taining what was really a beneficial object, the site scale. If he had ambition, it was of very overthrow of the oligarchy; and but for the cour-mean complexion, for he stooped to be but a nomage of Lord North, he must have capitulated to inal prime minister, and suffered the king's prithe Grenvilles, the Rockinghams, or the Bedfords, vate junto to enjoy the whole credit of favor, or surrendered to some combination of the factions while, between submission and laziness, Lord at discretion, when Grafton resigned. North saved North himself was seldom the author of the meathe crown from this degradation : sures in which he bore the principal part. This "Lord North had neither connexions with the passive and inglorious tractability, and his being nobility, nor popularity with the country, yet he connected with no faction, made him welcome to undertook the government in a manly style, and the king his having no predominant fault or vice was appointed First Lord of the Treasury on the recommended him to the nation, and his good hu29th, with only one day to intervene before it mor and wit to everybody but to the few whom would be decided whether he would stand or fall. his want of good breeding and attention offended. Could he depend on men whom he had not time One singularity came out in his character, which to canvass? Was it not probable that the most was, that no man was more ready for extremes venal would hang off till they should see to which under the administration of others, no man more side the scale would incline! Yet Lord North temperate than Lord North during his own :-in plunged boldly into the danger at once. A more effect, he was a man whom few hated, fewer could critical day had seldom dawned. If the court esteem. As a minister he had no foresight, no should be beaten, the king would be at the mercy consistence, no firmness, no spirit. He miscarried of the opposition, or driven to have recourse to the in all he undertook in America, was more improlords-possibly to the sword. All the resolutions vident than unfortunate, less unfortunate than he on the Middlesex election would be rescinded, the deserved to be. If he was free from vices, he was parliament dissolved, or the contest reduced to as void of virtues; and it is a paltry eulogium of a the sole question of prerogative. Yet in the short prime minister of a great country, yet the best interval allowed, Lord North, Lord Sandwich, that can be allotted to Lord North, that, though Rigby, and that faction on one side, the Scotch his country was ruined under his administration, and the Butists on the other hand, had been so ac- he preserved his good humor, and neither felt for tive, and had acted so differently from what the his country nor for himself. Yet it is true, too, Duke of Grafton had done, that at past twelve at that he was the least odious of the ministers with night the court proved victorious by a majority whom he acted; and though servile in obedience of forty." to a prince who meant so ill, there was reason to think that Lord North neither stimulated, nor was more than the passive instrument of the black designs of the court."

Walpole's character of Lord North presents essentially the same features as Lord Brougham's description of that minister, but has greater consistency of parts and more similarity to life in portraiture:

Sir Denis le Marchant, in his notes on this passage, calls attention to a fact, first revealed to the English public by the Atheneum, that Lord North disapproved of the policy pursued towards America, that he wished to resign his office, and only kept in place by the king's personal solicitations. The important letter which we published, and circumstances connected with the publication which many of our readers will recollect, led to a reasonable expectation that Lord North's correspondence would, ere this, have been before the public, and we cannot conjecture any plausible reason for its continued suppression. That correspondence would, we have reason to believe, show that the evils attributed to the personal influence of the Earl of Bute, came from a different quarter, and indeed this did not escape the sagacity of Walpole:

