great cheerfulness, but this was soon succeeded by nausea, thirst, and disposition to putrid dysentery, which was with some difficulty prevented from making further progress, by the physician who made the experiment.  Again, he remarks, “I knew a person who, by the advice of his physician abstained for some years entirely from salt, drank chiefly water, and used freely an animal diet, and by that means acquired a violent scurvy; he was, after some time, relieved by a strict regimen of diet and medicine, and as he afterwards used salt and vegetables with animal food, and drank wine more freely, never had a return of the disorder.”  It is therefore evident, that a moderate use of wine tends to promote health, and keeps off the numerous train of disorders, to which the constitution of man is subject, thereby lessening the evils incidental to human nature.  We can then exclaim with Virgil of wine,

  “Deus ille malis hominum mitescere discat.”

S.S.T.

    [3] It must be recollected that wild fowl in consequence of
        their living on animal diet, give more readily a putrid
        disposition to the fluids.

* * * * *

THE SKETCH-BOOK.

* * * * *

MY FIRST LOVE.

(For the Mirror.)

She was amiable, accomplished, fascinating, beautiful; yet her’s were beauties which description cannot heighten; fascinations which language were vain to embellish.  There was soul in her deep hazel eye as its flashes broke through their long, dark, encircling fringe; her jetty locks waved harmoniously, contrasting with the virgin snow of the forehead they wreathed in glossy luxuriance, the unclouded smile played on her lip like the zephyr over a bed of gossamer, or a sunbeam on the cheek of Aurora.

Scarce eleven summers had passed over my head when I first saw Annette.  She was by about three years my elder.  Young, though I was, I was not insensible; she rivetted my gaze, I felt an emotion I could not comprehend—­cannot describe—­as it were love in the germ just beginning to expand, waiting but for the genial warmth of a few summer suns to nourish and bring it to maturity.  We parted, still her image pursued me, the recollection was sweet, and I loved to cherish it.

Four years had elapsed; we again met.  My soul thrilled with delight in beholding, in contemplating, her perfections!  How was that delight increased when I saw her countenance shed its loveliest smiles, her eye pour its heavenliest beams—­on me—­happy presumption—­I loved. We loved; but words spoke not our love.  No, each read it in the burning glances that were reciprocated—­in the spirit-breathing sighs that would ever and anon steal forth—­spite of suppression.  Let me shorten the tale of rapture.  She was mine; Annette was mine—­mine undividedly.