the school is your mother! Boy! the school is your brother! the school is your sister! the school is your first cousin, and your second cousin, and all the rest of your relations! Let's have no more crying!"

No tongue can express good Mrs. Bowyer. Val Le Grice and I were once going to be flogged for some domestic misdeed, and Bowyer was thundering away at us by way of prologue, when Mrs. B. looked in, and said, "Flog them soundly, Sir, I beg!" This saved us. Bowyer was so nettled at the interruption that he growled out, " Away, woman! away!" and we were let off.

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I had one just flogging. When I was about thirteen, I went to a shoemaker, and begged him to take me as his apprentice. He being an honest man, immediately took me to Bowyer, (the Master of Christ's Hospital,) who got into a great rage, knocked me down, and even rudely pushed Crispin out of the room. Bowyer asked me Why I had made myself such a fool?" to which I answered, "That I had a great desire to be a shoemaker, and that I hated the thought of being a clergyman.” "Why so?" said he,-" Because, to tell you the truth, Sir," said I, “I am an infidel!" For this, without more ado, Bowyer flogged me, wisely, as I think, soundly as I know. Any whining or sermonizing would have gratified my vanity, and confirmed me in my absurdity; as it was, I was laughed at, and got heartily ashamed of my folly.—COLERIDGE. KEATS.-A loose, slack, not well-dressed youth met Mr. myself in a lane near Highgate. knew him, and spoke. It was Keats. He was introduced to me, and staid a minute or so. After he had left us a little way, he came back, and said: "Let me carry away the memory, Coleridge, of having pressed your hand!" "There is death in that hand," I said to when Keats was gone; yet this was, I believe, before the consumption showed itself distinctly.-COLERIDGE.— Table Talk.

124. THE GREAT DISMAL SWAMP OF AMERICA.

and

SIR C. LYELL. [WE extract the following account of one of the most remarkable natural objects in the world, from the Travels in North America,' of a distinguished geologist of our day, Sir Charles Lyell.]

There are many swamps or morasses in this low, flat region, and one of the largest of these occurs between the towns of Norfolk and Weldon. We traversed several miles of its northern extremity on the railway, which is supported on piles. It bears the appropriate and very expressive name of the Great Dismal,' and is no less than forty miles in length from north to south, and twenty-five miles in its greatest width from east to west, the northern half being situated in Virginia, the southern in North Carolina. I observed that the water was obviously in motion

in several places, and the morass had somewhat the appearance of a broad inundated river-plain, covered with all kinds of aquatic trees and shrubs, the soil being as black as in a peat-bog. The accumulation of vegetable matter going on here in a hot climate, over so vast an area, is a subject of such high geological interest, that I shall relate what I learnt of this singular morass. It is one enormous quagmire, soft and muddy, except where the surface is rendered partially firm by a covering of vegetables and their matted roots; yet, strange to say, instead of being lower than the level of the surrounding country, it is actually higher than nearly all the firm and dry land which encompasses it, and, to make the anomaly complete, in spite of its semi-fluid character, it is higher in the interior than towards its margin.

The only exceptions to both these statements is found on the eastern side, where, for the distance of about twelve or fifteen miles, the streams flow from slightly elevated but higher land, and supply all its abundant and overflowing water. Towards the north, the east, and the south, the waters flow from the swamp to different rivers, which give abundant evidence, by the rate of their descent, that the Great Dismal is higher than the surrounding firm ground. This fact is also confirmed by the measurements made in levelling for the railway from Portsmouth to Suffolk, and for two canals cut through different parts of the morass, for the sake of obtaining timber. The railway itself, when traversing the Great Dismal, is literally higher than when on the land some miles distant on either side, and is six to seven feet higher than where it passes over dry ground near to Suffolk and Portsmouth. Upon the whole, the centre of the morass seems to lie more than twelve feet above the flat country round it. If the streams which now flow in from the west, had for ages been bringing down black fluid mire instead of water, over the firm subsoil, we might suppose the ground so inundated as to have acquired its present configuration. Some small ridges, however, of land must have existed in the original plain or basin, for these now rise like low islands in various places above the general surface. But the streams to the westward do not bring down liquid mire, and are not charged with any sediment. The soil of the swamp is formed of vegetable matter, usually without any admixture of earthly particles. We have here, in fact, a deposit of peat from ten to fifteen feet in thickness, in a latitude where, owing to the heat of the sun and length of the summer, no peat-mosses like those of Europe would be looked for under ordinary circumstances.

