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This familiar Miscellany, from which religiousand politicalmatters are excluded, containsa varietyof originalandselected Articles: comprehending Literature, Criticism, Men and Manners, Amusement, Elegant Extracts, Poetry, Anecdotes, Biography, Meteorology, the Drama, Arts and Sciences, Wit and Satire, Fashions, Natural History, &c. &c. forming a handsome Annual Volume, with an Indexand Tit e-page.-Its circulation renders it a most eligible medium for Advertisements.

No. 315.-Vol. VII.

The Philanthropist.

INSTRUCTION OF THE DEAF AND DUMB.

Every institution which has for its object the melioration of the condition of those most forlorn and destitute of our species who are deprived of the use of hearing and of speech, must possess strong claims to the sympathy and patronage of the philanthropist and the Christian. Never was human ingenuity more usefully employed than in devising the means by which our deaf and dumb fellow creatures are enabled to communicate with each other, and with the rest of mankind; but the process is slow, tedious, and difficult, in proportion to the importance of the result; and too much praise cannot be bestowed upon those who have devoted themselves to the benevolent pursuit. Such an individual is our townsman, Mr. Comer, to whose unremitting and disinterested exertions Liverpool awes the honour of having at length an establishment for the instruction of the deaf and dumb. In the discharge of this most important task considerable expense and responsibility have been incurred, in which the public at Large ought in fairness to participate. At a general meeting of the gentlemen favourable to the institution, held on Thursday last, in Slater-street, the Report, which we shall presently lay before our readers, was read, and the object of the meeting will be best understood by the annexed advertisement, which we here insert gratuitously, as our contributory mite to the subscription.

INSTITUTION FOR THE INSTRUCTION OF THE
DEAF AND DUMB,

42, WOOD-STREET, AND 28, FLEET-STREET.

A GENERAL MEETING of Gentlemen favourable
to the object of Instructing the DEAF and DUMB,
was held in the Charitable Institution House, Slater-street,
Thursday, July 6, pursuant to public advertisement.
The Rev. R. P. BUDDICOM, A.M. F.A.S.
Was called to the Chair.

mesed unanimously, viz.

The Chairman having opened the business of the Meeting, d Mr. WM. COMER having given a detailed report of the roceedings which he had set on foot, for the purpose of weertaining the practicability of instructing the Deaf and Dub at the same hours, and under the same regulations is those of other Schools, the following Resolutions were 1. That the offer of Mr. WM. COMER, of placing this Instiration under the direction of a Committee, be accepted. 2. That the following Gentlemen, together with all Clergymen and Dissenting Ministers who shall be subscribers to Ce Institution, be the Committee for the ensuing year, with power to add to their number, viz. Mr. Robert Bickersteth,

Mr. Thomas Kaye,
Samuel Parkes,

James Ryley, Jun.
Robert Russell,

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T. B. Barclay,

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Edward Cropper.

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Edward Dearman,

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William Donald,

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Samuel Staniforth,

Thomas Forsyth,

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William Tarlet,

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,, Henry Wilson,

R. V. Yates.

Mr. RICHARD RATHBONE, Treasurer. Mr. WILLIAM COMER, Secretary. That the Committee be requested to solicit the patroace of the Mayor, and the Rev. the Rectors, to this Insti4 That Donations towards the expenses already incurred, ad Annual Subscriptions for the support of the Institution, t.nediately solicited, and that the Banks and the usual faces be requested to receive Books for that purpose. That the cordial thanks of this Meeting be presented to . Comen, for his exertions in establishing and bringing R. P. BUDDICOM, Chairman. That the cordial thanks of the Meeting be given to the Chairman, for his able conduct in the chair.

rward this valuable Institution.

TUESDAY, JULY 11, 1826.

pupils and their master, which fully establish the fact,
that these objects of our commiseration and sympathy,
notwithstanding their natural disqualifications, are capable
of being taught to reason and to feel correctly upon every
subject. Those who wish to refer to these documents,
may meet with them by consulting our sixth volume,
pages 353, 387, 422, and 430. We have a continuation
of them in store for next week.

We shall now lay before the public Mr. Comer's Re-
port, which is given in the third person, but which might
have been published in the first person, without subjecting
the writer to the charge of egotism, as to his exertions
alone the establishment owes its existence.-Edit. Kal.

REPORT.

It was, said Mr. Comer, about three years since his at-
tention was first directed to the very melancholy situation of
those children of the poor who are deprived of the faculty
of speech. The lectures of Mr. Humphreys, of Claremont
Asylum, near Dublin, first excited his attention to the de-
plorable condition of the uneducated deaf and dumb. The
mode of instruction pointed out by Mr. Humphreys, though
considered by Mr. H. as only applicable to those asylums set
apart for the education of mutes, appeared to him (Mr. C.)
the experiment on a few children in one of our common
to be so plain and simple, that he became anxious to try
schools. Having met with four mutes, two boys and two
girls, whose parents were willing that they should receive
such instruction as could be given them, he placed them
under the care of the master of the Jordan-street free day
school, where, in the course of six months after their admis-
sion, they were taught the use of the manual printed and
written alphabets, could spell most short words, knew the
names and uses of a variety of objects, and wrote a fair
legible hand. But Mr. C. finding that to proceed much
farther would take up so much of the time and attention
of the master as materially to interfere with his other
duties, this plan was abandoned, as the interest of the
many other boys in the school could not be allowed
to give way to that of the few mutes. The result of this
experiment was, however, so pleasing and satisfactory, so
far as it went, that Mr. Comer resolved to open a separate
day school for the education of deaf and dumb children,
so soon as he could procure a building and land sufficiently
central and commodious for the purpose, and could meet
with a master who understood the general mode of in-
struction practised in the institutions for this purpose in
other parts of the kingdom, and who would be willing to
conduct it on Mr. Comer's plan. That in pursuance of
this resolution he purchased the premises formerly oc-
cupied by the late Mr. Isaac Wolfe, as a dwelling-
house and brewery, in Fleet-street and Wood-street, anl
enlarged the former so as to render it a very comfortable
dwelling capable of accommodating with board and lodg-
ing ten or twelve children, whose parents were living at a
distance, and whose circumstances would enable them to
pay for their board and education. On the land fronting
Wood-street, a school was built, 8 yards by 9, two stories
high, and sufficiently commodious to accommodate from
50 to 60 pupils. At the time of purchasing the property,
there were only 12 years of the lease from the Corpora-
tion unexpired, but on his application to the Council for
a new lease, they, with their usual liberality, granted him
one for 75 years, without the payment of any fine, and
renewable so long as it continues to be used for the same
charitable purpose.

