on with boat-hooks when the squall struck us, and capsized her. A great misfortune!'

The sudden destruction of so many men is indeed a sad misfortune.'

'No doubt; but it is not of that I am just now thinking: besides, a ticket for Davy Jones may at any moment be drawn from the seaman's lottery-bag. The misfortune I had and have in my mind is that the Columbia, whose crew, judging by her tonnage, cannot be much under forty men, has been taken possession of by only eighteen of our fellows-young Webbe counting for nothing, or worse.'

'I have not seen the American ship since the hurricane burst upon us; have you?'

'Yes, more than once or twice. The last time, she was far away to windward, and seemed to be making tolerably fair weather of it. The Columbia should by this time,' added Dowling, 'have brought up in the Guernsey Roads, under the guns of Castle Cornet; would have done so were I on board in place of young Webbe. As it is, I'd take less than a thousand pounds for my share in her.'

'About where, allow me to ask, may we ourselves be just now?'

'Getting back to Britain by the way we came from it, except that we are more closely hugging the French coast. If the gale had not slackened, we should be now driving through the Alderney race as if Old Nick was kicking us endwise. I must on deck again. You need not come,' he added; we shall manage to keep the Scout afloat without your taking another spell at the pumps.'

Dowling had not been gone five minutes when Mr Tyler entered the cabin. I offered him a change of apparel from my own wardrobe-a courtesy which he met by a glum refusal; though he accepted the mute tender of restorative schnapps. I was quite sure that he had recognised M. Jean Le Gros; but as he chose to be silent upon the subject, and no explanation was possible on my part without violating the oath Webbe had exacted from me, I gladly followed his example. We conversed with some effort-on his side, with an overdone show of politeness-for perhaps eight or ten minutes, and then Mr Tyler retired to his sleepingplace. A naturally taciturn, but far from an ungentlemanly person, was Mr Tyler; he seemed to be a fair specimen of the American skipper tribe, of whom I have since known hundreds at Liverpool, who, according to my experience, whilst distinguished for greater nervous energy than their British rivals, are nothing like so physically robust, nor, I think, so healthily developed, mentally. This opinion of mine, a wider experience might perhaps considerably modify; and be that as it may, I was favourably impressed by Mr Tyler, and-saving the personal security of the English seamen on board the Columbia-I was heartily hopeful that his richly freighted ship might have been rescued from the ravenous sharks that had thought to make her their prey. And I could not help fancying that that same hope glittered vengefully in the sharp gray eyes of the American captain-very naturally so, if he knew the relative number of captors and captives on board the Columbia to really be as Dowling feared they were.

I was awake and up before daybreak; the uneasy working of the brig, the incessant jerk of the pumps, and frequent tacking during the night, which, as my cot-hammock happened to be lashed athwart-ship, caused me to be now head, now heels upwards and downwards, and the general bustle and trampling overhead, effectually preventing sound sleep, tired, worn out as I was when I turned in.

What the sailors called half a gale of wind was blowing when I went on deck, from the westward, and the Scout, I was informed, had been, during the previous three or four hours, in great danger of being

embayed and driven on the French coast. Dowling and his skilful mariners had fortunately at length succeeded, spite of the half-crippled condition of the brig, in clawing her off, and she was then rounding the projecting headland known as Cape La Hogue, though at not more than half a league to seaward. Close to Cherbourg as we were, such near proximity to the French shores was doubly dangerous; but to bear up for Portsmouth, or even half a point nearer to the wind than we were sailing was, with our make-shift foremast-already severely strained and shakenimpossible. Still, if the wind continued to blow from the same quarter, and with no greater violence, we might hope to bring up in the Downs, if we were lucky, one day within a week.

We shewed no colours, either English or French: the former would have caused us to be pursued as 'enemies;' and the latter might have brought more 'friends' to our assistance than would have been quite agreeable. Dowling's hope was, that before there was sufficient light to make us clearly out, we should have gained such a distance from the French war-port, as, combined with the chance of meeting with a British cruiser, would indispose the light gun-craft, kept there in readiness for such purposes, to attempt seeking our nearer acquaintance.

