for every quarter of an hour, at the same time, a mixture of chalk and other binding medicines-perhaps pills of opium, occasionally of creosote. Coarse brandy was generally given, and latterly a little sago was allowed. But there was no variety, and little difference in the quantities administered; though throughout the time there appeared great individuality in the cases. The quantities of calomel were so small as to be useless in a large number of them. It became clear, that whether in the individual case, the cholera could be encountered by the system it had fastened on, or whether it finally sunk under it, the dose given would never rouse that system effectually. Three grains, at a later period five, were given for the first dose; two or three being repeated every quarter of an hour afterwards. This the Clergy, where they had to act as physicians, increased to five, eight, or ten at first, each quarter of an hour five, for an hour or an hour and a half,-then three. Brandy was given to sustain the sinking forces. In some very desperate instances much larger quantities were given (one of the most eminent medical men had given 200 grains to a lady who had been given over. She recovered). This treatment was sometimes blessed with success; but it had become very evident that the ordinary practice pursued would not succeed. It grew into a moral certainty that under it the patient was sinking at a rapid rate into the grave. The symptom most destructive, and least to be encountered by medicine, was the sickness. There were cases in which the vomiting came on with spasmodic violence: the poor creature would spring up and cast forward like the bursting of a pipe. At other times it would continue at intervals of two to five minutes, during a period of seven or eight hours, or even days and nights, till the system shrunk from complete exhaustion. Some patients recovered apparently the shock of the disease, regained the voice and the natural colour, and continued so during four or five more days vomiting at intervals, shorter or longer, but incessantly, till those who had seemed saved, almost by a miracle, imperceptibly wasted away. That this sickness might be subdued, and if possible, to give a fillip to the system, six or ten drops of spirit of camphor, in a little water, were given, in some cases, every quarter of an hour, and sometimes found of great use. When a patient was far gone, and an effort was imperative for a few moments for the priest's office, one or two drops of tincture of ammonia generally produced a temporary revival. These were matters beyond our province, and a medical man might be tempted to smile at these clumsy efforts, were it possible for an earnest man to smile when he remembered the cholera.

The Clergy, could they have begun with the experience gained

in the sequel, would have opened some house in the parish for an hospital, and managed it themselves. The personal labour of keeping at least one of their number day and night on the spot, would have been more endurable than it proved amongst a number of patients scattered over a district, and demanding all their care. Certain arrangements only would have been necessary, which could always be provided by moderate means. 1st. A house in each parish, or any arbitrary division of district agreed on, to be used as an hospital for that district, so as to avoid concentration of the infection as much as could be. 2d. In these, a separate dispensary, or depository of medicine; a dèpôt of blankets and beds; fresh beds, i.e. fresh straw and the ticking washed, to be used for each patient; a supply to families of beds used in houses by patients; also, beds covered with a low awning, such as are used in Russia. The patient is laid on the open matting of the bed, the hangings are let fall all round, and a hot iron introduced underneath, on which, at the moment of dropping the hangings, an attendant pours a jug of water; a violent steam is thus produced, and profuse perspiration results. The patient can then be rubbed dry and rolled in warm blankets. This treatment is often successful in the Russian hospitals, even after collapse. A medical man and his one or two assistants, and such nurses as could be secured, would thus be well able to attend all the most pressing cases constantly. One vehicle at least, for the immediate removal of the patient, should be at the service of every such house. Had such a course been pursued we are convinced many lives would have been saved. And we will add, by way of cogent argument, the cost would not have exceeded, or not materially have exceeded, the cost of supplying such dilatory and hopeless relief as the town authorities doled out in the town which is the subject of these remarks.

The Board of Works there, as it was, did little on the part of the town. One small hospital was opened, which had been a mendicity office; and at a later period, a temporary building, formerly used for hospital purposes, was also employed for the cholera patients, but not till the worst of the mortality had already taken place.

The fear amongst the richer classes was great. Other motives, which should not have found their place at such a time, influenced, it was said, many of the owners of mills, and checked the expenditure of money. One large mill-owner was seized by the disease, and carried off. He had been part owner of one of the largest of the mills; and the vast mass of window-pierced brickwork was shut for the half day on which he was buried. The workpeople were dismissed with their half-day's pay, and the gloomy pile for a few hours maintained silence amongst its

