Suspicion. There are none so ready to suspect as those who have, at some time or other, been guilty; there are also many persons who suspect others of committing those crimes only they themselves have committed before. Innocence, should it be obliged, through pressing exigences, to suspect, has at least one advantage over guilt-it can fearlessly examine whether there be any ground for it or not, while guilt is obliged "to look tamely, on and sce," without daring to disclose them; but the same charges preferred by the one should be brought against the other, by way of retaliation. Thoughts. It is (even in the nineteenth century) argued by some, that thoughts are criminal, though not indulged. "Thoughts are only criminal when indulged,” says that profound moralist, Dr. Johnson. We ought always to be on our guard against the inroads of thoughts, which would be criminal if indulged; while, on the other hand, we ought to dwell with pleasure on those of an opposite tendency; they ought to be retained to operate as barriers against all incursions of those which would be liable to lead us into error. Virtue. Nothing exalts a man so much as virtue, and there is nothing more delightful than to contemplate on the various consolations she has in store for those who rigidly adhere to her principles. It was this that made Cato, when penned up in Utica by the armies of Cæsar, prefer his own condition to that of the conqueror. They who fall in the cause of virtue, fall gloriously, and in a cause which the best of men have fallen in, and which no man (who, by his actions, did not disgrace that sacred name) was ever found to oppose. I shall conclude by quoting a couplet of Pope's"Know, then, this truth (enough for man to know), Virtue alone is happiness below." Use. It is certain that use enables us to do that which, without it, we might ever despair of doing; and it must be remembered that we ought always to be on our guard against the use of that which may at any future time be injurious, as we cannot forsake it at pleasure. Woman. Woman has conferred upon us many blessings, and brought upon us as many miseries; of the origin of misery woman was made the instrument; and it must be acknowledged that the greatest crimes have been committed by the influence of them, and them alone, and the greatest ravages made: it was woman that caused Troy to be laid low, that conquered the great Cæsar, and lulled him to rest in peace, while every surrounding country called him conqueror. It was woman that caused that division between Antony and Augustus, which brought sons into the field to combat with their fathers, brothers against brothers, and citizen against citizen. It is asserted by some, that they ought to be excused on the ground of weakness; but "The weakness they possess, themselves create." And it is to be doubted, whether or not the influence they possess over the passions of men, is not more than adequate to that weakness; if they are weak in themselves, they are not at a loss for strength in others, there being always some to be found zealous enough to maintain their cause, either with their talents or their sword. After all that may or can be said on either side, it is certain that without woman we should not experience any portion of happiness; we should be no less than a species of animals, moving about this nether world, searching for society in vainno society among ourselves; those refined ideas and high-towering thoughts, those glorious virtues they inspire within the breast of man, would be sunk in oblivion; we should be uncivilized beings, void of all the finer feelings, and possessing hearts neither warmed by pity nor affection, but cold and obdurate as the adamantine stone, capable of no impression. LONDON AND ITS ENVIRONS. London, how art thou altered! I remember thee with many a narrow street and curious alley now no more. I remember thee encircled with green fields, with here and there a nest of cottages and a rural village. If swelling of the extremities indicate approaching dissolution, London, thy case is hopeless. Whilst, however, the amazing increase of buildings has been proceeding during the last forty years in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, within the city wonderful changes have taken place, and further alterations are proposed, till London proper promises to become but a few wide and uninhabited streets. It is not so much the increased population of London that has required the amazing increase of suburban buildings, but the great number of houses which have been pulled down within the city, the fashion of living out of it, and the removal of a large population, occasioned by the several docks and manufactories established at short distances. The scite now occupied by the East-India warehouses, the London Docks, the new Post-office, the improvement in various parts of the metropolis, by widening the streets, must have displaced an immense population. Many persons can well remember Butcher-row, St. Clement's, a place of considerable traffic, and a regular market, extending from Temple-bar to St. Clement's church. Snow-hill, now called Picketstreet, was formerly occupied by a cluster of thickly-inhabited houses, pulled down to widen this part of the city. The improvements in the neighbourhood of Westminster-abbey, occasioned the removal of many houses; nor is it alone that the inhabitants have thus been driven from London; it has become fashionable to live out of the city; almost every tradesman of any repute now has his countryhouse. London, on