The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-09-13 00:00:00

VARIETIES.

THERE is a man out west who is so bent upon accom
plishing his purpose that he has become hunchbacked.
GENIUS unexerted is no more genius than a bushel
of acorns is a forest of oaks.
A Goon WORKMAN WANTED.—He must be able to

rivet the attention," must understand how to join " a
broken rest," be able to " sharpen the understanding,"
and to bring rambling argumentsff "to the point." Any
" old file" having a few wise saws," will probably suit.
Persons used to "vice" need not apply.
EVEEY FAMILY at Matagorda, Texas, can have a salt
water bath on their own premises. Under the city, at a
depth of about eight feet, is a stratum vein of saline
water, and clear as rock crystal. Almost every house-
holder has dug a well, inserted a chain pump, and erected
a small bath horse in his own garden.
CHARACTERISTIC CANT OP THE AGE.—We live in an
age of universal cant, and I swallow all your shams on
the easy condition that you swear to mine ; and whenever
I hear people praising the present age, and extolling its
wonderful progress, and all that, I just think of all the
quackery I see advertised in the newspapers, and sigh
heartily to myself at our degradation ! Why, man, the
" Patent Pills, for the cure of Cancer," and the Agape-
mone, would disgrace the middle ages. And it is not a
little remarkable that England—so prone to place herself
at the head of civilisation—is exactly the very metropolis
of all this humbug !—Dodd Family Abroad.
YOUNG PEOPLE have an astonishing craze for every-
thing that can bear the name of multum in parvo :—a
knife with a dozen blades of different design ; a stick that
is at once a staff, a whistle, a telescope, a toasting-fork,
an eel-spear, and a yard-measure ; a pencilcase that has as
many contrivances in it as there are colours in a pencil of
light ; a penholder, a toothpick, a seal, a sovereign-gunge,
and a letter-weight ; last, not least, a theory of universal
appliance. The world is all before them ; they have much
to learn ; they entertain a vast admiration for the man
who can supply them with quintessences.—Hogg's In-
structor.