An essential condition of that doubtfully hoped-for piece of luck was that the dawn should be a dark, cloudy one; and so, precisely speaking, it was; the coming day, as it slowly broke in the east, being as dull and gloomy as could be wished. Unfortunately, the light, as it stole on, shewed us that the weather was clearing rapidly to windward; and the yet stiff gale-or half a one in seamen's estimation-drove the breaking clouds before it with such velocity, that before the sun was half an hour high, it was shining in unveiled brightness over land and sea; and especially, as it seemed to us, lighting up for general inspection our crippled, creaking, labouring, laggard Scout.

By that time, we were nearly two leagues past Cherbourg, which was something, though not enough, as it soon proved. Dowling's anxious glance detected one-two-three gun-boats, impelled by sweeps and sails, leaving Cherbourg in pursuit, and it was quickly plain, even to my unpractised eye, that they were coming up with us hand over hand.

'If the Scout had not lost ten of her teeth,' growled Dowling, she would have made no bones of the little spitfires; and as it is, she may perhaps manage to crunch up one or two. She shall, at all events, have a snap at them.'

As the privateer-brig could not luff, it seemed, without danger of carrying away her shaky jurymast, and it would hardly do to yaw with the Rochers de Calvados on her lee, Dowling gave orders to hew away sufficient space on each side of the helm to enable the Scout's two remaining guns to be used as stern-chasers. That was quickly done; the guns were loaded, run out, trained, and directly the pursuing gun-boats were thought to have come within range, fire was opened upon them. Without effect; the balls for some time fell short; and so small a mark did the French craft present, that the chance of striking them till they were very close indeed, seemed a desperate one. The Scout, on the other hand, could not well be missed, and we had not been more than ten minutes within reach of the boats' heavy guns, before she was hulled half-a-dozen times, and we had three men wounded and one killed. I remarked, however, that since the firing began, the venomous little spitfires, as Dowling rightly named them, had not gained upon us in speed.

They know a trick worth two of that,' said Dowling. ""Strike or sink," is what they are saying to us in better French than they often use; and unless a

The street-lamps or lanterns of Havre threw up dim lines of light, which doubtfully indicated the number and direction of the principal streets; and it was with filled eyes and a beating heart that I thought of two mournful dwellers in one of those faintly traced thoroughfares-asleep, no doubt, at that hour, and dreaming perhaps of their son, and the fulfilment of the precious hope of late associated with him-in my mother's mind at least; of their son who was then so near to them, and they knew it not! It was well they did not. Even to a sailor's imagination, as I knew by the silence of my companions since night-moonless, starless night-had fallen, there was something appalling in being afloat upon the wide, dark, solitary sea in a slight shallow boat which the eye could hardly distinguish from that sea, the only sounds meeting one's ear the measured jerk of our own oars, the moaning swash of waves, and the hoarse roar in the distance of the wrathful surf for ever spurned back in its ceaseless assaults upon the unconquerable shore. How much more appalling, then, would the vague, undefined imagination of such a scene be to a woman's -to a mother's heart! Better, then, infinitely better, that they slept on unconscious of my actual whereabout, and continued to dream of the speedy fulfilment of the great hope which, I had never doubted, save during a few tumultuous distracting moments, would, in God's good time, be fully realised.

I crave pardon of the reader for this digression from the direct current of my narrative. I do not, it will be conceded, often offend in that way, which, perhaps, if I do not linger upon it, will be my sufficient excuse. To resume, then, we laboured through the night at the oars with less and less success in the way of progress the tide, which about there flows like a torrent, was for several hours dead against us, so that we could barely hold our own; and at day-dawn we had but just passed the lofty headland of La Heve.

That lofty headland, as many readers know, is formed of chalk-cliffs, and the sinuous shore at its base strewed with jagged, fantastic rocks. This was once, it is said, the favourite resort of Bernardin St Pierre, the author of Paul and Virginia, and a native of Havre de Grace, who there studied the elemental phenomena which he, in after-life, embodied in his description of the wreck of the San Geran.

