ward, peevish, and ill at ease. As to the pleasures of intellect, Lord Walpole's Researches have not been able to redeem many royal authors from the dust; for it is much easier to win and wear a dozen crowns than to achieve a single wreath of bays. Too busy or too indolent for literary pursuits, they read despatches instead of books, and pension laureats instead of perusing them. Reasons of state equally debar them from the solace of those delights that emanate from the heart. Cupid is a Carbonaro who owns no allegiance to thrones; there is no sweet courtship in courts; a king goes a wooing in the person of his privy counsellors; marries one whom he never saw, to please the nation, of which he is the master only to be its slave; views his bride with indifference or dislike, and is generally cut off from those domestic enjoyments which constitute the highest charm of existence. Friendship cannot offer itself as a substitute, for equality is the basis of that delicious sentiment, and he who wears a crown is at once prevented by station, and prohibited by etiquette, from indulging in any communion of hearts. Verily he ought to be exempted from all other taxes, since he pays quite enough already for his painful pre-eminence.

If it be bad to have nothing to hope, it is not much better to have every thing to fear. It is humiliating enough for such exalted personages to be perpetually giddy with the height they have attained; to envy the meanest mortal who can exclaim that

"Treason has done his worst; nor steel, nor poison,
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing

Can touch him farther;"

to be incapacitated from looking out upon the face of nature or art without encountering some impertinent memento. If they gaze upon an eclipse, they are forthwith perplexed with fear of change; the full moon snubs them with the reflection that they, like her, have accomplished their sphere; that they cannot become greater, and have nothing left but to decline and wane: the high tide twits them with the consciousness that they have been raised by the flood of fortune, and may subside again with its ebb; a natural storm catechises them about the chances of a political one; a volcano thunders them a lesson upon conspiracies of the Carbonari; and they cannot open a book without being schooled by croaking ravens as to the instability of human grandeur. All the dethroned monarchs, from Nebuchadnezzar and Belshazzar down to Napoleon, are flung in their face; they are pleasantly reminded that the lightning strikes the tallest towers first; that those who are the most elevated have the farthest to fall; that when the sportsman Death goes out a shooting, it is a matter of perfect indifference to him whether he launches his arrow through the cottage casement, or the window of the palace; and that in many a royal cemetery

“Here's an acre sown indeed

With the richest royal seed

That the earth did e'er suck in
Since the first man died for sin.
Here are sands, ignoble things,

Dropt from the royal sides of kings."

Well might Napoleon, in the plenitude of his power, revert with a sad complacency to the days of his childhood, declaring that he even recollected with delight the smell of the earth in Corsica; and that the

happiest period of his existence was when he was roaming the streets of Paris as an engineer subaltern, to discover a cheap place for dining: and there can be as little doubt that his successor would gladly exchange the heart-corroding splendour of the Tuileries for the tranquil obscurity of Hartwell.

As the ocean is subject to unreposing tides to prevent it from stagnating, so is the human mind destined to a perpetual ebb and flow of excitement, that it may be stimulated to fresh enterprises, and thus conduce to the general advancement of the species by the developement of individual activity. The mental hunger must be gratified as duly as the corporeal; and, unfortunately, there is this analogy between them, that whatever either of them tastes it destroys: the vulgar adage "that we cannot have our cake and eat it too," is equally applicable to the feast of reason. Air that has remained a certain time in the lungs becomes unfit for the purposes of respiration, and whatever has once passed through the mind loses with its novelty its power of future gratification. Some pleasures, like the horizon, recede as we advance towards them; others, like butterflies, are crushed by being caught. Reader, didst thou ever see a squirrel in a cage galloping round and round without moving a step forwarder? or the same animal at liberty, jumping from bough to bough of a hazel tree, and shaking the ripe nuts into a pond beneath, in his anxiety to catch them? Art thou bustling -enterprising-grasping, and yet disappointed, thou hast seen an exact portrait of thyself. Pleasure unattained is the hare which we hold in chase, cheered on by the ardour of competition, the exhilarating cry of the dogs, the shouts of the hunters, the echo of the horn, the ambition of being in at the death. Pleasure attained is the same hare hanging up in the sportsman's larder, worthless, disregarded, despised, dead.

