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Mesmerism in India, and its Practical Application | fluid, and has a powerful effect on the system in Surgery and Medicine. By JAMES ESDAILE, when it has been previously affected. That the M.D., Civil Assistant Surgeon, H.C.S. Ben- mesmeric influence can be transmitted through the gal. Longman and Co. air to considerable distances, and even pass through dense materials."

All this, it must be admitted, is at least something very well worth the proving; the things asserted, if they can be established, certainly do not want importance. Any one, then, who takes an interest in such matters will do well to consult the evidence Dr. Esdaile has brought forward. We do not profess to offer an opinion upon it, either way.

THIS is one of the most notable works that have yet appeared on the curious subject of Mesmerism. It is remarkable not only for the facts it contains, but for its freedom from anything like passion or advocacy. Dr. Esdaile does not seem to have had any natural love of the marvellous, and has become a believer in the wonders of Mesmerism in opposition to a strong tendency to doubt whatever cannot be accounted for upon known principles. The book, let us add, is by no means a mere Indeed, it is with reluctance he admits there is any-history of scientific and humane bloodshed from thing really unaccountable in the matter; and he beginning to end. The cutting and carving is tries again and again to persuade himself and his agreeably relieved by much ingenious disquisition, readers that it may all be resolved into a modifica- and also by several mesmeric performances and tion of ordinary phenomena. We cannot say, adventures of the author's in which the knife plays however, that we look upon his reasoning to that no part. The most remarkable of these last is a effect as the most successful portion of his specu- singular story of a boy and a barber-a new exemlations. It seems to us that if Mesmerism is to be plification of the Scotch song, "I'll make you be admitted as true, even to any extent, it must be fain to follow me"-but it is too long for our space. received, at least for the present, as the develop- As a more commodious specimen we will take the ment of a power or principle distinct from any following: hitherto known.

"July 29th.-I made a man senseless and cataThe main purpose of the book is to detail a long leptic at a great distance, in the presence of a series of cases in which Mesmerism has been re- large number of gentlemen, who had come cently employed by Dr. Esdaile in India, with the from Calcutta and elsewhere; among them were effect of extinguishing for the time all nervous six doctors, in whose hands, and in those of the susceptibility, and in which operations, many of rest of the company, he was left as long as they them of a most formidable character, have been pleased, without my approaching till I was requestsuccessfully performed upon mesmerized patients ed to awake him, after they had all tried in vain. without any pain being felt by them. Seventy- This I did, but only to the extent of enabling him three such cases were reported as having occurred to walk and follow me. I then said, that I would in the hospital at Hooghly in the last eight months try to clear up his perceptive organs sufficiently to of 1845, besides eighteen cases of cures effected permit him to understand my wishes, with which by Mesmerism alone, without any surgical opera- he would implicitly comply; I did not wish to tion. We will not inflict any of these narratives leave him the power of speech even, at this stage. upon our readers, who, not having the advantages Having attracted his ear, I ordered him to do what of being mesmerized, might many of them suffer I did, and this he very faithfully performed by from Dr. Esdaile's knife what his patients were throwing himself, on the instant, into every attispared. Those of them, however, who have a tude I assumed; but I required to be careful, for taste for such sanguinary reading, may be con- if I threw him much out of balance, he was in scientiously recommended to procure the volume danger of plunging head foremost against the itself, not a page of which they will find tedious floor. Those who did not see him, may imagine or uninteresting. It will be sufficient to quote how little the poor fellow knew what he was Dr. Esdaile's summary of the general results about, when they are told, that he took the 'Jonwhich he conceives the cases have established: gitude' of the judges of the Supreme Court with "From the foregoing facts it is allowable to the cool impudence and precision of a cabman, conclude, I hope, that Mesmerism is a natural and the gravity of an astronomer. I then propower of the human body. That it affects directly ceeded to free his voice, but only to the extent of the nervous and muscular systems. That in the making him my echo; he was told to repeat mesmeric trance the most severe and protracted whatever I said, and he showed his intelligence by surgical operations can be performed, without the repeating the order. He then gave us Ye Marinpatients being sensible of pain. That spasms and ers of England,' and if the pronunciation was not nervous pains often disappear before the mesmeric very perfect, he seemed to me to reverberate extrance. That it gives us a complete command of actly my tones, and my gesticulations were also the muscular system, and is therefore of great ser- faithfully copied. We passed suddenly from vice in restoring contracted limbs. That the grave to gay,' and he did such justice to Hey chronic administration of Mesmerism often acts as diddle diddle,' that I lost my gravity and burst a useful stimulant in functional debility of the into a laugh; he joined me in full chorus, and I nerves. That as sleep, and the absence of all heard it remarked' he can't help laughing himpain, is the best condition of the system for sub-self;' and some were now quite satisfied that he duing inflammation, the mesmeric trance will was found out! Upon this I stopped laughing, probably be found to be a powerful remedy in local and, on the instant, his features relapsed into the inflammations. That the imagination has nothing to do with the first physical impression made on the system by Mesmerism, as practised by me. That it is not necessary for the eyes to be open: I always shut them as a source of distraction; and blind men are as readily mesmerized as others. That water can be charged with the mesmeric

