the nomination of a particular sum led many to believe that that sum was a minimum limit, and that small intentioned subscribers were thus hindered from giving anything. Then, too, the form proposed for the memorial a statue in Westminster Abbey or the British Museum-is considered inappropriate by many and by some ludicrous. They who knew Faraday's mind recollect that he abhorred monuments; they who knew his outward man can bear witness to its unfitness for statuesque reproduction. A portrait monument is not the thing. A fitting memorial, one that would symbolize the philosopher's character for work as against show, would be a scholarship foundation, or a permanent fund for assisting philosophical students in Faraday's branches of research, or for rewarding investigators and discoverers in the physical sciences. When the committee announce some such a plan of usefully perpetuating the philosopher's name, and when they remind hesitating donors that the smallest contributions will be thankfully received, their labours will arrive at that beginning of the end which all who are conscious of the dangers of delay would be glad to see.

Two popular errors have long existed concerning the history of the guillotine. Its invention has been credited to one Guillotin by name; and he is said to have lost his head in the machine. The second idea has so often been refuted that we need not further allude to it. With regard to the first, there are still doubts. Certainly Guillotin did not invent the destroying angel: a mechanically-falling hatchet had been used, during the two centuries preceding its French adoption, by half the countries of Europe, even by England. But did he revive it or propose its employment to his government? It is answered, No. One French writer denies him all participation in the questionable honour, and gives the sole credit of the proposal to the physician Louis, after whom the instrument was sometimes called la petite-Louison; while another party, wisely preferring a non-committal name, termed it the coupe-tête, which, by the way, was the nick-name of a French judge of the Jeffrey type. The reason for the revival of this disputation has been the question of the painlessness and momentary effectiveness of the falling knife's operation. It is asserted that Louis advocated its use upon humane and physiological grounds; he knew that the death thereby must be instantaneous; that all feeling and intelligence must cease at the moment when the sanguine connection between the heart and the brain is severed. And it was the humanity of the process that ultimately carried it in the Assembly; for the discussion on the point was long, and nearly terminated by the adoption of the gallows. Said the law reporter of the time (1791) “The penalty of death ought to be exempt from torture and reduced to the simple privation of life; your committee think that decapitation is the nature of death which departs the least from this principle; death by hanging appears to be slower and consequently more cruel." That Louis was correct in his conclusions has been within the past month re-proved

by two physicians who examined and experimented upon a victim's head directly it was severed, and found that the ear, the eye, the nose were absolutely unimpressionable. The face exhibited no sign of pain; the impression on the countenance, with its open mouth and dull staring eyes, was simply one of stupor. It would occupy a long space to detail their tests for sensibility; but they were all neutral in result; and all completely negatived the absurd stories lately revived in connection with the lugubrious subject. One thing only made the inanimate facial muscles twitch, and that was electricity; but it was certain that this was no voluntary movement, for, when the skull was sawn asunder and the brain removed, there was still a quivering in the features to which the current was immediately applied.

SILK, sugar, tobacco, quinine; these form a quartet of natural products of which recent philanthropists have advocated the home growth in Britain. If the Tenth Commandment is to be taken as applying to neighbouring nations, as well as individuals, then is it extensively broken in the matter of coveted trades and industries. Forty years ago strenuous efforts were made to introduce silk culture into England, or rather into Ireland; but the worms would not thrive. Some new attempts are being made, and these have been so far successful that, during the past three years, a gentleman in Kent has reared a thoroughly healthy stock of silkworms at a cost that promises profit, and produced cocoons of fibre equal to the finest Italian samples. There does not appear to be any reason why this branch of industry should not succeed with us: the French InspectorGeneral of Sericulture has given his opinion that our climate is well suited for it. We may feebly hope, then, at some time, to see the Lord Chancellor's wool-sack covered with silk. As to sugar-beet-sugar-there is no such fastidiousness in the sweet red root as would prevent its being agreeably introduced to our soils; and the culture ought to be remunerative, because after the sugar has been extracted the refuse substances supply two constant demands-the one, food for cattle, the other, material for paper manufacture. It is a fact that a small portion of homegrown beet-sugar already finds its way to the London market. Any prejudice that may exist against this article, whether British or foreign, will gradually be removed as it becomes known that large quantities of it are now mixed with the cane-sugar that we consume. The tobacco plant would give us mild cigars, if we might grow it; but, as the Government stated in the House of Commons one day last month, the revenue can't afford to lose the duties on imported weeds. Lastly, as to quinine. The cinchona plant has been reared in England; some interesting matters connected with its cultivation having recently been made known by Mr. J. E. Howard, a Fellow of the Linnæan Society; but from what we can gather, the difficulties encountered in trying to give the plant its native resources are so great that it must be long before the price of the indispensable medicine it yields is lowered by home supplies.

CORRESPONDENCE

OF SYLVANUS URBAN.

AURORA POLARIS.

