Seated by the side of a window whose glass had evidently not come in contact with whiting and water for years (an infallible indication of an extensive connexion), with his hands thrust into his breeches pockets, his pen placed after the most approved fashion behind his ear, and his feet dangling six-and-thirty inches from the ground, little Peter Smug sat in a brown study brooding over the "profit or loss" likely to attend his own private speculations, for Peter, humble though he was, had launched his little capital, some hundred and twenty pounds, into the famous bristle trade.

"Ah," cried he, spinning himself round on his high stool with the greatest glee, "only think!-One hundred and twenty pounds, and a hundred profit is two hundred and twenty-oh, I shall get on: and, who knows?— strange things do come to pass,-perhaps I may be admitted partner in the house of Cash and Squeezum!" But gloomy forebodings and dismal pictures of shipwrecks, and high winds, and "crew saved, cargo lost," would obtrude themselves on his imagination; and to dispel all his hopes and fears he thought he could not do better than have a peep at Lloyd's books. He returned in still greater glee, there had been no losses, and although his cargo of bristles was uninsured, he breathed more freely than he had done for several days.

"Well, Mr. Smug," I inquired as he closed the office door, "any thing at Lloyd's?"

Nothing, sir," he replied, "not one loss on the books?" "That's fortunate."

"It is, sir, indeed; very fortunate, especially for me," he rejoined.

"Your bristles!"

of Lloyd's, I'd see whether it shouldn't all be entered before ten o'clock."

"No, Mr. Smug, I must go this time," cried Thomp son, laying his hand on the little man's arm as he once more opened the door.

"Make haste! be quick!" screamed Smug after the shipping-clerk.

But the poor fellow's injunctions were not attended to. A quarter of an hour had passed away, but Thompson had not returned.

"What a while Mr. Thompson is!" cried Peter, straining his eyes to the utmost to catch the first glimpse of the truant. "I've a good mind to go and see what has become of him."

"You can't, Mr. Smug," I replied, actuated by the same spirit of mischief as my fellow-clerk, "I want to go out." At this moment Thompson returned, bearing in his hand a long strip of paper, and extending it towards Smug, he cried, "My stars! such a heavy book! nothing but losses and wrecks! Here Mr. Smug, here's a copy of the list of arrivals, perhaps you may find your ship among them."

"I hope so," replied Peter, pressing eagerly forward. He seized the paper, and hastily placing his spectacles— upside downwards in his hurry-on his nose, he devoured the contents.

And didn't you copy the losses as well?" he inquired, when he found that the " Mary and Ellen" was not on the list of arrivals.

"I began to copy it," answered Thompson, "but it was so deuced long-stay, though, there's the beginning of it."

"Yes, sir, a private spec of my own, only "a few bristles," and he clambered up his stool with the agility of a monkey.

"We'll have a lark with him," whispered Thompson, our shipping-clerk, who sat opposite me. "How ?"

"You shall see soon," was the reply.

As the genius of mischief would have it, that night the wind blew violently. Hats and chimney-pots were blowing about in all directions. Young ladies sat up all night, because they were afraid to go to bed; and old ladies sat up too, to keep their daughters and nieces company, and to assure them, that, "for their parts, when they were girls, they were not apt to take such ridiculous notions into their heads." The next morning the newspapers were crowded with accounts of "terrific accidents," "dreadful calamities," &c. Unmarried young ladies of sixty and upwards, on reading the aforesaid accounts, uttered the most heartbreaking cries and sentimental groans ever invented: and finally poor Peter Smug entered the office with a more rueful countenance than ever schoolboy assumed on the appearance of the pedagogue's cane, and heaving a deep sigh, exclaimed, "Good morning, gentlemen! oh, what a dreadful night we have had! I couldn't sleep one wink!"

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What, are you alarmed at the wind ?" inquired Thompson, smiling maliciously.

"Alarmed, sir!" repeated Smug, "no, but the bristles, oh, the bristles!" and off he ran to Lloyd's; but the books were not posted, and he returned reduced to the very verge of madness, and the next minute paid another visit to the captains' room; still the books were not posted! "Mein Got!" exclaimed Peter, "if I only had the management

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"Are they insured though!-not one stieber!-oh, my bristles, my bristles!"

