From Chambers' Journal. ON A REMARKABLE CHANGE IN THE CHARACTER OF THE FEMALE OF THE HUMAN SPECIES. ORIGINALLY WRITTEN FOR THE ZOOLOGICAL THE changes which from time to time take place in the external forms and characters of animals are an interesting department of the science of the philosophical naturalist, for they serve to illustrate the principle of a certain definite subserviency of organized creatures to the conditions in which they live. It is but following out this principle a little further, and still keeping, as we think, within the proper range of that science, to examine and report upon those moral changes which take place in the highest of animated species through the effect of the conditions of social life. It is fully admitted that the variability of humanity if we may use such an expression - is very great; and of this truth no one can doubt, who considers the difference between the cruel and treacherous savage and the highly-educated man of civilization. We do not need, however, to take these extreme ends of the history and condition of a people. Even in a single century, or, say, three generations, such improvements take place in national characters, as it would perhaps be difficult to believe, if we had not the best evidence of the fact. I wish to call attention, on the present evening, to a remarkable change which has taken place, within about a hundred years, or a little more, in the character of the female of our own species. I must first, however, apologize for the nature of the evidence which I have to bring forward. It unfortunately happens that the human female at all times an almost hopeless mystery to the naturalist, indeed to men of science generally was very little studied by zoologists in the days of Seba and Buffon. I am not aware of a single observation on the subject in that age, which can be said to have been set down with scientific accuracy. This is very unfortunate, but it cannot be remedied. It happens, however, that another set of observers namely, the poets-paid a good deal of attention to the ladies, and have left an immense number of references to them scattered throughout their writings. Now, I am far from saying that the poets can be accepted as, in themselves, singly, good witnesses, because it is well known that they decline swearing to the truth of what they advance. Yet, when we consider that we could not attempt to write the history of Greece, or trace its ancient manners, without making use of the writings of its poets, it will, I trust, appear as a thing utterly preposterous, that we should altogether rejeet such evidence. It is a kind of testimony we cannot dispense with in many cases; and my impression decidedly is, that, if carefully examined and collated, and accepted only when it is found perfectly self-consistent, and in harmony with the usual tone of men who aim at speaking the truth, we may make a certain limited use of it, even for scientific purposes. So much being premised, I proceed to remark on the great improvement which appears, from this evidence, to have taken place in the general affections of the human female since the middle of the eighteenth century. The creature, whom we all know to be now yielding, gentle, and kind, to a remarkable degree, is described in the writings of those irregular naturalists, as I may call them, as one of exceedingly barbarous and unrelenting character. From some of the poetical references in question, a literal interpreter might imagine that there were even some organic differences of a notable kind between the women of those days and the present. We hear, for instance, of eyes which had a killing power like those attributed by mediæval zoologists to the basilisk; likewise of bosoms of a marble-like coldness, as if the female of our species had not then been developed, in the circulating organization at least, beyond the reptilian stage. I must consider these allusions, however, as most probably only metaphorical; for we can scarcely imagine that even such early naturalists as Aristotle and Pliny would have failed to record such singular peculiarities, if they had had a positive existence. I come at once to the moral characteristics of which they may be accepted as part of the evidence. It fully appears, then, that the human female, down to the time we are speaking of, was a very cruel creature. While addressed by individuals of the opposite sex with a degree of deference and adulation now totally unknown, she beheld them all with an unbending severity and disdain equally unexampled in our days. The memorials are so abundant, that the difficulty is to make a selection. Turning up, however, a single volume of Ritson's collection of English Songs, we find such passages as the following: But oh her colder heart denies Or starved for want of heat. The whole book, indeed, seems to be a series of preachments on this one text. What Aaron Hill says in one page Chill, as mountain snow, her bosom, Though I tender language use, 'Tis by cold indifference frozen, To my arms and to my muse Is echoed by Henry Carey on another Must I, ye gods, forever love? may, indeed, admit of some doubt, whether the very large mortality of the former as compared with the present times, was not owing rather more to this cause than to inferior sanitary conditions, the virulence of small-pox, and other circumstances, to which it has been usually ascribed. It will be acknowledged as something quite It appears that even towards a patient reduced beyond our province to speculate on the teleto the last stage of bodily distress and weak-ological aspects of the question, and attempt ness, no sort of pity was shown by this merciless being look to yon celestial sphere, seem to have been presented in vain. Myra, Grim king of the ghosts, be true, In hopes to be freed from care, to define the design which Providence had in view in permitting so much evil to exist. But it is our grateful privilege, as merely observers of the facts of nature, to remark that, with that mercy which shines through the universal plan, it had been so arranged that the savage tendencies of the female breast were limited to a particular