that under Providence I owe the preservation of my life, and my perfect recovery from a dropsical complaint, to the exercise I have thus taken. If I can induce others to follow my example, and derive the like benefit, iny purpose will be answered. Even those who can afford opportunities of taking exercise in the usual way, cannot always command the means. Bad weather, accidents, business, and other circumstances, will sometimes intervene, and prevent this necessary enjoyment. The studious, in particular, require occasional bodily exertion, in order to preserve health. To these the means I have to offer may prove extremely useful. Most of the disorders that afflict the human frame arise from a want of exercise, to promote the necessary secretions, and expel gross humours. Prevention is at all times better than cure. The methods of exercise that I prac. tise are of several kinds : 1. Dumb Sawing. Any person who has seen sawyers at work, in sawing timber into boards, will immediately conceive a proper idea of this exercise. It is done by making a spring on the toes of the feet, without raising them from the ground, at the same time that both arms are thrown hastily forward to their full stretch; the motion being repeated and continued as long as may be thought necessary, or till you require rest. This motion brings every muscle of the body into immediate action; opens the chest; and propels the blood through the vessels with salutary violence, contributing to remove obstructions, and promoting the necessary secretions. In a few moments an agreeable warmth diffuses itself over the whole body, and brings on a gentle perspiration. This exercise should be performed without bending the body, either backward or forward, as all exercise is best taken in an upright position. A space of four feet square is sufficient for this mode of exercise. 2. The Skipping Movement. By seeing young people amuse themselves with a skipping cord, this movement is immediately learnt. It consists in making easy leaps, so that your feet just clear the ground; at the same time that your arms are thrown forward as before, and brought instantly back: repeating the motions, without intermission, till you find yourself tired and reguire a breathing. You may perform this either with or without a skipping cord, as you find most agreeable. 3. The Stroke and Knee Movement. This is performed by making quick and repeated curtseyings, by bending your knees toward the ground, at the same instant making a motion with both arms, and striking them forcibly toward the ground. This puts the whole frame, and almost every sinew, into motion, expels wind, and soon diffuses a grateful warmth through the body. This movement may be made without stirring a step from the place you stand in, and requires no more space than is sufficient to stand upright. 4. The Curved-Knce Movement. This is merely bending the knees alternately, in and out, as far as they will go, with a quick repeated motion, without any curtseying. This movement shakes the body, exercises the ancles, and causes the bowels to rub against each other with a gentle motion, having a great tendency to remove obstructions, and promote the proper discharge of the vessels. Any person, after having been long in a sitting posture, and then standing up, will find that his knees have a spontaneous tendency to this movement, so that this is only improving a natural impulse. These modes of exercise may be varied occasionally to suit circumstances. It is possible that on the first trial, some persons may not find them so pleasant as they expected, and may relinquish them on that account; but persevere, and, after a few trials, you will recur to them with pleasure. No expense, no loss of time worth mentioning, is incurred; as five minutes at once will generally be found sufficient for this kind of exercise, which may be repeated at intervals several times a day. For expelling wind from the sto mach and bowels, I have always found these practices to be the quickest and most effectual methods; and those persons whose ancles and legs are inclined to swell, will find much relief from such means. The warmth to be derived from this species of exercise in cold weather, is most grateful, and far preferable to the warmth gained from a fire. People may sit by a fire in cold weather till they quake; whereas those who use these means a few times a day, will seldom want to court the influence of a fire, This exercise may be enjoyed by both sexes with advantage, and even the blind may partake of it. Lame people, who cannot stand upright, may also enjoy a considerable and useful portion of exercise, by sitting in a chair and striking their arms forcibly and alternately to wards the ground, which will shake their bodies, diffuse an agreeable warmth, and greatly assist the digestion of food. The skipping cord should be introduced and recommended in all boardingschools, as the medium of a most salutary exercise, particularly among young females. It may be made not only a healthful, but