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William Scott was married in 1740 to a Miss Atkinson, of Newcastle. It was a happy matrimonial alliance. Besides good looks and placid temper, the lady possessed an excellent understanding, along with all proper domestic accomplishments. A fortunate marriage for the owner of keels and ships! At the time that a child was about to make its appearance, the country was thrown into alarm by the rebellion, in the spring of 1745. ing on the Tyne. The gates of Newcastle were shut and A rebel army was'advancguarded. In a condition which made her apprehensive of deeds of violence, Mrs. Scott removed to the village of Hey worth, four miles distant, in the county of Durham. There she gave birth to a male infant; but there was a second child, and, in the urgency of the case, a medical practitioner was sent for to Newcastle. It was during the night; the gates were closed; as delay might be hazardous, the doctor was let down over the wall in a basket, and he arrived in good time to deliver Mrs. Scott of a female child. The boy was named William, and we shall soon hear more of him.

It was Mrs. Scott's destiny to "fall into a family." Returning to Newcastle after the rebellion was over, she again, after a time, had twins, a boy and girl, born on the 4th of June (the birthday of George III.), 1751. The boy was christened John-the John Scott, hero of our story, but who almost until middle life was best known by his friends as Jack, or Jack Scott. Master Jackey was a promising youth while still in petticoats, but scarcely more so than his brother William, who was from five to six years his senior. The two boys had good brains. They grew up fond of books, which is always a sign of acute intelligence, and both had a surprising memory. Of course, they had the ordinary unruliness of boys, performed pranks, and underwent the floggings at school which at that time were considered a proper academic discipline.

mar-school at Newcastle, under the management of the At the Free GramRev. Mr. Moises, they acquired a sound classical instruction, to which they were largely indebted for their future advancement. William was sent to complete his education at Oxford; but the father did not contemplate sending Jack thither, considering the line of life he was likely to pursue. For one thing, Jack was a skilled penman. His handwriting was beautiful, and remained so during life.

Jack was otherwise acomplished. As a small but handsomely made youth of fourteen, he was one of the best dancers in Newcastle. At the dancing-school, he signalized himself by his gallantry in helping the young ladies to put on their dancing-shoes, it being according to etiquette in those days to render this kind of service, and at the same time offer a small bouquet of flowers. In this way, Jack Scott grew up a beau, and was admired for the gracefulness of his manners. began to think what was to be done with him. Nothing On reaching his fifteenth year, his father seemed more suitable than to bring him up to his own trade as a coal-fitter. William, who, by his excellent abilities, had already gained a fellowship, and occupied the position of a college tutor, did not like the idea of seeing brother Jack a coal-dealer, and persuaded his father to send the lad to Oxford, where something better could be done for him. So, in 1766, Jack goes in the fly to Oxford, and is there entered as a member of the university. Here he did not shine so conspicuously as on the banks of the Tyne, and his Northumbrian burr was not in his favor. Yet he spent three years at college, showed his splendid talents, and, like his brother, obtained a fellowship. In 1771, he wrote an English essay, and gained the prize for doing so - a matter of gratulation to the family.

While everything was going on swimmingly for high academic honors, Jack Scott, at twenty-one years of age, sacrificed all his prospects by a single act. In the course of a journey through the north of England, he attended church at Sedgefield in the county of Durham, and there saw and instantly fell in love with Elizabeth Surtees, daughter of a banker in Newcastle. Bessy was under the charge of an aunt, to whom Jack contrived to procure an introduction, which opened the way for a conversation with the young lady. His fame as a prize essayist, united with his hand

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some personal appearance, and black, sparkling eyes, gave
him an advantage which proved irresistible. After an ac-
quaintance of but a few days, Jack Scott and Bessy had
pledged their troth to each other.
This important

