CHAPTER III.
Le Gautier was not far wrong in his estimate of Carlo Visci. The game the former was playing was a dangerous one. He had met the youthful Genevieve in one of his country excursions, and, struck by her beauty, conceived the idea of finding some slight amusement in her society. It was not hard, in that quiet place, with his audacity and talents, to make himself known to her; nor did the child—for she was little more—romantic, passionate, her head filled with dreams of love and devotion, long remain cold to his advances. Friendship soon ripens into love in the sunny South, where temperaments are warmer, and the cold restraints of northern society do not exist. The Frenchman had no sinister intentions when he commenced his little flirtation—a mere recreation pour passer le temps on his side; but alas for good intentions; the moth may not approach too near the flame without scorching its wings. Begun in playfulness, almost sport, the thing gradually ripened into love—love such as most women never know, love encountered by keen wit and a knowledge of the evil side of life. When the story opens, Genevieve had known Le Gautier for six months—had known him, loved him, and trusted him.
But Le Gautier was already tired of his broken toy. It was all very well as a pastime; but the gilded chains were beginning to chafe, and besides, he had ambitious schemes into which any calculations of Genevieve never entered. He had been thinking less of dark passionate eyes lately than of a fair English face, the face of Enid Charteris; so in his mind he began to revolve how he could best free himself from the Italian girl, ere commencing his campaign against the heart and fortune of Sir Geoffrey Charteris’ heiress. Come what may now, he must file his fetters.
Filled with this virtuous and manly resolution, he set out the following afternoon for the Villa Mattio. It was Visci’s whim to keep his sister there, along with a younger sister, a child as yet, little Lucrece, both under the charge of a sleepy old gouvernante. In spite of his faults, Visci was a good brother, having too sincere an affection for his sister to keep her with him among the wild student spirits he affected, fearing contamination for her mind. And so she remained in the country; Visci running down from the city to see her, each time congratulating himself upon the foresight he had displayed in such an arrangement as this, little thinking he had thus caused the greatest evil he had to fear.
Le Gautier walked on till the white façade and stucco pillars of the villa were in sight, and then, striking across a little path leading deep into a thick shady wood, all carpeted with spring flowers, threw himself upon the grass to wait. There was a little shrine here by the side of a tiny stream, with the crucifix and a rude stone image of the Virgin in a dark niche; evidently a kind of rustic woodland sanctuary. But Le Gautier did not notice these things as he lay there; and there was a frown upon his brow, and a thoughtful, determined look upon his face, which boded ill for some one.
He had not long to wait. Pushing the branches of the trees aside and coming towards him with eager, elastic step, was a girl. She was tall and slight; not more than seventeen, in fact, and her dark eyes and clear-cut features gave promise of great beauty. There was a wistful, tender smile upon her face as she came forward—a smile tinged with pain, as she noted the moody face of the man lying there, but nevertheless a smile which betokened nothing but perfect, trusting, unutterable love. Le Gautier noted this in his turn, and it did not tend to increase his equanimity. It is not easy for a man, when he is going to commit a base action, to preserve his equanimity when met with perfect confidence by the victim. For a moment she stood there, looking at him, neither speaking for a brief space.
‘How ridiculously happy you look, Genevieve,’ Le Gautier said irritably. ‘It is a great compliment to me, but’——
The girl looked at him shyly, as she leant against a tree, the shafts of light through the leaves playing upon her lustrous coronal of dusky hair and showing the happy gleam in her eyes. ‘I am always contented when you are here, Hector,’ she answered softly.
‘And never at any other time, I suppose?’
‘I cannot say that. I have many things to do, but I can always find time to think of you. I dwell upon you when you are away, and think what I should do if you were to leave me. Ah, yes, I know you will not do that; but if you did, I should die.’
Le Gautier groaned inwardly. Time had been when he had dwelt with pleasure on these outpourings of an innocent heart.
‘You are not one of the dying order of heroines, Genevieve. By no means. And so you often wonder what you would do if I were to leave you?’