But, unfortunately for the success of our trick, the postman entered at that moment, and crying in an official tone, "Peter Smug, Esq." handed a letter to that worthy; and, half doubting whether he had delivered it to the right person, (for Peter had merely the appearance of a "Mr." at best,) slammed the door and retired.

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The speculating little German broke the wax with a trembling hand, for it was such a square, melancholy looking letter, that he felt certain it contained the announcement of the loss of the "Mary and Ellen," and of his bristles; but his countenance suddenly assumed a joyful expression as he read the magic words "Enclosed I hand you bill of lading," &c. and turning the letter over, perceived in the left-hand corner, per Mary and Ellen, Captain Steady," and the postmark 'Deal.' This was quite enough to assure him that the bristles were now lying safely off the coast, and not at the bottom of the northern ocean, and his joy at making this discovery, entirely overcame all feelings of resentment at the ruse which had been practised upon him, and he could not refrain from publicly announcing the welcome intelligence. In justice to Thompson I must add, that he was the first to shake his little friend by the hand, and congratulate him on his good fortune.

ORIGINAL POETRY.

VARIETIES.

THE HOLY BOAT.-A LEGEND.

BY THE HON. D. G. OSBORNE.

"THE Jews, to punish Martha, Mary Magdalene, Lazarus, Maximian, and Marcellus, for their fidelity to Christ while he lived, and to his memory after his death, put them into a small boat without sails or oars, and launched it into the sea in the midst of a violent tempest. The martyrs began to sing a hymn to Christ, and immediately the wind dropped, the waves grew calm, and a ray of sun surrounded the boat like a glory. The little bark, propelled by an invisible hand, glided on and on till it arrived at Marseilles, where these followers of Christ landed, and scattered themselves through the province, preaching the gospel and converting many to the true faith."-From "Impressions de Voyage par A. Dumas," vol. ii. p. 44.

THEIR impious hands have launched the bark
Upon the ocean's stormy wave;

The thunders roll, the skies are dark,

The wild winds roar, and who shall save?
The same fierce unbelieving hate

That dared the Saviour-God condemn,
Sends forth his servants to their fate,
To Him-the cross, the waves to them.

But e'en amid the tempest's wrath,

And with the dread commotion blending,
A strain of melody rings forth,

From that devoted bark ascending.-
Sweet as a virgin's hymn of praise,

Breathed ere she seeks her couch of rest,-
Sweet as our childhood's guileless lays,
When care is yet an unknown guest,-
Sweet as a mother's prayer of love,

When bending o'er her first-born boy,--
Sweet as the angel songs above,

Carolled in everlasting joy.

The storm may rear, the waves may beat,
And hope itself wax faint and dim,

But still that martyr crew repeat

To Christ on high their praise-fraught hymn.
No oar, no sail is in that boat,

The seas rush round to overwhelm,
And yet undaunted there they float,

For Faith is with them at the helm!

And lo! a sunbeam bright and warm,
Darts through the lowering mass of cloud,
That at the bidding of the storm,

Wrapped them as in a deathly shroud.
The winds are lulled, the thunders cease,
The fretted billows' ire is still,

And all above, around, is peace

And silence, save that hymn's sweet thrill.

By some unseen immortal hand,

Impelled across the trackless waste,
That bark hath reached a far, strange land,
That christian foot had never traced.
A sunny land, where nature flings

Her choicest gifts most rare and bright,
But unto which their presence brings,
The greater gift of christian light!

And may we not a lesson win

From this old legend of the past,
That when the clouds of care and sin
Our life's horizon overcast,-

When the world's aspect looks most dark,
And each wild billow rears its crest,
Faith will preserve our humble bark,
And guide it to a shore of rest.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PHYSICAL AND MENTAL LA. BOUR. Whilst we were in hand with these four parts of the Institutes. we often having occasion to go into the city, and from thence into the country, did, in some sort, envy the state of the honest ploughman and other mechanics. For one, when he was at his work, would merrily sing, and the ploughman whistled some self-pleasing tune, and yet their work both proceeded and succeeded; but he that takes upon to write, doth captivate all the faculties and powers both of his mind and body, and must be only attentive to that which he collecteth, without any expression of joy or cheerfulness while he is at his work. Sir Edward Coke.

