fine linen, in which members of our house | jewelled days of youth and early middle yet die and sleep and are born. Yet when life, and it is best sometimes to contemour youngest bitten with the prevailing plate the time when the very air seemed fever of the day- begged to have the intoxicating, and a summer's morning of poor thing polished and restored to the beauty was as a gift direct from God. light of day, to stand in its old accustomed | And so on the west wall of the garret place and do no work, we would not have hangs a picture of a summer morning on it so, feeling that, could it but speak, how the river, and gazing thereon, at once it would surely protest at being dragged comes back in an instant the scent of the from its seclusion and forced to stand an distant hay, the regular swish of the idle mockery where it had once been a scythe, and the curious soft grating feel useful and honored member of the house- of our boat, as with one vigorous stroke hold. Yet the "youngest" is the only of the sculls we brought her into the one who ever ventures near our garret, bank, and in the deep shade, cast by and who feels there somewhat of what we meadow-sweet and willow-herb, and over feel; and when she speaks not and nestles that by a great elm, rest from our pleasant there beside the chair, an indescribable toil, and learn, by the help of summer, something draws away, our thoughts to mysteries just faintly indicated by our fathat other youngest child, and we almost vorite poets, whose secrets were no longer believe the little life that was never lived secrets, when pored over and discussed by it was given to the daughter whose upon the river's placid breast. It is good brown eyes and serious expression are to remember it all; to recollect the glance not ours, but singularly like those other of the brilliant kingfisher, that we hold as eyes that scarcely opened on the world it an emblem of good luck, or to remember came only into to withdraw her mother the wondrous hues of the dragon-fly as he from. It is singular for us to sit here in sometimes pitched on the reeds or flowers the sunset and to know how divers are above us and balanced himself just a moour thoughts: the garret is the past, the ment there ere darting away again on present only to us; to us the sunset rep- another flight; or even again, to think resents the bringer on of night, full of rest over the scented silence of the summer and possibilities of slumber; while to her night, when the nightingales were almost it is a place of the dead, and the sunset is silent, yet sang once and again, when a wondrous foretaste of the dawning of an- least expected, small snatches of their other day in which, as we gaze over the eternal melody; when the dew lay heavy long red road over which so many of our on the path, and the flowers as we brushed dearest have been taken, and where we by them almost drenched us with their can only see long funeral trains, and only cups over-full and flowing with moisture. hear the sad boom of the bell in the square But what did that matter? our fortunes grey tower beyond the river, she smiles were to be determined that night, and as to herself as she sees in fancy the fairy we set our eggshells, lighted inside by prince come riding from the gaunt ruined miniature candles, floating down the tiny castle between the hills, eager to claim stream that farther on flowed into the the bride that gazes at him from the garret broader river, we took small heed of all window. Her presence, intent as she is our surroundings in the anxiety of seeing on a future, has not much in common with how we should progress in our tiny the dark rest and peace that are forever voyage; and if we should float successbrooding o'er the garret; and, as with a fully onward, or else sink ignominiously smile she kisses and lightly leaves us, her into chaos, represented by the forget-mefootsteps growing lighter as she emerges nots and flowering rushes growing thickly from the gloom, it is easy to believe that in the streamlet. Yet when we look at the dwellers in the garret are relieved by our picture on our garret walls all comes her absence, and that they come nearer as back to us: the bark of a dog across the night draws nigh, secure in their knowl- meadows, the grate of the heavy market edge of a sympathetic presence being carts groaning as they slowly rumbled up alone among them. And, indeed, it is to town, and farther away yet, the song well to have such a garret, for around its that one of our sisters sang as she tried walls hang undisturbed pictures seen only to amuse the father, saying with a smile by the possessor of them, and that if we that she need not try her for true, for that had no garret for them to hang in would was already settled. surely fade altogether beneath the garish light of day. But, for certain, it were not good to forget altogether the precious