CUVIER AND SATAN.-In the Gentleman's Magazine,
for this month, an article called " Traits of the Trappists,"
and bearing the signature of "John Doran," concludes
with a characteristic anecdote of Cuvier. He once saw in
his sleep the popular representation of Satan advancing
towards him, and threatening to eat him. " Eat me !"
exclaimed the philosopher, as he examined the fiend with
the eye of a naturalist, and then added, " Horns ? hoofs ?
graminivorous ! Needn't be afraid of him !" This might
be made applicable to the threatenings of some of Satan's
friends in the Popish community levelled against the Pro-
testant Church, which knows, also, how to value their
menaces.-Church and State Gazette.
A DAGUERREOTYPE OF SYDNEY. - The streets of
London are said to be paved with gold. The streets of
Sydney are slabbered with slush. The principal thorough-
fares are in a most filthy state, and the pavements are still
worse, because, besides being filthy, they are absolutely
dangerous. In the parts where there are pavements,
those pavements are generally in a very dilapidated state,
whilst other portions of the pavement are repaired with a
slippery substance, on which people may be seen sliding
and slipping, unless they prefer going into the street to
avoid the dangers of the footpaths. The attention of the
proper authorities requires to be attracted to the state of
the lightning conductor at the powder magazine on the
Flagstaff-hill, in Fort-street. The conductor is led over
the roof of the magazine, being supported upon several
small chocks of wood, and at the gable end, facing Miller's
Point, the chocks have fallen away, so that the rod actually
lays upon the gable end of the building, which might have
the effect, in a heavy lightning storm, to set the magazines
on fire-a blow up not to be desired by the residents in
Fort-street. Altogether the way in which the rod is laid
along the chocks seems a very rude idea in these days of
advancement.-Sydney Empire.
SIWESPEARE PILGRIM s.-A curious statement has just
been prepared of the number and nations of the several
visitors to Shakspeare's house, at Stratford-upon-Avon.
The statement has been compiled from the signatures of
the parties themselves ; and for the period from the Ist of
May, 1851, to the 30th of April, 1852, the total number is
2,216 ; and of these, England furnished 1,642, Scotland 58,
Ireland 9, United States 444, East Indies 1, Australia 3,
Brazils 5, Germany 18, Channel Islands 1, Hungary 3,
Switzerland 2, California 2, France 4, New Zealand 1,
Italy 3, Newfoundland 1, South America 1, Russia 2, Swe-
den 1, Mauritius 1, Cape of Good Hope 2, Canada 1, Hol-
land 3, Finland 1, Bagdad 1, Madeira 1, Belgium 1, Austria
4. For a like period, from the Ist of May, 1852, to the
30th of April, 1853, the return shows a slight increase, the
total being 2,821 :-England 1,898, Scotland 4, Ireland 14,
United States 306, Australia and New Zealand 8, South
America 4, France 12, Egypt 1, Switzerland 5, Cape of
Good Hope, 1, Germany 8, East Indies 3, Hungary 2,
Islands of South Pacific, 1, Russia 3, Canada 5, Silesia 1,
California 1, Turkey 1, China 2, West Indies 1, Spain 3.
Jonathan, it will be seen, considering the distance at which
he lives from the poet's house, is about as great a Shaks-
peare worshipper as John Bull himself.---Athenceum.
FOREIGN COMPLAISANCE.-Ask what you will of a
foreigner, be it an inquiry into the financial condition of
his country, its military resources, prison discipline, law,
or religion, he'll never acknowledge his inability to an-
swer, but give you a full and ready reply with facts, dates,
and data, all in most admirable order. At first you are
overjoyed with such ready sources of knowledge. You
flatter yourself that even with the most moderate oppor-
tunities you cannot fail to learn much ; by degrees, how-
ever, you discover errors in your statistics, and at last,
you come to find out that your accomplished friend, too
polite to deny you a reasonable gratification, had gone to
the pains of inventing a code, a church, and a coinage for
your sole use and benefit, but without the slightest inten-
tion of misleading, for it never once entered his head that
you could possibly believe him ! I know it will sound
badly ; I am well aware of the shock it will give to many
a nervous system ; but for all that I will not blink the
declaration-which I desire to record as formally and as
flatly as I am capable of expressing it-which is, that of
one hundred statements an Englishman accepts and re-
lies upon abroad, as matter of fact, ninety-nine are un-
true. Full fifty being lies by premeditation, thirty by ig-
norance, ten by accident or inattention, and the remainder,

