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“N0, drowned of drink, though he had a weakness for it before. He must have been silly to fall in love with me instead of with sw'iinmilig. ” “ That’s what everybody says,” she cx- claimed, laughing. “I suppose because I’m not afraid I assure other cowards. Now I learned to Swim from a man, and that gave me confidence. Man can teach woman to swim, and a woman who knows can teach man, but I never was able to make a swim- mer of any woman. I learned at a swim- ming-school. I saw that the teacher was in love with me, and that was some encourage- ment; as onc victory gives confidence and leads to another, I finally beat him swim- ming. Then I had no more respect for him â€"And he drowned himself.” “ irraciOuS heavens!” said I, swallowing halfa, int; of sea-water and going down. When came up again she was lying on her back with both feet half out of the water, making love ’90 the angels above. sax: Herc Ivalso turned over on my back and saw the clouds slowly, thoughtfully moving overhead, and we both ceased to make any exertion and floated there, taking half a mile from shore, like two people in a boat. A FUNNY story comes from the sea-side, in connection with the decease of awell- known hotel-keeper, who was more famous for his good heart and pride in the health- fulness of his hotel than for his adaptability to modern ideas. After his death, a woman, who had often visited the hotel, made a. call of condolence upon the widow, who received her cordially, and was much pleased to talk of her husband’s good qualities, her own loss, etc., but suddenly, wiping her eyes, she exclaimed: “But it is a great comfort to me, Mrs. C., that poorâ€"-â€"died in such a. healthy place.” We swam beyond the stakesvand lines, and Elle bottom had givep “Ely lggneath us. At these remarks, says “Johnny Bouquet” in the New York Tribune, tho pretty miss dived and shook one blue toe and its accom- panying flipper abovejthc waves, and struck out for the ocean direct. Assuredly it never seemed so easy to swim in deep waters. She was a grey-eyed girl, a little freckled, but with plenty of color, and her voice in particular articulated so distinct and mauful-like that it made the whole ocean submissive. Said I: “I never tried, but with you I think I could cross the whole pom .” “Keep your eyes 071 mine,” ~said the pretâ€" ty miss, still striking out like a- water-dog. “Pgople xylm (gem keep cheerful can not sink.” SOME men are so stupid! (Scene: At the Vavasours’ (lance). \Valtzer (to hostess’ fair da\1gl1te1‘).â€"~“So glad to find you alone at last, Miss Vavasour.” Miss Vavas0ur~ “You areâ€"very kind.” “'altzerâ€"Not at all. But tell me, you are not engaged?” Miss Vavasourâ€"No-o.” lValtzerâ€"«“Then may I hopeâ€"v" “Miss Vavasourâ€"Ohl 1‘eally~â€" Capt. Hawleyâ€"«you must talk to mamma." \Valtzer (blankly)â€"~“\Vhat about?” Most opportunely the waltz strikes up and they plunge into it. “The bathing hour is the only hour at the seaside for those still conscious‘of youth. There isa drivin hour also, but: it is not the same. Any 0 d cripple can drive.” v “If such are your sentiments,” thought I, “here goes with you; for it is better to be drowned that} to miss the bathing howl” I): the garden two 6-year-old children, a girl and a boy, exchanged vigorous blows and scratches, meanwhile caluinniating each other at the top of their voices like Homeric heroes. Mamma, interferes, and, after much difficulty, succeeds in separating them. “\Vhat in the name of goodness are you up to, you unhappy little wretches‘.’" “Playing husband and wife, ma 1" MISS VAN SKIMMERHORN, of New York, is at Mount Desert, but says it is awfully slow, “No swell teams, you know, like they have in Central Pawk. and they make an awful row if a girl has more than two milk punches sent up to her room in the course of the day.” “ROSALIND” wrote to an editor, asking “how to fire a plaque.” The hard-hearted wretch replied that, if the plaque was like a great many he had seen, the quickest and cheapest plan would be to “fire it out of the window.” A YOUNG lady who had ordered home a air of unusually high-heeled boots was flushed by the announcement by Bridget, fresh from answering the door bell: “If ye plaze, miss, there’s a man in the hall below with a, pair of sthilts for yes." A FASHION paper tells us that silken hoâ€" siery is now all the rage in Paris, “with in- sertions of portraits and medallions of point lace.” Fancy glancing at your ladylove’s stocking and finding there the portrait of some other