Captain J. D. Cunningham, of the Bengal Engineers, author of theHistory of the Sikhs, died in India on the twenty-eight of February, in consequence, it is said, of his removal from the political agency of Bhopaul, where his services and abilities had been highly valued. The act of the "Company" fell with peculiar hardship upon an officer who had passed twenty years of honorable and uninterrupted service in every climate of India, and whose error (if any were committed by the publication in question) was certainly not of a character demanding censure so grave. It will be recollected that the book threw some new light on the conduct of Lord Hardinge at Sobraon, and that the writer was dismissed on the charge of having, "without authority," published documents officially intrusted to his charge. The friends of Captain Cunningham aver that he had formerly asked permission, and he construed the reply to be an expression of indifference on the part of the directors. It was never pretended that an unworthy motive had influenced him, or that he had acted on any other than a desire (however mistaken) to promote the welfare of the government to which he was attached. It is understood that Captain Cunningham's health broke soon after this painful misunderstanding, and that its effects pursued him to his death. He was a son of Allan Cunningham, had distinguished himself greatly in all his Indian employments, and had not completed his fortieth year.
TheGlasgow Citizencalls attention to the death of Mr.John Henning, the well-known Paisley artist, whose studies from the Elgin marbles and cartoons after Raphad obtained so much distinction for himself, and contributed so largely to the diffusion of a general taste for the fine arts amongst his countrymen. Mr. Henning was a self-taught sculptor, and devoted twelve years of his life, under great difficulties, to the restoration of the Greek marbles brought over by Lord Elgin. His copies of these on a reduced scale are so well known and esteemed as to render eulogium on their merits here unnecessary. Many busts of his contemporaries remain to testify further to the excellence of his hand. He was one of the men whom his native town "delighted to honor."
Padre Rozaven, one of the most famous of modern Jesuits, and distinguished by divers polemical treatises, as well as by a long residence and religious warfare in Russia, has just died in Rome in his eighty-second year.
Prince Wittgenstein, Minister of the Royal House of Prussia, died on the 11th April, at Berlin, at the age of eighty-one. He had been in the service of the state fifty-six years, and had filled the post in which he died since 1819.
Henry Bickersteth,Lord Langdale, late Master of the Rolls, died on Good Friday, at Tunbridge Wells, to which place he had lately repaired for the benefit of his health—impaired by long-continued mental labor, resulting in a paralytic stroke, which took place shortly before his death. He was born on the eighteenth of June, 1783, in the county of Westmoreland, where his father was possessed of a small property. Originally destined for the medical profession (of which his father was a member), in which he had completed his studies, he visited the Continent with the family of the late Earl of Oxford, by whose advice he was induced to embark on the career of the bar. He entered Caius College, Cambridge, where he took his degrees as senior wrangler in 1808. Three years afterwards he was called to the bar, and engaged at once in the duties of his profession. He rapidly rose to great eminence in the Equity Courts, to which he confined his practice. On the nineteenth of January, 1836, he was appointed to succeed Lord Cottenham as Master of the Rolls, and was at the same time called to the House of Peers. But a few months had elapsed after his accession to the mastership of the rolls when Lord Langdale delivered in the House of Lords his remarkable speech on the administration of justice in the Court of Chancery, and on the appellate jurisdiction of their lordships' house, and to the opinions expressed in that speech, and in favor of the division of the duties of the Great Seal, he constantly adhered. On the resignation of Lord Cottenham last year, the Great Seal was more than once tendered to Lord Langdale by the head of the present administration; but though he consented to act as first commissioner, and sat for a short time in the Lord Chancellor's court, and in the House of Lords, in that capacity, the intense application to which the state of the Court of Chancery had condemned him forbade a further stretch of his powers.
General E. J. Roberts, for many years conspicuous as an editor and a politician in the state of New York, died at the age of fifty-five, a few weeks ago, at Detroit. He formerly editedThe Craftsman, at Rochester, and in 1830 was editor of a journal of that title in Albany. He removed to Michigan in 1834, and filled very important offices in that state. He was a member of the state senate at the time of his death.
