This savage phenomenon was found in the forest of Aveyron, and here his history begins and ends. During the two years of his captivity he has not made any progress in knowledge or speech, and though in the possession of his senses he does not seem to have a human idea. Civil society has no charm for him, and nothing has been known to attract his attention. Every effort has been made to impress him with some kind of sentiment. A good deal has been published respecting this “child of nature,” as he has been foolishly nicknamed by the Parisian wits; and the wretched condition of his mind has furnished several philosophists with arguments in which they have attempted to reason away the understanding and virtue of mankind. But this is a ridiculous mode of reasoning, and what Dr. Paley[1] has said in his _Elements of Moral Philosophy_, respecting Peter the Wild Boy of Germany, may be applied with equal force to the Wild Boy of France. [Sidenote: RENTE VIAGÈRE] The conversations into which I have been led in consequence of my visit to this young savage have been very interesting, chiefly because they were carried on with avowed atheists, members of the National Institute. It is really astonishing to what extremities they push their subtle sophisms; and while they affect to discard everything that is not _material_ and appurtenant to this globe, they are continually soaring _extra flammentia mœnia mundi_. In a solemn discussion I had the other day with a man who is considered one of the first natural philosophers in the world, he told me gravely that Lagrange, Lacroix and several members of the Institute had sent a German to the interior of Africa to request he would make the experiment of uniting an ourang outang to a negro woman, and that he looked forward with eager expectation to the result of these nuptials! Such a project is worthy of the philosophers of the National Institute. XXXVI ECONOMICAL ESTABLISHMENTS. PROGRESSIVE ANNUITY FUND. SOCIETY FOR THE ENCOURAGEMENT OF NATIONAL INDUSTRY