graceful exercise, being well calculated to display a light figure to advantage. I have frequently found people complaining of cold feet, before going to bed and after. For myself, I hardly know what it is to have cold feet. This is owing to the exercise I take in the modes here described. If any tendency to coldness in the feet is felt, you will find by following these methods, in less than four minutes, a gemle glow spreading itself through the feet, and all other parts of the body. Another method for preventing cold feet at bed-time is this: Draw off your stockings just before undressing; and rub your ancles and fect with your hand, as hard as you can bear the pressure, for five or ten minutes; and you will never have to complain of cold feet in bed. It is hardly conceivable what a plea surable glow this diffuses. Frequent washing of the feet, and rubbing them thoroughly dry with a linen cloth or flannel, is also very useful. In the eastern countries, the washing of feet is thought extremely salutary, and is a mark of respect usually shewn to strangers. In removing from the feet the accumulating dirt that obstructs the pores, we greatly promote health, by facilitating that emission from them that nature intended, and which, if long obstructed, gives rise to disorders of the legs and lower extremities, that often continue during life. BANBURIENSIS. For the Monthly Magazine. THIN quarto volume, printed in tonometer, (of which a plate is given,) and had it made by an able workman, he says, that he, "after divers trials of strings, pins, &c. strung it with two wire-strings off the same roll, with three moving bridges, and the strings to be wound up with two fine endless screwpins, to the utmost nicety of tuning to any chord or pitch: then I set it to my two-stopped harpsichord, one stop of which tuned the common scale way, the exactest I could; the other stop tuned, according to the nineteen (other) notes, flats or sharps, (which) I wanted more particularly to explain." By help of all these, duly prepared, with an exact broad diagonal scale and large.compasses, did Mr. Warren proceed to compare every note; and thus, says he, "I proceeded to take the exactest number and proportion I could, from the nut to the several two small moving bridges: but," continues he, "I am neither so vain or hardy as to affirm, that I have found and given the very precise number to one or two tenth parts of the 1000." On reading the above, I flattered myself that I should find what I have long been in search of, a careful experiment and calculation for reducing to numbers the thirteen notes of the common scale, as usually tuned, as well as the numbers answering to Mr. Warren's nineteen supplemental notes, as he calls them: I was considerably surprised however, on turning to the last of his tables, to find that the thirty numbers therein given to seven places of figures, are exactly thirty-one geometrical mean proporti onals between five hundred and one thousand; and on turning to Dr. Smith's Harmonics, page 225, I found twenty-one of them to agree with Huygens's monochord numbers there given; and thus it appears that the wonderful discovery which it is the object of this volume to explain, was, without doubt, pirated from Huygens's "Harmonic Cycle," who died thirty years before. Like some of our modern temperers, or musical quacks, this Mr. Warren affects to ridicule what he does not understand, and says that there are not "two sorts. A 1725, was lately put into my hands, of whole tones, major and minor; or three its scale, like that of the Temple church organ. Ambrose Warren, in the volume above quoted, says, that prior to 1683, a Mr. Player had made several harpsichords and spinnets, with some of the short keys divided, to express some of the intermediate notes; and at page 12 he mentions, regulating stops in an organ having been used by some persons, and shifting frets on the lute, viol, &c. by others, for increasing the number of notes above thirteen in the octave, in cluding the repetition of the key-note. Westminster. JOHN FAREY. To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. SIR, HE extraordinary increase within these few years in the number of rabid animals, and the many fatal accidents occasioned by their bite, must render the discovery of a specific for one of the most horrible diseases that can afflict humanity, an object of great and general interest. For this reason, in compliance with the suggestion of your correspondent A. (Number 196, p. 134) I transmit you the passage to which he alludes in Fis cher's animated Picture of Valencia, in which the author gives some account of a remedy that has been administered with signal success in Spain. The cases which are there detailed, bear all the marks of Authenticity; and appear sufficiently strong to induce our medical practitioners to ascertain by actual experiment, the result of this mode of treatment. This is the more desirable, because, if the efficacy of the remedy were estab. lished, the patient would be spared the