MISCELLANEA.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume II, Issue 112, 26 August 1846, Page 3

MISCELLANEA.

The Dress of Sailors. — In the habiliments of our jolly tars — God bless 'cm — utility is everything, ornament nothing. They are clad just as they should be ; and yet, on gala days, they know ho^v to make themselves as coquettish as any girl on Portsmouth Downs. There is no greater dandy in the world, in his peculiar way, than your regular man-of-war's man. The short jacket, and the loose trousers, and neat pumps, and the trim little hat, and the checked shirt, and the black riband round his neck — he is quite irresistible among the fairer portion of the creation. Or in a stormy night, with his pilot coat on, at the lonely helm, and his north-wester pulled closely over his ears, and his steady, unflinching eye, and his warm lion like heart within — the true sailor is one of the noblest specimens of man. He that is fierce as a bull, and yet tender hearted like a young child — the greatest blasphemer on earth, and yet the most religious^ or even the most superstitious, of men — he is not to be lied down by the rules of aesthetics, like a land crab. His home is on the sea, as somebody has said or sung; he has nobody there to see him but himself, (if we may be excused the ball.) What does he care for dress 1 Only look at him standing by his gun, when broadside after broadside is pouring into the timbers of some sanguinary Yankee or blustering Frenchman. What is his uniform then? Let them declare who have seen that most awful of human sights, a gieat battle at sea ; but let them not whisper it in ears feminine or polite. — Blackwood's Magazine.

Railway to Venice. — What a world of dream-land seemed to vanish from before us, as we read in a sort of every day paragraph in an every day paper, an account of the opening of the railroad from Venice to Vicenza ! Venice to Vicenza by railroad ! The old seagirt queen of the Adriatic chained and bound to the mainland ! " The railroad between Venice and Vicenza, which passes over the magnificent bridge thrown across the Lagunes, and the three other bridges over the rivers Tessino, Bochigliere, and Retrone, and through two tunnels near Vicenza, was opened on the 4th Feb. Ths departure took place from Venice a few minutes before ten in the morning, and the train passed the bridge across the ,JLag unes i Q 8 minutes, a distance which is not "accomplished by a gondola in so little time as an hour. The whole journey to Vicenza was •■formed in a little less than two hours. was fine, the road was found to and the departure and arrival of tn^train were hailed with loud cheers by a large concourse of persons, assembled at both ends." — Athenetum.

New Method of Stuffing Mattresses. — The Debats, on the occasion of the loss of the Papin, publishes a letter recommending the substitution on board ship of mattresses stuffed with powdered cork for those of wood. The writer states that one of these matresses when '"on the water, will support five or six persons, and that for sleeping on they are as elastic and comfortable as mattresses stuffed with horse-hair. A certificate from Mr. B. Delessert, who witnessed one of the experiments made with a cork mattress, confirms the assertions of the writer of the letter.

Gold. — Improvements in Mineral Production. — From a memoir of M. de Tchihatcheff, on the geological constitution of the Altai Mountains, and the clever report that M. Elie de Beaumont has presented to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, we gather some curious details on the auriferous sands of Siberia, and the manner of working them. It will be seen that these riches are so great that perhaps they will be the means of creating, in no short period, a revolution in Europe, analogous to that which resulted from the importation of the treasures of Peru. - This production has increased within the last fourteen years on an average of Ito 200 ; and it has only been from the scarcity of workmen — although out of more than 1 30,000 exiled colonists, 11,000 have been employed in the washing of auriferous sands — and this alone, that has prevented the increase being more

considerable. This industry, which, in 1830, only yielded 1901b. of gold, representing a value of £125,200, produces at the present time 36,0001b. of gold, valuing £2,448,000 sterling. M. Beudant estimated the quantity of gold annually extracted in every part of the globe not to exceed 48,0001b., of the value of £3,600,000. Of this amount he attributed £2,560,000 to South America, and £320,000 only to Siberia ; but now it will be seen, from the above official return, this proportionate comparison is entirely changed, and the production of this precious metal is augmenting rapidly in the north of Asia. Siberia, if this progression continues, will alone furnish more gold than all the rest of the world placed together — and, in less than twenty years hence, she will put in circulation a quantity of gold "at least double that which is consumed or employed in the present day. A similar revolution is operating in Spain ; deprived of her possessions, and right over Mexico and Peru, she is, at the present day, extracting silver from her own native rich mineral soils — the amount of which is becoming daily more and more considerable. The history of the workings of mines furnishes a number of examples of these vicissitudes or changes among nations. It is but recently that M. Dufrenoy, in giving an account to the Academy of Sciences of the different memoirs of M. Am. Burat, remarked that a similar change, as that which the lagonis of Tuscany produced in the trade of Borax, would perhaps result, by the working of the copper mines of the same country, which had been explored and worked at the period of the grandeur of Rome, and which are remarkable for their extensiveness and richness. — Mining Journal.