if there be a Balance, for I'm bad at figures, from any
other cause you like.—Dodd Family Abroad.
INTEREST IN FAVOUR OF YOUTH.—Never at any for-
mer period of our history has the child-life been magnified
into such importance in the pages of literature, and in the
eyes of thinking men. Look at the last novel : the first
volume is a minute analysis of childish experience. Look
at the innumerable schemes of education ; think of the
esteem in which the teacher of youth is now held ; think
of the host of books composed expressly for children, ser-
mons for schools, manuals of devotion ; the man who
overthrew ancient history, writing Greek legends for his
grandson, the most popular author of the day penning a
" Child's History of England;" a veritable Archbishop
inditing " Easy Lessons on Reasoning," and " Easy' Les-
sons on Money Matters.' It is the mark of a missionary
epoch, dissatisfied with the past, and doubtful of the pre-
sent, but having in hope, and better than hope—expecta-
tion. And no one, certainly no statesman, represents this
tendency more strikingly than Mr. Disraeli. His mind is
singularly well balanced in the regard which it bestows
alike on the past, the present, and the 'future. He is ab-
solutely unrivalled for the intensity of his gaze, and the
depth of his insight into the secrets of the future. Pro-
phecy, fortune-telling, astrology,. soothsaying—call it what
you will—this fascinated gazing into the future as into the
eye of a basilisk, is a part of his oriental heritage; as, in
like manner, also, and as the natural effect of it, is the
warmth of his interest in the possibilities of youth. Where
do we find such biographies of youth as in the Hebrew
Scriptures ? It is because youth is in the season of pro-
mise, and because of the many senses in which the child
is the father of the man, none is more often true than
this, that the achievements of the man are but the schemes
of the stripling.--Hogg's Instructor.
SEVILLE AND ITS INITABITANTS.—SeViIIe is situated
on the banks of the Guadalquiver, in a large plain, whence
it derives its name of Hispalis, which, in Carthagenian,
means a fiat piece of ground, if we may believe Arias
Montano and Samuel Bockhart. It is a vast, straggling
town, of very recent date, gay, smiling, and animated,
and must really appear a charming place to Spaniards.
It would be impossible to find a more striking contrast
to Cordova. The town of Cordova is dead : it is an os-
suary, a catacomb in the open air, on which neglect is
slowly sprinkling its white dust ; the few inhabitants you
meet at the corners of the streets look like apparitions
that have mistaken the hour. Seville, on the contrary, is
full of the petulance and busy hum of life ; the sound of
gaiety floats over her at every instant of the day ; she
hardly allows herself time to take her siesta. She cares
little for yesterday, and still less for to-morrow ; she exists
altogether for the present. Memory and hope are the
consolation of those who are unhappy, and Seville is
happy. She enjoys herself, while her sister, Cordova,
wrapt in silence and solitude, appears to be dreaming
mournfully of Abdoraman —of the great captain and all
his departed glories, brilliant meteors in the nights of the
past, while all she now possesses are ashes. To the great
disappointment of travellers and antiquarians, whitewash
reigns supreme at Seville ; the houses have a new coat of
it three or four times a year ; this gives them a look of
cleanness and neatness, but effectually prevents any hives-
tigation of the remains of the Arabic or Gothic sculptures
which formerly adorned the place. Nothing can be less
varied than this network of streets, where the eye sees
but two tints—the indigo of the sky, and the chalky
white of the walls, on which the azure shadows of
the neighbouring buildings are thrown ; for in warm
countries the shadows are blue instead of being grey, so
that the objects appear to be lighted up on one side by
the moon, and on the other side by the sun ; the absence,
however, of all sombre tints produces a general appearance
of life and gaiety. Doorways closed by iron gates allow
you to look through and see the patios ornamented with
columns, mosaic pavement, fountains, flower-pots, shrubs,
and pictures. As regards the external architecture, it
offers no particularly remarkable features ; the houses are
rarely more than two or three stories high, and you hardly
meet with a dozen facades that are interesting in an ar-
tistic point of view. The streets are paved, like those of
all Spanish towns, with small pebbles ; but, on each side,
there is a kind f pavement consisting of tolerably large
flat stones, on which the crowd walks in single file. If a
man and woman meet, the man always makes way for the
woman with that exquisite politeness which is natural to
Spaniards, even of the very lowest classes. The women
of Seville quite, deserve the reputation for beauty which
they enjoy ; they are almost all alike, as is always the
case in pure races of a well-defined type ; their long eyes,
opening to the temples, and fringed with long brown
lashes, produce an effect of black and white, which is un-
known in France. When a woman or young girl passes
you, she slowly drops her eyelids, and then suddenly opens
them again, shoots at you a look so searching that you are
perfectly unable to bear it, rolls the pupil of her eye, and
then again drops the lashes over them. The Bay-
adere Amany, when dancing the Pas des Colombes, was
the only person who could convey the slightest notion of
the murderous glances which the east has bequeathed to
Spain ; we have no terms to express this play of the eyes ;
the word ojear is wanting in our vocabulary. These
glances, which are so full of vivid, sudden brilliancy, and
which almost embarrass strangers, have, however, no par-
ticular signification, and are cast upon the first object
that presents itself ; a young Andalusian girl will look
with the same passionate expression at a cart passing by,
a dog running after its tail, or a, group of children play-
ing at bullfights. The eyes of the people of the north
are dull and, meaningless in comparison ; the sun has,
never left its reflection in them.—Gautier's Wanderings
in Spain.

