the milk-girl did, there was no fear in her about the matter she had had a disorder which would for ever prevent her from having the small-pox. The court physicians laughed at the reply of the Duchess, as others who were with Jenner had at the Dorsetshire milkmaid; but events proved how truly they had spoken; and all the wise and the crowned heads of Europe saved themselves and their children by the milkmaid's fashion; notably the house of Hapsburg, which had nearly been extinguished by it. It was observation which led to the discovery of that greatest of necessaries for sailors, the mariner's compass; and the same quality, of a more reverential turn, saved the life of Bruce, the African traveller, who, when fainting and ready to lie down and die upon the hot sands of the desert, observed a little lowly plant flourishing away, even in that remote and arid spot. That desert flower was not "born to blush unseen," and very few probably are. "Will the same Providence who nourishes that plant," thought Bruce, "suffer me to die?" and he crawled on to find a spring, and live. It were well if discontented and desponding people thought with Bruce. We should all "find goodness even in things evil, could we, observing, distil it out ;" and we do not know any Divine or human law which prevents us from so doing. There is not a situation in the world so low, or desperate, or mean, that observation will not either improve it, or make it bearable. Half the envyings and strife and bickerings, the jostlings and wranglings, the quarrels, wars, and murders, might be prevented and entirely eradicated, if we only encouraged this most useful faculty a

little more. We owe every kind of sanitary improvement, all kinds of medicine, and all surgical skill, all the grand discoveries, and all the civilization to which we have arrived, to the quiet exercise of observation. If those who thirst for gold, for power, and for position, had only thoroughly observed the state of those above them, who have all that they hunger for, they would probably sit still and be at peace. There is a good story—an old one, of course—told of a certain great king who was deterred from a series of sanguinary battles, and a destructive war, by the observation of a philosophic counsellor. "I shall invade such a kingdom," said the monarch. "And that taken ?" asked his friend. "Then another province." And that added?" "Why, then I shall pass such and such a river, and add the whole country beyond." "And that attained?" continued the questioner. Why, then I shall rest quietly at home." Could you not do so now, without undergoing all that fatigue and danger, with a very questionable issue?" "Ah!" returned the king, struck with the observation, "I never thought of that." So it is with most of us. We do not observe till it is too late; but of this we may be sure, that a due exercise of the faculty distinguishes, perhaps more than any other, the philosopher from the fool.

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NE of the most curious of mental phenomena, the most difficult to account for, the most subtile, and frequently the most evanescent, is that connection between the will and the brain which results in memory. The faculty does not belong alone to man. It is shared by the inferior animals, by reptiles, birds, and even fish and insects. So subtile is it, that it cannot be controlled. It is alike treacherous in its tenacity and its looseness. We often forget that which we chiefly desire to recall, and again we are forced to remember that which we wish to forget. It may depend upon a casual moment, an accident, or a trick. A London mechanic, whilst watching his Sunday dinner, as it twirled round on a roasting-jack, was endeavouring to teach an obstinate but tame starling how to speak. The bird obstinately refused, but the mechanic persisted, when suddenly the spring of the jack broke, and it ran down with a startling "whir." The bird, frightened off its perch, at once imitated the sound, and ever afterwards exercised the new accomplishment. It had fixed itself on the bird's memory to the exclusion of other teaching. Thus,

parrots brought over by sailors imitate the loud and energetic swearing of Jack Tars, rather than those dulcet and moral sentences which their young mistresses try assiduously to instil. So, also, a dancing bear learns to caper from being violently impressed with the necessity of so doing; and thus Banks's horse was taught to stand upon its hind legs, beat a tambourine, and astonish Queen Elizabeth.

The secret of this kind of memory therefore is IMPRESSION, which is the first agent mentioned by Professor Barron in lectures delivered in the last century. The second is ASSOCIATION; another very powerful and active agent, and which is chiefly depended on by all those who have written upon the subject of improving the memory, and who, from Simonides to our present professor, Dr. Pick, seem to have really got no farther than these two. Impression may be said to arise from accident or nature. Once thoroughly impress any one, and he will not forget. Association, on the other hand, is the leaning-post upon which the memory rests. It backs itself up with it. It is the only true support a weak memory can have. It is curious, but it is true, that by making the mind do double duty you force it to perform its single one well. If anybody has a weak and defective recollection, he must associate two facts in order to remember one. This is the natural system of artificial memory, and the only effective one. All persons who are weak in that way do so aid it ; and Hobbes, in his Leviathan, has pointed out the use of this association. Mrs. Quickly, the parent and prototype of all our careless gossips, remembers one thing by another she recollects

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Falstaff's debt by association-that when he borrowed the money "he was sitting in her dolphin chamber by a sea-coal fire; and that Mistress Keech, the butcher's wife, came in and called her 'gossip ;' whereby Sir John bid her not be called 'gossip,' because she should soon be called lady ;" and so on, till one association makes the original fact clear. This operation is repeated every day in our police-courts. The magistrate has to wait for a long time before the memory of a witness on the most important testimony is complete.

Association is at work, one fact calls up another, till the whole connection of facts stands suddenly revealed, as when a brisk wind lifts away a fog and shows us the landscape beyond. Nature and fiction alike help us. Mrs. Nickleby couples her ideas: she hears of Miss Biffin, and wonders whether she is of the same family as the "Norfolk Biffins." So also Mrs. Gamp wanders, and, to use an old country word, "maunders" to the end of the chapter; and our latest comic creation, Lord Dundreary, pieces out his confused bits of proverbs, trying to arrive at a whole one through an imperfect theory of association. So, also, Simonides, one of the earliest writers upon mnemonics, improved as well as proved his. Invited by Scopas to pronounce a panegyric at a feast, the poet indulged in a long rhapsody in praise of Castor and Pollux. Scopas, indignant at this, refused payment, and Simonides was driven out, or, as he says, was drawn away by the divine interposition of the gods he had praised. Hardly had he left the house when it fell, crushing Scopas and all his guests, and Simonides