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It is said that Mr Cobbett wishes to retire immediately to his seat in the country.

Divine service will be performed to-morrow at St. Paul's-refreshments between the acts.

A journeyman plumber was apprehended for robbing his master-he distinguished himself by taking the lead on this

occasion.

List of the majority who voted for ministers-all orders executed for ready money only.

A charity-sermon will be preached next Sunday at St. Dunstan's-no money will be taken at the door.

The health of Mr. Cobbett was then drunk in-pint-bottles of Day and Martin's liquid blacking.

Mr. Samuel Wesley performed a voluntary on the organ-many blows passed on the оссаsion.

A fire lately broke out in the premises of Mr. ; he was cured by taking only one box of pills.

Yesterday evening the rev. Rowland Hill delivered a lecture to a stupendous elephant, and a kangaroo from Botany Bay.

From experiments lately made on the livers of animals-they are no longer sought for by the dyers.

Last week a poor woman was safely delivered of one serjeant, one corporal, and thirteen rank and file.

The late love-feast at the Tabernacle was numerously attended-several members paired off in the evening.

By the new act for imposing a duty on quack-medicines-a good

allowance is made to them who take them by wholesale.

Buonaparte's Milan and Berlin decrees are said to be-under a prosecution in Doctors' Commons for impotence.

Mr. Editor,

Being in the constant habit of reading your Gleaner, of course nothing therein contained escapes my notice. In reading your eleventh number, I felt a little chagrin in reading a pretended solution of the proverb-" Nine tailors make a man." I think the person signing himself G. has not discovered a high degree of good sense, nor urbanity, in thus ridiculing a useful and respectable body of men. The reason of my noticing this case is, because I flatter my self, that I can give a more worthy and honourable solution of the phrase "Nine tailors make a man." I will begin with the words of your correspondent and say" It happened (it is no great matter in what year) that, at a certain place, a tailor had the misfortune to get encumbered in his circumstances; he contracted a debt he could not pay; nine tailors joined their resources and raised the sum required, and thereby discharged their brother from embarrassment; hence arose the proverb

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-Nine tailors make a man.' If this solution is admitted, it does great honour to that useful body of men, and is worthy the imitation of your correspondent, G, if any of his fraternity should ever be in like circumstances,

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"Thou hast often spoke," says this enlightened Turk, to his friend in Constantinople, " with much affection and reverence of Jesus, the Messiah of the christians, as all good mussulmen ought to do, being taught by the Alcoran, in several chapters, that he was a holy prophet, and in the number of the divine favourites." These are the words :

'There lives, at this time, in Judea, a man of singular virtues, whose name is Jesus Christ, whom the barbarians esteem a prophet, but his own followers adore him as the offspring of the immortal gods. He calls back the dead from their graves, and heals all sorts of diseases as with a word or a touch. He is tall and well-shaped- of an amiable reverend aspect; his hair of a colour that can hardly be matched, falling into graceful curls below his ears, and very agreeably couching on his shoulders, parted on the crown of the head, like the Nazarites; forehead is smooth and large; his cheeks without other spot, save that of a lovely red; his

his

nose and mouth formed with exquisite symmetry; symmetry; his beard thick, and of a colour suitable to the hair of his head, reaching an inch below his chin, and parting in the middle like a fork; his eyes bright, clear, and serene. He rebukes with majesty-counsels with mildness-his whole address, whether in word or deed, being elegant and grave. No man has seen him laugh, but he has wept frequently: he is very temperate, modest, and wise a man, for his excellent beauty and divine perfection, surpassing the children of men.'

"I send thee this picture of the christian Messiah," continued the mussulman, "not drawn by the pencil of the painter, but by the pen of a Roman governor, and, therefore, it may pass for authentic. I often heard thee praise the original, and condemn some too superstitious mussulmen, who, in their mistaken zeal for the Alcoran, have blasphemed this holy prophet; a man, whom the Alcoran itself mentions, in several chapters, styling him, The breath and word of God.""

THE SALT-MINE NEAR CRACOW, IN POLAND.

At Wielitska, a small town about eight miles from Cracow, this wonderful mine is excavated in a ridge of hills, at the northern extremity of the chain which joins to the Carpathian mountains; and has been worked above six hundred years.

There are eight openings or descents into this mine, six in the fields, and two in the town itself.

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The openings are lined throughout with timber and at the top of each there is a large wheel, with a rope as thick as a cable, by which things are let down, and the salt drawn up.

The descent is very slow and gradual, down a narrow dark well, to the depth of six hundred feet perpendicular. The place where the stranger is let down is perfectly dark; but the miners striking fire, and lighting a small lamp, conduct him through a number of passages, and by means of ladders, they again descend to an immense depth at the foot of the last ladder the stranger is received in a small dark cavern; and in the course of their descent it is usual for the guide to pretend the utmost dread and apprehension of the feeble light of his lamp going out, often declaring that such an accident might be attended with the most fatal consequences.

When arrived at this dreary chamber, the miner contrives to extinguish his lamp as if by accident, and, catching the stranger by the hand, drags him through a narrow creek into the body of the mine; when there bursts upon his view a little world, the beauty of which is scarcely to be imagined. He beholds a spacious plain, containing a kind of subterranean city, with houses, carriages, roads, &c. all scooped out of one vast rock of salt, as bright and glittering as crystal; while the blaze of the lights continually burning for the general use, reflected from the dazling columns which support the lofty arched vaults of the mine, and which are beautifully tinged with all the colours of the rainbow, and spar

kle with the lustre of precious stones, affords a more splendid and glittering prospect than any thing above ground can possibly exhibit.