"He had knowledge, and though fond of his amusement, seemed to have all necessary activity till he reached the summit. Yet that industry ceased when it became most requisite. He had neither system, nor principles, nor shame; sought neither the favor of the crown nor of the people, but enjoyed the good luck of fortune with a gluttonous epicurism that was equally careless of glory and disgrace. His indolence prevented his forming any plan. His indifference made him leap from one extreme to another; and his insensibility to reproach reconciled him to any contradiction. He proved as indolent as the Duke of Grafton, but his temper being as good as the duke's was bad, he was less hurt at capital disgraces than the duke had been at trifling difficulties. Lord North's conduct in the American war displayed all these fea"If the earl himself did not preserve the same tures. He engaged in it against his opinion, and degree of credit with his majesty, the king acted yet without reluctance. He managed it without on the plan in which he had been initiated, and had foresight or address, and was neither ashamed cunning enough, as most princes have, to employ when it miscarried, nor dispirited when the crown and trust those only who were disposed to sacrifice itself became endangered by the additional war the interests of the country to the partial and selfwith France. His good humor could not be good ish views of the crown; views to which his majesnature, for at the beginning of the war he stuck at ty so steadily adhered on every opportunity which no cruelty, but laughed at barbarities with which presented itself, that, not having sense enough to all Europe rung. It could not be good sense, for discover how much the glory and power of the in the progress he blushed at none of the mischiefs king is augmented by the flourishing state of the he had occasioned, at none of the reproaches country he governs, he not only preferred his perhe had incurred. Like the Duke of Grafton, he sonal influence to that of England, but risked, exwas always affecting a disposition to retire, yet posed, and lost a most important portion of his donever did. Unlike the duke, who secured no minions by endeavoring to submit that mighty poremoluments to himself, Lord North engrossed tion to a more immediate dependence on the royal whatever fell in his way, and sometimes was will. Mystery, insincerity, and duplicity were the bribed by the crown to promote acts, against engines of his reign. They sometimes procured which he pretended his conscience recoiled-but success to his purposes, oftener subjected him to t never was delicate when profit was in the oppo-grievous insults and mortifications, and never ob

duced by themselves. Without insisting on the On the Luminousness of the Earth. By BARON Problematical, but very common phenomenon of

From the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal.

On "Gutta Percha," a peculiar variety of Ca-
outchouc. By DOUGLAS MACLAGAN, M.D., F.
R.S.E., &c. Communicated by the Royal
Scottish Society of Art.*

of being rolled out into long pieces or flat plates. When in the soft state, it possesses all the elasticity of common Indian-rubber, but it does not retain these properties long. It soon begins again to grow hard, and a short time, varying according to the temperature and the size of the piece opeGutta Percha is the Malayan name for a sub-rated on, regains all its original hardness and stance which is the concrete juice of a large forest rigidity. A ball one inch in diameter was comtree, native of the shores of the Straits of Malacca, pletely softened by boiling water in ten minutes, Borneo, and the adjacent countries. The tree yielding it is unknown botanically, all the information we possess regarding it being, that it is a large forest tree, and yields this product abundantly. We are indebted for our knowledge of it to Dr. W. Montgomerie, H.E.I.C.S., whose spirited exertions to improve the cultivation of various articles of colonial produce at Singapore have obtained from him several distinguished marks of approbation from the Royal Society of Arts of London. For this communication regarding gutta percha, Dr. Montgomerie received a silver medal from the society.

This substance, in its crude state, differs, in many particulars, from common caoutchouc. It is of a pale-yellowish, or rather dirty-white, color. It is nearly as hard as wood, though it readily receives the impression of the nail. It is very tenacious, and not at all elastic.

It seemed to me to be worth while to determine, whether or not this substance really was a variety of caoutchouc, and for this purpose I subjected it to the ordinary process of ultimate analysis, and obtained as its per-centage composition, carbon, 86.36; hydrogen, 12.15; the remainder, 1.49, was most probably oxygen absorbed from the air during the process employed for purifying it, as the substance, whilst heating on the vapor-bath, acquired a brown color. The only analysis of common caoutchouc with which I am acquainted is that of Faraday, who obtained, carbon, 87.2; hydrogen, 12.8. The results are sufficiently near to warrant the conclusion, that the two matters in question are generically the same.

I found, also, that the gutta percha yields the same product of destructive distillation as the common caoutchouc. Without entering into details, I may briefly state, that both equally yield a clear, yellow, limpid oil, having no fixed boiling-point, and, therefore, being a mixture of different oleagi nous principles. In both instances, the distillation proceeds most freely at temperatures between 360° and 390° Fahr., and seems almost stationary at 385°. Comparative analysis of similar portions of the two oils were made, and, as is already known of common caoutchouc, the products exhibit a constitution represented by the formula C10 H. The gutta percha thus appears really to be a modification of caoutchouc.

In its general properties it likewise shows a similarity to common caoutchouc. It is soluble in coal naphtha, in caoutchouc oil, and in other. It is insoluble in alcohol and in water, and floats upon the latter.

Its most remarkable and distinctive peculiarity is the effect of heat upon it. When placed in water at 110°, no effect is produced upon it, except that it receives the impression of the nail more readily; but when the temperature is raised to 145° or upwards, it gradually becomes so soft and pliant as to be capable of being moulded into any form, or

*Read before the society 23d June, 1845.

and regained its hardness completely in less than half an hour. It appears to be capable of undergoing this alternate softening and hardening any number of times without change of property.

