One hundred guineas is stated to be the lowest cost of either of the engravings in "the Literary Souvenir for 1829;" some of them, indeed, cost from 150 to 170 guineas each. A circulation of less than from 8 to 9,000 copies, would entail a loss upon the proprietors; so that the expense of "getting up" this superb "Annual" probably exceeds 3,500l.; and taking this sum for the average of six others published at the same price, and with a proportionate advance for two more published at one guinea each, the outlay of capital in these works is from 35 to 40,000l. [ 4] This sum would purchase Five Million numbers of THE MIRROR, or 80 million printed pages, with 10 million impressions of woodcuts!
TRUE CONSOLATION.
A citizen of Geneva having lost his wife, he, according to the custom of the country, attended the funeral to the cemetery, which is out of the city. Somebody meeting him on his return from this painful ceremony, assumed a sorrowful countenance, and in the tenderest manner possible, asked him how he did. "Oh," replied the widower, "I am very well at present; this little walk has set me up; there is nothing like country air."
HARD RAIN.
Mr. Rae Wilson tells us, that he saw some huge stones of granite on his road to Mecklenburgh, which he says actually seem to have been rained there; in which belief he is strengthened by a story in a Philadelphia newspaper, of "a spitting of stones, which ended in a regular shower at Nashville, in May, 1825!"—There is seldom a good story without its match.
FRENCH PRISON.
A recent letter from Paris gives the following account of the Debtors' Prison, compared with which, it seems, our Fleet is a perfect Arcadia:—Each room contains four beds, small, dirty, and damp; so that the eyes of the unfortunate inmates become red and inflamed; not even a window can be shut to keep out a current of air. If a creditor visits a debtor who wishes to be revenged, the latter has only to cry au loup, when all parties assail the unlucky creditor, and perhaps murder him! Gambling is the great resource of the ignorant, so that frequently those who have only a few pence per day to exist on, are obliged to fast entirely, having anticipated their allowance; many even pawn their coats, and walk about en chemise!