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Thames Star, Volume VI, Issue 1868, 29 December 1874, Page 2

Josh Billings says: " The live man iz like a little pig: he iz weaned young and begins to root curly. He iz th« peppersass ov creation, the allspice ov the world. One live man in a village iz like a case ov the itch in the district schoo), he sets everybody scratching at onst." - ;

Porno singers at a concert were somewhat startled the other evening by finding that the selection, " When wearied wretches sink to sleep/ had been printed on the programmes^" When married wretcheaV'&c. -"

EASY DEATHS.

lhe Saturday Keview, in discussing the unpleasant sensation cau«ed by hanging, asks : " What is really the most painful mode of death ? " This is a question for which it is impossible to find conclusive evidence. If, indeed, spiritualism had anything to say for itself, it ought to be able to provide some kind of answer. The very material ghosts who revisit this world by the Kelp of mediums are often .drawn from that class-which has* considerable experience of the ! There tht'fi disreputable, beings jofverimioal jant.ecjd<?nts, > jr4o., peqnmi'ty.bMQ.JS&iie their exit to the spirit wo^id by; the~£QUte of the; fifallow's. A m.ore tjitangibleJresulfc would be obtained tWa. has hi.herfo^been com m unicated to" the world if some of their familiar* Would calLupvsaj; the, lttt murderer, who has been hung in, and guilotined in Ffancej and' get them to compare impressjpns.. TJn^trtunaitelj^findee<f, the ghosts',in quesiiori are such confirmed liars that very little reliance ; could; in any case. r be, placed $800. their testimony, There is, however", some evidence which is good as far as it goes. Various persons hare at different times rbeen;recovered, after- reaching; tbe ftage of insensibility, and their accounts, if trustworthy, tend Jto show, that hanging is so pleasant a. process t\\iii but fdr-the final results, if-would be worthwhile to indulge in it ocdasibnally,;; hy way cjjp amusement. The" recovered persons^ 7 it is said, agree that the uneasiness is "quite momentary;," tjiatthey have visions of beautiful colorsf jand speedily become unconscious,. - Similar accounts are generally givenby people who have recovered from drowning;; and, indeed, physiologists tell us that, so far as can be discovered, death is generally a more painless process than we are apt to suppose. If this be the case, oujr sympathy with the hanged is so far thrown: away, and we might relieve the anxiety of expecting sufferers by giving the most authentic, accounts of the operation which they are about to undergo. i .

It iriisfrib« ; ledmittedp indeed. - itt any case, that the worst part of hanging, or of | any other form of executions-is that very unpleasant harbour 'wliich. must be passed previous to' the mance. our object be to diminiih suffering, we must consider, 'pWijh& actual pang inflicted* at the instant, b^tlj^ pre. liminary impression upon the lmagiHation. For thii purpose there is *iT considerable body, of evidence which would demand attention.;, %he "popularity of dif-ferent-forms of-iuibid* -is Jfnot a proof that the form adopted is-really the most painless, but it is a proof that it isthe leastjierrifyingto tlie imagination. The queiptbn as to the be*t mode of performing the operation is pfte& discussed, Jbut uttluckil^ the Results are rathWilimbiguousf' Few persons who commit "suicide, in fact, are coolenougE to set about their end. in a business like ananner. A soldier naturally shoots, himself, because He has-the at hand. "Women, it is said, incline in! a general way to hanging /because they have ' contracted.—aa aversion to firearms* %fiicfi remains with them—though )t must be admitted that the logical process is not very soundeven when the, dangerous character of an implement should be its chief recommendation. Drowning, again, has recommendations to many pebple.uot on account of its intrinsic merits, but because rivers are always handy; and because, in many cases, a voluntary performance may be easily mistaken for an accident. Tbe choice would appear to depend generallyupon the peculiarity of temperament whichmakesitpleasantest for one to plunge at once into cold water and for another to sink in by degrees. A man with rigorous nerves likes to take the shock and hare done with it. A more excitable person generally shrinks from shock, even mor* than from the change which it introduce! and dreads nothing which can be brought about by slow degrees. The French school of suicide has distinguished itself by its fondness for the charcoal process, which to Englishmen generally suggests associatious unpleasant even at the moment of death, of stuffiness, headache, and discomforture. The most elaborate plan that we remember is described as having been adopted at Paris. According to some ingenious author of contemporary history, a professor of the art kept a hospitable table, which persons about to commit suicide were in the habit of visiting. They partook of a good dinner with plenty of wine and excellent cookery, paying the bill we presume, beforehand, with the: understanding that a subtle poison would be mixed in one of the dishes, not previously specified. We fear that the entertainer ' would be under a strong temptation to put it in<o the soup, by way of saving himself the rest of the performance. But if reliance could be placed upon the host, we feel that such, a mode of death, if not quite in accordance with Christian morality, would have its recommendation- for many temperaments. Llt is pleasanter to the imagination to allow the blow to strike you without being aware-at the instant of its decent than to encounter ie knowingly and visibly. And, indeed, if men of science should occupy themselves with the problem, there cannot be much doubt that some kind of poisoning would be the plan adopted in the-; interest of the sufferer* There is something unpleasant, afoput every mode of death which invQligjp a suspicious-looking,apparatus. A cold river in winter^ ii much more terrifying than a pleasant stream in the midst of summer. The end may be precisely, the same, and the actual amount of suffering not less in one case than the other. But the instinct of self preservation survives in a modified form even with peonl? who have decided to put an end to themselves, and warns them" 'against everything that is painful to the iminagination. Ophelia, would never have drowned herself if in her tinw streams h^d

been applied to th© purposes common to a civilized land. And on the same • principal there can be little doubt that some poisons put an end to life in the quickest *nd least terrifying manner. An overdose of laudanum tends one "out of the world with all possible respect for the decencies, and, if we consulted-exclusively the tastes of our.arinunais wjß^heuld probably put an end to them "by some composing draught, according to the great precedent of Socrate^' ,We_do not, however,* pronoulLce any^opinioin .as to the advisablenen of any cliance in the operation/ Aft.T all, the chief thing, is to have ' some method which is, «o to speak, v sanetraaed'. hf long afcspciatipn,, «nd^which f 3> of the" sufferer. * DeathTiy law ought no|) to be Buperfluoasl3rpaiT)ful, but it ought to be distinctly .ignominious,, and ther'tHs a.goott deal to.be said for adherence to the old fashioned methods which nave acquired a certain significance simply by the fact that they have been practiced immorally. , ' a

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