THE LIVERPOOL

HE UNruNc

AL WOMAN', like t

it time, inter-

becomes disliked, beca
feres with our plans, causes uneasy feelings, and 17
tells us we are not of sufficient importance to make h(
more prompt. To the business man time is money, and
to the business woman it is more—it is peace, comfort,
and domestic prosperity.
ADVICE TO A BRIDE.—I beg to remind my new,daugh-
ter that the husband has in his daily avocations a thousand
elements of disturbance to which the wife is an utter
stranger ; and it will be her privilege, and her title to the
respect of all whose respect is worth having, to make his
own fireside the most attractive place in the universe for
the calm repose of a weary body or excited mind.
VITALITY OF EGGS.—It is well known that eggs will
keep a considerable time in Milk of lime or other means
of entirely excluding the atmosphere : and we have an ac-
count of some, dug out of an old wall of a sacristy near
Lago Maggiore, quite sound after having been encased
there 300 years. It becomes then a curious inquiry, how
long the productive vitality of the eggs can exist in this
state of atmospheric exclusion—whether they retain it,
like toads, snakes, and cold-blooded animals, sometimes
found in solid stone ? Can any of your readers give or
refer us to any instances, respondent to the question ?
J. Prideaux.
THE MlsAppLicAnox of English words by foreigners is
often very ludicrous. A German friend saluted us once
with, " Oh, good-bye, good-bye"—meaning of course,

" How d'ye do ?" It is said that Dr. Chalmers once en-
tertained a distinguished guest from Switzerland, whom
he asked if he would be helped to kippered salmon. The
foreign divine asking the meaning of the uncouth word
kippered, and was told that it meant preserved. The
poor man in a public prayer soon after offered a petition
that the distinguished divine might long be " kippered to
the Free Church of,Scotland."

A CONVENIENT AURA.NGEMENT.—At the recent cap-
ture of Amoy the four city gates were thrown open.
Through three of them the " patriot army" entered, and
took possession of the town, while the fourth was left open
for the accommodation of the Tartar officers, in case they
should be of opinion that—

lie who fights and runs away,
May live to fight another day.

The convenience of this arrangement so forcibly struck the
Mandarins, that they evacuated the town without further
ado.

__STATE OF SCULPTURE IN ENGLIED.-It has been said,
writes " a Working Sculptor," that sculpture can scarcely
sustain itself in England, that it is an art not suited to
the English taste, and which never can flourish here.
That it is at a very low ebb is very evident from the
amount of talent and labour in the market unemployed,
or not employed as it ought to be. Much is said about art
education, and training men to a high pitch of perfection,
so that they may be able to carry out designs properly ;
but the matter is not considered with that regard to truth
and right which should influence our reasonings. What
is the use of stocking the market with that which no one
will purchase ? Where are your buyers of art-labour ? Do
they exist in sufficient numbers, and do they know how to
buy in the best market,? In a word, have our aristocracy
a sufficient knowledge of art to enable them to judge
whether a piece of sculpture be good or bad ? I see enough
of them to know that very few of them have this knowledge.
What can be a better proof of this than the fact that
hundreds of figures are yearly imported from the continent,
and eagerly bought, which are a disgrace to the maker and
the buyer Schools should be established

