contrasted by the finely cultivated country on the eastern side of the river, which rises in a gentle slope from the water's edge and presents at a glance a rich agricultural region, adorned with tasteful mansions. Although here the superior grandeur of the Highlands is wanting, yet the pleasing combination of the majestic and beautiful renders this portion of the scenery of the Hudson river, inferior to none other. ' THE INDIANS OF WESTERN NEW YORK. AMONG the many acts of brotherly love for which the society of Friends are eminent, one, productive of much good, is that of appointing a committee at each yearly meeting, to visit the remnants of the Indian tribes, in the western part of New York. The following interesting facts are derived from the report of the committee, appointed at the last yearly meeting. furniture exhibit but little neatness or order. A wooden mortar and pestle for pounding corn, a few iron pots, stools and wooden utensils, with scarcely an article of crockery generally comprise of the houses have only shutters without glass their whole store of household furniture. Some windows. These Indians generally go decently dressed; many of them, however, retaining the peculiarities of the red man, such as brooches, earrings, bead-embroidered leggins, &c. Their lands are now well cultivated-their lots are in many instances neatly fenced-they have improved their roads-and have made very satisfactory advances in the arts of civilized life. All this is the fruit of the benevolence of the Society of Friends. None of this nation appear to have joined any society of Christian professors, their religion is of the most simple character, inculcating reverence for the Great Spirit, and for Him only-and that he will reward them according to their actions. TONAWANDAS. This is understood to be one of State. The population now amounts to about the most prosperous Indian settlements in the 500. Their dwellings are generally comfortable, and their furniture and cooking utensils better than those usually found in Indian dwellings. Their lands appear to be of good quality, are well cultivated, and stocked with horses and cattle. Black Chief is the head of the tribe, which is said to be unanimously averse to the government scheme of emigration. THE ONONDAGAS. The reservation secured to this tribe, is situated about seven miles south from the beautiful village of Syracuse, and consits of a territory about two and a half miles wide by three and three quarters in length, and has a present population of some three hundred souls. The condition of these Indians, when the notice of the Friends was first attracted to them, is described TUSCARORAS. This Reservation consists of 6920 as having been deplorable. There was but one acres, 5000 of which were purchased by the Inhouse in the whole Reservation, and the door of dians from the Holland Land Company, and no that house was placed upon four stakes, driven one holds a preemption right over this portion into the earth, to form a table, from which their of it. Population 280 persons. The Railroad to friendly visitants could eat the provisions which they carried with them. A few miserable bark huts formed the residue of their habitations, and the poor people were in as wretched a state as could well be imagined. They were cut off from their natural means of support-the chase; and they felt themselves opposed, despised, and looked upon the white man as their oppressor. The whites at that period, instead of encouraging the Indians, seemed disposed rather to deceive and wrong them. Intemperance found its way among them, through the white man's introduction, and the degraded, despised Indian, looking forward only to the rapid and inevitable extinction of his race, gave himself up to inaction and to vice. Such was the situation of the Onondagas, when the notice of the Friends' Society was attracted toward them. Mark the change. They have now a Council-House, which is a commodious white frame building-and dwellinghouses mostly frame, though some are of hewn logs, sufficiently comfortable to accommodate the population. Their houses are mostly about twenty by thirty feet, generally not painted. They own a saw-mill, and rent it to a white man, who saws their logs on shares. There is no grist-mill in the settlement, though they have many good mill sites. Most of the Indians keep one or more cows, and their barns are at least as numerous as their houses. Their lodgings are on cot-bedsteads, but the beds and a few simple articles of the Falls of Niagara passes through this tract, and the Company very honorably made compensation to the Indians for the damages occasioned thereby. Several of the Tuscaroras have very good farms, which they cultivate with success. One of them had a field last season of twenty acres in wheat on his farm, and it is stated that he had saved, and placed out at interest, three thousand dollars. CATTARAUGUS. This Reservation extends from the north of Cattaraugus Creek, seven miles into the interior, and is four miles wide; the soil is light, fertile, and easy to cultivate. The principal clearings are along the public road, producing fine grass and grain. But a small portion of the valley is yet cleared, much of the timber being heavy. The dwellings are principally built of logs, though there were a number of snug framehouses, with good barns and other out-houses. There is a saw-mill, rented to a white man, and much timber is