conversation about the weather and Murphy, trious, but fruitless search, to resume my seat and be content merely to listen to, as Ĭ could not observe the organized performances of this my little animated chronometer. Often have I witnessed with fear and trembling (such is my nature) the whirlings and coquettings of the moth or the "long leg" round my candles, previous to the grand consummation-the sacrificial suicide-the headlong devotion of these fire-worshippers; and often, after their vital spark had fled, have I caught up the unburnt fragment of a leg or a wing that lay embalmed, as it were, in grease, and submitted it to the microscope, to speculate upon its structure, and to imagine all its invisible nerves and vesselsaye, and to endow it with a "mens" sui generis (philosophers name it "instinct," that most unintelligible of words). In these inquisitive moods the very candles themselves have not escaped me; for, certain people are there who look upon their candles as a kind of hieroglyphical obelisks, upon which they spend their time, decyphering the arabesques of wick or tallow, and torturing their brains for what ought to bear the easiest explanation. I can forgive Johanna, notwithstanding her occasional abrupt "Against the bulwark of the sight intrusion of some of the household affairs Did lay strong siege and battailous assault," into the calm atmosphere of my thoughts, and made him exclaim loudly against the when she subjoineth some ominous allusion "villainous saltpetre." Again, with your to my "ignes minores,"—my “lucida sistick, at once crayon and scale of feet, you dera," the candles. Her countenance, her can show how you would run your stairs gesture, her manner of expressing herself on were you to build; where you would have these occasions, (at candle-light she is wont your library and your kitchen, (two impor- to come into the presence,) are all the result tant departments in your house) or other of a certain inspiration, not occasioned, howchamber. In short you can delineate any ever, by such exhalement as made eloquent extempore map or drawing you please, for it the Delphic priestess of old, upon her tripod; is ever an available "quod est demonstran- but by the vapours of a certain distilment, best dum" accompaniment to you, provided al-known to herself, which marvellously oileth ways that thou art a man of my kidney, reader. For my part I can only say 'tis my firm resolve to stick to my stick as long as my stick sticketh to me. A CHAPTER ABOUT CANDLES. 'Tis my wont, my peculiar bent, to notice things when I am alone, which otherwise would most certainly escape attention. I watch the fly, or the moth, or the spider, or that singularly-contrived creature (I am not a naturalist-I cannot give you its genus or species) which ordinary people entitle the "daddy long legs." Often have I listened to the tick-tick on the wall or ceiling of my apartment, and stood on a chair with candle in hand, to ascertain where "the watch" was "going" so regularly (the death watch of superstition); and had, after a long indus and quickeneth, yet thickeneth her tongue. To this, her nightly delivery of oracles, am I indebted for various useful and useless knowledge; in particular, for what I know of the mystery of candle-craft-the "letter," the "winding-sheet," the " ring," the "thief," the curse of an additional year's celibacy upon my head did I extinguish while I snuffed a candle, and sundry other information connected with this candelabral science. In some of my moments of ennui, when given to reverie, have I sat down by way of a relief-a laying down of my load of fretfulness-a little of resting to take breath, for the purpose of cogitating, after the manner of some of our modern scientific enquirers, upon some of these superstitious appearances. The "letter," what is it? How formed? The threads composing the wick are not the rest. The upper (burning) end of it gets disentangled from the main body, and hangeth; at first outwards, and then gradually downwards, continuing to burn all the while, and making a deep, destructive, unsightly "channel to a flood" of grease, that layeth naked, on one side, the whole length of the wick. This "thief" hath, like other thieves, a surreptitious mode of procedure. While you are engaged, or least observant, or while you are enjoying your vespertinal nap, it effecteth most of its incendiary work:-but, take your eyes seasonably from your books, or your papers, or awake from your dozing, your engine is by you to check the progress of the fire; your snuffers-or, if that do not answer, Johanna's scissors as a supplementary engine. Snip off the incendiary thread at once-you remove all danger; yet is there dread havoc in your candle. It seemeth like some tree just fissured by lightning-it is a monument of destruction. After this it can only perform a lap-sided-no longer a uniform symmetrical function! And how like a frozen cataract the grease appeareth adown the candlestick, and upon your table cloth! Latterly I have laid myself out for a decided vigilance after the approach of such thieves, and I promise you that seldom do I allow their encroachments to do mischief like that I once