Miscellaneous.

Anglo-Maori Warder, Volume 1, Issue 23, 28 September 1848, Page 1

Miscellaneous.

MEMOIRS OF COUNT ROTOPSCHIN. IN FOURTEEN CHAPTERS, WRITTEN BY HIMSELF IN TEN MINUTES.

Chap. I.—My Birth.— On the 12th of March. 1765, I burst from darkness into the light of day. 1 was meikured, and I was weighed, and I was baptized. I was born without knowing why; and ray simple parents (like most others) thanked Heaven fur the event, without knowing wherefore. Chap. ll.— My Education.—l was taught all manner of things, and all sorts of languages. By dint of impudence and quackery, I sometimes contrived to pass niyself off for a vety learned person. My head became, as it were, a library of nothing but odd volumes, of which I kept the key. Chap. lII.— My Sufferings —l was tormented by my tutors, by my tailors—they would make my clothes so tight!—by women, and by vanity, and by ambition, I aod by idle regrets. Sometimes I was tormented by sovereigns, sometimes by souvenirs. Chap. IV.— My Privation) —I was deprived of th e capacity for enjoying the three great pleasures of th" human race—thieving, gluttony, and pride. CnAP. V— Memorable Epochs in my Life. At thirty I gave up dancing; at forly I renounced the desire to make myself agreeable to the fair sex; at fifty I ceased to care for public opinion; at sixty I pave up the trouble of thinking, aod became a true philosopher—or thoroughly selfish man: the terms are synononious. Chap. Vl.— My Character.—\ was as obstinate as a mule, caprici-'Us as a pretty woman, gay as a child, lazy as a dormouse, active as Bonaparte—and all this just as it sKited me. Chap. VII. —A Momentous Resolution.—Went having been able to command my countenance, I re solved to give full liberty to my tongue, till at length it b-came a habit to me to think aloud. To this I was indebted for ousiderable pleasure, and a great many enem'e . Chap. VIII What lvcas, and what I might have been.—l was frank, confiding, and exceedingly susceptible of friendship; so that, had I lived in the golden age, I might probably have been a downright simi'letuu. Chap. IX Sins 1 have not committed.—\ was never implicated in biinging about a marriage ; to no one did I ever recommend a cook or a physician; cons> quently I never attempted any person's life. Ciup. X— My Tastes.—l was fond of pleasant little paities, and a rumble in the woods ; I entertalucd an imoluntaiy veueration for the sun, and his setting often saddened me. My favourite colour was blue j IB ertmg, I liked heef and hoac.radigh; iq dii ukin

cuol spring «ater; comedy sud force when I went to the play; in both man and woman I liked an open, eipiessire count.nance. Hunchbacks of either sex—for me possessed an indefinable charm, a charm which I never cou'd account for. Chap. Xl.— My Aversions.—l always entertained on antipathy to fools and to rogues, aud to eerta.n women who simulate virtue ; disgust for affectatior ■ pity for dandyfied men and made up women j aversion' for rats, liqueurs uetaphysics, and rhubarb ; dread of justice and wild beasts. Chap. XH.— M v Created Blessing —My chief happiness now consists in that I am independent of the three great rulers of the destinies of Europe. As I am as rich as I care to be, have turned my back noon public affairs, and am pretty indifferent about music, I have consequently no accounts to settle with Messrs Rothschild, Metternich, and Rossini. Chap. Xlll.—^« a /j,ri, of my Life—l await death without fear, as without impatience. My life has been a bad but showy melo-drama, in which I have alternatively played the hero, the tyrant, the lover, the dignified father— but never the valet. Chap. XlV .—EpislU-Ditlicatory to the Public.— Dog of a public ! Harsh and untenable mouthpiece oi every bad passion! Thou that elevatjst to the skie* and plungest into the mire ; thou that, ignorait and caanceled, now fkttcrest, now calumniates! Senseless tyrant! Uedlamite broke loose ! Thrice-drawn esssnee of roses—and of rats bane ! Satan's representative at the court of humankind! Fury—disguised beneath the mask of Christian charity ! Public ! that in my younser days, I fVared; in riper years, respected i in age, confirmed, despised—'tis to thee I dedicate my memoirs. Gentle public! I am now beyond t'.iv reach—only for lam dead—deaf, dumb, and blind. tor thine on-n repose, and the repose o! mankind I heartily wish thee the same.

Tits Post-office Superseded.—The Postmaster General, Colonel Maberly, and Mr. Rowland Hill, mav set tlieir houses in order and prepare to evscuate St Martm s-le.Grand; for they will have to eicl-iim with Othello, " Our occupation's gone !" It seems indeed a hard case, ofier so much trouble to improve the postal communications of the country, and nficr steam baa done its utmost to ha ß ten the mail bags to all p irts or the kingdom, th;it the well planned arr.ngements and cscelluit machinery should come to nought; but even they must submit to fate and scientific infeoti.ni. Not many months have passed since we noticed .Mr. Bam s ingenious Marking Electric Telegraph, by means of «Inch symbols representing letters of the oli'luost are maiked on paper by electricity ; and We predicted that menus would soon be found of transmitting aloug the telegraph-wires enact copies of written amiroumcations. What we then deemed probable has now been

ing by . x - Copying Telegraph, invented by Mr. F. C. B." 1 -"'\'el!, wherein words trared from tbe original were legibly copied on paper by an instrument tbat bad no connexion with tbe one to which the transmitted message was applied, excepting by the usual wires from the voltaic battery. The letters traced on Ihe paper aupear of a pile colour, on a dirk ground formed by numerous linss drawn close together. The con - mnnications thus traced, we understand, may be transmitted at the rate of bo> letters of the alphabet per minute of ordinary writing ; nod were short-band symbols employed, the rapid.ty of transmission would be quad'upled. When this means of correspondence is in operation, instead of dropping a letter into the post office box and wait-ng; days for an answer, we may apply it directly to the Cop) mg Telegraph, have it co« pied at the diatant town in a minute or less, and receive a reply in our correspondent's band writ ing almost as soon a* the ink is dry with which it was penned. There are various mean** to% for preserving tlie secrecy ot the correspondence; the most curious of which is, that the writing may be rendered nsar'y invisible in a'l rarisbut 'he direction until i's delivery to the person fjr whom k is designed. The operations of tut' Copying Telegraph are not limited to the tracing of writtt n character. Letterpress printing may be coi ie-t \ntn even rapidi y than \lritiu4, and fac-siiui!e cop.-s of the morning papers may thus be transmuted to L -veipool and Manchester lonsr tiefore the papers themselves are delivered to their readers ia LoLu,n. The means by wh:cli thueastu-mhmg effects are produced we are not ot; reseni permitted to state, aa tht 1 tount : on is not yet protected; but we are as* iured that the me'hod is simple, and that the mechanism is neither curtly nor I.My to set out of urder.— It is, iud.:d, one 01 the peculiar featurei of the Copying Telegraph that it cannot commit errors, because tue co n33u -ications it tron,mitj are itic*sinr.ks of the original writing.— Cpcc alar.