FIRST LORD MAYOR OF LONDON.-The annual choice of the chief magistrate was granted to the citizens of London by a charter from King John.

BELLANI'S THEORY OF FALLING STARS.-M. Bellani sup ports the theory that they are formed by the combustion of trains of inflammable gases or vapours in the atmosphere. He thinks that these trains may exist in the higher regions without being dissipated, in consequence of the general and perfect tranquillity which may be considered as existing there. He endeavours to combat the difficulty which is generally urged to such a theory, of the diminished inflammability of any gaseous or vaporous mixture by expansion, by referring to the vapour of phosphorus, stating, "that phosphorus becomes luminous, or suffers a slow combustion, at a temperature so much the lower as the quantity of oxygen gas in a determinate space is rendered smaller, either by mixture with other gases, or by rarefaction;" and then ventures the conjecture, that there may be other substances, capable, by natural operations, of being reduced into the state of vapour or gas; and which, though at common temperature and pressure they are not inflammable, may become so by being elevated in the atmo sphere.-Giornale di Fisica.

LONGEVITY OF TREES.-At Elderslie, the birth-place of Wallace, near Paisley, there is an oak tree which is said to have concealed under its branches Wallace and three hundred of his followers. However doubtful this may be, it is certain that "the Wallace oak" cannot be much less than seven hundred years old. Eight olive trees still grow in the garden of Gethsemane, near Jerusalem, which can be proved to have been there more than eight hundred years ago, and which are alleged to have been witnesses of the Saviour's agony. Such great antiquity, however, is small when compared with the age of the baobab, some specimens of which, growing in Africa, Adanson found to be 5150 years old! Even this great age is surpassed by that assigned to the taxodium by Decandolle, who makes some specimens which he discovered in South America to be six thousand years old. Adanson ascertained some banian trees to be of equal antiquity.

INEXPERIENCE AND EXCESSES OF YOUTH.-The excesses of our youth are drafts upon our age, payable with interest some five-and-twenty years afterwards.-Seneca.

GREGARIOUS SPIDERS.-Upon the banks of the Amazon, spiders, which are solitary in Europe and Asia, live in congre gated societies of several thousands. Taking possession of a tree, they unite in forming a net entirely over it. When this net is completed, they take their several stations; each secures its own prey without disturbance; each labours for itself; but in case of damage to their net, they labour to repair it for their general good.

LONDON:

W. BRITTAIN, PATERNOSTER ROW. Edinburgh: JOHN MENZIES. Dublin: CURRY & Co. Glasgow: D. BRYCE.

Printed by J. Rider, 14, Bartholomew Close.

ILLUSTRATIONS OF HUMANITY.

No. XXV. THE GAMBLERS. THERE is an old Anglo-Saxon word, primitively signifying a place covered over, or concealed, but which is now familiar to us in a larger and more awful sense. That word has been felicitously applied to places such as the one of which we have given a representation look at our engraving, and say if the scene does not indeed appear a hell!

It is unquestionably a most extraordinary vice this of GAMBLING. Almost all nations have practised it, civilised and uncivilised, and amongst rude people it has been carried to extraordinary length. The ancient The ancient Germans would stake their own bodies, and the loser would cheerfully go into voluntary slavery, permitting the winner to dispose of his body for any consideration he could realize. The same thing has been, and is, done in modern times, amongst some of the African tribes or nations; while North American Indians, or apparently impassive Chinese, will stake whatever they possess in the world "on the hazard of the die." Nay, even fingers and thumbs are lost and won in this absorbing vice: while, in what are reckoned civilised and polished countries, too often has the Gambler rushed from the " hell" where he had lost his entire earthly possessions, and with his own hand added to his earthly loss by flinging his soul down the dark gulf of eternity! An awful instance of this occurred in the case of Caleb Colton, the author, amongst other things, of the celebrated collection called "Lacon, or Many Things in Few Words." In that book, Colton said, "The Gamester, if he die a martyr to his profession, is doubly ruined. He adds his soul to every other loss; and by the act of suicide renounces earth to forfeit heaven." Yet the man who wrote that awful sentence, was himself a gamester. Though a beneficed clergyman, and a man of acute and cultivated mind, he spent his time in the gambling "hells" of London, until he fled, in order to avoid his creditors; afterwards he became a regular frequenter of the gambling houses of Paris, often winning large sums of money. But being on a visit to a friend at Fontainebleau, the wearied, wasted, forlorn wretch blew out his brains. This was in 1832.