cut on this Reservation. The approach to this settlement, which is under the especial care of the Genesee Yearly Meeting, is thus detailed :— "After travelling a difficult road, for two miles through the woods, that nearly surrounded the Indian settlement, we emerged from them, near the brink of an abrupt descent perhaps two hundred feet; below lay a delightful valley, several miles wide, nearly level, extending east and west as far as the eye could reach. It was studded "We called at Big Kettle's habitation. He was not at home, having retired to a distant residence, in poor health. He is said to be a man of great powers of mind; is the first chief of the Seneca Nation since Red Jacket and preserves the simplicity of the Indian character. His house, a small, log-building, we felt strongly inclined to enter, but an ox-yoke leaning against the door, (the Indian lock and key) forbade the act, and we retired, with feelings of respect, for the honesty of a people who require no other guard for their property. "The main road leads through this Reservation, crossing the creek several times on good bridges. over, here and there, with Indian habitations. | habits the Buffalo reservation. The narrative of Through this valley ran the Cattaraugus creek, the Committee of Friends thus describes their or river, though hidden from our sight by trees. visit to this reservation :The first dwellings we approached were without chimneys, and about the poorest we had seen. It was a pleasant evening, and we met several men, women and children, returning from the labors of the field, with hoes in their hands. We proceeded down the valley, on a pretty good road, to the settlement granted by the Indians to Friends, for the support of an Indian school. This establishment is on the main road from Lodi to Lake Erie. The buildings are placed on a green lawn of about an acre, and consist of a dwelling-house twenty-six by thirty-six feet, school-house, barn, and other out-buildings. The farm contains about two hundred acres; seventy of which are well enclosed, and cultivated in wheat, oats, Indian corn, potatoes, &c., with considerable meadow, all in good condition. We attended the school, and procured a specimen of Indians' writing; there were present fourteen small Indian, and a number of white children, who, with their parents, resided among them. In winter, we were told, it was attended by an average of twenty-four; many of the larger children being now at home, employed in hoeing corn; a number of whom we saw, and found they could read, write and cipher, and speak tolerable English. In November, 1840, the benevolent arrangement of the Friends with the Indians, as respects the school, and the two hundred acres of land set apart for its support, will expire; after which period, it is specified in the articles of agreement, between the Indians and the Committee of Genesee Yearly Meeting, that it shall be continued, under the care of a joint committee of Indians and Friends, for the education of the children in the Cattaraugus Reservation, for ever." "The land is fine and rich, with considerable clearing on both sides of the road. There are about seven hundred and forty inhabitants. Their houses are both frame and log, with barns and out-houses. Several of the houses are very commodious, and their interior arrangements are much better than many we had seen; some were well furnished. Their women were well clad, and tolerably attentive to domestic order; they still wear some beads, brooches, &c. The men were dressed mostly like the whites, and the young men generally read and write, and speak English. They have one school, attended by from ten to twenty-five pupils, averaging about sixteen. They are now convinced of the necessity of quitting the chase, becoming farmers, and some, of educating their children. "There are a few mechanics among them, such as plough-makers, carpenters and tailors, but in these branches they have made little progress, owing to their near vicinity to Buffalo, where The in-door arrangements of these Indians, it is they can have their wants easily supplied. They said, do not correspond with the improvements have greatly improved in temperance, and had which they have otherwise made; although there they not been so harassed on the question of are instances, where they have, in addition to a emigration, their advancement in other respects comfortable frame-house, a sufficient number of would have been more conspicuous. The perbeds, chairs, tables, crockery, and kitchen-uten-manent improvement making in the several setsils, much in the order of a farmer in comfortable tlements, we thought, spoke in language stronger circumstances. than words, the general opposition to removal." Very many of the men of this tribe dress after the manner of their white neighbors; the women generally dress in short-gowns and petticoats, ornamented leggins and moccasins, or shoes; they wear the blanket or shawl over the head and shoulders, and trinkets about the neck. They commonly eat but twice a day, or when hungry, though many are beginning to adopt the practice of eating at regular periods, like white people; their principal diet is boiled hommony, sometimes sweetened with maple sugar. These Indians may be called a sober people. They are tolerably industrious, and generally provide a sufficiency for support. Some support themselves well by making moccasins, &c. for sale. The women still work in