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most awful repose, and I pointed out that it was no joke to him, but purely imitative laughter, and this, I should think, became evident to all. He also sang God save the Queen,' as well, or rather as badly, as I, for he is capable of much better things, under a more skilful music master. I now awoke him up a little more, and made him capable

of answering questions. He was asked if he covery. It has been even said that he disregards could fence he said that he could; and I bid him all obstacles, such as ground, or intervening show me. He began to cut the preliminary capers heights, and that he could destroy vessels at of the native fencers, but, in the act of stooping, Spithead by any apparatus behind the Isle of a fit of rigidity shot through him, and he would Wight. But let him sink a vessel at six miles have fallen, with dangerous violence against the range, and he will have sufficiently substantiated floor, if his fall had not been fortunately broken. his claims. I am always alarmed, and on the look out, when this man is experimented on, from this tendency to instantaneous rigidity of the body. A profound trance, from which it is very difficult to awake him, succeeds such exertions, and usually lasts for four or five hours. I showed another step in the mental phenomena, on other subjects; enabling them to answer simple questions correctly, and extinguishing and releasing the power at pleasure. All reflection being dormant, they feel a natural impulse to give a direct answer to a direct question, and in this way tell me frankly whatever I choose to ask. We are assured that common sleepers can also be played upon in the same way by patient and skilful persons, and that this is well known to the secret police of France."

"You may fret me," says Hamlet, "but you shall not play upon me!" The melancholy prince, though conscious of more things in heaven and earth than our philosophy dreams of, had not sounded the wonders of Mesmerism.-Examiner.

WARNER'S INVENTION.

LORD INGESTRE's motion on the subject of the invisible shells and the long range has brought Mr. Warner's claims again before the public. The inventor had unfortunately proceeded so much in the style of charlatans that he has thrown a strong degree of doubt over the whole transaction. This doubt, however, will be quickly extinguished by the trial which has been assented to by the chancellor of the exchequer. The objections hitherto made must be suffered no longer. The demand for so monstrous a sum as nearly half a million of money, the demand to have his own selection of the officers who were to try the experiment, and the various objections which were made to every attempt to bring the question to a brief and direct trial, altogether enveloped the whole affair in such a tissue of apparent equivocation, that the public grew utterly weary and dismissed the matter from their minds. A trial is now to be given, and, if Mr. Warner will not exhibit fairly the results which he avers his secret to be capable of effecting, he must expect the natural consequence. We must hear no more on his part of the hazard of communicating his secret, or his right to bargain for a remuneration. Nothing can be more easy of apprehension than the reality of his discovery if he chooses to convince the public.

The invisible shell is altogether an inferior proposal. It is much more within the power of trick; and the shattering of the vessel at Brighton was managed with so much artificial arrangement that it produced no conviction whatever. Torpedoes, submarine shell, and explosions by galvanic wires, have been so common that their effects produce no interest, and their secrets are not worth the name of a discovery. As to the long range, we must hear no more scruples from the fear of developing the secret too suddenly. All that is necessary for either the officers or the public to know is, that the thing can be done. This is not like the secret of the congreve rocket, or of any other combination of explosive materials. It can only be necessary, in the first instance, that the officers should use their eyes and see whether the ship is actually destroyed by a projectile, or whatever may be the means at the proposed distance. If the effect is produced, there can be no doubt of the importance of the secret.