In countries like Scotland and Ireland, where the climate is damp, and the summer short and cool, the natural vegetation of one year does not rot away during the next in moist situations. If water flows into such land it is absorbed, and promotes the vigorous growth of mosses and other aquatic plants, and when they die, the same water arrests their

putrefaction. But, as a general rule, no such accumulation of peat can take place in a country like that of Virginia, where the summer's heat causes annually as large a quantity of dead plants to decay as is equal in amount to the vegetable matter produced in one year.

There are many trees and shrubs in the region of the Pine Barrens (and the same may be said of the United States generally) which, like our willows, flourish luxuriantly in water. The juniper trees, or white cedar (Cupressus thyoides), stand firmly in the softest part of the quagmire, supported by their long tap-roots, and afford, with many other evergreens, a dark shade, under which a multitude of ferns, reeds, and shrubs, from nine to eighteen feet high, and a thick carpet of mosses, four or five inches high, spring up, and are protected from the rays of the sun. When these are most powerful, the large cedar (Cupressus districha), and many other deciduous trees, are in full leaf. The black soil formed beneath this shade, to which the mosses and the leaves make annual additions, does not perfectly resemble the peat of Europe, most of the plants being so decayed as to leave little more than soft black mud, without any traces of organization. This loose soil is called sponge by the labourers: and it has been ascertained that, when exposed to the sun, and thrown out on the bank of a canal, where clearings have been made, it rots entirely away. Hence it is evident that it owes its preservation in the swamp to moisture and the shade of the dense foliage. The evaporation continually going on in the wet spongy soil during summer cools the air and generates a temperature resembling that of a more northern climate, or a region more elevated above the level of the sea.

Numerous trunks of large and tall trees lie buried in the black mire of the morass. In so loose a soil they are easily overthrown by winds, and nearly as many have been found lying beneath the surface of the peaty soil, as standing erect upon it. When thrown down, they are soon covered by water, and keeping wet, they never decompose, except the sap-wood, which is less than an inch thick. Much of the timber is obtained by sounding a foot or two below the surface, and it is sawn into planks while half under water.

The Great Dismal has been described as being highest towards its centre. Here, however, there is an extensive lake of an oval form, seven miles long and more than five wide, the depth, where greatest, fifteen feet; and its bottom, consisting of mud like the swamp, but sometimes with a pure white sand, a foot deep, covering the mud. The water is transparent, though tinged of a pale brown colour, like that of our peatmosses, and contains abundance of fish. This sheet of water is usually even with its banks, on which a thick and tall forest grows. There is no beach, for the bank sinks perpendicularly, so that if the waters are lowered several feet, it makes no alteration in the breadth of the lake.

Much timber has been cut down and carried out from the swamp by means of canals, which are perfectly straight for long distances, with the trees on each side arching over, and almost joining their branches across, so that they throw a dark shade on the water, which of itself looks black, being coloured as before mentioned. When the boats emerge from the gloom of these avenues into the lake, the scene is said to be "as beautiful as fairy land."

The bears inhabiting the swamp climb trees in search of acorns and gum-berries, breaking off large boughs of the oaks in order to draw the acorns near to them. These same bears are said to kill hogs, and even COWS. There are also wild cats, and occasionally a solitary wolf, in the

morass.

