"Are all very wonderful, I daresay; but I should like to see the thing with my own eyes. A friend of mine told me, no later than yesterday, that he had been present at a meeting, held in a professional gentleman's house, for the purpose of testing the powers of a lad said to be clair-voyant, who was exhibited by one of those itinerant lecturers. In addition to the usual bandages, of which there was much suspicion, a mask, previously prepared, was put upon the face, so that all deception was impossible. In this state, the boy, though professedly in the mesmeric sleep, could see nothing. He fingered the cards--fumbled with the books--but could read no more than my poodle-dog. In fact, the whole thing was considered by every one present not only a failure, but a rank and palpable sham; and until I have some better evidence in support of these modern miracles, I shall take the liberty of denouncing the system as one of most impudent imposture." "But, my dear fellow, recollect the number of persons of rank and station--the highly intellectual and cultivated minds which have formed a directly opposite opinion. What say you to Van Helmont? What say you to Michael Scott, 'A wizard of such dreaded fame, That when in Salamanca's cave, Him listed his magic wand to wave, The bells would ring in Notre Dame?' What say you to the sympathetic secrets still known to be preserved in the monastery of Mount Carmel? What say you"-- "I say," replied the Jemadar, "that you are beginning to talk most infernal nonsense, and that I must be off, as I have an engagement at three to play a match at billiards. In the meantime, you'll oblige me by settling with Mrs Stewart for the ices." COOKERY AND CIVILISATION.[12] It is only after passing through an ordeal cruelly insidious, tolerably severe, and rather protracted, that we feel conscientiously entitled to assert our ability to dine every day of every week at the Reform Club, without jeopardy to those immutable principles which are incorruptible by Whigs and indestructible by Rats. A sneer, perhaps, is curling with "beautiful disdain" the lips of some Conservative Achilles. Let us nip his complacent sense of invulnerability in the bud. To eat and to err are equally attributes of humanity. Looking at ourselves in the mirror of honest criticism, we behold features as unchangeable as sublunary vicissitudes will allow. "Time writes no wrinkles on our azure brow."