As to the triflings on the subject of inhumanity if this power should be attained, they are not worth listening to for a moment. Whatever increases the power of defence renders a service to humanity. The "long range," if it should ever be effective, would, for example, not merely destroy an invading fleet, which would be an obvious service, but it would prevent the existence of an invading fleet altogether, for no sovereign would think of constructing a fleet at the enormous expense which naval preparation demands, and manning it with thousands of his subjects, where its certain fate was to be total destruction. Thus the lives which must be spent in any invasion at the present day would be saved, for invasion would be attempted no more. It is true that every nation might have a Warner apparatus to defend its coasts and harbors; and what would be the result? That nations would have no power of injuring each other; and thus the very excess of danger would produce the excess of safety.

On the same principle we regret the imperfection of Perkins' steam gun, because, if it had fulfilled its objects, it would have made defence irresistible, by rendering assault utterly ruinous. After the first evidence of its powers, assault would be felt to be massacre, and, therefore, no assault would be made. A gun discharging 500 balls a minute, capable of sustaining that discharge for any length of time, and throwing its shot with the precision of artillery, would render the musket utterly useless, and mow down an enemy's line without suffering it to advance a step, when the He has only to make the experiment before range was once found. Therefore no assaults their eyes. He states that he is in possession of a would thenceforth be attempted. This would be a discovery by which he can infallibly destroy a ship great triumph of humanity, and the next step of war at a distance of six miles; and that he also would probably be the extinction of war altogether. has an invisible shell, by which, without any com- But to this fortunate consummation we must munication with a ship, he can instantly sink it. acknowledge that we see no approach at present, The former experiment is the more important and and, in the mean time, we must wait for Mr. peculiar one. Let him take his apparatus into the Warner's unequivocal evidence that he can sweep Channel and destroy any vessel anchored six miles a fleet from the seas at twice the range of a sixoff, and there will remain no doubt of his dis-and-thirty pounder!-Britannia, July 18.

From the Britannia.

The Modern Orlando. Cantos I. to VII. Colburn.

THIS work comes at a happy time to silence the reproach that the spirit of poetry has been smothered by steam. Every one will acknowledge here the rising of a new star, destined to move with brilliancy in an orbit of its own. "The Modern Orlando" is by turns striking, picturesque, pathetic, witty, and grand, and displays in all the true soul of genius-originality. Should it fail to become popular it can only be from one defect-a great defect it must be admitted with a certain class of

Worn out with age, and yet, by time unhurt; Light without lustre, glory without fame, Earth's darkest picture, set in earth's most gilded frame."

His dinner at "Vatel's" and his supper at the Trois Frères Provenceaux" are succeeded by graver themes. His visit to Fontainebleau and the picture gallery of the palace draw forth the powers of his sarcastic wit. Here are a couple of his portraits :

MOLIERE.

readers the absence of personality and vicious-Whose is that visage, sportive, yet severe;

ness."

When it was thought all veins of poetry had been exhausted, and the mine worn out, this author appears to show that invention is limitless; and that where there is true ability there will never be wanting novelty in style and subject.

For the idea of his production, and the idea merely, the writer is indebted to Ariosto His hero is a traveller, but a traveller in modern fashion-by rail and by steam-boat, by yacht and by post-chariot. All his adventures are of the day, all his characters of the time. His plan of painting is the plan of Pope. His canvass is a summer cloud, his colors rainbow hues, and his subject "the Cynthia of the minute." His motto is the mirror of his spirit:

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Travel! travel! travel! The mind stagnates at home. The flower dies unless it is transplanted. Hear all things-see all things-write all things, and write them on the spot. Give the world your thoughts, fresh, fast, and fair, as they come. Make your pen a pencil, your ink colors, your paper a canvass, and Nature your sitter. Say what you think; tell the truth, and fear not. Cherish woman, and castigate man. Be bold of heart, quick of eye, and pleasant of tongue. Carlo mio-where then is the true poet to be found? By the Madonna, I know not. Let the world, which decides everything, decide that too. I follow none

-I ask none to follow me. This is the only boast of your friend Ludovico.-Farewell; may all the graces hover round your pillow, Carlo mio." Lettere Scelte, v. 2.