fellow ‘. Bathing-Dresses that Show the Shapeâ€"The Advantages Possessed by the Plump Person. NEVER marry for wealth, but remember that it is just as easy to love a. girl who has a brick house with a. mansard roof, and a silver-plated doorbell as one who hasn’t anything but an auburn head and an amiable disposition. A YOUNG lady admitted to her mother that her beau had kissed her on the cheek. “And what did you no?" asked the old lady in a tone of indignation. “Mother,” said the young lady. “I cannot tell a. lie; I turn- ed the other cheek.” A Pretty Swimmer at Long Branch and Her Chat in the Surf on the Men and. Their Wivesâ€"The Most Charming Princess of Wales and a. Few other Female Members‘of British Royalty. How could the maid of Orleans be con- sidered fair when everyone knows that J oan was d’Arc? A NEW powder is used by most females. When the old favorite heard about it, it said: “I’m paint to hear it.” THERE are five women to one man in Holyoke, Mass., and the poor men have to enter ice cream offices by way of the back window, and they carry revolvers when they go to picnics. “DiH he drown at” sea?” I ventured to WOMAN GOSSIP. In the Surf. The most shocking bathing-dress which I saw during my visit at Long Branch, says “Clara Belle,” was worn by a pretentious daughter of an old New York Dutch family. Her descent was of the nrest, and so, may- be, was her own mind, 111; that is a tremen- dously charitable View to take of her taste. The View of her person was much broader and truer. The costume was of a. bright shade of sapphire blue, made with full Turk- ish trousers, terminating in a shirred ruf’fle, garnished with bands of Titan braid. The blouse was of the Mother Hubbard style, shirred to fit her fat shoulders, and Shirred The sweet and gracious princess of \Vales, says a London correspondent, still preserves the right to be considered the most charm» ing lady in Europe, as her husband is the best “poser.” Though she is hovering peril- ously near the fatal year to feminine charms (the 40th, for she is fully 37), she still pos- sesses that exquisite womanly grace and sweetness that more than even the delicate outline of her features, the sculpturesque lilies of her head and throat, or the dreamy tenderness of her soft eyes, have gone to make up her reputation for beauty. She will never lose her charms, for those charms do not depend in feature or coloring for their fascination. I think that were Nihilism or Red Republicanism ever to become rampant in England (but of such a consummation I do not perceive the smallest chance), the af- fection and enthusiasm which this winning and lovely lady has impressed in the popu- lar breast would do more to protect the 1m- perial throne than all the virtues of the pre- sent queen. The princess evidently realizes and enjoys her own abounding popularity, and she is the only member of the royal fam< ily, with the possible exception of her hus- band, who cares for such popularity. She is extremely scrupulous about returning sa- lutetiom from even the poorest of her future subjects. I was driving with a friend in the park, yesterday, when the princess’ carriage passed. My friend’s coaclunan took off his hat and the princess looked up and bowed as gracefully as though a duke had saluted her. It is such little acts as these that en- dear her to the hearts of the British people. The rest of the royal family remain in a sort of almost Oriental seclusion, so far as London is concerned. The duchess of Edin- burgh is in deep mourning, and the duke and duehess of Connaught and the Princess Louise are off travelling. As to the queen and the Princess Beatrice, they are as invisi- ble as though they were Turkish sultans. Poor Beatrice, who is rapidly verging 011 a royal old-maidism, is very likethcmembers of the suicidal family in the old comic song of “A Horrible Tale,” who never had no fun nor nothink.” She never goes to the theatre or the opera with her brother and sister-in law; she never makes her appearance at the court balls, and still less at any other of the social gayeties of the season; she never drives in the park, and though reported to be the wittiest and most brilliant of all Queen Victoria’s daughters, she certainly leads the dreariest existence to which a princess, out- side of a fairy tale full of wicked fairies and impregnable towers, was ever doomed. “Absolutely sensible. \Vhy should a wo- man bare her arm, which she does not need to do, never occupying it, and sew up her feet at the swimming hour, when she wants them to kick with? You