for the education of the sons of the aristocracy in
the true principles of art, which principles are to be
found in Greek art and in the works of Flaxman. When
they have formed their taste they will find that there are
men to execute designs in England, and that she stands at
the head of the world so far as sculpture is concerned.—
The Builder.
HAYDON PAINTING CLABKSON, THE PHILANTHROPIST.
—Found the dear old man at tea with his niece and wife,
looking much better than when in town, Playford is a
fine old building : 1593 the last date, but must he much
older they say. It is surrounded by a moat, with running
water. Clarkson has a head like a patriarch, and in his
prime must have been a noble figure. He was very happy
to see me ; but there is a nervous irritability which is
peculiar. He lives too much with adorers, especially
women. As he seemed impatient at my staying beyond
a certain time, I went to bed, and wished him good night.
I slept well, rand the next morning walked in the garden
and fields. He breakfasted on milk and bread, (alone,)
and I breakfasted with Mrs. T. Clarkson up-stairs, I
promised to sketch him at ten, and at ten I was ready.
When all was ready, the windows fitted, he said,
" Call in the maids." In came six servant girls, and.
washerwomen (it being washing-day.) " I am deter-
mined they shall see the first stroke." In they all
crowded, timidly wondering. Clarkson said, " There
now, that is the first stroke ; come again in an hour, and
you shall see the last !" We now began to talk. He
said, " When Christophe's wife aud daughters, all accom-
plished women, were brought or introduced by him to
Wilberforce, and others in high life, there was a sort of
shrink at admitting them into society." I told him I
believed it, because when I resolved to place the African
in front of the picture, on the same level as the Euro-
peans, there was the same delicacy; but I got him, and
put him in at once. Shame prevented remonstrance.—
Life of Haydon, by Taylor.

A 15Ruktives:1nee.:The Boston Courier has the
following curious, although somewhat hyperbolical ac-
count of a tree lately felled about 20 miles from a place
called Murphy's Camp, in California :—" It measures at
the ground 98 feet in circumference, and 85 feet 10 from
the earth, which size it holds for 100 feet. It is 300 feet
high, though the top has been broken off. There are
many trees in this vicinity higher than that, from 50 to
70 feet in cireumference. It is estimated that this tree
would square 25 feet at the butt, and consequently a cut
of 12 feet in length would make 90,000 feet of lumber.
A party of men are now at work in taking off the bark for
60 feet in height, in sections, so that it can be put together
again. It is about one foot in thickness, and will be sent
to the World's Fair, where it will be put up, and have the
California specimens exhibited in it. Thirty feet in
diameter is quite a room, large enough to hold political
mass meetings in just before a presidential election. It is
estimated by those who have counted some of its rings,

that the above-named tree is not less than 6,500 y6iti
old, or 500 years older than this world, according to the
vulgar notion. It must have been something of a tree
when Adam and Eve went round to name the productions
of the forest. Can any one (the American editor con-
tinues) read this story without indignation at such a
stupid act of vandalism P A tree which, from its descrip-
tion, must have been one of the noblest works of nature—
the wonder of the vegetable world—the pride and glory
of the American forest—murdered—we can find no other
appropriate word—that a basket-full of chips may be sent
to a show-shop ! Any man who could have a hand in so
wanton an act of barbarism, deserves to have his shin-
bones made into button-moulds and sold for three cents
a gross."

