1808. ] 
tlie of comfumption, or complaints in the 
cheft, the foundations of which are com- 
monly laid in colds, caught either by ex- 
polure to night-ajy, or perhaps more fre- 
quently from the omiffion of due cloathing : 
thefe, fo often repeated, feem to, produce 
. an aptitude to difeafe : we hear them com- 
plain of chillinefs, cough, pain in the fide, 
or fimilar fymptoms, which at firft are 
looked upon as flight indifpofitions, are 
lightly treated, or perhaps wholly difre- 
garded. Thus the infidious approaches of 
this direful malady are fuffered to pafs un- 
noticed. During the fucceeding fummer, 
ts ravages are probably fufpended, and 
they are flattered with returning health ; 
but, no fooner do nipping frofts, or chil- 
ling winds, fet in, than difeafe appears 
in an aggravated form, and, after a tedi- 
ous confinement and illnefs, the haplefs fe- 
male is cut off in the bloom of life; or, 
fhould fhe be preferved by art through the 
cold months of winter, it ferves but to 
eniure her death on theirreturn. ‘This is 
not an exaggerated picture, nor defigned. 
as a bug-bear to produce fear, but is eve- 
ry day feen verified in numbers of in- 
flances. Yet, whilft we fee females of 
ftrong ftamina, and robutft conftitutions, 
who, in the natural courfe of things, 
micht have lived many years, fall victims 
to their own imprudence ; we alfo obferve 
others, who, with great delicacy of frame, 
and even pre-difpofition to difeafe, are, by 
the ufe of proper means (and of thefe 
warm covering is a moft effential one) 
fafely conduéted through the dangerous 
period of youth. 
The wearing of flannel under-dreffes has 
of late been ftrongly recommended ‘by 
fome eminent men of the medical profef- 
fion, and the obvious advantages accruing 
from this prattice have fully juftified their 
recommendation; but it unfortunately 
happens, with many, the name of flannel 
carries with it an idea of fomething coarfe 
or uncomfortable, when contrafted with 
the linen ufually worn. This objeétion, 
however, exifts but in imagination, and it 
requires only a trial to convince them that 
the wearing of it (particularly of the foft 
Welfh kind) is, of all other fubftances 
that come in contaét with the (kin, the 
moft pleafant and genial. Without at all 
entering into a phyfical definition of its 
manner of acting, it need only be obferved, 
that, by a conftant tranfpiration from the 
furface of the body being kept up, an uni- 
verfal equable aétion is prelerved between 
the fuperficial veffels, and thofe of the 
_ heart and large arteries ; the fun&tions of 
the organs effential to life are lef liable to 
MoNTHLY Mac. No, 99. 
Device for teaching Arithmetical Rules. 225 
become difordered, and fufceptibility to— 
cold is confiderably diminifhed. 
If, then, ye amiable part of mankind, 
on the terms we have ftipulated, the at- 
tacks of difeafe can be warded off, or ren- 
dered lefs frequent, your comfort can be 
fecured, or your apprehenfions allayed, 
liften to the digtates of your reafon, and 
fuffer not the tyrannical fway of fafhion 
to beguile you out of that moft eltinnable 
of bleffings-——** Health.”’ 
Newcaftle on Tyne. | Your's, &c. 
; C. N. W, 
Ta the Editor of the Monthly Magazineé 
SIR, 
HOEVER has learned arithmetic, 
mutt be fenfible of its importance s 
to render the knowledge of it eafy to be 
obtained, muft therefore be defirable. Ido 
not find fault with the methods in ufe for 
teaching it at {chools; but it muit have - 
been frequently obferved, that, even after 
children. have learned addition, fubtraétion, 
multiplication, and divifion, they know 
little or nothing of the reafon why they 
work the queftions fet them in that parti~ 
cular form; that is, they do not under= 
ftand, when cafting-up whole numbers 
in addition, why they carry the tens to the 
next column on the left hand; nor, when 
cafting up pounds, fhillings, pence, and 
farthings, why they carry one to the pence 
for every four farthings, and one to the fhil- 
lings for every twelve pence; nor why, 
in fubtracting, they borrow, in whole num- 
bers, ten, when the fum to be fubtracted 
is in fome of the units or tens greater than 
the fum it is to be fubtracted from. At- 
tempting to explain this toachild, the fol- 
lowing plan ftruck me, which I found, 
upon trial, to be of confiderable ufe :—E 
gota few cards, which I cut in fmall 
pieces, fome triangular, fome {quare, fome 
round, and fome oval; the triangular 
pieces I called farthings, the fyuare ones 
pence, the round ones fhillings, and the 
oval ones pounds: I then began, by writ- 
ing down a queftion in addition as fol- 
lows :—= 
eae a 
ee eee: 
714 8% 
612 94 
9 7 10% 
29 5. of 
I then laid down upon a table five of 
the oval pieces for pounds on the left 
hand, then nine round ones for the fhil- 
Gg ~ dings, 