Miss Surtees had not yet come out. affair in a young lady's life was to take place at a ball given to the Duke of Cumberland riety at Newcastle on the 1st September, 1771. Jack the duke of Culloden notoBessy led out as a partner by the duke, and that she was took good care to be at the ball, but disconcerted by seeing ceremoniously treated as the "belle of the ball," he did not ask her to dance. For this shyness, he speedily made up. At the weekly assemblies, he not only danced with her, but openly showed that he was an admirer. An arrangement in the rooms was favorable to the young pair. There was a large and a small apartment, with a lobby or stair-head between. In the dances, Jack made a point of dancing with Bessy down the long room into the lobby and the small room beyond relate in his later days as a skilful piece of generalship. a circumstance he used gleefully to These dancings did not escape notice. The Scotts were sorry that Jack had entangled himself so early in life, though they allowed his choice was unexceptionable. If he married Bessy, he would lose his fellowship, and where were his means of a respectable livelihood? they were furious at the notion of Jack Scott, son of a coalAs for the Surtees, fitter who once kept a public-house, aspiring to be a match⚫ for their daughter. Resolved to do all in their power to check the alliance, they sent Bessy off on a visit to a lady, a high connection in London; trusting she would there be looked after, and the fancy for Jack Scott driven out of her parties in Northumberland House, the Opera, and Ranehead. Bessy saw much fine company in London, figured at lagh. Jack was not far off. He found means to have interviews with Bessy while walking under female tutelage in Hyde Park. On these occasions, there was a mutual determination to hold to their plighted troth. tled, Jack went for a short time to Oxford, and Bessy reThis being setturned to her home in Newcastle. If Surtees imagined that the engagement with his daughter was broken off, he was mistaken. Bessy had secretly arranged to elope with her lover. We do not justify elopement. It is a paltry way of beginning an honorable married career. however, was not without blame. He thought that he, as a banker, was a much grander person than any of the Scotts, and viewed the proposed marriage of his daughter with Jack Scott as a prodigious downcome in dignity. In reality, Jack was as good as he was, intellectually a much greater man; and the amusing fact is, that the whole Surtees family lived to see their error.

Surtees,

The plot now thickens in intensity. The night of November 18, 1772, was selected for the elopement. Mr. Surtees, notwithstanding his affected grandeur, lived in a house above a shop in a street called the Sandhill. The shop was that of Mr. Clayton, a clothier, who had for assistant a young man named Wilkinson, a friend of Scott. The shop, but its windows could easily be reached by a ladder dwelling of Surtees had an entrance separate from the ing a ladder, which at the time appointed he placed against from the pavement. Wilkinson had no difficulty in secretthe most westerly window; and down it, under cloud of night, slid Bessy Surtees into the arms of Jack Scott. post-chaise was in waiting, and in it the pair drove off for The thing was well managed. At a respectful distance, a Scotland. The road they took was that by Morpeth and Coldstream, by which they arrived next morning at Blackshiels. Scott's design was probably to take fresh horses at Blackshiels, and post on to Edinburgh, only two stages disBuchanan, Episcopal minister at Haddington, was in the tant, where the marriage ceremony could have been effected; but having accidentally learned that the Rev. J. house, he invited that gentleman to officiate, which he did according to the form prescribed by the Church of England, newly wedded pair immediately retraced their route to and afterwards gave them a certificate to that effect. The Morpeth, where they resided for a day or two.

It need scarcely be said that Surtees was at first impla

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cable in his resentment. The Scotts were more distressed than angry. As what, however, was done could not be undone, they sent their forgiveness, and invited Jack and his bride to their dwelling. They came, and matters were so far made up. In a few months, there was a softening in the feelings of the old banker. He saw it was no use, or rather worse than useless, to stand out. There was accordingly a treaty of peace by the belligerents. Scott's father settled two thousand pounds on the newly wedded pair, and Mr. Surtees settled one thousand pounds, a sum which he afterwards doubled. The annual proceeds were meant as a help to the young couple. They were literally penniless, and the small annual income from these gifts was all they could reckon upon till Jack could make his way in the world. To make the marriage doubly sure, the ceremony was solemnized afresh in the parish church of St. Nicholas, Newcastle, 19th January, 1773. That may be called the date at which Scott began his memorable career. He and Bessie drove off southwards across the Tyne. The world was all before them. Doubts and darkness hovered over the future; but in these young beings there was the spring of hope and intelligence, with a determinate resolution to fight | the battle of life. Jack had formed his plan. It was to enter himself as a student at the bar, and reside during the period of probation at Oxford. He was admitted to the Society of the Middle Temple 28th January, 1773. At Oxford, he delivered lectures, taught pupils, and so eked out his small income. Mrs. Scott proved an admirable helpmate. Studying her husband's means, she made both ends meet. The only entertainments she gave were small tea-parties, and we learn with some interest that one of her occasional guests was Dr. Samuel Johnson.

