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Miitt'fil Cabinet. VOL. 11. THE CABINET Is published every Saturday by }’. L, JiOBI-YSOJV, fVarrenton , Geo. at three dollars per annum , icliic.h may be discharged by two dollars and fifty cents if paid within sixty days of the time of subscribing. Advertisements conspicuously inserted at seventy five cents per square for the first insertion and fifty cents fur each \ subsequent insertion Monthly inser ■ I tions charged as new advertisements Advertisements not limited when hand -! ed in, will be inserted until forbid , and charged accordingly. \ From the Spirit and .Manners ot‘ the Age. j I fragments of an antediluvian diary. By Miss Jewsbury. REFLECTIONS OF METHUSALEH IN HIS YOUTH —IN MIDDLE AGE— AND IN HI3 OLD AGE, s To day I am a hundred years old. llow blissful are the feelings of boyhood! My senses are acme as the tree with the shrinking leaf. My blood bounds through j my veins as the river pours through the) valley, rejoicing in its strength. Life lies before me like another plain of Shinar —vast, unoccupied, inviting—l will fill it with achievements and pleasure! in about Sixty years it will be time for me to think of marrying; rny kinswoman Zillah will by that time have nnerged from girlhood; she already gives promise, f hear, of comeli ness a id discretion.—Twenty years hence 1 will pay a visit to her father, that I may see how she grows; meanwhile, I will build a city to receive her when she be corn s my wife. Nearly three centuries have passed since my inarrage. Can it be? It seems but yesterday since I sported like a young an tehope round my father's tent, or, climbing the dark cedars, nestled like a bird among the boughs—and now lam a man in au thority, as well as in the prime of life* I lead out my trained servants to the light, and sit head of the council, beneath the very t ! ee where. a3 an infant, my mother laid me to sleep, dazed, my youngest born, a lovely babe of thirty summers, is dead: but 1 have four godly sons remain ing. And my three daughters are fair as their mother, when 1 first met her in the Acacia grove, where now stands one of my city watch towers. They are the pride of the plain, no less for their acquirements than their beauty. No damsel carries the pitcher from the fountain with the grace of Adah, none can dry the summer fruit like Azubah —and none can fashion a robe of bkins with the skill of Milcah. When their cousin Mahaleel has seen another half century, lie shall take the choice of the three. j * • * * * Mv eight hundredth birth day! And now I feel the approach of old age and infirmity. My beard is become white as the blossoms of the almond tree. I am constrained to use the staff when 1 journey the stars look less bright tiian formerly : the flowers smell les9 odorous; 1 have liad Zdlah in the tomb of the rock; Milcah is gone to the dwelling of Mahaleel; my son- take my place at the council and on 1 the field; all is changed. The long fu- ; ture is become the short past. The earth i is full of violence; the ancient and the honorable are sinking beneath the young and the vicious. Tliegiants stalk through the length and breadth of the land, where once dwelt a quiet people; all is changed. The beasts of the field and the monsters of the deep grow! and press on us with un wonted fury; traditions, visions, and threatnings are abroad. What tealful doom hangs over this fair world, 1 know j not; it is enough that 1 am leaving it; yet i “another five or eight years, and the tale will b j complete But have I, in very deed, trod this earth nearly a thousand years? It is false. lam yet a boy. I have had a dream—a long, long ; busy dream; of buying and selling; mar ymg and giving in marriage, of building and planting; feasting and warring; sorrowing nnd rejoicing; loving and hating; but il is false to call it a life. Go to—it lias been a vision of the night; and now that 1 am awake. 1 will forget. ‘Lunech, my son, iiow long 16 it siuqc we planted the g*rdc u of oak* beside the river? Was it uot y r es terday 7 ’ ‘My father, dost thou sport? 1 hose oaks cast a broad shadow when my sister carried me beneath them in her arms, and wove me chaplets of their leaves.’ I’hou art my son; and 1 atn old. Lead me to thy mothers tomb, and there leave me to meditate. What am l the better for my past length of being? Where will be its records when 1 am gone? They are yonder—on all sides. Will those massy towers fall? Will those goldon plains become desolate? Will the chil dren that call me father, forget? The seers utter uaik sayings upon their harps when they sing of the future; they say our descendants shall be men of dwindled stature; that the years of their lives shall be constructed to the span of our bo) hood —but what is that future to me? 1 have listened to the tales of Paradise—nay in the blue distance, 1 have seen the dark tops of its cedars. I have heard the so lemn melodies ol Jubal w hen he sat on the sea shore, and the sound of the waves min gled with his harping I have seen angels the visitants of men —l have seen an end of all perfecticn-whal is the future to uier’ MODERN FEMALE. DRESS. Few