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them, so as to commence fair when I reach
America. I have a great many more accounts
of my exploits since I came to Stafford, but
must defer sending them until next time. I
beg you will write me. for now, since a cor
respondence is opened. I shall be able to tell
you something about England. I know it
well. I have dined with Earls, and from that
down—down—down to where the knives,
forks, and plates, are chained to the table, for
fear they should be stolen.
1 am. my dear sir,
Your obedient servant,
J. R. Remington.
fetters from a {Musician.
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
A REJOINDER.
Roswell, Cobb Cos., Geo., )
November 22, 1848. )
Dear Sir , —“ A Learner” must needs re
main a learner still. She (?) must be a little
better posted up on scientific subjects, before
she ventures on the dangerous ground of criti
cism.
If we have to deal with a lady—“an es
teemed correspondent”—of course she shall
receive due consideration; and, while offer
ing our explanation-, we shall keep constantly
in our mind the esteem, regard and admira
tion of woman, which is an inherent quality
of man’s heart. This being premised, we
are obliged, by natural gallantry, to desist
from pointing at “A Learner'’ as proof of
the position we almost accidentally took in
our third letter. “ A Learner” will he sur- 1
prised to learn that Lady Montague never, in
all her letters, advocated the “ introduction
of vaccination into England,” nor was vacci
nation known till near half a century after
her return from Turkey. All that Lady Mon
tague did was to adopt the Turkish practice
of innoculation. In this, she certainly exhib
ited peculiar powers of mind : for it required
not a little moral courage to subject her own
child to so novel a practice, and then advo
cate its introduction into Britain. The prac
tice, however, was novel only to Lady Ma
ry : for it had long been understood in Cir
cassia, in Turkey, in Africa, in the South of
Wales, and in the Highlands of Scotland.—
Vaccination was not thought of till Dr. Jen
ner began his researches about the year 1776.
Does “ A Learner” know how wide a differ
ence there is between innoculation and vacci
nation ? or is she aware that this “ very great
blessing,” introduced by the Lady Mary,
was, after fair trial in England, pronounced
worse than a failure. “ Although innocula
tion for the small-pox may have been benefi
cial to individuals, by greatly lessening the
chance of death, yet it may safely be asserted
that it has proved to be of no benefit to the
community at large, but the reverse; which
is evident by the bills of mortality, as they
clearly prove that the disease of small-pox
has increased in England since the introduc
tion of innoculation in the proportion of 19
in every 100.” Such is the testimony of one
of the ablest writers in medical science.—
What, then, does “A Learner” prove, by
“ instancing the case of the Lady Mary Wort
ley Montague ?”
“A woman’s understanding may not be
capable of advancing the cause of science,
but it seems she could appreciate some of its
results.” Just so, madam ; and it is a wo
man’s province to appreciate —seldom to illus
trate.
“Does Bayard make one of the little court
at the bottom of the well ?” He was trying
hard to get there, when the counter-jerk of
“ A Learner” hauled him up again. All that
an “eminent physician of his own school
says,” Bayard subscribes to; and it is the
glory of Allopathy, that its followers are not
tied down to a single principle—to any one
system, nor any “pent-up Utica; but that
they roam free as the wind over the hills and
dales of science.” We regret that the super
numerary sense of “ A Learner” is so ‘ pain
SI &IE El MV ©&BHIf IT B ♦
fully affected ;” but since she knows so well
what treatment should be adopted in case of
a bum, or frost-bite, we will not offer to pre
scribe.
“ Let the German refinements of Homeopa
thy alone, and look to its effects.” This is
just the point on which we wish your optics
to rest. Look to the results of Homeopathy.
“Are we better content to die scientifical
ly?” Most assuredly, madam. Who would
be willing to shuffle off the mortal coil, when
it was in his power to prove some far-reach
ing theory—some sublime proposition. The
lower orders of animals die mathematically :
and, as it is the beauty of every science to
approximate nature, so, when men die “sci
entifically,” they cannot but die naturally. —
Read thf* “ Death of Mirabeau,” in a late
No. of the Gazette, and his last words to
Cabanis show what satisfaction he derived
from the hope of dying secundum artem.
“I am neither a fashionable lady, a dandy,
a mesmerizer, a fanatic, a poet, a divine, nor
a lawyer.” Tell us your genus and gender,
that we may account for the sage remarks
which are, like so many delicate tit-bits, scat
tered through your “reply.”
We beg to assure “A Learner” that no
disrespect was intended by the remark she
quotes from us at the beginning of her reply.
