Let all plump persons, therefore, rejoice. We offer them our hearty—perhaps somewhat envious-congratulations. They, at any rate, are prepared to stand a long siege from cold.

10. For the same reason, animals which hibernate-like the bear, jerboa, marmot, dormouse, bat, and others— generally grow plump before they retire into winterquarters. Upon this capital of corpulence they subsist during their lethargy, the respiration being lessened, the pulse reduced to a few beats per minute, and the temperature lowered to perhaps 30° or 40°. But when the season of torpor terminates, they issue from their caves and burrows meager and ravenous, having burnt up their stock of fuel, Bruin himself appearing to be anxious to defraud the perfumers of the unguent which is so precious in their eyes.

11. But perhaps the most striking feature in this warmth-producing apparatus within us is the self-regulating power which it possesses. The fires on our domestic hearths decline at one moment and augment at another. Sometimes the mistress of the house threatens to faint on account of excessive heat; sometimes the master endeavors to improve the temperature by a passionate use of the poker. Were such irregularities to prevail unchecked in our fleshly stoves, we should suffer considerable annoyance. After a meal of very inflammatory materials, or an hour spent in extraordinary exertions, the gush of caloric might throw the system into a state of high fever. How is this prevented?

12. In some of our artificial stoves, little doors or slides are employed to control the admission of air; in furnaces connected with steam-engines, we may have dampers which will accomplish the same purpose by the ingenious work

ings of the machine itself; but neither doors nor dampers, pokers nor stokers, can be employed in the bodily apparatus. If, on the one hand, our human fires should begin to flag from undue expenditure of heat, the appetite speaks out sharply and compels the owner to look round for fuel. Hunger rings the bell, and orders up coal in the shape of savory meats. Should the summons be neglected, the garnered fat, as we have seen, is thrown into the grate, to keep the furnace in play.

13. If, on the other hand, the heat of the body should become unreasonably intense, a very cunning process of reduction is adopted. When a substance grows too hot, the simplest method of bringing it into a cooler frame is to sprinkle it with water, the conversion of fluid into vapor involving the consumption of a large amount of caloric. This is precisely what occurs in our human organisms; for no sooner does the temperature of the body rise above its standard height than each little perspiratory pipe (of which there are said to be several millions) discharges its stream of moisture as if it were the hose of a fire-engine : so that the skin is speedily sluiced and further incendiary proceedings are arrested.

14. The human body, then, is an apparatus which, as if by magic, produces a steady stream of heat,-not trickling penuriously from its fountains, but flowing on, day and night, winter and summer, without a moment's cessation, from January to December. Carry this splendid machine to the coldest regions of the globe; set it up in a scene where the frosts are so crushing that Nature seems to be trampled dead; still it pours out its mysterious supplies with unabated profusion. It is an apparatus, too, which does its work unwatched and, in a great measure, unaided. The very fuel which is thrown into it in random

heaps is internally sifted and sorted, so that the true combustible elements are conveyed to their place and applied to their duty with unerring precision.

15. No hand is needed to trim its fires, to temper its glow, to remove its ashes. Smoke there is none; spark there is none; flame there is none. All is so delicately managed that the fairest skin is neither shriveled nor blackened by the burnings within. Is this apparatus placed in circumstances which rob it too fast of its caloric? Then the appetite becomes clamorous for food, and in satisfying its demands the fleshly stove is silently replenished. Or are we placed in peril from superabundant warmth? Then the tiny flood-gates of perspiration are flung open, and the surface is laid under water until the fires within are reduced to their wonted level.

16. Thus protected, thus provisioned, let us ask whether these human hearths are not entitled to rank amongst the standing marvels of creation; for is it not startling to find that, let the climate be mild or rigorous, let the wind blow from the sultry desert or come loaded with polar sleet, let the fluctuations of temperature be as violent as they may without us, there shall still be a calm, unchanging, undying summer within us?

