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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times, 1888-2-9, Page 3j isle° Now Finn Pnatasion. j , LI ,tAnta Rump ItitsanYnpd By M. E. BRADDON, *rare LADY .A.CDLEY'S SECRIX," VVYLLAnD'S WEIRD," ETC., RTC. CHAPTER Hi— (Corianiunta) A suodeeston of tenants had occupied Mor- nomb virithin the last ten years, and had 'been looked apon more ite leap coldly by the surrounding families. There is always a shade of suspicion in the rustic naiad at - tabbing to the people who occupy tarnished mansions, an idea, that if they were all that they ought to be they would have houses ot their own. If they are rich the neighbourly:aid wonders where their money comes fro, If they are foreigners, the neighbouttatad is sure they are not all they ought to Attai. Madame is a cadevant opera- singerMonsieur has a talent for card -sharp Ii ing. f they are Americans, and scatter their money in the lavish Transatlantic style, opinion is againet them from the out- set. The only people who are kindly Wok - ed upon in this connexion are those whose naroes and belongings are plaioly set iorth in Debrett, and wine have houses of their own in other counties To these are the arms of frienclahip opened. Col. Deverill was such an one. The Rook, Kilrush, was his ostensible dwelling place; and though• his, reputation was by no means untarnishea, he was known to be a gentleman by birth and to have begun life in a crack regiment. The two facts that he was an Irishman and had liveda good deal on the Continent counted naturally hi his disfavour, and the county looked upon him with a qualified approval. The house was half a mile from the lodge, and a fairly kept drive wound along the base of a low hill, athwart undulating pas- ture land, dotted here and there with good old oaks and elms, aid clusters of ancient hawthorns, and offered. Sir Adrian a view of Mr. Pollack's beeves cropping the acanty award of late autumn. On the crest of the hill stood the mansion, a classic villa about a hundred years old, much after the manner of the Club House at Hurlingham, with portico and pediment of white stone, and uniform rows of long French windows bank and front. A large bay window, broken out forty years before, by an unaisthetic Lord Lupton, at the end of the south wing, was the only relief to that faultleas uni- formity. There were no servants about. Sir Adrian's groom pulled a bell, which rang with startling loudeess a long way off, peal- ing long and strong, as if it would never have done ringing. Sir Adrian alighted, as- hamed of the noise he had caused to be made, flung the reins to his groom, and went up the steps. The hall doors were open, and a girl's voice cried, "Your shot, Leo," as ke approached the threshold. This was embarassing, but the situation became even more involved when another voice exclaimed, "That bell means another county family come to catechise and stare. le m'esguive." But before the speaker could escape, Adrian tied crossed the threshold, and was standing, hat in hand, face to face with two youngiladies, dreeeed as he had never seen girls dressed before, and both of them a great deal prettier than any girls his mem- ory suggested to him by way of comparison. Miss Deverill, I think," he said to one of the damsels, "my name is Belfield, and I must apologise most humbly for bursting te in upon you in this manner." Oh, but you could not possibly help it. architects will plan houses with billiard la „toms on the doorsteps'the occupants must 'tar the brunt of their folly," answered the tier lady gaily. "We are very glad to Yfie't you, Sir Adrian. This is my sister, •lies Deverill, and I am Mrs. Baddeley. I achtne sorry my father is out this afternoon. iffe would have been charmed to make your iailtacque.intance, I know. He has talked ed altremendeusly about Lady Belfield, whom he ete,4 had the pleasure of keownig quite intimate - eel/ ly when they were both young. Will you up/ come to the drawing room or shall we sit t7 and talk here? Helen and make this our den for the most part. You see we have no brothers to dispute the ground with us." "I would much rather stay here," said Adrian. Mrs. Baddeley had flung aside her cue while she was talking, and Miss Deverill, who had been sitting on the table when he first beheld her, was now standing beside it, flicking the chalkmarks off the cloth with her handkerchief. She was a tall sliin girl, in a straight:skirted sage -coloured velveteen gown, with a theft waist and a broad yellow sash, and with her reddish auburn hair which was superb in hue and texture and quality, failing down her back in a rippling mass of light and shadow. Her gown was short enough to show a perfect instep, and a slender ankle, set off by Lang- try shoes and yellow silk stocking. The, married sister wore an olive plush tea gown over an Indian red petticoat, red Shoes and stockings, and her hairwhich was darker than Helen's, rolled up in a great untidy mass, and fastened with a red ribbon. The style and costume were altogether different from the