period of life. The power and the disposition to treat men cruelly appears seldom to have appeared before the age of seventeen; and the instances in which it lasted beyond twenty-five are rare. After that period of life, if marriage had not intervened, the female heart was usually observed to relent; and I have not been able to discover a single well-authenticated case of cruelty recorded against an unwedded woman above thirty-five. Thus it appears to have put on very much the aspect of a kind of calenture; and we are left to believe that many a woman, who had acted as a perfect tigress in early life, was converted in due time into one of those winning old maids, or one of those benign widows, who are also the themes of so many allusions in our by-gone literature. In this respect, physiologically, the whole subject assumes a very curious character. We find the hot head still applicable to the young man, avarice to the old; all the great charac teristics assigned to particular epochs of male life by our old writers, still remain as they were. How singular that the sanguinary character attributed to the female between eighteen and twenty-five, should alone have undergone a revolution! That the revolution is a complete one, need not, I presume, be largely insisted on, as the Society must be well aware, from their own observation and experience, that coldness and rigor towards the opposite sex no longer mark the demeanor of womankind at any period of life. A poetical complaint against Myra or Clorinda is never heard; and Mr. Farr can at once make clear, beyond dispute, that deaths We have not, indeed, any means of knowing from either the lightnings of female eyes, or the amount of destruction produced by those the coldness of female bosoms, are not the subpitiless creatures, there having, unfortunately, ject of any return. At evening-parties, the been no register of mortality, giving, in a waltz and polka demonstrate the amicable reliable manner, the causes of death, till footing on which the two sexes live. Instead some time after the female character had of holding out that she is to be sighed for by begun to undergo a favorable change; but many, and will, at the utmost, take one, and from the prevalence in literature of the allu- kill off the rest, the young lady, with that sions to such tragic results, we cannot doubt submissiveness and courtesy which mark a that the evil was of very serious amount. It high civilization, and which was doubtless designed to be the highest development of her | borne all these evils and disappointments in nature, does not now object that the question deepest ignorance of the Chemistry of Silk, should rather be: Who is going to take her ? and perhaps believing that "Where ignorance Since Woman has thus been put into her is bliss, 't is folly to be wise." He alone, of proper social attitude, we see how much all the workers, has neglected to seek the sweetness has been infused into those assem-friendly aid of the chemist. blies where the two sexes meet; barring, Possibly it is this indifference to science, indeed, certain competitions which occasion- which has left the silk manufacturer so far It is ally take place amongst the ladies themselves behind every other son of industry. with regard to particular swains, and the lit- notorious that, whilst our cotton, linen, and tle jealousies which will thence arise - a woollen manufactories have been multiplied trivial incidental drawback from a great good. ten-fold during the last score of years, those of silk goods have made scarcely any progress. The manufacturers are themselves perfectly aware of this startling fact, and it was but a few months since that a memorial was presented from them to the legislature, praying that all remaining protection on their goods might be removed, as the only hope of giving a new vitality to their slumbering trade. From Household Words. SILKEN CHEMISTRY. MOST persons are familiar with analyses of various minerals and vegetables, made with a view of ascertaining and determining their relative degrees of purity. But a method by which such a delicate fabric as silk is capable of being assayed; of being put through a fire and water ordeal, flung into a crucible, and brought out free from all impurities, is a novelty of a rather startling nature; for who ever dreamt that silk is adulterated? The truth is, that Frenchmen are more keenly alive to the value of science in connection with manufacture than ourselves. Whilst our silk manufacturers have gone on upon the old, well-beaten track, those of France have enlisted in their behalf the services of the Silk is, from its nature, more susceptible chemist, who has brought their raw material of absorbing moisture than any other fibrous as completely under his analytical control as article. In fact, it approaches in this respect subtle gas or ponderous ore. He has demonto the quality of sponge well-dried silk, strated to a nicety that its relative purity, its when placed in a damp situation, will very strength, its elasticity, its durability, its rapidly absorb five or six per cent. of moist- structure, the very size and weight of each ure; and, being very dear and being always separate fibre, may be shown and registered sold by weight, this property gives large op- with precision and certainty. He tells the portunity for fraud; yet it is not the only manufacturer the actual amount of latent channel for mal-practices. Silk, as spun by moisture contained in a pound of silk; he the silk-worm, contains amongst its fibres, in shows him how much natural gum, resin, and very minute portions, a quantity of resin, sugar, every bale comprises; he points out sugar, salt, &c., to the extent generally of how much lighter his thread should be after twenty-four per cent. of the entire weight. the processes of spinning and dyeing; and, This peculiarity leads to the fraudulent ad-more valuable still, he indicates the most mixture of further quantities of gum, sugar, and even of fatty substances, to give weight to the article; consequently, when a dealer or manufacturer sends a quantity of raw silk to a throwster, to be spun into