It were easy now to see another picture one of disappointment and despair; but surely 'tis best to contemplate yet an

other, when we were older truly, but only | on an approaching Medical Congress, we just beginning to really live, and this bas mentioned the prevalent belief in the inits own sounds of martial music; and we crease of longevity, and asked the Eurorecollect the band playing in the valley pean doctors to tell us how far it extended, while we climbed the hill and looked down and whether we really gained by it, on the great camp-fire, where the flames whether, that is, the young lived longer, rushed and sprang from the darkness or the mature, or the old. We ourselves straight up into the clear autumnal sky. suggested, as results of observation, that And then the music stopped. We heard old age had grown stronger, the pantaloon the vast sea moaning on the shore below stage of mumbling senility being now selour feet, and looking seaward we saw dom seen, except among the over-worked come suddenly into the moonlight a great poor; and that youth or ladhood was now ship, outward bound, that passed away al- protracted further into life. Men of twenmost as suddenly into the shadows, caus-ty-eight are beginning, instead of men of ing us to think simultaneously of the shortness of this life of ours, and how we emerge but for a moment out of the gloom into the broad light of life, and then disappear into the darkness almost before our presence on the scene is recognized. Perchance the shortness of life made us ponder also on how best to dispose of the time we had. I know not; but somehow the beacon-hill became a sacred spot to us, and life after that one evening was never quite the same thing to either of us again.

It does not matter that it is dark outside our garret, for darkness and silence suit this resting-place best, and when we contemplate our pictures, aided thereby by the presence of the relics of the past, we cannot help feeling that with the outside world we have very little indeed to do. Folks may sneer at us, or talk of our little failings and peculiarities, and trouble may come, and friends may leave us, and nearer and dearer ties may, nay must, snap with the hand of time; yet it seems to us that fates may do their worst, if we may come at twilight, and with faith and hope and memory to serve as handmaidens, contemplate our past happiness, our present quiet pleasures, from a garret.

twenty-four. Both those suggestions turn out to be accurate. Mr. Humphreys, who has even drawn up a new life table to compare with Dr. Farr's, shows that ever since 1872, when the first Public Health Act was passed, the longevity of the English people has sensibly increased. Whether from the operation of that act, or from the general attention to health which produced the act, or from an unobserved change in the ways of the people akin to the development of temperance now going on, or from one of those alterations in the virulence of disease which have repeatedly occurred in history, the mortality from epidemic diseases suddenly declined, till the mean, mortality in England, which between 1838-54 had been 225 per thousand, dropped in 1876-80 to 20.8 and is dropping still, the mean deathrate of 1881-82 being only 193, a total improvement of very nearly one-seventh. This increased longevity is not, it is true, quite equally divided between the sexes. Owing to causes which are still only partially ascertained, but which probably have some relation to the extra liability of women during the child-bearing period of life, females benefit most by improved sanitary conditions, and the total progress effected may be broadly stated thus. Men live two years longer than they did thirty years ago, and women three years and four months longer, a difference, we need not say, quite large enough to be perceptible in human life. It is equivalent, if with Mr. Humphreys, we take forty years MR. N. A. HUMPHREYS, in his paper to be, roughly speaking, the usual term of on the decrease of mortality, read before life, to an improvement of six per cent., the Statistical Society on the 17th inst., and would in a generation leave a country has done a considerable service to the of thirty millions with two millions more public. With infinite care and painstak- people in it than it otherwise would have ing, he has brought a mass of floating and had. A population greater than that of vague opinion upon the subject of English Denmark would have been saved from health to the test of accurate statistics, perishing. Whether that addition to and has told us exactly what modern hy numbers is a good must, of course, degiene has and has not done for English-pend upon a multiplicity of conditions. men. In July, 1881, for example, writing | We have never ourselves been able to ac

J. E PANTON.

From The Spectator.
ENGLISH LONGEVITY.

