which, by the way, upon my conscience, | led in all would be untrue, though striking neither my lord-treasurer nor my Lord examples of each might easily be selected Lauderdale are guilty."*

from his writings. The activity with which his mind suggests ludicrous images and analogies is astonishing. He often absolutely startles us by the remoteness and oddity of the sources from which they are supplied, and by the unexpected ingenuity and felicity of his repartees. His forte, however, appears to be a grave ironical banter, which he often pursues at such a length, that there seems no limit to his fertility of invention. In his endless accumulation of ludicrous images and allusions, the untiring exhaustive ridicule with which he will play upon the same topics, he is unique; yet this peculiar

All this is very pleasant and facetious. But it seems Marvell's intrepid patriotism and witty writings rendered him extremely odious to the court, and especially to James, Duke of York, and heir presumptive to the crown. As already mentioned, he was frequently compelled to conceal himself out of dread of assassination. He died, however, to all appearance, peaceably in his bed, on the 16th August, 1678-the year in which his obnoxious work on the Growth of Popery and Arbitrary Government was published; but as he was in vigorous health immediately before, strong suspicions have been enter-ity not seldom leads him to drain the genertained that he was poisoned. We know of no evidence in support of these suspicions, so that, probably, there were no grounds for them, as we are all aware that strong and vigorous men have not unseldom died suddenly.

Aubrey describes Marvell as being in person "of a middling stature, pretty strong-set, roundish-faced, cherry-checked, hazel-eyed, brown-haired," the very figure of a jolly Yorkshireman. He adds, that in conversation he was modest and of very few words; and was wont to say, "he would not drink high or freely with any one with whom he could not trust his life." Who would? Of his collected works, we believe there is no complete edition. Cooke's edition, published in 1726, contains only his poems and some of his private letters. That of Captain Thompson, in three volumes quarto, published in 1776, is not considered quite complete, and is very indifferently edited. There may be other editions, but if so, they are unknown to the present writer. The "Life of Andrew Marvell, with Extracts from his Prose and Poetical Works, by John Dove," (1832,) is, we believe, the fullest and most recent account we have of this distinguished patriot; and, perhaps, the passages selected will, to ordinary readers, prove the most interesting and agreeable portions of his writings.

"The characteristic attribute of Marvell's genius," says the Edinburgh critic already quoted, "was unquestionably wit, in all the attributes of which-brief sententious sarcasm, fierce invective, light raillery, grave irony, and broad laughing humor-he seems to have been by nature almost equally fitted to excel. To say that he has equally excel

Marvell's Works, vol. i. pp. 428, 429, as quoted

in Ed. Rev. No. 159.

ous wine even to the dregs, to spoil a series of felicitous railleries by some far-fetched conceit or unpardonable extravagance."

But whoever supposes Marvell to have been nothing but a wit, simply on account of the predominance of that quality, will do him great injustice. As the same writer remarks:-"It is the common lot of such men, in whom some one faculty is found on a great scale, to fail of part of the admiration due to other endowments; possessed in more moderate degree, indeed, but still in a degree far from ordinary. We are subject to the same illusion in gazing on mountain scenery. Fixing our eye on some solitary peak, which towers far above the rest, the groups of surrounding hills look positively diminutive, though they may, in fact, be all of great magnitude." Though wit was his most predominating endowment, the rest of Marvell's talents were all of a high order of development. His judgment was remarkably clear and sound, his logic ingenious and adroit, his sagacity in practical affairs admirable, his talents for business apparently of the first order, and his industry in whatever he undertook steady and indefatigable. He had all the qualities which would have enabled him to succeed in almost any department of exertion; while in regard to candor, strict integrity, and all the solid merits which render a man honorable and worthy, he was not surpassed by any man of his generation.