As an epicure in the enjoyment of life, I thank the gods, that by placing me above want and below riches, they have given me little to fear and much to hope. I rejoice that so large a portion of enjoyment remains unpossessed, that I have spoilt so little by usage, and that seven-eighths of the world remain yet to be conquered, at least in hope. The ancients were quite wise in placing that goddess at the bottom of Pandora's box; it was like making the last-drawn ticket, after a succession of blanks, the capital prize. Oh the matter-of-factness of imagination-the actuality of reveries—the bonâ fide possession of those blessings which we enjoy in hope-the present luxury of anticipation! These are the only enjoyments which cannot be taken from us, which are beyond the reach of the blind fury with the abhorred shears, or her sightless sister of the ever-revolving wheel. To the winds do I cast the counting-house morality inculcated in the story of the milkmaid with her basket of eggs, Alnaschar with his panier of crockery, and all such musty apologues of the fabulists. There is a loss in breaking eggs or cracking teapots, but is there no gain in fancying oneself, for however short a period, a princess or a grand vizier, and revelling in all the delicious sensations which those respective dignities confer upon the imaginary, but withheld from the real incumbent ? Surely if the fancied delight be real, and the positive enjoyment of those stations illusory, the non-possessor has the best of the bargain. Credo quod habeo, et habeo. It is incredible what riches and estates I hold by this tenure. I pity the title-deed proprietors of manors, parks, and

mansions, who, keeping them in fear, and quitting them with regret, may truly exclaim from their narrow tombs

I have but to put on my Fortunatus's cap and all such domains are mine, for I have the full enjoyment as I walk through them, or gaze over the park-paling, of all the prospects they present, the breezes they waft, of the song of their birds, the hum of their bees, the fragrance and the beauty of their flowers. Like Selkirk in Fernandez, "I am monarch of all I survey" and "my right there is none to dispute." Nor is my omnivorous mind easily satiated. The Marquis of Stafford's gallery is mine-Lord Spencer's collection is mine, and mine more than theirs, for I am probably less satiated with gazing upon their beauties. Fonthill, Knole, Petworth, Blenheim, Piercefield, the Leasowes are not only mine, but Windsor Castle, and Hampton-court; and as I have as unbounded a stomach for palaces as the builder of the

I keep the Louvre, Versailles, Fontainebleau, and Compiegne for

summer residences when I make my annual excursion to Calais in the steam-boat. All these, my establishments, cost me not a farthing for their maintenance. I live in no fear of losing them; I stand in no awe of thieves; fire gives me no apprehension; I as little dread the watery St. Swithin, lest the damp should injure my pictures and statues; I am unvisited by tax-gatherers, and untormented by servants. Mine is the only secret by which so rich a man may be so perfectly at his ease. Then my literary distinctions! I am a regular lion among the blues every time that my imagination walks out of its den: I am conversazioned by the Countess of C—, routed by the Marchioness of S, read by the public in the New Monthly, praised by the critics, courted by the Row. In due course I become as good an LL. D. as Dr. Pangloss; and were I to recapitulate all the literary honours I achieve by the same process, I fear the reader would extend to me the worthy doctor's subsequent dignity, and set me down for an A double S.

H.

1

THE WALL-FLOWER.

WHERE the wall-flower lives on high
O'er the sculptured oriel-stone,
Steals a perfume on the sky

With the night-wind's hollow moan.

Thus 'tis o'er the waste of years
Comes an undistinguish'd throng,
Ruin'd hopes, and mingled tears,
And gentle wishes cherish'd long.
Hopes though ruin'd, lovely yet;
Tears for one though dead to me;
Thoughts I may not e'er forget;
Wishes that can never be.
Ask not if they're good or ill-
All are sad, yet pleasing all ;-
Nor how many haunt me still-
Count the rain-drops as they fall.

W. T.

THE PHYSICIAN,—NO. XII.

On Corpulence.

H

I HAVE Somewhere met with the observation, that there are persons in imaginary health who are not so deserving of ridicule as the Malades imaginaires, at whose expense that satirist of physicians, Molière, made himself so merry; but for which the vengeance of Hygaa overtook ok him, since he was seized, during the representation of this celebrated comedy, with an illness which afterwards carried him off. These healthy persons in their own imagination are the plethoric and corpulent, who take weight for the standard of health, and look with pity on the spare and meagre. It is to such great folks that I address this paper, and I claim no thanks from them if I should be so fortunate as to convince them of their error. I am well aware how gratifying it is to retain errors which persuade us that we are happy; for this very notion confers hap piness. I know what pleasure is felt by one who is congratulated on the portliness of his corporation, and the goodly rubicundity of his visage. It is this pleasure of the corpulent that I intend to spoil. I shall prove to them that they are diseased; and, instead of confirming them in the idea that they are pictures of health, I will strike a terror into them that shall penetrate to the very centre of their sub-pectoral protuberances. I can easily foresee how they will reward me for my pains, and I shall, therefore, reply to them in the words of the culprit, who, when the judge had commented on the heinousness of his crime, and concluded with asking him, what he thought he had deserved by it-coolly answered, "Oh! 'tis not worth mentioning-I desire nothing for it!"