Suspension Bridge at Niagara Falls. — Charles Ellet, jun., an engineer of Philadelphia, has recently, in company with Major C. B. Stuart of Rochester, inspected the localities in the vicinity of Niagara tails, with s view of ascertaining the practicability of a suspension bridge across the Niagara river. There is a point, about a mile and a half below the cataract, and near the whirlpool, where the distance from one high bank to the other does not exceed 700 feet. The cost of a hanging bridge at that point, of sufficient strength to sustain the weight of a railway train or any other burden which may be placed s upon it, and made in the best and securest manner, is estimated by Mr. Ellet at 200,000 dollars. He offers to construct such a bridge for that sum, and to subscribe 20,000 dollars to its stock. — Vtica Gazette.

Backing a Friend. — A New Englander. riding in a railroad car, seemed particularly disposed to astonish the other passengers with tough stories about Yankeedom. At last he mentioned that one of his neighbours owned an immense dairy, and made a million pounds of butter and a million pounds of cheese yearly. This story produced some sensation; and the Yankee, perceiving that his veracity was in danger of being questioned, appealed to a friend as follows :— " True, isn't it, Mr. P. ? •I speak of Deacon Brown — you know Deacon Brown ?" " Ye-e-s," replied the friend ; " that is, yes ; I know Deacon Brown ; I don't know as I ever heard precisely how many pounds of butter and cheese he makes a-year, but I know that he has twelve saw mills that go by buttermilk !"

An American Table d'Hote. — For the first time we here (Portland) dined at a regular American table d'hote. The consumption of food was fearful ; pome left the room in seven minutes and a half, from that to fourteen minutes the room was cleared, and we were left alone. Boiled green ludian corn, plastered over with hutter, seemed the favorite dish, and most excellent it was. They hold it at hoth ends, gnawing it round, ridge after ridge, like a man playing pandean pipes. Some, in their hurry, transfixed whole fowls and dragged them bodily on to their plates. One man, addressing me in mercantile phraseology, said, " Stranger, I guess I'll trouble you for the balance of that fowl," meaning what remained of it on the dish. On another occasion, a brother officer, travelling with bis wife, was dining at Boston on the first day green pease made their appearance. He saw the dish making its rounds, and one man between himself, his wife, and the pease ; he therefore made sure of getting some for her ; but no, the brute swept the whole contents of the dish on to his own ylate, gave the dish an exulting shove, and, turning round, exclaimed, " I guess I'm a whale at pease." —It is painful to witness the unlady like practice of arranging pease along the blade of a knife and eating them off by rows, at once dispelling the charm of a you ug and pretty face ; nor was the substitution of forks for toothpicks a redeeming trait. From Portland we embarked on board a magnificent steamer for Boston*. There were upwards of four hundred persons on board, half of them ladies. The gentlemen's cabin was one hundred and eighty feet long. The doors of the ladies' cabin were left open in consequence of the excessive heat. There wers many unpro-

vided with berths, and they lay about in beautiful confusion, most of them in great dishabille. These steamers have much the appearance of floating bazaars, every sort of amusement going on, from eating, drinking, and gambling, to swapping and speculating, even to taking advantage of the miseries of their fellow-passengers : it being a common practice, when the steamers are crowded and a rough passage expected, for individuals to take a number of berths, on the chance of sea-sick bidders ; three, four, and even five times the original price being then given. — Echoes from the Backwoods, by Captain Levineg.

Yankee Shaving. — No independent Yankee ever thinks of shaving himself. They study the comfort of that operation much, and the chair in which they sit has a board or platform for the head to rest upon, which is raised or depressed by a screw, to the desired height ; when adjusted, the artist, generally a nigger, seizes the patient's nose between his fore-finger and thumb, and shaves him slick. He then powders the face as a finale. We tried the process, and found it rather comfortable. At Eastport, a woman operated. A New-Englander travels so much, a wardrobe would be in the way. He therefore gets every thing- " all standing," a complete suit, and when worn out, he buys another ; rarely has he a change of any thing, with the exception of fronts, one of which, tied on after shaving, does duty for, and has all the appearance of a clean shirt; but like Topffer's Monsieur Vieuxbois, il change de linge Men rarement. His kit, therefore, not being extensive, packs easily into a small valise, and is conveniently carried in one hand ; brushes, combs, tooth-brushes, and round towels, being generally to be fouud suspended from the walls" in most of the hotels and steam-boats. In New England States the ladies are for the most pait extremely serious, and camp-meet-ings are more fashionable than theatres. — New Monthly Magazine.