The girl half started from her reclining position, with her scarlet lips parted, and a troubled expression on her face. ‘You speak very strangely to-day, Hector,’ she exclaimed. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Precisely what I say. You are anxious to know how you would feel if I left you. Your curiosity shall be gratified. I am going to leave you.’
‘To leave me! Going away, Hector, and without me?’ Genevieve wondered vaguely whether she heard the words aright. She started and pressed her hand to her heart, as if to still its rebellious beating. Going away? The warmth seemed to have departed from the scene, the bright light grew dim as gradually the words forced themselves upon her; and the cold numbness of despair froze her trembling limbs.
‘Yes, I am going away,’ Le Gautier repeated in a matter-of-fact manner, but always with his eyes anywhere but on the girl’s face. ‘Indeed, I have no alternative; and as to taking you with me, it is impossible.’
‘I have dreamt of something like this,’ Genevieve intoned in a low vague voice, her look seemingly far away. ‘It has been forced upon me, though I have tried not to think so, that you have been growing colder day by day. And now you come and tell me that you are going to leave me! There is no regret in your voice, no sorrow in your face. You will go away and forget, leaving me here in my sorrow, mourning for my lost love—leaving me here heartbroken—deceived!’
‘You should go on the stage,’ Le Gautier replied sardonically. ‘Your talents are wasted here. Let me assure you, Genevieve, speaking as a man who has had a little experience, that if you can get up a scene like this upon the boards, there is money in it.’
‘You are cruel!’ the girl cried, dashing her tears away impetuously—‘you are cruel! What have I done to deserve this from you, Hector? You wish to leave me; that you will not come back again, my heart assures me.’
‘Your heart is a prophetic organ, then, caro mio. Now, do look at the thing in a rational light. I am under the orders of the League; to disobey is death to me; and to take you with me is impossible. We must forget all our little flirtations now, for I cannot tell when I may be in Italy again. Now, be a sensible girl; forget all about unfortunate me. No one possibly can know; and when the prince appears, marry him. Be assured that I shall tell no foolish tales.’
Gradually, surely, the blood crept into the girl’s face as she listened to these mocking words. She drew herself up inch by inch, her eyes bright and hard, her head thrown back. There was a look of infinite withering scorn upon her as she spoke, sparing not herself in the ordeal. ‘And that is the thing I loved!’ she said, each word cold and clear—‘that is the thing to which I gave all my poor heart! I understand your words only too well. I am abandoned. But you have not done with me yet. My turn will come, and then—beware!’
‘A truce to your histrionics,’ Le Gautier cried, all the tiger aroused in him now, and only too ready to take up the gage thrown down. ‘Do you think I have no occupation, nothing to dwell upon but romantic schoolgirls one kills pleasant hours with in roaming about the world! You knew well enough the thing could not last. I leave for London to-morrow; so, be sensible, and let us part friends.’
‘Friends!’ she echoed disdainfully. ‘You and I friends! You have made a woman of me. From this moment, I shall only think of you with loathing!’
‘Then why think of me at all? It is very hard a man cannot have a little amusement without such a display of hysterical affection as this. For goodness’ sake, Genevieve, do be sensible!’
Stung to madness by this cruel taunt, she took one step towards him and stopped, her whole frame thrilling with speechless, consuming rage. It would have gone hard with him then, could she have laid her hand upon a weapon. Then all at once she grew perfectly, rigidly calm. She stepped to the little sanctuary, and took down the wooden cross, holding it in her right hand. ‘Before you go, I have a word to say to you,’ she said between her clenched white teeth. ‘You are a man; I am a poor defenceless girl. You are endowed with all the falseness and deceit that flesh is heir to; I am ignorant of the great world that lies beyond the horizon. You fear no harm from me now; I shall evoke no arm in my defence; but my time will come. When you have nearly accomplished your most cherished schemes, when you have your foot upon the goal of your crowning ambition, when fortune smiles her brightest upon your endeavours—then I shall strike! Not till then shall you see or hear of me; but the hour will come. Beware of it!’