The school opened on the 18th of January, 1825, under Deaf and Dumb Institution, Glasgow, whom Mr. C. enthe superintendence of Mr. John Anderson, late of the In the last volume of the Kaleidoscope were introduced was to give instructions to any young men it might be degaged at an annual salary, with the understanding that he everal interesting conferences between deaf and dumb | sirable to qualify as teachers; and that he should derive

PRICE 34

no emolument from the pupils whose parents could afford to pay for their instruction.

the opening of the school was about twenty; but they were The number of children and young persons admitted at soon reduced to twelve of the youngest, as the parents were generally too poor to do without the earnings of those who were old enough to get employment.

The change in the appearance of these children was very soon apparent. Instead of the dull, stupid, heavy, they soon became lively, cheerful, animated, and intellimonotonous countenances which they at first exhibited, gent.

That, during the time that these interesting objects of our Christian sympathy have been at school, which, exclusive of the holidays, is scarcely fifteen months, the improvement they have made is such as to give the most cheering anticipations, that, by the time they have been at school an equal number of years to children attending other day schools, they will be sufficiently instructed in all that is essential for them to know, to qualify them for the proper fulfilment of the duties of life, and to enable them to become useful members of civil and religious so ciety. In proof that this expectation is well founded, he said it was only necessary to appeal to the observation of those who were present at the late examination of the pupils. On this occasion the children manifested a degree of intelligence, and an acquaintance with the rudiments of by children attending, for an equal length of time, at our learning, scarcely, if at at all, inferior to that possessed common schools.

In addition to the twelve poor children, there had been for the last twelve months a young gentleman and his sister, from Oswestry, received as private pupils. The former had been, for four years previously, with Mr. An. derson, in Glasgow, and his parents were so much pleased with the rapid progress he had made, that, as soon as his health, which became impaired, was restored, they immediately placed him and his sister (whom he had instructed during his stay at home) in this institution. That these had hitherto been boarded in the dwelling-house already alluded to, in which was fixed a respectable female, under whose care it might with great confidence be recommended that children should be placed.

dumb, in the way he had proceeded, merely as an experiThat, considering the attempt to instruct the deaf and ment, he had declined receiving more children into the school, until those first admitted had made that progress which would demonstrate to all impartial persons the practicability of teaching mutes in a school conducted on the same plan, and held during the same hours, as schools for the instruction of children who enjoy the inestimable blessing of speech.

That the experiment had, he thought, fully succeeded, and when it was considered that the school had been under little or no patronage, had been left almost entirely to the management of the master, without the aid and assistance of an efficient committee; and that, in these respects, it had not enjoyed the advantages common to all our other charity schools; the result was quite as favourable as he could have expected. Much credit was certainly due to Mr. Anderson, for his assiduity and attention to his pupils, whose entire confidence he seemed to possess.

ations and additions, amounted to rather more than £1600, That the first cost of the buildings, including the alterand the current expenses of the establishment, since its commencement, to £425, towards which £30 had been received for the education of the two private pupils, together with unsolicited donations amounting to £200.

In conclusion, he said, that, in compliance with the wish of several ladies and gentlemen who had witnessed the anxious that the benefits of the institution should be exprogress of the children's improvement, and who were into the hands of such gentlemen as may be appointed a tended as far as it is possible, he now offered to transfer it committee for its future management.

The Souquet.

"I have here only made a nosegay of culled flowers, and have brought nothing of my own but the thread that ties them." MONTAIGNE.

Having lately had occasion to consult the last number of the London Magazine, for the pupose of commenting upon an article which appeared in that work on the subject of John Dunn Hunter, the great traveller, or soi disant great traveller, we took the opportunity of perusing the other contents of the Magazine, and were so much entertained with the Suicide, that we immediately made up our minds to lay aside some prepared communication in tended for this day's Kateidoscope, in order that we might lay before our readers the whole of this very amusing, instructive, and well-written story.-Edit. Kal.

THE SUICIDE.