The

In studying for the bar, Scott made the most strenuous endeavors. Having taken his degree of Master of Arts, he plunged into his legal studies; rose at four in the morning; spent only a few minutes at meals; took little out door exercise; and sat up over his books till late at night. He also had the fortitude to keep his brain unclouded. His abstemiousness was as remarkable as it was exemplary. In the circumstances in which he was placed, he was a model husband; while Bessy, in her tender and loving way, and earnest devotion to his interests, was a model wife. The marriage had been a perfect success. economizing spirit of the pair was, if anything, augmented by the birth of a son in March, 1774. Next year, being called to the bar, Scott- for we must drop calling him Jack went to reside in London. His house was in Cursitor Street, near Chancery Lane, afterwards described by him as his first perch, to which in an evening he used to bring from Fleet market twopenceworth of sprats for supper. Success in the legal profession is only attainable by intense industry, a fair share of common-sense and tact, along with perhaps a degree of good-luck. Erskine was a surprising instance of a rapid rise to fortune. Thurlow also mounted suddenly by his ingenious reasoning and fervid oratory in the Douglas cause. Scott had not so good a chance, but he lost nothing in perseverance; and he was aided immensely by his powers of memory, as well as by acuteness of judgment. His slender means did not permit his becoming a pupil for twelve months under an equity pleader. For this deficiency he was partly compensated by being allowed gratuitously to study cases in the office of a kind-hearted conveyancer, and so stored his mind with details for practice as a barrister.

In

We cannot go into a regular account of Scott's career. That is given better elsewhere by Lord Campbell. For several years he had little practice, and Mrs. Scott's housekeeping, as may be supposed, was still on a moderate footing. But he never despaired, went upon circuit, and accumulated experience. His day of triumph came. 1780, in an intricate contest as to the rights of an heir-atlaw to rank as a residuary legatee, tried before Lord Thurlow, Mr. Scott offered such convincing arguments as to gain the case for his client. His reputation was made. Briefs came in upon him, and ever afterwards he was at ease in his circumstances. In 1783, he received a silk gown. He about the same time, through his strong Con

servative leanings, was elected member of parliament for Weobly. His appearances in the House of Commons, as has been the case of many noted lawyers, were disappointing. In 1788 he rose to be Solicitor-General, and received the honor of knighthood from the king. In 1793 he was promoted to be Attorney-General. Next, in 1799 he was made Chief-Justice of the Common Pleas, and created Baron Eldon of Eldon in the county of Durham. Jack Scott a peer! Bessy become Lady Eldon! How the news spread at Newcastle, and astonished everybody — the Surtees in particular, though they already had occasion to change their opinion concerning Bessy's marriage. Fortunately, Lord Eldon's venerable mother survived to see her son arrive at this distinction; and with proper filial affection, his first duty, on being raised to the peerage, was to acquaint her with the fact - signing himself ELDON. One does not learn without emotion that on receipt of the letter, the old lady burst into tears, and exclaimed: "To think that I should live to be the mother of a lord!" What justifiable pride hath not a mother in the high worldly appreciation of her sons! It is about the most exalted sentiment in which humanity can indulge. Lord Eldon attained still higher honors. In 1801, on the dismissal of Wedderburn, Lord Loughborough, he was appointed Lord-Chancellor of Great Britain.

Few men have had such a lengthened juducial and political career. Eldon was Chancellor under three successive administrations. His decisions were sound, and the chief fault imputed to him was his delay and hesitation in bringing suits to a final judgment. In the present day, his political views would be pronounced narrow and ungenial, though no one ever doubted his sincerity, and earnest desire to promote the best interests of his country. In private life, he was fond of jocularities, and untiring in his anecdotes about early struggles and acquaintances; often giving amusing accounts of incidents in which he had been concerned. He never affected to conceal his origin; and, as an instance of his goodness of heart, did not forget, on becoming Lord-Chancellor, to confer a lucrative appointment on Moises, his old friend and school-master at Newcastle.