cept that rabbit-warren theory of national | 1,000 males by the reduction of the deathgrowth of which statists are so fond; do not believe that China is an ideal country; and contend that Canada is, or may be, a nobler, as well as happier, place than Belgium. Of the fact, however, as regards England there can be no reasonable doubt; and it is well that the fact, whatever it is worth, should be universally recognized. Our people tend more strongly year by year to keep alive.

rate in 1876-80, no less than 1,407, or 70 per cent., are lived at the useful ages between twenty and sixty. Of the remainder of the increase, 445, or 22 per cent., are lived under twenty years; and 157, or 8 per cent., above sixty years. Thus, of the total increase, 70 per cent. is added to the useful, and 30 per cent. to what may be called the dependent-age periods. The increased number of years lived by 1,000 females, according to the rates of mortality that prevailed in 1876-80, is 3,405. Of these (see Table X.), 2,196, or 65 per cent., are lived at the useful ages between twenty and sixty; 517, or 15 per cent, under twenty years of age; and 692, or 20 per cent., over sixty years."

This is the broad fact, but Mr. Humphreys adds details of the highest interest. Our suggestions, derived not from figures, but from observation, were, it appears, correct. The very old live longer, that is, of course, they are, as we suggested, stronger, less liable to that senile feebleness and degeneracy which struck our If, therefore, Mr. Humphreys's figures ancestors as their natural condition. They are correct and there is every reason to decay, of course, and lose powers of all believe them-the question we put in kinds, but they no longer sink into a sec- 1881 is finally answered, and answered in ond childhood; but, except when over- the affirmative. Hygienic progress, so far worked, die, so to speak, standing, as only as it extinguishes or diminishes disease, heroes used to do. We see men and does not merely lengthen life, which would women nowadays over eighty with all be no boon, if the extension were confined their faculties intact, able to converse, to to the Psalmist's period of "labor and soreat well, and to walk, and with a decided row;" but it increases efficiency. More and admitted influence on the affairs youths live and more men and women in amidst which they live. This is the more their prime, and youth and early maturity striking, because the increased longevity are less suddenly and frequently cut short. of the very aged is not shared by the old. The reservoir of force in the nation is Both in men and women, the chance of deepened as well as the reservoir of vitalsurvival between fifty-five and seventy ity, and a generation of the English peohas not increased, but has rather, if any-ple, taken as a whole, gains more time to thing, declined. People of that age do do its work, whatever it may be. Three not benefit so much by the reduced power minutes for men and five minutes for of epidemics; they feel, unless exception- women is added to every hour of their ally strong, the influences, such as sudden time on earth. That is most satisfactory, falls of temperature, over which science even to us, who see with a painful clearhas little power, and they decidedly suffer ness to what extent crowding diminishes from the increase of worry and anxiety the happiness of life, and reduces it to a which, among men and women with grown continuous struggle, for if effective vitality families, so markedly characterizes mod is increased, so also is the capacity for ern life. It is, however, in youth and emigration. Moreover, Mr. Humphreys, early maturity that the improvement is adhering, like a true statist, to his figures, most marked. The man's chance of life might, had he wandered out of them, have is increased most decidedly between five indefinitely strengthened his case. and thirty-five, and the woman's between addition of six per cent. to the longevity, five and fifty-five; and as, of course, great taking the sexes together, must mean a numbers, though not increased numbers, much greater addition to health. The who reach those ages survive, Mr. Hum- epidemic disease kills fewer, because it phreys condenses extensive calculations attacks fewer, and strikes those it does into the following sentences: "Although attack more lightly, leaving fewer of those a large proportion of young people cease terrible sequela which interfere so deeply to be dependent before twenty, and a with human happiness. If scarlet fever large proportion of elderly persons do not kills fewer persons, it leaves fewer still become dependent at sixty, we shall not with that liability to disease and incapac be far wrong in classing the forty years ity to work, often for years on end, which from twenty to sixty as the useful period attend a severe attack. We all saw this of man's life. Table IX. shows us that when small-pox passed away. The result of the 2,009 years added to the lives of of vaccination was not merely a dimin.

