Unable, unfortunately, to treat his read-| ers to glowing descriptions of the Spanish banditti, who seem to have almost vanished from their classical home, Mr. Wallis, in sheer despair, discusses another class who sometimes take life in the pursuit of their avocations. We will quote some of his concluding remarks concerning the medical profession in Malaga.

does not look like one, it will be of no avail for me to say so."

"In the use of leeches to reduce inflammation of the brain, it is customary to apply them, at the lower extremity of the spine; the theory being, that the farther you draw the blood from the diseased part the better! Why, upon that principle, they stop short of the soles of the feet, or do not send the blood a league into the country afterward, seems rather difficult to

understand.

"As a matter of justice to the faculty of Malaga (though perhaps they have nothing to do with it) I ought to mention, that in looking over the daily bills of mortality, as published in the newspapers, I was constantly struck with the frequent instances of longevity. Deaths of persons, over ninety years of age, occured very often during my first visit. I remember that of one who had gone considerably over an hundred, and the proportion of those who died at sixty, seventy, and eighty, was quite large. Captain Widdington notices this fact in his sketches, and it is entitled to some consideration, on account of the particularity with which the parish records are kept, and the consequent improbability of

We dare say that these playful flings at "the profession" in Spain must be merited. For we find our author but little addicted to

satire, except when he is dealing with some French or English traveller in whose track

he follows. Alexander Dumas, Theophile Gautier, Ford, and many others are treated by him with unmerciful rigor. But to every thing Spanish, he is as gentle as if his journey had been a pilgrimage of love.

"Whether the Spanish physicians are responsible for some very droll notions upon medical subjects, which prevail among the people, I am not prepared to say; but, if they be, it is clear that their art needs mending. Pulmonary consumption, for example, is popularly deemed contagious, and patients suffering from it are treated and shunned accordingly. When death ensues, the sick-chamber goes through a perfect quarantine of disinfection; and beds, clothing and furniture are consigned to the flames. In Cadiz, it occurred to me to exchange my travelling bag for one of a more convenient size. The tradesman expressed his regret that he could not find any use for mine: "It is an excellent one" he said, "but it has been slightly used and nobody will buy it. My customers will think that it has belonged to some consumptive person, (algun ético) and although your worship

The character which he claims for Span

of the flippant descriptions which other travellers have given us. Since Byron took upon himself the ungenerous task of defaming the fair sex of the Peninsula, it has become the fashion to follow his example. Not a French commis-voyageur, not a British graduate, who does not claim to have been very generally an object of particular solicitude and tender affection among the beauties of Seville and Cadiz. To hear these self-sufficient travel-writers, chastity does not exist in Spain. We are tempted to think that they ignorantly judged of the whole society of that country from the very limited and not very exalted part of it that admitted their visits. We will never forget the experience of the author of Miriam Coffin in that respect. He was once walking in a Spanish city with a Caledonian friend. A beautiful female passed them in the street, and, turning back, smiled somewhat significantly towards them. Mr. Hart expressed his astonishment. "Oh dom!"

We will not finish the sentence, since the author himself does not. Mr. Hart quotes this as the only instance of immodest conduct on the part of a Spanish female that ever came under his observation. And we should not wonder if the only difference, in that respect, between him and some more cynical travellers, consisted in this: that the latter, in their excursions did not always chance to have a matter-of-fact Scotchman by their side.

in

We have lingered too long, we find, that part of Spain to which properly applies the "dura tellus Iberia." Were we to follow Mr. Wallis, we must visit in turn Seville, Cordova, Grenada, and what, with his pleasing narrative, the thousand recollections which these names awaken and the time we must employ in worship to the genius of Irving that consecrates the Moorish capital, this paper would stretch beyond its allotted limits. Not only the poetry of Spain but even its utilitarian matter-offact statistics must we leave unnoticed in our haste. Surely we would greatly astonish some of our readers if we were to copy from Mr. Wallis his account of some of the manufactures of Spain. But we may not pause. Embark we, therefore, with him on board the first steamer; let us force the ne plus ultra of Hercules, and bestowing a passing glance upon Gibraltar, rejoice that we are once more upon our own Atlantic. Nor dare we tarry with him at Cadiz, although an English traveller says that it may be seen in one day." we might be forcibly detained by attractions far superior to those of Moorish remains, galleries of paintings or vasty gothic cathedrals, haunted with feudal reminiscences. The "Girl of Cadiz," as sung by Byron, remains in the imagination as a choice type of female lovliness; and strange to say, not a dissenting voice has been raised against her claim. Mr. Hart, in his Romance of Yachting," has enthusiastically endorsed the world-wide reputation of the ladies of Cadiz for beauty, and even our fastidious travaller, Mr. Wallis, is content

Here

*THE ROMANCE OF YACHTING. Voyage the First. By Joseph C. Hart, Author of Miriam Coffin. New York, Harper & Brothers.

