courses at dinner. This injurious custom we have exploded; but we take wine with our meals. How many soever may be at table, we deem it the height of ill-breeding in any gentleman to omit pledging himself in wine to each one of the other guests, and that, too, before the cloth is removed. In support of this absurd practice, it has been alleged that wine assists digestion. No plea could be more unfortunate; for the fact is that wine has the effect of hardening the food, and rendering it less digestible. How can it be otherwise, seeing that the wines commonly consumed in this country are adulterated with large quantities of brandy?

CONSIDERING the exhaustion and debility that in the end succeed to the large quantities of stimulating drinks taken by men in general, it ought to be received as a strong argument in favour of

water as a beverage, that it is free from stimulating properties, a circumstance which not only makes it innocent, but adapts it to the constitution of man in all its varieties. Some, indeed, have had the boldness to allege that water is unfit to drink; but, were that really the case, they ought at any rate to inform us in what way it is prejudicial. I have paid special attention to the matter; and my investigations have resulted in a thorough conviction, that there is no foundation for the vulgar notion that water will not agree with certain constitutions or that it is less favourable to the process of digestion, than the various fermented and distilled liquors which are habitually drunk. There is this to be said on the side of water-drinking, that it is the invariable beverage of all the lower animals. It is also clear that pure water has the effect of bracing the digestive organs, and preventing that class of disorders of which acrid humours and plethora are the ostensible causes. There cannot be produced a well-authenticated instance in which health has been ruined, or life endangered, by the habit of drinking pure water. Of course, I exclude such imprudent persons as, to allay the thirst which attends a feverish state of the blood, swallow cold water in immoderate quantities. That practice is undoubtedly reprehensible, and ought to be carefully guarded against. I refer to those who drink water where others drink beer, wine, or spirits.

Nothing will quench thirst so readily or so effectually as water, which also is quite adequate to the due supply of the waste which the blood and the juices continually sustain. All scientific men agree in pronouncing it to afford the best means of dissolving and diluting solid food; and, unlike the various compounds substituted for it, so far from diminishing the vigour of the stomach, it rather strengthens the tone of that organ. Wine is of course more exhilarating than water; but then, it causes fermentation in the stomach, thereby retarding, instead of promoting, the concoction and assimilation of its other contents. "Pure water," observes that excellent physician Hoffman, "is the fittest drink for persons of all ages and temperaments, and, of all the productions of nature or art, comes the nearest to that universal remedy so much sought after by mankind, but never hitherto discovered."

CHINA TEA

Is so favourite a beverage with the English people of all classes, from the highest to the humblest, and it has besides so many advocates amongst medical authorities, that I am afraid my animadversions on the subject will scarcely be heeded.

It is no easy matter to convince people that what they like is bad, especially when they can quote books in its defence. In tea, however, there is no nutriment, which alone ought to exclude it from professed meals, at all events. But I But I go further, and maintain that it is not simply useless, but, if habitually used, is absolutely hurtful. If I be reminded that tea is a stomachic, I reply that its tonic properties are counterbalanced by its sedative qualities, which tend to destroy nervous sensibility. When concentrated by distillation, it becomes, as has been proved by Doctors Smith, Lettsom, and several others, a poison so powerful as to kill insects and other animals, and to throw even a dog into violent convulsions. This testimony has been confirmed by Dr. Jones, Dr. Cullen, and others, who attribute the prevalence of indigestion in this country, in a great measure, to the use of strong tea. It has been ascertained that carbonate of copper is employed to give a fine colour to the leaves, and carbonate of copper is at all events a deadly poison; but the leaves themselves in their natural state, before the oil they contain is dissipated by drying, are considered unwholesome even by the cultivators of the plant in China.

INEBRIETY.

"And in the tempting bowl

Of poisoned nectar sweet oblivion swill.”

DRUNKENNESS is at once the most destructive and disgraceful of vices. Other vices injure the health and abbreviate life; and some also tend to debase the mind; but this, while most certainly ruinous to the strongest constitution, not only debases the mind, but actually deprives those who practise it of the use of their reason, and reduces them to the level of brutes in understanding and ferocity. Incapacitating for exertion, it defeats the best-laid schemes and brightest prospects of worldly advancement. It also kills the affections; and, while disabling its unhappy thralls from being useful even to themselves, brings them under the exclusive influence of selfish considerations. It is true that habitual inebriety may not produce acute disease; but those who are addicted to it rarely escape chronic affections, which are so obstinate as seldom to admit of a perfect cure. Many persons imagine