Marvell has some, though not very considerable reputation as a poet. His poems are, for the most part, quaint, fantastic, uncouth in rhythm; but there are a few pieces which display both beauty of thought and no indifferent elegance of expression. The "Emigrants in Bermudas," a "Dialogue between Body and Soul," "The Nymph complaining for the Death of her Fawn," and a

AN INDIAN Sword-PLAYER declared at a ed his left hand, which was admitted to be great public festival, that he could cleave a suitable in form; yet the Indian still declined small lime laid on a man's palm without in the trial, and when pressed, twice waved his jury to the member; and the General (Sir thin keen-edged blade as if to strike, and Charles Napier) extended his right hand for twice withheld the blow, declaring he was the trial. The sword-player, awed by his uncertain of success. Finally he was forced rank, was reluctant, and cut the fruit hori- to make trial; and the lime fell open, cleanly zontally. Being urged to fulfil his boast, he divided-the edge of the sword had just examined the palm, said it was not one to marked its passage over the skin without be experimented upon with safety, and re- drawing a drop of blood.-Sir Charles Nafused to proceed. The General then extend-pier's Administration in Scinde.

From Chambers's Edinburgh Journal.

THE POISON EATERS.

A VERY interesting trial for murder took place lately in Austria. The prisoner, Anna Alexander, was acquitted by the jury, who, in the various questions put to the witnesses, in order to discover whether the murdered man, Lieutenant Mathew Wurzel, was a poison-eater or not, educed some very curious evidence relating to this class of persons.

As it is not generally known that eating poison is actually practised in more countries than one, the following account of the custom, given by a physician, Dr. T. Von Tschudi, will not be without interest.

In some districts of Lower Austria, and in Styria, especially in those mountainous parts bordering on Hungary, there prevails the strange habit of eating arsenic. The peasantry in particular are given to it. They obtain it under the name of hedri, from the travelling hucksters and gatherers of herbs, who, on their side, get it from the glass-blowers, or purchase it from the cow-doctors, quacks, or mountebanks.

taste. In order to increase the effect, she was so rash aso increase the dose of arsenic, and fell a victim to her vanity; she was poisoned, and died an agonizing death.

The number of deaths in consequence of the immoderate enjoyment of arsenic is not inconsiderable, especially among the young. Every priest who has the cure of souls in those districts where the abuse prevails could tell of such tragedies; and the inquiries I have myself made on the subject have opened out very singular details. Whether it arise from fear of the law, which forbids the unauthorized possession of arsenic, or whether it be that an inner voice proclaims to him his sin, the arsenic-eater always conceals as much as possible the employment of these dangerous means. Generally speaking, it is only the confessional or the death-bed that raises the veil from the terrible secret.

The second object the poison-eaters have in view is to make them, as they express it, "better winded!"-that is, to make their respiration easier when ascending the mountains. Whenever they have far to go and to mount a considerable height, they take a minute morsel of arsenic, and allow it gradually to dissolve. The effect is surprising; and they ascend with ease heights which otherwise they could climb only with distress to the chest.

The poison-eaters have a twofold aim in their dangerous enjoyment; one of which is to obtain a fresh, healthy appearance, and acquire a certain degree of embonpoint. On this account, therefore, gay village lads and lasses employ the dangerous agent, that they may become more attractive to each other; and it is really astonishing with what favorable results their endeavors are attended, for The dose of arsenic with which the poisonit is just the youthful poison-eaters that are, eaters begin, consists, according to the congenerally speaking, distinguished by a bloom-fession of some of them, of a piece the size ing complexion, and an appearance of exuberant health. Out of many examples, I select the following:

A farm-servant who worked in the cowhouse belonging to was thin and pale, but nevertheless well and healthy. This girl had a lover whom she wished to enchain still more firmly; and in order to obtain a more pleasing exterior, she had recourse to the well-known means, and swallowed every week several doses of arsenic. The desired result was obtained; and in a few months she was much fuller in figure, rosy-cheeked, and, in short, quite according to her lover's

of a lentil, which in weight would be rather
less than half a grain. To this quantity,
which they take fasting several mornings in
the week, they confine themselves for a con-
siderable time; and then gradually, and very
carefully, they increase the dose according
to the effect produced. The peasant R——,
living in the Parish of A-
g, a strong, hale
man of upwards of sixty, takes at present, at
every dose, a piece of about the weight of
four grains. For more than forty years he
has practised this habit, which he inherited
from his father, and which he in his turn will
bequeath to his children.