Tan NORMAN " CONQUEST,"--" I think," says Mr. H.
Duesbury, "it can scarcely be called a conquest in the
usual acceptation of the term, that is, a conquest by a
distinct foreign nation. The early Britons established
themselves in Amorica, the subsequent site of Normandy,
and the Britons, still under the Romans, established a
colony in Bretagne, the adjoining province, now Brittany.
The people to whom Normandy was allotted in 918, were
the same as those to whom Northumbria and E. Anglia
were allotted in 872, and they were invited as mercenaries
in 975. Further, it appears that Ethelred the Unready,
A.D. 978-1016, married Emma, the sister of Richard, Duke
of Normandy, and aunt of the Conqueror ; that he fled to
Normandy, after the Danish revenge, and left his wife and
two sons, Edward and Alfred, there ; that after his death,
Canute, the Dane, married his widow, who still left her
children in Normandy ; that after Canute came the son,
Edward, (called by the priests the " Confessor," and whose
dominion he was entirely under,) who had been reared and
educated in Normandy, and who brought over Norman
priests and favourites to succeed the Saxons. (The Saxon
priests were not over obedient to the Pope : the Normans
were ; so the Pope, after the manner of popes, cursed
Harold and blessed his opponent.) He invited his cousin
William over to see him, and left him his throne by will.
He married the daughter of Earl Godwin, (apparently to
keep the great earl quiet,) and shamefully neglected and
ill-used her ; hence most bitter animosity between the
parties ; and Harold's (the earl's son) seizure of the throne,
after shipwreck on the Norman coast, where he saw
William, who offered him his daughter in marriage and
swore him, not being able to help himself, on a tub full of
the bones of the saints, (probably taken from the nearest
shambles or graveyard,) not to attempt the throne of
England. William seems to have relied, in fact, on his
equally near descent, the will of the late king, and this
oath, to justify his claim. The affair seems to me, I must
confess, to have partaken more of a personal quarrel for
succession than a national conquest. Indeed, the Normans
have scarcely given a name to a single town, river, place,
or district in England ; and, althoukh they introduced their
barbarous French in law language, the tongue of England
(still so called) to this day is essentially Saxon, with a
small proportion of British, Celtic, and Latin left by the
Romans.—The Builder.

Nouns or LA BOITE.—A very mortifying comparison
may be made between the days of actual and of nominal
life, even in the case of the favoured individuals who may
have attained the statutable age of threescore years and
ten. Let us presume that the person in question shall
really be a painstaking, hardworking man, severely intent
upon discharging what middle-aged gentlemen call the
real business of life. He shall rather transact than enjoy
existence, and comport himself in every way as though he
were bound to produce at the end of each day his ap-
pointed piece of work. It would scarcely be too much to
dock off thirty entire years from the tale, for during the
first twenty years of an average Englishman's existence
he is passed from the nurse to the preparatory school,
from this to the grammar-school, and from this again to
college ; and during this period, if he be a painstaking
lad, the most serious occupation of his thoughts is to at-
tain a competent skill in the concoction of Greek lambics,
and an intimate acquaintance with the scansion of Aris-
tophanic choruses, according to the theories of various
German illuminati. We allow the ten years before the
grave for repose and preparation. Forty years remain,
although in how few instances can it be said—in this
country at least—that a young man begins to do man's
work so early in life as at twenty years of age ? However
this may be, the forty years soon become twenty on any
reasonable scale of allowance for sleep, daily ablutions,
spells of illness, and so forth. But to return to the
twenty years of waking life, he is a most remarkable man
indeed who shall spend but one-third of his waking hours
in serious and useful thought. In all probability no man
who has ever lived has done so much as this ;—not Sir
Isaac Newton in the exact sciences—Lord St. Leonard's
in conveyancing lore—James Watt in mechanical inven-
tions—or Walter Scott in poetry and fiction. The pro-
portion is, in truth, disproportionate ; but still, take the
calculation for what it may be worth, and the prodigies of
industry and longevity contrive to devote about six years
and eight months of actual life to business purposes. Of
course, we exclude from our reckoning all shams and
make-believes. Sir Isaac Newton, in his half-hour's
saunter under the pleasant lime-groves of Trinity, is hard
at work, while the man who sits for fourteen hours at a
stretch upon a high stool in an office, frittering away his
time, or waiting upon Providence, is a mere idler. He
has gone to town in the morning with a grave aspect and
with a brown umbrella, and he has penned himself up in
well
elidirt-zany dnetnliffeorhasthewoperkrt:dod named, but at the end of the
time he has not even a hatched egg to show for his pains.
That is a Prodigy whanodinthothuge
ht course oefffaecbr
forg amid
/ears and a half.--The Times