regulation afternoon attire in that part of the world, vein& was generally severe—a tailor gown and a neat linen collar being the rule. Bad Sir Adrian seen this kind of picturi esque toilette in Bedford Park, on the per- son of a plain girl, he would have regarded it with infinite disgust, for he had all the masculine love of neatness and subdued coloring: but both these women were so pretty, both were so graceful, with the easygrace of perfect self-assurance, that gracious air of women who are accustomed to be admired, approved, and made much of on all occasione, that had they been clad in such calicoes as Manchester mandate turee to meet the taste of the untutored African, must have not the less admired 4 them. , There ras a large fire blazing in the wide hall grate, and there were three or four de- lightful arm -chairs (of draped and cushion- ed bamboo) about the hearth, and a ecarlet Japanned table, suggestive of afternoon tea. Thee° chain with their vivid reds and yellows ; and tassels and frioges, and Liberty silk handkerchiefs tied about them, had never beloeged to Lord Lupton, whose ferniture all dated from the reign of William the Fourth. Chairs aid tables were an importation of the Doverills,A.drian saw at a glance. They all three sat down in front of the fireplace, while the outer doors were shut by the butler, vetio had come in a leisurely Way to see if that loud pealing of the hall bell were a matter requiring his peroonal attention. He olceed the double doors, put a fresh log on the fire, and discreetly re- tired. "And now tell us all about Lady 13e1 - field," said the inatried eister, perchin her as lovely as she was wheu ehe was young ?' "That might be saying too much, I mean about tbe lovelineta," anatirared Adrian, Broiling; "but to iny mind rey mother is the prettiest woman of her age that I have ever seen. Of °puree, a son ie partial. As for health, well, yes, I think 1 may say she is quite well. Would you like her to drive over aod see you ?" Of course we should, we are dying to 'lee her," said Helen, win: was not all shy. "11 Eaglith etiquette were not written in blood, like the laws of Draco, we should have made father take us to Lady Belfield the day after we arrived here." "You don't appreciate British conven- tionalities ?" '01 detest everything Britieh, present company of course excepted,: We have al- ways had Such good times in France and Italy—and as for Switzerland, I feel -as if I had been born there. I am longing to be at Vevey, or at one of those dear little villages on Lake Lucerne, now, when your horrid English winter is Iwginningt I can't think why father persisted in bringing us here, It is almost as bad &Babe Rock." "You don't care for /Ireland ?" "Does any one, do you think? And if you knew Kilrush ; but you don't of course.,, "1 have never had that privilege." Weli, perhaps it is a privilege to have lived in the dullest, raost out-of-the-way hole on the surface of this earth," retorted Miss Deverill lightly, flinging herself back in the Liberty chair, and, showing rather more ankle and instep than the rival estab- lishment on the otherwade of the hearth. "There is something exceptional in the fact, of course. But why, being obliged to live at thetRock occasionally for duty, my father should bring us to a remote Devon- shire village for pleasure, is more than this feeble intellect of mine can grapple." "1 don't think there's much mystery about it," said Mrs. Baddeley. "In the first place father is tired of wandering about the Continent; and in the second my husband will be home on leave in December, and I must be in England to receive him. So my father very good-naturedly suggested a country place where Frank could stay with us and get a little huntin° and shootina If Frank had been obliged to find his own quarters the choice would have been between lionaon lodgings or staying with his own people, both equally odious for me." "Mr. Baddeley m in the army, I con- clude." "Yes, he is a Major in the Seventeeth Lancers, and has been in India for the last two years, and I'm afraid may have to go back after a, winter in England.' "You return with bine V' "Unhappily, no," sighed the lady, "1 cannot stand the climate. I tried Iiedia for a year, and it was something too dreadful. I was reduced to a shadow, and I looked forty. Now, Helen, on your honour, didn't I look forty when I landed from Bombay ?" "You certainly looked very bad, dear," said Helen. "Do you think it would be too dreadful to offer Sir Adrian tea at a quarter to four," with a glance at a fine old eight-day clock. "Do you ever take tea, Sir Adrian ?" . "A tea pot is the favorite companion of my stuaious hours," answered Adrian. "May I ring the bell for you7". "Yes, please, and you won't laugh at us and call us washerwomen for wanting tea 80 early." "1 promise to do neither; but were my brother here I would not answer for him. He is very severe on my womanish passion for the tea pot." "Is he very different from you ?" "Altogether different." "And yet you are twins. I thought twins were always alike." "1 