It is well to observe, that neither in these | nor in other poison-eaters is there the least trace of an arsenic cachexy discernible; that the symptoms of a chronic arsenical poisoning never show themselves in individuals who adapt the dose to their constitution, even although that dose should be considerable. It is not less worthy of remark, however, that when, either from inability to obtain the acid, or from any other cause, the perilous indulgence is stopped, symptoms of illness are sure to appear, which have the closest resemblance to those produced by poisoning from arsenic. These symptoms consist principally in a feeling of general discomfort, attended by a perfect indifference to all surrounding persons and things, great personal anxiety, and various distressing sensations arising from the digestive organs, want of appetite, a constant feeling of the stomach being overloaded at early morning, an unusual degree of salivation, a burning from the pylorus to the throat, a cramp-like movement in the pharynx, pains in the stomach, and especially difficulty of breathing. For all these symptoms there is but one remedy--a return to the enjoyment of arsenic.

According to inquiries made on the subject, it would seem that the habit of eating poison among the inhabitants of Lower Austria has not grown into a passion, as is the case with the opium-eaters in the East, the chewers of the betel nut in India and Polynesia, and of the cocoa-tree among the natives of Peru. When once commenced, however, it becomes a necessity.

In some districts sublimate of quicksilver is used in the same way. One case in particular is mentioned by Dr. von Tschudi, a case authenticated by the English ambassador at Constantinople, of a great opium-eater at Brussa, who daily consumed the enormous quantity of forty grains of corrosive sublimate with his opium. In the mountainous parts of Peru the doctor met very frequently with eaters of corrosive sublimate; and in Bolivia the practice is still more frequent, where this poison is openly sold in the market to the Indians.

In Vienna the use of arsenic is of everyday occurrence among horse-dealers, and especially with the coachmen of the nobility. They either shake it in a pulverized state among the corn, or they tie a bit the size of a pea in a piece of linen, which they fasten to the curb when the horse is harnessed, and the saliva of the animal soon dissolves it. The sleek, round, shining appearance of the carriage-horses, and especially the much-ad

mired foaming at the mouth, is the result of
this arsenic feeding.*
It is a common prac-
tice with the farm-servants in the mountain-
ous parts to strew a pinch of arsenic on the
last feed of hay before going up a steep road.
This is done for years without the least un-
favorable result; but should the horse fall
into the hands of another owner who with-
holds the arsenic, he loses flesh immediately,
is no longer lively, and even with the best
feeding there is no possibility of restoring
him to his former sleek appearance.

The above particulars, communicated by
a contributor residing in Germany, are curi-
ous only inasmuch as they refer to poisons
of a peculiarly quick and deadly nature.
Our ordinary indulgences' in this country
are the same in kind, though not in degree,
for we are all poison-eaters. Το say nothing
of our opium and alcohol consumers, our
teetotallers are delighted with the briskness
and sparkle of spring-water, although these
qualities indicate the presence of carbonic
acid or fixed air. In like manner, few per-
sons will object to a drop or two of the
frightful corrosive, sulphuric acid, (vitriol,) in
a glass of water, to which it communicates
an agreeably acid taste; and most of us have,
at some period or other of our lives, imbibed
prussic acid, arsenic, and other deadly poi-
sons, under the orders of the physician, or
the first of these in the more pleasing form
of confectionery. Arsenic is said by Dr.
Pearson to be as harmless as a glass of wine
in the quantity of one sixteenth part of a
grain; and in the cure of agues it is so cer-.
tain in its effects, that the French Directory
once issued an edict ordering the surgeons
of the Italian army, under pain of military
punishment, to banish that complaint, at two
or three days' notice, from among the vast
numbers of soldiers who were languishing
under it in the marshes of Lombardy. It
would seem that no poison taken in small
and diluted doses is immediately hurtful, and
the same thing may be said of other agents.
The tap of a fan, for instance, is a blow, and
so is the stroke of a club; but the one gives
an agreeable sensation, and the other fells
the recipient to the ground. In like manner
the analogy holds good between the distri-
bution of a blow over a comparatively large
portion of the surface of the body and the
dilution or distribution of the particles of a
poison. A smart thrust upon the breast, for
instance, with a foil does no injury; but if