silk thread, it is no unusual thing to find it heavily charged In France, Italy, and other parts of contiwith adulterate matters. When he sends that nental Europe, the assaying, or, as it is there silk to be dyed he will find out the loss, pro-technically termed, the 'conditioning of vided the dyer does not follow up the system by further adulteration. The presence of foreign substances in the silk is fatal to proper dyeing; hence the dyer proceeds to get rid of them by means of boiling the silk in soap and water. As silk thread becomes charged with foreign matters to various degrees, given weights of several samples will contain very different lengths. In this way manufacturers are often deceived in the produce of various parcels of thrown silks after coming from the loom. In our own country, great as have been the strides made by most branches of manufacture, the silk-spinner or weaver has quietly profitable use to which every bale of raw silk is applicable: that whilst one parcel is best adapted for the manufacture of satin, another may be better employed for plain silk, another for velvet, and so on to the end. silk," is carried on under the sanction of the municipal authorities, in establishments called Conditioning Houses. The quantity thus assayed is published weekly for the information of the trade with as much regularity as a Price Current. In this way we may find it publicly notified that, in the Conditioning House at Lyons there were during last year five millions, thirty-seven thousand, six hundred and twenty-eight pounds of silk assayed; at Milan, three millions, four hundred and sixty-six thousand, six hundred and ninetyone pounds, and other large quantities at St. Etienne, Turin, Zurich, Elberfeld, and other places. Of so much importance has this process been deemed in France that, in 1841, a royal ordonnance was passed, setting forth the ascertained weight which silk loses by the conditioning process, and which is eleven per cent. This eleven per cent., added to the weight of the silk after the ordeal it has gone through, makes up what is termed its merchantable weight. The French have brought to our doors the means of accomplishing what they have practised, during the last twenty years, with so much advantage. These means are no further removed from us than Broad Street Buildings, in the city, in premises lately occupied by one of the many colonial bubble companies which have so multiplied during the past half century. Science has established herself where humbug so recently sat enthroned. We have paid a visit to these premises. The first operation we beheld was that of determining the humidity of silk. Eleven per cent. is the natural quantity in all silk, but from various causes this is nearly always much exceeded. Several samples of the articles having been taken from a bale, they are weighed in scales, capable of being turned by half a grain. Two of these samples are then placed in other scales, equally delicate and true; one end of which, containing the sample, being immersed in a copper cylinder heated by steam to two hundred and thirty degrees of Fahrenheit, the other, with the weights, being enclosed within a glass case. The effect of this hot-air bath is rapidly seen; the silk soon throws off its moisture, becomes lighter, and the scale with the weights begins to sink. In this condition it is kept until no further loss of weight is perceived; — the weight which the silk is found to have lost being the exact degree of its humidity. The natural eleven per cent. of humidity being allowed for, any loss beyond that shows the degree of artificial moisture which the silk contains. the lighter will these four hundred yards be. But as this gossamer fibre is liable to break, a beautiful contrivance exists for instantly arresting the reel on which it is being wound off, in order that it may be joined and the reeling continued. Another means exists for stopping the reel immediately the four hundred yards are obtained. The degree of elasticity is shown by a delicate apparatus which stretches one thread of the silk until it breaks, a tell-tale dial and hand marking the point of fracture. Equally ingenious and precise is the apparatus for testing what is termed the "spin" of the silk; its capability of being twisted round with great velocity without in any way being damaged in tenacity or strength. The last process is also purely mechanical. A hank of the silk, on its removal from the boiling-off cistern, is placed upon a hook; and, by means of a smooth round stick passed through it, a rapid jerking motion is given to it, which, after some little time, throws up a certain degree of glossy brightness. This power of testing its lustre is employed to ascertain its suitability for particular purposes. Should it come up very brilliantly, the article will be pronounced adapted for a fine satin; with less lustre upon it, it may be set aside for gros de Naples, or velvet, and in this way the manufacturer can determine beforehand to what purpose he shall apply his silk, and so avoid frequent disappointment and loss. In short, instead of working in the dark and by chance, he works by chemical rules of undeviating correctness. After each of the above assays, or conditionings, the owner of the silk is supplied for a small fee with an authenticated certificate of its various qualities. A Treatise on the Law and Practice relating to Letters Patent for Inventions. By John Paxton Norman, Esq., M. A., of the Inner Temple, Barrister-at-law. To determine the amount of foreign matters contained in a sample of silk, the parcels- The changes effected by the late act on the imafter a most mathematical weighing are portant subject of patents render a fresh account boiled in soap and water, for several hours. of the law desirable; and Mr. Norman's treatise They are then conveyed to the hot-air cham- is a book that may be safely recommended. Clear bers, subjected to two hundred and thirty and well-arranged, comprehensive in its leading degrees of heat, and finally weighed. It will principles, yet terse in their expression, it is perbe found now that silk of the greatest purity