Page 2 Advertisements Column 4

Otago Witness, Issue 299, 22 August 1857, Page 2

Emigration.— The departures from Liverpool for the first quarter of the present year were: — To New South Wales, 125 vessels, 9347 tons, 1601 passengers; to Victoria, 27 vessels, 30,860 tons, 6101 passengers ;- to Moreton Bay 1 vessel, 996 tons, 381 passengers; to Tasmania, 2 vessels, 1238 tons, 180 passengers. Total — 47 vessels, 45,187 tons, 8923 passengers; against HO vessels, 20,860 tons, 2563 passengers last year. On the 2nd March there were 8450 statute adults on the lists of the ; Commissioners, for whom, if approved, passages must be provided after the 13th April; making the total number of passengers for Australia during that period, to amount toiw 17,373. There was an unappropriated balance* of £123,000 on the 3rd April, andthe,pro-" bable number of adults for whom that balance would provide passages was 7,687. 1,706 persons connected with the building trades have been sent out during the last six months, bearing a proportion of 18-65 per cent, to other emigrants. — London Times. Singular Case op Mesmerism. — The young woman in this town (Galashiels) whose extraordinary case has excited the liveliest attention in the medical world, and throughout the country, is now quite recovered and restored to the use of her faculties, mental as well as physical. In the beginning of June last the girl, whose age was 17, was seized with a severe gastric fever, which left her in a very prostrate condition, during which she was attacked with a violent spasmodic cough, which lasted without intermission for 24 hours. Dr. Tweedie, seeing that she would die from sheer weakness — after he had exhausted all the remedies in the pharmacopoeia — resolved upon trying mesmerism. After much perseverance he succeeded in putting the patient into a sound sleep, which controlled the spasms. The character of the disease was then changed. The patient fell into a trance, in which she remained for five weeks, during which time she was unconsciously fed with beef tea, being mechanically roused to this exertion through mesmeric passes. For eight weeks more she remained under the magnetic influence, any attempt to remove it even for the briefest time being instantly followed by strong convulsions. Gradually, however, she was able to be demesmerised for the space of a few minutes, till by degrees the natural period extended from five to ten minutes, and from a half-hour to two or three hours. The intervals in the end rapidly lengthened, till she at last completely recovered. The first night she slept in a natural state was on the 15th of March, and her recovery since then has been rapidly progressive. Altogether the process of cure extended over nine months, and during that time— -her hearing, speech, and ability to walk having been lost — these were restored seriatim by the magnetic process, and in the same gradual way. Full power of hearing was preceded by noises in the ears of various kinds and at longer or shorter intervals. In like manner speech was preceded by moaning sounds and indistinct monosyllabic utterances, until, in both instances, the full action of the organs was restored — the recovery taking many weeks to be accomplished. We do not advert to the extraordinary developments of clairvoyance and other magnetic effects which the patient exhibited in a way probably never seen before, and which she is still capable of showing. A rather remarkable and even ludicrous circumstance attending her recovery is, that on meeting Dr. Tweedie in the street after she began to walk abroad, she immediately fell into the magnetic sleep, and it was not till she had fairly been brought to dispense altogether with mesmerism to induce sleep at night that this influence of the operator ceased. Of course she is still highly susceptible of the power when applied in the usual way, but in every respect she is well and healthy, and has even grown during her illness. We may remark, that during her protracted attack she always appeared to be free from organic disease ; the skin was clear, the lips full and red, and the complexion healthy, notwithstanding the terrible severity of the convulsive spasms. — Border Advertiser. A Wife and Six Children. — A traveller tells the following story. Some time since, while stopping at the Sutter House in Sacramento city, California, I accidentally overheard a conversation between two gentlemen, one of whom was from New York city, and had been in the country nearly a year, and the other had just arrived. The new comer was lamenting, his condition and folly in leaving an abundance at home, and especially two beautiful daughters who were just budding into woman-hood, when he asked the New Yorker if he had a • family. " Yes, sir, I have a wife and six children in New York, and I never saw one of them." After this reply, the couple sat a few moment? in silence, then the interrogator again commenced : " Were you ever blind, sir ?" No, sir. " Did you marry a widow, sir ?" ' No, , sir. (Another lapse of silence.) "Did lun-. derstand you to say just now sir, that you had a wife and six children living in New York, and had never seen one of them ?" Yes, sir, I^, so stated it. Another and a longer pause of silence, then the interrogator again inquired; " How can it be, sir,, that you never saw one of them ?" " Why," was the response, " one of them was born after I left." Oh ! ah ! and a general laugh followed; and after that the New Yorker was especially distinguished as the man who ' had six children and never sawone of them.'