ries be forced under careful shelter and in hot houses, but their very breadstuffs, their wheat, rye and maize, their sauces, condiments, spices and sugars, their potatoes, peanuts, beans and cabbages will be made to grow in great crystal palaces, or immense Sydenham winter gardens, or fields heated by subterranean fires, factitious imitations of the Solfaterra, where fat sheep shall be fed on forced turnip, for their wool and mutton, and cows for their milk, butter and cheese, on forced grass and hay. How long the world will be able to get along on these terms, we will not pretend to say. Doubtless there will be many difficulties to contend with, but "necessity is the mother of invention," and the ingenuity of our Yankee bretheren. will exult in such a wide field to expatiate in. Coal is heavy and transportation costly, and there will be much contest for propinquity to Newcastle, Wolverhampton, Cumberland, Cloverhill, Pottsville, Mauch-Chunk and Deep River, but as knowledge and science improve, locomotion and transportation must become more and more easy, and thus the circles crowding around these coal-deposites will be larger and better accommodated than we can now conceive to be possible. We take for granted that our readers know as well or better than we do what is meant by the terms coal beds and "coal measures," and coal deposites. It is not very easy to comprehend how ferns and other vegetable matters came to be charred in these immense masses and long drawn out veins; nor how and under what pressure they came to be so tightly packed, so hard and heavy as we find them now. A question arises as to the difference of quality in these several collections, and whether there was in the original materials the same variety as we find now in the degrees of combustibility. Some coal we know is almost as slow to take fire and burn as slate. All anthracites catch very reluctantly, and go out readily unless in a strong draught. That which is found in Rhode Island is, indeed, called coal by courtesy merely, as being somewhat less incombustible than asbestos, and, indeed, might be made use of for the furnace, hearth, vent and chimney of a volcano. the other hand the bituminous species makes a very good torch, and cannel coal especially blazes at once when held near a flame. We have often inquired its etymology; unde derivatur cannel? Is it not a vulgarism for "candle?" On We have been long observant of the changes and substitutions of one kind of fuel for another in this, our ancient, well-beloved, native city of Charleston. We recollect the time-alas! for our gray hairs-when we did not know of any other than a wood fire. Then our level hearths glowed with the fat lightwood, and the brightly burning hickory and the slow consuming oak. Then the axe gave employment to hundreds of sturdy negroes in the neighboring forests, and the saw and "horse" afforded occupation and support to the aged and comparatively feeble at our doors and within our enclosures. Then, the chill morning air rung all around with the musical cry of the chimney sweep, now so seldom heard comparatively, as "crawling like snail reluctantly along he sought for a job, or, having found and half completed one, "crowed like Chanticleer," perched upon the outlet of some tall chimney. The ships that came hither from Great Britain for our cotton and rice, soon fell into the custom of bringing us, partly, at least, as ballast, and at no very high rate of cost, the "sea coal" of old England, always the favorite fuel of the emigrant from the old country.The use of this valuable article soon became common. All houses of any pretension in the city were furnished with grates; and the cheerful blaze and genial and very manageable fire which it made, recommended it to all who could afford it. But for the distance of the supply and its occasional and increasing irregularity, it would have grown into universal and exclusive use. Our lamentable, perhaps unavoidable, commercial dependence upon New York, and the consequent uncertainty of direct voyages from England to this port, augmented the price of the article, and shook the confidence of the housekeeper. Wood fires were never abandoned, therefore, and seemed likely to be resumed more generally again after a time, when the discovery or invention of easy and economical modes of burning anthracite, which was found in prodigious abundance and of good quality in Pennsylvania, brought this cheerless but convenient variety of fuel into our houses. Of late it has constituted our principal supply, and thousands of tons are employed annually in our houses and kitchens. of St. Peter's at Rome, down to a Bengal blue light, or a line of torches at a Mississippi wood pile, a sky rocket, a serpent, or a Catherine wheel. A dull, changeless, reddish glare, hot and dry, fanned into existence by the dark suffocation of a "blower," which, when taken off, is sure to burn the carpet or scorch somebody's fingers, and once set agoing keeps itself up at a wearisome and monotonous average, exciting no attention and requiring no care for some long hours-this is the characteristic of a "red ash" fire. If it goes out unhappily by your forgetfulness, a thing not unlikely, as it demands so little current notice, you will have a hard fight to get it alight again-freez ing before you succeed and simmering when you have succeeded. Nor will you find it easy to manage the degree of heat to your wish in moderate weather, being forced to comply with the exigency that requires a considerable mass to be burnt, together with a fierce draught, or resort to the use of a small stove and the suppression