believe we are alike in person, except that Valentine im handmomer, stronger, and bigger than I. But it is in lades and char- acter we are unlike. Yet perhaps, after all, it is mostly a question of health and physical energy. His robust constitution has made,him incline to all athletic exercises and manly sports, while my poor health has made me rather womanish. I am obliged to obey the doctors, were it only to satisfy my mother" "If Mr. Belfield is as nice as you are I am sure we shall all like him," said Mrs. Baddeley, frankly. "1 hear he is abroad just now. ' "Yes, he is in Paris, en route for Monte °silo ; but I don't think he will be long away. He is very fond of hunting, and won't care to miss too much of it." The leisurely butler brought in the tea tray, and arranged it comfortably in front of Miss Deverill, who was allowed to enjoy all those privileges which involved the slightest exertion. Mrs. Baddeley was the very genius of idleness, and never pickel up a pocket handkerchief, shut a door., or buttoned a boot for herself. She required to be waited upon and looked after like a baby. She attributed this lynaphatic con- dition entirely to the twelve months she had spent in Bombay, which was supposed to to have shattered her nerves and under- mined her constitution. Helen, who had never beeti in India was expected to write her sister's lettere, Pick up her handkerchief, and to find screens to protect her complexion from the fire by which she sat at all times and seasons. Helen's maid was expected to wait upon her from morning to night, to the neglect of Helen's wardrobe. So Helen poured out the tea, and they all nestled cosily round the fire, with as inti- mate an air as if they had been friends from childhood. The two women chattered about their continental life; their summers at Biar- ritz or Arcachon, their winters at Nice or at Vevey, and of those dreadful penitential periods of residence in Ireland. "Father is afraid of our being boycotted if he once gets the reputation of being an absentee," explained Helen, "20 we make a point of spending three months of every year at ICil- rush, and we pretend to be very fond of the peasantry on the estate. They really are nico, warmhearted creaturee though I daresay they would shoot us on lhe eligIxt- est provocation. And father has a yacht on 'the Shannon, and altogether it is not half a bad life." "Speak for yourself, Helen," said her eister, peevishly; "you can bear solitude. I can't. hope the people about here give demob parties," she added, taming to Adrian. ' "They are not energetic patty -givers. A couple ox balls within a radius of tvventy mita" and half- a,clezen dinnere, constitute a rather gay season." " Good heavens, am to exist all the winter open two balls 1" cried Mrs. Bad- deley. • / shall forget how to walte, feet epee the old bra se feticliir, and a ord- dukanonds will go ott coleur from being shitt ing Adrian a full view of arched ineteps and up so long 18 their cases. ` „..ll.% ionid hee" she gaite well, and it 'she I Sir Adrien wondered a little to hear an offleer's wife talk ot dianiOnde as if he bad beeu a dechess, but beaopinionedthet Major Baddeley must be a Malt Of stibetance, Geri tainly Colonel Deverillia delighten eould hardlyhavo been jewelled 'rem the paternal resourgee,whichevery ono knew, tio be meagre, What a levely woman 'ate was, letting back in her chair math the „firelight 'Shining on her hair and lerge hazeeyes. livery feature was charming, if net altogether faultless. The itosennall end sligh tly retrousse; the mouth rather large, with full carmine Ips and delicious smile, The chin beauti- fully rounded, the eomplexioil of creamy whiteness. The yontiger sister was like her, foray prettier, freeher, more girlish, eyes larger and more brilliant, hair brighter and more luxuriant, meuth smaller and of a more exquisite mould, nose less coquettish and more dignified, a face to dream about, a face to celebrate in soaiety versead in- finitlan. The -Clock struck five and startled Sir Adrien from his pleasant forgetfulness of ell things hut the two faces and the two voiees and the little glimpses of two hitherto un- knowe lives, revealed to him bythEat care - leas prattle. He rose at once. "1 must really apologise for the length of my first visit," he aid. "You wouldn't if you knew how dull we are and how apxious we were to see you and Lady Belfield I hope she:vent come soon," said the elder sister. "She shall come to -morrow," answered Adrian. "Oh, that is too good of you. Please bring her to lunch. My father will be charmed." "I'm afraid to engage tier for lunch, I !mew that in a general way she dislikes going out so early. Afternooia tea is her passion." "Then bring her to afternoon tea. She hall not discover us in the hall as you did. She shall find as in the drawing -room be- having like ladies." Adrian was glad to hear this. He had an idea that the vision of two girls playing billiards with open doors,'and that exclama- tion, "your shot," would have disparaged the young ladies in his mother'a estimation. He