It is not a little surprising that the verse of this young writer should display the finish of that of a veteran poet. The vigor of his thought goes hand in hand with the music of his rhyme. He is neither careless nor labored; a slovenly line or a false cadence never slips from his pen. Poetic expression seems so natural to him-whatever his theme, however changeful his subject-that one is tempted to think the stanza he manages with so much ease and grace must be his every-day language.

Visiting all lands, and passing rapidly from grave to gay, our "Orlando" sees some objects that call forth serious reflections, some that move him to smiles and ridicule. In Paris, the city of strange contrasts, he finds food enough for his varying humor. The character of the capital is splendidly struck out in a single stanza :

"Paris, thou strangest thing, of all things strange; Young beauty, superannuated flirt; True to one love alone, and that one, change: Glittering, yet grim; half diamonds, and half dirt;

Thou model of-two ruffles and no shirt! Thy court, thy kingdom, and thy life, a game;

That brow so bright, yet careworn?-Ah, MoThat lip of laughter, yet those piercing eyes;

lière !

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Yes! 't was delightful, from thy features placid,
Thy wit a drop of death-pure prussic acid-
To see such firefly sparks of satire dart!
A flash of lightning, killing without smart!
Tell me, thou man of brain without a heart-
Prince Scapin! in what courtly escritoire

That steered thee safe through council and boudoir;
Hast thou locked up thy never-failing chart,
Till France's blazing torch was buried in the
Loire?

France has for thee no rival-Rome but Sylla; Yet, strip the classic gilding from the name, What was his lazy life, his Baian villa,

His Senate, craving for the bread of shame, To thy keen course, through France's tide of flame;

Thy path, beset with faction's serpent-stings? Thine was the longer and the harder gameWhen Europe's thrones were made the tombs of kings.

But politics, avaunt!-I turn to wedding-rings!"

One presence pervades all Fontainebleau, but especially fills

THE CHAMBER.

"One glance at thy bronze bust, Napoleon! Ere all are hurried from the little room, Where Europe's lord was tumbled from his throne. There stands his couch;-the table, hid in gloom,

Where his own pallid fingers signed his doom; The chair, in agony of spirit scored:

King-maker! I ask not, where stands thy tomb

Though thousands round it wept, or cannon roared. | Or, like your old cathedrals-spite of rats-
Here was Napoleon's tomb; here vanished crown

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And yet, I paused, to see an old château;

Now but a heap of ivy-mantled stones; The fortress of thy father's Mirabeau!

Ten centuries of purple deans surviving!
Nay, like your bankrupts, by their ruin thriving!
While commonwealths, however free and furious,
Are smothered, once for all; like hornets
hiving!

Paying for power an interest usurious—
Blood, cent. per cent.! I leave the problem to the

'curious.'

I think republics are, like London fires,

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Got up, to help your men of parts' to rob! The blaze burns out its fuel, and expires,

Just by the time the rogues have done the job(A fact at which I have no heart to sob !) Then comes the course of nature, and a king! As sure as Moslems love a hot kabob. The lucky knaves get rich-the luckless swing! Thus runs this mill-horse world, in one eternal ring!"

These sketches, by so masterly a hand, have some public interest; but they do not constitute the most amusing part of the volume. Anecdotes of society, tales of romance, jests, pictures of manners, descriptions of travel, adventures by sea and land, follow each other in rapid succession. The last canto is filled with a strange story, in which the writer shows his power over the mysterious,

and his talent for narrative.

