He enables others to do a double service to their country, rather than by doing half that service himself, prevent them from doing any. He denies himself one pleasure that his fellow-creatures may have two. He sympathises in the postman's joy at the receipt of twopence, as it brings back old times, and restores to him his youth. He is so anxious to write to those he loves, that the stamp, hastily affixed, comes off in the letter-box. Signing himself "your most obedient humble servant," of course he dares not take the liberty of paying for what _you_ receive. He is married, and leaves it to bachelors to pay _single_ postage. Mark his hand-writing, nevertheless; and when his unpaid epistle arrives, let your answer be, a copy of the "Times," supplement and all, sealed up in an unstamped envelope. FIRST DISCOVERY OF VAN _DEMONS_' LAND. BY CAPTAIN MARRYAT, C. B. The vessel rose upon the mountain waves, with her bowsprit pointing up to the northern star, and then plunged down into the trough of the sea, as if she were diving like the porpoises which played across her bows,--shaking and trembling fore and aft as she chopped through the masses of water which impeded her wild course. Sea after sea struck her on the chesstree or the beam, pouring over her decks and adding to the accumulation of water in her hold. Her sides were without a vestige of paint--her shrouds and standing rigging worn to less than inch-rope; her running rigging as mere threads; the foresail, the only sail set, as thin as gauze. Decay was visible in every part of her; her timbers were like touchwood; even her capstan had half rotted away; and her masts might have proved, if once ashore, a safe asylum to colonies of ants and woodpeckers. How then could a vessel in this forlorn condition continue afloat or contend with so fierce a gale? Because it was the spectre-ship with her spectre-crew; Vanderdecken, in the Flying Dutchman, still contending against the divine fiat, still persevering in his fatal oath--that he would double the Cape. Vanderdecken stood at the break of the weather-gangway with his chief officer, Jansen, by his side. The crew were most of them sheltering themselves under the weather-side of the deck; their large, flat, pale muffin faces sunk down deep in their chests; shoulders, high and bony; their nether garments like bladders half shrunken, as if there was nothing in them. When they shifted from one part of the deck to the other, their broad, flat feet made no sound as they passed along the planks, which were soft as pith. Their dresses were now of the colour of mahogany or chocolate; seaweed was growing here and there on their jackets; and to the seats of their small-clothes, a crop of barnacles had become firmly attached. They all looked melancholy and disheartened; and as they shivered, the rattle of their bones was distinctly to be heard. Vanderdecken put his speaking-trumpet to his lips-- "Another pull of the weather fore-brace," cried he.