The mischiefs arising from the bad custom of many people swallowing the stones of plums and other fruit are very great. In the _Philosophical Transactions_, No. 282, there is an account of a woman who suffered violent pains in her bowels for thirty years, returning once in a month, or less, owing to a plum-stone which had lodged; which, after various operations, was extracted. There is likewise an account of a man, who dying of an incurable colic, which had tormented him many years, and baffled the effects of medicine, was opened after his death, and in his bowels was found the cause of his distemper, which was a ball, composed of tough and hard matter, resembling a stone, being six inches in circumference, when measured, and weighing an ounce and a half; in the centre of this there was found the stone of a common plum. These instances sufficiently prove the folly of that common opinion, that the stones of fruits are wholesome. Cherry-stones, swallowed in great quantities, have occasioned the death of many people; and there have been instances even of the seeds of strawberries, and kernels of nuts, collected into a lump in the bowels, and causing violent disorders, which could never be cured till they were carried off. P.T.W. * * * * * THE NIGHTINGALE, BY THE AUTHOR OF "AHAB." (_For the Mirror_.) In the low dingle sings the nightingale. And echo answers; all beside is still. The breeze is gone to fill some distant sail, And on the sand to sleep has sunk the rill. The blackbird and the thrush have sought the vale. And the lark soars no more above the hill, For the broad sun is up all hotly pale, And in my reins I feel his parching thrill. Hark! how each note, so beautifully clear, So soft, so sweetly mellow, rings around. Then faintly dies away upon the ear, That fondly vibrates to the fading sound. Poor bird, thou sing'st, the thorn within thy heart, And I from sorrows, that will not depart. S.P.J. * * * * * SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS * * * * * A NIGHT ATTACK.