also hoped that Helen would have her hair less carelessly displayed to -morrow "rahoeonsb "Sall certainly wine to -morrow, un- less there is something extraordinary to prevent her,'' he said, "and in that case I'll send you.a note, Mrs. Baddeley." " You•will not put us to the trouble of being proper for nothing. That is very kind of you. Good-bye." She rang for Donovan, the butler, who ap- peared five minutes afterwards, just as Sir Adrian was disappearing. The sisters went with their visitor to the door, which he opened for himself, and went out into the windy afternoon with him, and patted and admired hia horses, which had waited in the cold much longer than they were accustomed to wait. The two girls stood in the portico and watched him drive away, and waved white hands to him like old friends. Scarcely had he driven out of sight of them when his heart began to fail him as to that promise which he had made about his mother. He had been so ready to pledge her to friendship with these strangers five minutes ago'and now he began to ask him- self whether these two young women, lovely as they were, would not appear intolerable in her eyes. His mother was the very es- sence of refinement ; and these girls, though assuredly charming, were not refined. They had a reckless free and easy air which would jar upon a woman whose secluded life had kept her unacquainted with the newest developments in society and man- ners. Young women who wore their hair au naturel, and showed their ankles freely, were an unknown race to Lady Belfield; nor was she familiar with the, type of young woman who is thoroughly at home with strangers of the apposite sex the minute after introduction. Lady 13elfield's manners had been formed in the quiet and reserved school. She had never played billiards, or been interested in racing, or gambled in a Kursaal, or enjoyed any one of those amuse- ments which society smiles upon now -a - day s. She had been an only daughter and an heiress, brought up very strictly, per- mitted few amusements, and only a chosen circle of friends knowing not Hurlingham or Ascot, Goodwood or Baden, oscillating between a dull house in•London and a duller house in the country, working at her piano conscientiously under a fashionable German master, cultivating her mind by the perueal of all the best books of the day, attending all the best operas and concerts, dancing at half -a -score of aristocratic balls in the sea- son, and knowing as little of the world as an intelligent child of ten. "I'm afraid She'll hardly like them as much as I do," thought Adrian innocently. "They are so frank, so friendly, so full of life, and so different from all the girls we have met round about here. I wonder what the father is like?" And then he recalled his feelings as he drove along this road two hours ago, and re- membered with what a suspicious mind he had thought of Colonel Deverill, inclined to suspect that gentleman of the most Macchia- vellian motives for planting himself within easy reach of Belfield Abbey. Had he not come to MorOomb withthe secret intention of renewinghis old suit to Lady Belfield, of trying to win her for his spoil, now that she was a wealthy widow, her own mistress. young enough to marry again without pro- voking too much ridicule from a malevolent world, free to marry whom she chose? Yes, he had been inalined to suspect the Colonel of hidden views in this direction; and yet had be any such scheme it was strange that he should not have set about the business ten years ago, since he had been quite eleven years a widower. That such a scheme should be an after thought would be strange. And now in his homeward drive, Adrian was assured that Col. Deverill had come to the neighborhood in all innocence of mind, in his happy-go-luoky Irish way, glad lo get a cheap house in a picturesque country, (TO BE CONTINUED.) It Was Curious. Wife—t" Do you know what time it was when you got in last night'?" Husband—" Nearly one o'clock, I guesa, It was after midnight when I got through balancieg my books. Well, well 1 Thie is curious ; here's my hat under tte bed, I mut have huog it on title °hair and it fell down. Where are ray hooter "On the hat rack," New Congressman at dinner. — Waiter (who had Been new Cotigreraiman before)— 'Slcuse me, boss, but 'taint good fatten to eat ye' pie wid yo' knife. New Congressman.