It is also to a certain extent ductile. When soft it is easily torn across, but when hard it is very tenacious. A piece not an eighth of an inch in thickness, when cold, easily raised a weight of forty-two pounds, and only broke when half a hundred weight was attached to it.

From these properties, it seems capable of many applications in the arts. Its solution appears to be as well adapted as that of common caoutchouc for making waterproof cloth, and, whilst softened, it can be made into solid articles, such as knifehandles, door-handles, &c. The Malays employ it for the former of these, and prefer it to wood. A surgeon, furnished with a small piece, could easily, with the aid of a little hot water, supply himself with bougies or pessaries of any size or form.

[Dr. M. exhibited a knife-handle, a walkingcane head, a riding-whip, and other articles, made of gutta percha.]

THE EXILED LONDONER.

I ROAM beneath a foreign sky,

That sky is cloudless, warm and clear;
And everything is glad but I ;

But ah! my heart is far from here..
They bid me look on forests green,
And boundless prairies stretching far;
But I rejoice not in their sheen,

And longing turn to Temple Bar.
They bid me list the torrent's roar,

In all its foaming, bounding pride;
But I, I only think the more

On living torrents in Cheapside!
They bid me mark the mighty stream,
Which Mississippi rolls to sea;
But then I sink in pensive dream,

And turn my thoughts, dear Thames, to thee.
They bid me note the mountains high,
Whose snow capp'd peaks my prospect end :
I only heave a secret sigh-

To Ludgate Hill my wishes tend.

They taunt me with our denser air,

And fogs so thick you scarce can see ;
Then yellow fog, I will declare,
Though strange to say, I long for thee.
And everything in this bright clime
But serves to turn my thoughts to thee?
Thou London, of an earlier time,
O when shall I return to thee?

Punch.

From Tait's Magazine.

may be new, renewing such as may be old, towards the encouragement of the information of persons

ON THE TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT OF MODERN engaged in so great a struggle. My own expe

TIMES.

BY THE ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER.

rience had never travelled in that course which could much instruct me in the miseries from wine, or in the resources for struggling with it. I had repeatedly been obliged, indeed, to lay it aside altogether; but in this I never found room for more than seven or ten days' struggle: excesses I had never practised in the use of wine; simply the habit of using it, and the collateral habits formed by excessive use of opium, had produced any difficulty at all in resigning it even on an hour's notice. From opium I derive my right of offering hints at all upon the subjects of abstinence

the evil, and the separate modes of suffering from the effort of self-conquest, together with the errors of judgment incident to such states of transitional torment, are all nearly allied, practically analogous as regards the remedies, even if characteristically distinguished to the inner consciousness. I make no scruple, therefore, of speaking as from a station of high experience and of most watchful attention, which never remitted even under sufferings that were at times absolutely frantic.

THE most remarkable instance of a combined movement in society, which history, perhaps, will be summoned to notice, is that which, in our own days, has applied itself to the abatement of intemperance. Naturally, or by any direct process, the machinery set in motion would seem irrelevant to the object if one hundred men unite to elevate the standard of temperance, they can do this with effect only by improvements in their own separate cases each individual, for such an effort of self-in other forms. But the modes of suffering from conquest, can draw upon no resources but his own. One member, in a combination of one hundred, when running a race, can hope for no cooperation from his ninety-nine associates. And yet, by a secondary action, such combinations are found eminently successful. Having obtained from every confederate a pledge, in some shape or other, that he will give them his support, thenceforwards they bring the passions of shame and self-esteem to bear upon each member's personal perseverance. Not only they keep alive and continually refresh in his thoughts the general purpose, which else might fade; but they also point the action of public contempt and of self-contempt at any defaulter much more potently, and with more acknowledged right to do so, when they use this influence under a license, volunteered, and signed, and sealed, by the man's own hand. They first conciliate his countenance through his intellectual perceptions of what is right; and next they sustain it through his conscience, (the strongest of his internal forces,) and even through the weakest of his human sensibilities. That revolution, therefore, which no combination of men can further by abating the original impulse of temptations, they often accomplish happily by maturing the secondary energies of resistance.