When the blood contains too many nutritious and oily particles, these transpire by innumerable, almost invisible pores, through the arteries and veins, and collect in the cellular substance, which covers. nearly the whole body. Here they form vesicles, or small bags of fat, which become fuller and larger the more of this superabundant nutritious matter is conducted to them. In this manner the otherwise empty interstices of the body are filled up, and it acquires rotundity and corpulence. The fat deposited in these interstices has all the properties of an oil, when it appears in a fluid form. In this state fat exists in some fishes; and Pocock relates of the ostrich, that when it is dead, the Arabs shake it till its fat dissolves and is changed into an oil, which they apply externally in contractions and pains of the limbs, and also administer internally.

A person may grow fat from various causes, the principal of which consists in the use of soft, fluid and nutritious food; such as gravybroth, juicy flesh, a milk and farinaceous diet, and strong beer. Upon the whole, all alimentary substances which convey many fatty particles into the blood, should be avoided by people in good health.

Another cause of corpulence is want of exercise. "A man who lives well," says Hippocrates, "cannot be healthy unless he takes exercise, and attention should always be paid to keep the exercise and food in equilibrium." It is the violation of this rule that produces corpulence, and hence corpulence has justly been described a mark affixed by Nature upon those who transgress her precepts. In fact, we know from experience, that nothing fattens sə

as

rapidly as good eating and drinking, combined with bodily inactivity and love of ease. We see how soon horses grow fat when they are well fed and not worked. The oxen which have been used for draught, when turned into a rich pasture, are soon covered with wholesome fat. By means of abundant food and confinement, geese, turkeys, and other poultry, may be rendered prodigiously fat; and the same effect is produced by them upon man. When Demetrius Poliorcetes was kept in confinement, and yet provided for in a royal style, he acquired such corpulence that he died of it in a few months.

Tranquillity of mind also tends to promote corpulence when superadded to the circumstances already mentioned. Hence we rarely find that persons subject to violent passions grow fat; but in general that such as are disposed to corpulence are either volatile or not overburdened with sensibility. For the same reason much sleep encourages the increase of fat. If it be true, as some naturalists assert, that the bears, which sleep all the winter, are fat when they come forth again from their retreats, this is to be ascribed to no other cause but the torpid state in which they have passed their time. Why do carp grow so fat when enveloped in moss, unless because they are kept in a state of inactivity and stupor out of their natural element ?

The absence of such passions as reduce the strength and consume the vital spirits contributes not a little to corpulence. Compare only a patient ox and a quiet gelding with an ungovernable bull and a fiery stallion, and you will find that a more weakly body and cooler blood render the former infinitely more disposed to feed than the latter. This calmer circulation of the blood is favourable to the secretion of fat in general; and this is the reason why most persons increase very much in bulk between the ages of forty and fifty years. At that period the pulsations of the heart and the circulation are not so strong and so rapid as in the heyday of youth, and to this the cessation of the growth of the body must certainly contribute its share. A man after he has ceased to grow continues to live, as far as regards food and exercise, just as he did before; the consequence is, that the juices which used to be applied to the enlargement and completion of the members, are from this time produced in a superabundance, which turns to fat. The same is the case with people who have lost their arms or legs. As they eat and drink no less, though they have no longer those limbs to nourish, they become in general exceedingly plethoric and fat, since they daily retain a quantity of nutritious juices that is not distributed as formerly in the deficient members.

From these observations any one who wishes for rotundity of form will know how to proceed in order to obtain that desirable quality. I am not so biassed, however, as to assert that no advantage whatever is attached to corpulence. A fat man may tumble into the water with less apprehension than a raw-boned figure; because the fat being a substance of a lighter nature is better calculated to keep him afloat than the muscle of the latter, who needs the aid of a couple of blown bladders or of cork to give him the buoyancy which the former derives from his portly paunch. As fat saves from drowning, so also it may preserve for a time from the effects of intense frost, because it protects the flesh from the inclemency of the weather. On other accounts it would not be well to have no fat: for it renders the joints supple and