And it is on them that its fate depends. Louis Napoleon will almost certainly select his first cabinet from among them. Their administration will show how much moral elevation and material prosperity is possible under the new constitution. Should they fail, it will perish utterly. An indignant nation will throw it to the winds, and Louis Napoleon may crown himself, if he pleases, at Notre Dame.-Chronicle.

abhorrence to the phases it has assumed since Feb-|patible with the stability and well-being of society, ruary. The first category embraces all the French they will become its loyal and devoted servants. peasantry. The rustic population has availed itself of universal suffrage to indulge the only romantic feeling it is in the habit of experiencing. It has used the balloting papers as it would a dead wall —it has scribbled on them the rude record of its sympathies. Who does not remember the beautiful prophecy of Beranger-that exquisite song, in which he foretells, that though Paris may do homage to the Bourbons, on parlera de sa gloire in the cottages-father telling the tale of the imperial victories to son, and grandmother to grandchild! So THE PRESIDENT OF FRANCE.-To all appearit is. The glory of Napoleon is the sole theme of ance the time has arrived when it becomes necesthe conteur of French village life, not even obscured, sary to pay our homage to Louis Napoleon, the at the present time, by the shadow which dims it in first President of the new French Republic. But Beranger's poetry-the memory of the misery which how to discharge that duty is the question. Were he spread far and wide. And it is as independent we ever so desirous to worship the rising sun of of republics as it was of Bourbon restorations and France, we shall still find it a matter of difficulty. Orleans substitutions. Who, but the narrow dream- Under what name and quality are we to address ers of Paris, would have supposed that, instead of him? For what auspices is he to be congratuthe glorious substance of these traditions, the peas-lated? What wishes are we to express? Are ants would be content, or able, to grasp the loose we to ask Heaven for a successful presidency or generalities and dogmatic crudities of republican for a lengthened reign? Is it the maintenance of theory?—that a clique of Parisian journalists could a policy or the inauguration of an empire which the change the direction of an enthusiasm like this, and omens portend? Such questions crowd upon us bring it to bear on the sentiment, whatever it may the moment we turn to the new object of our be, embodied in the starched personality of Cavaig- political regards. The traveller in an unknown nac? The second class of Louis Napoleon's sup-region is suddenly introduced to a personage who porters is composed of adherents of the two Bourbon evidently embodies the genius and religion of dynasties, indiscriminately mingled. The Orlean- the place, but whose rank, position, and attributes ists are greatly in the minority. The larger part are as yet a mystery. What obeisances, what of them, though the least eminent, seems to have offerings, what propitiations are required? The passed over to Cavaignac with M. Dufaure. In- traveller consults in vain the recollections of his deed, the position and antecedents of the lately varied experience. We are in the same awkexiled family almost excluded that pertinacity of ward position, and must wait till the idol makes a retrospective regret which creates and sustains a sign, or his worshippers have given us some clue party like that of the Jacobites and legitimists. Their to the proprieties of the place. We will not comworthiest supporters were supporters from reflection; mend as a republican in December one whom we and these are, of course, actuated by motives very may have to adore as an emperor next March. different from the chivalrous hope, and no less chival- The nation and the man, the electors and the forrous despair, which dominate alternately the energies tunate candidate, contribute to the difficulty in of the Carlists. Sentiments very much mixed-de- equal proportions. Till last February, Prince signs half understood, and plans half matured-influ- Louis Napoleon devoted all his thoughts to an enced, in all probability, the voting of these latter. object which, in the ordinary estimation of these Louis Napoleon can hardly have many attractions things, was natural and even praiseworthy. It for them, and they have too little hypocrisy to dis- was nothing less than the occupation of his uncle's guise their state of mind in relation to Cavaignac imperial throne. The modern Octavius, who, and Marrast. No bad exponent of their doubt is, like the Roman original, had good advisers, and perhaps, their honest-hearted leader, M. de La- was wise enough to seek counsel, might fairly rochejaquelin, who is said to have inscribed on his consider that the reign and the dynasty of Cæsar balloting-card the name of Abd-el-Kader. The had suffered a premature check. All this was remainder of the majority comprises such French-intelligible and honest. It was simply the case men as have sincerely accepted the republic, and of a pretender in quest of his estate. In the spring will continue to support it, should it prove separable from the men of February. There is abundant proof that many of the soundest patriots and clearest thinkers of France are inclined to disregard particular forms in government, provided that certain all-important ends can be attained. These have no prepossessions against a democratic, and in favor of a monarchical régime, except in so far as the machinery of the former is primâ facie clumsy and cumbrous. If the republic be com