‘Perfection!’ Le Gautier cried. ‘You only want’——
‘Not another word!’ the girl commanded. ‘Now, go!—mean, crawling hound, base deceiver of innocent girls! Go! and never look upon my face again; it shall be the worse for you if you do! Go! and forget my passionate words; but the time will come when they shall come back to you. Go!’ With steady hand she pointed to the opening in the wood; and without another word he slunk away, feeling, in spite of his jaunty air, a miserable, pitiful coward indeed.
As he turned to go, Genevieve watched him down the long avenue out of sight, and then, sinking on her knees, she sobbed long and bitterly, so full of her grief and care that she was oblivious to her surroundings. Her face was deadly pale, her white lips moved passionately, as she knelt there weeping, half praying, half cursing herself in her despair.
‘Genevieve!’
The word, uttered in a tone of wonder and alarm, was repeated a second time before the agitated girl looked up. Salvarini was standing there, his usually grave face a prey to suspicion and alarm, a look which did not disguise entirely an expression of tenderness and affection. Genevieve rose to her feet and wiped away her tears. It was some moments before she was calm enough to speak to the wondering man at her side.
‘I have chosen an unfortunate moment for my mission,’ Salvarini mournfully continued; ‘I am afraid my presence is unwelcome here.—Genevieve, there is something behind this I do not understand. It must be beyond an ordinary grief to move you like this.’
‘There are some sorrows we dare not think of,’ Genevieve replied with an air of utter weariness.—‘Luigi, do not press me now. Some day, perhaps, I will ask you to help me.’
‘I am afraid a brother is the fittest confidant in a case like this. Pardon me, if I am wrong; but when I hear you talking to a man—for his voice came to me—and then I find you in such a plight as this, I must think.—O Genevieve! my only love, my idol and dream since I first saw your face, to have given your heart to some one unworthy of you. What will Carlo say, when he hears of it?’
‘But he must not hear,’ Genevieve whispered, terrified. ‘Luigi, you have surprised me; but you must keep my secret—I implore you.’
‘I can refuse no words of yours. But one thing you must, nay, shall do—you must tell me who this man is; you must have an avenger.’
‘Luigi,’ the girl said, laying her hand gently upon his arm, ‘I shall be my own avenger—that I have sworn by the cross I hold in my hand. If it is for years, I can wait—and hope.’
‘That is a wrong spirit,’ Salvarini replied sorrowfully. ‘You are mad just now with your wrongs. Stay here at home, and let me be your champion. I love you too well to admire such sentiments from you yet. I shall not press you now; but all time, for good or for evil, I shall wait for you.’
‘Luigi, you are a good man, far too good for me. Listen! I must gratify my revenge; till then, all must wait. Things alter; men change; but when the time comes, and you are still the same, say “Come to me,” and I shall be by your side.’
‘I shall never change!’ he replied as he touched the outstretched hand with his lips gently.
Slowly and sadly they walked back towards the house—Genevieve calm and collected now; Salvarini, mournfully resigned; pity and rage—pity for the girl, and rage against her deceiver—alternately supreme in his heart. For some time neither spoke.
‘Will you come in?’ she asked.
‘Not now,’ he replied, feeling instinctively that his presence would only be an unwelcome restraint. ‘I had a message to bring from Carlo. He and Sir Geoffrey and Miss Charteris are coming to-morrow.—And now, remember, if you want a friend, you have one in me.—Good-bye.’
‘Good-bye, Luigi,’ she said mechanically. ‘You are very good. I shall remember.’
Strangers coming to-morrow. The words bear on her brain like the roar of countless hammers. Strangers coming; and how was she to meet them now, with this wild sense of wrong burning within her vengeful Italian heart, bruised but not crushed? She walked slowly up-stairs and sat down in her room, thinking, till the evening light began to wane, and the lamps of distant Rome to twinkle out one by one. The very silence of the place oppressed her.
‘Are you coming down to supper, Genevieve?’
She aroused herself at these words, and looking up, saw a child standing there before her. She was regarding her sister somewhat curiously, and somewhat pitifully too; the latter, child as she was, did not fail to notice the pale face and dark-ringed eyes. She approached the older girl, throwing her arms round her neck and kissing her gently. ‘What is the matter, caro?’ she asked in her soft liquid Italian. ‘Have you one of your headaches again, sister? Let me comfort you.’