It was written in all honesty, without the
intention “of impugning the judgment
of womeii in matters of science.” House
keeping is a science, and in this they excel.
Yours, most philosophically,
BENEDICT BAYARD.
fjomc (ffomsponitncc.
For the Southern Literary Gazette.
NEW-YORK LETTERS.-NO. 30.
Rath bun Hotel, New York, \
Nov. 22, 1848. j
My Dear Sir , —According to the couplet,
“from grave to gay,” etc., I feel morally
bound, alter the dose of art in my last letter,
to be excessively funny in this. I have just
searched my portfolio, with the desire to
amuse you, and have fished up a didactic po
em, “ never before published,” which you
may find somewhat edifying. My friend P.,
the author, mourns beneath the infliction of a
breakfast-put-ofl-a-tive landlady. You may
imagine the high gratification of being com
pelled to wait half an hour, or a whole one,
, for your breakfast, when you have struggled
manfully against the predisposition for a lit
tle more snoose, and have bravely succeeded
in reaching the dining-room, as you suppose,
just in time.
Remonstrance proving fruitless in the case
of our poet, he penned the lines, which I shall
annex, (and of which, at my request, he fur
nished me a copy,) and read them aloud, the
other morning, for the amusement of the ta
ble and the instruction of the hostess. Lis
*
ten to
THE BREAKFAST BELL.
That breakfast bell —that breakfast bell—
How punctually it tolls,
At morning’s earliest (lawn, the knell
Os buckwheat cakes and rolls !
The chimney may refuse to draw,
The morning may be dark,
But, spite of all domestic law,
That bell will toe the mark !
Talk of the Lover, when he’d fly
To meet that angel face;
(Ere sentiment is all my eye,
And love grows commonplace.)
Tho’ the beatings of his heart were true,
The appointed hour to tell,
They couldn’t hold a candle to
That punctual breakfast bell.
The eastern sun may gild each cloud
That lies upon his track,
Precisely at the hour allow'd
By Hutchings’ Almanac.
But sooner would he paiut the pole,
And o’er the iceberg climb,
Ere our chronometer would toll
One second after time.
This life, alas, is but a span,
And soon the hour may come
When Death, that grim old gentleman,
Shall call me to the tomb.
> Oh! if that hour were half past seven,
(Which fate can only tell.)
I’m sure my music up to Heaven
Would be that Breakfast Bell!
Y hether the bell still tolls as regularly as
before the reading of the poem, I cannot say,
but, for my friend’s sake, sincerely hope ‘not.’
Apropos of landladies and boarding-houses.
No place in the world is better supplied with
the commodity than New York. We have
hundreds, almost thousands, of every possi
ble complexion. You may, in some of the
by-streets, be 4 slept’promiscuously with all
manner of vagabonds for three cents ora pen
ny per night, and be ‘eaten’ for either price :
your plates and spoons being chained to the
table, and yourself narrowly watched by the
argus-eyed hag of a hostess. If you do not
desire to go so 4 low,’ you may board gen
teelly with a private family of sixteen chil
dren and twins, occupying the centre of a
room —of the comers of which, four other
small families are in quiet possession. These
recherche places, though sadly numerous, are
known only to the initiated. After the pas
sage of many ascending steps in the ladder,
you reach the plain and comfortable estab
lishments provided for laborers and apprenti
ces. Here you are boarded and lodged for
some dollar and a half, or two dollars a
week. You are fed on suspicious mutton,
questionable coffee, and sky-blue tea, with
the addition, on Sunday, of a roast joint of
mutton —perchance of beef —and are treated
to something in the way of dessert. These
places, like the great mass of boarding
houses, are kept by poor widows, or by poor
er wives, whose lords and masters are drunk
en, idle loafers. The next class, a very large
one, is that made up of merchants’ clerks,
with small salaries—of petty shop-keepers,
tailors, shoe-makers, and other similar mem
bers of the industrial professions. Here you
are fed more extravagantly than in the last
mentioned houses, always, on Thanksgiving
and other holidays, being cheered to the ex
tent of a turkey; if the landlady is in a re
markably happy mood, and “flush,” perhaps
to that of a lobster, and small, very small oys
ters. There are still some disagremens , how
ever, to a young gentleman accustomed to
refined society.
