one of his rooms were
carpeted, he replied, "When I enter my house in the winter, I do not hear
any complaints of cold from the furniture of my rooms; but the poor who
stand shivering at my doors tell me but too plainly that they have need of
clothing."

IMAGINATION AND FEAR.

Fear of Death.--It is recorded of a person who had been sentenced to be
bled to death, that, instead of the punishment being actually inflicted, he
was made to believe that it was so, merely by causing water, when his eyes
were blinded, to trickle down his arm. This mimicry, however, of an
operation, stopped as completely the movements of the animated machine as
if an entire exhaustion had been effected of the vivifying mud. The man
lost his life, although not his blood, by this imaginary venesection.

We read of another unfortunate being who had been condemned to lose his
head, but the moment after it had been laid upon the block, a reprieve
arrived; the victim was, however, already sacrificed. The living principle
had been extinguished by the fear of the axe, as effectually as it would
have been by its fall.

The Editor of the _Philosophical Magazine_ relates a remarkable instance
which came within his own knowledge many years ago in Scotland. Some silver
spoons having been mislaid, were supposed to have been stolen; and an
expression fell from one of the family, which was either intended, or was
so understood by a young lady who acted as governess to the female
children, that she had taken them. When the young lady rose next morning,
her hair, which before was dark, was found to have changed to a pure white
during the night. The spoons were afterwards found where the mistress of
the family had herself deposited them.

Mons. Boutibonne, a man of literary attainments, a native of Paris, served
in Napoleon's army, and was present at a number of engagements during the
early part of the present century. At the battle of Wagram, which resulted
in a treaty of peace with Austria, in November 1809, Mons. Boutibonne was
actively engaged during the whole of the fray, which lasted, if I rightly
remember, from soon after mid-day until dark. The ranks around him had
been terribly thinned by the enemy's shot, so that his position at sunset
was nearly isolated; and while in the act of reloading his musket, he was
shot down by a cannon-ball. The impression produced upon his mind was, that
the ball had passed from left to right, through his leg