‘I have something more than headache, Lucrece—some pain that no soft words of yours can charm away. Run away down-stairs, child; I am not fit to talk to you now.’
‘Please, Genevieve, I would rather stay with you.’
Genevieve looked out again across the landscape, lit here and there now by twinkling lights, reflected from the happy firesides, till it was too dark any longer to see aught but the ghostly shadows.
‘Lucrece!’ she exclaimed suddenly, ‘come here.’
The child hesitated for a moment, and obeyed, taking her sister’s cold damp hand in her own, and waiting for her to speak.
‘Do you remember, Lucrece, the Golden City I used to tell you about when you were a little one, the blessed place far away, where there is no strife and no care, and every heart can rest?’
‘Yes, I remember, sister.’
‘And should you care to go with me?’
‘O yes, please. I would go anywhere with you and not be afraid.’
‘Then you shall go. When you go to your room to-night, do not take off your clothes, but lie awake till I come for you. Only, mind, if you say a word of this, you will not see the beautiful city.’
Through the rest of the hours, Genevieve moved about mechanically, getting through the evening meal she scarcely knew how. Gradually time passed on, one by one the members of the household retired. It was an hour later when Genevieve entered her little sister’s room. ‘Lucrece, are you awake?’ she whispered.
‘Yes, sister; I am waiting for you. Are we going now?’
‘Yes, we are going now. Walk softly, and hold my hand. Come, let us hasten; we have far to go, and the way is weary.’
Silently they passed down the stairs, and out into the night-air, along the path to Rome, walking on till they were lost in the darkness of the night; Genevieve’s face stern and set; the little one’s, bright and hopeful.
Gradually the east flushed with the golden splendour of the coming dawn; the birds awoke to welcome up the sun; and after them, the laggard morn. The orb of day saw strange things as he rose in the vault of heaven: he saw two tired wayfarers sleeping on the roadside; and then, later, the anxious faces of a party gathered at a pretty villa by the Tiber. As he sank to rest again, he went down upon a party searching woods and streams far and near; and as he dipped behind the shoulder of the purple hills that night, his last red glimpse flushed the faces of the stern sad-visaged group on their way to Rome. When he rose again there were no wayfarers by the roadside, but a brother on his knees praying for his lost darlings and strength to aid him in his extremity. In Sol’s daily flight he saw hope lost, abandoned in despair; but as came each morn, he brought a gentle healing, but never Genevieve back to the Mattio woods again!
And so time passed on, bringing peace, if not forgetfulness.
(To be continued.)
THE MONTH:
SCIENCE AND ARTS.
The armour-plated ship Resistance was lately the subject of some interesting and highly practical experiments at Portsmouth. The ship’s armour is four and a half inches in thickness, and this armour was backed up in various places—for the purpose of experiment—with india-rubber and asbestos, in order to see how far these materials might be relied upon as automatic leak-stoppers. A little fleet of gunboats now fired upon the vessel at short range, sending shot after shot completely through the armour, and penetrating the india-rubber backing, which measured an inch and a half in thickness. The armour when protected with an outer jacket of india-rubber fared no better. Much the same results were obtained when the shots were directed to that part of the hull of the vessel which had been provided with a backing of asbestos. The water poured so freely through the shot-holes, that they had to be plugged, to obviate the risk of the vessel sinking. In the sequel, it was unanimously agreed that both india-rubber and asbestos are quite valueless as additions to armour-plating.
Mr Mallet, of the University of Virginia, describes a most unusual phenomenon which occurred in the laboratory of that institution last winter, in the shape of explosive ice. The ice in question formed in the glass vessel of a gasogene—the familiar apparatus for charging water with carbonic acid gas. The expansion of the ice burst the vessel, after which the ice itself exploded repeatedly, and threw off fragments with a crackling sound. The effect is attributed to the pressure of the gas contained in the ice, which in the case of water would appear as simple effervescence.