persons unacquainted with the occult machinery of a lady‘s wardrobe are aware of the anatomical instru ments now in use to improve *thc le mal’ form divine’or of the amazing quantity of material in which modern belles enhance their lovely persons. A lady now a days, rquires, not a paltry half dozen yards for a gown, but not fewer thin eighteen yards are requisite to make that single article of her dress. We even know one ladv, of diminutive stature, who actually contrived to consume twenty four yards of silk io one dress; a sufficient quantity to have served her grandmo ther, in former times, for three or four. The clothes of children are, in like manner, made so as to consume ihc greatest possible quantity of ma terials, and a girl of six years of age is bundled up into as much stuff in her frock alone as would have made a cloak for her mother a dozen years agd Wc should not feel inclined to rep rehend this profuse expenditure of clothing material, were it observed without rendering its objects soar what ridiculous; for it must tend greatly to increase the consumption of goods, and thus benefit the manufacturing in terestofthe country. But it is to be lamented, that this fashion, like others that are carried to excess, involves certain points or usages, the utility or elegance of which are so questionable, that nothing but daily custom prevents all sensible people from setting them down altogether as absurd. The bus tics, for instance, or stiffening to en large the hips, area downright impo sition upon the credulity of the male community’ So, in some degree, arc the enormous sleeves, like balloons, much thicker than the waist of the ; wearer together with the hustles afore said, and certain other stuffings, arc intended, by contrast, to give the waist an unusual appearance of slen derness. Some of these sleeves have hoops of whalebone with them, to keep them extended, or inflated to their full dimensions. The shape of the arm is thus entirely concealed in the huge [cavity within, and the hand peeps out at the lower extremity through a little wristband, as if it were thrust ’ through a pillow. For some time the fulling of the sleeve was confined to the upper arm, leaving the wearer some use, at least of her hands; after wards, il extended to the wrist, like the lawn sleeves of a Bishop, and [hung down like a huge rag bag; so | that ladies at dinner ob liged to call the waiting maid to pin ! up the sack, or take in a reef (as a sailor would say) to keep the super- Warrenton, February 20, 1830. fluous drapery out of tlit; soup. Since this latter fashion the sleeves again appear, like a balloon or ball, down to the elbow, through which appears the lower arm lightly covered, and redu ced by contrast to the appearance of a drumstick. NVe cannot, for the very life of us, find out any use for them immense wide sleeves, unless indeed, they w re to be used as traveling bandboxes for light articles, or for the smuggling of lace ami other finery. If they were filled with gas, the lady would certainly be borne aloft, and might, when the wind served, take aericl journey to see her friends in distant parts. We now come to the modern bon nets, contrived, no doubt, by theii bulk, to diminish the appearance of the countenance, and make the fea tures look neat and small. In former times, females wore strings to theii bonnets to keep them on. Now, they have Hying ribbons as well as ty ing ribbons, the former being left to hang down from the cars, or flv ou* like pinions on the wind, by way of giving the belle a girlish, careless, and interesting appearance. But what were tiie ribbons our mother was s< proud of, of about two inches in breadth, and purchased for iOd. a yard, to the ribbons now attached to these enormous penthouses of straw yclept bonnets? Why, a ribbon of less than six inches in width is intolerable even to a country wench, and some of the fashionables have ribbons of a 1 4 of a yard in breadth, which cost the very moderate sn offil'tooo oliillings a yard! If this fashion continues to grow’, webs of 6atin will, in a short time, be rather too narrow for ribbons, and the silk weavers must enlarge their looms for anew article. With respect to the bonnets, it is impossible for a modern lady to pass through an ordinary door way without being in danger of damaging her upper works: and hence many house doors that o pened from the middle (half being suf licier.t for the admission of an ordina ry corporation) have been made to open in one to admit the mistress of the mansion. Ladies, too on entering their carriages, are compelled to un cover, and, crushing in their Leghorn thatch sidewise before them, contrive to find room for themselves beside it These bonnets may, however be re commended to young wives, as. with a little stiffniug, they may serve, upon occasion, for cradles for the first born. To the deception of hustles and puf fings we may add that of false fronts of iuxurant ringlets now much in use, and which save the wearers the trou ble of putting their hair, if they ha* e any into papers-* task which occupies some of them a couple of hours every night. The curling is assuredly or