DEFINITIONS.—1. €a lõr ́ie, heat. 2. Fluet'ū ātes, varies. Ôr'gan ism, a being endowed with organs. 3. E võlved', thrown out. Com bust'ion, burning. 4. Căl o ríf ́ie, heating. 5. Ěp'i eure, one who is devoted to the pleasures of the table. 7. In tū'i tìve ly, without reasoning. 8. Ŭņet'ū oŭs, oily. Ġen'er ate, to produce. Eschews', avoids. 9. Єor pō're al, bodily. 10. Hi'ber nate, to pass the winter in seclusion. Leth ́ar gy, continued or profound sleep. Un'guent (un'gwent), ointment.. 12. Stōk'ers, those employed to tend furnaces. Gär'nered, stored. 13. Sluiced, wet thoroughly. 14. Penū'ri oŭs ly, with scanty supply. 15. Wont'ed, customary. 16. Rig'or oŭs, severe; harsh.

19. THE DISMOUNTING OF "LONG TOM."

CHARLES READE was born in England in 1814, and was educated at Oxford, where he graduated with honors. He ranks among the most popular of the English novelists. His usual custom was to attack some existing abuse, political, social, or moral, as in Never Too Late to Mend, Put Yourself in His Place, and White Lies, from the latter of which the extract is taken. He was also the author of a number of dramas. His novels show the intellectual vigor of the writer, as well as his eccentricities. He delights in bright lights and heavy shadows, and his books are of absorbing interest. He died April 11, 1884.

1. COLONEL DUJARDIN explained at full length why he could not bring a gun in the battery to silence "Long Tom," and quietly asked to be permitted to run a gun out of the trenches and take a shot at the offender: "It is a point-blank distance, and I have a new gun, with which a man ought to be able to hit any mark at three hundred yards."

2. The commander hesitated: "I cannot have the men exposed."-"I engage not to lose a man except-except him who fires the gun. He must take his chance.". "Well, colonel, it must be done by volunteers. The men must not be ordered out on such service as that." Colonel Dujardin bowed and retired.

3. "Volunteers to go out into the trenches!" cried Sergeant La Croix, in a stentorian voice, standing erect as a poker and swelling with importance. There were fifty offers in less than as many seconds. "Only twelve allowed to go," said the sergeant; "and I am one," added he, adroitly inserting himself.

4. A gun was taken down, placed on a carriage, and posted near Death's Alley, but out of the line of fire. The colonel himself superintended the loading of this gun, and, to the surprise of the men, had the shot weighed first, and then weighed out the powder himself.

5. He then waited quietly a long time, till the bastion pitched one of its periodical shots into Death's Alley; but no sooner had the shot struck, and sent the sand flying past the two lanes of curious noses, than Colonel Dujardin jumped upon the gun and waved his cocked hat. At this preconcerted signal his battery opened fire on the bastion, and the battery on his right opened on the wall that fronted them; and the colonel gave the word to run the gun out of the trenches.

6. They ran it out into the cloud of smoke their own guns were belching forth, unseen by the enemy; but they had no sooner twisted it into the line of Long Tom than the smoke was gone, and there they were, a fair mark. "Back into the trenches, all but one!" roared Dujardin ; and in they ran like rabbits. "Quick! the elevation !" Colonel Dujardin and La Croix raised the muzzle to the mark. Hoo! hoo! hoo! ping! ping! ping! came the bullets about their ears. "Away with you!" cried the colonel, taking the linstock from him.

7. Then Colonel Dujardin, fifteen yards from the trenches, in full blazing uniform, showed two armies what one intrepid soldier can do. He kneeled down and adjusted his gun just as he would have done in a practicing-ground. He had a pot-shot to take; and a pot-shot he would take. He ignored the three hundred muskets that were leveled at him. He looked along his gun, adjusted it, and re-adjusted to a hair's-breadth. The enemy's bullets pattered over it; and still he adjusted and re-adjusted. His men were groaning and tearing their hair inside at his danger.

8. At last it was leveled to his mind, and then his movements were as quick as they had hitherto been slow. In a moment he stood erect, in the half-fencing attitude of a gunner and his linstock at the touch-hole. A huge