the heart of one of
the mummies he found about three drams of pure nitre; the heart being
entire, this must have been injected through the blood-vessels. Mummy
powder was formerly in use all over Europe as a medicine, and is still
employed as such among the Arabs, who mix it with butter, and esteem it
a sovereign remedy for internal and external ulcers.

_Sulphur._

It is well known that sulphur which has been recently fused, does not
immediately recover its former properties; but no one suspected that it
required whole months, and even a longer period, fully to restore
them.--_From the French_.

_Sympathetic Ink._

Write on paper with a weak solution of nitrate of mercury, and the
characters will become black, when held to the fire.

* * * * *

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

* * * * *

A SINGULAR LETTER FROM SOUTHERN AFRICA.

_Communicated by Mr. Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd_.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

In my last I related to you all the circumstances of our settlement
here, and the prospect that we had of a peaceful and pleasant
habitation. In truth, it is a fine country, and inhabited by a fine race
of people, for the Kousies, as far as I have seen of them, are a simple
and ingenuous race.

You knew my Agnes from her childhood--you were at our wedding at
Beattock, and cannot but remember what an amiable and lovely girl she
then was; and when she was going about our new settlement with our
little boy in her arms, I have often fancied that I never saw so lovely
a human being.

The chief Karoo came to me one day with his interpreter, whom he caused
to make a long palaver about his power, and dominion, and virtues, and
his great desire to do much good. The language of this fellow being a
mixture of Kaffre, High Dutch, and English, was peculiarly ludicrous,
and most of all so when he concluded with expressing his lord's desire
to have my wife to be his own, and to give me in exchange for her four
oxen, the best that I could choose from his herd!

As he made the proposal in presence of my wife, she was so much tickled
with the absurdity of the proposed barter, and the manner in which it
was expressed, that she laughed immoderately. Karoo, thinking she was
delighted with it, eyed her with a look that surpasses all description,
and then caused his interpreter to make another palaver to her
concerning all the good things she was to enjoy; one of