6

A blind

groutiness, and grumbling. ... WE have omitted to notice the superb annual engraving for the subscribers of the 'Apollo Association,' recently put forth by that popular institution. The subject is VANDERLYN's celebrated picture of 'CAIUS MARIUS on the ruins of Carthage.' The engraving is in line, by S. A. SCHOFF, a native artist, and forms one of the finest specimens of art in its kind ever produced in this country. ... MR. PRENTICE, the well-known Louisville Journalist, is 'down upon' a 'gentleman of some smartness who rejoices in the euphonious name of Poɛ,' (a correspondent of ours spells it 'Poh!') for terming CARLYLE, in one of his thousand-and-one MAC-GRAWLER critiques, an ass.' The Kentucky poet and politician thus rejoins: We have no more doubt that Mr. EDGAR A. POE is a very good judge of an ass, than we have that he is a very poor judge of such a man as THOMAS CARLYLE. He has no sympathies with the great and wonderful operations of CARLYLE's mind, and is therefore unable to appreciate him. man can describe a rainbow as accurately as Mr. PoE can CARLYLE's mind. What Mr. Poɛ lacks in Carlyleism he makes up in jackassism. It is very likely that Mr. CARLYLE's disciples are as poor judges of an ass as Mr. PoE is of CARLYLE. Let them not abuse each other, or strive to overcome obstacles which are utterly irremovable. That Mr. PoE has all the native tendencies necessary to qualify him to be a judge of asses, he has given repeated evidences to the public.' 'Nervous, but inelegant!' as Mr. ASPEN remarks in The Nervous Man.'... CAN any native citizen of 'The Empire State' peruse the forceful paper under this title, in preceding pages, without a feeling of natural and just pride? For ourselves, born, bred, and educated upon the soil of New-York, we cannot read it without a thrill of gratification, that our lines have been cast in pleasant places,' and that we have so goodly an heritage.' WE do not know when we have been more 'horrified than on reading the following in a London journal: Two natives of the cannibal islands of Marquesas have been carried to France. The story runs, that on the voy. age one of their fellow-passengers asked them which they liked best, the French or the English? The English!' answered the man, smacking his lips; they are the fattest.' 'And a great deal more tender,' chimed in the woman, with a grin that exhibited two rows of pointed teeth as sharp as a crocodile's!' . . 'The Exile's Song,' with the note which accompanied it, came too late for insertion in the present number. It will appear in our next. ・ ・ ・ THE story of The TobaccoQuid is as old as the seven hills. What a silly thing it is, to give new names and a new locale to an ancient MILLER,' and at the same time vouch for its entire authenticity and originality! 'O git eöut!'... READER, did you ever see a small puppy bark at an elephant in a menagerie, whereat the dignified beast did n't even deign to flap his leather-apron ears? Did you ever see a stump-tailed ape sporting a Roman toga? And have you seen the 'Annihilation of DANIEL WEBSTER' by CRAZY NEAL, in a recent newspaper piece of his? Mr. NEAL thinks the great orator and statesman a humbug! He is a judge of the article... IF the 'Stanzas to Mary' are a 'little after the style of WORDSWORTH,' we can only say that the WORDSWORTH school is not a grammar-school:

Upon my brow

Glooms gathers fast and thick,'

is not unlike Cats eats mice,' or 'Shads is come!'... SEVERAL communications, among them 'Chronicles of the Past,' Number Two; 'Evening Hymn;' 'The Deity,' etc., will receive attention in our next.

THOMSON'S ABRIDGEMENT OF DAY'S ALGEBRA FOR THE USE OF SCHOOLS.-DAY'S Algebra has sustained a high reputation during a period of fourteen years; a fact sufficiently evinced by the sale of more than forty large editions. In appropriateness of arrangement, perspicuity of expression, and adaptation to the purposes of instruction, whether public or private, it stands, we believe, unrivalled. The highest praise which can be bestowed on a school-book is, that it is its own teacher.' By commencing with points so simple that any child of ordinary ability can comprehend them, and advancing step by step, removing every obstacle when it first presents itself, and conducting the student gradually into the more intricate parts of the science, the author makes him master of the subject while he is yet scarcely aware of its difficulties. The exactness of defini tion and clearness of illustration which characterize Mr. THOMSON's 'Abridgement' together with the exclusion of the answers to the problems, (a course indispensable to an independent scholar,) are especially commendable. The method also of completing the square by multiplying the equation by four times the coefficient of the higher power of the unknown quantity, and adding to both members the square of the coefficient of the lower power, avoids the introduction of fractional terms, and strikes us as an improvement. The most weighty objection to DAY'S Algebra has been its paucity of examples. This defect is remedied in the 'Abridgement,' the number of examples being nearly twice as great as in the original work.