the fields, with their husbands. There are a number in this, as in other reservations, who let out their cleared land to white people, at an annual rent of from two to three dollars per acre. SENECAS. The remnant of this great tribe in SCIENTIFIC NOTICES. THUNDER AND LIGHTNING. It is a curious fact that thunder and lightning are very rare in Egypt, and never known in Lima; nor is there reason to believe in any place in which there is no rain. Neither does it appear that there is any thunder in islands and seas beyond seventy-five degrees of latitude; and in the open ocean, very far from land, thunder is rarely heard. Storms of thunder and lightning are always more dangerous in cold than in hot months, because in these months the clouds are lower. M. Arago has added to the Annuaire of last year the most elaborate article on this subject that we have yet met with. He states, that in the parish of this kind, divided, in a map, the surface of the Southern Pacific and Indian Oceans into vast bands of alternate elevation and depression: “we have seen the remarkable confirmation of his views in the observation that active volcanoes occur only in the areas of elevation;" and the author has presented this subject under an aspect which cannot but have the most powerful influence on the speculations concerning the history of our globe. Casena, in Italy, five or six miles in circumference, when the land rises, are carried into elevated sitthey have for three years past raised, at every uations, where they remain as evidences of the fifty feet, heaps of straw and light-wood, which elevation." Mr. Darwin has, upon evidences of are set fire to on the approach of a storm; and that during these three years this parish has neither been damaged by lightning, nor has it had hail, though it had suffered every year before by storms, and though during the above three years the neighboring parishes had suffered much by storms of thunder and lightning. Hence Arago concludes why our mining districts experience less from these storms than our agricultural districts; that is, on account of the large fires kept up in the former. M. Arago, in his valuable essay, gives a masterly historical sketch of the real facts which have hitherto been accumulated, and from these deduces the inferences, scientific and practical, which may legitimately be drawn. In the general results, as the author anticipated, various truths have been discovered, which the examination of the isolated facts could never have revealed. A translation of this elaborate paper appears (in part) in Jameison's Journal, No 15. According to the experiments of Professor Oersted, the compression of water is .000046 by a pressure of twenty-five pounds per square inch; and he has found that it proceeds pari passu, as far as sixty-five atmospheres-the limit of his experiments. This compression is about equal to reducing a given bulk of water one-sixteenth of its volume by a pressure of 20,000 pounds per square inch. THEORY OF RESPIRATION AND ANIMAL HEAT. On June twenty-first, 1838, was read to the Royal Society a series of experiments on the above inquiry, tending to show that the lungs are absorbing and secreting, and perhaps also inhaling organs; and that their peculiar function is to introduce oxygen into the blood, and separate carbonic acid from the blood; and they favor the idea that animal heat is owing, first, to the fixation or condensation of oxygen in the blood in the lungs during its conversion from venous to arterial; and secondly, to the combination into which it enters in the circulation in connexion with the different secretions and changes essential to animal life. ACTION OF FERMENTATION ON A MIXTURE OF OXYGEN M. Theod. de Saussure observes -It is well Mr. Darwin, who accompanied Captain Fitzroy, as naturalist, in his recent expedition in H. M. S. Beagle, entertains the following new views respecting the history of coral isles. Those vast tracts of the Pacific which contain, along with small portions of scattered land, innumerable long reefs and small circles of coral, have hitherto been full of problems, of which no satisfactory solution could be found. For how could we explain the strange forms of these reefs; their long-and winding lines; their parallelism to the shores? and by what means did the animals, which can only work near the surface, build up a fabric which has its foundations in the deepest abysses of the ocean? To these questions Mr. Darwin replies, that "all these circumstances, the linear or annular form, their reference to the boundary of the land, the clusters of little islands occupying so small a portion of the sea, and, above all, the existence of A new carburet of hydrogen has been extractthe solid coral at the bottom of deep seas, pointed in France from the oil of potatoes. It consists out to us that the bottom of the sea has descend- of eighty-six of carbon and fourteen of hydrogen, ed slowly and gradually, carrying with it both and the density of its vapor is 5.06. land and corals; while the animals of the latter are constantly employed in building to the surface, and thus mark the shores of submerged Gobel has found that formate of soda furnishes lands, of which the summits may or may not re- the most ready means of reducing metallic poimain extant above the waters." Mr. Darwin ex- sons, not only when in the state of oxydes but as plains "how corals, which, when the level is per- sulphurets, and is, therefore, of extreme impor manent, fringe the shore to the depth of twenty tance in researches connected with medico-legal fathoms, as the land gradually sinks, become inquiry. The substance to be examined is mixed successively encircling-reefs at a distance from with the formate and heated in the usual manner the shore; or barrier-reefs at a still greater dis- in a small glass tube, over the flame of a lamp; tance and depth; or, when the circuit is small, the arsenic, if present, of course, sublimes. In lagoon-islands:-how, again, the same corals, this way, Gobel has detected the presence of NEW CARBURET OF HYDROGEN. REDUCTION OF METALLIC POISONS. (Arsenics.) 