SPECTABILIA.
PRESERVATION OF FOOD BY FROST.—AbOla the end of October, the Russians, according to Dr. King, kill their poultry, and pack them in tubs with layers of snow betwixt them, using them afterwards as occasion requires. Veal frozen at Archangel, and brought to Petersburgh, is esteemed tho finest they have; nor, when properly thawed, can it be distinguished from that which is recently killed, being equally juicy. It is in this manner that the markets are supplied, vast stacks of whole hogs, sheep, and fish being in this state exposed to sale. When animal substances are thus submitted to an extreme degree of cold, they seem capable of being preserved for an indefinite period of time.
A remarkable discovery of this kind was made in 1799. on the shores of the Frozen Sea, near the mouth of the same river Lena, which is one of the largest in Siberia. An animal of uncommon size was found imbedded in a massof ice, which, as it melted gradually, disclosed him to view. His hair, skin, and flesh were in good preservation, so that dogs and many wild animals preyed upon it. The block of ice in which he was found was upwards of 200 feet high, and when first discovered, he appears to have been about forty feet beneath the surface. According to the celebrated Cuvier, this animal differs from every species of elephant, as well as from the large animals whose bones have been found on the banks of some of the great rivers in America. He bears, indeed, no resemblance to any species of animal at present known on the surface of the earth, and is therefore considered by Cuvier as antediluvian, and to have been preserved from the remote period of the Deluge, in the mass of ice that enveloped him. Vegetable substances, in like manner, may be thus preserved in a frozen state. Mr. Boyle mentions examples of apples that had been frozen, and which, by proper management in thawing, were restored to their former freshness ; and grapes and cabbages that have been quite frozen, are said by Dr. King to be as good as when recently gathered, if they are properly thawed. EXTREME SHORTSIGHTEDNESS,-...Whell a man rubs out with his nose what he has written with his pen.
FREE TRADE DEBATED IN CROMWELL'S PARLIAMENT.—In the Committee of Trade was o a petition of the Free Merchants against the Merchant Adventurer.—"Wherein," says Burton, " was set forth what a great prejudice it was to the Commonwealth that the trade of the woollen manufactures should be engrossed into the hands of one company, it being the only staple trade of England, and ought to be improved to the best advantage. There were strong arguments brought on the account of the Free Merchants, to prove that a Free trade was most for the good of the nation. Sir Christopher Pack, who is master of the Merchant Adventurers' Company, turned in the debate like a horse, and answered every man. I believe he spoke at least thirty times. Mr. Lloyd helped him as much as could be; but both reason and equity, and the sense of the Committee being against them, they were forced at last to give up the cudgels, but with much ado. Sir Christopher did cleave like a clgg, and was very an,gry that he could not be heard ad infinitum, though the Committee were forced at last to come to a compact with him, that he should speak no more after that time. He said, at last, be hoped to he heard elsewhere."—Burton's Diary.
NAVIGATION UNDER WATEIL—The system of submarine navigation for which M. Baudouin des Angelys has obtained a patent gratis, is altogether new : it is founded on the impression made by water on air in its state of atmospheric expansion, and of air upon water, which are made reciprocally to displace each other at the pleasure of the submarine pilot. Hitherto navigators have been content to lay in.a stock of water; the principal stock which Mr. Baudouin is careful to lay in is air. By a process, at once simple and of easy execution, he compresses that highly elastic fluid so as to enclose, in a vase of one cubic foot of contents, sixty feet of respirable air. We shall not here describe the diving-boat with its open bottom, the helmet of the diver, his safety-casks, and other machines equally simple and ingenious, the exercise and the design of which yesterday attracted in a particular manner the attention of the Minister of the Marine. We shall not, we say, describe these machines, because it is intended to exhibit them to the public until about the end of the next month; but we participate entirely in the opinion of those persons who think that a discovery which opens up to a man the portals of an element, hitherto inaccessible to his steps, is destined, as was the discovery of the steam-engine, to operate mighty changes both in the moral and physical world —Constitutionnel of Sunday.
PHRENOLOGY IN TILE PULPIT.—The Rev. Mr. Welsh, a stanch Kirk-ofScotland-man, publicly says—" I have found the greatest benefit from the science, as a minister of the gospel. I have been led to study the Evidences of Christianity anew, in connexion with phrenology, and I feel my confidence in the truth of our holy religion increased by this new examination. I have examined the doctrines of our church also, one by one, in connexion with the truths of our new science, and I have found the most wonderful harmony between them ; and, in dealing with my people in the ordinary duties of my calling, the practical benefit I have derived from phrenology is inestimable."— Phrenological Journal.