In the first place, you never can, in winter,
discover in what quarter of the room the fire
is kept, without a light, and usually without
a better light than can be obtained. The on
ly chair in your chamber has but three legs,
which, after long practice, it finds scarcely
sufficient to preserve its equilibrium. Your
abldtionary apparatus is always cracked,
and, though your towel ought to be changed
weekly, it but poorly answers the purpose of
an Almanac. And, lastly, your mind is for
ever exercised in attempts to solve the diffi
cult problem, as to how the hostess manages
to cater so nicely and so closely, that there
is always just enough, and never a scrap too
much to eat.
The next class is a peg higher in character,
comfort and price. The houses occupied by
these establishments are usually three stories
instead of two; they are situated in respecta
ble streets down town, along the line of
Greenwich, Hudson, afid all the cross streets
in the lower portions of the city, They are
patronized by the more pretending members
of the caste last mentioned. Here you dis
cover the earliest symptoms of boarding
house misses and landladies’ daughters, who
set themselves up as bones of contention to
the gentlemen, and spend their lives insetting
caps for the most eligible of the green ones.
Up, up, up, the scale ascends, through the
two dollars and a half, the three, four, five,
and even six dollars—each price offering ad
ditional attractions, in elegance, comfort and
society.
By this time, you have entered the region
of the upper ten, and find yourself in Broad
street, and—if you are content with sky-par
lors—in University Place, Clinton Placed
Union Park, and the Fifth Avenue. This is
the fashionable quarter, where you dine at 5
o'clock, at a good table, provided with- jp’
delicacies and elegances of the best hotels*
Your associates are, for the most part, m er l
chants and their families, lawyers, clergymen
artists, physicians, and gentlemen of leisure’
Here young ladies reside, with the express
end of securing an establishment; and here
too, the daughters of the hostess serve as ad
vertisements and attractions to the house
and practice in their perfection the little arts •
we have observed, in a humbler dearpp in
less pretending places. They depend upon
the gentlemen-boarders for new music, f or
escorts to the theatres and the opera, and for
all the little attentions ladies receive from
gentlemen in genteel society. These houses,
as well as a few of more exclusive charac
ter, are kept by people fond of society, and
who are thus enabled to live in an aristocrat
ic quarter, maintain a certain style, ‘brinjr
out’ their daughters, and dispose of them eli
gibly. In speaking of the expense of this
class of houses, I referred only to the attic
accommodations of bachelors. As the rents
range from one thousand to fifteen hundred
dollars per annum, the price of board advan
ces, necessarily, in a terrible ratio as you
come down stairs, and is ruinous, when you
reach suites of rooms, or establish yourself
in front parlors.
As I have already hinted, also, the inciden
tal expenses here are fearful. Servants are
to be bribed, the ladies want bouquets and a
thousand other things ; they have birth-days
wonderfully often for the sum total of their
years; balls and masquerades are to be giv
en, and your ward-robe must be properly
supplied. Each class has a very distinctive’
character in all respects, and it would be an
interesting and amusing labor to draw the
line, in all its phases, between them. At
some future time, I may resume the subject;
turning, for the present, to other matters.
We had quite a warming time here last
Saturday night. No less than five fires, in
different parts of town, all in successful ope
ration at once. As the engines could not be
übiquitous, the fire had a nice time, pretty
much to itself.
The extensive Stables of the Murphys—
omnibus men—corner of Fourth Avenue and
Twenty r -seventh street, were first destroyed,
with more than a hundred of their best hor
ses, twenty-five elegant sleighs, their factory,
blacksmithy, etc. Total loss estimated at
sixty thousand dollars, with an insurance for
only twenty-five hundred. With these sta
bles were also consumed a number of small
tenements occupied by poor people, in the
rear of 28th street; the St. Barnabas Protes
tant Episcopal Church ; the Rose Hill Metho
dist Church, and the Public School, No. 15.
The second fire, at the corner of Broome
street and the Bowery, destroyed a number of
shops and stores, and injured the beautiful
Baptist Church edifice in Broome street —
Rev. Dr. Cone’s.
The third fire, at the corner of Thirty-fifth
street and Eighth Avenue, originated in a Sta
ble, which was consumed, with other build
ings. Estimated loss here ten thousand dol
lars.
Fire No. 4, raging at the same time with
the three already mentioned, broke out, also,
in a stable in Seventeenth street. The build
ing was totally destroyed, with four valuable
horses. Throughout the live-long night, the
city was illuminated with the lurid light ol
the conflagration, and not for an instant did
the bells cease their heavy tolling.
To-morrow is to be observed, through the
city and State, as a day of thanksgiving and
prayer. Turkeys and geese are looking mel
ancholy, in anticipation of their fate.