From Stockholm is announced the death, at the age of seventy-one, of the distinguished botanist and geologist,M. Gorean-Wahlenberg, Professor at the University of Upsal, and director of the botanical garden in the same institution. M. Wahlenberg is stated to have spent thirty out of his seventy-one years in scientific journies through the different countries of Europe; and the results of these travels he has recorded in a variety of learned works. He left his rich collection and numerous library to the University of Upsal; in which he was a student,—and to which he was attached in various capacities during upwards of forty-three years.
We lack room for notices of the lives of ArchbishopEcleston, of Baltimore; GeneralBrady, of the United States Army; and Mr.Philip Hone, three eminent persons who have died since our last publication.
Dr. Marcy is one of the thousand or more physicians of the old school who have become homœopathists. With professional eminence, and a liberal fortune, he joined the converts to the doctrine of Hahnemann, and at once took rank among the most distinguished physicians of the new practice. Homœopathy is one of the grand facts of this age. It is no longer laughed at, but has reached that condition which enables it to challenge a respectful consideration from all who would not themselves be subjects of ridicule. Of educated and thoughtful men, in our large cities, it is contended that more than one-half are of its supporters. In Great Britain we see that Archbishop Whately, the Chevalier Bunsen, and Dr. Scott of Owen's College, constitute a trio of its literary adherents. Cobden, Leslie, and Wilson, are examples of its parliamentary partizans. Radetzky, Pulzsky, and General Farquharson, rank among its numerous military defenders. Leaf, Sugden, and Forbes, are three of its great London merchants. The Duke of Hamilton, the Earls of Wilton, Shrewsbury, Erne, and Denbigh, and Lords Robert Grosvenor, Newport, and Kinnaird, may serve for its guard of honor. Queen Adelaide was one of its numerous royal and noble patients, and the Duchess of Kent is the patroness of a great fair to be held for the benefit of some of its institutions in London during this present month of June—in the very heyday of the exhibition season. In France, Guizot, Changarnier, Comte, Lamartine, and some forty members of the Academy, are among its advocates. Here in New-York, it is sufficient to say of the character of the society in which it is received, that it includes Bryant, who has been among the most active of its lay teachers.
It is clear that homœopathy not only spreads apace, but that it also spreads in all sorts of good directions, through the present fabric of society. And this fact certainly conveys the idea that there must be some sort of truth in homœopathy; whether pure or mixed, whether negative or affirmative, whether critical of something old, or declaratory of something new.
Dr. Marcy is one of the leaders of the sect. He is the son of an eminent lawyer, who for more than twenty years has been in the legislature of Massachusetts; he was graduated at Amherst College, took his degree of Doctor in Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and for ten years devoted himself with greatsuccess to medicine and surgery in Hartford: in surgery, on several occasions, commanding the applause of both European and American academies. As a chemist, also, he greatly distinguished himself; and it is not too much to say, that in the application of chemistry to the arts, he has been more fortunate than any other American. At length, while travelling in Europe, he became a convert to the theory,similia similibus curantur, and renouncing his earlier notions, gave himself up to the study of it. He published, six months ago, in a volume of six hundred pages,The Homœopathic Theory and Practice of Medicine, of which a second edition is now in press; and he is industriously occupied, when not attending to the general business of his profession, with a voluminous work onAnimal Chemistry.