— Well, why in thunder didn't you bring rae spoon I Tee fibre of silk is the lotgest continuous abre known. An ordinary oocoon of a well- fed silkworm will often reel one thousand yea do, and accounts are given of a cocoon it yielding ono thousatul two hundred and at aihety-five yards, ot a fibre nearly three. de Interiors of a mile in length. Remarkable Exhibition Recently EOM ri Paris. An exhibitien of edueeteal Veneta recent ly held in Paris showed very clearly te what a high Oat° of perfection these little birds are capable of being trahied. Theis etage was A long table, at one end of which were perches, on which were grouped half a dozen parrots. Four ef 'blame were cock- atoos—white, with yellow create; the other two were gray parrote, 'with the neck and under parts rose color. Among the tricks which they perform at the bidding of their owner, Abdyt are' the following :—Two fixed bars on upright supports are placed on the table; a parrot climbs upon one of them, turns a someraault, keeps his head downward, and, passing on to the second bar, goes threugh the same Mieroise. Their owner then calls Tom,a small white parrot, who comes toward bint as if about to olimb on one of the bane but runs back again, holding down his head and ehaking his wings in a grotesque way. Tam is evidently the buffoon 61 the troupe. A bell is then brought, *ith a handle which forms a lever; a parrot 'advances, and, put- ting his foot on the leyer, rings the bell. The trainer asks the audience what number of rings they wish for; some one exclaims, "Seven 1" and the parrot rings the bell seven times. The bird is then asked how much does three times three make, and it replies by ringing the bell nine times. A perch is then placed on the table in the form of a see -saw, at each end of which a gray parrot perches, and in the centre, just above the pivot, jumps a magnificent parrot named i Charley, the principal one n the troupe. This parrot, throwing the weight of hie body successively to right and left of the pivot, rocks the see -saw rapidly. To pee the ani- mation of this bird during the performance one would suppose that he took a real pleas- ure in rocking his companions. The same bird then goes through another exercise. Four flagstaffs are set up on the table and at the foot of each is a fiag at- tached to a cord which pasties over a pulley at the top. The flags are English, French, Belgian and American. One of the audi- ence asks for the French flag. Charley advances, draws himself up, erecting his bright yellow crest, and spreading his wings, suddenly seizes the line with his beak, and then, alternately with beak and foot, hauls up the flag as a sailor would, hand over hand, until it is fast at the top. He then goes through the same performance with the other flags in succession. Several letters of the alphabet are placed upright, on the table, and Charley is again brought forward, pluming himself as before. A spectator calls for a letter. Charley hesi- tates, inclines his hied on one side, appears to reflect, then suddenly advances and picks up the letter named, repeating the perform- ance with other letters when called for. Suddenly little Tom jumps off his perch, runs up, Seizes the remaining lettere one after another, and pitchewthem away on the floor. Another parrot then appears, and at the word of command throws several someraaults on the table. Two others follow, and waltz slowly while the music plays. Of all parrots M. Abdy considers the white cockatoos the most gifted in regards to agil- ity and capability for learning tricks, being, in fact, acrobats by nature. They are very plow in learning to talk, but they are easily tamed, and understand and do what they are told. Soul and Becht. "Doctor," said an anxious mother, lately, to an eminent physician, "what should I do if my boy were to contract ague ?" "It.is your business not to cure disease in your child, but to prevent it, Do not take him where there is ague. Keep him in pure air ; give hina plenty of water in which to 'bathe, and good, wholesome food ;lot him exercise his =melee regularly. Then if ague comes, he will have strength to combat The doctor's rules are soicommon as to be platitudes. In every intelligent, educated Canadian household the children are care- fully guarded from infection ; and the value of pure water, wholesome food, and exercise,, to the life of the body, is thoroughly under- stood, But how many families recognize the fact that there ia in eaoh child a secret self, which requires the same habitual, regular care as does its body to ensure its health and well-being, while neglect will bring moral disease, and, perhaps, death? The rules of treatment are singularly alike. If a boy is not to have scarlet -fever or measles, do not bring Min in contact with scarlet -fever or measles. If he is not to become a thief or a debauchee, do not brirg books into the house which will make him familiar with dishonesty and sensuality. Keep the moral air of his home free. Prevent disease. If his legs and arms and blood are to be strong, his stomach must be supplied with food. If his character is to be manly, true and courageous, his soul must be fed with the stories of how brave and noble men helped the world; with the talk of intelli- gent, honorable people; with tle loving, daily companionship of good women; and with the thoughts which God has given to mankind to nourish and help their souls. As strength comes to his muscles,. a wise permit makes hint use them, to =mese that strength ; and as his character shows proofs of truthfulness, energy and kindness, it must have opportunities to pat its truth, its energies and helpfulness into action. There are mothers who watch with excessive care the food which their children take into their