his own advanced system, he devoted his | with a deep sense of the great value of the most sedulous attention with unremitting new system, and actuated by national feelindustry. The sphere of his action being thus enlarged, he shone with fresh lustre, seemed impelled by a new impetus, so much so, that some noblemen, justly proud of their countryman, combined to strike an honorary medal of him at their own expense, thus giving a decided distinction to his increasing fame, added to which, he was, in 1747, nominated royal archiater, that is, chief physician to the king. The measure of his country's gratitude, however, was not yet full; an honour awaited him which had never before been conferred by any Swedish monarch on a literary man; having acquired a moderate degree of opulence, sufficient to enable him to purchase a territory, with a mansion, at Hammarby near Upsal, he was created a knight of the polar star in 1753, and in 1761 elevated to the rank of nobility. During the last years of his existence, he chiefly resided upon his own estate, enjoying the fruits of his genius, the confidence of his countrymen, together with the respect of all the learned bodies in Europe. It was in this beautiful and well-earned retreat that he fulfilled the order of nature, by yielding up a life devoted to scientific research, on the 11th of January, 1778. So highly were his talents appreciated, and so properly was he looked up to as an ornament to his species and a benefactor to science, that, impressed ing in favour of so intelligent a native of the country which had adopted him for its sovereign, the king of Sweden, in 1819, ordered a monument to be erected to him at the place of his nativity. Besides his works on natural history, he published a Classical Materia Medica, also a Systematic Treatise on Nosology, entitled "Genera Morborum." Natural science owes him great obligations, since few men have been more assiduous in its service, few have equalled the boldness, the zeal, the activity, and the sagacity he displayed in the pursuit; and although it is possible the arrangement may hereafter give place to one more perfect,-indeed it has already gone under no less than sixty-three revisions by different botanists, among whom are to be found Thunberg, who was his own pupil, Gmelin, the botanical professor at Gottingen, Withering, Schreiber, and our own Dr. Smith; independent of which, another system, broached by Jessieu, the French naturalist, is making rapid strides ;-yet that of the immortal Linné will never fail to be contemplated as a noble effort of the human mind, will always attract the admiration of the sons of science, nor will it ever cease to be eulogized by the world at large, seeing that it will furnish ample reason for congratulation, that, instead of being made a shoemaker, he made himself a philosopher. THE SEASONS. SPRING came adorned with early flowers, For then, in yonder shady grove, The Summer came with rip'ning grain, The Autumn came with many a blast, For then my young and lovely wife In all its harsh inclemency; For then my wife, in youth and bloom, DEAR THE ODD BOY ON DOCTORS. EAR MR. EDITOR,-You did not expect I was going to write this month! Didn't you now-there, did it feel savage poor thing! poor thing! I'll explain all about it in four words. I have been ill. Is not that apology enough? Shall I go further? No; I feel certain you are disarmed in a moment, that commiseration looks out of both your eyes, and that you are heard to utter the words, "How dreadful!" mentally resolving, at the same time, to send me a very handsome cheque. YesDroit vous sont, mon garcon! (Is not that the French of a real native ?) It is dreadful to be shut up and shut in when the thermometer is bang up to the top of its glass prison, and you have only the happy consciousness that it cannot get no hotter. Dreadful! yes, it is; when Smith has gone to the Exhibition, and Brown is baking himself to the colour of his nominative on Ramsgate Sands; when Jones is yachting it round the Needles, and Robinson is dining at Guildhall and everywhere else-hobnobbing with Sultans, Pachas, and Princes, and filling his pocket with sovereigns through telling other people in the newspapers what he has seen! I call it very hard indeed. A hard case! it cannot be harder where there is none. Shall I grieve not I; it is not in the composition of the Odd Boy. Give me pen, ink, and paper. I'll send a ball into the surgery-I'll wake up my Esculapius: "Sir,-If you cannot make a perfect cure of me in five-andtwenty minutes, say no-resign your portfolio. Another