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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures, by
+Arabella B. Buckley
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures
+       A Sequel to The Fairyland of Science
+
+
+Author: Arabella B. Buckley
+
+
+
+Release Date: October 1, 2011  [eBook #37589]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES AND OTHER
+LECTURES***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Chris Curnow, Robin Shaw, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made
+available by Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 37589-h.htm or 37589-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/37589/37589-h/37589-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/37589/37589-h.zip)
+
+
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      http://www.archive.org/details/throughmagicglas00buck
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: For Description see Page 152           Frontispiece
+
+THE GREAT NEBULA OF ORION
+
+From a photograph taken on February 4th, 1889 by Mr Isaac Roberts.]
+
+
+THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES AND OTHER LECTURES
+
+A Sequel to The Fairyland of Science
+
+by
+
+ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY
+(Mrs. Fisher)
+
+Author of Life and Her Children, Winners in Life's Race,
+A Short History of Natural Science, Etc.
+
+With Numerous Illustrations
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+New York
+D. Appleton and Company
+1890
+
+Authorized Edition.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The present volume is chiefly intended for those of my young friends who
+have read, and been interested in, the _Fairyland of Science_. It
+travels over a wide field, pointing out a few of the marvellous facts
+which can be studied and enjoyed by the help of optical instruments. It
+will be seen at a glance that any one of the subjects dealt with might
+be made the study of a lifetime, and that the little information given
+in each lecture is only enough to make the reader long for more.
+
+In these days, when moderate-priced instruments and good books and
+lectures are so easily accessible, I hope some eager minds may be thus
+led to take up one of the branches of science opened out to us by magic
+glasses; while those who go no further will at least understand
+something of the hitherto unseen world which is now being studied by
+their help.
+
+The two last lectures wander away from this path, and yet form a natural
+conclusion to the Magician's lectures to his young Devonshire lads. They
+have been published before, one in the _Youth's Companion_ of Boston,
+U.S., and the other in _Atalanta_, in which the essay on Fungi also
+appeared in a shorter form. All three lectures have, however, been
+revised and fully illustrated, and I trust that the volume, as a whole,
+may prove a pleasant Christmas companion.
+
+For the magnificent photograph of Orion's nebula, forming the
+Frontispiece, I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Isaac Roberts,
+F.R.A.S., who most kindly lent me the plate for reproduction; and I have
+had the great good fortune to obtain permission from MM. Henri of the
+Paris Observatory to copy the illustration of the Lunar Apennines from a
+most beautiful and perfect photograph of part of the moon, taken by them
+only last March. My cordial thanks are also due to Mr. A. Cottam,
+F.R.A.S., for preparing the plate of coloured double stars, and to my
+friend Mr. Knobel, Hon. Sec. of the R.A.S., for much valuable
+assistance; to Mr. James Geikie for the loan of some illustrations from
+his _Geology_; and to Messrs. Longman for permission to copy Herschel's
+fine drawing of Copernicus.
+
+With the exception of these illustrations and a few others, three of
+which were kindly given me by Messrs. Macmillan, all the woodcuts have
+been drawn and executed under the superintendence of Mr. Carreras, jun.,
+who has made my task easier by the skill and patience he has exercised
+under the difficulties incidental to receiving instructions from a
+distance.
+
+                                                  ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY.