My father was a Shropshire country gentleman, who, to an ancient descent and narrow income, added the blessing of a family of thirteen children. My mother having died in giving birth to the thirteenth of us, he married a second wife, whose single misfortune it was, as she used feelingly to lament, to have no offspring. My father, though a tender husband, bore this dispensation without repining; reconciled, no doubt, in some degree to it, by the daily cheering sight of thirteen rosy boys and girls, of all ages and sizes, seated at six o'clock in full health, appetite, and activity, at the long mahogany dining-table. This consoling spectacle was strongly backed by the butcher's weekly bills, which reminded our parent punctually every Saturday morning, that Heaven had already done much for him in respect of progeny, and sent him to church on Sunday perfectly resigned to the barrenness of his second lady. These considerations operating on a naturally contented mind, indeed, so weighed with my father, that instead of sharing in my stepmother's distress at having no children by his second marriage, he appeared solicitous about nothing so much as how to dispose of that ample stock which he had been blessed with by his first. It happened, unfortunately, to our house, as to many other good houses, that while our honours had increased with time, our fortunes had waned with it; years, which had steadily added to the antiquity of our name, had as regularly abstracted from the rents and profits of the domain; the genealogical tree shot its roots deep, and spread its branches far and wide, but the oaks were felled, and there was as much parchment on the land as would have sufficed for all the pedigrees of the Welsh principality. When my father came into the possession of the estate, a prudent wife and genteel economy just enabled him to support the dignity of Place; he kept fewer servants, fewer horses, saw less company, than his father before him; but still the establishment was on a creditable and comfortable footing. As my mother, however, successsively blessed him year after year with some one of us, matters began to wear another aspect; it became necessary to pare things closer and closer, and by the time that I, the seventh child and fourth son, had arrived at my full appetite, it was necessary to practise the most rigid economy, in order to keep half an ox on our table for our daily meal, and two or three clowns in livery behind our chairs, to change our plates and fill our glasses. Had our wants stopped here, all would have been comparatively well, but being gentlemen of name in the county, it was essentially necessary to us that we should do as others of our own rank did; we were all, accordingly, for hunting, racing, cocking, attending balls, music meetings, &c. and miserably was my poor father importuned to provide the means of our various indispensible amusements. this state of things, it was not surprising that his most earnest wish was to see us "strike root into the pockets of the people" in some way. But he was a Whig, unfortunately, and could therefore do no more than put us in the right path against a favourable turn in public affairs; which, in the vulgar phraseology, is the turn out of the opposite party, and the turn in of one's own. My eldest brother, John, took orders that he might be ready for a living; the second, Charles, got, through the friendly in terest of our Tory neighbour Sir Marmaduke Boroughly, an ensigncy in the 60th foot; James went into the navy with a view to a ship when our friends should come in, and, poor fellow, he is at this day a midshipman of twelve years' standing. Unluckily, having come into the world after my three brothers, I found, when my time arrived, that all the best things were disposed of. The Whig bishopric in expectancy, the staff appointment, the ship,

In

free to make my final election. My father further i tered into a treaty with me, to allow me, during period, at the rate of £200 a year, while I punctuall attended the office, but in default of attendance the allow ance was to be stopped. These arrangements having be made, I was packed off to London, having only just ha time to snatch a parting interview with Louisa Davent in which I vowed never to be an attorney's clerk, and mutually swore to preserve unshaken constancy.

It is unnecessary to tell the reader that I of cou imputed the vexatious resolution of my father to machinations of my stepmother; and also failed not lay to her account a kind of hint that Louisa's father Sir Toby, had given me, that my visits to his house we favours which he should value more highly if they rarer. My stepmother, however, had in truth nothing do either with the one affair or the other, for she w harmless, inoffensive being, possessed of one all-absorbi wish, which was to increase the family of the Squanderly A desire which, however natural, Providence, in its mere did not vouchsafe to gratify.

were all gone,-anticipated by my brothers; and now be gan my troubles, and the vexatious affair which led to the remarkable incident that is the main subject of this paper. One of my father's earliest and fastest friends was Mr. W. an eminent London solicitor. Business brought this worthy man to our part of the country just at the time that the peace had thrown my brother Charles back on my father's hands a half pay ensign, and also my brother James a no-pay midshipman, and that my brother John had returned from college to take up his abode in the paternal mansion till a stall should be opened to him by a Whig admininistration. At this happy moment of reunion, Mr. W. became our guest, and professionally acquainted as he was with my father's affairs, the sight of his board, so graced with well-grown sons from barrack, sea, and college-not to mention nine daughters, whose pink sashes alone must have required half a mile of ribbon-filled him with a friendly concern. My three brothers had their professions; I alone was unprovided for, and there was a sobriety in my air which found favour in the eyes of our guest. The truth is, that I was naturally a romantic, melancholy lad, and at this particular period a little affair While on my journey to London I consoled myself of sentiment had deepened this complexion to a very der all my cares with the idea of the many pleasurses t respectable seriousness of deportment. So favourable was awaited me in the capital; but after the novelty of the impression I produced on Mr. W. that a few days first two or three days had worn off, I cannot describe h after he had left us for London, a letter arrived from him much, and in how many small points of comfort I containing an offer to my father, couched in the handplored the change in my habits of life. I had no acquain somest terms, to take me into his house as an articled clerk tance in London excepting M. W. whom I looked on without the usual premium; and concluding with an in- | professional quiz, and his family were not in town: as timation that in good time he would take me also into the clerks in his office, it was enough for me that his firm. My father considered my fortune as made, but were clerks-I was a Squanderly. Then I had exchange there was a sound in the word clerk that did not please me; a good house; a genteel, sufficiently furnished, though it seemed to confound me with excisemen's clerks, par- not handsome table, and the society of a large and alway son's clerks, and all the other clerks that I could think of cheerful family, for a lodging up two pair of stairs in in the town of D. At all events, thought I, Louisa little street called Gloucester street, Queen-square, and Daventry must be consulted before I accede to this dero- solitary meal on a blackened tough chop, or an impreg gatory proposal: I don't like it I am free to confess, but nable beef-steak. Every thing was squalid within, as I will hear what she says. And that very evening Louisa melancholy without. I thought of our dear skies and Daventry was consulted, and never shall I forget her pleasant fields, and sighed at the view of dull, dirty houses look of absolute horror as she exclaimed, "An attorney's and a dun-coloured canopy of smoke over head, which es clerk! What! and wear short black gaiters!" The cluded the sight of even a cloud fresh from the county affair was finished! I resolved firmly, and swore to From sheer ennui I took to the office for a few days, b Louisa, never to be classed with a body of men chargeable when there I was expected to share in its duties, and with short black gaiters! But knowing my father's pre- hated the look of the parchments more than the view judices in favour of the road to wealth, and that he did the smoke buildings of Gloucester-street, and found cop not view short black gaiters in the same light with Louisa ing an indenture more intolerable than the solitude of and myself, I returned home full only of the honour of dingy apartment. This did not last long. I began our family, and represented to him that it would be highly haunt the theatres at night, (the first step in the Raff unbecoming that one of the ancient house of Squanderly progress,) and to read novels and romances in the da should become an attorney's clerk. My father very coolly abandoned Mr. W.'s altogether, killed time, spent m answered that our ancient house could no longer keep our money, ran in debt, and got letters of reproach from ancient family; that, in short, he could not support me father, nay, even from my brothers. To make short in idleness, and that I must accept of Mr. W.'s offer or the discreditable details, at last I received a resolute was remain a burden to my family; a thing, which, in justice ing from my father, that if I did not resume my atten to my sisters, he could not permit. He told me, further, ance at Mr. W.s, and make up my mind to avail mys to be under no sort of uneasiness about the honour of the of the means offered of procuring my bread, justice to t family, reminding me that I was only a younger son, and other members of his family required that he should wi that my eldest brother was charged with the maintenance draw my allowance, and leave me to pursue my o of our house's dignity, while I was free to get rich as I course. This communication somewhat shocked me; could, like other younger brothers. With all respect II thought of Louise, and resolved to suffer the last ext intimated to him that he was entirely in error in his view mity rather than degrade myself in her bright eyes. of the matter, and that my regard to the name of the therefore persevered in the cause which had drawn do Squanderlys must compel me to disobey his commands. my father's displeasure, and after the lapse of a fortni I observed on the baseness of making sacrifices to wealth, received from him the following letter:and quoted such passages from the classics as my education had stored me with in disparagment of riches. My father's good opinion of wealth remained unshaken, however, and he was wholly unmoved by my citations. I dared not quote my best authority, Louisa, nor could I urge the black gaiters; this was, I felt, an argument for refined souls, and somehow or other, with every respect for my father, I knew that it would be worse than thrown away on him. I need not describe the details of the contest; my father was what I called obstinate, and I what I called firm. The substance of the argument between us might be summed up in these common forms of disputation, you shall," and "I won't."