torment inevitably attending excision, the application of causties, and all the other painful operations at present resorted to. S. IMPORTANT DISCOVERY. "The inhabitants of the district of Hoya de Castalla, in the southern part of the province, possess an excellent remedy against the bite of the viper, composed of the sea-holly (eryngium campestre,) viper's bugloss (echium vulgare,) madwort (alyssum spinosum.) and Cretan balm (melissa Cretica,)* in the following manner: The plants are taken when they are beginning to run to seed, and dried in the shade till all their humidity is • Under this name the plant is described by some botanists, and, among the rest, by Lamarch; but Cavanilles proves, from the structure of the calyx, and other circumstances, that it is properly the nepeta marifolia. bce zinales de Ciencias Naturels, 8vo. 1 evaporated. On this, each is separately pounded: the powder is passed through a hair-sieve, mixed in equal parts, and put away in well-corked bottles. It is to be observed, that none of the roots must be employed except those of the sea-holly, which possess very great strength. 1 "With respect to the use of this remedy, it is indispensably necessary that it should be administered immediately after the infliction of the wound. The com. mon dose for a man is one scruple ; for a dog a drachm: the vehicle used for both, is wine or water." No particular diet need be observed: only the powder must be taken morning and evening for nine days successively. "From time immemorial, the inhabi tants of the above-mentioned district have made use of this powder as a spe cific for the bite of vipers, with universal success; till at length, the celebrated Cavanilles resolved to try its effects against the bites of mad dogs. He lost no time in communicating his ideas to the physicians and medical men in the province, and had the satisfaction to sce that his philanthropic views were pro ductive of the happiest results. "Thus, for instance, at the farm de los Puchols, in the district of the little town of Sierra den Garceran, a man of sixty, named Miguel Puig, and a boy twelve years old, named Vito Sorello, were, in January 1796, bitten, the one on the hand, the other on the cheek, in such a manner that both lost a considerable quantity of blood. The physician of the place, don Blas Sales, was not sent for till three days after the accident: he nevertheless resolved to try the powder, which produced effects that surpassed his expectation. "In fact, the two patients perfectly recovered of the bites, without manifesting the slightest symptoms of hydrophobia till the present time, (1802;) and during an interval of six years, not the least alteration has been observed in their health. The actual madness of the dos seems to have been fully proved; for several goats and sheep, which were like wise bitten by him, died in forty days, with all the signs of the most complete hydrophobia, "In 1799, at the village of Tornesa, in the district of the same town, a man of fifty-five, named Francis Baset, his daughter Manuela Baset, aged twentythree, and another man named Joaquin Fauro, were bitten; the two former on the hand, and the latter on the middle finger. Baset and his daughter immediately applied to don Thomas Sabater, the surgeon of their village, who furnished them with powder sufficient for nine days. On the contrary, Fauro, who lived at another village, looked upon his wound as a mere trifle, and took no further notice of it. "What was the consequence? Baset and his daughter were perfectly cured, and have for these three years experienced not the least alteration in their health; whereas the unfortunate Fauro died sixty days after the accident, with all the symptoms of the most confirmed hy drophobia. Another mad dog in Sierra den Garceran, had bitten several other dogs, pigs, &c. The powder was administered to some of them for cleven successive days; and, till the present moment, during the space of nearly two years, no ill consequences whatever have been observed. All the animals to whour the powder was not given, died raving mad in twenty-five days. "One dog, to whom it was found im possible to administer more than four doses, did not go mad, but fell into a kind of lethargy, and refused to eat; till at length he died on the sixtieth day, but without any of the symptoms of actual hydrophobia. "So much for the experiments with a remedy, which, as far as I know, has never been included among the six or seven medicines for preventing the consequences of the bite of mad dogs. It seeins, however, to be so much the more me desirous, that for less than the value, of one shilling, which the ingredients will cost, the public should be thus put in possession of it : Take of myrrh, coarsely bruised or powdered, half an ounce, put it into a saucepan, or glazed pipkin, sufficiently capacious; and add to the myrth, a pint and a half of cold spring-water, taking care to stir the myrrh well in it before placing it on the fire, to prevent its becoming Tumpy: then put into