of this year some remarkable events had a twofold effect on the prince. They improved his prospects, and at the same time lowered his pretensions. They gave him opportunity and subdued his aims. It is commonly ascribed to adversity to chasten the desires. Prince Louis Napoleon showed a more than ordinary—we had almost said a more than human-virtue, inasmuch as in his case it is prosperity that has purified his ambition. When he was an exile he wished to be an emper

ter.

the law of revolutions that the foremost ranks fall. Governments are taken like citadels. The leaders of the assault fill the ditch for their followers to walk over. The ardent spirits of the Hôtel de Ville were the forlorn hope that stormed the

its offspring. The Juggernaut has crushed all
who drew it. Their place is supplied by the
servants of a constitutional king, who appear on
the stage surrounding a pretender to the empire.
In all this we find nothing that will enable us to
form positive conclusions or even probable conjec-
tures as to the fate of new France. We can only
read the ingratitude or the jealousy of republicans,
if not the condemnation of the republic. We can
only gather that there is no loyalty, because no
appreciation of loyalty, in France; and that the
faithful servant of a republic fares even
than the faithful servant of a king.-Times.

or; when France was at his feet he forthwith not do them the injury of supposing them really asked for nothing more than to contribute a little unfaithful to their new master, but the actual antemporary aid to an infant republic. Doubtless tecedents of their history are strongly at variance his aspirations, which had previously taken a more with their present position. Till the republic was vulgar and selfish direction, were now fulfilled by an historical fact, neither Thiers nor Odilon Barrot the magnificent spectacle of a liberated nation. had ever approached nearer than to be the minisThe dreams of an empire fled before the dawn of ters of Louis Philippe, with the pledge of reform. a republic. This is a very noble solution of our In the morning of February the 24th France was difficulties as far as relates to the object of this a monarchy; in the evening it was a republic. wonderful election, and for the honor of human Short-sighted spectators were ready to condole nature we would gladly believe it. Truth, how- with the men who had fallen into the rear of that ever, compels us to admit that a life spent in furious advance, and who, after laying the foundesultory exile, among strange companions, in dation of the victory, saw others pluck the prize. prison, and in lodgings, does not furnish materials That is a mistake. It was no misfortune to drop for so heroic an estimate of the prince's charac-out of the tideway in that memorable race. It is When we turn from the prince to his followers-that is, to the majority of the French, our perplexities are by no means diminished. They have rejected the authors and edifiers of the republic, and chosen one who has contributed nothing but promises-promises at variance with breach. They have fallen. Time has devoured his life and position. To support popular equality and an elective chair, they have summoned to their assistance the legal representative of an emperor. A crowd of honorable names has been cast into the shade. The whole constellation of heroes that illuminates this era of French regeneration pales its ineffectual fires. A host of patriots is cashiered. Yet they were all "honorable men;" and not only honorable but successful. Marrast was successful, for he openly battered down monarchy, and from the moment of its downfall has maintained a leading place in the republican government and legislature. Lamartine was successful, for with his voice he did the work of an army, and tided over those fearful DR. HENRY WILLIAM FULLER, of St. George's three months, till he had delivered France to the Hospital, has sent to the Lancet a communication care of a National Assembly, an invincible army, of curious interest. 66 For some months past, in and an energetic republican general. Cavaignac found dead in the fields, presenting a very remarkcertain parts of Hampshire, partridges have been was preeminently successful, for he crushed the able appearance. Instead of lying prostrate on intestine foes of the republic, he quelled a most their sides, as is usually the case with dead birds, frightful insurrection, he has kept the insurgent they have been found sitting with their heads erect masses under his iron arm, he has enabled the and their eyes open, presenting all the semblance Assembly to proceed on its deliberations and finish of life. This peculiarity, which for some time had its appointed task without coercion or fear. He attracted considerable attention among sportsmen has established order on the wreck of conspiracies, about ten days ago, when a covey of ten birds havin the neighborhood, led to no practical result until and maintained peace amid the passions and the ing been found nestled together in this condition, actual neighborhood of war. He has made the two of the birds, together with the seeds taken from republic rational, grave, and respectable. Yet the crops of the remaining eight, were sent up to such is the mutability of fortune and of France London for examination." By analysis, Dr. Fuller that all these are cast aside, like obsolete fashions discovered considerable quantities of arsenic in the or broken tools. There is no record of services viscera of the birds; this was traced to the seedor note of experience. Everything that is known corn in their crops. Inquiry established that "in Hampshire, Lincolnshire, and many other parts of is foregone. Nothing is approved but what is the country, the farmers are now in the habit of absolutely untried and new. The patricide repub- steeping their wheat in a strong solution of arsenic lic disavows and destroys the authors of its being previous to sowing it, with the view of preventing and the nurses of its infancy. Like ambition, it the ravages of the wire-worm on the seed, and of kicks away the ladder by which it has ascended-the smut on the plant when grown; that this prolike tyranny, it loathes the instruments of what cess is found to be eminently successful, and is we must not call its crimes. therefore daily becoming more and more generally adopted; that, even now, many hundredweight of arsenic are yearly sold to agriculturists for this express purpose; that although the seed is poisonous when sown, its fruit is in no degree affected by the poison; that wherever this plan has been exten