I. The first hint is one that has been often offered; viz., the diminution of the particular liquor used, by the introduction into each glass of some inert substance, ascertained in bulk, and equally increasing in amount from day to day. But this plan has often been intercepted by an accident: shot, or sometimes bullets, were the substances nearest at hand; and an objection arose from too scrupulous a caution of chemistry as to the action upon lead of the vineous acid. Yet all objection of this kind might be removed at once, by using beads in a case where small decrements were wanted, and marbles, if it were thought advisable to use larger. Once for all, however, in cases deeply rooted, no advances ought ever to be made but by small stages: for the effect, which is insensible at first, by the tenth, twelfth, or fifteenth day, generally accumulates unendurably under any bolder deductions. I must not stop to illustrate this point; but certain it is, that by an error of this nature at the outset, most natural to human impatience under exquisite suffering, too generally the trial is abruptly brought to an end through the crisis of a passionate relapse.

Already in their earliest stage, these temperance movements had obtained, both at home and abroad, a national range of grandeur. More than ten years ago, when M. de Tocqueville was resident in the United States, the principal American society counted two hundred and seventy thousand members and in one single state, (Pennsylvania,) the annual diminution in the use of spirits had very II. Another object, and one to which the gladisoon reached half a million of gallons. Now a ator matched in single duel with intemperance, machinery must be so far good which accomplishes must direct a religious vigilance, is the digestibility its end the means are meritorious for so much as of his food: it must be digestible not only by its they effect. Even to strengthen a feeble resolu- original qualities, but also by its culinary pre tion by the aid of other infirmities, such as shame paration. In this last point we are all of us or the very servility and cowardice of deference to Manichæans: all of us yield a cordial assent to public opinion, becomes prudent and laudable in that Manichæan proverb which refers the meats the service of so great a cause. Nay, sometimes and the cooks of this world to two opposite founto make public profession of self-distrust by assum-tains of light and of darkness. Oromasdes it is, ing the coercion of public pledges, may become an expression of frank courage, or even of noble principle, not fearing the shame of confession when it can aid the powers of victorious resistance. Yet still, so far as it is possible, every man sighs for a still higher victory over himself: a victory not tainted by bribes, and won from no impulses but those inspired by his own higher nature, and his own mysterious force of will; powers that in no man were ever fully developed.

This being so, it is well that from time to time every man should throw out any hints that have occurred to his experience-suggesting such as VOL. VII. 18

LXXVIII.

LIVING AGE.

or the good principle, that sends the food; Ahrimanes, or the evil principle, that everywhere sends the cooks. Man has been repeatedly described or even defined, as by differential privilege of his nature, "a cooking animal." Brutes, it is said, have faces-man only has a countenance; brutes are as well able to eat as man-man only is able to cook what he eats. Such are the romances of self-flattery. I, on the contrary, maintain, that six thousand years have not availed, in this point, to raise our race generally to the level of ingenious savages. The natives of the Society and the Friendly Isles, or of New Zealand, and other fa