1 orpiment in the golden sulphuret of antimony, when present only in the proportion of one part to 1,000 of the antimonial sulphuret. DECLINE OF VEGETATION IN LAPLAND. The London Athenæum contains a letter from a correspondent in Sweden, who accompained. the French savans on their scientific tour to Lapland. He states some interesting facts relating to the change which had been effected in that climate within a few years. It has long been believed that vegetation in more northern parts of Lapland is constantly on the decline; and large tracts of land are found under the lee of the mountains, formerly covered with fir woods, where now only stumps and rotten roots of fir trees with a miserable birch are to be seen. But nowhere is this decline so perceptible as in the neighborhood of Kautokeim; where formerly, perhaps. only a century ago, a forest of Scotch fir flourished the whole length of the Alten river, a distance of seventy-two miles: nothing is now to be seen but a few miserable mountain birch, which every year threatens to destroy. The writer adds, that on comparing this phenomenon with the experience of the successive decrease of the fir in Tornea, Lapland, it must be admitted as a fact, that vegetation is on the decline in the higher northern regions; and the question will then be, how this phenomenon can be accounted for! Is it to be attributed to local causes, or to the great increase of ice in the Polar regions! the cause of which must again be looked for in some great cosmographical change in the globe. If this decline of vegetation continues, the high northern regions Absorbent, in anatomy, means a vessel which will, in a few centuries, become uninhabitable, imbibes or sucks up like a sponge. You know and the northern part of Norway will be in dan-how a sponge will absorb water. In the same ger of being frozen up in the same way as history narrates of Greenland. MR. EDITOR THE TEETH. [This plate exhibits the jaws of a child four years old.] The pulps, or rudiments of the second or permanent set, can be seen directly under the roots of the first teeth. These rudiments are supplied with nerves, blood-vessels, and absorbents which are readily traced by dissection, but are not discoverable after the rudiments are formed into bone. When the rudiments commence hardening or ossifying, they crowd against the absorbents of the infant teeth, and stimulate these absorbent vessels to such a degree that the infant teeth are absorbed or consumed away, as fast as the permanent or adult teeth advance. manner the absorbents of the first set, suck up or eat off the roots of the teeth, so that when extracted, the roots appear as if eaten off by little worms. Indeed there will be no need of forcible extraction where the absorption is complete, as the teeth fall out without aid. And when the teeth disappear the absorbents disappear also, as there is no further use for them. In the engraving, the nerves are represented As your Magazine is devoted to families, and by white or thread-like filaments, which supply the teeth with the vital or life-giving principle. these necessarily including children, I have sent You perceive there is one to each root. When you a few observations and illustrations on the any one of these nerves is destroyed, the tooth, abovementioned subject designed particularly which was nourished by it, loses all sensation and for the information of youth, on the importance becomes a dead or foreign body, and, as it ceases of early attention to these valuable and useful to be a part of the living body, soon decays and organs. A knowledge of their formation and the means of preserving them is highly necessary, to prevent what our Creator intended for our comfort and happiness, from becoming a source of great suffering and inconvenience. falls out. The picture represents the external part of the flesh and jaw as removed, or cut away, that you may see how curiously and wonderfully the little pulps of the second set are arranged, close under the roots of the first set, each being supplied with I shall be happy to continue these remarks as a small white nerve, and ready, at the proper time and opportunity may present. This drawing shows the number and arrangement of the infant or temporary teeth, and their nervous connexions with the general system. There are twenty teeth; ten in the upper and ten in the lower jaw. In the engraving we see only the left side, and therefore but ten of the teeth, five above and five below. time, to press into the places assigned them. And now, as I have described the plate, I must tell you a little about the covering of the teeth. You may, perhaps, think there is no necessity for a covering, as I told you they were ossified, or converted into bone; but our wise Master-builder saw differently. He therefore organized an external covering for the teeth, differing from the bony portion, to which we give the name of enamel, as it is smooth and glossy. Provision having been made for the organization of the inner parts of the teeth, and for the support of their vitality and connexion with the living system, there is then spread over all that portion above the gums, a dense, hard, insensible and almost indestructible substance. This is arranged in a peculiar manner about the crown of the tooth, which I will endeavor to explain, by showing a magnified section of a tooth. The formation of the external covering, or enamel, of the teeth, differs from that of the bony portion. is the cavity of the tooth. 