Steel sleepers for railways, in lieu of the rough wooden ones formerly employed, are now coming into greatly extended use, and there are few railways where they are not being tried either experimentally or adopted permanently. In the underground workings of collieries, the maintenance of wooden sleepers forms an important item of expense, and there is every hope that steel sleepers will take their place. Mr Colquhoun, the general manager of the Tredegar Iron and Coal Company, has invented a form of steel sleeper for this particular purpose. Its sides are corrugated, and it has two projecting fangs at each end, which clutch the ground upon which it is laid. The complete weight of the sleeper and its fittings is only sixteen and a half pounds. It has been on trial in some of the South Wales collieries, and has given every satisfaction.
The Lancet lately called attention to a singular tradition bearing upon infant mortality, which is widely circulated and believed in. An inquest was held upon a child five weeks old which had been found in bed suffocated beside her mother. Death was attributed to a cat getting on the bed and sucking the breath of the child. There seemed to be no evidence against the cat; indeed, the animal did not appear upon the scene. The Lancet points out that death was no doubt due to overlaying by the parent, and that ‘breath-sucking’ is probably a myth, or it would ere now have been proved by observation.
An American inventor, Mr A. Hardt, has patented an arrangement for using very small slack coal as fuel for boiler-firing. The apparatus consists of two fireclay retorts—very much after the pattern of the retorts used in gas factories—which are placed immediately above the ordinary firebox. Each retort has a slide in the bottom, which can be withdrawn so as to empty it of its contents. In addition to this, each has a tube of fireclay reaching from the back part of the retort into the fire beneath. The action of the apparatus is as follows: The retorts are charged with slack, which by the heat of the fire is gradually coked, while the gas evolved from it is carried to the fire beneath. When all the gas has been driven off, the sliding bottom of the retort is withdrawn, and the coke falls into the furnace, to form fresh fuel. Two retorts are employed, so that one can always remain at work while the other is being recharged.
Mr F. Siemens has invented a new method of repairing furnace-linings while at a white-heat, which will be found very useful in steel and glass furnaces where high temperatures are necessarily employed. Under such temperatures, the sides of furnaces become softened, and quartz powder or sand projected against the soft places will readily adhere. Mr Siemens’ apparatus for compassing this end consists of a small wagon, upon which are mounted a fan and a movable pipe like a fire-hose, which can be made to direct a blast in any required direction. The nozzle attached to the pipe is introduced into the furnace-doors, and the sand is blown against the particular part of the furnace-lining which may require reparation.
The tricycle is being gradually applied to so many different purposes, that it can no longer be regarded as a means merely of healthy exercise. Traders use it largely for the delivery of small parcels; postmen in country districts depend upon it as a useful steed; the military genius of the Germans is turning it to account for the battlefield; and in many ways its value is receiving increased recognition. Its last application is in the form of an auxiliary to the fire brigade. The tricycle in question embodies the following parts: It contains a hosereel, with a quantity of hose specially constructed to wind up into a very small compass; a light double-pump fire-engine, capable of throwing twenty-five gallons of water per minute; a collapsible cistern to hold water; and a simple fire-escape with descending ropes and bag. Two men can run the tricycle at full speed, and the pedal action can afterwards be applied to pumping. The apparatus has been introduced by Mr Glenister, chief of the volunteer fire brigade of Hastings, in conjunction with Mr J. C. Merryweather of London.
The French scientific journal La Nature describes and illustrates a machine for making a product which is coming into favour in various different employments under the name of wood-wool. As its name implies, this material is simply wood cut into such fine shavings that it answers many of the purposes to which wool is commonly applied. Although it was at first intended merely as a packing material, it was soon found that it had a much more extended field of usefulness. It is being employed for stuffing mattresses, as bedding for cattle, for the filtration of liquids, &c. It is elastic like horsehair, and is beautifully clean in use. The wood used by preference is Riga fir; and the machine will produce, without any necessity for skilled labour, more than fifteen hundred pounds of ‘wool’ per day of ten hours.