of that ventilation without which there can be neither health nor comfort. We never understood the commercial reasons that prevented our resorting to the mines which supply Richmond and Baltimore with their bituminous coal, while we imported from Great Britain and even from Nova Scotia, an article not at all preferable. We ourselves with some delay and difficulty, obtained it from both the sources named, and found it of admirable quality. But there was no one engaged in the business, and our opportunities of procuring it were few and far between. It seemed to us nearly as good as the best English Cannel and far inferior to It it in price, while it was decidedly so as to burn either slowly or fast superior to all other trans-Atlantic as you choose to let in air with varieties. the poker; and is very decent, leaving very little cinders or ashes. makes a very choice cake, too, and is well, adapted for culinary purposes. Quite recently an excellent coal has been discovered, or rather rediscovered by the geologists of North Carolina. It seems that the existence of coal in the coun- Best of all, perhaps, it lies very ties adjoining our own State on accessible to us, and the line of the Pee Dee and in the neighbor- rail road from Cheraw to the dehood of Deep River, was known posites, projected and about to be to our anti-revolutionary masters, built, will bring it to us in any who were about to avail themselves amount, and at a rate of cheapness of the knowledge when the war of that will altogether set aside any independence broke out. This coal from Anthracite, Orrel or Newis highly bituminous and very free castle. Our forests will henceforth from sulphur; catches quickly, be spared to adorn the landscape even at the flame of a candle; and furnish warmth to the dwellburns brightly with cheerful flame ings of the rustic poor and the and glowing heat; cakes readily, isolated planter. RETIREMENT. The truth is trite upon a thousand lips, The soul if it would burn with star-like power, The tumult of a tempest rolling through A chain of neighboring mountains-they, awhile hazy air which hangs over the whole like an atmosphere of dreams. In a luxury of quiet we yield ourselves to the potent spell of the season, and muse and moral bidden, and commune with phantasies of the past, or the unformed shapes which flit misty and pallid about the depths of the time to come. Whom the world would sting with its sharpest satire, that unfor tunate it calls a dreamer; but there is wis dom even in a day-dream, and in the paths of aimless speculation, truth sometimes strays lovingly beside us, and whispers strange words of peace and joy. How rich and glowing, and full of ruddy life, is this delicious season! this pause, as it were, between the buoyant maidenhood of June, and the more set tled and matronly splendor of the volup-ize, and walk among visions that rise untuous August! Let us divest ourselves, gentle reader, of the yokes of toil and custom, let us leave the tumultuous city with its din of Mammon, and jargon of sharp tongues behind us, and under the shade of grey hospitable oaks, or by the brink of shadowed streams and secluded fountains, catch somewhat of the inspiration of our first youth from communion with the full youth of nature. Have you ever so clearly realised before that nature is indeed our mother? Imperfect sympathies she may have awakened in us by her sublimer moods and aspects, but it is only through the currents of the genial Summer, that she thrills us with the deep love of her living heart. We are drawn to her bosom with all the tenderness of maternal passion. The hard scales of convention fall from off our eyes, and with "purged vision" we are admitted to the presence of holy mysteries, and our ears attuned to the music of sweetest hopes. Life and death! how impenetrable a veil envelopes their solemn secrets, while we move only among our fellow men, but it is not all dark and cold, and mournful to Him, for whom the "hills have a language, and the stars harmonious influences," and of whom it may be said, "The pulse of dew upon the grass keeps his within its number, And silent shadows from the trees re fresh him like a slumber." Last autumn we stood beneath these very trees, the earth a carpet of withered leaves, ard the harsh North-western winds surging among the heavy branches, and blighting what little of life and verdure had lingered thus long upon the scene. Could we have imagined aught more desolate? And here after the lapse of a few months we stand again, surrounded by a chorus of glad voices, the voices of bird, and breeze, and stream, and forest, refreshed by the odors of wild roses, and the queenly laurel flowers, great canopies of green rustling above our heads, and all earth and heaven flushed, teeming, radiant with vitality, tempered by the In Autumn we think of the graves of our beloved, and the "Conqueror Worm" writhes cunningly into our fancies, trailing the mould and gleaming through the dull glow of the charnel; but now it is upon the "resurrection and the life," the re-vivification and renewal of the beauty that has vanished-and the soul-treasures of faith and tenderness that vanished with it, that we delight to ponder, till hope grows strong, and winged with the enthusiasm of belief, and from the land of cloud and shadow we gather a vigor, and trust, and freshness of the spirit, which the beaten highways of the world can never give. "Man doth not yield him unto the angels, nor unto death utterly, save through the weakness of his feeble will," but shall we yield ourselves unto the angels of dark thoughts, or to despondency, which