The cause of gambling may easily be traced. The human mind requires occupation; it likes to have some pursuit that will rouse its passions, and keep it excited between hope and fear. The warrior, returned from fighting or hunting, lies down and sleeps; the excitement is gone, and he is all apathy and indifference: he cannot think, and he has no books, even supposing he could read. Propose a game-a gambling match -and instantly he rouses up! So in countries called civilised, especially in large cities, where men have both leisure and money, but are not sufficiently intellectual to live without stimulus, gambling prevails. The gambling table excites them, even supposing them to be indifferent to money for its own sake. But add also a love of money—a desire to obtain riches without

labour, or the slow process of accumulation-then, gambling becomes "an enchanting witchery, gotten betwixt idleness and avarice." But we are not going to moralise on gambling: essays, tales, poems, and plays, there are in abundance, in the English language alone, all full of warning against the "enchanting witchery."

The passion for gambling in England, or rather we may say London-during last century quite infected "all ranks and conditions of men." The desire to become suddenly rich was an overmastering passion, and any scheme that promised to gratify it was eagerly patronised. South Sea bubbles, and other joint-stock schemes-lotteries, large and small-cards, dice, &c. all flourished. all flourished. Dr. Johnson, in his "Rambler,” frequently refers to the absorbing desire for wealth, directing the thunders of his grave rhetoric against the many vices which it germinated. In one paper devoted to gambling, the motto is taken from Juvenal, with Dryden's translation:

"What age so large a crop of vices bore?

Or when was avarice extended more?

When were the dice with more profusion thrown? And the Doctor commences his paper with saying, "There is no grievance, public or private, of which, since I took upon me the office of a public monitor, I have received so many, or so earnest complaints, as of the predominance of play; of a fatal passion for cards and dice, which seems to have overturned, not only the ambition of excellence, but the desire of pleasure; to have extinguished the flames of the lover, as well as of the patriot; and threatens in its further progress, to destroy all distinctions, both of rank and sex, to crush all emulation but that of fraud, to corrupt all those classes of our people, whose ancestors have, by their virtue, their industry, or their parsimony, given them the power of living in extravagance, idleness, and vice, and to leave them without knowledge but of the modish games, and without wishes but for lucky hands."

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Up to within two or three years ago, gambling in Paris was a legalised pursuit. The government derived a revenue from the gambling houses, and the police protected the gamblers. There was a company which took all the gambling houses, six in number, and paid to the government an annual sum-about £240,000-for the privilege. They kept six houses, namely, Frascati's, the Salons, and four in the Palais Royal. In a trial in Paris, it came out in the course of the evidence, that the clear profit for 1837, exclusive of the duty, had been 1,900,000 francs, (about £76,000,) of which three-fourths was paid to the city of Paris, leaving the lessee £19,000 for his own share. The average number of players per day was stated at 3000, and about 1000 more refused admission. The games played were chiefly Roulette and Rouge-et-Noir, of which the latter was the favourite. It was very seldom that large sums were staked at Roulette, as the chances against the player were considered immense by professional men, a class of gentlemen who are gamblers by profession. Rouge-et-Noir (red and black)

is played with four packs of cards, and the 'couleur' which is nearest thirty-one wins; the black being dealt for first, and then the red. All the houses were open from one o'clock in the afternoon till one or two after midnight; and latterly, till five or six in the morning." The gambling-house called Frascati's was the aristocratic one, lofty and splendid saloons, liveried servants, and well-dressed croupiers, or dealers at the tables. The Chamber of Deputies expressed a wish that the French government would give up the revenue derived from this infamous source; and accordingly it was resolved that after the commencement of 1838, no more licenses should be given to the gambling houses.

