The Sun.
London, England, 1836-11-02 00:00:00

3H MARKETS.
TE tbr the WEEK ENDING OCT. 28.

(From the Macclesfield Courier of Saturday.)
It is our duty to relate a most distressing case of that
Most atvftil thaladt td *bleb human nature is subject—hy-
drophobia) *hid-1 has deettricd in this neightiatirtotkl doting
the present week.
On Monday last a son of Mr. Priestrieii; d eePectable
farther at Batley; near this town, about thirteen yeaA of
age, a fin@ Lima!), as taken ill at school with a gene-
ral fever and difitculty of SMilidifinel On his return home
in the evening, his parents engaged the attendance of Mr.
Nightingale; of Wilmslow, surgeon, but no appreti@tins
of hydrophobia being entertained, the case was treated as
one of hysteria, until the follotcing morning, when Mr.
Bland, of Macclesfield, also saw the boy, and the symp-
toms were then such as to leave no doubt on has mind
that the patient was labouring under a decided attuclt
of hydrophobia. The boy wag able to swallow, but not
without great effort ; he complained of flinch confu-
sion in his head, and after taking any fluid, hid erg
became glaring and very prominent, with an appearance
of obliquity of vision. A large numb•.:r of leeches were
immediately applied at the back of the neek, and slight
opiates administered. In the evening he expressed him-
self greatly relieved by this treatment, but the diffi-
culty of swallowing had become increased ; and the slight-
est noise, or the appearance of water, or the approach of
a candle near him, threw him into dreadful convulsions ; he
•became- gradually worse during the night, and in his con-
scious intervals he frequently requested his parents, who at-
tended him with the utmost anxiety, and whose agonised
feelings cannet be described, and the other persons wliO
came near his bed, not to approach too near him lest he
might bite them, almost immediately afterwards attempting
to do so, during the paroxysms of his dreadful malady, On
the following morning, he was visited by Mr. Nightingale,
Mr. Fleet, Mr. Lallemand, and Mr, Bland, who, in con-
sultation, deemed the case utterly beyond the reach of me-
dical skill, the poor boy remaining in a state of almost Unin-
terrupted convulsions, accompanied with violent struggling,
requiring the united efforts of several persons to restrain
him from doingc, injury to himself or those about him, the
saliva issuing from his mouth in considerable quatitltiet,
He continued in this deplorable state until the afternoon of
Wednesday, when death terminated the excruciating ago-
nies which the poor boy endured, in about 48 hours from
his first attack.
The cause which led to this melancholy, and to those who
witnessed the case most heartrending event, was simply, we
are informed, as follows :—About four months ago young
Priestnall, in his rambles in the country, met a strange dog
near a brook, and with boy-like mischief endeavoured to
force the dog into the water ; it however turned upon him
and bit him very slightly (a mere scratch) on the back of
his left hand, but the wound was so trifling, that he did
not make the occurrence known at the time. The dog
was, however, soon afterwards seen by other persons, and
suspicions of its being in a state of madness arising, it was
pursued and killed near Dean-row. It would appear that
the poor boy had afterwards some apprehensions of danger,
from the circumstance that on seeing a book at school that
treated on the subject of canine madness, he paid much at-
tention to it, and, in the interval of his convulsions, he
inquired from the medical gentleman whether excision of the
part, or the amputation of his limb, would not be desirable,
adding, that he had read of it in a book at school. The
fatal virus had however been then ton deeply imbibed in
the system to allow of the possibility of success from the
remedy the poor boy suggested. Whilst yet the deadly
malady was working its fatal progress there were intervals
of consciousness. On one occasion, when he heard it in-
cidentally mentioned that the night was very fine and light,
and the moon at the full, he started up and exclaimed,
" Ah, people go mad at the full of the moon !" and was in-
stantly seized with violent convulsions.
The melancholy event has occasioned a considerable
sensation in the neighbourhood of its occurrence, and much
sympathy is manifested towards the distressed parents.

