"own sartan knowledge, them there jontlemen, "I mean Mr. A. and Mr. B., have this day been "offered fifty shillings a week, and their board, "washing, and lodging,—and all that, at Mr. Roger O'Flanaghan's, the master-taylor, as honest a "jontleman as ever padded a shoulder or flattened

66

The valorous knights of the needle being asked, Why they did not accept so liberal an offer?'answered with the utmost sang froid, "that on "inspecting the bed-rooms in which they were to "lie, they found one of them uncarpeted, and the "other without either basin, wash-hand stand, or "dressing-table."

After this, a variety of other subjects occupied the attention of the company, among the most prominent of which was, "the propriety of admitting EX-PARTE and circumstantial evidence in cases of life and death." The Scotchman contended for the principle, and our more enlightened country. men against it: While John Bull and brother Jonathan, totally uninterested, having never thought of putting their necks in danger, withdrew to another apartment, convinced that they had at least strong circumstantial evidence of the impertinent vanity of our countrymen.

Of all vapid coxcombs upon earth, an Irish emigrant without education is the most intolerable, the least amiable, and the most preposterous: A perfect model of affectation! You must recollect, however, that I speak only of the lowest classes.

In their persons the Upper Canadians are tall, slight, and not badly proportioned. The men, though in their complexions little fairer than their Indian neighbours, are nevertheless not ordinary. Their features are generally good, but entirely void of intelligence and expression. Inured to hardships from their infancy, and always accustomed to labour in the open air, they are strong, athletic, and active. In their dress, they differ little from the English, except that the lower class, for there are two distinct classes in the country, invariably wear long loose pantaloons, instead of small-clothes.

The women are in general above the middle size, slight, but not elegantly formed. Their com plexion is perfectly sallow; and, though some of them are possessed of the finest black eyes, they can boast of very few of those irresistible charms which captivate the heart and enslave the affections. They marry while yet children; and, frequently before they attain to 30 years, exhibit many symptoms of old age. Even at 25, and sometimes prior to that period, they have an emaciated and dejected look. Their conversation,-if they may be said to converse at all,-is seldom interesting, never sprightly, and tends little to atone for the almost total absence of personal attractions. They early become martyrs to the tooth-ache, which greatly disfigures them. Scarcely a female of 20 years' old can be found in the country, onehalf of whose teeth are not entirely destroyed and

the other half rapidly decaying. They are also very commonly subject to swellings of the neck, usually called goitres. This unpleasant malady is said to have its origin in the frequent use of snow-water; but as the inhabitants of those countries which lie nearest to the Glaciers, drink no other water, and yet are not afflicted with these violent tumours, it does not seem right to fix upon that as the cause.

Guthrie says, the people of Naples, of the Island of Sumatra, of Putna, and Purnea in the East Indies, where snow is entirely unknown, are much subject to goitres. This being the case, it is quite evident, that the disease must be attributed to some other cause. Many people think, that the water in Canada, as well as that of the countries mentioned by Guthrie, is impregnated with certain deleterious particles, which engender the goitres. This theory is, however, equally liable to refutation; for if water were in any wise the cause, men, who in Canada drink four times as much water as women, would also be afflicted with the same disease, which is not by any means the fact. You must, therefore, if you are at all curious to know the origin of this complaint, apply to some person of more competent judgment than your correspondent.t I have only further to remark,

On this subject I quote with approbation the subjoined just remarks from Professor DWIGHT's Travels:

"There is another disease, which is unquestionably owing to the nature of this country, and not merely to the recency of its

that the neck swells to a prodigious size, but without producing any pain, or other unpleasant

settlement. This is what is called in Switzerland the goitres, or the hernia gutturis. By the Honourable Uriah Tracy, late a senator of the United States from Connecticut, I am informed, that this disease is found to some extent throughout a great part of the regions lying North of the Ohio and West of the Alleghany mountains. Mr. Tracy was employed by the American government on a mission of importance, which required him to make a tour throughout a large extent of this country. Accordingly he passed through Pennsylvania, by the way of Pittsburgh and Presque Isle, and thence, crossing Lake Erie, proceeded to Detroit. From this place he went to Michilimackinac, and thence to Lake Superior. From Michilimackinac he returned to Buffaloe Creek, and took the great western road to Albany. In this excur sion he found the goitres existing in the older settlements more, in the newer less frequently, but actually existing at different distances throughout the whole region. Several other gentlemen have confirmed the account of Mr. Tracy. That the disease exists from Utica to Buffaloe is, I think, certain; probably not in every township, but in such a manner as to indicate that it is incident to the country at large, and has a foundation in its nature and circumstances. When I was at Paris, in the year 1799, there were in the parish of Clinton but two families affected with it. In these families, however, and most others where it has been for a number of years, it seized on several of the members. At the North end of the bridge, which crosses the Mohawk from Utica, there was, in the year 1799, á family within the township of Deerfield, consisting of ten or eleven persons, every one of whom, as I was informed, had the goitres.

"Persons afflicted with this disease have, as is well known, swellings of the neck, rising indifferently in front or at the sides; and, when they become large, extending throughout the anterior half. These swellings are of all sizes, from the slightest protuberance to that of a quart bowl; and are attended with stiffness of the neck, a slight degree of continual pain, and frequently a

effect except that of disfiguring and discomforting the patient.

In Upper Canada, there are only two classes of society. The FIRST is composed of professional men, merchants, civil and military officers, and the members of the Provincial Parliament: The

depression of spirits. The sufferings of the patient are increased by a cold, and by almost every other infirmity. Women are more frequently and more severely afflicted with this disease than men, feeble than vigorous persons, and children than adults. In the higher degrees it becomes a painful deformity, not only as an unnatural protuberance, but by imparting a disagreeable cast to the features, particularly to the eyes. When the patient continues in the same place, and in the same habits of living by which it was produced, it generally increases; but if he removes to a part of the country where it is unknown, it not uncommonly decreases, and sometimes disappears.

"The existence of this disease, throughout so great an extent of country, is, I believe, unexampled in the world. Should it spread very generally among the inhabitants of this region, it must hereafter affect many millions of the human race. When we consider the magnitude of this fact, and remember, that the disease in its higher stages is hitherto incurable, it becomes a very serious evil. It is to be hoped, that the same good Providence, which has so lately and so wonderfully dissipated the terrors of the small 'pox, by the discovery of the vaccine inoculation, will also disclose a remedy for the melancholy disease under consideration.

Distressing, however, as this disorder seems to a stranger, the inhabitants appear already to regard it with abated apprehensions, and to be approximating in their views of it towards indifference. An intelligent and respectable lady in Pittsburgh was -asked by Mr. Tracy, whether it existed in her family: she said, she presumed it did not. The children were then called up and examined, and five of them were found to be affected with it."