saw happen. The "winding sheet"-how formed? I have thought, thus :-On some point of the circumferent edge of the candle is sometimes observed a small concrete molecule of grease. This is the aboriginal nucleus of it. Some one snuffs the candle rather closely; but say -not too much so. The shortened wick, "The curse of single blessedness"-well, then can take up but a limited supply of the I suppose by extinguishing (accidentally by molten grease, the surplus remaining fluid all means) your candle, you, ipso facto, on the top; of which fluid the least stir of the must be supposed to extinguish your "flame" table throweth out wavelet after wavelet hot of the current year, and must make up your upon the molecule, which from this succes- mind to look out for some other that will sive increment of weight, as well as heat, burn unextinguishably, or peradventure rebecomes dislodged, and taketh a gradual light the same love again!-But methinks I curvature "from above downwards, and from now hear some fastidious puppet, of the without inwards!" The "ring" is formed "coterie and literary lady" atmosphere, in the same way; but the difference between waxing choleric, and exclaiming :—" Psha! both formations is, that for the former the this is some vulga' fella'! neva' burned molecule must be oblong, somewhat flat-wax in his life!"-And how do you know, tened; for the latter, globular, or nearly so. Why the one should portend death, and the other marriage, be it for other augurs than Johanna and me to tell; far, far be it from us to penetrate (mayhap, impiously) into the Poetry, the Polytheism of superstitionto uncurtain the mythology of the "good people" and the fairies. "Tis mine but to follow the example of men of science, elaborately and circumspectly to elucidate these formations, and no more. And for Johanna-'tis her's to remain a Polytheist all the days of her life. The "thief" cometh in this way:-one of the threads happens to be shorter than Mr. Impertinence? Can you pronounce upon my tastes without an acquaintance with me? About wax candles there is to me that sort of sepulchral (that is not the word) that sort of deathlike, hydropic transparency-that sickly delicacy which unnerveth me to contemplate; while in the tallows there is that dense unempyreal compactness that all-body-no anything in them reminding one of sickliness; besides, there is a certain animation in the lambency of their flames-these are indeed fires alive-not like the staid, inanimate, cold looking, pallid flamelets of your waxen composts. Methinks I hear, too, some hard-featured to my performer in Philosophy exclaim:-"Pah ! | that could give them security. As yet am how any sensible man could sit him down I merely learning to dip-I am afraid to go to write about candles!"-I answer, Most beyond my depth-I must rush out again potent, grave, and reverend signior, 'tis true 66 terra firma." Nay, I feel the I have written about candles; but would shivering that whispereth, too long have I you know the reason? Here it is-and take been dipping. it with you I did not wish that Johanna's lights- the oracles of which she is the Priestess-should for ever be "hid under a bushel." ON DREAMING. "Dreaming," saith Beattie, " though common, is not universal." Now, if you can suppose sleep to happen, without dreams of any kind whatever, where will you place, during the state of rest, the soul? Will you, nay, can you insulate it from the body? Can you understand the harmony of the functions tending to uniform effects-health, growth, reproduction-in other words, can you understand the life of the body to be independent of soul in sleep? Rather, is it not reasonable to suppose an order of dreamings, watchfulnesses, which the selfpreservative principle always keeps up, some of them impressed on the memory vividly, others confusedly, and others not at all; and that, in the last case, it cannot be said these were no dreamings, but that none could be remembered? Might we not allow that certain states of the brain in sleep shall account, as well as the injuries and accidents of that viscus in one's waking moments, for the phenomena of confused recollection or total forgetfulness of things? "There is no one," saith Richerand, "who has had syncope of more or less continuance, but knows that it leaves no consciousness of what passed whilst it lasted. It is the same after apoplexy, a fit of epilepsy, &c." Yet, will it be denied that the self-preservative principle was active in these states, although the, as it were, material mirror was partially clouded, and for a time incapable of reflecting clearly every feature of life? I contend that whatever happeneth this mirror, it still reflecteth in sleep, as awake, more or less of the workings of the soul, and continues so to do till death totally clouds it, and allows it no longer the power of reflecting. I differ therefore from Beattie, and while I do not mean to assert that all men dream equally, yet dreams do I give to all men, let them be modified in what sort they may. Even thus far, it i behoveth me to venture into the troublous waves of dissertation, seeing that I have not "heart of controversy" to breast them, nor skill