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Henry, As I hear that my last admonition has not

duced you to present yourself at Mr. W.'s, I must take it granted that some means of making your fortune have eline one sure way to a competence; I must, therefore,

curred to you of which I am not at present aware.

You

pose that you have another in view, but as I am not consul 1 presume that my assistance is not required, and ther from this hour I shall withhold it. I have children end

with claims on the allowance which has been for some mo

thrown away on you. From this moment cease to expe We all wish you well, and success in the scheme of life have resolved on pursuing, whatever it may be.

J.

I thought that I had long made up my mind t Through the kindness of a friend, Mr. W. was duly worst consequences of my disobedience, but it seemed informed of the gracious reception I had given to his kind this letter opened my eyes for the first time to my offer, and of the consequent dispute raging between father helplessness, when abandoned to my own resources. and son. On learning these circumstances, he wrote at debts (small, very smail, as they really were) first oce once to my father, entreating him to put no force on the to me-how were they to be discharged? how cou young gentleman's inclinations, regretting that his pro- meet the applications of my creditors? how could posal, meant for the best, should have occasioned domestic Squanderly, endure the insolence of these import uneasiness, and hoping that no more would be thought people, an insolence of which I had already had a sa about the matter. My father, however, who, having or two ?-then, how was I to support myself, how to succeeded in getting so many children, knew the advan-ply my daily wants? I knew not how a stiver was tage of getting rid of then, replied to such effect as to earned. I could hunt, shoot, draw a badger, fight a bind Mr. W. to his offer, but with this proviso-that I of cocks, with any youth of my age in the kingdom should go up to town and attend the office of Mr. W. though thus accomplished in my proper sphere. I regularly for six months, after which time I should be sessed no one kind of knowledge or skill on which

at a price. "How am I to live?" was the question;
I can die,"
was my answer. The suggestion elevated
in my own opinion. The squalid details of misery
hich I had been passing in anticipation before me, dis-
peared, and I strode across my little apartment with the
of one who had taken a resolution which placed him
ove the malice of fortune. The being who has been
noured with Louisa's love, thought I, must never sub-
it to degradation. That word degradation was of great
se to me; it supported me through all my desperate re-
olutions like little Acre's "honour." But I did not
hink with levity of the matter then, and the simile never
atered my head. Young people always think lightly of
leath, and my romantic turn made me regard a violent
ne by my own hands with something very much akin to
omplacency. I was about to act the first part in a tra-
edy, which would make some noise in the world. My
mily would be made to suffer vain regrets, and to repent
meir rigour towards me. The world would admire my
Egh sense of honour which led me to prefer death to de-
radation. And Louisa Daventry!-Louisa Daventry
ould pass a life of virgin innocence in weeping over my
arly fate, keeping her vestal flame alive in the tomb of her
Henry! I remembered how she had been affected one sweet
ight as she sat in the honey-suckle alcove, by my reciting
o her the lines from Campbell's Pleasures of Hope :-
And say, when summoned from the world and thee,
I lay my head beneath the willow tree.
Wilt thou, sweet mourner! at my stone appear,
And soothe my parted spirit lingering near?
Oh! wilt thou come, at evening hour to shed
The tears of memory o'er my narrow bed;
With aching temples on thy hand reclined,
Muse on the last farewell I left behind;
Breathe a deep sigh to winds that murmur low,
And think on all my love and all my woe?