take those fifty women 011 the beach and watch them as they are costumed. Candor, equality, and unconscious play and health surrounds the girls in stocking. \Voman wants less dress every way, and more nature. She had bet- ter dress like the pages at court than wear long skirts over French heels. She means to invite attention to her feet by those heels, but she wears a free bathing dress for an honest reason. “\Vhat do you think aboufi the bathing robesâ€"or, rather, the short skirts '3” “W e will go towards the beach," she said; “for we shall be tired before we get there. Do you know why husbands do not court their wives more? Because their wives sit down on them. Show me a wife who walks around the park with her hus- band and talks frankly with him, like any other man, and I’ll show you a couple still courting. Swimming is woman’s greatest luxury if she only knew it, but she is not dressed in a style either to walk or swim. She sits down at home, talking dress, and accusing him of neglect, while it is the high- heeled shoe and the tight sta 's and selfish- ness of ease which is coming etwcen them. He is selfish too, but he can not give up his nature for what she is worshipping at. Go up yonder to the hotel of evenings, and what are they talking about? Dress, ap- pearances, and spending money. I hear it over and over every night, and I don’t wonâ€" der the husbands are playing poker or pool, or propping up the bar. Few of the ladies touch the piano; those who can sing do not do it.. Because I can swim out here beyond the ropes they perhaps think I am queer. Now I know some of the same neglecting husbands, because they have swam with me, and in every case their wives could kindle them to glowing love again if they were not helpless. It is ardor that begets the ardent glance. One husband told me yesterday that he took his wife to Europe, and all she wanted to look at was the shop windows. The pretty miss” talked in that large assur- ing voice with a, real sense and eloquence which made the ocean safe romance. “There is plenty of everything but self- reliance,” she said, “and that nobod can get without daring for it. The b0 y re- quires education more than the head. A well-bred woman who can swim out here, far at sea, can hold her own with her husband after she gets him. Husbands leave their wives because their wives will not go along with them. Man is an exercising animal; after business his world is and ought [to be the open air. But his wife never learned to walk, and what little she once walked she will not do a year after marriage. Not a single physical exercise does an American woman require after marriage. Consequent- ly,” said the pretty miss, with the most na< tural frankness, “a woman of active body c in, if she wants to, lead away those bereavâ€" ed husbands. J ohnny,” remarked the lady, executing a dive which was like a duck’s go- ing down for a weed, “teach your daughters to ride, to walk, and- to swim. They can see just where their husbands g0." ‘ “There's no fear about me BOW," said I: this peculiar conversation is too healthy for apprehensiop. " Sights at Long Branch. English Royalty. Old-Fashio .ed. Courting. As to the “ old-fashioned court,” that was business. No “ lum-tum” about it. “'hen a young man had his eye tenderly fixed on a young woman he told her of it before the open kitchen fireplace, while he was paring apples and she knitting stockings. The fire- light just showed their blushes off to good a( vantage, they woke up the old folks and told them of their expected happiness, next Sunday sat together at church, were soon married, began life humbly and worked up quietly, peacefully and with their souls fill- ing up day by day with that sentiment which lives forever and is the power of all powers, love. Nowadays it is different, sad- ly different. Young people use 11p more time in nonsensical “attentions” than the whole business is worth, begin married life in better style than their parents ever have grown to, and as a consequence their pro- gress is backwards in all that is true and noble in character, and the divorce court too often tells the sequel to a story that is any- thing but pleasant. Oldâ€"fashioned, earnest courting is the foundation of true home life, and the sooner our young people return to its simplicity the better. â€" «â€"â€"â€"«90 4-} Dopâ€"W -- Very beautiful white dresses are made of Persian mull, with flounces richly embroider- ed and reaching from just below the belt to the foot of the short skirt, the bottom of the dress just showin