'PRAYERS FOR THE USE OF FAMILIES.'- Here is a volume of some three hundred pages, containing upward of seventy prayers, designed to meet all conditions of mankind, and all the wants of humanity. The author, Rev. WILLIAM JAY, of England, has aimed to be very plain and simple in his diction, since prayer admits of no brilliance, and rejects studied ornament. He has not substituted finery for elegance, nor the affectation of art for the eloquence of feeling; but has wisely avoided a strained, inflated style, unintelligible to the ignorant, lamented by the pious, and contemned by the wise. This is as it should be. It is remarkable that in the Bible no prayer is recorded, in which the figure employed is not as familiar as the literal expression. An appendix is added, containing a number of select and original prayers for particular occasions; short addresses, applicable to certain events and circumstances, and which the reader may insert in their proper place in the main prayer, or use at the end of it. A work like this, from a competent pen, may supply with many families an important desideratum. The volume is published by Mr. M. W. DODD, Brick Church Chapel, opposite the Park.

'THE WYANDOTTE, OR THE HUTTED KNOLL,' is the title of Mr. COOPER's last work, recently published by Messrs. LEA AND BLANCHARD, Philadelphia, in two well-executed volumes in the pamphlet-form. It embodies legends of the sufferings of isolated families during the troubled scenes of colonial warfare, which are distinctive in many of their leading facts, if not rigidly true in the details. We gather from the prefatory remarks of the author, that in these volumes he has 'aimed at sketching several distinct varieties of the human race, as true to the governing impulses of their educations, habits, modes of thinking, and natures.' How this aim has been accomplished, we are quite unable to say. We trust however that the friend who transported the work from our table into the country, will at least repay us for the gratification of which he has deprived us, by returning it when he is through with it, that we may be ourselves enlightened, and enabled to enlighten our readers, concerning the character of the work.

THOMPSON'S HISTORY OF LONG-ISLAND.-A second edition-revised and greatly enlarged, and included in two handsome volumes-has just appeared, of Mr. B. F. THOMPSON's history of Long-Island, from its discovery and settlement to the present time. The work embodies many interesting and important matters, connected with the first settlement of our country and its colonial and revolutionary history; and includes notices of numerous individuals and families, and a particular account of different churches and ministers. In short, the indefatigable author has availed himself of every source of authentic and valuable information which could add to the interest or usefulness of his work; which we should not omit to mention embraces two large and well-executed maps, and is illustrated by numerous lithographic engravings of edifices and other objects of interest on the island; and including the author's 'counterfeit presentment.' Messrs. GOULD, BANKS AND COMPANY are the publishers.

'THE KAREN APOSTLE.'- Messrs. GOULD, KENDALL, AND LINCOLN, Boston, have issued in a handsome little volume, The Karen Apostle, or Memoir of Ko-THAH-BYU, the first Karen convert; with Notices concerning his Nation. By Rev. FRANCIS MASON, Missionary to the Karens.' The first American edition is revised by Prof. H. J. RIPLEY, of Newton (Mass.) Theological Seminary. The work is 'sent forth in the hope that the interest which has been felt in behalf of the Karens may be deepened, and that the cause of missions to the heathen in general may be promoted by the striking proof of the power of the gospel exhibited in its pages. The work is illustrated by maps, in part from manuscript, and by one or two well-executed engravings on wood. The specimens of Karen literature appended to the volume do not afford a very exalted idea of the writings of that sect; nevertheless, they possess a certain interest in the connection which they sustain in the volume.

NEW MUSIC.-We have before us, from the extensive and popular establishment of Messrs. JAMES L. HEWITT AND COMPANY, Broadway,' Woodside Waltz,' by Miss MARION S. MCGREGOR; Grand Austerlitz March and Quickstep, arranged as a Duet, for the Piano-forte,' by GEORGE W. HEWITT; The Alpine Horn, a Tyrollean,' by JOHN H. HEWITT; and Robin Buff, a Ballad, the music by Mr. HENRY RUSSELL.