low; but it were cowardly to economise, when death
comes with the last pound. Acting on this feeling, I lived
more expensively than usual, (though, Heaven knows, my
expenses were, after all, by no means prodigious, though
exceeding my very slender means.) I drank some wine,
too; and the first night, after dinner, I had a very good
mind to carry my purpose into effect at once, without
more delay, for I felt braced up to it, and thought that
I could plunge from the top of Waterloo-bridge into the
river, as boldly as ever I plunged into a cold bath; but
happening to pass Covent-garden Theatre, in my way to
look at the water, I dropped in there instead. Here I
heard the graceful Miss M. Tree sing that sweet song of
Moore's,

Weep not for those whom the veil of the tomb,
In life's early beauty hath hid from our eyes;
Ere sin threw a blight o'er the spirit's young bloom,

66

ing them my forgiveness, and my debts. I set out at about three, on a mild but blowy December day, and walked from my lodgings to Millbank, thence on to Chelsea; for though it was high-water, and the river ran deep at Millbank, I passed on, preferring, I don't exactly know why, the more distant Battersea-bridge for my fatal plunge. When I arrived at the bridge, the evening was fast closing in, the tide had turned to the ebb, and was sweeping ra pidly through the wooden arches, curled, blackened, and hurried, by a brisk south-westerly wind. I thought myself ready for my leap; I first turned to the western side of the bridge, but that aspect did not suit my deed. There was still a good deal of light in the West, and as the breeze raised the clouds from the horizon, and chased them on, a momentary change of scene from quickly varying light and shadow was produced, which did not harmonize with my purpose. Those clouds seemed to carry Or earth had profaned what was born for the skies. my thoughts from gloom and death to the pleasant home Though there certainly was nothing in me that seemed day's hunting or shooting, I had delighted to imagine of my youth. Many an evening, on returning from a particularly born for the skies," yet I failed not to apply them thus sweeping over, on their long, long journey, to the sentiment to my intended untimely fate; and the big hang over the sailor's storm-tossed ship, and lend their the sweet air with that soul and expression for which she west to the east side; here all was blackness and haze; I tears coursed down my cheeks, while Miss Tree breathed gloom to the horrors of the tempest. I turned from the was so justly celebrated. I thought that Louisa should resolved not to hesitate another moment; I placed my sing that song, and that song only, when I should be gone; foot on the rail, and fixed my eye on the whirling black forgetting at the instant that Louisa did not sing; and eddies below, which seemed to my then excited imagi requiring, in my own mind, that she should practically nation as the smiles on the face of a fiend laughing at my belie the injunction of it, by weeping the whole time. On destruction. A thought perfectly ridiculous then occurred leaving the theatre I was too sleepy to think of suicide. to me. The next day I read the Sorrows of Werter, wrote a letter then, I shall sink at once; and while yet full of life, I I have said that I could not swim. I thought, to Louisa, and cut off a large lock of my hair, which I shall struggle, perhaps stand, and walk, on the slimy bed enclosed in it. On the third day my money was getting of the river, with the waters pouring and rushing by over low, and I thought of the choice of deaths. Shooting was out of the question, for I had no pistols; and if I had horror to me; I was prepared to die by drowning, but not my head. I don't know why, but this idea was full of had any, I conceived that there would be an ugly crunch, with my feet on earth. I was at that time as strong as a horse, and, like Tony ful death, which I felt extremely anxious to spare myself. without hesitation; but the apprehension of feeling my like the drawing of a tooth, and perhaps a lingering pain-fathoms deep, I thought I could have made the plunge Had the water been a hundred Lumpkin, never coughed except when my liquor went the Throat-cutting I disapproved also, for I was habitually a natural, while destroyed by another, element, was terrible; wrong way; but, nevertheless, it pleased my sentimental neat man in all things, and I did not like to make a mess and having looked at the water for two or three minutes, soul to imagine myself fated to early death by consump-in my lodgings; the sensation of the gash, too, I fancied during which time the idea gathered strength, I turned tion; and I recited these lines with all the eloquence of a might possibly stay one's hand, for I could, by no means, away, walked off the bridge through the toll-gate, instead lover, and the peculiar tenderness of one anticipating his dismiss my tenderness for my flesh. The idea of drown of the way I had projected, and took the nearest way home. own demise. Louisa was moved, and sunk sobbing on ing pleased me most, for I delighted in the water, and As I approached my lodgings I became birterly ashamed my shoulder. I triumphed in those tears; and it afforded thought that death would come most endurably in the shape of myself-I felt that a tragic resolution had been defeated me at this period an indescribable satisfaction to think, of a bath. I was no swimmer, too. So much the better. by a most absurd and fantastic idea. I had determined to that the desperate expedient I contemplated would cause On drowning, therefore, I resolved. It may seem odd, drown myself, and changed my purpose because the them again to flow in sorrow for my too real and too but it is, nevertheless, true, that, in considering the means thought of struggling in the mud occurred to me! I reragic fate. Yes, I thought, my death will put its sad I escaped all thought of the catastrophe itself. I had de-solved to drown myself the next day. When I got home eal on her young affections She will never love another termined to die, and pondered on the mode; but the thing I took tea, dinner I did not choose to afford myself, and I -No! She will pass the remainder of her blameless itself, death, occupied no portion of my thoughts. I had ate several rounds of toast, just as if I had not been a man ife in retirement, and "think on all my love and all my resolved to put out the light, and reflected seriously whe-whose mind was set on suicide, and who was about to play oe." The thought was luxury to me. The thought of the ther I should clap the extinguisher on it, or snuff, or blow his part in a grand and sad tragedy, for so I considered it. ate regrets of my family also pleased me. I felt that they it out, or turn it down in the socket, or ram it against the ad every thing to answer for; it was their selfishnes that wall, or quench it in a basin of fair water; but I had never made me a suicide. In my own judgment I stood clear troubled myself with any idea of the consequent darkness. of all blame. I never cast the slightest reproach to my Death was a mere word to me: but words were every own account. I looked upon myself as an injured, per- thing to me. It was the word degradation which led me secuted being, driven to death by the base, worldly, sordid to the remedy death. I had quarrelled with the profession Covetings of my kinsmen. I cannot express how I com- allotted to me, because I should bear the name of clerk; assionated myself, and how affectionately I took my own about the thing I never troubled my head, the sound had art. The best friends in the world have found something irresistible power; and that, and Louisa Daventry's conmiss in my conduct; they all, on such occasions, find ception of attorneys, as black-gaitered men, had given the uits on both sides; but I myself was my own best friend, colour of my destiny. These names had led me to the and I found no fault on my side. I was as magnani- brink of destitution; and nothing stood between me and mous to myself as Hector is to Helen, in the Iliad. I the word degradation, but the word death. But though I ever blamed the main cause of the calamity. I gene- did not think deeply of death, I thought it a pitiable thing ously carried my reproaches and my wrath elsewhere. that I should die; and I lamented myself, and grieved Of course, my poor innocent stepmother came in for a over myself, with a true and tender sorrow. Being alone handsome portion of both. Many a night, after having privy to my own intended demise, I was, as it were, my burned with indignation at her imagined machinations, I own chief mourner; and I conscientiously believe that the have been softened to tears by contemplating my own office was never more sincerely or affectionately filled. My istress; and have wept over myself with the tenderness poor stock of money was flying much quicker than a f a mother weeping over the sufferings of an innocent weaver's shuttle; there was, therefore, no time to lose, babe. It is astonishing how affliction endears us to our- more especially as I had some secret distrusts, which I heelves. If what Sheridan says of woman is, as I believe sitated to confess even to myself, of my own resolution. I it is, true that a woman never loves a man with passion dreaded lest want and misery should bind me to existence, tul she has suffered for his sake; it is no less true, that as I had observed that men always cling to life with a tewe never love ourselves with full fervour till we have nacity inversely proportioned to its worth. Give a man suffered for our faults. A man is his best friend; there health and vigour, and he will be ready to throw up his is nebody that feels so much for him as he feels for him-life for a straw: fix him to the bed of sickness, blind his self; and there is nobody who espouses his quarrels with eyes, dull his senses, paralyse his body, make him a cripthe same zeal and blind spirit of partisanship. ple, helpless to himself and burdensome to others, and he Having now determined on self-destruction as the only cherishes his maimed existence with frightful earnestness, means of avoiding want, misery, and degradation, the and contemplates, with horror, the robber Death, who time for carrying my resolution into effect was the only has little to deprive him of but his pains. The seremaining point to be settled. I was in no immediate cret dread of sinking to this abject pass, made me harry to be cruel to my flesh. While I had the means of hasten to my measures: like a child taking physic, I living, I thought there was no reason for dying; but I felt the policy of a hasty gulp; and, in the afternoon of determined not to put the deed off to the last moment, or the third day since the date of my tragical resolve, I went tatter to the last pound. In my treasury I found only forth with the purpose never to return, having left a packet three pounds and some silver. My sand, thought I, runs for Louisa, and a short letter for my family, bequeath-colouring the objects beneath them.

