30 
but 1s, 4d.,.and that of a French letter 
Is, 2d., the post-office have the effron- 
tery to charge, for every letter addressed 
to Germany or Switzerland (although 
you may write upon it, via Holland, or 
via France, as the shortest route), and 
for every letter coming from those parts 
(although it bears the Dutch or French 
post-mark), 1s,8d., as if it were to go, 
or had been sent, by the Hamburgh 
packet. My own correspondence with 
Germany is limited; nevertheless, the 
additional charge of sixpence upon every 
single letter robs me of nearly £2 per 
annum. I leave you, therefore, to judge 
of: what its effects must be with the 
merchant of extensive dealings with the 
countries to which I refer. I may be 
told, that the post-office having esta- 
blished packets for the conveyance of 
letters to Hamburgh, confers a favour 
upon me, by sending mine by a shorter 
conveyance; and that, therefore, I have 
no right to complain, if they charge me 
the full amount of postage. Granted. 
But what right have they to charge me 
more for a letter they receive at Calais or 
Helvoetsluys, because it bears a German 
or Swiss post-mark, than if it bore that 
of a Dutch or French town ? 
I should be happy to have this ques- 
tion satisfactorily answered; for I re- 
spect England and her institutions, and 
shall always be happy if I can be instru- 
mental in removing any stigma, real or 
apparent, that may be attached to the 
name of the country, or its government. 
A ForeEIGNer. 
———a 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
On Smoky CuIMNEYs. 
HERE is an English proverb, de- 
scribing a smoky house and a 
scolding wife as two of the greatest nui- 
sances with which a man may be cursed. 
As nothing, however, is more calculated 
to put a housewife out of humour than 
the spoiling of her furniture and dress, 
which is always one of the immediate 
results of smoky chimneys, it is probable 
that the two evils are most generally 
combined, and are therefore thus united 
in the proverb. Be this as it may, I 
have many friends who are pestered 
with both ;. and as I am anxious to free 
them of the first of these evils, and at 
the same time entertain some faint hopes 
that I could thereby mitigate, if not re- 
move, the second,—I shall feel grateful 
to any of your architectural readers who 
could inform me of the most approved 
methods for curing (as the phrase is) 
smoky chimneys. I should, however, 
On Smoky Chimneys. 
(Feb. I, 
be more grateful still, if any scientific 
gentleman would take the trouble to 
point out a general principle for creating 
the draught necessary for carrying off 
the smoke by means of chimneys. 
It is, I believe, a general remark, 
that the modern houses in and about 
this metropolis are more annoyed by 
smoke, than the more ancient erections 
within its precincts. What may be the 
cause of this? Is it because the vents 
are too straight and narrow, and the 
fire-places too shallow, too high, and 
insufficient in breadth ? How is it, too, 
that the westerly winds affect the chim- 
neys more perniciously than those from 
the north or east ? 
Anti-Fumus. 
——< 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
A Tour to Lert. 
S it not monstrous, that a being cre- 
ated originally upright, should be 
condemned to bend in prostration over 
the slope of a mahogany desk ? Goaded 
by this reflection, and acted upon by 
the warm influence of an autumnal sky, 
I resolved to knock off the fetters of 
servitude, and to refresh that ethereal 
vapour called Mind, by roving over the 
scenes of nature, “till Fancy had her 
fill.’ So, selecting a companion com- 
bining the best two requisites for an 
excursion, good temper and good sense, 
I put myself on board the , bound 
to the port of Leith, from that of 
London. 
It is common for young persons, 
young voyagers in particular, to trust, 
like Pompey at Pharsalia, too much to 
their hopes: they are sanguine of two 
things, above others pregnant with ~ 
danger,— Love, and the Water. I was 
nothing behind my contemporaries in 
anticipations of pleasure from the datter, 
and had no doubt that we should sail 
with the adverse winds bagged, and the 
tide in our favour. Taking a farewell 
at Greenwich of our river-pilot, we ran 
before a fine westerly wind, down to the 
Nore. Partaking of a hasty meal, and 
not having had time enough to scruti- 
nize our companions, we turned into. 
our hammocks, and to the influence of 
“Death’s twin-brother, Sleep.” I had 
resolved that all my senses should have 
full exertion during my excursion, that 
what I suffered in pocket might be re- 
munerated to my mind; and the mate 
of the vessel, who slept at the head of 
my hammock, .seemed. determined to 
second my views with respect to the. 
sense of hearing,—for his nose, “ that 
deep 