In 1821, he was advanced to the dignities of Viscount Encombe and Earl of Eldon. His "beloved Bessie " lived ten years to enjoy her new title as Countess of Eldon; and deeply did the Earl mourn her decease in 1831. He himself, after outliving almost all his immediate relations, died in his eighty-seventh year, January 3, 1838, leaving behind him a fortune of over half a million sterling. In his titles and estates he was succeeded by his grandson. Lord Eldon's brother, William, had a scarcely less distinguished career. He, too, was a lawyer, and ultimately rose to be judge of the Court of Admiralty; in which position as also in his knowledge of international and ecclesiastical law, he won high distinction. He was raised to the peerage as Baron Stowel; but at his decease in 1836, without male issue, the title became extinct. Lords Eldon and Stowel were two of the most remarkable men of their

time. In their lives they presented a memorable instance of two brothers rising to eminence through sheer force of abilities which they are said to have had the good fortune to inherit from their mother.

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denotes a somewhat saucy and disobedient spirit; but really these things so often occur in families, that it is no use to be over-particular. It is rather difficult to see in what sense he went wooing

With his roly poly, gammon and spinach ;

of a violent wind is sufficient to elevate the spawn of frogs to a certain height in the air; that the germ of each animal there develops itself into a true frog; and that the whole family of frogs return to the ground again as rain. But there are some awkward difficulties connected with specific gravity, in relation to this. Professor Pontus, of

but this is the means of bringing us to a knowledge of the Cahors, communicated to the French Academy, early in Christian name of the mysterious Rowley

Heigho, says Anthony Rowley!

We refrain from plunging further into the lyric, and tracing the tragic end of the frog, the cat, and the mouse : but it may be worth remarking that Rowley is ready with his Heigho at every stage of the history.

The frog is not unknown to poets in other quarters. Witness the frogs of Aristophanes; Homer's Epic of the Wars of the Frogs and Mice; the important dramatic part filled by the frog in Esop's Fables; and Grimm's curious old legends, in which princes and nobles so often assume the outward form of the frog. In some ages and countries the frog has put on the form of superstition. He was sacred among the Egyptians, who credited him with a power of purifying the waters. We know that the toe of the frog was one of the ingredients of the witches' caldron in Macbeth; though Shakespeare has not told us what particular efficacy it was supposed to possess. There was an old charm which consisted in cutting out the tongue of a live frog and laying it on the heart of a sleeping woman, and which compelled her to return a true answer to any question put to her; rather an awkward proof of Mr. Froggy's influence. If it be true that frogs can foretell the weather, or enable others to do so, a superstitious regard for them becomes rather respectable than otherwise. Mr. Pengelly, the naturalist, states that a few years ago he overtook a farm laborer near Torquay, when the following colloquy

ensued: :

"It's a fine evening."

"Yes, 't is, but there 'll be rain before morning." "Rain before morning! Why, there's not a cloud to be seen, and we've had no rain for some weeks. What makes you think there'll be rain?"

"Well, the frogs make me think so. I've seen lots of 'em jumping across the road this evening-there goes another. I'm sure there'll be rain before morning." And rain there was.

Many of the beliefs and disbeliefs concerning the frog, the right notions and wrong notions relating to him, are dependent on his very remarkable personal history. The creature commences life as a tadpole, without limbs, but with a fish-like tail or paddle for progression through the water, and branchiæ for aquatic respiration. Some weeks afterwards, lungs begin to develop themselves, the branchise disappear in a withered state, the limbs peep forth, and the tail is completely but gradually absorbed; Master Tadpole becomes Master Frog, and is immensely delighted at being able to live like other landsmen, instead of eternally paddling in the water. Nevertheless he still abides near marshes and ditches.