Louisa, read Werter till nearly four, and then again went The next day I rese late, made additions to my letter to forth to do the deed, but having had enough of Battek sea, I chose not to go farther than Millbank this time While looking out for a proper spot, I saw two genteel lads engaged in a row with some drunken blackguards who were hustling and bullying them; I believe that I never wanted courage in the common acceptation of the word, and I interfered now more boldly in the affray than perhaps I should have done at another season and in another frame of mind.

the ruffians sheered off, the youths were all gratitude, and After a few blows and more words, we walked together to Westminster; when we parted, suicide was as much out of my head as if it had never been in it. I again found my way to my last home in Blooms

lieve, without meaning a bad pun, that the heads of all
I have stated that I was a romantic youth; and I be-
romantic youths are a good deal in the clouds: that is to
say, if they are brought up in the country; for town-bred
smoke and clouds of dust. But to us country-folks, who
people appear to have no idea of any clouds, except clouds of
are at all tinctured with fancy, the clouds furnish an ever-
varying prospect; and not only do they vary themselves,
would grow stale to our eyes but for their passing touches of
and very beautifully, but they vary our landscape, which
light and shade. People talk of the sky of Italy; it is doubt-
beautiful, must want variety, and a changing expression.
less fine to look at once, but the landscape under it, however
Living in it, must be like being wedded to a beautiful woman
come insipid from sameness.
who wants play of feature, and whose brightest charms be-
whose constant motions give an appearance of life to our
I love our bold fleecy clouds,
skies. Wordsworth is the only poet who has made any use
of the clouds. In his Excursion, this beautiful thought is

suggested by a solitary spot

-In such a place

I would not willingly, methinks, lose sight Of a departing cloud. Painters know the value of clouds, but unfortunately they cannot paint them moving; they can only seize the ing ever-varying effects. They are incessantly shading and one effect: but the great virtue of clouds, is that of produc

