A FRAGMENT ON THE CULTIVATION AND IMPROVEMENT OF THE ANIMAL SPIRITS.—It is surprising to see for what foolish causes men hang themselves. The most silly repulse, the most trifling ruffle of temper, or derangement of stomach, anything seems to justify an appeal to the razor or the cord. I have a contempt for persons who destroy themselves. Live on, and look evil in the face; walk up to it, and you will find it less than you imagined, and often you will not find it at all; for it will recede as you advance. Any fool may be a suicide. When you are in a melancholy fit first suspect the body, appeal to rhubarb and calomel, and send for the apothecary; a little bit of gristle sticking in the wrong place, an untimely consumption of custard, excessive gooseberries, often cover the mind with clouds and bring on the most distressing views of human life.… The greatest happiness which can happen to any one is to cultivate a love of reading. Study is often dull because it is improperly managed. I make no apology for speaking of myself, for as I write anonymously, nobody knows who I am, and if I did not, very few would be the wiser—but every man speaks more firmly when he speaks from his own experience. I read four books at a time; some classical book, perhaps, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. The “History of France,” we will say, on the evenings of the same days. On Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, Mosheim or Lardner, and on the evenings of those days, Reynolds’s Lectures or Burns’s Travels. Then I have always a standard book of poetry, and a novel to read when I am in the humor to read nothing else. Then I translate some French into English one day and retranslate it the next; so that I have seven or eight pursuits going on at the same time, and this produces the cheerfulness of diversity, and avoids that gloom which proceeds from hanging a long while over a single book. I do not recommend this as a receipt for becoming a learned man, but for becoming a cheerful one.—_From Reid’s “Life and Times of the Rev. Sydney Smith.”_ * * * * * SCENES ON A STAGE COACH.—The views of the mountains as the afternoon wore away, grew more and more interesting. The ravines darkened, the summits brightened. Cloud-shadows chased each other up and down the steeps, or, flitting slowly across the valley, spread thick mantles of black that seemed to deaden the sound of our wheels as we passed over them. On one side all was light, on the other all gloom. But the landscape is not all that may be seen to advantage from the top of a stage coach. From time to time, as something provoked an exclamation of surprise or pleasure, certain of the inside occupants manifested open discontent. They were losing something where they had expected to see everything.