I knew nothing of this at the time I am writing of; and if I had, Bernardin St Pierre would assuredly have found no place in my thoughts, which were painfully pre-occupied by two paramount facts-namely, the rapid increase of the wind, and the existence of a current, which helped the wind not only to drive us upon the shore, but upon the most rocky part of the shore, whereon the surf was leaping at a gigantic height, and with the sound of thunder.

An accident capped the terrors of the situation. The extra strength exerted by one of the seamen to keep the boat at sea, had the effect of snapping the blade of his oar short off, and we were at the mercy of the furious elements.

Dowling, who had scarcely spoken since we hauled him into the boat, and who was still acutely suffering from the injury to his foot, now interfered in his usual stern, decisive manner.

6

Hand here the oar still left,' he said: 'place it in the stern rowlock, and I will endeavour to beach the boat as favourably as may be, since nothing better can be done. Remember, all of you to leap out, if you are not thrown out of the boat, the instant it strikes the shore, and then run swiftly ahead. Should the surf overtake you, fall down flat on your bellies, and cling to anything you can lay hold of-to the sand, by digging your fingers into it, if nothing better offers; and so on, ditto repeated, till you find yourself high and dry. There are, I see, people, either fishermen or peasants, on the shore observing us. They will, no doubt, render

what assistance they can, so that it's upon the cards that we may all yet live to be buried in an elm suit, with all the honours.'

'And you,' I exclaimed-how, with that crippled limb, will you be able to manage?'

'Like yourself-the best way I can. And now be silent, if you please, and prepare for a race with King Death.'

The boat, urged by wind and sea, drove swiftly towards the shore, and was dexterously guided by Dowling to an opening between rocks, towards which we were directed by the gestures of the people on the shore. Ten or more fearful minutes passed, and then we were lifted and borne along upon the back of a terrific surf-wave, which receding, dropped the boat upon the shore with a force that smashed in its bottom, and threw us all out upon the pebbly sand. What immediately followed, I do not distinctly remember. I know that I ran landward the moment I regained my feet; that I was caught by the boiling flood, and smashed upon the sands: then followed a sense of suffocation, of despair, and, finally, spasms of excruciating pain, from which I recovered to find myself still on the rude shore, but beyond reach of the waves, and sedulously ministered to by a number of halfpeasant, half-fisher French men and women, directed by a podgy, bustling little clerical gentleman, whom I afterwards knew to be the kind and good Father Meudon, parish priest of Monvilliers, a village not very far inland.

As soon as I had sufficiently regained consciousness, and felt the assurances of the good people about me that I had suffered no serious injury to be true, my thoughts and inquiries reverted to my boat-companions. Two of them, I found, had been carried out to sea, and of course drowned. Dowling had been rescued with life, after incurring frightful injuries; Mr Tyler had escaped with even less of mishap than myself; and the four other sailors with not at all serious hurts and bruises.

We were all carried to farmhouses, the owners or habitants of which if, according to our notions, poor in purse, were abundantly rich in generous feeling. Mr Tyler had said he was an American, and the conclusion, which I did not contradict, was, that we were all of the same nation, though I am quite sure our treatment would not have been one whit less kindly had our entertainers known from the first that, except Mr Tyler, we were all their natural enemies'-to quote an atrocious popular phrase of that time and age.

It was all over with poor Dowling! He had been injured internally to such a degree, that he could not possibly survive more than a few hours-perhaps not one. This was communicated to him as tenderly as possible through me by the doctor whom Father Meudon had summoned in great haste from Monvilliers.

The first officer of the Scout received the announcement with a smile-brave, though feeble. I would rather,' he murmured, 'have died in battle, than thus faint out of life, as one may say: it, however, comes to the same thing at last.'