bury, and did not feel ashamed of my postponement of the execution of my purpose this time as I did before. My gallantry in the affray assuring me of my courage. But after this I thought no more of drowning, persuading myself that there was a fatality against it. The conclusion of this day brought me to my last shilling, but instead of running out my last sand with it as I had projected, I bethought myself of two or three arti. cles of jewellery, of small value, which I possessed, and I resolved to sell them, and to live a day or two longer on the money. This I did; how I lived I care not to tell; suffice it to say, I sought distraction in every possible way. On Christmas-day I came to my last dollar, and a melancholy day it was. The excitement which I had produced for some hours past, by artificial means, had given place to the usual consequent depression: my purse was just exhausted the people at my lodgings looked suspiciously on me; my duns threatened me for the morrow: I was alone in this great city, without a hope for the future, or a friend to cheer the present moment. I remained for many hours in an agony of misery. At one instant I thought of throwing myself on my family, and, if neces. sary, conceding to their wishes; but when I reflected on the high tone I had assumed, and the firm resolution I had professed, a resolution on which I extravagantly piqued myself, I fancied that it would be the height of meanness in me to succumb. I had in truth vapoured a good deal; I had played the hero of romance to the life. I had filled the glass; I must drink it, thought I. Louisa Daventry shall lament, but never despise me. To a friendless, unconnected man, in a large city, a great festival which draws together each domestic circle, and leaves the stranger alone, solitary-is a melancholy occasion. To me, destitute, full of sad thoughts, and desperate resolution, it was a day of bitterness indeed. I saw gladness all around me, and felt misery within. Every sign of cheerfulness quickened the sense of my own forlorn condition. I envied every creature that met iny sight, for I fancied that every creature but myself made one welcome guest in some dear circle. I was no where linked in this vast social chain. The thought was bitterness to me, and it afflicted me more than my poverty and its attendant miseries. I have hinted that I was the creature of sentiment, and thrown as I had been, suddenly, out of the fostering bosom of a family, on the cold wide world, it may not be difficult to understand my feelings.

About the middle of the day my landlady came up stairs, and in that peculiar voice and manner which are produced in landladies by an unpaid bill, asked me whether I did not dine out, taking care to remind me at the same time that it was Christmas-day. I told her I did, and at bout four o'clock I left the house, intending to walk about till night, when I purposed to end all my earthly troubles and mortifications. The evening was close and heavy, a drizzling rain fell now and then, and every thing out of doors looked blank and gloomy. As if to seek out a place more melancholy under these circumstances than another, I unconsciously took the way to the city, and strolled for some time through its filthy, and, at this season, deserted streets; thence I crossed London Bridge, and passed from the Borough into Saint George's Fields; the squalor and misery of this district would at another period have disgusted me, but now I felt more at home there than any where else. There was no appearance of any thing social or cheerful here to shock me by contrast. Hence I wandered to Westminster, and as it began to rain smartly as I passed over the bridge, I made that accident a pretext for taking a seat under one of the covered recesses on that bridge. Here also was a woman rather advanced in life, and of a genteel, but very subdued air; her clothes, which seemed scanty and unsuited to the season-a light shawl and silk petticoat-were dripping wet, and I looked upon her with compassion as a sister in calamity; she avoided looking on me at all. She had a little girl with her whom she held by the hand, and during the time that I was in their company, not a word was exchanged between them; the child gazed up intently in the woman's wan face sometimes, but neither spoke a syllable. I thought they seemed numbered with misery. The only action of the mother, if such she was, was to pass her hand frequently over the child's clothes, and to endeavour to wring the moisture from them. The dollar my pocket I could not part with; it was reserved to purchase my death, and I could not bestow it to support the lives of these poor creatures. When the rain ceased, the watchman came and desired us to move on, and the woman hurried away with an alarmed air, as if a being apparently so sunk in misery had still something to dread. We went in opposite directions. After having walked so many miles in darkness. I heard, to my amazement, the cry of past eight o'clock; I thought it should be near midnight, and it seemed to me that there would be no end of this dismal night. Foot sore, drenched

with rain, and exhausted, I resolved to make now for my lodgings, and on my way I went into a chymist's near Bloomsbury, and asked for an ounce of oxalic acid to clean boot-tops. The man looked at me, I fancied, as much as to say, you are above cleaning boot-tops, and below wearing such smart gear. He, however, weighed out the quantity, wrote- OXALIC ACID-POISON," on the paper, and extended it towards me without any observation. I took the packet with a steady hand, and having before laid the dollar down on the counter, was about to leave the shop without receiving the change. He called me back, reminding me of my omission, to my some small confusion. I had no farther use for these poor coins, and on my way to my home I looked out for some object on whom to bestow them. I met with none, however; I seemed to myself the only miserable creature walking the streets on that night, so joyous to the rest of the world, and joyless to me. My knock at the door of my lodgings was answered by the servant of the house: she was in truth a Maritornes such as is common to lodging-houses; but as she opened the door to me for the last time, and lit and handed me my candle, I invested her with that sort of adventitious dignity which belongs even to the humblest performers in a great tragedy-my dark destiny seemed to shed a romantic colour on the commonest and vulgarest objects around me. The woman, who was dirty, careless, and stupid, had never been in favour with me; on the contrary, indeed; but now I was softened even towards her, and as she performed these homely little offices for me for the last time, I felt moved, absurd as it may sound, and thanking her with a voice of kindness, told her that I was ill, and therefore going early to bed. Truth compels me to say that she appeared perfectly unconscious that her part at this instant, mean as it was, was one in tragedy, and she wished me good night, just as if I had been a man destined to see the morning. When in the room it struck me that I should want some warm water to dissolve my oxalic acid, and I rang the bell, which was answered by my landlady's daughter. She came up, I knew, in order to display the finery which she were in honour of the day. I thought, "You little know what is passing in the mind of the man whose eye you would surprise with these miserable gauds." She was no more fitted for the part of witness to a romantic catastrophe than the maid, for she was plain and squinted; but these are after thoughts-at the time I had no such trash in my contemplation.

ease, as the long wick of the candle showed me tha doze had not been short. It will last me out, I thou and I continued for about half an hour gazing at the light and fancying the likenesses of fantastic forms i gloom beyond it, while the wind howled, and the pattered against my window. Then, for the first tin felt some twinges of pain, which admonished me tha enemy was at work, and which increased gradually ir lence, till I suffered what I knew to be the usual oper of poison. I thought now of nothing but my pains perceived that the work of death was by no means dignity corresponding with its horror. The process gr my flesh, and shocked my sentiment. As the pains sharper I began to repent of what I had done, wishi undone or over, and frequently examined my pul ascertain the exhaustion of my strength-other pain: fancies then possessed me. But I must draw a veil the scene here, for even at this distance of time, ther circumstances in it which I cannot bear to remen much less to commit to paper.