namental, but it is, nevertheless, a species of deception, for, in nine cases out often, the hair of the woman of these Countries is as straight and sleek as candle wicks. The curling is not, therefore, a natural beauty, tho* woman often assume a mighty conse quence from a well curled pate—for getful of furnishing the apartments within—but curls are so becoming, so bewitching, that we grant them with out reluctance, setting them down, nevertheless as a sort of springes or gin work to catch the hearts of the ru* dei sex. To conclude, how is a man to ascertain the real personal attractions of a modern lady who is thus enceased —her arms in balloons, her hips in bustles, her face set oft’ in artificial curls, and her waste squeezed into an artificial span by the aid ot steel and whalebone? Or rather, sup posing a man should marry a woman thus built and inflated to the rouodness an symmetry of beauty, on the supposition ! that such shape wa9 her own; bow would he look when he fu J (hit all that he admired was the eff ct >f mere padding, and wadding and puffing, and stuffing— that she was inflated into symmetry—all but her waist—which was none of the most slender, when released from the gal ling bondage of her stays, it burnout in dignant, to its proper clumsiness? Might lie nut demand an annulling of the mar riage contract? Might he not plead that he had been cheated and deceived? Might lie not say—“l married, as l thought, a line, robust, well formed woman: I find her, when divested of her borrow* and plumes anil stuffing, an ordinary feeble bodied object, as shapeless as a post! !! In verity, if some redress be not pro vided lor such a fearful contingency, no bachelor will be safe.* for as gallantry and delicacy would forbid him to request a more satUfactory view of a lady than the present fashion of dress will permit, in place of flesh and blood lie may find (as we observed a few months ago) that he has united himself for better lor worse, to a bundle of drapery and cushions, with a skeleton stuck in the middle of them ! ! ‘ THE LEG SAFETY-CHAIN By the late death of a fuller, a country lad caine into the possession of an estate of Bboo. Two courses presented them selves to his mind—the one to devote himself to the persuit* of agriculiui e, and the other to lead a fashionable course of life. To be chained down to the earth, all his days, he could not endure the tho’t; he therefore, resolved upon the life of a gentlemen of fashion. Upon taking a peep into the world, he found himself comparatively coarse in both dress and manners. Instead of the flue Saxony, he saw upon the backs of the n*>•> r fj■ ■■ *’ •*-- mti * ’ |**il i3 j he uiscove red his to be the homespun nf the counln—instead of the elegant fit of th tailor, Ins was the clumsy work of a country seamstress—instead of the glistening, thimble shaped beaver of the dandy, he discovered upon his head the low crown, broad brim, wool hat—in stead of the superfine kersey petticoat pantaloons, falling in graceful folds upon his boots, his were the coarse butternut colored, snug setting trowsers, reaching only to the calf of hi* leg—and instead of the nicely moulded, square toed boots, so much in vogue, his feet were entrench ed in the rough, round toed cow hides of the country cobler.—-A* lie had deter mined upon the course of a fashionable, lie must assume his habiliment*, an la bide the consequences. Ho winds liis way to the shopt of the citv. and in a few hours, the robust son of the moun tains, is transferred into the shape and figure of a dandy. He returns to his quarters. Ho now receives civilities fi om the major dorno, so which he was nut accustomed in his c< u ‘try garb, it slitters his vanity and puffs him with pride. He presents himse/f to the grand mirror of the pat lour, turns this way and that, and in the language of tri uph, thug expresses himself; ‘Egad, now I look like folks, now 1 am a gentleman/’ Had he not been moved by further cu riosity perhapi. be had returned to his home and upon reflection relinquished the persuits of a gentleman—but upon taking another turn down Broadway, he quickly discovered his array to be incomplete; he had no ring upon his finger, no cane in his hand, no watch in his fob, no s .fi ty chain about his neck, no breastpin in hia bosom, no snuff box, no gloves, no stock, and no paper collar. These were radio* al deficiencies; and as they were the main constituents of a buck of the world, they must be supplied—no time is loit: he en ters the Jeweller 4 *, the rings thicken and glisten on his fingers, the diamond sparkles in his bosom, the safety chain protrudes its modest front upon the vest, and the grand establishment dangles at his fob. He enters the millmary and cane estab lishment. and soon emerges with his head •supported by *tock and collar, and pu - li es his way back to the Ex hange with many a flourish ol his ivory cane. The civilities of the host are redoubled—suits f rooms are tendered—bottles of chain* . aigne and burgundy sparkle upon the -idehoard; gentlemen of fashion are in* • oduced; all things go merrily, evening app.oachefl; its amusements are charming; me >o 3.,).