vaded by a spirit of good sense, without which has lost not only its eleven per cent. of moist-science of any kind becomes a dry husk, and law ure, but a further twenty-four per cent. in especially a mere bundle of arbitrary dicta. It the various foreign matters boiled out of it. will be understood that this is really a treatise on the law of patents, in which principles are But should the article have been in any way digested, from the statutes and decisions, extampered with, the loss is not unusually as pressed in a terse and scholarly manner, and not much as thirty or thirty-two per cent. a mere commentary on a leading act of Parlia ment; though perhaps the volume would have been improved by the addition of the last statute. - Spectator. The assaying the lengths of silk is done by ruling off four hundred yards of the fibre, and weighing that quantity; the finer the silk, From Eliza Cook's Journal. THE SCULPTOR'S CAREER. I. BEGINNINGS. We are about to relate in the following pages the true story of an artist one of the very greatest that England has yet produced. The first scene lies in a shop, in New Street, Covent Garden -a very small shop, full of plaster casts, by selling which the worthy but humble proprietor managed to maintain himself, his wife, and his two boys. Arranged on the shelves around the shop and in the window were casts from the antique, which appealed to the classical tastes casts of the Niobe, of the far-famed Venus de Medicis The bending statue that enchants the world— of Hercules, Ajax, Achilles, and many more; but these were for the few, and art in England was then but in its infancy. For the less refined and more ordinary tastes there were casts of George II., then king; of Lord Howe, and Admiral Hawke, then in the heights of their fame the naval darlings of England; of the brave General Wolfe, who had gloriously fallen during that year (we are now speaking of the year 1759) on the heights of Quebec, and with the praises of whose gallantry all England was then ringing; and there were also to be observed a few busts of the prominent-featured William Pitt, then a young man, but already a recognized orator in the English Commons. Such were the mute humanities of the shop shelves; and from them we turn to the living inmates. The master of the place might be observed, through a glass door which separated the little back room from the front shop, busily engaged in moulding a figure of one of the new popular men of the Admiral Boscawen, who had recently sprung into fame by reason of a victory he had gained over the French fleet off Cape Lagos. In the front shop, waiting for customers, we find a woman, and a boy-indeed, we might almost say a mere child. The woman is hanging anxiously over some lines the child is busily engaged in drawing with black chalk upon the paper before him. He has books on either side of him, which he takes up and reads from time to time, when fatigued by stooping over his drawing. The little fellow is propped up in a high chair, so that he can overlook the counter, on which his drawing and reading materials are laid. The chair is stuffed round with cushions, so that the poor little fellow may sit soft upon his day-long seat. Poor, pale, placid little boy; debarred by disease and debility from taking any share in the amusements of his age, and doomed to sit there from day to day under his patient and watchful mother's eye, who springs to do his every little bidding. "God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," it is said, and truly. You had but to watch the sparkle of that boy's bright eye, and the blush, that mantled his cheek, when some object of beauty, embodying a fine action or a noble idea, was placed before him; or when he took up the book which lay by his side and thereupon endeavored to design with his chalk the actions therein narrated; or when some chance visitor, interested in the poetic little invalid, talked to him of great poets, sculptors, and heroes - you had but to observe the rapt interest and enthusiasm of the boy on such occasions to be persuaded that, suffering and feeble though he was in body, his mind was quick to feel beauty in all its aspects, and that he revelled in intellectual delights of the rarest sort. Moreover, the boy was always cheerful, though grave in his manner; he was patient and uncomplaining, though he ofttimes regretted that he could not go out to feel and enjoy the sun and the sight of the green trees in the parks like other boys. com The soul of our cripple invalid was the soul of a true genius, and behind that shop-counter it obtained its first impulse towards art. These casts from the antique and stucco medallions which surrounded the boy, and preached beauty to him from the mean shelves paratively worthless though to many they might appear- were the source of many beautiful and noble inspirations, which ger minated in noble works in the boy's after life. It has been said that the soul of every man of genius is a mirror which he carries about with him wherever he goes; and it is only by tracing the artist from his infancy that we discover the circumstances to which he owes in maturer years his genius and his success. A customer entered the little shop one day. He was an elderly man, mild, benevolent, and gentle-looking seeming by his dress to be a clergyman. No sooner had the bell hung at the back of the front shop-door, which was closed to keep out the cold from the little invalid -no sooner had it sounded and intimated the approach of a customer, than the master of the shop emerged from the back apartment, and approached, cap in hand, to wait upon the gentleman. "Good day, John," said the visitor; "1 have brought with me a small figure for you to mend. My servant, in dusting this Helene,' has had the misfortune to chip off an arm, you see." "And a beautiful thing it is, Mr. Mathews," said the man; "beautiful indeed -a very gem. Yes, I will mend it while you stay. Plaster of Paris hardens in no time; and you may take it with you, unless you would prefer that I send it by a messenger. "No, I will wait,' said Mr. Mathews; and thereupon the image-maker retired into |