A cart-wheel without axle, axle-boxes, grease-boxes, and journals, seems to be something akin to an impossibility; but such a thing has been produced and exhibited at the Palace of Industry, Paris, by M. Suc. Its principle is this: Suppose that we have two grooved rails, and that we place one on the ground with its groove uppermost. In this groove we then place a number of steel balls, and above them we place the other rail with its groove downwards. Thus placed, the two grooves are facing one another, while the balls are embraced by both, so that if we push the upper rail, it will slide over the lower one, owing to the simple rotation of the balls. Imagine the two rails to be bent into a circle, with the balls still between them, and we have the principle of M. Suc’s axleless wheel. The inner part is fixed to the wagon; and the outer part, consisting merely of a grooved rim, works round it with the balls between. The thing seems to be wonderfully ingenious; but we doubt whether it would work so well as the old-fashioned form of wheel. A dusty road would try its powers to the utmost.
A somewhat elaborate plan for keeping railway foot-warmers hot has been devised by M. Tommasi, a French electrician. He proposes that after the foot-warmers have been charged with their hot solution of acetate of soda—as is commonly done on the French railways, and on some few lines in Britain—the heat should be kept up by electricity. The current to maintain this heat would be obtained from a dynamo driven off an axle of the carriage-wheels, and would be carried to all the foot-warmers throughout the train. We should think that it would be a far easier and less expensive plan to utilise some of the waste heat from the locomotive, which might be applied to the carriages by means of pipes. Has this plan ever been tried?
The cultivation of tobacco in Kent is an experiment which many agriculturists are observing with keen interest. So far, the experiment has been a success, and this in spite of very unfavourable weather, and the presence of unusual quantities of destructive pests in the shape of insects. We are told that earwigs have done a great amount of damage to the plants, for they have been chewing tobacco ever since the leaves came to maturity. According to the opinion of experts, Kent is the most suitable place in this country for the culture of tobacco. Not only is the soil suited to the growth of the plant, but the same oast houses which are used for drying the hops, and whose conical tops form such a noteworthy feature of the Kentish landscape, can be readily adapted to drying the tobacco leaves. It is thought, indeed, that hops and tobacco might be grown on the same land, and form a combined industry which would pay well.
M. l’Hoste, the French aëronaut who recently crossed the Channel by means of a balloon, made use of a piece of apparatus which seems to represent some advance in the art of aërial travelling. This contrivance was dragged in the water of the Channel from a rope attached to the balloon. By this means the aërostat was kept at a certain height above the water. But it served a further purpose than this. By its means water was drawn up into the car and utilised as ballast. Formerly, ballast once thrown out of the car could not be recovered; but by this invention it can be picked up when the balloon is travelling over water. We may note that Mr Green, one of the most celebrated balloonists, made use of an inverted cone, attached to a rope, when travelling over water. This cone acted as an anchor to the balloon, keeping it a certain height above the water, and at the same time allowing it to drift along.
A Report was lately read at the French Academy of Medicine referring to an operation which was successfully conducted by the help of a magnet. A patient who was by profession a sword-swallower at fairs, had, while at a restaurant, amused some companions by hiding a steel fork in his throat. By an accident, the fork reached to a lower point than the experimenter had reckoned for, and a surgical operation became imperative. By means of a strong magnet, the fork was moved to a position, where a simple incision soon relieved the sufferer of this unwelcome intruder.
The divers employed on the wreck of the ill-fated Oregon have almost finished their labours. Six men have been at work upon the wreck, each man remaining under water for from half an hour to one hour at a time. The cargo of the vessel chiefly consisted of bales of cotton; and the divers were furnished with hooks, like workmen employed in the same business on dry land, with which they could grasp and handle the bales. These were attached to steam pulleys, and hauled on board the wrecking vessel. To get at the mail-room, the side of the submerged vessel had to be blown in with dynamite, but much of the mail-matter was spoilt by the water before this was done. The divers report that the vessel is fast breaking up; her bow has fallen over into the sand, and she is broken in two between the mainmast and the foremast, although some of her spars are still visible above water.