Father Meudon, with tears in his round, beady black eyes, entreated me to explain to the moribund that he, Father Meudon, prayed him to have heed, whilst there was yet time, to the salvation of his immortal soul; only to be assured, Father Meudon declared, through the instrumentality of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, into the bosom of which he was ready and anxious to admit the dying sinner even at the eleventh hour.

I translated what the kindly intending priest said; and Dowling, with a slight glimmer about his eyes of the old reckless privateer spirit, bade me tell the good little gentleman that he would do more than that to oblige him, only he must let him, Dowling, have some five minutes' previous conversation with me.

Father Meudon was delighted with my paraphrase of the dying seaman's reply, and after earnestly impressing upon me the vital necessity of quickly despatching any merely mundane business I might have to arrange with his penitent, left the room.

'I must be quick and brief,' said Dowling as the door closed; 'life, I require no doctor to tell me, is ebbing fast. In the first place, Linwood, take this pocket-book. I appoint you my executor. Will you undertake the trust?'

'Most willingly.'

"Thanks, thanks! The old couple-my father and mother-live at Camberwell. You will find the address amongst the papers. The money is of course for them. Webbe, to whom I have ever done my duty, will, there is no fear, do his by me. I think he will have to hand you over about three hundred pounds, supposing the Columbia to have slipped through our fingers. Let him state the amount himself: if he cheats anybody, it will be himself, not me. That also will be for the old couple. And if,' said Dowling with a perceptible tremor of voice, 'you will see them, and say their son died as a British seaman should, it would

be kind.'

capital shot! You'll shave the Frenchmen's whiskers yet. Ha, ha, ha! what a confounded splutter they make in the water. Be ready, Englishmen, to board in the smoke. FIRE!'

That was the last word audible to mortal ears Robert Dowling uttered.

THE MONTH:

SCIENCE AND ARTS.

TRUE to custom and the autumnal equinox, savans and philosophers have found their way back to town, as well as ordinary folk-the officers of the scientific societies are determining whose salaries shall be raised, and what shall be the order of meetings for six busy months to come-and publishers are ready with supplies for the thousands who, having recreated themselves in idleness during the vacation, are now, as the long evenings come on, eager to read anything amusing. In no former year has there been so much attention paid to marine natural history by amateurs and students, as in the present: from all parts of the coast we hear of researches which will advance science more or less, and help to fill the pages of scien

And now, having squared the yards as regards myself, let me speak of something which, from certain words I have heard drop, I believe concerns you, though how or why I cannot understand. I allude to Maria Wilson, who'

naturalist, and a brace of professors, Scottish and German-had a rare philosophical holiday on the Firth of Clyde, catching all sorts of queer sea-animals off the shores of Arran, and converting them into subjects for drawings and dissections, and ultimately for papers, which can hardly appear anywhere else than in the Philosophical Transactions. Among those who took flight to the Alps were Dr Tyndall and Mr Huxley, whose interesting inquiries into the structure of glaciers we noticed some months ago. Desirous to test their views by a second examination, these two gentlemen have made such a survey of some of Mont Blanc's glaciers as fully to confirm their former conclusions. The doctor, accompanied by a friend and one guide, ascended to the top of the

'It is in your hand. Let me hold it to your lips.' 'Better, clearer, stronger now! We sailed to Madeira, where we had often been before. One Wilson, a good fellow, with odd ways about him, lived there. His brimstone of a wife-a Frenchwoman— died soon after giving birth to a daughter, the Maria Wilson now in Jersey. Well, Wilson himself had slipped his cable suddenly some time before we arrived at Madeira, and had left a will appointing Webbe his executor, and the guardian of his child. The property was to be invested in the British funds-only two hundred a year to be drawn out for the daughter's maintenance and education till she reached her seventeenth birthday, at which age she might marry, and the accumulated money with interest was to be hers absolutely. Wilson, as I told you, was a queer stick This faintness again '

Wine once more brought back light to the darkening eyes-strength to the fluttering speech:

'We sailed for England with Madame Broussard and two children, both, it was said, of about the same age, and we got wrecked on the Galway coast. The vessel was not the Wasp, mind you. Wilson's child,' he faintly proceeded after a pause, 'will come into something like twenty thousand pounds, and it would be a thousand pities that that poor poltroon Harry Webbe should-should '

He stopped, and presently I could hear what is called the rattle in his throat. I once more gave him wine; and the expiring flame of life leaped up for a moment brightly in the socket.