In Germany gambling is a fashionable, and in many place, a legalised vice. The small sovereigns of different states derive a portion of their incomes from this source; and at many of the watering places, such as Baden, Wisbaden, &c. there are magnificent saloons fitted up for Roulette and Rouge-et-Noir; and in these not a few of our English pigeons, who fly abroad in summer, get very comfortably plucked.

Gambling has been the subject of legal enactments in England from an early period, and all common gaming-houses are nuisances in the eye of the law. "But as a proof," (says a writer well-informed on the subject) how futile all legislative measures hitherto have been, we need only mention, and we do so without fear of contradiction, that there are more of those infamous places of resort, appropriately denominated "Hells," in London, than in any other city in the world. The handsome gas lamp, and the green or red baize door at the end of the passage (as well-known a sign as the Golden Cross or Spread Eagle) are conspicuous objects in the vicinity of St. James's and of St. George, Hanover square. It is the interior of one of these which our engraving represents; and the artist has sufficiently expressed the character of the place in the countenances of the knaves and fools assembled, without requiring one word of comment from us.

POETICAL CONTRIBUTIONS.—No. IV.

Ax immense number of poetical contributions have reached us since the appearance of our last article under this head. We are only, however, able to make room for four. The first is from the pen of Mr. H. G. Adams, and is a continuation of the "Lays of a Lunatic," which formerly appeared in our Journal. The lunatic in this instance is represented as apostrophising

THE STORM.

HURRAH! hurrah! the tempest king

Is riding forth to-night,

I hear afar re-echoing

His langh of fierce delight;

I hear the trampling of his steed,

Which onward, like the blast, doth speed

Along the rocky height;

And over vale, and over hill,
Sends out his neigh, as trumpet shrill-
Rejoicing in his might.

Hurrah! hurrah! the lightning blue

Is quivering all around;
The thunder rolls the welkin through-
An avalanche of sound;

I hear of falling trees the crash,
I hear of water-falls the dash,

Amid the gloom profound;

And from the sea, and from the land,
Above-below-on every hand,

Come noises that astound.
Hurrah! hurrah! why this is brave!
It pleaseth me right well;
Come forth, O tiger, from thy cave,
I'll give thee yell for yell;

Ye wolves that in the forest prowl,
Though wild and dismal be your howl,

My voice shall sound as fell;
Hoot, night-birds, hoot! and eagles scream;
Both owls and eagles, ye shall deem,

Are answering from this cell! Hurrah! hurrah! how merrily

Speeds on the whistling blast;

How creaks and groans the old yew-tree
As he doth hurry past;

How chink and rattle all the chains
Round yonder murderer's remains,

Whose limbs about are cast,

As though a demon tune were played
That stirred his fleshless bones, and made
Him leap and twirl so fast.

Hurrah! hurrah! I'll dance with thee,
My chains shall rattle too;
I'll "mop and mow" in ghastly glee,
And leap as thou dost do;
And were I free to take my stand,
With knife or dagger in my hand,

Where men their ways pursue;
Gods! how the gory tide should flow,
No rest, no pause, my arms should know,
Till all my foes I slew.

From out my narrow cell I gaze

Upon the troubled main;
Now are the billows all ablaze,
Now pitchy black again;

I hear the booming of a gun,
Ah! ah! the jagged rocks have won
A goodly ship ;-in vain
She struggles to avert her fate;
She sees her danger, but too late;
She parteth right in twain!
There will be bodies on the sea,
And bodies on the shore,
Below, a goodly company,

Five hundred souls, or more;
And things that my oppressors prize,
Rich gems and costly merchandize,
The billows will roll o'er;

And eyes will dim, and hearts will break,
Of those, who here their idols make,
And earthly things adore.
Again my glance to land I turn,
Ah! ah! what see I there?

The blaze of villages that burn

Is reddening all the air;

And there are shrieks and there are cries
That in the winged blast arise,

And accents of despair;

And there are forms, that as they shout,

Like swarthy demons leap about,

Amid the lurid glare.

The dusky legions overhead,

The storm-king's call obey,

Their sable banners wide they spread

In terrible array;