Speculation will, of course, strive to fix this poem on some established writer. But we rather think the force and finish it displays are the result of natural ability rather than of long practice. There appears in it too much freshness of feeling and originality of style to countenance the supposition that it belongs to any of the writers with whom we are acquainted, though it is undoubtedly true that genius has little difficulty in assuming a

Thou man of contradictions!-prop of thrones, Yet, the hot marrow in rebellion's bones; The monarch's hireling; yet the rabble's king! Courtier, yet brazen trump of faction's tones! Thy genius, half swine's hoof, half eagle's wing! Bold, coward, patriot, slave, tool, traitor-every-disguise, and that veterans in literature have some

thing!

These are the men one hates, and yet admires ; The base, yet brilliant, actors on life's stage; The Titan-brood, with serpents for their sires; The shame and scorn, but, wonder of their age; Wild mixture of the savage and the sage; Fierce summoners to that consummate fray, Which tainted thrones with maddened nations

wage;

Dark heralds of the last avenging day,

times been able to throw the keenest critics off the scent of their track.

NUTRIMENT IN SUGAR.-The nutritive properties of sugar are much underrated in this country. As an aliment, Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, maintains that sugar affords the greatest quantity of nourishment, in a given quantity of matter, of any subject in nature. Horses and cattle were fed wholly on it at St. Domingo for some months,

When diadems are crushed, and those who crush- when the exportation of sugar and importation of

ed them-clay!

Those are the tribe whose mission is, to teach,
Not learn-interpreters of fate to men.
Instinct, their thoughts; their tongues, of mighty
speech;

Too fiery for the slow performing pen.
There never rushed the lion from his den,
Rousing the forest echoes with his roar;

More marked by nature for the fight; than when

This tribe their way to sanguine triumph tore, Leaving the world in doubt, to dread them, or adore."

Monarchies, in our poet's opinion, have little to fear from revolutions. There is truth in these reflections on

THE STABILITY OF THRONES.

"I always bet on thrones; they fall, like cats, On their four paws! they 'scape, like ducks, by diving!

grain were prevented from want of ships. During the crop time in the West Indies all appear fat and flourishing. The cattle fed on the cane-tops become sleek and in fine condition. The negroes drink freely of the juice, and become fat and healthy. Sir George Staunton observes, that many of the slaves and idle persons in China hide themselves among the canes, and live entirely on them for a time. In that kingdom the emperor compels his body-guard to eat a certain quantity of sugar every day, that they may become fat, and look portly. Sugar and rice constitute the common food of the people, and every kind of domestic animal is fed on sugar. Plagues, malignant fevers, and disorders of the breast, are unknown in the countries where sugar is abundantly eaten as food. The celebrated Dr. Franklin used to drink syrup every night before he went to bed to alleviate the agonies of the stone.—Popular Errors Explained.

MRS. MAGEE, of Dublin, has left £20,000 to trustees for the erection of a Presbyterian college in Ireland.-Athenæum.

FROM Copenhagen, we learn that, on the 21st sume, no more than a general refitting-an armault., the inhabitants of Denmark, Sweden, and ment adapted to national security and pretensions; Norway, to the number of 8,000, met on the little just what the restoration and reorganization of the island of Hvéen, to celebrate the three hundredth French maritime forces are proclaimed. A story anniversary of the birth-day of the illustrious as- travels in the opposition journals that Louis Phitronomer, Tycho-Brahé. The flags of the three lippe, in several letters, urged Queen Victoria to Scandinavian kingdoms floated from the fleet of persuade or command Sir Robert Peel to poststeamers which bore the pilgrims, from the oppo- pone the dissolution of his ministry until after the site points, to the place of rendezvous—a govern- French elections; and that her majesty (unavailment war-steamer conveying the professors of the ingly of course) exerted herself to that end. The universities of Copenhagen and Kiel, the members notion obtained here, in all quarters, that the acces of the Royal Academy of Sciences and of the Roy- sion of the whigs would operate in France unfaal Northern Society of Archæology, other person-vorably for the conservative canvass; but it is now ages of the Danish capital distinguished for litera- dissipated. It was argued that France would no ture, art, or science-and a colossal bust in white longer consent to be dragged in tow by England; marble of the subject of the day's celebration. that there must be in both countries cabinets who The principal ceremonial was the inauguration of could treat with each other on equal footing. All this monument, beneath a triumphal arch erected the deputies are included in a series of biographiamid the ruins of the old palace of Uranienburg, cal sketches published in many numbers of the where the philosopher was born and spent most of ministerial organ, the Epoch. Those in opposihis life. The brow of the image was encircled tion are not spared in the least, but handled with with a laurel crown; and then, a thousand young very amusing and pungent sarcasm and disparagevoices raised, in honor of him whom it represents, ment of one kind or other. The truth of most of the national songs of the three Scandinavian coun- the lives and traits heightens the effect and protries and the Philharmonic Society of Copenha- motes the purpose, in all the denominations of depgen executed a cantata, written for the occasion. uties. The monument was solemnly handed over to the guardianship of the people of Hvéen; and left to its solitude of ages on an island which numbers not more than a hundred inhabitants.-The two hundredth anniversary of the birth-day of the Philosopher Leibnitz was celebrated with great pomp, a few days ago, by the University of Leipzig; of which city he was a native.-Athenæum.