My groans, groans more of mental than of phy suffering, at last alarmed some part of the family; my landlady's daughter tapped at the door and asked whether I was ill? No answer being returned, she c ed the door and repeated her inquiry; I replied "1 me alone-leave me alone-I have taken poison-leav to die in peace.' On this she uttered a loud scream, rushed to the head of the stairs, and stood screaming till the whole family, which had sat up carousing, brought to the spot. In answer to their questions a the cause of the uproar, she only screamed, and at le to explain the matter more clearly, went into hyst After the lapse of some valuable minutes, when they found that nothing was to be learnt from her, the m of the house, a coarse fellow, applied to me to inform what had happened, and I told it to him pretty near the same words in which I had told it to his daughter received the intelligence differently. "A pretty bus this here," said he, "I would not have had such at to happen in the house-no, not for a thousand poun And then off he went, as he said, for the doctor. I fa told him it would be of no use-that human aid w not avail; but I must confess that I felt no dispositic offer any vehement resistance to the experiment. My was now surrounded by the members of the family, ceased not to ask me how I came to do such a thing, to admonish me of the sinfulness of the action; at same time that they seemed full of the most te While the girl was fetching the water I strode up and anxiety to alleviate my bodily pains. Indeed, such down the room in some perturbation of spirits. This was their zeal for me, that but for the good sense of a vis the most painful interval in the whole of that terrible day they would have made me swallow all the sallad oil w to me. The impossibility of facing the morrow, had com- there happened to be in the cruet stand, on the streng pletely braced me for my deed before, but this pause at its antidotical reputation, without waiting the arriv the very point of execution, seemed to relax my purpose the doctor. After the lapse of about a quarter of an why, I knew not. In a minute, however, the girl returned which seemed to me an age, the apothecary arrived, with the warm water, and asked me, when about to retire, having very sensibly commenced business by clearing at what hour I would be called in the morning? I felt room, he asked me what the poison was, the quantity, a choking sensation as I replied" At the usual hour." how long I had taken it. I told him what it was She then left the room, giving that slam to the door which quantity, and that I took it at about nine; he pulled reminds a lodger that he has not paid his bill. A moment's his watch, looked at the time-half-past twelve, and 1 communing with myself, shame for my perturbation, and ed grave. "What did you take it in ?"-I replied p an appeal to my pride, restored me to my resolution, and ing to the glass on the toilet. He walked up to it I was again strung for my purpose. I walked delibe- I thought, with strange deliberation, and unfeeling rately to the table, mixed the dose, shaking the last grains posure, and seeing the paper on the table, took it up, of the powder from the paper into the glass, and then set the inscription, and dropped it with a manner which it on the looking-glass stand to cool. I then walked up to my heart, and made my teeth chatter in my head and down the room, composed, and to the best of my re- then felt, for the first time, the horror of death collection perfectly thoughtless-my mind was either va- then seemed, for the first time, to feel that I was in cant, or so loaded that it had lost its action. When I con- dying,-fated in a few quick minutes to cease to be,cluded that the draught was sufficiently cool, I walked up passing bitter was that moment of agony! Still I wat to the toilet, took it, and raised it to my lips with a steady the apothecary, as if my last shadow of hope rested or hand; at this instant my eye rested on the reflection of uncouth person. Having laid down the paper as I | my own face in the mirror, and I felt proud of its com-described, he immediately took up the glass-and posure, and pleased to look on it while I drained the deadly period, short as it was, was the period which contained draught. This done, I set down the glass with a firm me an age of anguish-he dipped his little finger in hand, and again walked up and down the room, with moisture at the bottom of the glass, carried it to his some confusion of thought going on in my mind, but no tasted it, and looked surprised,-tasted it again, at pain or apprehension-those feelings had had their day; burst into a loud laugh! My blood boiled against they were now gone. Being weary, after a time I laid monster, but before I could find words, he said, “ Co down on the bed, waiting the action of the poison, and come, young gentleman, there is no harm done after comforting myself with the reflection that the pain would Here has been a lucky mistake. You have taken a be short, that it would soon be over, and I at peace. of Epsom salts instead of oxalic acid, and it will cool y Louisa Daventry, I remember, and my family, did not blood and do you a great deal of good, and you will fill much of my thoughts, which were all centered in my all the better for it to-morrow, and thankful that you self: my anxiety was all about myself, and how I should alive and kicking. Say your prayers, thank God fo bear my sufferings, and whether my courage would hold his mercies, and go to sleep. Good night." And out as the shadow of death darkened my intellect. Strange these words, and a ha! ha! ha! he closed the door. as it may seem, while thus meditating, my ideas wan- a minute the whole house rang with the same soun dered, and a doze came over me, and I slumbered, I every creature was giggling and chuckling, and I h should imagine for nearly an hour; on waking suddenly, their smothered titters as they passed the door. I felt the common shock of recollection under calamitous circumstances, and wondered that my body was still at

From an agony of dread I now passed instantaneo to an agony of shame. My tragedy had, in a seco

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