pitiless fellows. This event made authorities rather more in earnest to do something. It was evident rich as well as poor might be taken by the cholera. To the last, however, resources were sadly insufficient. For the one whole eastern division of the town, in which the parish is situated, if not for the whole town, one coach, that is a fly drawn by one horse, was the only vehicle for conveying patients to the hospital. None but the fever coach' would have been ventured by its owner for the desperate enterprise. There were but few nurses, barely sufficient even for the small hospitals, where the patients were collected in a narrow space. In two or three rare instances one was spared and sent out. Medicines and medical attendance were provided, but the doctors were too few to do the work, and so completely were they over-worked that in many cases the Clergy were the only physicians that could be got. Medicine had to be fetched; that for the whole town-90,000 inhabitantsfrom one dispensary. The result of this was generally a delay of an hour at the dispensary, which, with the time taken in going and returning, where even a messenger could be got at once, (not always possible,) took from the poor sufferer the slender chance which immediate applications and remedies might have promised for him. The physician appointed for the district in which lay this parish, a most amiable person, did what he could, but was quite exhausted with his work: half his cases fell under the charge of a young apprentice. The hurry of all this made constant attendance a simple impossibility.

With no better preparation, then, than this, the place awaited the coming storm. A church was built there a few years since, and in the buildings of the vicarage adjoining, which are confined enough, live the Clergy attached to the church. During the period in question, they were four in number, the vicar, one curate in priest's orders, one deacon, and a person in priest's orders taken in as a guest during a part of the time. The first case of cholera appeared in the last week of July. It was also the first appearance of the disease in the town. Three were attacked, and two carried off suddenly. Cholera was then sweeping up the country. Paris had suffered the worst, 800 having died in one day; some of them instantaneously in the open streets. In London it was increasing rapidly. It was showing itself at Liverpool, Hull, and other ports. Here, however, for the present, no great alarm was created. Instant measures were taken for the removal of the bodies, and the matter rested. But in this district, in which the streets were close, (though not always crowded,) there was no drainage. The filth was excessive; the personal habits of the poor greatly increasing it. It was felt that cholera, if once it took a firm

to a Creator does not bring us sufficiently in connexion with the distinctive doctrines of Christian revelation to have much influence as a direct motive in the conduct of a Christian's life, or the establishment of his faith. Conclusions from physical reasoning have, we think, very little to do in any immediate relation with those feelings of the heart which constitute the Christian's state of mind. By Astronomy, therefore, we do not expect to convert the infidel, or materially to settle the mind of a sceptic, neither would we look to it as a reformer of morals except so far as it may, in common with other intellectual pursuits and interests,

'Emollit mores, nec sinit esse feros.'

Yet Astronomy has an important religious and moral purpose to accomplish in the world, and is capable of adding much to man's perception of the glory of God if viewed in its proper light, and not required to accomplish what was never intended of it.

What, then, is the religious use and purpose of Astronomy if we slight its influence over the reasoning powers? It is comprehended in the word praise. The more a Christian knows of God's works, the more instruments of praise does he possess, and the more widely does he feel his common interest with all things visible and invisible, to give glory and honour and praise to the Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth. O praise the 'Lord of heaven,' saith the Psalmist: 'praise him in the height. 'Praise him, sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars and light. 'Praise him, all ye heavens: and ye waters that are above the 'heavens. Let them praise the Name of the Lord: for he spake 'the word, and they were made; he commanded, and they were 'created. He made them fast for ever and ever: he gave them 6 a law which shall not be broken.'

But in the guidance of morals, astronomy has its specific use, which is none the less important, because we curtail it of a certain vapid generality popularly attributed to it. We take the laws of physical astronomy, if understood, to be a natural antidote in the human mind to the confusion, the irregularity, and discord of all sublunary plans and earthly governments. After witnessing the strife of tongues, whether in the senate, in the public places of resort and business, or in the domestic hearth, what more solemn contrast can be imagined, one calculated to sink deeper into the mind, than the contemplation of that awful silence, that gigantic power and unerring rectitude shown in the laws and circuits of heavenly bodies. Physical disorder is here met by physical order, and a field is open for the latter to attune the harsh discord of the former, to subdue the fretting

vicissitudes of thought and feeling that pass over us, by making us look on the mighty roll of time; to soften the asperities of the heart, by reminding us of the smallness and humility of our outward actions, when viewed in conjunction with the great yet peaceful works of heaven. Supra sphæram lunæ non est malum,' was a saying of the Schoolmen.

In thus marking out the uses of astronomy under the heads of praise, and a moral example of rule and order, we are not only safe against all deistical exaltation of science and physics that some popular modes of talking would encourage, but we have the authority of many early devotional writers of the Church for a very abundant introduction of such objects and such lessons as this science instructs us of, into religious exercises themselves.