REAL DEL MONTE SILVER MINES.—The mode of procuring silver from the ore, in the haciudas of Mexico, is a far more complicated operation than is generally supposed. The crude ore, which contains a large proportion of sulphur, after being pulverized, is mixed with a quantity of common salt, sulphate of iron, or pyrites, and calcined copper. The combination soon becomes heated through the chemical action of the pyrites, which has the effect of partially.. disengaging the silver from the ore; when quicksilver being added to the mass, amalgamation takes place, and the mercury may be driven off by distillation. Although the process affords a beautiful example of spontaneous chemical agency, its principles of action did not appear to be well understood previous to the silver mines falling into the hands of the British Mining interests. The agent of the Real del Monte works, Mr. Buchan, ascribes the chemical agency during amalgamation to the presence of sulphuric acid; and proposes that acid as a substitute for the compound technically called magistral, from its supposed essential properties in the preparation for effecting the reduction of the ore by decomposing its elements. The rude native machinery in the mining districts has been in most eases superseded by British machinery, or labourers working under British enterprise and superintendance.
• Esuimsu C order to give the Bordeaux wines some resemblance
to those wines of Spain and Portugal which are used in England—to render them of the taste preferred in that kingdom, front the effect of long habit— the greatest part of our wine-merchants who trade with England are obliged to work them, that is to say, to mix them with other wines by means of a particular operation. This is the reason why, in general, the wines shipped for England are not pure, and can no longer be known to be the same, when compared with those which remain at Bordeaux, such as they are produced in the department of the Gironde. The operation consists in mixing a certain quantity of Hermitage, and other kinds of fine strong wines of the south, which give fire to the claret, but which render it dry when old, turn it of a brick red colour, and cause a deposit of sediment when it has been some time in bottle. When by the effect ()noising several sorts of wines, a working or fretting results which might injure the quality, they take some mineral crystal, reduce it to powder, and put an ounce into each barrel, beat up with a proper quantity of isinglass, and rack off the wine about fifteen days after, when it has got clear, and has entirely ceased to work. To give odour (bouquet) to the wine, they take two drams of orris-root (racine diris)in powder put into a fine rag, and let.it hang about fifteen days in the cask ; after which it is taken out, because the wine has then acquired sufficient odour ; you may also, if desired, put the powder into the barrel, beak up with fining, and fifteen days after, it may be racked off. Many persons, to make the wine appear older and higher flavoured, and at the same time to prevent the injuring its quality, employ raspberry brandy (esprit framboise in this case the dose is two ounces for each cask ; this spirit is well mixed with the wine, and fifteen or tweety clays after, the wine has acquired a certain degree of apparent maturity, which is increased by a kind of odour which this mixture gives it. The bouquet which by these means is given to the common or ordinary wines never replaces perfectly the natural flavour which distinguishes our choice wines of Medoc and Grave, which ought to embalm the palate. It is very easy to distinguish the fictitious bouquet which has been given to the wine, if you have ever so little habit of tasting.; for the smell of the iris, as well as the raspberry, always predotninates in the wines which have been worked, and forms a striking contrast with the natural flavour of the Caine wines.—Pagnierre's Classification and Descrip. (ion of the Wines of Bourdeati4 A THE AFFAIR OF THE HEART.-M. Gretry, the celebrated French composer, has been numbered with the host of departed harmonists ever since the year 1813, but his heart has never known ease since the immaterial part of him joined the celestial choir. Gretry when he died left his heart to Liege, his native city. Flamand Gretry-, his nephew, never executed the will of his uncle ; and, after an extraordinary exertion of patience, the citizens of Liege, who long had sighed, but in vain, for the heart of their dear townsman, brought their claim into a court of law. M. Flamand Gretry pleaded, that, on his uncle's demise, he desired the authorities of Liege to send for the heart, which he had carefully preserved ; but that they, devoid of that refinement in feeling which distinguishes true Frenchmen, desired 1dm to forward to them the noble remains of his deceased relative by the stage-coach, carriage paid. Such a reply naturally enough filled M. Flamand with unappeasable wrath ; and, vowing that the Liet,ceois should never benefit by his ielative's will, he deposited the bequest in all urn in the garden of the hermitage of J. J. Rousseau at Montmorency, which had become the property of F. Gretry. The case was heard and decided in one court, the decision appealed against in another, referred to a third, and so on, the lawyers profiting amazingly, as they always take care to do, by the dispute; while numbers of the composer's admirers, nay many of those who most esteemed and loved. him, declared that his heart was not in the right place. At length, in 1823, ten years after the conimencemmit of the struggle, the Cour Royale gave judgment in favour of Liege, and on the 19th of last July, five more years having elapsed, time decree was carried into execution. "The Prefect of the Seine and Oise had refused to sanction the decree, by which the heart was to be transferred to Liege, where a public monument had been prepared for its reception. The refusal of the Prefect was approved by the Minister of the Interior in 1825 ; but a royal ordonnance of the 2nd of April last, annulled this ministerial decision, and authorised the execution of the decree of the Cour Royale. Accordingly, the Mayor of Montmorency, accompanied by the Chevaliers Regault de Rochefort and Anseau, commissioners deputed expressly for the occasion by the city of Liege, M. Guery, their advocate and Dr. Sauberville, who had embalmed the heart, proceeded to the hermitage of Jean Jacques Rousseau, for the purpose of exhuming the precious relic. The Cure of Montmorency was also present, and took part in the ceremony by reciting the usual prayer, and sprinkling the heart, or rather the box which contained it, with holy water. This box, which was of lead, and in the form of a heart with all its veins and arteries, after a careful examination by Dr. Sauberville, and the workmen who had been employed in placing it in the garden, to ascertain its identity, and that it had not been opened, was bound round wilh a ribbon, the ends of which were sealed with the seals of the Mayor of Mentinoreney, of the Commissaries of Liege, and the arms of that city surmounted by a mural crown. The box and its valuable contents were then placed in a second case, prepared for the purpose, and delivered to the Commissaries of Liege, who, on going away, left with the Cure the sum of 100 francs for the poor of Montmorency." The Regency of Liege have had a meeting to arrange the ceremonial which is to be observed upon the entry of this long-contested property into the city; and I shall doubtless soon be enabled to record the particulars of its reception, and, perhaps, of the heart having at length reposed.—Harmonicon fur September ; Diary of a Dilettante.