is the death of aspiration, while even in the gloom and decay of nature, we can look forward with a confidence that laughs at ruin, to the everlasting revival of the seasons, to the gush and splendor, and gladness of the present time, typified in which we perceive, not through a glass darkly, but al most face to face that glory which never wanes into autumnal shadow, over-folding like the wings of the Spirit of Mercy, the fields of immortal life. Scarcely had we finished writing the preceding sentence, when an exceedingly dapper gentleman, dressed in exquisite taste, with a very silky moustache, and an air of interesting languor, strolled leisurely into our office, and having introduced himself by gracefully offering his snuff-box, handed us the harrowing involuntarily revert to Dickens' descripnarrative which follows: SUMMER-ITS GREATEST ANNOY ANCE. (Illustrated by an Adventure.) It is melancholy at this, the turning point of the seasons, to think upon the miseries that await us in the dreary summer months. The hot days and the enervating nights, the clouds of dust and the swarms of mosquitoes, the flies, the bugs, and the vermin generally, that turn out about July and August to give us an idea of the power of petty annoyances, and force upon us the Scripture injunction of not despising "the day of small things." Were this all, however, it might be borne. But it is not all. Mosquitoes are doubtless less pleasing than musical: flies-though interesting under a microscope, are offensive on a table,and bugs, unless they are genuine Scarabai, have but slight claims to our regard; nevertheless, they are not altogether, insufferable, We have the philosophy to endure them,-but who can think of the dog days, and the cause that originated the term, without shuddering. To reflect that there are hundreds of the canine species, permitted in defiance of law to wander about our streets,* with the liability of going mad at any moment of the day or night! It is distressing. Our readers probably cannot appreciate the danger. They may never have been pursued by an insane dog. We have been; and can assure them that the position (if such a word can be applied to a retreat) is terrific. Imagine a gentleman, fond of quiet and contemning excitements, walking forth in the cool of a summer afternoon to enjoy his cigar and the sunset. What a magnificent bank of clouds lie along the horizon! how beautiful the sky! how balmly the air how fragrant the earth, redolent of the first dews of the evening! After the "burden and heat of the day," this is the time for relaxation, repose, revery, dreaming. You look at the clouds, and fancy them anything you please-angels' wings, or the crown of the sun, or spiritual palaces, or sublime armies, or the night-cap of the Genii-in short, whatever your imagination may suggest.Then a delightful sensation of peace begins to steal over you. Your thoughts tion of his feelings at Niagara, though as regards Niagara itself you are compelled to acknowledge that Dickens would have described the " next pump better." Nevertheless, as a description of peace, and apart from the inappropri ateness of the occasion you confess to the beauty of his reflections, because, at the time, you experience something like them yourself. You become poetical. A complete stanzas arranges itself in your brain. The divine afflatus expands. That "fine phrenzy," the common herd cannot understand, takes possession of your faculties. You sit down on a green knoll by the side of the mill pond, and having produced a note book and pencil, proceed to chronicle your thoughts. You are in the middle of a sentence-a very fine sentence-when a dreadful cry arises in the rear. What can it be? Looking back along the lane you have just traversed, you desery a miscellaneous crowd with sticks and pokers, pursuing something--you can't see exactly what. The crowd is headed by a man, with a musket. As it comes nearer, the cries, from a "breezy bass" to a shrill falsetto, inform you that the miserable brute in front, the subject of this hue and coramotion, is a mad dog. With hair bristling and tongue drooping, and tail erect, and eyes burning like red hot copper coins, the wretched animal dashes towards you-growing in size and ferocity every instant, until you are ready to swear that the cub of a lion has escaped from the menagerie. heavens! what are you to do? is cut off-for the mill pond is on the left, and the lane, already thronged to overflowing, stretches away to the right. The fences, too, in the neighborhood, are alarmingly high. In the present nervous state of your system, it is impossible to leap them. Your pencil goes one way, your note-book another-and you look in agony to see whether you cannot go a third. But the thing is out of the question. By this time the dog is within forty steps of the little knoll near the water, where a minute before you had been under the influence of the "divine afflatus." Lord deliver us! what is that man with the musket about? The wretch has absolutely lifted the gun to his shoulder, though you are precisely in a line with him, (a mathematician could'nt Good Retreat *NOTE.-Of course it is NOT to the city of Charleston, that the writer refers. We take pleasure in bearing witness to the efficiency of our police in this particular, since we have had two valuable dogs, to whom we were tenderly attached, murdered in the neatest and most satisfactory manner. Modern seience having established the fact, that the old notion of hydrophobia is a mere superstition, we cannot too warmly admire the exterminating spirit manifested by our city authorities.—[ED. |