The great Lord Bacon sadly misconstrued some of the phenomena connected with frog life, probably from not duly estimating the remarkable preliminary stage of tadpole life. He mentions, as a peculiar and extraordinary circumstance that young frogs have sometimes been observed with tails; and that the years in which such phenomena occur have proved more than commonly pestilential and unhealthy. Hence, "the appearance ou ta i l animals argueth a great disposition to putrefaction in the soile and aire." The great founder of the Inductive Philosophy was decidedly below par here. The so-called showers of frogs have in like manner led to much misconception. Often after a warm July shower, meadows and lanes show myriads of young frogs, leaping about in all directions; sometimes coming so suddenly and unexpectedly as to give rise to a belief that they have fallen from the clouds. The small size of such animals denotes that they have only recently emerged from the tadpole state. Under the theory of showers of frogs, some observers contend that the action

the present century, the particulars of a shower of frogs which he observed near Toulouse. He saw several young frogs on the cloaks of two gentlemen who had been caught in a storm on the road. When the diligence in which he was travelling arrived at the place where the shower had burst forth, the road and fields were observed to be full of killed thousands during the passage of the vehicle along frogs, in some places three or four deep; the horses' hoofs the road. It was observed that the shower was preceded by the sudden appearance of a very thick cloud from the horizon, and the bursting out of a thunderstorm. The explanation of these phenomena, now accepted as most likely to be correct, is that myriads of young frogs, just emerged from the tadpole state, and taking their first walk on dry land, are whirled up by the vortex or whirlwind which so often occurs in sultry, thundery weather, and afterwards fall as a shower by their own weight.

The Heralds' College knows something about frogs; or ought so to do, for these batrachians figure in many an old emblazonment and armorial bearing. The early kings of France, long before the republican tricolor was thought of, had three frogs in a yellow field on their banners and coat armor; through some curious whim or freak, these frogs were afterwards changed to fleurs-de-lis, or lilies. The symbolic meaning seems to be lost; but in some old English churches there are stone effigies of mailed knights, supported by frogs- or rather, a frog supports the knight's sword. A golden frog hangs from the right ear of an armed figure in a monument at Boxsted church, Suffolk; the monument, of the time of Charles the First, is commemorative of Sir John Foley. Ireland, true to her belief that St. Patrick drove away all reptiles from that favored island, asserts that frogs were banished as well as snakes. The land certainly brings forth frogs now, and in considerable number; but an unexpected explanation of this phenomenon is given: "However fabulous it may appear, it is certain that frogs were formerly unknown in this Spain, intended as an experiment, by a Fellow of Trinity country (Ireland). They were first propagated here from College, Dublin, in 1696."

Naturalists have not left us entirely without anecdotes of froggy. Dr. Roots had a frog which domesticated itself in the kitchen. Every evening, when the servants went to supper, he peeped out of his hole, as if to reconnoitre, jumped out if all seemed right, basked on the warm bright hearth, and there remained till the family went to bed. A friendship sprang up between froggy and an old cat, who shared the fireside with him, and was solicitous not to disturb or incommode his strange companion. A writer in the Zoologist states, that on one occasion he saw several frogs gather round a window, crawl up the sun-blind, and peep into the room, each in his turn. At the time he did not understand what it meant; but on the following morning he found a frog which had accidentally been imprisoned between the window and the blind. The episode became clear enough; the frogs had anxiously clambered up to see a comrade who was in trouble, and were no doubt sorry at being unable to extricate him.

We bipeds in the human form have a proneness to devour many animals which we admire when living, such as lambs, deer, chickens, and pigeons; while some of us show the same kind of gastronomic liking for beings which certainly are not much admired in the living form. Take frogs, for instance. That they are an article of food is unquestionable, though not to a great extent. The French declare that, when properly cooked, frogs are very nice eating; and certainly cooking has been raised more nearly to the rank of a fine art in France than in any other country. Some time ago a statement appeared in the newspapers to the effect that, within the short space of three