From Cadiz, however, we may be permitted to accompany our author on a flying trip to Xeres, and then, with the nectar of its vintage still upon our lips, (at least in imagination) close the agreeable volume to which we have dedicated these remarks.

A flying trip to Xeres did we say? No, Xeres is deserted. We will only take the ferry-boat at Cadiz, and flying across the bay on the wings of steam, land at Port Saint Mary, where Duff Gordon's famous cellars are, where all the wine-merchants of Xeres keep their pleasant country-houses and their still pleasanter vaults. At the mouth of the Lethe-oh land of Hesperia,

what a host of classical recollections arise at the mention of that name, corrupted though it be into the modern "Guadalete," which Arabic scholars teach us is compounded of the ancient word with the abstemious Moslems, unacquainted with Moorish prefix signifying water. These the sweet forgetfulness of sack, how could they couple the idea of water with that of Lethe? The true Lethe sleeps on the banks of that stream within the cool capacious cellars of Duff Gordon, where twelve tuns of immense size baptized (sans water) livion enough to have drowned all the sorwith the names of the apostles, contain obrows of that last Gothic army which poor Roderick arrayed against the Paynim on this very spot. In praise of genuine Sherry (Xeres) we need not speak. We will appeal to the recollection of our readers, and invoke the genius of Falstaff to our aid.

"A good Sherris sack hath a twofold operation in it. It ascends me into the brain, dries me there all the foolish and dull and crudy vapors which environ it; makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes;

which delivered o'er to the voice which is

the birth, becometh excellent wit. The second property of your excellent Sherris cold and settled, left the liver white and is, the warming of the blood; which, before pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and makes it course from the inwards to and cowardice; but the Sherris warms it, the parts extreme.

Most fully will we endorse the commendation of the critical Sir John, provided that it be applied exclusively to pure Xeres

wine unadulterated with any strengthening or coloring matter. It is really unaccountable that a thing in itself so excellent as good wine must needs be drugged by meddling improvers upon the handiwork of nature. Pure wine is seldom exported from Spain or Portugal. A late writer has created almost a panic among the wine drinkers of England by his exposition of sundry secrets attending the manufacture of Port. We forget his statistics, nor have we the pamphlet at hand. But it would appear that the Port wine we drink in this country is invariably an article whose fermentation has been stopped (coupe the French wine-growers call it) by an admixture of brandy in a frightful proportion. The theory is, that all wines if allowed to ferment to the full extent are somewhat sharp to the taste while new, and that this peculiar flavor which would betray the date of the vintage can be disguised by interrupting the process of fermentation. The imperfect, stunted liquor obtained in this artificial manner, though pleasing to the palate, requires some further "doctoring" to disguise other characteristics attendant upon wine insufficiently fermented. So that to cover up the fraud with another fraud, more brandy, together with coloring matter, is added. It seems that the evil, as regards port wine, originates in the fact that the vintage of 1824 was remarkably successful. The wine raised that year had all the properties of excellent wine in its utmost perfection. The inferior produce of subsequent seasons found the fastidious customer wholly intractable, and the exporters were obliged to resort to fraud in order to gratify the public (English) taste. Such is the explanation of the author of the pamphlet in question. But we think that the practice he refers to has been for a very long time in use in most wine growing conntries.