+
+UPCOTT AVENEL, _Oct. 1890_.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS
+
+
+    CHAPTER I                                                       PAGE
+    THE MAGICIAN'S CHAMBER BY MOONLIGHT                                1
+
+    CHAPTER II
+    MAGIC GLASSES AND HOW TO USE THEM                                 27
+
+    CHAPTER III
+    FAIRY RINGS AND HOW THEY ARE MADE                                 55
+
+    CHAPTER IV
+    THE LIFE-HISTORY OF LICHENS AND MOSSES                            75
+
+    CHAPTER V
+    THE HISTORY OF A LAVA STREAM                                      96
+
+    CHAPTER VI
+    AN HOUR WITH THE SUN                                             117
+
+    CHAPTER VII
+    AN EVENING AMONG THE STARS                                       145
+
+    CHAPTER VIII
+    LITTLE BEINGS FROM A MINIATURE OCEAN                             172
+
+    CHAPTER IX
+    THE DARTMOOR PONIES                                              195
+
+    CHAPTER X
+    THE MAGICIAN'S DREAM OF ANCIENT DAYS                             209
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+  PLATES
+
+    PHOTOGRAPH OF THE NEBULA OF ORION                     _Frontispiece_
+
+    TABLE OF COLOURED SPECTRA              Plate I.      _facing p._ 127
+
+    COLOURED DOUBLE STARS                  Plate II.     _facing p._ 167
+
+
+  WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT                                              PAGE
+
+    PARTIAL ECLIPSE OF THE MOON _Initial letter_                       1
+
+    A BOY ILLUSTRATING THE PHASES OF THE MOON                          6
+
+    COURSE OF THE MOON IN THE HEAVENS                                  8
+
+    CHART OF THE MOON                                                 10
+
+    FACE OF THE FULL MOON                                             11
+
+    TYCHO AND HIS SURROUNDINGS (from a photograph by De la Rue)       13
+
+    PLAN OF THE PEAK OF TENERIFFE                                     15
+
+    THE CRATER COPERNICUS                                             17
+
+    THE LUNAR APPENNINES (from a photograph by M.M. Henri)            19
+
+    THE CRATER PLATO SEEN SOON AFTER SUNRISE                          20
+
+    DIAGRAM OF TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE MOON                              23
+
+    BOY AND MICROSCOPE _Initial letter_                               27
+
+    EYE-BALL SEEN FROM THE FRONT                                      30
+
+    SECTION OF AN EYE LOOKING AT A PENCIL                             31
+
+    IMAGE OF A CANDLE-FLAME THROWN ON PAPER BY A LENS                 33
+
+    ARROW MAGNIFIED BY A CONVEX LENS                                  35
+
+    STUDENT'S MICROSCOPE                                              36
+
+    SKELETON OF A MICROSCOPE                                          37
+
+    FOSSIL DIATOMS SEEN UNDER THE MICROSCOPE                          39
+
+    AN ASTRONOMICAL TELESCOPE                                         41
+
+    TWO SKELETONS OF TELESCOPES                                       44
+
+    THE PHOTOGRAPHIC CAMERA                                           47
+
+    KIRCHHOFF'S SPECTROSCOPE                                          51
+
+    PASSAGE OF RAYS THROUGH THE SPECTROSCOPE                          52
+
+    A GROUP OF FAIRY-RING MUSHROOMS _Initial letter_                  55
+
+    THREE FORMS OF VEGETABLE MOULD MAGNIFIED                          61
+
+    _MUCOR MUCEDO_ GREATLY MAGNIFIED                                  63
+
+    YEAST CELLS GROWING UNDER THE MICROSCOPE                          65
+
+    EARLY STAGES OF THE MUSHROOM                                      67
+
+    LATER STAGES OF THE MUSHROOM                                      68
+
+    MICROSCOPIC STRUCTURE OF MUSHROOM GILLS                           69
+
+    A GROUP OF CUP LICHENS _Initial letter_                           75
+
+    EXAMPLES OF LICHENS FROM LIFE                                     77
+
+    SINGE-CELLED PLANTS GROWING                                       78
+
+    SECTIONS OF LICHENS                                               81
+
+    FRUCTIFICATION OF A LICHEN                                        83
+
+    A STEM OF FEATHERY MOSS FROM LIFE                                 85
+
+    MOSS-LEAF MAGNIFIED                                               87
+
+    _POLYTRICHUM COMMUNE_, A LARGE HAIR-MOSS                          88
+
+    FRUCTIFICATION OF A MOSS                                          89
+
+    SPHAGNUM MOSS FROM A DEVONSHIRE BOG                               93
+
+    SURFACE OF A LAVA-FLOW _Initial letter_                           96
+
+    VESUVIUS AS SEEN IN ERUPTION                                      97
+
+    TOP OF VESUVIUS IN 1864                                          100
+
+    DIAGRAMMATIC SECTION OF AN ACTIVE VOLCANO                        105
+