weeks, one merchant sent two hundred thousand frogs from Belgium to France, chiefly to Paris, Nancy, and Rheims. The price was about thirteen francs or half a guinea per thousand. Much patience must have been shown by the cooks; for we are told that the thighs of the frogs were roasted, and eaten with white sauce, or in fricassees; the skin and most other parts were utilized as components in mock-turtle soup. It appears to be in the spring and autumn that this supply for France is obtained. In the market-place of Milan, some few years ago, an English sojourner saw a woman preparing frogs for cooking. She had a sackful near at hand: she took them one by one, placed them on her knee, skinned them expertly, and threw them into a dish, where the wretched little beings crawled one over another skinless. Mr. Fortune describes a scene almost exactly similar to this, as coming under his notice at Ningpo, in China. A traveller, passing near St. Helen's, Lancashire, saw some boys splashing about in a pond, catching frogs, and cutting off their hind legs. He asked them what they did with the frogs. The answer assumed this puzzling form: "We putters um oth fryingpon, an' then ith 'oon; an' they're graidly good." The meaning of which we may surmise after a little study. Most likely the hind legs were the parts thus treated. Besides being regarded as a somewhat exceptional article of food, the frog is credited by many persons with medicinal virtues. A woman, when reaping in one of the rural districts, was seen to swallow some frogs; she held each by its legs, put it into her mouth, and gulped it down. When questioned, she stated that it was intended as a cure for a stomach complaint. Highland gleaners have been seen to do the very same thing. Schoolboys were much addicted to this practice, and from the same motive, early in the present century. In the North Riding of Yorkshire the frog-regimen is occasionally adopted for weakness and consumption. In Lincolnshire, when infants have a mouth complaint arising from, or somewhat resembling, thrush, some of the country people will take a live frog by the hind leg, and allow it to sprawl about the mouth of the child, under the supposition that a curative influence would be exercised. In some parts of Wiltshire, live frogs are given to cows when they cease to chew the cud.

One of the most remarkable, and perhaps the least explicable, facts connected with this family of reptiles, is the alleged inclosure of frogs and toads in solid rock and in the heart of trees, where they are supposed to have existed for unknown centuries, deprived of all access to food or air, and yet alive when extricated. The stories relating to this subject are many and marvellous; men of science do not think it safe to believe them, but at the same time they are convinced that there is some truth in the matter, however difficult it may be to get at. Smellie, in his Philosophy of Natural History, refers to an account in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences, of a toad found alive and healthy in the heart of an old elm; and of another discovered near Nantes in the heart of an old oak, without any visible entrance to its habitation. In this second instance, judging from the number of rings in the wood, and the depth of the imbedding, it was inferred that the animal must have been imprisoned there at least eighty or a hundred years. Mr. Jesse, the naturalist, found a frog in a mulberry-tree; the annular layers of wood were gradually but surely inclosing him.

The imprisonment of frogs and toads in stone is, however, much more remarkable than that in the trunks of trees, even if we believe only a modicum of the narratives published on the subject. The statements are unmistakable, and are made in all good faith, that living frogs and toads are occasionally met with thus imbedded, and that exact impressions of their bodies, corresponding to their respective sizes, are left in the cavities of the stone where they are found. Chatsworth is credited with having once had (we do not know whether it still exists) a marble chimneypiece with a print of a toad in it; there was a traditionary account of the place and manner in which it was found.

The Mining Journal contains an account of a discovery made by a miner at Pen-y-darran, near Merthyr Tydvil.

When working at a depth of forty-five feet, his mandrel struck into a piece of shale; a frog, large but weak, leaped out and crawled along the ground with some difficulty; the eyes were full-sized, but apparently sightless; the mouth seemed as if permanently closed, and the spine was twisted as if it had been compelled to adapt itself to a narrow and ill-shaped space. The frog, when liberated, grew in size and weight, but could not be fed; he appeared to breathe through the skin covering the lower jaw. We certainly cannot blame Ellis, the miner, for exhibiting his prodigy to admiring visitors at a public house in Merthyr; and considering the intensity of popular belief on this subject, we must view indulgently his inscription: "The greatest wonder of the world! a frog found in a stone forty feet below the surface of the earth, where it has been living without food for the last five thousand years!"