* Arsenic produces an increased salivation.

the button is removed, and the same momen- | producing instant death, and the drunkard tum thus thrown to a point, the instrument enters the structures, and perhaps causes death.

dies of the want of drink! Many persons,
it cannot be denied, reach a tolerable age un-
der this stimulus; but they do so only by
taking warning in time-perhaps from some
frightful illness-and carefully proportioning
the dose to the sinking constitution.
not drink now as formerly," is a common re-

"I can

But the misfortune is, that poisons swallowed for the sake of the agreeable sensations they occasion owe this effect to their action upon the nervous system; and the action must be kept up by a constantly in-mark-sometimes elevated into the boast, “I creasing dose till the constitution is irremedi- do not drink now as formerly." But the reably injured. In the case of arsenic, as we laxation of the habit is compulsory; and by have seen, so long as the excitement is undi- a thousand other tokens, as well as the inminished all is apparently well; but the ability to indulge in intoxication, the ci-devant point is at length reached when to proceed drinker is reminded of a madness which even or to turn back is alike death. The moment in youth produced more misery than enjoy. the dose is diminished or entirely withdrawn, ment, and now adds a host of discomforts to symptoms of poison appear, and the victim the ordinary fragility of age. As for arsenicperishes because he has shrunk from killing eating, we trust it will never be added to the himself. It is just so when the stimulant is madnesses of our own country. Think of a alcohol. The morning experience of the man deliberately condemning himself to dedrinker prophesies, on every succeeding oc- vour this horrible poison, on an increasing casion, of the fate that awaits him. It may scale, during his whole life, with the certainty be pleasant to get intoxicated, but to get that if at any time, through accident, necessober is horror. The time comes, however, sity, or other cause, he holds his hand, he when the pleasure is at an end, and the must die the most agonizing of all deaths! horror remains. When the habitual stimulus In so much horror do we hold the idea, that reaches its highest, and the undermined con- we would have refrained from mentioning stitution can stand no more, then comes the the subject at all if we had not observed a reaction. If the excitement could go on ad paragraph making the round of the papers, infinitum, the prognosis would be different; and describing the agreeable phases of the but the poison-symptoms appear as soon as practice without mentioning its shocking rethe dose can no longer be increased without sults.

A SKETCH OF MAZZINI.-A correspendent of the Edinburgh News, who lately spent an evening in London with M. Mazzini, thus attempts to convey an idea of the striking personal appearance of the trium vir:-"I should have known him among a million, although I cannot describe him, not having the gift of portraiture. The pictures of him which are in common circulation, are sufficiently like him before you have seen him, and perhaps afterwards too, but I have not come on one of them since that evening. A delicate but indeficient back-head, a bald coronal region of wonderful height and amplitude, a brow proper more remarkable for beauty than volume, and more expressive of keenness than power, dark eyes fitter for pity than defiance, and a thin, regular, long, pale, Persian face, are the first things that catch the eye of a stranger. The coalblack hair of the head and untouched beard yield fitting shadows, and form an appropriate ground for so eminent a countenance, surmounting, as it does, a small and slender figure. I soon perceived that, with all its beauty, it is a melancholy face; a most thoughtful, not unremembering, faithful, hopeful, yet

sad countenance. It struck me, however, as being
the melancholy of temperament rather than of cir-
cumstance; the melancholy of genius, depending part
ly on some degree of constitutional languor, and part
ly on the continual perception of the littleness of
life, and partly also on the feeling of his country's
wrongs. Taking it all in all, it is a head and face as
full of love and pity, clearness and truth, as ever I
saw; worthy of a prophet or an apostle, a confessor
or a martyr, and eminently capable of command
wherever love and truth shall rule.
Mazzini's conversation is wide and various, being
spoken in quite as good English as we of Scotland
are yet accustomed to hear. His thoughts have
evidently been concentrated on the present state of
Europe; necessarily so indeed, owing to his posi
tion: but then he has studied, and can descant with
effect upon the theological, the philosophical, and
the literary aspects of European life, as well as its
political phases. He gives one the impression of
being abreast with the foremost thought of his age
along an unusually large line of advance-a man to
teach a prince, or to be one."