An

they resent the loss of the military as- | least able to bear it. They are, too, becendancy amid which they have all been bred up since they quitted the military schools. Their discontent may have been expressed to each other, and if so, the strong feeling always manifest in France, that the army should act as a body, may have produced some understanding. This understanding need not, however, be formidable for the present. The generals, it is certain, have no candidate whom they care about; they have no immediate and producible grievance; and they are not likely to attack the republic openly and as such. They are not agreed enough for that; they desire exceedingly that the minister of war should be with them in whatever they do, which at present would not be the case, and they are by no means quite certain of the disposition of the troops. A majority, perhaps, especially of the Bretons, would obey any order, but a minority, including an unusual proportion of the non-commissioned officers, would not, and it is a first object to prevent any contest whatever among the wearers of uniforms. The history of the Spanish army is much better known to the higher French officers than to Englishmen in general, and that example is greatly dreaded. It is most unlikely, therefore, that the discontent should become active, unless it also seizes the people, and it is on their emotion that everything must in the last resort turn. If the peasantry fancy the republic a failure the army will act, and the only question is whether this is probable. On the surface it is not so, but we confess we think the Republicans have some ground for their uneasiness. The French as a people have always shown an excessive devotion to material interests, and are apt to think that any failure in their proj. ects indicates a feeble or an ill-meaning government. They have not been pleased in this direction of late. Profits have not been large in any department of work, while in the wine-growing districts the losses have been severe. The financial panic caused by the crash of the Union Générale, and of a whole system of speculation, greatly affected the richer peasants and the saving townspeople, who, more over, have been greatly annoyed by the project of conversion, which they look upon as repudiation of a debt contracted when France was in difficulties. They hold this debt, and the fact that France may save by the operation a million and a half a year seems to them no compensation for their own diminution of income, which, again, occurs just when they are

ginning to be alarmed by what they hear about finance in general, a fact shown by the disinclination to absorb the last issue of rente, and by the increasing pressure of taxation. France is spending, when all taxes are thrown together, thirty per cent. more than England; and although France is a rich country, still the taxation presses upon people at once poor and miserly, and is raised in addition to the heavy personal tax involved in the conscription, which now falls upon every one. Under these circumstances, any new tax would evoke bitter resentment; a new and heavy loan, which many consider indispensable, and which would send down rente, would be felt as a blow; and a short harvest would produce a dangerous amount of distress, and of regret for the more prosperous times of the empire, when the wealth of France was so steadily increased. Under such circumstances the opportunity of the generals might speedily arrive. It is in the economic situation that the danger arises, and we see no sign that the governments which rise and fall every day are able to meet this adequately. The ministers do not insist upon economy, but, on the contrary, ask the country to undertake new and considerable responsibilities, under the pretext of housing the artisans of Paris. The Chamber is not awake to the situa tion, but persists in voting fresh credits for unnecessary improvements, such as larger schoolhouses; while the people, though anxious for economy in the abstract, constantly press new demands upon their members, all of which mean expense. Searching retrenchment is held to be out of the question; new taxation will not be tried; and the great resource of conversion, in which reliance was placed, is mismanaged, partly through popular resistance, and partly through M. Tirard's misconception of the market. He has forgotten that no conversion reassures fundholders, unless they are satisfied it is final, and that four and one-half per cent. is visibly only a temporary arrangement. The resources of the French treasury are so great, and it has so many privileges to sell, especially to the railways, that the evil day may be postponed for a time; but the reckoning must come at last, and may produce a panic deep enough to be of political importance. Should it arrive, the peasantry will for a time be both discontented and disenchanted, will accuse their rulers of imbecility, and will submit to almost any change which does not mean a return to the old régime.