It's no fault of mine, Webbe,' he exclaimed, 'that the Columbia was recaptured! Bravo, Rawlings, a

alone at the Grands Mulets. He waited seventeen hours, so long were the adventurers delayed and wearied by soft and treacherous snow. This inquiry is believed to involve certain consequences important to geological science. Important in another way, and regarded with much satisfaction, is a recent event at Glasgow: we refer to the appointment of an American geologist, Mr H. D. Rogers, as Regius Professor of Natural History in the university of that city. The talk about what was done by the British Association has not died away, when news comes that the meeting of the Canadian Association at Toronto surprised every one, even the Canadians themselves: they knew not till this gathering took place that Canada could muster so many real representatives of science.

Among the resolutions passed by the British Association at their late meeting, one commends itself to general attention-namely, that government should be requested to send out an exploring expedition to that great river of Eastern Africa, the Zambesi.-And on the western coast, geographers and merchants have been for some time agreed that an annual expedition should be sent to the Niger. The one for this year, under Dr Baikie and Lieutenant Glover, was heard of a few weeks since. The party had left Brass River for the Niger, with fifty Kroomen and twenty-five natives of the river banks, and used to the climate. A botanist is with them, and they have the means of instituting scientific inquiries. Mr Macgregor Laird is making arrangements to run several steamers periodically to trading-ports on the coast and up the river; and as by his contract with the Admiralty he is bound to convey deck-passengers of the negro race

who can read and write English, from Fernando Po to all parts below the Niger and Chadda, it is hoped that a new element of civilisation will be introduced into the interior by the return of liberated Africans to their native country in considerable numbers.' Dr Livingstone is of opinion that the rivers of Africa will be crowded with vessels before fifty years are over. Apropos: the doctor has given to the Chamber of Commerce at Manchester a statement concerning the resources of that continent; and Edinburgh and Glasgow have given to him the freedom of their cities. Mr Laird has sent to the same Chamber specimens of woven cotton-cloth from Africa, soft, though coarse, and of various colours; among which the red and blue dyes are remarkable. And with all this, we must not omit a highly interesting fact from North Africa: the French have bored artesian wells in various parts of the Sahara, in the province of Constantine, with marked success. All the boringsseven or eight in number-yield water; some about a hundred quarts a minute; but from two the discharge in a minute is more than 4000 quarts. The temperature is said to be 21 degrees; if centigrade is meant, it corresponds with 69 degrees of Fahrenheit. It is impossible to exaggerate the results that may follow from these borings. No greater benefit could be conferred on the natives. We are told that when a shout from the soldiers announced the outburst of the water, the Arabs crowded round; some stooped to drink, to wash their hands and face, mothers dipped their children into the gushing element; and many falling on their knees, gave thanks to Allah and the French. What will be the further effect on the natives, remains to be seen; but already a tribe had given up their wanderings, and settled and built a village, and began to till the land near one of the wells. Since Solomon set his famous wells flowing, there has been no happier application of science in the desert; and we see no reason why artesian wells should not be numerous in the wilderness, and along the line of our overland route.

Another item from the tropics is, that a scientific party has set out from Demerara, to ascend the river, and explore for gold in the mountains of the interior. Proof has been given that gold exists there; indeed, that it is the Dorado which Raleigh meant to discover. -And further-to some readers the most interesting of all-the Dutch government have made arrangements and sent out the necessary preliminary instructions for the abolition of slavery in all their West Indian colonies.