the above mixture also half an ounce, er three tea-spoonfuls, of pure starch, and three or four pieces of ginger, according to their size. When these ingredients are all stirred together in the fluid, place the saucepan on the fire, and boil them from five to eight minutes, occasionally taking it off to prevent it from boiling over into the fire: let it then be strained hot through a cloth, or sieve, into a bason, and covered over with a plate till cold; then add to it half an ounce of prepared chalk, greally mixed with some of the decoction by means of a large spoon, in a bason or cup; add likewise two or three table-spoonfuls of tincture of rhubarb: then put all into a wine quart, which is to be filled up with peppermint, or plain water, if there be not sufficient of the mixture without. Then take two table-spoonfuls for a dose, two or three times, or ofteneri requisite, a day. Ippollitts. JOHN PROCTER. To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. SIR, TIE ancients were of opinion, that deserving of the attention of the physi-T cians of every country, as its efficacy against the venom of the viper is fully confirmed by the experience of ages.*" crows, having once paired, and had young, are faithful to one another; and that on the death of the one, the other generally lives a solitary life, and not unfrequently dies of vexation. Can any of your intelligent readers say how far this is a fact? I bave the best reason to conclude that geese, having once paired, if left to themselves, continue faithful to one another; a kind of new courtship each spring commencing between the same pair: and that a gander, still alive, his mate having died twenty years ago, still lives a solitary life. JAMES HALL. THE SIR, HE pretensions of judicial astrology as a science, have long since been deservedly exploded. It is not therefore with the remotest view of favouring any popular prejudice as to the possibility of foretelling future events, that I send you the following extract out of an old Latin book on the subject; but merely as an instance of curious, though accidental, anticipation of the character of the present emperor of the French. This tract, printed at Strasburgh in 1663, is entitled, "Joannis abIndagine Introductiones Apotelesmatica;" and, besides astrology, contains treatises also on physiognomy, chiromancy, prognostics of diseases, prognostics of the weather, &c. also on artificial memory-and, amidst a great mass of absurdities on these subjects, contains some well-founded and ingenious observations. In the astrological part, where the influence of the sun is spoken of while in each of the signs of the zodiac, though nothing can be more ridiculous than the application of one kind of character and fortune to every individual born under the same sign, yet the following, given as the character of those born while the sun is in the sign of the Lion, though not quite correct, may perhaps be applied with more propriety to Buonaparte, (certainly the most remarkable person ever born with the sun in that sign) than any of the Philippics or panegyrics of his contemporaries. Napoleon Buonaparte, born 15th August, 1769. SOL IN LEONE. "In Leone natum sol facit magnanimum, audacem, arrogantem, eloquentem, superbum, derisorem, immitem, immise ricordem, durum, inexorabilem, tetricum, undequaque angustiis & periculis maxianis septum. E periculis rursum eximit & officiis prestituit publicis, centurionem facit vel pentacontarchum, e tribus magnatitius beneficia expectantem, infelicem in prolibus et pro iis sustinentem labores et afflictiones multas, ad iram SIR, Isional Education (page 150,) he says. N Mr. Edgeworth's Essays on Profes "A military school should have annual competitions and prizes for foot-races, leaping, wrestling, fencing, and firing at a target; for trials of fortitude as well as of skill and exertion," &c. (page 151.) "If exhibitions of these military games were made in great public theatres, and if the prizes were conferred by a royal or noble, or by some fair and fashionable hand, there can be little doubt but they would tend more than all the precepts of masters, to produce that ardour and am bition which constitute the true military character. All sports, without exception, that promote strength and agility of body, should be encouraged in our military schools; for instance, archery, swimming, hunting, and shooting." I presume Mr. Edgeworth to be a stranger to the Berkshire game of backsword, or single-stick, as it is called in Hants, Wilts, and Somerset, or he would certainly have added it to the martial sports above enumerated; its practice generating, in a superior degree, mental and bodily fortitude, courage, and intres pidity. Those who have witnessed in the west-country fairs the severe contests and struggles at this game, for a prize, generally some paltry hat and ribbon, and have remarked the triumph of the victors, and the interest felt by the spectators, will bear me out in asserting this pastime to be the most lively picture of war extant. |