bodies and the exercise of their muscles in the playground and gym- nasium, yet who know little cr nothing of the books and companions, tho moral food and exercise, that are training them for their place in life. Every child of decent parents, too, who reads these words understands the use of water to hitt body. He is careful to bathe in it, to remove every stain and soil, and to make his 'skin white and clean in the morn- ing, before he begins the day with his fellowmen. But is he taught to bring his heart and thoughts before God in the morning ? to wash them in the thought of His purity and love, until he can go forth to his work fresh and clean in mind as in body? If this machinery of lungs and muscles flesh and blood, require such constant, min! ute care to keep it preeentable and in order, can we afford wholly to neglect' its motive power, the living creature within, which is making its way, with each minute, towards oat eternal destiny? What an awful country that Ameri- can North-West must be with its bliz- garde, cyclones and what not. There would need to be very many and very great compensations to make Weh a life as the Inhabitants innst lead in any way tolerable. Now it ie people tun- niug away to the cellars of their houses as the only safe places to be thought of, and soon the world hears of poor school children "men to death coming from the distriet heel, Altooether it would require a good al to reconcile Ise to melt a date of urry, danger and uncertainty, scuarnric A./m USEFUL, Many a broadcloth hoebend owes hi prosperityto the fact that he married gingham girl. At Parkersburg, Pa,, two houses are being ereoMd which will tuive paper wells, paper partitions mid paper roofs. A novelty is an insole ramie of horsehair on a felt foundation. The felt absorbs the moisture, while the horsehair keeps the foot warm by constantly irritating it. .4 fire caused by spentaneous combustion early yesterday morning destroyed the ne.V. igation bundles' in the Brooklyn nary yard, tbe contents, including valuable naval and 'unitary maps, plane and designs, being consumed. The Salvation Army recently needed $25,000 for its work, and raised the amount in one week by what is called a week of self-denial." It didn't have a 'angle ice cream party or sacred concert or supper. Is there not here a practical lesson? Persons troubled with a tendency to stoop, and who are becoming round-shoul- dered, ate advised to walk with the palate of the hands forward, the thumbs outward, It will do wonders toward straightening a bent form, as any soldier will testify. The common puff -bell very strikingly il- lustrates the rapidity with which fungi may multiply. It is slid that 300 years would be required for a man to oount the spores of a single ball, if possible to continue counting day and night for that time. Yet a favorably planted spore will produce a plant as large as the double fist in a single night. It will be just a theusand years before the three 8s come together again, A.D. 888, 1888, 2888. Could we not work out an equation, suggests The Int' erior by compar- ing the past period of eights with the sec- ond? As 888 with the dark ages the pre- vailing, is to 1,888 with the nineteenth con - taw enlightenment, so will 2888 be to the milennial glory. Recent experiments with the Nordenfelcl subir erged torpedo boat were highly success- ful. At night she approached a boto that was expecting her to withinafour hundred yards, the agreed distance, without being noticed. Then she dived and rose within a hundred yards of the ship with a snort like a whale and then disappeared. She was regarded as a great suocess. The number of pianos made in America last year, according to a musical exchange, was 52,000, requiring 4,576,000 keys, 200,- 000 casters, over 12,000,009 tuning puts, and 1,500,009 brass agraffes. The number cf suicides and lunatics resulting from this un- checked traffic will never be known The facts will be sternly suppressed by themanu- facturers of the instruments. The Art Review has this interesting and instructive paragraph bibliopegist is a bibliophile with a special regard, for book- bindings. A bibliotaph is a book miser. A bibliopole is a bookseller for bibliophiles. A biblioklept is a stealer of valuable books. Mn Lenox, who would not let Prescott see his Mexican manuscripts, was a loibliotaph, and Sam Pepys was a biblioklept. Biblio- latry is the worship of books." a From accounts given in Old Country papers of recentexperiments on Southampton water with the Nordenfeldt sub -marine torpedo boat it would seem as if a more effectually destructive agency could hardly be imagined. Big ironclads may well tremble before a tiny antagonist that is as much at home on or In the water as a fish, and endowed with an intelligentdestructive- ness that no fish can pretend to. The moral effect on a blockading squadron, for instance, can be imagined when one or more than one of these torpedo boats is known to be going about. Just where is not certain. Like a certain disagreeable insect, nobody:can tell when or where