the edges of a dainty lace balayeuse. Sma l embroidered shoulder- eapes to match, or long fichus which cross in front and tie at the back, are invariably added to this charming summer toilet. But there is a part of the Scriptures which we should like to have incorporated into the revision of the whole Bible, if it ever is to be published. That is the so-ealled Apocrypha ; meaning those works which some gentleman, appointed to select from a lot of manuscripts those that they considered inspired, chose to put aside as not inspired. The stories of the Maccabees, which are amena those Apocrypha, make as fine a historical, paint- ing as you can find in the Kings or Chroni- cles, and even Solomon can not rank ahead of the man who wrote proverbs under the name of Jesus Lirach. Filth unintelligibility and terrors; whereas it is of all the books handed down to our race the most interesting, instructive and poeticalâ€"always leaving unnoticed its in- spired characters. As far as the poetry is concerned, the new revision deserves decided credit for having brought out the parallelisms of the ancient Hebrew poetry in a way to strike the eye as well as the ear. When the Old Testament shall have been revised in the same form, what a. wealth of rhythmical phrases will be opened to us 1 The song of Solomon has never yet been chanted in Eng- lish in language benefitting its Hebrew meter and rhythm. The most finished works of that great kineg rhymester and journal- ist, his Proverbs and Preachings, have been handed down to 11s in a most miserable state. A new revision will do much to make us better acquainted with the great works of the old Hebrew poets. We have growxf up infilo \iérlr‘$;llvll\\’11010- some dread of the Bible. “'e have come to {ggard it as. q bgok to be associatefl only Of all books written there is probably no book so deserving to be read, and yet so little read, as the book of all books that we hear quoted day by dayâ€"the Bible. \Ve will drop entirely the theological part of the question ; we will take the Bible just as it stands, an ordinary hook, pleading its own cause. Is there an admirer of Hamlet who will not acknowledge J Oh to be the greater work, taking it merely from an artistic point of View? The sonnets of Shakespeare are wovderful, let us confess it ; but how about the psalms of David ? There are marvellous colorings about Richard 111., no doubt, but how do they compare with the gloomy stories of the Maccabees? Sweeter Idyl than Goothe’s Hermann and Dorothea was never written, and yet how it does fade into insignificance after you have read the simple story of Ruth ! 1"? v ing on tape in fancied shapes. The only salvation for a woman in the surf is a good figure. Drenching will reduce the most ela- borately contrived garments to a sagging, dripping shapelesness, and then the wearer can only be charming on actual physical merit. Lean and fat bathers alike are dis- enchanting, and the wonder to me is that sea-side watering places do not break off more matrimonial engagements than they make. The only females who can gain ad- mirers in the surf are the very, very few who have exquisite forms, and the girls of twelve to fourteen. The latter are at an age when they can still presume upon the free- dom of artless childhood, and if they bare their legs to the knees it is all right. to fit her substantial waist, with a shirred flounce at the bottom. The neck opened in a point under a. small, square sailor’s collar, almost covered with rows of braid. White pearl buttons closed up the front, and a white tasselled cord girdled the waist. What was there improper about that dress? asks the reader, finding nothing in the descrip- tion to distinguish it particularly from those commonly worn at ocean bathing-places. The material was what was the matter, and not the sha e or shortness of the garments. Fabrics for isthing-suits ought always to be woollen, so that when Wet it will not cling to the skin. This woman knew better than to use cotton, and had done it, in my 0 inion with the deliberate purpose of dis- p aying the undeniable perfection of her fig. ure. She was well aware that the thin cot- ton, as soon as saturated, would adhere to her body like a second skin; and so it did. She made a weak pretense of occasionally pulling the skirt of the blouse awa from herself, and of trying to keep waist eep in the water: but every recedence of the surf left her exposed like a statue away down to her shins, revealing every square inch of her body with startling fidelity. I saw hun- dreds of