'WHEN THOU WERT TRUE.'- This is a very charming Song; the words by F. W. THOMAS, Esq., the music by JOHN H. HEWITT, inscribed to Mrs. ROBERT TYLER, and just published by JAMES L. HEWITT AND COMPANY, Broadway. If the noble-looking portrait upon the title-page represents Mrs. TYLER, she is justly entitled to the praises with which the journals have teemed, touching the grace and beauty of her person. The following are the words:

1.

When thou wert true, when thou wert true,

My heart did thy impression take,

As do the depths where skies are blue,
Of some wood-girt and quiet lake,

The image of the moon that gives
The calmness in whose light she lives.

II.

But when doubts came, my troubled breast
Was like that lake when winds do blow;
Her image there, though still impressed,
Beams brokenly in ebb and flow:

Until the storm obscures her light,
And reigns the ebon-visaged Night.

III.

Again that changing moon shall shine,

When storms are o'er within the lake,

Which, like that wayward heart of thine,

Can any other image take:

Mine, graven like memorial-stone,

Is now a memory alone.

'ALHALLA, OR THE LORD OF TALADEGA: A TALE OF THE CREEK WAR.'-Thus is entitled a narrative poem by HENRY ROWE COLCRAFT, better known as HENRY R. SCHOOLCRAFT, Esq., an old correspondent of this Magazine. The story turns upon the contests of the Muscogees, their exertions, their discomfitures, and their final fall. It opens at a distant northern point, within a short period after the close of the Creek war, and occupies two days and nights in its action. Its style is a union of the dramatic with the narrative and descriptive; a conjunction well adapted to the character of the story and the nature of its personages. There are appended to the main poem a few selected miscellanies, among which we recognize three or four clever effusions, originally given to the public in these pages. Messrs. WILEY AND PUTNAM are the publishers.

THE NEW PURCHASE. Our task for these departments of the KNICKERBOCKER was completed, when we received from Messrs. APPLETON AND COMPANY, a native novel, in two volumes, entitled 'The New Purchase; or Seven and a half Years in the Far West.' BY ROBERT CARLTON, Esq. We have not found leisure to read one of its pages; but if we may judge of its merits from the encomiums of two or three of our contemporaries of the daily press, it should prove a work of the most sterling attraction. To say that MARY CLAVERS' must look to her laurels,' there being an equally gifted laborer in a kindred field, strikes us as very high praise. We hope, but doubt, to find that precaution in any degree necessary.

'USURY: THE EVIL AND THE REMEDY. - The pages of this department of the KNICKERBOCKER were mainly in the hands of the printers, when we received the newspaper folio entitled as above. We are left but space therefore barely to state, that this essay on usury differs entirely from the usual mode of treating that subject, in that it does not rely on the penalties for the repression of the evil, but proposes to root out its existence by a practical, beneficent mode of removing the temptations to, and occasions for, usury. It is for sale at BURGESS AND STRINGER's, corner of Annstreet and Broadway.'

NEW WORKS FROM THE AMERICAN PRESS. We have before us several excellent publications, which came too late for notice in the present number. Among them, we may mention three entertaining volumes from the press of Messrs. LEA AND BLANCHARD, Philadelphia, The Court of England,' from 1688 to GEORGE the THIRD; 'Nature and Revelation,' or the Second Advent; the beautiful Illustrated Prayer-Book' serials of Mr. HEWET; and PEABODY'S Dartmouth College Address. These publications, with others which we lack space even to mention, will be adverted to in our November number.

THE KNICKERBOCKER.

VOL. XXII.

DECEMBER, 1843.

No. 6.

MIND OR INSTINCT.

AN INQUIRY CONCERNING THE MANIFESTATION OF MIND BY THE LOWER ORDERS OF ANIMALS.

IN some are found

Such teachable and apprehensive parts,

That man's attainments in his own concerns,

Matched with the expertness of the brutes in their's,

Are ofttimes vanquished and thrown far behind.'

COWPER.

