Thoughts of a few Good Heads.

Emerson says: Nature makes fifty poor melons for one that is good, and shakes down a tree-full of wormy, unripe crabs, before you can find a dozen dessert apples; and she scatters nations of naked Indians, and nations of clothed Christians, with two of three good heads among them. Nature works very hard, and only hits the white once in a million throws. In mankind, she is contented if she yields one master in a century. The more difficulty there is in creating good men, the more they are used when they come. I once counted in a little neighborhood, and found that every able-bodied man had, say from twelve to fifteen persons dependent on him for material aid-to whom he is to be for spoon and jug, for backer and sponsor, for nursery and hospital, and many functions beside; nor does it seem to make much difference whether he is bachelor or patriarch; if he do not violently decline the duties that fall to him, this amount of helpfulness will, in one way or another, be brought home to him. This is the tax which his abilities pay. The good men are employed for private centers of use, and for larger influence. All revelations, whether of mechanical, or intellectual, or moral science, are made not to communities, but to single persons. All the marked events of our day, all the cities, all the colonizations, may be traced back to their origin in a private brain. All the feats which make our civility, were the thoughts of a few good heads.

Curative Properties of Grapes.

Dr. Herpin, of Metz, has published a very interesting account of the curative effects of grapes in various disorders of the body. They act, first, by introducing large quantities of fluids into the system, which, passing through the blood, carry off, by perspiration and other excretions, the effete and injuri

ous materials of the body; secondly, as a vegetable nutritive agent, through the albumeroid of nitrogenous and respiratory substance which the juice of the grape contains; thirdly, as a medicine, at the same time soothing, laxative, alterative, and defarative; fourthly, by the alkalies, which diminish the plasticity of the blood, and render all more fluid; fifthly, by the various mineral elements, such as sulphates, chlorides, phosphates, &c., which are an analogous and valuable substitute for many mineral waters. Employed rationally and methodically, aided by suitable diet and regimen, the grape produces most important changes in the system, in favoring organic transmutations, in contributing healthy materials to the repair and reconstruction of the various tissues, and in determining the removal of vitiated matters which have become useless and injurious to the system.

Dreams in Disease.

In

You must not deem all your "night thoughts" the whisperings of departed spirits. You are not in perfect health. your present pathological condition, it is but reasonable to suppose that, at best, your "dreams are but mind-clouds-high and unshapen beauties-like mountains which contain much and rich matter." Bailey, in "Festus," said: Dreams are rudiments of the great state to come. ... We dream of what is about to happen to us." But such dreams are the inspirations of the sleeper, when his bodily state is not much diseased, and when the slumber is nearly perfect and harmonious. Be not overmuch troubled.

Sleep, without Dreaming.

It is better (says a medical authority,) to go to sleep on the right side, for then the stomach is very much in the position of

pass

a bottle turned upside down, and the contents are aided in ing out by gravitation. If one goes to sleep on the left side, the operation of emptying the stomach of its contents is more like drawing water from a well. After going to sleep, let the body take its own position. If you sleep on your back, especially soon after a heavy meal, the weight of the digestive organs, and that of the food resting on the great vein of the body, near the backbone, compresses it, and arrests the flow of blood more or less. If the arrest is partial, the sleep is disturbed, and there are unpleasant dreams. If the meal has been recent or hearty, the arrest is more decided, and the various sensations, such as falling over a precipice, or the pursuit of a wild beast, or other impending danger, and the desperate effort to get rid of it, arouses us; that sends on the stagnating blood, and we awake in a fright, or trembling, or perspiration, or feeling of exhaustion, according to the degree of stagnation, and the length or strength of the effort made to escape the danger. Eating a large, or what is called "a hearty meal," before going to bed, should always be avoided it is the frequent cause of nightmare, and sometimes the cause of sudden death

Patience, as a Medicine.

Patience and serenity of disposition should be cultivated as a remedy, to neutralize the irritability and fretfulness of the diseased organs. The electro-battery can do but little good. A faithful medium, when under the true Indian influence, can restore life to failing limbs. Sleeping with the head northward results in establishing the magnetic (or warm) forces in the vital system, and in directing the brain and cerebral nerves. are the natural consequences. closed.

the vital electricity (cold) upon Sleep, dreamlessness, and health, Always sleep with your mouth

Summer Foods and Drinks.

The following sensible whisper is taken from Dr. Hall's Journal: Physiological researches establish the fact that acids promote the separation of the bile from the blood, which is then passed through the system, thus preventing fevers, the prevailing diseases of summer. All fevers are 66 bilious," that is, the

bile is in the blood. Whatever is antagonistic of fever is cooling. It is a common saying that fruits are "cooling," and also berries of every description; it is because the acidity which they contain aids in separating the bile from the blood. Hence the great yearning for greens, and lettuce, and salads, in the early spring, these being eaten with vinegar; hence, also, the taste for something sour-for lemonades-on an attack of fever. But this being the case, it is easy to see that we nullify the good effects of fruits and berries in proportion as we eat them with sugar, or even sweet milk, or cream. If we eat them in their natural state, fresh, ripe, perfect, it is almost impossible to eat too many, or eat enough to hurt us; especially if we eat them alone, and not taking any liquid with them whatever. Also is buttermilk, or even common milk, promotive of health in summer time. Sweet milk tends to biliousness in sedentary people; sour milk is antagonistic. The Greeks and Turks are passionately fond of milk. The shepherds use rennet, and the milk dealers alum, to make it sour the sooner. Buttermilk acts like watermelons on the system.

Effect of Wearing Silk Dresses.

A lady correspondent propounds the following question: "How does the wearing of silk dresses affect us ladies?"

ANSWER. The wearing of "silk dresses" exerts a variety of wonderful influences upon both body and soul. We have seen examples of intense chronic suffering occasioned by the

habitual wearing of "silk dresses " too tight over the region of the diaphragm. Instances are on record, also, where the length of "silk dresses" has inveigled the wearer into divers and sundry difficulties. Deplorable cases are known where the price of "silk dresses " has disturbed the financial equilibrium of very respectable progenitors. That alarming and epidemical phenomenon of the age, known as the trailing of "silk dresses" over tobacco-stained pavements, is rapidly developing among sensible classes a psychological disease called "disgust." In young female minds we have observed, with some beautiful exceptions, that the wearing of very fine "silk dresses " produces an enlargement of certain cerebral organs-developing the symptoms of insulation, superiority to poor folks, pride, approbation, and temporary shallow-mindedness. The physiological effect of "silk dresses " is not much, however, unless the wearer is nervously-diseased and dreamful. Then the fabric is too electrical for health.

Corruption and Groans.

Mr. Emerson, in his late volume on the "Conduct of Life,” says: "There is one topic peremptorily forbidden to all wellbred, to all rational mortals, namely, their distempers. If you have not slept, or if you have slept, or if you have headache, or sciatica, or leprosy, or thunder-stroke, I beseech you, by all angels, to hold your peace, and not pollute the morning to which all the housemates bring serene and pleasant thoughts, by corruption and groans. Come out of the azure. Love the day. Do not leave the sky out of your landscape. The oldest and the most deserving person should come very modestly into any newly awakened company, respecting the divine communications, out of which all must be presumed to have newly come. An old man, who added an elevating culture to a large experi