According to Darwin, even poultry have mounted the ladder to within a few steps of Elysium; for that worthy informs us, that they were fed for the London market by mixing gin and opium with their food, and keeping them in the dark, but that “they must be killed as soon as they are fattened, or they become weak and emaciated, like human drunkards.” We have no recording pullet to inform us of the visions of the barn-door family under the influence of the beatific drug, nor “Confessions of a Chanticleer,” to tell of the pains that succeeded a too-free indulgence in the little pills; all we learn from the account is, that the vision of Paradise very closely preceded its reality, for the feathered bipeds were dosed and killed. The human biped for half a century continues his dream—and all through that period it is but a dream—yet that he is happy while under its influence there can be no doubt; and when he has reclined on his couch, obtained his pipe, and sunk into the beatific oblivion so coveted by the Asiatic, we may imagine his exclaiming with the Peri, after obtaining the trickling tear,
“Joy, joy for ever! my task is done;
The gates are passed, and heaven is won.
Oh! am I not happy? I am—I am.
To thee, sweet Eden! how dark and sad
Are the diamond turrets of Shadukram,
And the fragrant bowers of Amberabad.
Joy, joy for ever! my task is done;
The gates are passed, and heaven is won!”