It is admitted by the most wise and profoundly learned physicians of the allopathic practice, that the laws of that practice are for the most part vague and uncertain. The cumulative experiences of many ages have shown indeed that certain substances have certain effects in certain conditions of the human organism; but the processes by which these effects are induced are unknown, or not so established as justly to be regarded as a part of science. Facts have been observed, and hypotheses have been formed, but there has been no demonstrative generalization, really no philosophy of disease and cure; and while in almost every other department, investigation and reflection have led by a steady and sure advance to the establishment of positive and immutable principles, medicine has made, except in a few specialities, no advance at all, unless the theory here disclosed shall prove a solution of its secrets. Of these specialities, the most important has been the discovery of the homœopathic law in the isolated case of smallpox. Every body knows how difficult and slow was the reception of the principle of inoculation—ofsimilia similibus curantur—in this disease; but it was received at last universally; and then arose Hahnemann, to claim for every disorder of the human system the application of the same principle. Right or wrong, the father of homœopathy gave us a system, perfect in its parts, universal in its fitness, and eminently beautiful in its simplicity. It has been half a century before the world, and though all the universities have parleyed and made truce with other innovations and asserted heresies, and opened against this their heaviest and best plied artillery, it is not to be denied that homœopathy has made more rapid, diffusive, and pervading advances, than were ever before made by any doctrine of equal importance, either in morals or physics.
We cannot but admit that we have been accustomed to regard the theories of Hahnemann with distrust, and that the principle of the attenuation of drugs, etc., viewed as it was by us through the media of prejudiced and satirical opposition, seemed to be trivial and absurd. We heard frequently of remarkable cures by Hahnemann's disciples, and even witnessed the benefits of their treatment, but so perfectly had the sharp ridicule of the allopathists warped our judgment and moulded our feelings, that we felt a sort of humiliation in confessing an advantage from an "infinitesimal dose." We could never forget the keen and brilliant wit with which our friend Holmes, for example, assailed a system which threatened to take away his practice and patients, deprive him of his income, and consign his professional erudition and ingenious speculation to oblivion. But the work of Dr. Marcy displayed these matters to us in an entirely different light, and guarded by walls of truths and arguments quite impenetrable by the most finely pointed or most powerful satire. His well-known abilities, great learning, and long successful experience as an allopathist, gave us assurance that his conversion to the school of Hahnemann could have been induced only by inherent elements of extraordinary force and vitality in its principles, and we looked to him confidently, when we understood that he was preparing for the press an exhibition and vindication of homœopathy, for such a work as should at least screen the layman who accepted its doctrines from the reproach of fanatical or credulous weakness. We were not disappointed. He has given us a simple and powerful appeal to the common sense upon the whole subject. In language terse, direct, and perspicuous, and with such bravery as belongs to the consciousness of a championship for truth, he displays every branch of his law, with its antagonism, and leads his readers captive to an assenting conclusion.
Dr. Marcy's work is the first by an American on the Homœopathic Theory and Practice of Medicine; it is at least a very able and attractive piece of philosophical speculation; and to those who are still disposed to think with little respect of the Hahnemannic peculiarities, we specially commend, before they venture another jest upon the subject, or endure any more needless nausea and torture, or sacrifice another constitution or life upon the altar of prejudice, the reading of his capital chapters on Allopathy, Homœopathy, and the Attenuation of Drugs and Repetition of Doses.
The LondonLeaderdemands attention to the scholarship of the homœopathic physicians, to their respectability as thinkers and as men, and to the character of their writings; and surveying the extraordinary and steady advances of the homœopathic sect, urges that every thing, which has at any time won for itself a broad footing in the world, must have been possessed by some spirit of truth. Every thoughtful person knows that no system stands fast in virtue of the errors about it. It is the amount of truth it contains, however little and overlaid that may be, which enables an institution or a doctrine to keep its ground. The extent and quality of that ground, taken together with the length of time it is kept, constitute a measure of the quantity of truth by which a militant institute is inspired and sustained.
In Paris and London the chief novelties have been preparations for the London season. Head-dress is particularly rich, by no means lacking lively colors, and ornamented with gold, silver, and beads. We only speak here of fancy head-dress; for diamonds are always very much admired for a rare andrecherchée parure. Never have they been so well set as at the present day, both as regards elegance, lightness, and convenience. Thus, each night a lady may change the disposition of her brilliants: to-day she may form them into a band, like a diadem; to-morrow, a row of pins for the body of her dress; another time she can place them on a velvet necklace, and so forth.
