cation, bind themselves apprentices to prac→ tising physicians; some of whom, with grave faces, pretend to doubt the advantages of medical, botanical, and chemical lectures; and even express a sort of mahometan horror against the dissection of a dead body. To evade the act in question, a private contract is made with the teacher, by means of which the student is permitted to practise in his name, at some neighbouring place, for a certain portion of the fees which he receives. How then under these circumstances can he be acquainted with the causes, nature, symptoms, and species of diseases? Even the science of botany, and the study of the qualities of those plants, which nature has provided as remedies for certain disorders, are almost entirely neglected. How strikingly unjust, that a gentleman and scholar, regularly educated as a physician, should be placed on a level with a person who believes in the efficacy of charms, amulets, and superstitions worse than Egyptian.

The profession of an apothecary ought to be distinct from that of a physician. This would promote the interests and convenience of both, provided the fees were regulated as in France and in Britain. The physician,

when called to the country, is paid but a shilling a mile; but he has more profit from the sale of his drugs, which he is obliged to carry in his saddle-bags, where they are frozen in winter and melted in summer, to the great injury of the patient. He is obliged to profit of another circumstance, that of repeating his visits as long as a shadow of indisposition exists. The obstetric art ought not to be, as it generally is, in the hands of old women, unless educated for it, when young, as in France. Infants are mutilated, mothers are injured, sometimes rendered unfruitful, and, in difficult cases, expire, for want of a skilful surgeon. The ravages

which quackery exercises over the population are perhaps worse than all the diseases which prevail. Every species of ignorance and superstition is put under contribution to serve her purposes, while she operates by means of the influence acquired over the imagination of the victim. The good sense and integrity of magistrates and ministers of truth ought to be vigorously exerted against the mummery and delusion of words, signs, and charms.

In a territory where the wisest legislation has been adopted and sanctioned by public

opinion, ignorance, which degrades the moral and destroys the physical man, ought to find no resting-place. The enlightened physicians of Washington ought to create an association for establishing a medical library, and form themselves into a standing committee for foreign correspondence and domestic consultation on medical matters. The fruits of such an institution would be incalculable1.

OF THE WOMEN OF COLUMBIA.

The state of female society at Washington does great honour to the sex. They have been accused of sacrificing too much to the empire of fashion, but as we have not been able to verify the extent of this tribute, it would be dangerous to decide on so delicate a subject. They are certainly superior women, generally highly gifted in mental, as they are adorned with personal endowments. They have hitherto withstood the lamentable

1

Respectable and distinguished physicians and surgeons of the United States regret, as we do, that ignorance and quackery prevail against suffering humanity; and we hope that they will find nothing else in these observations than an homage which is due to their talents and patriotism.

ravages which art and luxury have in other great cities produced upon the sex.

There is an evil, however, which is deeply lamented. It is natural to love those who are made to be loved; and no sooner do the young ladies of Washington arrive at the nubile state, than they give their hand to some wooing stranger, or member of Congress, who carries them off in triumph to his distant home. The young citizens, who have been daily contemplating the regular advances of these shoots into perfection, disappointed in their ardent intentions, sigh and exclaim (not without reason) against the corruption of the times, against family interest, and an unnatural and disheartening preference to foreigners. Washington thus resembles a nursery, whose fine plants are annually transported to a foreign and less congenial soil.

In cities and in towns, the motives to marriage are not so strong as in the country; and, on this account, members of Congress have the advantage. When the author of "The Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," wrote that admirable work', it appears, "that a young widow

• In 1776.

in North America, with four or five young children, was considered as a kind of fortune." The value of children, he observes, was the greatest of all encouragements to marriage.

This is no longer the case, as is evident from the increasing number of bachelors, and of window-frames of a certain colour, which they readily recognize. How far preferable the sweet illusion of moral love! With all our predilection for the Columbian fair, we have seen with regret among the ladies of Washington, a fondness for play, that bewitching passion, which extinguishes the best sentiments of the heart, and creates a dislike to every useful or pleasant occupation. When indulged from motives of gain, the violence of hope, fear, and other worse passions, changes the very features, in effacing that divine impression of the female countenance which is so often irresistible.

Buffon has very wisely observed, "that there is no proportion between the pleasure of gaining and the misfortune of losing." Against a vice so dangerous to morals, every parent ought to exclaim

"O pueri fugite hinc, latet anguis in herba."-Virg.

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