Dr H. J. Fox announces in the St Louis Medical Journal that creosote is almost a certain cure for erysipelas, for he has treated some hundreds of cases with only one fatal result. The affected parts are kept constantly covered with cloths soaked in a solution of creosote in water—six to twenty drops of creosote to one ounce of water; or a poultice may be formed by stirring ground elm into the solution so as to make a paste.
At the Birmingham Art Gallery, a new method of illuminating the pictures is being tried. In the centre of the room is a suspended ring of ninety-six Swan incandescent lamps, each of twenty candle-power. Within this ring is a series of silvered glass reflectors bent to such a curve as will insure the pictures being well illuminated without any reflection from their surfaces. The arrangement has been devised by Messrs Chamberlain and Hookham.
A Report has recently been published by Mr Verbeck, who was deputed to inquire into the origin and character of the terrible volcanic outburst at Krakatoa, in the Straits of Sunda, two years ago. He calculates that the amount of matter ejected from the volcano was equal to a mass measuring at least ten cubic miles, and that the velocity with which this matter was thrown into the atmosphere was greater than the projecting power of the biggest of big guns. He considers that the ejected matter must have reached a height of thirty miles; that is, about six times the height of the highest mountain in the world. The explosions were heard over a fourteenth part of the earth’s surface; and an atmospheric wave travelled from the scene of disturbance, and spread itself over the surface of the globe in thirty-six hours.
We are glad to see that a Society for the Protection of Birds has been instituted in New York. It seems to be akin to the Plumage League recently incorporated in our own country, while its aims are more comprehensive. Its chief object is to protect birds not used for food from destruction for mercantile purposes, and it will also endeavour to secure and publish information relative to the present enormous destruction of birds for the purposes of dress, decoration, and general adaptation to fancy articles. It will also point out in its teachings the bad results which must in time accrue to agriculture from the wanton destruction of birds which prey upon insect life. The robbing of birds’ nests and the destruction of eggs will also be discouraged by the Society.
Among the papyri which have recently been brought to Vienna from El Fayoum was one which, according to those who have deciphered it, mentioned the existence of a city in Lower Egypt which seems to have completely vanished. The document in question is a papyrus four feet long by one foot wide. It contains a marriage contract between one Theon and his bride Maria, with the signature of witnesses and a notary. All these people are described as belonging to the city of Justianopolis. No mention of this place can be found among any lists of places which exist. The papyrus is supposed to date from the sixth century.
The dispute as to the permanence or non-permanence of water-colour drawings has received a fresh contribution from the pen of Mr E. A. Goodall, whose father engraved a certain drawing of Turner’s which is now in the national collection. It had been pointed out, as a proof of the fugitive nature of the pigments which the great painter employed, that many details which appear in the engraving in question are not now visible in the original drawing. Mr Goodall, however, says that these details never were visible in the painting, it being the custom of Turner, when proofs were submitted to him for approval, to touch up those proofs and to introduce new effects—clouds, figures, &c., which were not in the original work.
Mr W. A. Gibbs, whose name in connection with hay-drying apparatus will be remembered, has lately turned his attention to a machine for ‘withering’ tea after the leaves have been curled and twisted in the rolling-mill. This is brought about by submitting the damp leaves to a current of dry air, which speedily desiccates the mass. The machine consists of a revolving fan in an iron casing mounted on a pair of wheels, with a small coke-fire in a box in front of it. There is a hand-wheel to drive the fan, and handles attached to the casing, so that the contrivance can readily be moved from place to place. There is an inlet and outlet for the air, the latter passing over the fire. In front of the inlet there is a cage, in which are placed lumps of chloride of calcium, a salt which has the property of absorbing all moisture within its reach, and which when saturated can easily be restored to its former state by heating. It can thus be used over and over again, so that first cost is the only expense. By this apparatus a dry air can be delivered without the employment of any excessive heat, and such conditions give the best results in the desiccation of tea. Mr Gibbs has also devised a machine for the rapid drying of fibrous materials, which will doubtless be found valuable in many branches of trade and manufacture.