a Sunday, is literally deserted; as a proof of this, I may relate a fact. A gentleman, a few Sundays ago, passing through the city in the afternoon, went into a church, not a mile from the Londontavern; presently the pew-opener came to him, and said, "If you wish it, Mr. will preach a sermon, but you and I are the only congrega tion." It is curious to notice the people coming in and retiring from daily influx and reflux of the tide of the city; Islington, Highgate, Walworth, Camberwell, Stepney, Hackney, and all the villages within six miles, seem every morning to empty themselves of their adult male popu lation to fill the great city, the emporium of the world; but as soon as the last bell announces lockers-up on the Royal Exchange, out rushes the tide, north, east, west, and south; gigs, stages, horses, vehicles of every description are put in requisition, whilst humbler pedestrians increase their appetite, although they delay their meal, and London, at eleven at night, has a hundred thousand inha bitants less thau at eleven at noon. ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS. To the Editor of The Economist. SIR;-The questions you proposed in the 20th Number of The Economist attracted my attention. I beg leave to answer them seriatim, first premising that peculiar circumstances may lead to different conclusions. 1. What is the best way for a young man of 100l. a year to live, in order to be as happy and as economical as possible? The best way for a young man to enjoy economy and happiness with the proposed income, if he cannot live with his friends, is to board with some respectable, comfortable family, where he may enjoy rational society without extra expense: innumerable evils spring from young men living on the town, as it is called: it is not to be expected that a young single man, leaving his employment at five or six in the evening, should retire to his solitary apartment: in order to obtain society, he too frequently resorts to the tavern or public-house, spends his money, gets bad habits, bad company, and ruins his health and happiness for ever. 2. Which, are shoes or boots the best? and why? Shoes are always preferable to boots for pedestrians; they are easier to walk in, more convenient to change when wet, and less expensive. Persons should have several pairs of shoes to wear in rotation; this will prove a great saving. 3. Is it better to buy your clothes as you want them, or contract with a tailor at 204. a year for four suits, returning the old ? It is certainly cheaper to buy your clothes as you want them; for 201. you may have four suits a year without returning the old, but this can only be effected with ready money, and buying your cloth at the drapers ;* your coats will cost about 31. each; trowsers about 30s., and waistcoats 10s. each; different colours make a trifling difference; and here I may offer an answer to your last question in regard to colour: I do not think Respectable tailors living in the metropolis, willing to make garments for those who purchase their own cloth, may send us their names and residences, with their terms, free of expence, to be left at our publishers; it may, perhaps, give us an opportunity of doing them a service.-EDIT, there is much difference (except, indeed, blue, which soon looks shabby): upon the whole, I should prefer grey; it hides the dirt better than any other. 4. Which is it better to dine at, an eating-house, or at your own lodgings? The answer to the first question partly applies to this; if you can dine with the family, dine at home; but a dinner provided for yourself at your own lodging is expensive and uncomfortable. The city abounds now with respectable eating-houses, where the best provisions are served, and comfort, cleanliness, and cheapness, are combined. R. G. HINTS FOR NEW INVENTIONS. SIR;-There is an irresistible inclination in Englishmen to laugh at, and even to run down, every proposition that appears to them extravagant: the ready epithet "impossible" is applied to every scheme which lies beyond the pale of their comprehension. When Morton wrote his comedy of Speed the Plough, he little thought that the plans which he put into the mouth of Sir Abel Handy, for the purpose of ridiculing mechanical genius, namely, converting saw-dust into deal boards, and washing rooms by a steam-engine," should ever be carried into effect: yet both have been done; and although of very little use, yet the operation shows us that even the most difficult and apparently impossible proposals in mechanics may be ultimately effected. Who would have believed a man, who, a few years ago, said that stage-coaches should be lit up with gas? yet this is the case; for a lamp has been invented to be lit with gas, which is attached to coaches; or who would have dreamt that our city light should run beneath our feet? Many a valuable and magnificent discovery in practical and natural philosophy has owed its origin to a hint, a flash of thought, a sociation purely accidental; and doubtless, fifty years hence, many articles will be in general use, and many schemes will be brought to bear, of which the present generation does not even dream. Every one knows that the first germ of the steam-engine is to be found in the "Century of Inventions" of the Marquis of Worcester (not the present one, by-the-bye); and poor Ged, the printer, left his native Scotland, above a hundred years ago, filled with the plan of rendering type solid, by which the press might be always kept standing. He laid open his plans before the King's printers, with a view of facilitating the production of Bibles and Prayer-books; but he was ridiculed, and he died in starving poverty. Towards the close of the last century, Didôt, the Parisian printer, perfected the plan; and now almost every standard work is sent into the world stereotyped. I will now, with your leave, Mr. Editor, submit a few suggestions: and should you think them worthy of insertion, or, what is of much higher import, should they act as clues, inviting the mechanist to tread the labyrinth at the entrance of which they are placed, you shall hear from ne as often as I have any suggestion to offer. Your most obedient, A NEW SUBSCRIRER. QUERIES.