The first question is, how much of these narratives to believe; and the second, how to account for so much as we do believe. That frogs live to a great age; that they are able to endure long abstinence; that their power of hibernation is something extraordinary; and that the skin has the property of acting upon the atmosphere in such a way as to fulfil, in some degree, the function of the lungs are facts admitted by naturalists. The toad, also, when kept in a damp place, can live several months without food of any kind. Smellie, while cautiously abstaining alike from positive belief and absolute incredulity, recommended observant men to attend to such a possible explanation as the following: "In the rocks there are many chinks as well as fissures, both horizontal and perpendicular; and in old trees, nothing is more frequent than holes and vacuities, of various dimensions. Through these fissures and vacuities the eggs of toads may accidentally be conveyed by water, the penetration of which few substances are capable of resisting; after the eggs are hatched, the animals may receive moisture and small portions of air through the crevices of rocks or the channels of aged trees. But," he modestly adds, "I mean not to persuade, for I cannot satisfy myself.". Mr. Broderip, the naturalist, does not admit the probability of Smellie's conjecture concerning the conveyance of the frogs' eggs by water. No one now doubts that frogs, toads, snakes, and lizards really do issue occasionally from rock broken in a quarry, hard stone loosened in well-sinking, and coal or shale dug in a colliery; but the question is, whether the substances were really solid and impassable to air and moisture. The late Dr. Buckland remarked that "The evidence is never perfect to show that the reptiles were entirely inclosed in solid rock. No examination is ever made until the reptile is first discovered by the breaking of the mass in which it was contained; and then it is too late to ascertain, without carefully replacing every fragment (and in no case that I have seen reported has this ever been done) whether or not there was any hole or crevice by which the animal may have entered the cavity from which it was extracted. Without previous examination, it is almost impossible to prove that there was no such communication."

Dr. Buckland, to test the matter in some degree, made some remarkable experiments. He caused twelve circular cells or cavities to be cut in a large block of coarse oölitic limestone, with provision for an air-tight glass cover to each cell. Twelve other cells were cut in a block of silicious sandstone. Twenty-four live toads were put into the cells, one in each, the covers fastened down air-tight, and the blocks of stone buried three feet deep in a garden. They were left undisturbed for twelve months, at the end of which time the cells were opened. All the toads in the sandstone rock were dead; but most of those in the oölite (the cells of which were larger) were still living; some had lessened in weight, some had increased; but as a few of the plates of glass were found cracked, it was deemed possible that minute insects might have entered. The living toads were left alone for another twelve months, at the end of which time all were dead. Seen through the glass covers, the poor fellows seemed to be always awake, with open eyes. Perhaps they were marvelling what crime of theirs had subjected them to a sentence of two years'

solitary confinement. A smaller experiment accompanied this principal one. Dr. Buckland placed four toads in three cells or holes cut for the purpose in the trunk of an apple-tree; two were companions in the largest cell, the other two occupied a small cell each; but though small, these cells were tolerably roomy for middle-sized toads, being about five inches deep by three inches diameter. The cavities were carefully and closely plugged with wood. All four toads were found dead and decayed at the end of the first year. In another subsidiary experiment, four small basins of plaster of Paris were scooped out, a live toad placed in each, and a cover luted down air tight on the top. The whole were buried underground; twelve months afterwards two of the toads were dead, the other two living, but greatly emaciated.

To sum up; the best naturalists now agree that, however wonderful the ascertained phenomena.really are, frogs and toads cannot live one year wholly without air, nor probably two years wholly without food.

THE COMTE DE PARIS.

WE have not read the volumes that the Comte de Paris has published on the American Civil War; but we have little doubt that their literary merits are more than respectable, and still less doubt that they will make the doors of the French Academy fly open at the next vacancy, even if such plebeian men of letters as M. Taine or M. About should be bowed away with a cold sneer. The Academy likes titles more than it likes style. It is proof against the literary fascinations of Renan, but it cannot resist the advances of any Royal Highness who writes passable French. The " reception" of the Comte de Paris will be a redletter day in the calendar of the second-rate aristocracy and the first-rate bankers to whom the reign of Louis Philippe was the golden age of France. If the Comte de Paris were to be officially welcomed to the Academy by his uncle, the Duc d'Aumale, the literary festival of the Orleanists would be complete. Much might be hinted about the political glory and the domestic virtues of a King who always contrived to desert his friends in the nick of time to save himself from sharing their ruin, until the impatience of Paris forced him to fly from the Tuileries in a cab. Something might also be said about the healthy wish of the old monarch that his sons should be well educated, and about the boldness with which he sent them to a public lycée. An eloquent and pathetic passage might be delivered on the untimely death of the Duc d'Orleans, the father of the Comte de Paris: and the Duc d'Aumale might skilfully suggest that if Providence had not thus cut short a noble life, France might have been spared from the miseries amid which she has been drifting ever since she cut herself loose from the anchor of constitutional monarchy. Then might come a glowing description of the virtues and the talents which the father had transmitted to the son. His dignity in exile, the part that he had taken in the American war, the military talents that he might display if the field lay open, the literary powers that would suffice by themselves to build an honorable name, the industry of a toiling politician, the thirst for the accumulation of facts that he had learned in the land which is the home of ordered freedom, the wisdom and the foresight which were proof against the temptations of political excess, might all be woven into a subtle prediction of the beatitudes that would come to France with Louis Philippe II.