WASHINGTON IRVING'S NEW WORK, " As.
TORIA."-" In the course of occasional visits to Canada
many years since," observes Washington Irving in the pre-
face to this charming work, which every one must read, and
which will render even the author of " The Sketch Book"
more popular, " I became intimately acquainted with some
of the principal partners of the North-West Fur Company,
who, at that time, lived in genial style at Montreal, and
kept almost open house for the stranger. At their hospi-
table board I met with men who had passed years remote
from civilized society, among distant and savage tribes, and
who had wonders to recount of their wide and wild peregri-
nations, their hunting exploits, and their perilous adven-
tures and hair-breadth escapes among the Indians. I was
at an age when the imagination lends its colouring to every
thing, and the stories of these Sinbads of the Wilderness
made the life of a trapper perfect romance to me.
From those early impressions, the grand enterprises of the
great Fur Companies, and the hazardous errantry of their
associates in the wild parts of the vast continent of America,
have always been themes of charmed interest to me."
" Astoria" comprises various expeditions and adventures by
land and sea. The facts, however, will prove to be linked
and banded together by one grand scheme, devised and
conducted by a master-spirit ; one set of characters, also,
continues throughout, and the whole enterprise winds up by
a regular catastrophe ; so that the work, without any la-
boured attempt at artificial construction, actually possesses
much of that unity always sought after in works of fiction.

" Astoria," is, incieed, a romance of real life.

GAMING HOUSES.—To the disgrace of the magis-
terial and parochial authorities of Westminster, and more
particularly of St. James and St. Martin, not only are the
numerous gaming houses with which that part abounds, al-
lowed to carry on their illicit pursuits at all hours of the
day and night, but even to desecrate the Sabbath, when
their avocations are as extensively carried on as during the
rest of the week. There are no less than seven of these
dens of plunder in the Quadrant, in Regent-street, the doors
of which stand invitingly open until four or five o'clock every
morning, to entrap the unwary ; and no distinction is made
on that day, the due protection of which is called for, both
by the laws of God and man. The moral consequences of
this unhallowed desecration are obvious, by affording an op-
portunity of indulgence in this ruinous vice to young men,
whose commercial pursuits prevent their attendance at any
oth2r time, and of whom the majority of visitors on such
occasions is composed. The sole protection of the laws
for the observance of the Sabbath, seems confined to a cru-
sade against the comparatively harmless venders of fruit in
streois, whilst these dens of infamy are allowed to exist per-
fectly uncontrolled, and even unheeded. At some of the
low hells in the neighbourhood of Leicester-square, even
sums as small as copper are staked.

WOMAN'S LOVE.—How extremely chaste is the
following aphorism which Mr. James, the author of " The
Gypsy," " John Marston Hall," &c., introduces in one of
the episodes of " The Desultory Man," his last new novel :
Women are taught to keep their affection, like a rare
gem, hidden from all eyes, in the casket of their heart ; and
it is not till, by some mishap, the key is lost or stolen, that
man finds what a treasure there is within."
LONDON STREETS.—It has been said of John
Bull that he is at once the busiest and the idlest animal in
creation. Look at any of the great London thoroughfares ;
a stream of human kind pours through it so rapid, so full,
and so continuous, that the true wonder is where it all comes
from. But all is business : every step is hot and hurrying,
if a moment's delay were a thing of fate ; every face is
full of something to be done ; and every gesture is en
avant. How different all this is from the tardy look of
life in every other part of the globe, all their visitants
know. How long is it before we shall see a range of
chairs posted rank and file in Cheapside and Cornhill, each
containing its lounger, male or female, quietly displaying
their own graces, or examining, with glass at eye or gob-
let of orgeat at lip, the shapes and costumes of the pass-
ing genevxtion ! Yet Paris, too, is a stirring spot, and an
absolute mart—an operarium to the whole tribe of the
towns of Italy and the Peninsula. Yet a dead dog, a
fallen horse, two brats quarrelling, a detected pickpocket,
or a pair of pigeons flirting on a house-top, will chetk the
whole London torrent at once, fix every eye, and arrest
every footstep, till the spell is broken ; the whole frozen
tide is thawed again.—Blackwood for October.
Died, on the 31st of July, on his passage to Eng-
land, between the Cape of Good Hope and St. Helena,
William Hawkins, Esq., in the 78th year of his age, second
son of James, late Lord Bishop of Itaphoe, and eldest bro-
ther of Admiral Sir James Hawkins Whitshed, Bart.,
G.C.B. Mr. Wm. Hawkins had been in the East India
Company's Madras Civil Service in various and important
capacities since the year 1776, and for the last 13 years had
been their resident agent at the Cape. On the 12th of
August, his remains were deposited at St. Helena, where
the voluntary and marlzed demonstrations of respect and re-
gard for his upright, honourable character, paid him both by
;on in which he was held by all ranks, as
the military and civil_ service, unequivocally testify the high
and general estimr,ci
that noblest wo• ;It of God—" an honest man?'