Sherry has probably suffered less than most wines from this kind of adulteration. It is generally allowed to ferment sufficiently, and then the properties of "age" are communicated by mixture with older wines. The "brown sherry" is made by mixing the paler kind with coloring matter. Abundance of brandy is added for the English market, the Spanish merchants honestly believing in their hearts that they cannot better please their British customers than

VOL. V. NO. III. NEW SERIES.

by drugging that delicate wine with spirits. As a warning to the consumer of Falstaff's favorite Sack, we will in conclusion of this paper copy a paragraph from the volume before us, although Mr. Wallis pleads guilty to limited information in the premises :- No Sherry exported, not even the best, is a simple, unprepared production of nature. It is, all of it, the result of time, mixture, and much doctoring. The finest is the growth of the district immediately about Xeres, and its natural purity is only violated by the admixture of something better of the same sort. The oldest, richest, and most generous wines, are kept and used especially to give body, strength, and flavor to the new ones that need them. The inferior qualities come from the districts along the coast. These last, good enough in themselves and when left to themselves, become any thing but nectar by the time they have been manufactured into sherry. Some of them, to be sure, enriched by the judicious admixture of the vino jeneroso, become sound and respectable wines, and there is no knowing how much of homely San Lucar, and even dry Malaga, passes into the cellars and down the throats of the Anglo-Saxons yearly, with the name and at the cost of the ripest Jerezano. But this is not the worst. Immense quantities prepared especially for exportation, and at cheap rates, have their principal virtues given to them by the liberal use of bad brandy; and it is with them chiefly that the sherry-drinking world is drugged.

A wine of fine

quality, eight or ten years old, will cost at Xeres, at least four dollars the gallon. Those who know what our tariffs are and have been, and who can calculate the cost of transportation, may judge from the range of prices with us."

From these hasty remarks it is easy to perceive, that the American wine-drinker pays, not only from his purse, but with his health, for the poor privilege of being accounted the possessor of a fashionable brand. We could name from actual experience, at least twenty places in the Mediterranean where excellent pure wine is raised, of a flavor nearly equal to that of Burgundy, Constance and Sherry, and in our opinion vastly superior to that of all the Rhenish in the universe; and yet no enterprising importer is found to enlighten

20

MACAULAY, in the opening paragraphs | of his essay on Lord Bacon, observes that the moral character of men eminent in letters or the fine arts is treated with tenderness by the world, because the world is disposed to be charitable to the faults of those who minister to its pleasure; and he proceeds to instance in his brilliant manner, "Falstaff and Tom Jones have survived the game-keepers whom Shakspeare cudgelled, and the land-ladies whom Fielding bilked," &c. But if it be true that the world is most charitable to the characters of those who contribute most to its enjoyment, then the world is certainly not very delicate in its charity; for could it be ascertained, for example, that some other damsel than Anne Hathaway occupied the place that should have been hers during this very Shakspeare's long absence from her, even the telegraph lines, that give us the twilights of the foreign news before the sunrise of the newspapers, would be put in requisition to spread the scandal; and could a secret correspondence, arising out of some such relation, be dug out of the British Museum, how quickly should we have it in cloth, in boards, in pamphlets for two shillings, and in the columns of extras for six-pence! So if we consider who those are who do really contribute most to the world's enjoyment, we shall easily conclude that they are the very ones to whom it is least kind, either while they are alive or after they are dead. It was not kind to Burns; it is not kind to any of those who are the life of the world, "the salt of the earth," who season and intensify

it, each by some individual vitality; an eye, an ear, or an inward questioning, that must drink in beauty and must wrestle with itself, or not live; or else a strong fortitude that stands like a wall against woe and wrong, all-comprehending, allfeeling, and all-suffering, but unmoved in the faith of better things hereafter. The inferior organizations which make up the sum of being, do not so much honor these nobler spirits as they beat against them, like the rain, and the floods, and the wind, against the house that was founded upon a rock.

So far, therefore, from admitting the universality of Macaulay's law, we look upon it as only one of the natural superficialities of an acute Scotchman. We are too deeply steeped, to relish speculation which goes no deeper than this, in the metaphysics of VON DENCKEN, that most indefatigable of Dutch philosophers, from whom we will translate a paragraph for the benefit of readers who may not have had access to him.

"As in the material world, so the chemist of things change; the tree grows and decays; tells us, nothing is ever lost, though the forms the fire separates the coal into its various products; metals oxydize, and the water that ascends in vapor descends in rain; so it seems to be in the immaterial world of that breath of life which was breathed into Man at the

creation, and whereby he became a living soul,' not an atom has left him, though it is ever manifesting its presence in such an infinity of shapes. For since there is the same amount of matter now in the world as there was at the end of the creation, why should not ana

1850.