M.D. must do the trick.Yours, in the bonds of indigestion, T.O.B." Ay, ay, sir! that woke him up. I am already better: besides, a subject is suggested. Doctors have at ye all! Don't be alarmed, I am not going to dish up an article made up of the book about doctors for Galen, Abernethy, LettsomI leta 'em alone. They in their days were gruff or civil, dull or sharp-true on the question of fees, and in making their unhappy patients suffer both in person and in purse. I have heard it is the rule in China for the pay of the Imperial physicians to be suspended the very day the Brother of the Sun falls ill, and not resumed again until he's well and hearty. O, but they are wise ones, those old Celestials, and verily wandered not for nothing in the forest of pencils! Doctors! I have suffered a very plague of doctors all my life. They will earth me in time, and then with crocodile tears expect to hear themselves mentioned in my will. Courage, mes braves! mentioned you shall be-but, O lancets and gallipots, I will not say how! I count amongst my friends-ha! ha! ha! that is a joke-fifteen and a-half medical men:— They are very nice people socially, and, if I may so speak, "off the boards," but they are horrible upon them. May I trouble you with a few of their peculiarities ?-of course I cannot wait for your answer, and shall turn your silence to consent. There is a bland gentleman of the old school-white hair, white neckcloth, spotless, black cloth impeccable, a big gold watch, that has run a race with many a fevered pulse, and has counted out the lifesands oft. Soft, satiny-skinned is he; he drives to your house in a handsome chariot with two well-fed horses and a driver on the same pattern. He never bustles into your house, never comes hurriedly into your room, never rudely pulls aside your bedcurtains, never bounces down in a chair in a self-assertive way, as if because you were bankrupt in health you were entirely at the mercy of the medical commissioners. He glides in, he draws the curtain gently, he looks upon you with all the soft sweetness of a good nurse on a wayward child; so soft of speech as he takes your hand, so intent as he whispers one or two questions, so discreet as he murmurs in quite an undertone to those in attendance, looking all the while at you, and not at them. So affectionate, but quite undemonstrative, as he glides away-the very spirit of healing. Well wot I that such a man is a good doctor; there is health returning in his very aspect. He has gone: a happy octogenarian, to rest at least from his labours, for there physicians are no more. Here's another of them-a very friendly fellow, a capital taste for the brewing of punch, and such a hand at cards that I would not recommend anybody to challenge him on the green cloth for guinea points. You are ill-he rushes in-bang, bang, bounce, and, "Now then, Todboy, what's the row with you? What have you been at, eh? I see what it is-stomach all awry-regular turn up: you must have a dose, my fine fellow." A dose! his doses are worse than disease. He told me how to find out the diagnosis. "How's the appetite ? Stomach ? Let's look at your tongue. Pulse ?" He used to say that was all that was necessary, and that when he was dispenser somewhere, this formula, followed by a big bottle full of the same sort of stuff for everybody-something that made fellows feel jolly queer, but really did them no harm-answered in thousands of cases. Another medical gentleman I know, who was riled with me the other day for being taken ill at four o'clock in the morning instead of four o'clock in the afternoon, rather confirmed these opinions. He mentioned the case of a poor patient, who would not believe in medicine unless it was particularly nauseous; and I understand the "niggers," whom I cannot say I recognise as men and brothers in this particular, will never be satisfied with recipes that are not very large in quantity, and very nasty to the palate. I suppose it is a matter of taste! There is the sleek, lugubrious doctor, who comes in like an undertaker, and shakes his head so gloomily, that if you were in extremis you would like to pull it off. He makes the worst of everything, exaggerates every symptom, and says, "Well, we must hope! we must hope!" One of these gentlemen, I remember, had a frenzy for small-pox, and was always, when called in, mentioning his fears to nervous women. Three times he confidently predicted smallpox in my own case, and I have not had it yet. I called on him one morning, and he asked me did I notice that fine healthy-looking young man who had just left. "Yes," I