like Cæsar's to hold high my thoughts, proud of the buoyancy In plain speaking, let us rest now upon the question which Beattie himself (and every one else) admits, that there are those who remember their dreams. With those we have to do in what follows; for I take them to be a kind of Dramatists. The dramatist converts his theatre into a mimic museum, in which he conjureth up, by a peculiar magic, antique specimens of ethics, rich in the golden mean, and of costly value; specimens of the upshot, the lava of revolutionary Vesuvii,-petrifactions of tyranny, ferruginous concretions of barbarity, the asbestos of true patriotism, and the pure, undefiled diamonds of virtue and love. But to come down from our me taphoric stilts, he brings upon the stage, whatever is great and good and grand of the Past, and "holds the mirror" to the Present, to show its unsightliness, and to suggest what is most conducive toward its improvement. The immortalities of past actions are personified; the soul of honour, the soul of valour, find their metempsychosis, happily illustratated in the "tableaux vivans" of the stage, our dramatic representations being but telescopic retrospections, re-embodied chivalries, resurrections of "foregone conclusions;" while the immortalities of what may be future actions are pre-created (and personified too) as "the shadows before of coming events.' How very nearly alike are the dreamer and the dramatist. Each can hold the "world as his stage;" each get up a drama or a dream; each take a part in the one or the other, or become merely a spectator. But they differ in that the dramatist can command, can choose his subject, may or may not take a part in his drama, just as he pleases; while the dreamer hath no controul over his dream, though creating it himself, and must of inevitable necessity take a part in it, or become a spectator. They are quite alike, however, in this respect: a dream that is told you, and a dramatic piece that is read for you, may sometimes be the most ridiculous things imaginable. Nevertheless, they are likely to have their advantages, if the authors of each take but seasonable hints for them. Both can readily account for the monstrosities of their creation; if, for instance, the dramatist but look to the crude, undigestible state of his nightly thoughts, and the dreamer to that of his nightly suppers; and if the one learn to systematise his thoughts, the other his suppers, to suit the cerebral digestive function in the one case, and the intestinal in the other. Besides these, manifold are the advantages of dreaming and dramatising, on which, for the present, I do not wish to lengthen out my observations, hastening as I am to detail a dream I had a few nights ago, which occurred in such wise, that methinks it differed little from any the most palpable dramatic scene 'twas my lot ever to have witnessed. I dreamed I attended a meeting of scientific gentlemen, not as a member of the body, (I am most unscientific)-but as a candidate for the Stranger's Gallery. The attention of the meeting was occupied with "papers," the reading of which created erudite skirmishings amongst the profound Pros and confounded Cons, relative to each theory that was started. Methought some of these skirmishings took so odd a turn, that with what tachygraphy I was master of I made the following notes in my pocket book :— After a good deal of "balloon"ing, "meteoric stone" throwing, "water-spout"ing, earth-quaking, star-gazing, mesinerising, and locomotion, a robustious gentleman stood up to favour us with one of the results of his botanical researches. Alike of middle age and middle height, he had a very doughy countenance, kneaded into coarse, clumsy features, and flanked on either side with an immense (autumnal-looking) shrubbery of whiskers. His eyes of gray, and exceedingly small, were sunken deeply under the shelving of his brows, as if designed to look inwardly upon the growth and reproduction of his theories, as well as outwardly upon the growth and reproduction of his plants. His stiff hair stood up boldly from his forehead, a very grove (in miniature) of poplars. In short, his whole head would remind you, I know not why, of a something connected with the vegetable kingdom; and the moment you looked at it, you would say, verily this head is the head of some Horticultural Society. Professor Pollen (Professor of what, I could not learn) holding paper" in his left hand, and pronating the right upon the page, (he wore a richly wrought signet ring on his little finger,) coughed off such webs as might entangle his utterance, and "in medias res" was he in a the " moment. "Gentlemen," he began, "I have long considered the quassation or agitation of leaves to be essentially necessary to the due growth, health, and vigour of trees; for by this quassation, I take it, these respiratory organs are at once better enabled to modify the sap and to facilitate its circulation. Now, as in the Populus (a genus of the Diæcia Octandria of Linnæus) we find the motion of the leaves more remarkable than in any other trees, I thought it well to select a specimen of that genus for the experiment which I shall have the honour