Fancy head-dresses are made of lace, blond, silk, gold, or silver. Flowers of all kinds are also worn, and above all foliage of velvet and satin, deep shaded, enriched with white or gold beads, and gold or silver fruit. We have also seen acoiffureof gold blond, forming a small point at the top of the head, and ornamented on each side with a branch of green foliage and golden fruit in little flexible bunches.
Ball dresses have nearly all two skirts, which are ornamented with a profusion of flounces, trimmed with ribbons or flowers, which follow the shade of the first or upper skirt; or they are used to raise it at the sides, or on one side only. We have also seen a dress of white net with two skirts, the first (the under) trimmed with two net flounces at the extremity with two gathers through the middle, and satin ribbon. On each of these flounces was a trimming of Brussels application lace, with a gather of ribbon at the top, of the same width as those of the extremity. The second skirt was trimmed at the bottom with two gathers of ribbon, and one lace flounce with a ribbon gathering at the top; the body was an intermixture of gathered ribbons and lace flounces.
Capotes will be more in vogue than bonnets, their style allowing spangling, for which bonnets are not suited. We have seen capotes of taffeta, and ribbon applied like flounces as ornaments to the crown; these ribbons are cut into teeth or plain, but with a narrow border of much brighter shade. We have also seen very pretty capotes covered with net, made of very lively colored taffeta. The tops of all these bonnets are widened more than they are high; however, they are drawn near the bottom, and are quite closed.
Dresses, it is certain, will be open in front and heart-shaped to the bottom of the waist. Low square-fronted chemisettes suit this kind of bodice, with breast-plates of embroidery and lace. At concerts, many dresses are seen either with flounces or apron-shaped fronts; that is to say, the front breadth has a much richer pattern, and different from the other breadths of the skirt. This pattern is generally an immense bouquet, whose branches entwine to the top, diminishing in size; or there are two large columns of stripes, which form undulating wreaths.
Dresses of white or other ground of taffeta warped will be the fashion this spring for walking; however, we must wait for Longchamps, at the latter end of April, to decide the question.
In the illustration on the following page is a lace cap, trimmed with flowers without foliage;African velvet dress; body with Spanish basks or skirts cut out into teeth, trimmed with a small white lace, having at the top a small gathering of ribbon; the body trimmed with lace facing, edged with a gathering of ribbon; black velvet ribbon round the neck, fastened with a diamond buckle; bracelets the same. Bonnet of pink taffeta, very plain; and plain dress of Valencias, with festooned teeth. Small felt bonnet, with bunch of ribbons; Nacaret velvet dress; trowsers of cambric muslin, with embroideries; gaiters of black cloth, and mousquetaire pardessus, trimmed with gimp or lace, put on flat.
Mantelets will certainly enjoy more than their usual vogue this season, and from what we have seen of the new forms, we must own they are very superior to any that have before appeared; the novelty of the forms, and the taste displayed in the garnitures even of those intended for common use, show that the progress ofla modeis quite as great as any other sort of progress in this most progressing age. First, then, for the mantelets in plain walking dress; they are for the most part composed of black taffeta; several are embroidered in sentache, and bordered with deep flounces of taffeta; others are trimmed with fringe of a new and very light kind, and a number, perhaps indeed the majority, are finished with lace.
The materials for robes, in plain morning neglige, are silks of a quiet kind, and some slight woollen materials, as coutil de laine, balzerine, striped Valencias; some in very small, others in large stripes; corded muslins, and jaconet muslins, flowered in a variety of patterns. We cannot yet say any thing positively respecting plain white muslins for morning dress, but we have reason to believe they will not be much adopted.
Taffeta has resumed all its vogue for robes; it is adopted both for public promenade, half dress, and evening robes. Some of the most elegant mantelets are of white taffeta.