That the ancient seams of coal were produced for the most part by terrestrial plants of all sizes, not drifted but growing on the spot, is a theory more and more generally adopted in modern times; and the growth of what is called sponge in such a swamp, and in such a climate as the Great Dismal, already covering so many square miles of a low level region, bordering the sea, and capable of spreading itself indefinitely over the adjacent country, helps us greatly to conceive the manner in which the coal of the ancient carboniferous rocks may have been formed. The heat, perhaps, may not have been excessive when the coal measures originated, but the entire absence of frost, with a warm and damp atmosphere, may have enabled tropical forms to flourish in latitudes far distant from the line. Huge swamps in a rainy climate, standing above the level of the surrounding firm land, and supporting a dense forest, may have spread far and wide, invading the plains, like some European peat-mosses when they burst, and the frequent submergence of these masses of vegetable matter beneath seas or estuaries, as often as the land sank down during subterranean movements, may have given rise to the deposition of strata of mud, sand, or limestone, immediately upon the vegetable matter. The conversion of successive surfaces into dry land, where other swamps supporting trees may have formed, might give origin to a continued series of coal measures of great thickness. In some kinds of coal the vegetable texture is apparent throughout under the microscope; in others, it has only partially disappeared; but even in this coal, the flattened trunks of trees of the genera Lepidodendron Sigillaria, and others, converted into pure coal, are occasionally met with, and erect fossil trees are observed in the overlying strata, terminating downwards in seams of coal.

125. THE CHEMICAL PHILOSOPHER.

SIR H. DAVY.

The Unknown.-Persons in general look at the magnificent fabric of civilized society as the result of the accumulated labour, ingenuity, and

enterprise of man through a long course of ages, without attempting to define what has been owing to the different branches of human industry and science; and usually attribute to politicians, statesmen, and warriors, a much greater share than really belongs to them in the work;-what they have done is in reality little. The beginning of civilization is the discovery of some useful arts by which men acquire property, comforts, or luxuries. The necessity or desire of preserving them leads to laws and social institutions. The discovery of peculiar arts gives superiority to particular nations; and the love of power induces them to employ this superiority to subjugate other nations who learn their arts, and ultimately adopt their manners;—so that in reality the origin, as well as the progress and improvement of civil society, is founded in mechanical and chemical inventions. No people have ever arrived at any degree of perfection in their institutions who have not possessed in a high degree the useful and refined arts. The comparison of savage and civilized man, in fact, demonstrates the triumph of chemical and mechanical philosophy as the causes not only of the physical, but ultimately even of moral improvement. Look at the condition of man in the lowest state in which we are acquainted with him. Take the native of New Holland, advanced only a few steps above the animal creation, and that principally by the use of fire; naked, defending himself against wild beasts, or killing them for food only by weapons made of wood hardened in the fire, or pointed with stones or fish-bones; living only in holes dug out of the earth, or in huts rudely constructed of a few branches of trees covered with grass: having no approach to the enjoyment of luxuries or even comforts; unable to provide for his most pressing wants; having a language scarcely articulate, relating only to the great objects of Nature, or to his most pressing necessities or desires, and living solitary or in single families; unacquainted with religion, government or laws, submitted to the mercies of Nature or the elements. How different is man in his highest state of cultivation! every part of his body covered with the products of different chemical and mechanical arts, made not only useful in protecting him from the inclemency of the seasons, but combined in forms of beauty and variety; creating out of the dust of the earth, from the clay under his feet, instruments of use and ornament; extracting metals from the rude ore, and giving to them a hundred different shapes for a thousand different purposes; selecting and improving the vegetable productions with which he covers the earth; not only subduing but taming and domesticating the wildest, the fleetest, and the strongest inhabitants of the wood, the mountain, and the air; making the winds carry him on every part of the immense ocean; and compelling the elements of air, water, and even fire as it were to labour for him; concentrating in small space materials which act as the thunderbolt, and directing their energies so as to destroy at immense