about the careless, unthinking countenance of Cudjo ; but streets of Spanishtown and Kingston, I presume, nature has done it perfectly, if that can be called a were of the latter class, for there is not a planter combination in which the negro furnishes the color on the island probably, whom it would be more and the Jew all the rest of the expression. What difficult to get any work out of, than from one of will be the ultimate consequence of this corruption these. They subsist by begging altogether ; they of the African blood, is a question which might are not vicious, nor intemperate, nor troublesome occupy the attention of your Ethnographical Soci- particularly, except as beggars. In that calling ety as profitably, perhaps, as anything which it has they have a pertinacity before which a northern recently pondered.

mendicant would grow pale. They will not be Though Kingston is the principal port of the denied. They will stand perfectly still and look island, it has but little of the air of a commercial through a window from the street for a quarter of city. One looks and listens in vain for the noise an hour, if not driven away, with their imploring of carts and the bustle of busy men ; no one seems eyes fixed upon you, like a stricken deer, without to be in a hurry; but few are doing anything; while saying a word, or moving a muscle. They act as the mass of the population are lounging about in if it were no disgrace for them to beg, as if the idleness and rags. They have what they call the least indemnification which they are entitled to omnibus here, which is of the capacity and shape expect, for the outrage perpetrated upon them in of four-wheeled cabs. These vehicles pursue no bringing them from their distant homes to this specific roue, but carry their passengers to any strange island, is a daily supply of their few and part of the city for twenty-five cents, provided their cheap necessities as they call for them. starved horses are equal to the effort.

I confess that their begging did not leave upon I never saw a place so abounding in old people my mind the impression produced by ordinary and babies. Almost every woman you meet, and mendicancy. They do not look as if they ought of whatever age, has an infant in her arms or some to work. I never saw one smile, and though they where about her, while the streets are littered with showed no positive suffering, I never saw one look children more advanced. So of aged persons, they happy. Each face seemed to be constantly telling are far more abundant than in our northern cilies. the unhappy story of their woes, and like fragThis may be attributed to the mildness of the ments of a broken mirror, each reflecting in all its weather, which enables the old people to be in hateful proportions the national outrage of which the streets at all seasons, without exposing them they are the victims. to those infirinities with which our northern climates afflict the aged. But the fact probably is,

The Oyster TradE.-Few people have any idea that while in the north the poor aged people die of of the immensity of the oyster business done in neglect, privation and exposure, as soon as they the United States. The Chesapeake and Delaware become too infirm to provide for all the wants occa- bay oysters go all over the world, and we learn, sioned by our trying climate, and long, cold win- from a late number of the Baltimore Sun, that one ters, in Jamaica' the same class do not reach any establishment in that city, during the oyster season, such boundary until much more advanced in years, keeps. twenty-five men constantly opening the They have no cold weather ; they can easily get all shells, and they sometimes open five hundred galthey require for their support, if they can walk, so lons a day, which are all designed for exportation. abundant are the fruits and edible productions of The oysters are put up cans, in their own liquor, the island ; and though the ties which bind the which are made air-right and hermetically sealed ; parent and child together are generally much more they are warranted to keep fresh in any climate. frail here than at the north, and though the aged Five men are kept constantly employed in making rarely depend upon their children for any assist

the cans.

The oysters are sent principally to the ance, yet the means of subsistence are so much Western States, but considerable quantities are more accessible, that one never hears of a person sent to the West Indies, South America, and some contracting disease, or suffering very seriously for have been even sent to China. want of food.

On Saturday week—the first day of the oysterI here beheld, for the first time, a class of beings taking season in Fairhaven river-six or seven of whom we have heard much, and for whom I hundred boats were ready for operation with the have felt considerable interest. I refer to the sunrise. The striking of the bell in the brick Coolies, imported by the British government to church was the signal to begin, and soon all was take the place of the faineant negroes, when the stir and commotion amongst men and shell-fish. apprenticeship system was abolished.

Those that During the day between thirty and forty thousand I saw were wandering about the streets, dressed hishels of oysters were taken, which, from the rather tastefully, but always meanly, and usually tae of their having been undisturbed for two years, carrying over their shoulder a sort of chiffionier's sack, in which they threw whatever refuse stuff took from seventy-five to one hundred bushels cach,

were unusually large and very fine. Some boats they found in the streets, or received as charity. and some few went much above this quantity. Their figures are generally superb, and their east- Transient oystermen sold their products at the bank ern costume, to which they adhere as far as their of the river, for 20 and 25 cents per bushel, while poverty will permit of any clothing, sets off their those who make " oystering" a regular business, fithe and graceful forms to great advantage. Their preferred to hold on for a speculation. faces are almost uniformly of the finest classic mould, and illuminated by pairs of those dark, A Scotch Stoic.--" Ah! John, you won't have swimming, and propitiatory eyes, which exhaust me much longer. I shall never leave this bed the language of tenderness and passion at a glance. alive.”-“ Please thee-self, Betty, and the 'll please

But they are the most inveterate mendicants on me,” returned John, with great equanimity. "I the island. It is said that those brought from the have been a good wife to you, John,” persisted the interior of India are faithful and efficient workinen, dying woman. Middlin', Betty, middlin',” rewhile those from Calcutta and its vicinity are good ) sponded the matter-of-fact husband.

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