But in the pretender we had well nigh forgotten his future advisers. It must be confessed they are neither exiles nor unknown. They were all, this time last year, the loyal subjects of Louis Philippe. We will

worse

SINGULAR FATALITY.-Dr. J. Stewart died at Cumnock on the 20th ult., after a week's illness, in consequence of a very trifling accident. He had burnt his wrist some short time previously by letting fall upon it a drop of melted wax, but the injury was so slight that he paid little attention to it at the time. In a few days, however, it became inflamed and painful, and notwithstanding all that medical skill could devise, the inflammation increased, inducing a high degree of fever, till, after a week of severe distress, exhausted nature gave way.-Ayr Advertiser.

sively carried out, pheasants and partridges have | she was horror-struck to find her child burnt almost been poisoned by eating the seed, and the par- to a cinder.-Devonshire Chronicle. tridges have been almost universally found sitting in the position I have already described; and lastly, that the men employed in sowing the poisonous seed not unfrequently present the earlier symptoms which occur in the milder cases of poisoning by arsenic." The question was then suggested, "Might not the flesh of birds so poisoned prove injurious when eaten?" Dr. Fuller cut off the breast of a bird, and gave it to a fine healthy cat. "She ate it with avidity; but in about half an hour she began to vomit, and vomited almost incessantly for nearly twelve hours, during the whole of which time she evidently suffered excessive pain. After this, nothing would induce her to eat any more partridge. I kept her without food for twenty-four ited to the public on Tuesday night, between eight THE ELECTRIC LIGHT.-This light was exhibhours, but in vain; she resolutely refused to touch an atom more of the bird. This being the case, I and nine o'clock, from the portico of the National gave her some beef and some milk, which she could not have been selected, and the novelty of the Gallery. A better site for such an experiment eagerly swallowed; proving, beyond doubt, that her instinct, and not her want of appetite, induced exhibition soon attracted to the spot a large assemher to forego the dainty meal which had just been blage of spectators, who filled the street and terrace offered her." Dr. Fuller also found in every part opposite the gallery, as well as a great portion of of the flesh of the other bird strong traces of arsenic; the square below. The moment the experiment the bird could not have been eaten by a man with commenced, the large open space in front was filled out very serious consequences. with a flood of light, which paled the lamps, not "It is notorious," Dr. Fuller says," that many of the dealers in game only in the square, but also some distance down are supplied through the agency of poachers and Whitehall. So intense was it, that, when thrown others who have a direct pecuniary interest in sup- upon the people, one could scan the countenances plying them with the largest possible number of of those who were most distant from the gallery, birds. It is certain, moreover, that if men of this and discern the cut of a man's coat or the pattern sort were to find a covey of partridges in a field, of a lady's dress at the outskirts of the crowd. dead, but fresh and in good condition, they would Every now and then a strong pencil of light would not hesitate to send them with the remainder of be thrown upon the Nelson column, bringing it out their booty to the poulterer; who would as cerfrom the surrounding obscurity, from its base to its tainly, without suspicion, sell them to his custom-summit. The light was as steady as it was inThe conclusions are, that "suspicious cases tense, and the shadows which it cast were as deep of belly-ache" at this season are not always to be and positive as those which accompany the strongtaken for cholera; and that the practice of steeping est sunlight. The experiment was repeated with seed in arsenical solution may become matter for the same success on Thursday evening. restrictive legislative interference, both on sanatory and medico-legal grounds.