of detailing to the society. A sapling of about five or six feet high I thus experimented upon. "By means of wires I secured each leafstalk to the branches, and so radiated the wire over the upper and under surfaces of the leaves, that it was impossible they could stir. In a week I was pleased to find the leaves withered, and in another week the sapling was without a trace of life. Want of motion in the leaves, therefore, it was plain" "Not quite so plain," uttered a tall, skinny, consumptive looking gentleman, who shot up from his seat like an arrow, "Not quite so plain. I rather conceive the oxydized deposition from the wires lessened the vitality of the circulating juices, inasmuch as it interfered with the frondal respiration, and then", Here this gentleman was interrupted by a little wag in large green spectacles, who thus finished the tall gentleman's sentence-" and then tuberculization was the consequence, and the tree died of consumption."-[Loud and dissonant was the cachinnation here, in which I confess I could not help joining.] Professor Pollen, nothing daunted, though sorely irritated, said-"Gentlemen may feel a malicious satisfaction in thwarting the advance of science, but, I tell them, their efforts are likely to be as vain as those of a certain long-eared animal we read of the other day, who foolishly supposed he could impede the progress of a rail-train by a few of his venomous kicks. (Loud laughter.) Had the first gentleman but patience enough to listen without interrupting, he would not have thrust forward his rusty anticipations, nor would the second gentleman have followed so triumphantly in his wake. (Hear, hear.) The wires I used, though iron, were properly prepared-were painted with white lead, to preclude the possibility of atmospheric action. Therefore their oxydization could not take place. Why then did the tree wither?" " May I be permitted to observe," said a young gentleman with large eyes, and very red lips, on whose breast dangled a gold rimmed glass, "although I do not pretend to the best knowledge of the vegetable world, that as the exhalation (whatever that is) from white lead, is known to be injurious to the animal system, through the medium of the lungs, may not such, analogically speaking, have proved injurious, in the present instance, to the tree, through the medium of its leaves ?" ferous laughter I ever heard. The consumptive took so great a cachinnatory fit, that he was throwing up blood in large quantity, and coughing frightfully-I awoke! Doubtless I heard coughing enough, but it was from the next room-from Johanna going down her guttural gamut-her usual nightly pectoriloquy. MR. KEARNEY. Here the little gentleman in the big spectacles bounced up and said, addressing the last speaker, "From your theory, sir, the tree would appear to have died of white lead coliccolica pictonum,' as we call it. Peace to thy spirit, poor Mr. Kearney! (Loud laughter.) Indeed had the Profes- Thou that first enteredstinto our Nursery, and sor used gold wire, his experiment, perhaps," taught our young idea how to shoot," art would be less questionable-but, "when amongst the earliest of my childhood's assoFolly grew romantic, he should paint it"-ciations, and now art thou present to me (Renewed laughter.) "Wait, sir," quoth the consumptive, "till the professor wins golden opinions for his works on botany; then you may find him trying what virtue there is in gold wire superior to that of the more vulgar metals"-(continued laughter.) I would merely ask Professor Pollen," said a clerical looking old gentleman in shorts and leggings, "if he followed, in the adjusting of his wires, the pendant order of the leaves and leaf-stalks?" 66 Professor Pollen-"No! not invariably. That did not appear to me of the least importance in my experiment." "Allow me, sir, to differ from you. I do conceive, with Pope, that art should be "Nature still, but nature methodized," and that whatever curvature, accordingly, or pendulous habitude nature gave to the leaves of that tree, these should not have been altered into a position forced, straightened, and on the stretch. This position, 'tis my idea, injured the tree by""Just so, very, very probable indeed," said the little gentleman again, who appeared not to suffer an opportunity to escape for an attack upon the poor professor, "from an overstraining of the sap vessels, as well as the tracheal apparatus of the leaves, I should say that their functions were unperformable. There was indiscriminate extravasation of sap as well as air; there was a-aa in fact, a kind of a-a-a of frondal emphysema with engorgement of sap-there was aa-a"-" Oh! come, doctor," interrupted the old gentleman in the breeches, "there was quite enough in all conscience to show that the Professor's experiment was unsatisfactory." (Loud laughter.) "One question more I would ask," said the gentleman with the red lips, "did Professor Pollen 'cut his loves' like Cowley, upon the tree, so that his flames might be said, like Cowley's, to have quite burnt it up, and to have thus withered it?" Here there was the most voci even in my manhood. Good, pious, inno- And then the tasks over, how pleasurable |