2. Bony substance. 3. Enamel, showing the crystals disposed in radii. The enamel is much more slowly worn away by friction, and is less liable to be fractured than the bony part of the tooth. Thus the tooth is constructed. It is a wonderful instrument, possessing requisite hardness, durability, and insensibility; yet organized, and as truly a living part of the general system as the eye or heart. The other day, a young gentleman called on me, and I examined his teeth. He had just returned from a fashionable boarding-school, with his education completed; but I want to show you the difference between fashionable knowledge It is composed principally of phosphate of lime. and that which is real. He said he had been to Phosphorus is a mineral. In chymistry, it signi- a dentist who examined his teeth, and filled one fies a combustible substance, hitherto undecom- or two, and told him to call again, soon, as he posed. You know decomposition means the sep- ought to have the others attended to; but, as they aration of the constituent parts of any compound did not pain him, he did not see the necessity of substance. For instance; when the vital princi- it. I must say I really pitied him, to think he ple leaves our bodies, (which are compounded of was so ignorant as not to know, that a tooth like different elements,) or, as we usually express it, any other member of the body, after mortification when we die, they soon decay or decompose; had taken place, was subject to entire dissolution, that is, the parts, which were combined, separ- unless timely prevented by artificial means. In ate; and they are no longer organized bodies. fact, he did not know, until I explained it, that And, as the enamel is chiefly composed of this the tooth was any thing more than a mere bone, indestructible substance which has never been and knew nothing about the enamel, or its formadecomposed, you perceive how wonderfully it is tion or use, and I could not help thinking, how adapted to the preservation of the teeth. But fortunate it would have been for him, if he had even this may be, and is very often injured by been blessed with a little more information on hard substances coming in contact with it, such this much neglected subject: he would then as pins and nut-shells; but more frequently have known how to take care of those organs through the medium of the stomach, in exciting which his Maker has been at so much pains to and stimulating the secretory vessels, causing in- furnish him with, for his comfort and happiness. flammation and fevers, and so injuring the entire JOHN BURDELL, nervous system. Hot drinks, likewise, taken into the mouth, affect the teeth immediately; the heat causing the tooth to expand, and the enamel, becoming cool sooner than the bony part, contracts and splits; producing the cracks which are so common in the teeth of tea and coffee drinkers. The following drawing shows the crystals disposed in radii, springing from the centre of the tooth, so that the extremities of the crystals form the external surface of the tooth, while the internal extremities are in contact with the bony substance, in which you see the figure 2. 3 3 The tooth is supposed to be cut in two, and much magnified, that you may see the arrangement of the fibrous crystals composing the enamel. Look at the figures in the picture. No. 1, No. 69 Chambers-st., N. Y. Ir is believed that there are lasting and painful infirmities which begin in the school-room. It is a convenience and a relief to a busy mother to send her children to school for several hours in the day. She considers them safe while so employed; not only so, they are getting learning and preparing to get a living. But at this tender age, while the bones are hardening, and the delicate structure of the human frame is easily deranged, it is more than probable that long-continued sitting lays the foundation for diseases which show themselves in after life, and occasion affliction to the child, and cost and pain to parents. The learning that may be acquired in these early years can be no compensation for such evils. It would be far better for parent and child, to have good schools for playing, as well as for learning, during the early years of infancy. The natural athletic action of the human system has no tendency to deform or enfeeble it; while the tedious confinement of the school-room is certain to do both. All that is contended for, is, that there should be a rational mixture of bodily action and mental employment for children, as mutually auxiliary in preserving health and in acquiring learning; and, however common such thoughts may be, they cannot be too often expressed until they are carried into practical and general effect. |