said, "he has had the small-pox-a week ago he could not see out of his eyes." With regard to making the worst of things, one of the fraternity assured me it was the most natural and proper thing in the world. "Make light of the matter, and the patient is not properly looked after; pitch it in strong, and the nurses cure him." A more politic reason was assigned by another: "If we say it is almost a goner, of course-if they go-why the mischief weren't we called in earlier! if they come round, as most likely they will, we have a glorious triumph-quite a stock case, a very snatching from the jaws of death." There is the quiet doctor, who does apparently nothing. To most people he is a great bore. Then there is the impatient doctor, who, in order to do something, has the windows instantly thrown open or shut up, as the case may be, burns feathers, tumbles the patient about, routs the nurses, demands half-a-dozen things in as many seconds, and so gets time to think what he shall do in real earnest. A man who can do this cleverly, combining real skill with it, is a shrewd card. Here comes one friend of mine, and he denounces the old school-pills, potions, blisters, bleedings, and the rest of it: he is an homœopath, and will believe in nothing else; a few of his magic globules-no tinctures-and the thing is done. Here is another of the thorough-going old school— blue pill, black draught, castor oil-everything that is nasty, half-a-dozen leeches, a pretty little blister, and the use of the lancet in the arm. He snatches up the homoeopath globules, and swallows the lot. Here is a disciple of Preissnitz, with cold-water baths, cold-water bandages, cold-water sheets, and plenty of clean cold water inwardly. You remember, perhaps, that T. Hood, the elder, tells us of watching a duck in St. James's fees to give, but pain to bear. I should like to have been summoned from my dinner-table; to have been knocked up three times every night; to have been called from the social party at the most social moment Park following the hydropathic instructions, and how at last the sagacious bird cried, quack, quack, quack!" Here comes one, whom I know very well and esteem very highly for all sort of good qualities, and he is Eclectic. You know what that means ?--ay, and of course this is the most trelook it up, boys, if you don't-he is much of an homoeopathist. Something of the old school, and not a little inclined to the use of cold water. All through the last frightful visitation of cholera, this man, with a very large practice, never lost a patient. Mr. Editor, I am growing slow. Having been so lately ill, perhaps I might be ill again, and one or other of the doctors play Meg's diversion with me out of spite. No they won't do that, not though I throw their physic to the dogs, who, I am quite sure, would not take it. I hold themreally-in too much respect to think any harm of them. But sure I am, that a few of them only act up to the dignity and grandeur of their profession. Suppose I was a doctor-ah, suppose that roasted fowls fell from the sky!should not I have reaped a golden harvest? Fees, fees, fees, snugly slipping into my unconscious right hand, that all unknowingly conveys them to my left-hand pocket. I should not have hesitated to take the handsomest of fees from the rich, nor to have done my best for the poor who had no IN mendous of all-I would not have minded being fetched out of church when Poundtext was only at his first particular. Would I have been narrow-no. The ladies desiring to enter our profession should have had free access. "Come to my arms, my Mary Walker!" would have been my involuntary cry. Give Just in conclusion, let me say a word about the size of doctors. Some are too big. Elephantine beings make a sick man angry and a weak woman scared. There are some too little-bits of things about as long as the bolster. Bah! Take them away-throw them out of window. me your middle-sized man-nicely-built-a gentleman in behaviour and that's the man for my money. Once upon a time, I was ill in bed, and my medical attendant danced a hornpipe--a pretty little affair it was, and did me a world of good. The day before he had been but a simple M.R.C.S., now he was a full-fledged M.D. Nothing could be more appropriate the College Hornpipe. Yours obediently, A STORY OF REVENGE. all Singleton there was not a prettier girl than Bessie Wells. With the moderation of this statement her many admirers would doubtless quarrel; but, since the fact of their being admirers exposes them to a suspicion of partiality, the first limited claim shall