more becoming costumes worn by bathers who burned their bare arms in the sun to the shoulders, and their bare feet and ankles half way to theknee;butthe garments were woollen and did not cling. Desperate endeavours are made to impart jauntiness to the garments, but a wetting spoils all the effect, unless they be worn tight on a plump body, and then you have too much disclosure for any nice girl to make. So the Long Branch bathing-dress of 1881 is the old loose tunic belted at the waist and a pair of loose trousers gathered at the ankle. About all that is usually done for ornaments is in sew- The Bible. upper lakes upon Lake Ontario, they were still over 245 feet above their objective point â€"the sea-port of Montreal. The Lachine Canal was first built around the rapids of that name just above the city. This. new channel of trade was opened in 1825, the depth being four anda half feet, and the breadth twenty-eight feet on the bottom. The ‘Velland, as enlarged in 1834, led to the ~ Notwithstanding the fact that the Canadi- ans were not able t9 {1an the @onnarge of the The honor of overcoming obstacles inter- posefl by nature is greater than that of a victory over our fellow-men. Louis XIV. is remembered far more endurineg through his Languedoc canal than he is by his con- quests. The Duke of Bridgewater’s fame would not have survived the etlarc of a cen- tury had he not broken the hide-bound preju- (lice of his (la) , and built the first canal in Great Britain. although the idea, was not a new one on the Continent. Lord Dalhousie’s administration of Indian affairs gained him renown not more for his magnificent high- ways than for his Baree Doab and other canals throughout the Punjab. The State of New York will ever hold- De \Vitt Clin- ton prince among her Govenors for his reso- lute zeal in the matter of the Erie Canal; while to the Ho‘h. “7. H. Merritt belongs the credit of making a. pathway to the ocean in spite of the Falls of Niagara. Disappointed in their plan of using the Grand River to avoid the Niagara, with ist swift currents in the summer and its ice blockade in the spring, the Canadians east about for still further improvements. A direct cut of seven miles to Lake Erie was made, and the canal was completed on its present line on the 20th of May, 1833, the summit still being fed by the Grand River. There were forty wooden locks, 110 feet long by 22 feet wide, except the three lower ones, which were 130 by 32, and the one at Port Colborne, which was 125 by 24. The width in the Deep Cut was twenty-four feet, the general width being twenty-six feet, The depth was eight feetvâ€"suflicient for the passage of 400-ton boats. The length of the main-ship canal was twenty-eight miles; but if the old towing-path along the Welland and Niagara, and the boat-canal, which serv- ed as the Grand River feeder, were consider- ed, there were near eighty miles more of navigation. Three harbors were also erect- edfil’ort Maitland, at the mouth of the Grand River; Port Colborno, at the Lake Erie entrance, twenty miles above the head of the Niagara ; and Fort Dalhousie, at the Lake Ontario entrance, eleven miles to the west of the Niagara’s mouth, It was finallgl resolved to build a ship- canal, sixteen miles in length, to connect the mouth of Twelve-mile Creek with the \Vel- land River, a tow-path along the banks of which would give a continuous passage from Lake Ontario to the Niagara River. Thirty- five looks were built to overcome the total rise of 3:23 feet ; a branch canal to the mouth of the Grand River was proposed in order to avoid the ice blockade at the mouth of the Niagara. But so frequent were the land- slides in the Deep Cut (Port Robertson) that the \Velland River could no longer be used as the summit. By the advice of James (x‘etldes, one of New York’s most experienced engineers, the waters of the Grand River were brought from Barefoot Rapids (Cale- donia) to the Deep Cut, which henceforth re- mained the summit, while the water of this upper level crossed the \Velland by means of an expensive aqueduct. 0n the 30 Novem- ber, 1329â€"exaotly five years after the enter- prise was commenced ~the schooners Ann, and Jane, of Toronto, and 1?. 11. 