vored spots, had, and still have an art of cookery, of bread and of the baker's art, must be aware that though very limited in its range: the French this quality of sponginess, (though quite equal to have an art and more extensive; but we English the ruin of the digestive organs,) is but one in a are about upon a level (as regards this science) legion of vices to which the article is liable. A with the ape, to whom an instinct whispers that German of much research wrote a book on the chestnuts may be roasted; or with the aboriginal conceivable faults in a pair of shoes, which he Chinese of Charles Lamb's story, to whom the ex-found to be about six hundred and sixty-six, many perience of many centuries had revealed thus much, of them, as he observed, requiring a very delicate viz., that a dish very much beyond the raw flesh of process of study to find out; whereas the possible their ancestors, might be had by burning down the faults in bread, which are not less in number, family mansion, and thus roasting the pig-stye. require no study at all for the detection: they Rudest of barbarous devices is English cookery, publish themselves through all varieties of misery. and not much in advance of this primitive Chinese But the perfection of barbarism, as regards our step; a fact which it would not be worth while to island cookery, is reserved for animal food; and lament, were it not for the sake of the poor trem- the two poles of Oromasdes and Ahrimanes are bling deserter from the banners of intoxication, nowhere so conspicuously exhibited. Our insular who is thus, and by no other cause, so often thrown sheep, for instance, are so far superior to any which back beneath the yoke which he had abjured. the continent produces, that the present Prussian Past counting are the victims of alcohol, that, minister at our court is in the habit of questioning having by vast efforts emancipated themselves for a man's right to talk of mutton as anything bea season, are violently forced into relapsing by the yond a great idea, unless he can prove a residence nervous irritations of demoniac cookery. Unhap-in Great Britain. One sole case he cites of a dinpily for them, the horrors of indigestion are relieved ner on the Elbe, when a particular leg of mutton for the moment, however ultimately strengthened, really struck him as rivalling any which he had by strong liquors; the relief is immediate and known in England. The mystery seemed inexcannot fail to be perceived; but the aggravation, plicable; but, upon inquiry, it turned out to be an being removed to a distance, is not always referred importation from Leith. Yet this incomparable to its proper cause. This is the capital rock and article, to produce which the skill of the feeder stumbling-block in the path of him who is hurry-must cooperate with the peculiar bounty of nature, ing back to the camps of temperance; and many a calls forth the most dangerous refinements of barreader is likely to misapprehend the case through barism in its cookery. A Frenchman requires, as the habit he has acquired of supposing indigestion the primary qualification of flesh meat, that it to lurk chiefly amongst luxurious dishes. But, on should be tender. We English universally, but the contrary, it is amongst the plainest, simplest, especially the Scots, treat that quality with indifand commonest dishes that such misery lurks, in ference, or with bare toleration. What we require England. Let us glance at three articles of diet, is, that it should be fresh, that is, recently killed, beyond all comparison of most ordinary occurrence, (in which state it cannot be digestible except by viz., potatoes, bread, and butchers' meat. The art a crocodile ;) and we present it at table in a transiof preparing potatoes for human use is utterly un- tion state of leather, demanding the teeth of a tiger known except in certain provinces of our empire, to rend it in pieces, and the stomach of a tiger to and amongst certain sections of the laboring class. digest it. In our great cities-London, Edinburgh, &c.-the With these habits amongst our countrymen, sort of things which you see offered at table under exemplified daily in the articles of widest use, it the name and reputation of potatoes, are such that, is evident that the sufferer from intemperance has if you could suppose the company to be composed a harder quarantine, in this island, to support of Centaurs and Lapithæ, or any other quarrelsome during the effort of restoration, than he could have people, it would become necessary for the police to anywhere else in Christendom. In Persia, and, interfere. The potato of cities is a very dangerous perhaps, there only on this terraqueous planet, missile; and, if thrown with an accurate aim by matters might be even worse; for, whilst we an angry hand, will fracture any known skull. English neglect the machinery of digestion, as a In volume and consistency, it is very like a paving- matter entitled to little consideration, the people stone; only that, I should say, the paving-stone of Teheran seem unaware that there is any such had the advantage in point of tenderness. And machinery. So, at least, one might presume, upon this horrid basis, which youthful ostriches from cases on record, and especially from the reckwould repent of swallowing, the trembling, palpi-less folly, under severe illness, from indigestion, tating invalid, fresh from the scourging of alcohol, of the three Persian princes, who visited this counis requested to build the superstructure of his try, as stated by their official mehmander, Mr. dinner. The proverb says, that three flittings are as bad as a fire; and on that model I conceive that three potatoes, as they are found at many British dinner-tables, would be equal, in principle of ruin, to two glasses of vitriol. The same savage ignorance appears, and only not so often, in the bread of this island. Myriads of families eat it in that early stage of sponge which bread assumes during the process of baking; but less than sixty hours will not fit this dangerous article of human diet to And those who are acquainted with the works of Parmentier, or other learned investigators

be eaten.

Fraser. With us, the excess of ignorance, upon this subject, betrays itself oftenest in that vainglorious answer made by people, who at any time are admonished of the sufferings which they are preparing for themselves by these outrages upon the most delicate of human organs. They, for their parts, "know not if they have a stomach; they know not what it is that dyspepsy means;" forgetting that, in thus vaunting their strength of stomach, they are, at the same time, proclaiming its coarseness; and showing themselves unaware that precisely those, whom such coarseness of orable reaction of suffering, are the favorite subganization reprieves from immediate and seasonjects of that heavier reaction which takes the shape of delirium tremens, of palsy, and of lunacy. It