+    SECTION OF A LAVA-FLOW                                           108
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS WITH CRYSTALLITES AND MICROLITHS                  109
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS WITH WELL-DEVELOPED MICROLITHS                    110
+
+    A PIECE OF DARTMOOR GRANITE                                      112
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS SHOWING LARGE INCLUDED CRYSTALS                   115
+
+    A TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN _Initial letter_                      117
+
+    FACE OF THE SUN PROJECTED ON A PIECE OF CARDBOARD                120
+
+    PHOTOGRAPH OF THE SUN'S FACE, taken by Mr. Selwyn
+    (Secchi, _Le Soleil_)                                            122
+
+    TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN, SHOWING CORONA AND PROMINENCES
+    (Guillemin, _Le Ciel_)                                           124
+
+    KIRCHHOFF'S EXPERIMENT ON THE DARK SODIUM LINE                   128
+
+    THE SPECTROSCOPE ATTACHED TO THE TELESCOPE FOR SOLAR WORK        132
+
+    SUN-SPECTRUM AND PROMINENCE SPECTRUM COMPARED                    134
+
+    RED PROMINENCES, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer 1869                    136
+
+    A QUIET SUN-SPOT                                                 140
+
+    A TUMULTUOUS SUN-SPOT                                            141
+
+    A STAR-CLUSTER _Initial letter_                                  145
+
+    SOME CONSTELLATIONS SEEN ON LOOKING SOUTH IN MARCH FROM
+    SIX TO NINE O'CLOCK                                              148
+
+    THE CHIEF STARS OF ORION, WITH ALDEBARAN                         149
+
+    THE TRAPEZIUM [Greek: th] ORIONIS                                150
+
+    SPECTRUM OF ORION'S NEBULA AND SUN-SPECTRUM COMPARED             151
+
+    SOME CONSTELLATIONS SEEN ON LOOKING NORTH IN MARCH FROM
+    SIX TO NINE O'CLOCK                                              156
+
+    THE GREAT BEAR, SHOWING POSITION OF THE BINARY STAR              157
+
+    DRIFTING OF THE SEVEN STARS OF CHARLES'S WAIN                    159
+
+    CASSIOPEIA AND THE HEAVENLY BODIES NEAR                          162
+
+    [Greek: e] LYR�, A DOUBLE-BINARY STAR                            166
+
+    A SEASIDE POOL _Initial letter_                                  172
+
+    A GROUP OF SEAWEEDS (natural size)                               175
+
+    _ULVA LACTUCA_, a piece greatly magnified                        176
+
+    SEAWEEDS, magnified to show fruits                               177
+
+    A CORALLINE AND SERTULARIAN COMPARED                             179
+
+    _SERTULARIA TENELLA_ HANGING IN WATER                            180
+
+    _THURICOLLA FOLLICULATA_ AND _CHILOMONAS AMYGDALUM_              182
+
+    A GROUP OF LIVING DIATOMS                                        184
+
+    A DIATOM GROWING                                                 185
+
+    _CYDIPPE PILEUS_, ANIMAL AND STRUCTURE                           187
+
+    THE SEA-MAT, _FLUSTRA FOLIACEA_                                  191
+
+    DIAGRAM OF THE FLUSTRA ANIMAL                                    192
+
+    DARTMOOR PONIES _Initial letter_                                 195
+
+    _EQUUS HEMIONUS_, THE HORSE-ASS OF TARTARY AND TIBET             201
+
+    PRZEVALSKY'S WILD HORSE                                          202
+
+    SKELETON OF AN ANIMAL OF THE HORSE-TRIBE                         206
+
+    PAL�OLITHIC MAN CHIPPING FLINT TOOLS _Initial letter_            209
+
+    SCENE IN PAL�OLITHIC TIMES                                       212
+
+    PAL�OLITHIC RELICS--NEEDLE, TOOTH, IMPLEMENT                     213
+
+    MAMMOTH ENGRAVED ON IVORY                                        216
+
+    NEOLITHIC IMPLEMENTS--HATCHET, CELT, SPINDLE WHORL               219
+
+    A BURIAL IN NEOLITHIC TIMES                                      221
+
+    BRITISH RELICS--COIN, BRONZE CELT, AND BRACELET                  223
+
+    BRITONS TAKING REFUGE IN THE CAVE                                224
+
+
+
+
+THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE MAGICIAN'S CHAMBER BY MOONLIGHT
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The full moon was shining in all its splendour one lovely August night,
+as the magician sat in his turret chamber bathed in her pure white
+beams, which streamed upon him through the open shutter in the wooden
+dome above. It is true a faint gleam of warmer light shone from below
+through the open door, for this room was but an offshoot at the top of
+the building, and on looking down the turret stairs a lecture-room might
+be seen below where a bright light was burning. Very little, however, of
+this warm glow reached the magician, and the implements of his art
+around him looked like weird gaunt skeletons as they cast their long
+shadows across the floor in the moonlight.