1302172022, of Youngstown, New York, passed from Lake Ontario to Lake Erie. The original project was to connect the two lakes, Erie and Ontario, by a mere boat- canal, for vessels of 100 tons. The route was up the valley of the Twelve-mile Creek to the foot of the Niagara. escarpment ; thence by a railway to the Beaver Dam Creek, from which point across to the Chip. pawa was had by a second boatlcanal tun« nelled through the “divide” on the site of the present Deep Cut. The importance of a larger canal becoming more evident, the capital stock was increased fivefold, and the stockholders were guaranteed a paid-up an- nual dividend of twelve and a half per cent. in case the crown should ever assume the canal. The board of directors reported every prospect for encouragement. Bishop Strachan left off his opposition to Lord Sel- kirk’s Red River settlements, and remarked with enthusiasm that "the \Velland Canal will in time yield the only importance to the canal which may hereafter unite the Pacific with the Atlantic.” That wonderful colon- izer of Upper Canada, John Galt, pledged the influence of his Canada Company in be‘ half of the new canal, while the Legislatures of both Upper and Lower Canada eased the work with temporary loans. From inception to completion the Erie Canal was watched by the Upper-Canadians. They became intensely interested in the dis- cussion whether the route should be north- ward from the Rome level, through Oneida Lake to Lake Ontario (access to Lake Erie to be had by an American canal around Niagara Falls), or whetherâ€"es it finally provedâ€"the waterway should crcss the en- tire length of the State. The most interest- ed of the Canadians was William Hamilton Merritt, a youth but little past his majority, whose ancestors were New-Yorkers of note in the French and Indian wars. With other British sympathizers they removed to the Niagara Peninsula, and located upon “Twelve-mile Creek"â€"the present city of St. Catherinesâ€"in 1796. In the course of his trading along the banks of the Niagara it had occured to young Merritt that a canal was practicable, and in 1818 he surveyed from Allanburgh to Chippawa with a water- level. In response to his statement, the Canadian Legislature voted £2000 for sur- veys, and a. route was laid out from Chippe- wa to Burlington Bay (Hamilton), via Grand River. The impracticability of this route, and the certainty of the Erie Canal, made the construction of a Canadian canal a ne- cessity. The avoidance of Niagara Falls by the Americans was the Canadians’ opportun- ity. In 1821, their Legislature appointed a board of commissioners to report upon the most feasible route. A year later (1823), the commission recommended a canal large enough to accommodate any vessel then navigating the lakesâ€"advice that led to the incorporation of the “\Velland Canal Com- pany” during the following year. Merritt and his associates subscribed £40,000, and first sod was turned on the 30th of Novem- ber. The Original Welland Canal. Harper 5 Magazine. REGARDING the contact of civilization and barbarism in South Africa, Sir Bartle Frerc holds the following opinions : 1. It is pos- sible for the civilized to destroy by war the savage races, to expel, or turn them aside in their migrations. 2. Proximity of savage and civilized races has led or is leading to the decay and robable extinction of the Buslnnon race ; ut this result is doubtful in the case of the Hottentot races, and is cer- tainly not taking place with regard to the Bantu or Kafir races. 3. The changes con- sequent ou the proximity of civilized and un« civilized races are an approximation to the European type of civilization. 4. The essen- tials to such an approximation are a pax Romana or Anglicans, bringing with it pro. tection of life and property, which involves equalify before the law, individual property in land, abolition of slavery, abolition of private rights, and makinnr war and of carry ing arms without the authority of the su- preme ruler, and the power of local legisla~ tion on European principles, with a view to secure education in the arts of civilized life. taxation sufficient for State purposes, and restrictions on the use of intoxicating sub- stances. DURING a course of lectures on indigo and its artificial production, Prof. H. E. Roscoe slave thsee instructive figures re arding an industry hardly more than a ecade old. Last year (1880) the estimated product ofithe artificial coloring material was 14,000 tons, but this contains only 10 per cent of the pure alizari‘n. Reckoning 1 ton of the artificial coloring material as equal to 9 tons of mad- der, the whole artificial product is equival< cut to 126,000 tons of inadder. The present value of these 14.000 tons, is £1,568,000, That of 126,000 tons of madder at £45 per ton is £5,670,009, ora saving is effected by the use of alizarin of considerably over £4,- 000,000. In