ers."

THE Spanish correspondent of the Morning Post describes his recent arrival at the head-quarters of Cabrera, and the distinction with which he was DESTRUCTION OF LARKS BY THE ELECTRIC TEL-treated as connected with the English press." EGRAPH WIRE.-One frosty morning last week the Cabrera gave him liberty to visit every part of his plate-layers upon the Whitehaven junction railway force and of his positions; "said that his headfound no less than seventy larks lying dead beneath quarters would always be open to me, and that, the telegraph wires between Workington and when either tired of Catalonia or dissatisfied with Maryport. The same day Mr. Forster, the inspector of the line, found seventeen larks between Har- my mission, I should have passports and an escort to the frontier. All he desired was publicity for rington and Workington. The heads of many of his acts, and that the facts of the war should be the birds were cut off, and their bodies otherwise honestly and truly stated." At a supper in Camangled.-Carlisle Journal. brera's camp, the writer had some singular documents put into his hands by Cabrera- Christino correspondence intercepted by the Carlists; and he promises to send for publication in the Post some curious particulars illustrative of palace peccadilloes."-Spectator.

A BOY named Edward Hayball, of Chard parish, one day last week fell into a mill-pond, and was supposed to be drowned; he was, however, taken out of the water and the body carried home. Everybody believed the child dead except his mother, whose affliction was very great. She took him in her arms and held him before the fire. After Dearly half an hour the child showed symptoms of returning consciousness, upon which some change in the position of the body took place, when it was discovered that the child's foot had been in the fire, and was dreadfully burnt. A surgeon having been called in, did what was necessary, and the child was getting on very well. About three days after the mother placed him before the fire for a moment whilst she went into the garden, and on her return

THE LANDER MONUMENT AT TRURO.-Mr. Bernard, a Devonshire artist, has been authorized to execute a statue of Mr. Richard Lander, the enterprising traveller in Africa, who was a native of Truro. The figure will be placed on the Lander column, at the top of Lemon street, Truro; its height will be about eight feet, and the material will be stone either Portland or magnesian limestone, of which the new houses of parliament are built, and the design will be as simple and effective as possible.West Briton.

6. EUROPE. Germany; the Pope and Papal Power; France and its President; W. S. Landor on European Politics; Change Perplexing Kings; Louis Napoleon Imperator, &c. &c.,

SHORT ARTICLES. Sagacity of a Pyrenean Dog, 253. Causes of Disease; The Crafts in Germany; Raft of Monkeys, 271.- Poisoned Partridges, 286.- Electric Light; Landor Monument, 287.

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Or all the Periodical Journals devoted to literature and science which abound in Europe and in this country, this has appeared to me to be the most useful. It contains indeed the exposition only of the current literature of the English language, but this by its immense extent and comprehension includes a portraiture of the human mind in the utmost expansion of the present age. J. Q. ADAMS.

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 248.-17 FEBRUARY, 1849.

From Fraser's Magazine.

THE ARCTIC EXPEDITIONS.