Disparity in Horses and Disparity in Men. — Ninety-six inches (or eight feet) is the utmost height of which we have any authentic record jf any living man having attained ; and thirty-two inches that of the shortest man, that man not being deformed. The largest horse known is Carter's Mammoth, which, if strictly measured, is, we believe, just seventy-eight inches (nineteen and a half hands) to the shoulder ; the smallest, her Majesty's pet, " The Eastern equine pigmy," twenty-six inches (six and a half hands). The relative proportions are, therefore, exact — the giant is three times the height of the dwarf; the Mammoth horse three times the height of the Eastern pet.

The Ear of Dionysius. — This is probably the most wonderful acoustic contrivance in existence ; and that it was the work of studious design, is proved by a second one commenced in a neighbouring quarry — commenced, but not further prosecuted, evidently because it would not answer, from the soft chalky material of the wall on one side. The external shape of the conch is that of the ass's ear. The aperture, through which the light now enters from its further end, and from a height of one hundred and twenty feet, was till lately not known to exist ; it not being supposed that the ear had any tneatus internus corresponding* with the external one. The accidental removal of a quantity of loose stones from above, revealed a narrow passage of from twenty t< thirty feet in length, and opening directly into the cave. This internal opening is situated almost immediately over the amphitheaire, one hundred and twenty feet above the floor of the cavern, and (measuring in a plaue) is one hundred and eighty feet from the external opening. Having rent paper, which made an incredible noise, and let off a Waterloo cracker, which reverberated along the walls like thundei, and done other deeds of the same kind below, we ascended, and walking over the back of the cavern, presently came upon the passage which leads to its inner opeuing ; and there, leaning over a parapet wall (in doing which we almost exclude the feeble light that penetrates into the cavern from behind,) we are startled by a very audible but faint whisper, which comes from our friend below, asking us to declare our present sensations. We reply in the same faint whisper; and are immediately apprised of its safe arrival by another. One hundred and eighty feet separate the parties. In the stillness of that half-lit cavern, not only were our faintest whisperings conveyed, but we could hear each other breathe ! This was a place to come and see ! <

The Astronomer's View of the Universe. — In wafting ourselves in imagination to our own satellite, the moon, the nearest of our celestial bodies, we have passed over a distance equal to 30 times the diameter of our globe. In advancing to the sun we travel over a distance equal to 400 times that of the moon; and before we reach Uranus, the remotest of the planets, we have traversed a space equal to 20 times the earth's distance from the sun. Thus placed at the limits of a system, enclosed

I in a circle of 1800 millions of miles, in radius, our appreciation of distance would appe*r to be exhausted, and we seem to be on the margin of an unfathomable abyss. The telescope, however, and the mural circle, have enabled us to span the void ; and the genius of man, proud of the achievement, and justly, if humbly, proud, has crossed the gulph 12,000 times the radius of his own system, that he may study the nearest world in the firmament of heaven. Beyond this frontier lies the whole universe of stars, their binary systems, their clusters, and the nebulous combinations. The observed parallax of one-fourth of a second in Alpha Lyr», carries us four times as far into the bosom of space ; but, though beyond this we have no positive measures of distance, it would be as unphilosophical to assign limits to creation as to give it an infinite range. In this rapid flight into space we have traversed it but in one dimension, and the line which we have traced is but a unit in the scale of celestial distance. Creation, in its wide panorama, is still beyond us, and around us. The over-arching heavens still " enclose us, and distant worlds yet sparkle in their canopy. If from this bourne, from which the astronomical traveller alone returns, we look back upon our course, our own planetary system ceases to be perceived. Its sun is dim, itself but an invisible point in the nebulous light which intervenes. Where then, is our terrestial ball, its oceans, its continents, its hills, its empires, its dynasties, its thrones ? Where is our fatherlaud, its factions, its Christian disunions, its slave crimes, and its unholy wars ? Where is our home, its peace, its endearments, its hopes and its fears? Where is man, the intellectual monad, the only atom of organic life that can pierce the depths and interpret the enigma of the universe ? — and yet the only spark of a spiritual nature which disclaims the authority and resists the will of the Universal King ! They have all disappeared in the far-off perspective, the long vista of space, whose apex, were it a sun, the hugest telescope would fail to descry. No living thing here meets the eye, and no sentiment associated with life presses on. the affections. The tiny organisms of earth and ocean, everything that moves and breathes, that grows and dies, all are ingulphed in the great conception of the universe. The straining mind cannot unite the incommensurable extremes. The infinite in space, the eternal in duration, the omnipotent in power, the perfect in wisdom, alone fill the expanded soul, and pourtray, in their awful combination, -the Creator of the Universe. — North Review.