A good deal of the eulogy would be strictly true. The Comte de Paris is a young man of high personal character and considerable talents. He is unstained by the frivolities, far less by the vices, which might almost seem to be inseparable from the princely state. He has not lived a life of the laborious idleness which is filled up by the thing called sport." From his youth he has been a student, and he has carefully fitted himself to do the work of a constitutional King, not by shooting pheasants, but by mastering blue-books. He has travelled, and he has seen as much of

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real warfare as he could learn while General M'Clellan was trying to defeat the Confederates by a kind of engineering which signified a profuse employment of spade industry. At Twickenham the Comte de Paris had abundant time to make himself acquainted with the reasons why the English Monarchy had succeeded and the French had failed. Seeing the great part which trades' unions were playing in England, and which they might play in France, he also specially studied the labors of the Royal Commission that investigated the doings of these institutions some years ago, and the result has been two very respectable books. One, written while he was in England, gives a strikingly fair account of the trade societies. It is totally free from that unreasoning prejudice with which they were once regarded by most Englishmen of social position and wealth. Another was written after he returned to France, and it was intended to supply a Commission of the National Assembly with information which it had solicited from him. It presents the same tone of fairness as the first account, but it is much more minute. It is, in fact, a sort of blue-book, the first perhaps ever written by a man of his rank. We are bound to add that both works, if conspicuously free from the prejudices of France, are equally free from her liveliness. They are, indeed, rather dull. If they are a fair specimen of the Prince's literary powers, he will never be a brilliant writer, although he should study Voltaire all the days of his life, and write as much. Like the Duc d'Aumale, however, he must have a strong passion for the exercise of the literary craft; because he has toiled at the composition of a large history, amid all the turmoil of French politics, during the last two years.

The Comte de Paris has other advantages. His friends praise the calmness and the sureness of his judgment. M. Hervé, the editor of the Journal de Paris, and therefore the official eulogist of the Orleanist House, breaks out into ecstasies over his youthful wisdom. He asks us to believe that the Comte de Paris unites "the meditative and profound spirit of William of Orange to the good grace and the charm which were absent from the melancholy founder of constitutional monarchy in England." It is easy to smile at so preposterous a compliment, and yet to admit that the Comte de Paris is a very sensible young man. If he were not a very sensible young man, he would be no grandson of Louis Philippe. He seems indeed a paragon of good sense when compared with his Quixotic cousin. All that cousin's talks about Divine Right, the White Flag, and the Church seem as absurd to the Comte de Paris as they do to an ordinary Englishman. The present writer had the advantage of talking with him about the Comte de Chambord's pretensions at the very time when one of the White Flag letters spread confusion through the whole camp of the Royalists; and it is no breach of confidence to say that the young Prince could not have dismissed his cousin's semi-supernatural claims with more polite contempt if he had been an English member of Parliament. He said that he and his relative differed so widely on fundamental questions as to make it useless for them to discuss their positions. He held fast by the Louis Philippe, or rather by the English idea that a limited and hereditary monarchy was the best form of government, because it united the strength of tradition to the force of the popular will. He recognized his cousin as the head of the royal house, because it was important to keep the hereditary claim unbroken; but the distinctive claims of Legitimacy were bowed aside with polite and silent scorn. It is true that he afterwards went to see his cousin, and did him some kind of homage; but, it is said, he went against his own will. Strictly construed, the visit may have meant merely that he admitted his cousin to be older than himself, and hence, in the ordinary course of events, the nearest heir to the throne; but the multitude do not draw precise legal inferences, and M. Thiers correctly anticipated what they would say when, on hearing of the interview, he rubbed his hands, and declared the Orleanists to be undone. It was instantly said that they had abandoned the principles of constitutional government, and the Comte de Chambord has lost no opportunity of assuming in the face

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