In various parts of this spacious plain stands the huts of the miners and their families, some single and others in clusters like villages. They have very little communication with the world above ground; and many hundreds of persons are born and pass the whole of their lives here.

Through the midst of this plain lies a road, which is always filled with carriages laden with masses of salt from the furthest parts of the mine. The drivers are generally singing, and the salt looks like a load of gems. great number of horses are kept in this mine; and when once let down, never see daylight again.

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The instruments principally used by the miners are pick-axes, hammers, and chisels; with these they dig out the salt in the form of huge cylinders, each of many hundred weight. This is found the most convenient method of getting it out of the mine; and as soon as got above ground, the masses are broken into smaller pieces, and sent to the mills, where they are reduced to powder. The finest sort of salt is sometimes cut into toys, and often passes for real crystal.

This mine appears to be inexhaustible. Its known breadth is one thousand one hundred and fifteen feet, its length is six thousand six hundred and ninety-one feet, and its depth seven hundred and forty-three feet. This, however, is to be understood only of that part which has been actually worked; as the real depth or

longitudinal extent of the bed of salt, it is not possible to conjec

ture.

NOTHING IS SOMETHING.

Contrary to the common opinion, which maintains, that nothing is nothing.

It has been, hitherto, universally believed that nothing is nothing, but which, upon a cursory reflection, may appear quite otherwise.

There is nothing in the world that makes a finer figure than the inhabitant, Nothing. It is everywhere found, and yet resides nowhere. The citizen and statesman, the poet and philosopher, and even the divine, all often make a great noise for nothing.

I have read in the histories of our parliaments, convocations, and a diversity of other meetings for deliberating on the most important and solemn affairs, that, after spending much time in sharp contestations and debates, nothing in the end has been done or concluded. 'Tis true, it was pretended to accomplish mighty matters, by doing justice to all men, by fixing the public belief and opinions in regard to certain things, and by discovering the causes of malversations and corrupt morals; but all these bravadoes terminated in nothing.

I have known a sage philosopher keep silence for a whole evening, without assigning any other reason than that he had nothing to

say.

Several of the wisest men in the world, after long and dili gent researches for acquiring knowledge, have been perfectly

convinced that they knew nothing. I have heard it said that, under many of our kings of England, there were secretaries of state and lords of the admiralty, that knew nothing of the business of their respective departments; and I have been informed that some of our kings have sent messages to their Parliaments without knowing a tittle of what was so sent; or, if they did, knew nothing of the matter.

I remember to have read in some ancient historian, that a brave old Lacedemonian general had been dismissed from his employments for nothing, and that another had been put in his place, who, in himself, was nothing.

If Achilles, whom Agamennon disobliged, had not been prevailed upon to return to the army, the great advantages the Greeks had obtained, in a ten years' war with Troy, would have come to nothing.

In the reign of James I. the great sir Walter Raleigh was arraigned, condemned, and, at length, executed, though scarce any thing was alledged, and nothing proved deserving of death, against him. In the same reign also, and in those of some of his successors, many eminent and eloquent patriots were sent to the Tower for nothing.

This phantom of Nilliety is not less in use among us than it was in the time of our ancestors. It seems, its value increases in proportion to its antiquity. Do we not constantly see by our weekly lists of bankrupts, that those who owe the largest sums pay as little as they can to their creditors, and sometimes nothing; and that those, who keep possession of usurped goods, use

their best endeavours to restore nothing.

Some of our supercilious critics are continually exclaiming against the new books that appear, that they have nothing in them, or nothing new. The same inanity they find in our poets, especially the retailers of dramatic compositions - their imaginations, they say, have been bewildered in fairy-lands, or bewitched by magic; and, if so, they embrace a cloud instead of Juno; and, just as children, slaves, and melefactors, when punished, they have done nothing. Ah, Nothing! That so significant cypher, though at all times generally esteemed, was never so illustrious as at present. And, indeed, we have often seen numerous armies spend whole campaigns in doing nothing; negociations spun out to nothing; quarrels and law-suits engaged in for nothing; women married for nothing; divorces made for nothing; protestations of friendship reduced to nothing; arguments concluding nothing; oaths required for nothing; people amusing themselves in nothing; and a thousand other nothings of like nature.

But, to give a specimen of the grandeur of nothing, suppose I should conceive it in the way of an enigma, leaving the case to another of putting it in verse.

"Gentle reader, I am not yet born; but if you have a mind to know me, I am under you, I am over you; you can scarce imagine what I am. In the purse, I am

a devil, and, when I am, I am no more. I am the great coffer of the world. My nature was so fruitful, that all was engendered by me. I am the inaccessible immensity; I am the indivisible point, and the riches of a beggar, as well as thine. What a thief does on his trial, what the deluge respected, what serves to support the skies, what a bailiff's setter cannot be, what we do, when we do nothing, is, gentle reader, my name and heing."

The explanation of this enigma will shew the solution to be exceedingly easy.

A thief protests

"What is not, could not be born-in vain, to know it, should we search above and below: it surpasses the reach of our imagination. Nothing in one's purse is the devil; and, when nothing is in it, it is good for nothing. All is nothing here below. The nature of nothing was very fruitful, as out of nothing every thing was created. It is the great inaccessible space; it is the true indivisible point; it is nearly my whole wealth. before his judge, that he has done nothing, and the deluge formerly respected nothing. Whoever mentions a bailiff's follower may think there is nothing honourable in the profession; and, notwithstanding Ovid's fiction, that Atlas bears up the heavens on his shoulders, they are indeed supported by nothing. The fact is not problematical, and thus it seems demonstratively proved, that nothing is something.

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