-Can no better instrument be invented than the one already in use in England (and for aught we know in all other parts of the civilized world) for cutting marble? Can no way be devised in the building of coaches, by which, in case of danger, the horse, or horses, with their traces, cross-bar, and pole, might be detached at once by the driver from the body of the carriage? Can no way be discovered to enable the driver of a coach to lock or unlock a wheel without descending from his seat on going down hill? Can nothing be invented similar to snow shoes, to enable men to cross rivers? Could there not be a spring placed in a shoe or boot, to assist, by its elasticity, the motion of the foot in walking, dancing, &c.? Why not cast metal houses as well as metal bridges? we should then have no houses burnt, and they could be removed at pleasure. Could it not be so contrived, that a bellows might be within the side of parlour stoves, which would act upon the fire by touching a spring, and thus avoid the disagreeable and inelegant operation of puffing the fire with a common bellows? Could not the lovers of skating be accommodated with a pair of skating boots, whereby they would be saved the trouble and escape the accidents which arise from screwing skates on? [We are happy to have an opportunity of opening a field to speculating genius, by inserting the above, and hope it may draw from our readers similar suggestions to what it contains.-EDIT.] TO PROCURE THE JAUNDICE. Drink strong ale, and plenty of it; for this purpose Wiltshire or Burton is preferable: three or four pints of this in the evening, with as many pipes of tobacco, may be thought too heavy; a glass or two of warm strong gin or rum and water afterwards will qualify it: persevere in this course for six months, and you will most probably have your face a sovereign colour. ESTIMATE OF EXPENDITURE FOR A PERSON HAVING AN INCOME OF £.100 A-YEAR. There is no class of persons to whom the study of economy is more necessary than in that where the individuals move in respectable society, enjoying but a small income; such are clerks, subordinate officers of the revenue, teachers, superior shopmen, &c. &c.: compelled by circumstances to make a respectable appearance, and precluded from extraneous methods of assisting their means, they are generally more straitened in their circumstances than others, who, with less income, move in a different and humbler walk of life: a person of this description, possessing of £.100 a year, having a wife and three children, may, by adhering to the following estimate, live in comparative comfort, and save a trifle, either to be put by as a reserve-fund an income or £.91 per annum, which, out of one hundred pounds per annum, would leave a saving of £. 9. A strict economist should not only make his income last out, but should have a strict regard to saving; this practice will naturally induce a comfortable state of mind: he who saves a part of his income, can always go to market with ready money, whereby he may, generally speaking, obtain every article of consumption at two shillings in the pound less than he who takes credit; besides, he preserves his independence, and is travelling in the high road to happi ness. In the foregoing scale there are many articles of general use omitted, such as oatmeal, &c.; but it must be obvious that if such are used, they will lessen the consumption and consequent expense of those things for which they are substituted. A HINT PO BUTCHERS FOR A GOOD OPENING OF BUSINESS. : There is a continuity of streets from one end of London to the other (an extent of nearly four miles), on one side of the way of which there is in the whole distance but one butcher's shop; this may be proved by walking from Brick-lane, White-chapel, to Tyburn Turnpike, keeping on the north-side of the streets. ANNALS OF CULLING No XXII. THE FLOSCULO RELIEVO CHEAT. SIR;-I was much delighted with your exposure of the flosculo-relievo cheat. I some time ago read her deceiving advertisement in a newspaper, and was induced to go to the expense of the stage to inquire about it, and found it just as your informant describes, only he did not tell you (but perhaps she did not tell him, for she is not a very communicative gentlewoman) that she charges ten guineas for teaching the wax-work, two guineas separate for teaching the painting on paper, and five for teaching artificial flowers. I used to know an artificial flower-maker, and the utmost she could earn was ten shillings a week. Besides the two guineas to be paid to learn what you properly call stencilling, she charges two guineas for the colours to be used; and when I asked her for a reference to somebody who got their bread by it whom she had taught, she evaded that point altogether, and Isaid she did not want to teach unwilling or doubting people; no doubt the people she wishes to meet with |