it will bite. Even in broad daylight on the surface of the water it pre- sents a mark so small that accident rather than skill would be the source of a successful shot at it. With the utmost ease it can sink out of signt ahnost in a moment, run under water for a long distance at some eight knots an hour'steal noiselessly upon its huge foe, affix the torpedoes, and be off again before the leviathan knows she is attacked. The chief difference between the Nordenfeldt and other torpedo boats is that, while they sink with greater ease, they cannot be raised again without discarding some superfluous ballast. Her tendency, on the other hand, is to the surface, and her buoyancy k overcome by mechanical means. She is forced down by propellers, fore and aft, that act like Archimedian screws. By these, combined with water ballast, she is kept on even keel, and there is an automa- tic arrangement for preventing her from diving head or stern foremost into depths where she would be crushed by the weight of water. Old Fools and Young Maidens. Apparently there is no end of proof to the old saw that there are no fools like old ones. Especially is this the case when an old dotard takes it into his head to fall in love as he fancies. He ui all but sure te make an ass of himself, if nature has not been before him in that operation. What could, for instance, be more absurd than the exhibition which that rich coffee merchant, Arbuckle, has lately male of himself? • It is not merely or chiefly that he has been east in 845,000 of damages. In some re- spects that is the least of it. lie has cover- ed himself with ridicule which he will never ba entirely able to throw off or to live down. He is " Baby Bunting " for the rest of his ife and his love passages will meet him, go where he may. The woman, to be sure, was herself no chicken, and from the careful way in which she filed all his letters and her own replies, she evidently saw the possibilities of &breach of promise me. But even with all the alleviations can anything be more absurd than the position in which this wealthy old fool finds himself? And he deserves it all. His old brass will buy the forsaken one a new face, and no doubt the deadly wound will in no long them be healed. It is very likely that this craze of old men for young women cannot be punish- ed as a crime. It is, however, as much and ought to be so treated. It is a frightful out- rage upon human nature to see January and June as mon and wife, or playing at lover, An old man, no doubt, sometimes needs a wife badly. 13ut if he he do let him seek somebody reasonably near his own time of life, and let him do his courting chiefly-, if not entirely, by Word of mouth. Let him eschew pen, ink and paper. If he don't, in all likelihood he will live to smart for it. What kindof a smart that ie poor Arbuckle can tell to any one who would like to know, The exemption trouble of which Rev. D. J. Macdonhell complains is not unknown in the United States. The New York Oliurcit- man, says Mr. Maedonnell's fight against the payment by Protestent clergymen of takes from which Roman Catholic clergymen are exempt will be watched with interest. "It's determination may establish a precedent which can be followed judiciouely in some of our own citiee." Throwing the Boomerang. TheAustralian blacks are as fopdof throw- ing the boomerang, to see who is the best Mau, as some cenadiane, with more or lees - famine, are of shooting at glass belle threwn from a trap. Each man in boomerang con- test appears with his favorite weapon. A Hoe of 'Tears ie iaid, oit the ground es a boundary. The thrower 'delis back from it a few paces, grasping his boomerang at one eliwithvhaisereisg,imhrtahaenebd. eadnis arm, with the eli bow bent, above his head, and the oonvea edge of the weapon downwards. With a rapid, oireular movement of the awn from left to Tight, he sends the boomer- ang on its course, with the concave edge nr the direction of the line of flight at the mo. roent of delivery. The weapon flies swiftly until it reaches its ouhatinating point, seven- ty or eighty yards away, and twenty yards above the earth, when it flutters, and hangs for an instant in the air. Then it apins beets to the thrower, and falls within a few yards of him. The paha is given to the thrower whose boomeaang returns and falls the near- est to him. In this manner the boomerang is thrown when its Object is a fiyiug bird, so that if it misses its mark it shall return to the throw- er. The weapon is thrown differently, when mead for fighting purposes. The thrower runs rapidly forward and de- livering it at the level of his hip, makes it strike the ground on one of its horns, tenor twelve yards from him. The weapon then reeoche is, flies atraight away for sixty yards, keeping a horizontal line three or four feet from the ground, and gradually rises until it is spent and falls to the earth, • The English author, from whose book we have condensed this description of a boomer- ang contest, also describes the nerve of a stalwart warrior who offered himself as a target