Of the numerous exploring expeditions which have left the British shores, from the days of Cook to the present time, few, if any, have excited so much interest as that now shrouded from our view by the icy curtain which clings for the greater part of the year around the North Pole.

which should endeavor to pass from Melville Island to Behring's Strait, a distance of about nine hundred miles, keeping midway between the supposed Banks' Land and the coast of America. Sir John Barrow conceived that, although Parry saw from Melville Island something that looked like the looming of land to the southward, which is marked on the Polar chart as Banks' Land, yet, even were it so, it would not in any way interfere with the direct track between Behring's Strait and Cape Walk

Behind that curtain, Sir John Franklin, and the gallant party under his command, disappeared on the 26th July, 1845; since which period no au-er, (the last land on the south of Barrow's Strait, thentic intelligence of them has been received, nor indeed any account at all beyond the rumors of boats, filled with white people, having been seen by Esquimaux in the summer of 1816, to the east of the mouth of the Mackenzie river.

Availing ourselves of the official documents relating to the Arctic expeditions, which have recently been published by the admiralty, and of information derived from authente sources, we purpose in this article to notice in the first instance the expedition under Sir John Franklin, and, secondly, those lately despatched to his elief, with the view of bringing succinctly and cearly before our readers the machinery, if we may so express ourselves, now at work in the Polarseas, for the purpose of exploring and making dscoveries.

which leads to Melville Island ;) and the ground on which he assumed that in this track no land intervenes, is, that the whole north coast of America has been traversed by various persons by land, and in boats by water, that nothing like land could be discovered from the high coast between the meridians of Cape Walker and Behring's Strait; and that little or no ice was observable.

Sir John Barrow adds:

to ask, Cui bono? but Elizabeth and her ministers, The Utilitarians were at all times ready enough with their enlightened minds, sought for "knowledge," the result of which they needed not to be told was " power." Observe what followed; the knowledge gained by the Arctic voyagers was not thrown away. Sir Humphry Gilbert, by his grant The existence of a North-west Passage has been thither, in which he nobly perished, but his know!of the Island of Newfoundland, made his voyage a favorite dream for enturies. The hope of dis-edge did not perish with him; on the contrary, it covering a shorter pasage to India-the original laid the foundation of the valuable cod-fishery, which pursuit of Columbus Inself-may be regarded as still exists. Davis, by the discovery of the strait that the first incitement t the attempts to navigate bears his name, opened the way to the whale-fishwestward of the north of America; and we find ery, still carried on; and Frobisher pointed out the sovereigns and merchats, time after time, bestow-Strait which conducted Hudson to the bay that bears

ing their patronage and money on attempts to pass from the Atlantic to he Pacific. In 1585, the merchants of London being, they say, "satisfied of the likelyhood of te discoverie of the Northwest Passage," sent at an expedition with this object in view; and, ahough the ships returned unsuccessful, other exeditions followed in rapid

succession.

his name,

of a company of merchants under the name of the and which gave rise to the establishment Hudson's Bay Company, whose concerns are of that extensive nature as to be carried on across the whole continent of America, and to the very shores of the Polar Sea.

name,

Lastly, the discovery of Baffin, which pointed out, among others, the great opening of Lancaster Sound on the eastern coast of that bay which bears his It would be impossile to find a stronger exam- Polar Sea, through which the North-west Passage has in our time been found to lead into the ple of the undaunted ourage, moral as well as from the Atlantic to the Pacific will one day be accomphysical, which animas British seamen, than is plished, and for the execution of which we are now presented to us by thes Polar expeditions. Here, contending; and which, if left to be performed by indeed, is one of their hief glories; for it is ev-after having opened the east and west doors, would some other power, England, by her neglect of it, ident that the fearful riprs of winters spent in the regions of thick-ribbed ce, are unable to quench that intellectual fire whh has animated, from the first, the leaders and paicipators in our Arctic and Antarctic voyages.

In December, 1844, ir John Barrow, then one of the secretaries to t admiralty, submitted a proposition to the counc of the Royal Society, for the discovery of the Non-west Passage, in which he strongly urged the eipment of an expedition

CCXLVIII.

LIVING E.

be laughed at by all the world for having hesitated to pass the thresholds.

It should not be overlooked that there are in the Pacific, at this moment, two fleets of the only two naval powers likely to undertake the enterprise in question; it is extremely probable some of their ships will make trial of this nearest passage home when they leave the Pacific station.

met by observing that one season only would suffice If the expense be the only objection, it may be for its decision, and the cost not more than one third