From late calculations it appears, that the average age of marriage in Paris, during tile eighteenth century, was, for inen, about twenty-nine years and three-quarters—for women, about twenty-four years and three-quarters; and that the average age of parents, at the birth of a son, was, for women, about twenty-eight years and a quarter—for men, about thirty-three years and a quarter.
RUSS/AN DINNERS.—We dined generally, and so did everybody else, I believe, at five o'clock. In one of the principal drawing-rooms there is a small table set out with a number of small dishes containing carved cold tongue, dried herrings, caviar, preserves, anchovies, thin slices of bread and cheese, with small bottles of liqueurs or brandy : most of the guests partake of 'some of these before dinner. On entering the dining-room, the table decked out with a gilt or silver plateau of great value, in the centre, surrounded by vases of flowers, groups of fruit, and baskets of dry comfitures, excites the attention of the stranger. Around this the guests take their seats with that intuitive attention to distinction of rank, which good breeding naturally imparts to people in every country. It is not true, however, (at least not true in about twenty of the first Russian houses in St. Petersburgh, with which I was acquainted,) as both English and French writers have, even so late as last year, asserted, that the ladies sit all on one side, that the guests of an inferior rank are all compelled to take the bottom of the table; and that only the worst fare, and a particular set of trash wines, are allowed to the latter. I never remarked any thing of the kind ; and indeed there is no bottom of the table, since both the master and mistress take their places in the centre, and are consequently equally distant front their guests at each end of it, where I often remarked persons of the first rank and character. The Marchese Caraccioli, who was a great gourmand, and spent several years in England, as ambassador from Naples, used to observe, in reference to English cookery, II y a en Angleterre soixante sectes religieuses differentes, et une seule sauce, le melted butter! quel pays!' Had the marquess been ambassador at St. Petersburgh instead, he would have been spared the trouble of such an antithesis. I doubt whether any other national cookery can boast of a greater variety of diehes or sauces than the Russian, and I feel convinced that Maitre Anonyme, the editor of the Almanach des Gourmands, will be considered as not having done one half of his duty if he expires before he has opened to the public the budget of Russian dishes. These are presented to the guests by the maitre d'hiitel and his assistants, already carved at the side tables, and one after the other, with the pleasing attention .of whispering into your ears the nomenclature of each dish. One comes and another goes, and a servant follows with a decanter in each hand. The first commends to your attention a little vareniky ; the second, finding that you have already before you a dish of stchy, brings round the rastingay, or oblong pastry, to eat with it. He of the bottles then thinks it high time to remind you of such cordial beverages as Champagne, Burgundy, Lafitte, Pa.charete, Vin du Commandeur, du Johannisberg, de la Comete, and so on, until you know not what choice to make. Mine was the easiest task on such occasions, for I took none, and I am the better for it : but the quantity of champagne that 1 saw drank in St. Petersburgh actually astounded me. I feel confident that there must be another champagne country somewhat nearer to Russia than the French champagne, to supply what is actually consumed of that wine,--Dr. Granville's Petersoursh,
DEAF AND Dumn.-In a report lately read before the French Royal Academy of Medicine, by Mr. Ruisson, on a system pursued by M. Itard for the instruction of the deaf and dumb, it is stated, that instances of children being born absolutely deaf are extremely rare, but there is sufficiont sensation in the auditory nerves to render children capable of some instruction if proper attention be paid to them. It is worthy of notice, that a child having a very imperfect sense of hearing will, if neglected, become absolutely deaf: but if the sense be frequently exercised, by the person heing brought near to church-bells or any other powerful vibrations of sound, the faculty of hearing may be considerably improved. M. Itard is in the practice of placing the patients near musical instruments when he conveys instruction to them, by teaching pronunciation in conjunction with the sound.
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