to the boomerang throwers. Creeping a shield of light wood, two feet long, a foot wide, and four inches thick, he placed himself thirty paces fromthe boundary line of spears, and challenged any one to hit him. His assailants, standing the other side of line, threw at him in rapid succession, but one at a time. He, watolag them with a keen eye, avoided a hit, near by a alight movement of his body, and again by catch- ing the boomerang on his shield. He was not hit even once. His nerve was marvel- lous,for a blow from a boomerang either kills or wounds severely. Business Education. Business men in Great Britain and the United States are waking up to the import- ance of preparing the next generation of merchants for the work they have to do. Business has greatly changed of late yearg. It has become, so to speak, cosmopolitan, competition is keener and over a wider field. It will never do for the merchant and his clerks to go on lathe old huindrum way. Business can no longer be done by the rule of thumb. Those engaged in it naust receive a special training for their occupation. German clerks are elbowing English and American clerks out of their seats in London and New 'Y ork, The rea- son of this is that the former are better educated commercially. They can speak and write three or four modern languages, whereas the Englishman oritheraiankee knows only his own, and in exceptional cases has a smattering of one or two dead languages. The German, too, is economical as well as studious. He can, if needs be, liveon five dollars» a week The British clerk:, both in the Old Country and in Canada, has not hitherto seen the necessity of inereasing his intellectual outfit, but has spent a very large proportion of his leisure and his money. -- hrhaving" a good time.'" He is now, how- ever, beginning to see that he is being beat- en in the race of life by the German. It is dawning upon hint that if he ie to keep his place in the eounting house and in the world, he must bestir himself and make im for the deficiencies of his education by his own exertions. British educationists, too, have taken this matter to heart, and are taking steps to give the boys of the present generation a good business education. It is time. What is being done in Canada to prepare the merchants °film near future for their business? The Drift Cityward. The great, brilliant successes are. as a rule, in our cities. They attract notice. All men hear of the man who rolled up a fortune in a few years. Only few hear of the twenty that failed on the same lines. "What is hit is history; what is missed ismystery" One consequence is that the movement is from the country to the town. Young Thatcher is not going to plod along year after year on the farm when he might with less toil make his thousands in the city as a politician or a man of business. "Why, there is Baker—I'm just as smart as he is— and he is near the top of the wheel ; they say he will soon be an alderman." So the tide is townward. Now it is true that one may find the best people in the towns, for mind quickens mind; but you may also find the worst; and in this word evil works ata tremendous advantage. No better 18 found for morals and trustworthiness is found in any Christian country than those who live by the tilling of the soil. We do not ignore the value of cities, but "God made the country, and man made the town." and withougbuilding on any forced exegesis of this passage we canna, be blind to the fact that city life multiplIES and complicates the problems with which Christian civiliza- tion has to deal. No 5,000,000 of country people in England present so much that is discouraging as you 'find among the same number crowded together in London,--1Dr. John Hall, in New Princeton Review` for January. Greek Courtships. There are certain old women whose duty it is to carry the proposal and bring back the answer. These old women know many love Mations which they administer for money. When the old woman goes to pro- pose she must wear stockings of different colors. "She has on stockings of two colors," says a modern Greek rhyme, "methinks we shall have 'an offer." If the proposal is the young man is said 'to eat gruel," The cause of the frequency of these mar- riages de convenience fa to be found in the peculiar law of inheritance still in vogue in *mine of the remoter Islands. The elder daughter inherits everything to the exalt. tion of her brothers and younger sisters, even her mother's embroidered garments and the slab on whicla she says her prayers in church. In other parts of Greece no mrl can ever hope to find a husbend until she has a house of her own ; hetice providing his cleeghtere with houses is an onerous duty which Mlle to the lot of every paterfamiliaa, and this systera reselts in leaving a very large portion of the female population to pass their days in sir& blessednears ; and where the above-mentioned inatrierehea system is still invogue,the parents alwaye aspire to Obtain for their eldeat daughter a good match, and the proposala always come froin the 1840 family-.,