MR. URBAN,-It was my intention to have gone into certain investigations before troubling you with a reply to "Your Contributor's" letter on the above subject in your December number, but as I am still unable to do so, I enclose a list of several of my papers" on meteorological and magnetic subjects, to some of which he may perhaps be able to refer.

I must pass over the greater part of his letter; and with respect to the question as to the height of the aurora, I beg to state that the opinion I advanced is, that (although so varied) auroral appearances are similar to the rainbow, and that no two persons see identically the same, or at least that no persons at a distance from each other can be certain that they look upon the same appearance, and, therefore, that all observations of the altitude of the aurora are useless. In support of this opinion I must refer him to my paper " On the Height of the Aurora Borealis," in No. 87 (Oct. 1847-Jan. 1848) of the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, in which, I believe, I have shown that Halley's account, in the "Philo

"Conjectures on the Cause of Rain, Storms, the Aurora, and Magnetism, with a Suggestion for Causing Rain at Will," read at the meeting of the British Association at Glasgow, 1840. See British Association Report, and Athenæum for 1840; and in a pamphlet, 1841.

"On the Cause of the Electricity of Steam." Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1844.

"On the Phenomena of Evaporation, the Formation and Suspension of Clouds," &c. Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1845.

"On the Cause of Storms and the Fluctuations of the Barometer," Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1846.

"On the Cause of Terrestrial Magnetism." Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1847.

"On the Aurora, and Declination of the Needle;" and "On the Cause of Evaporation, Hailstones, and the Winds of Temperate Regions," read at the meeting of the British Association at Oxford, 1847. See British Association Reports, and the Athenæum.

"On the Height of the Aurora Borealis." Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1848. In this paper the following corrections should be made: P. 84, line 5, for "80°," read 18°;" p. 88, last line, for "or," read "and; " p. 89, line 12, "little" should be omitted.

"On the Change of Temperature in Europe, and the Variation of the Declination of the Needle." Published in the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, 1853. "An Essay on the Cause of Rain, and its Allied Phenomena." Published in 1859.

A Lecture on the Storm in Wiltshire, which occurred on the 30th of December, 1859," given at a meeting of the British Meteorological Society, 1860.

sophical Transactions," of the aurora of March 6, 1716, proves that the appearances he describes were only local, although such were observed over a large portion of Northern Europe, Asia, and America; and he himself supposed that the auroral rays reached to such an enormous height as to be illuminated by direct rays from the sun so far below the horizon; that Dr. Dalton's celebrated calculation on the height of the aurora of March 29, 1826 (also published in the " Philosophical Transactions "), tells the same tale, as he rejected the observations on the height, apparently taken with care at Edinburgh, Jedburgh, Hawick, and Kelso, because the aurora appeared at the same elevation from all those places, and made his calculations on observations which were mere guess work, and not worthy of a moment's consideration; and that the observations of Professors Challis and Chevallier on the aurora of October 24, 1847, are of the same character, as the corona appeared at Durham, in a direct line with a southern star, and at the same time 2° to the south of that star to Professor Challis at Cambridge.

Professor Loomis states that observations gave a height to the aurora of 500, and not less than forty-six, miles from the earth's surface; and I would ask "Your Contributor" how he can account for the electric effects on the telegraph wires from an auroral cloud forty-six miles high? And how he can explain the elevation of vapour and its electricity to 500 miles in height? Which it must have been, if the theory now advanced by Professor Loomis be true, and the observations not deceptions?

As it appears that "Your Contributor" could only find a brief sketch of my theory in the "high-class scientific library" he has the privilege to use, I may perhaps be once more tempted into print, and if so, I hope my paper may be deemed worthy of your notice; and if you pass it over to the handling of "Your Contributor," I shall heartily wish "more power to his elbow," and say "Lay on, Macduff."-I am, sir, your obedient servant,

G. A. ROWELL.

THE

GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE

MAY, 1870.

THE CHRISTIAN VAGABOND.

BY BLANCHARD JERROLD.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE FIRST FOOTPRINT.

Y first steps in the world," said the Christian Vagabond, 'cost me more than it is needful to the purpose of my tale, I should dwell much upon, Sisters. I had my mission for go-cart. I had to settle my arm to my staff, and to wear it smooth. The tool is best when it has been intelligently used. The first time a man feels himself alone in the world, is a moment nothing which the future may have in store, can sweep from him. His sense of independence is worth all the luxury of bought service; but his idea of feebleness in the presence of a world's strength is the dominant one, and it has a weight that holds his feet to the earth.

"I turned the shoulder of the road from my gates, catching the tearful face of Felix for the last time over a hedge. I was at once almost borne down under the mob of confused memories that rushed in upon me. So, the beggar had turned away, bleeding, from my father's lodge. I was thus far, on his track: thus far! A furlong or so. At my back was the winding riband of a road over the hills, which my gruff father was accustomed to take, when he went forth to the boar hunt, or to the fiercer strife of man against man. His sad, stern face peeped under my hat. His stalwart form strode to bar my passage. Whither was I, the heir of that mighty baron, bending my steps? My casque and plume, where were they? VOL. IV., N. S. 1870.

T T