suffice. Very pretty she was, then, and endowed by nature with an inexhaustible fund of gaiety, for ever welling up from the light heart, to sparkle in the sunny, hazel eyes, and dimple about the ripe, red lips. But, beside all this-partly, perhaps, in consequence of it-Miss Bessie was a flirt. Unfortunately, there can be no question upon the subject. Never a city belle has THE ODD BOY. been more thoroughly versed in wiles and So own heart should be held in the bonds of a strong, real love: the only lasting spell of such a nature. Among Bessie's suitors, Will Farnsworth undoubtedly had the advantage, if resolute persistence could avail to win the prize. Energetic and determined, he had no thought of yielding to despair until such a resignation became absolutely necessary-which certainly was not yet. For, if a negative hope be worth anything, Will's case was far from hopeless, since his sweetheart at least afforded little encouragement to his rivals. Wherefore he kept up a stout heart, under the conviction that, as long as her liking belonged to no other, there was a chance of its some day becoming his own. Such was the young man's theory, from which, hitherto, he had derived a good deal of comfort. But, in the summer about to be recorded, he seemed in danger of witnessing its inverse demonstration after a fashion not at all to his taste. That Bessie Wells had at length found her match the young men and maidens of Singleton all agreed; so did the elder village gossips, whose time and tongues might have been more usefully employed; and, last but not least, in view of its vital importance to his own happiness, so did poor Will himself. And it certainly did look very much as if the little coquette had surrendered to Alfred Gaines, the young city gentleman who occupied the "parlour chamber" in the Widow Wells' pleasant white cottage. Not only had he become her constant attendant at all the rustic merry-makings, but, day after day, the two might be seen, strolling throughout the sunny, dewy mornings, over meadow and woodland, with smiles on their lips and flowers in their hands, or passing away the long and lovely twilights among the woodbine and climbing roses that twined around the pillars, and swung from the roof, of the cosy cottage-porch. And all the while people talked and speculated; the girls envied Miss Bessie; the boys hated Mr. Gaines-and Will Farnsworth was miser :able. For a time he kept away from the house, but, finally, absence grew too heavy a burden for endurance, and, at the risk of increasing his unhappiness, he resolved to see her. For once she was not in the porch, nor yet within, where he sought her, unsuccessfully, until directed by Mrs. Wells to the garden. Turning his steps thither, he presently came upon a picture which, however charming from an artistic point of view, was anything but pleasing to the unappreciative gaze at that moment bent upon it. Standing beside Bessie, Alfred Gaines held her in the swing with one arm, while the other was stretched upward in the endeavour to gain something which, with both hands, she held away from him. Both were laughing, but not too heartily to hear the rustle made by the intruder, as, in turning quickly, his hand hit and shook a low-drooping apple-bough that fell across the path. Recognizing him in the clear moonlight, Bessie started so violently as to throw her head against Mr. Gaines's shoulder, but for which, and the encircling arm, she would have fallen to the ground. Immediately recovering herself, however, she drew away from him, into a patch of shadow near by, leaving Will no choice but to advance, with a very hot and uncomfortable sense of false position, indicated by his first words. "Good evening," he began, doubtfully, addressing no one in particular-"I hope I'm not intruding ?" Beyond a corresponding salutation, Bessie made no reply, but her companion was not so reticent. "On the contrary," he said, with a mischievous laugh, glancing towards the girl— "you are extremely welcome-to me, at least. I have quite worn myself out with swinging Miss Bessie-whose weight is really something surprising!—and shall be glad to find so able a substitute." But, with a saucy retort, Bessie declared herself tired of the sport, and the party sought the porch. Here, however, it was no better. A spell of mischief seemed to hold Bessie, who could not or would not talk, but sat silently weaving a wreath of rosebuds with the ivy that entwined one of the rustic pillars. Chilled with this cold welcome, Will very soon rose to go, but, making one last effort, he said, hurriedly: |