OF THE REASON OR JUDGMENT OF THE PRINCIPLE CALLED INSTINCT.

A SURGEON of Leeds, (Eng.,) says BUFFON, found a little spaniel who had been lamed. He carried the poor animal home, bandaged up his leg, and, after two or three days, turned him out. The dog returned to the surgeon's house every morning, till the leg was perfectly well. At the end of several months, the spaniel again presented himself, in company with another dog, who had also been lamed; and he intimated, as well as piteous and intelligent looks could intimate, that he desired the same kind assistance to be rendered to his friend as had been bestowed upon himself. A similar circumstance is stated to have occurred to MORANT, a celebrated French surgeon.

A fox, adds the same writer, having entered a hen-house through a small aperture, which was the only opening, succeeded without disturbing the family in destroying all the fowls, and in satiating his appetite with part of them; but his voracity so enlarged his dimensions as to prevent his egress. In the morning the farmer discovered the havoc of the night, and the perpetrator himself sprawled out on the floor of the coop, apparently dead from surfeit. He entered, and taking the creature by the heels, carried him out and cast him beside the house. This was no sooner done than the fox sprang up and bounded away with the speed of a racer. This was communicated by the person.

A spaniel, OBSEND informs us, having discovered a mouse in a shock of corn, jumped with his fore feet against it to frighten him out; and then running quickly to the back side, succeeded in taking the mouse as he attempted to escape.

BUFFON says: 'A number of beavers are employed together at the foot of the tree in gnawing it down; and when this part of the labor is accomplished, it becomes the business of others to sever the branches, while a third party are engaged along the borders of the river in cutting other trees, which though smaller than the first tree, are yet as thick as the leg, if not the thigh, of a common-sized man. These they carry with them by land to the brink of the river, and then by water to the place allotted for their building; where sharpening them at one end, and forming them into stakes, they fix them in the ground, at a small distance from each other, and fill up the vacant spaces with pliant branches. While some are thus employed in fixing the stakes, others go in quest of clay, which they prepare for their purpose with their tails and their feet. At the top of their dyke, or mole, they form two or three openings. These they occasionally enlarge or contract, as the river rises or falls. NOTE.-Should the current be very gentle, the dam is carried nearly straight across; but when the stream is swiftly flowing, it is uniformly made with a considerable curve, having the convex part opposed to the current.

'Ac veluti ingentem formica farris acervum
Cum populant, hyemis memores, tectoque reponunt:
It nigrum campis agmen, prædamque per herbas
Convectant calle augusto: pars grandia trudunt
Obnixæ frumenta humeris: pars agmina cogunt,
Castigant que moras: opere omnis semita fervet.'

'In formicâ non modo sensus sed etiam mens, ratio, memoria.'- Cic.

ENEID, IV., 402.

'Si quis comparet onera corporibus earum (formicarum) fateatur nullis portione. Vires esse majores. Gerunt ea morsu; majora aversæ postremio pedibus moliuntur, humeris obnixæ. Est iis Reip ratio memoria cura. Semina arrosa condunt vie rursus in fruges exeant è terra. Majora ad introitum (caverna) dividunt Madefacta imbre proferunt atque siccant.'- PLINY: lib. XI., cap. 30.

Many birds and other animals, BUFFON informs us, station a watch, while they are feeding in the fields. Whenever marmots venture abroad, one is placed as a sentinel, sitting on an elevated rock, while the others amuse themselves in the fields below, or are engaged in cutting grass and making it into hay for their future convenience; and no sooner does their trusty sentinel perceive a man, an eagle, a dog, or any other enemy approaching, than he gives notice to the rest by a kind of whistle, and is himself the last that takes refuge in the cell. It is asserted that when their hay is made, one of them lies upon its back, permits the hay to be heaped between its paws, keeping them upright to make greater room, and in this manner remaining still upon its back, is dragged by the tail, hay and all, to their common retreat.

These instances could be multiplied indefinitely; but more than sufficient have been cited. They prove in the first place, without need of argument, that animals have a language by which they apprehend each other. Concert of action and division of labor would be impossible without it. They also exhibit the exercise of memory and abstraction; and it now remains to ascertain whether their conduct was the result of reason.

If a person should take a friend whose arm had been fractured to a skilful surgeon who had before cured him of a similar wound,