We hear that the Niagara and Agamemnon are to discharge their coils of Atlantic telegraph cable into a receptacle prepared for the purpose at Plymouth; and so for another year or two steamers must still continue to be the messengers between us and the United States.-The French government are considering a line to pass under sea from Marseille to Hyères, thence to Corsica, thence to Constantinople.-The cable for completing the Mediterranean line from France to Algeria, is laid from Sardinia to the African coast, 125 miles, excepting a length of fifteen miles. The greatest depth between the two points was found to be 1000 fathoms for a space of ten miles. Owing to this and other accidents, the 162 miles of cable paid out fell short by the number above mentioned. A telegraph to India is now the prime desideratum.

Among miscellaneous scientific facts, we notice Mr Nasmyth's proposition that 'all substances in a molten condition are specifically heavier than the same substances in their unmolten state.' He recommends a conclusion derivable therefrom to the attention of geologists, as 'an explanation of many phenomena of eruption or upheaval of the earth's crust-namely, that on the approach to the point of solidification, molten mineral substances below the crust of the earth

must, in accordance with this law, expand, and tend to elevate or burst up the solid crust. Of which a striking confirmation is revealed to us by the lunar surface, as seen through powerful telescopes.'-Mr Robert Mallet, in his Fourth Report on Earthquake Phenomena, discusses the catalogue of 6000 earthquakes published by the British Association. Among important facts, he finds that earthquakes in either hemisphere respectively, are most numerous in winter. The place where most convulsion is at present felt is the island of Luzon, in the Indian Archipelago. He describes a new seizmometer, or earthquake-measurer, of his own invention, in which four heavy balls, one for each quarter of the compass, set in motion by the shock, describe its direction and intensity. To arrive at satisfactory conclusions as to the extent and propagation of the disturbance, he has made experiments during the great blasting operations at Holyhead, in some of which eight tons of powder have been fired at once. In one instance, the shock was so great as to be felt at a distance of two miles, and even to throw crockery off a shelf at a distance of eight miles.'-Dr Daubeny has read a final report on the Vitality of Seeds, summing up the results of experiments carried on for seventeen years. These contradict the popular notion that seeds possess an unlimited vitality. The experiments were started with a given number of seeds, and continued with them year after year; and as all except four lost their vitality, he considers the trial at an end. The greater number of seeds,' he says, 'lose their vitality at eight years, and forty-three years is the longest period to which they retain it.' The statements concerning the growth of seeds found in mummies he holds as not supported by satisfactory evidence. Dr Hofmann, Professor of Botany at Giessen, has published a book, Witterung und Wachsthum, Weather and Growth, or Elements of Climatology as affecting Plants,' a large book, filled with details in which the student may glean valuable information. The author takes the year 1854, gives a table of its climate, the effect produced thereby on thirteen plants specially chosen for trial; shews the daily development of leaves, stems, and blossoms, by a scale of coloured curved lines; and from all this he deduces the effect of the main conditions of weather on the growth of plants.

A successful application of the steam-jet to ventilation has been made in a mine near Bradford, Yorkshire. The jet turned on at the upper end of a series of pipes, drew off the foul air, and in thirty minutes, the miners could descend into passages which before were fatally filled with choke-damp.-Boydell's 'traction engine and endless railway' has proved its capability by drawing four trucks laden with forty-two tons of timber from Thetford to Woolwich at the rate of four miles an hour, some part over bad country-roads. The engine lays down the 'pattens' or endless rail for itself, and travels on the ordinary highways. It is the second which the government have purchased for dock-yard service; we hear that it will do the work of sixty horses, and that an officer was appointed to watch it while on the way from Norfolk with a view to purchase for use in India. We learn from Captain Galton's annual report, that 8506 miles of railway were open at the end of 1856, employing twelve persons to the mile. The number of passengers carried in that year was 129,347,592, nearly 11,000,000 more than in 1855-that an astonishing development has taken place in 'goods traffic'-that,, in the captain's opinion, low fares are most profitable to the company-and that he recommends the adoption of measures for protecting shareholders from the delinquencies of directors.-The Lancaster and Ulverstone Railway is noteworthy for tangible advantages in addition to the traffic, as the line is carried across Morecambe Bay, protected by a sea-wall which protects 20,000 acres in its rear