other words, we get our alizarin dyeing done now for less than one-third of the price which we had to pay to have it done with madder. So much for the discovery of the German chemist, Prof. Adolph Baeyer, and its successful application by Dr. Care to the demands of the textile manufacturer. THE three fundamental colors, according to M. Roscnstiehl, have the following prop- erties : By their mixture, two and two, they produce all the colors perceptible to our eyes. They produce at the same time the sensation of whiteness to a less degree than the other colors. The sensation of pure whiteness de~ pends on the equal excitement of the three fundamental sensations. As regards comple« mentary colors, he finds that the colors situ- ated on the one and the other side of a pri- mary color, and which are to the eye equi- distant, have their complementaries so close together that it is difficult to distinguish be- tween such as are consecutive. BESIDES the ancient and remarkable in- scription found on a stone at the Pool of Si- loam, on which Prof. Sayce discourses in the July number of the Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund it is an- nounced that Lieut. Condor has found aJew- ish tomb of the Herodian period cut in the rock near the place where the crucifixion is believed to have occurred. The Rev. C. L. Bradslcy is also said to have recently un- covered the mouth of J acob’s Well,the stones surrounding it showing grooves caused by the friction of ropes. Another matter of importance to student: is the almost certain identification of Ain Codes with Kadesh Barnea. Mn. G. H. DARWIN has taken pains to es« timate the stresses caused in the interior of the earth by the weight of continents and mountains, and he concludes that either the materials of the earth have about the strength of granite at 1,000 from the surface, or that they have a much greater strength nearer to the surface. He conflicts Sir \Villiam Thom~ son’s theory that the earth must be solid nearly throughout its whole mass, and he at tributes the lava of volcanoes to the melting of solid rock which exists at high tempera- tures at points where the pressure is dimin- ished, or to the existeseo of comparatively small vesicles of molten rock. Mn. C. SHALER SMITH, who has had much experience in testing the violence of wind storms, doubts whether the pressure of a di- rect wind or gale ever exceeds 30 pounds per square foot. The only exception to this maximum was an unusually violent storm at East St. Louis in 1871, when the wind blew over a locomotive. In this instance the pressure must have been 93 pounds per square foot. Les filomles publishes the following method of distinguishing spurious honey : A solution of 20 parts of honey in 60 parts of water, mixed with alcohol gives a heavy white pre- cipitate of dextrine, if glucose has been add< ed. Genuine honey, when treated in the same way merely becomes milky. A Plante secondary battery and a special lamp, the whole weighing only one kilo- granime, were used to read the scales of in~ struments during a balloon ascent made after midnight July '2 at; Paris by M. (le Fonviellc and M. Lippmann. IN a letter to M. Diamilla-Muller, M.Faye suggests that in thunder-storms the source of electricity is not merely charged air and icy particles whirling downward from upper reâ€" gions, but that electricity is dcvelopediu the act of giration. AUSTRALIA is to be divided into meteoro- logical districts so as to obtain the data for weather telegraan and warnings. IT is re )orted that the phylloxera has done consideragle damage to the vines in some parts of Spain, but the weather has been so favorable that a fair vintage is expected. IT is found by R. Schneider that distinct traces of silver are obtained in many of the commercial preparations of Bismuth. Pure oxide of bismuth, when free from silver, is not affected by light. contemplation of a. uniform system of canals large enough for the steamers of the upper lakes. W'hile the subject was under discus- sion, four short canals were built to over- come the Cascades and Cedar and Cotcau rapids in the channel of the St. Lawrence, between Lakes St. Louis and St. Francis. In 1845, the Beeuhamois Canal replaced the four, the Cornwall Canal having recently been constructed upon the enlarged scale, to surmount the rapids of the Longue Sault. The Farran’s Point, Rapid Plat, and Galops â€"known collectively as the Williamsburg Canalsâ€"were opened in 1847, thus complet- ing the chain of navigation from Lake Erie to Montreal. SCIENTIFIC GOSSIP.