CORRESPONDENCE.

We are informed from Rome that the new pope (the 258th) has not yet appointed the secretary of state-the functionary who enjoys more control over the foreign relations and internal policy than his holiness, in whose case the maxim, reign and not govern, is usually realized. A higher congregation, or council of state, of six eminent cardinals, of different political attachments and sentiments, has been formed to examine all matters of civil administration. Meanwhile no changes occur, no reforms are announced; and Pius IX. incurs blame for tardiness. His name, you know, is Mastai-Feretti. The Romans play upon it thus: "You are very handsome and good-ma-stai," which means "but stationary.” His election, however, has proved more popular in the provinces than even in the capital. În authorizing railroads to Civita-Vecchia, Ancona, and Bologna, he has restricted the granting to natives and the employ ment of laborers also, when natives can be ob tained. Pasquinades abound at his expense. He is said to join in the public merriment. A French writer well remarks: "A politically ambitious or personally immoral pope is now impossible." It is a subject of complaint in the London prints that England has no diplomatic representative-avowed or in form-at the court of Rome: the consul at Ancona has served as political agent.

From Mr. Walsh's letters to the National Intelligencer. Paris, July 14, 1846. WE received yesterday afternoon the advices from the United States by the Great Western. We have a mere summary in the Journal des Debats of this morning; but an ample report and intelligent discussion of the whole in La Presse, and a good exposition in the Constitutionnel. The Oregon treaty and the President's new message touching a war-tariff are warmly commended. Stress is laid on the profession of readiness for peace, in case Mexico should propose reasonable terms. "According to the London papers," observes the Constitutionnel," England has given a lesson of prudence and moderation to the United States; if so, the United States have, on their side, given one of firmness to the other powers having The present summer teems with gigantic calamirelations and controversies with England." The ties-the destructive earthquake in Messenia-anidea of dissent by Lord Wellington and Sir Rob- other at Smyrna; the fire at St. Johns; submerert Peel, in the cabinet, to the terms of the treaty, sions in mines; the burning of the theatre at Queis held to be refuted by Sir Robert's language bec, so like the old calamity at Richmond; more in announcing the event to parliament. My im- deaths and conflagrations by lightning, more coup de pression, from the epoch of the disclosure of Sir soleil, more suicides, atrocious murders, and mutilaRobert's anti-corn law project to the latest peri- tions; more sudden visitations of body and mind, od, has uniformly been that he meant to yield in are recorded for France, within the two months the Oregon question what he believed could not fail past, than in any former year for this generation. to be accepted. He seemed, in all his public pro- The extraordinary and protracted heat of the wea ceedings, to have put himself entirely at ease on ther has a large share in the assigned causes. At that question. Some of the Paris editors now re- Stockholm, on the 26th ultimo, it was so cold that mark: "After all, the British naval preparations ice was formed in the open grounds Extensive were not intended for the United States; France strikes, popular tumults, sanguinary affrays, romanmust have been in the eye and calculations of Eng- tic or curious trials, have been frequent in a rare land." The "preparations" were, we may pre-degree.

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