+
+The small observatory, for such it was, was a circular building with
+four windows in the walls, and roofed with a wooden dome, so made that
+it could be shifted round and round by pulling certain cords. One
+section of this dome was a shutter, which now stood open, and the strip,
+thus laid bare to the night, was so turned as to face that part of the
+sky along which the moon was moving. In the centre of the room, with its
+long tube directed towards the opening, stood the largest magic glass,
+the TELESCOPE, and in the dead stillness of the night, could be heard
+distinctly the tick-tick of the clockwork, which kept the instrument
+pointing to the face of the moon, while the room, and all in it, was
+being carried slowly and steadily onwards by the earth's rotation on its
+axis. It was only a moderate-sized instrument, about six feet long,
+mounted on a solid iron pillar firmly fixed to the floor and fitted with
+the clockwork, the sound of which we have mentioned; yet it looked like
+a giant as the pale moonlight threw its huge shadow on the wall behind
+and the roof above.
+
+Far away from this instrument in one of the windows, all of which were
+now closed with shutters, another instrument was dimly visible. This was
+a round iron table, with clawed feet, and upon it, fastened by screws,
+were three tubes, so arranged that they all pointed towards the centre
+of the table, where six glass prisms were arranged in a semicircle, each
+one fixed on a small brass tripod. A strange uncanny-looking instrument
+this, especially as the prisms caught the edge of the glow streaming up
+the turret stair, and shot forth faint beams of coloured light on the
+table below them. Yet the magician's pupils thought it still more
+uncanny and mysterious when their master used it to read the alphabet of
+light, and to discover by vivid lines even the faintest trace of a metal
+otherwise invisible to mortal eye.
+
+For this instrument was the SPECTROSCOPE, by which he could break up
+rays of light and make them tell him from what substances they came.
+Lying around it were other curious prisms mounted in metal rims and
+fitted with tubes and many strange devices, not to be understood by the
+uninitiated, but magical in their effect when fixed on to the telescope
+and used to break up the light of distant stars and nebul�.
+
+Compared with these mysterious glasses the PHOTOGRAPHIC CAMERA, standing
+in the background, with its tall black covering cloth, like a hooded
+monk, looked comparatively natural and familiar, yet it, too, had
+puzzling plates and apparatus on the table near it, which could be
+fitted on to the telescope, so that by their means pictures might be
+taken even in the dark night, and stars, invisible with the strongest
+lens, might be forced to write their own story, and leave their image on
+the plate for after study.
+
+All these instruments told of the magician's power in unveiling the
+secrets of distant space and exploring realms unknown, but in another
+window, now almost hidden in the shadow, stood a fourth and
+highly-prized helpmate, which belonged in one sense more to our earth,
+since everything examined by it had to be brought near, and lie close
+under its magnifying-glass. Yet the MICROSCOPE too could carry its
+master into an unseen world, hidden to mortal eye by minuteness instead
+of by distance. If in the stillness of night the telescope was his most
+cherished servant and familiar friend, the microscope by day opened out
+to him the fairyland of nature.
+
+As he sat on his high pedestal stool on this summer night with the
+moonlight full upon him, his whole attention was centred on the
+telescope, and his mind was far away from that turret-room, wandering
+into the distant space brought so near to him; for he was waiting to
+watch an event which brought some new interest every time it took
+place--a total eclipse of the moon. To-night he looked forward to it
+eagerly, for it happened that, just as the moon would pass into the
+shadow of our earth, it would also cross directly in front of a star,
+causing what is known as an "occultation" of the star, which would
+disappear suddenly behind the rim of the dark moon, and after a short
+time flash out on the other side as the satellite went on its way.
+
+How he wished as he sat there that he could have shown this sight to all
+the eager lads whom he was teaching to handle and love his magic
+glasses. For this magician was not only a student himself, he was a rich
+man and the Founder and Principal of a large public school for boys of
+the artisan class. He had erected a well-planned and handsome building
+in the midst of the open country, and received there, on terms within
+the means of their parents, working-lads from all parts of England, who,
+besides the usual book-learning, received a good technical education in
+all its branches. And, while he left to other masters the regular
+school lessons, he kept for himself the intense pleasure of opening the
+minds of these lads to the wonders of God's universe around them.
+
+You had only to pass down the turret stairs, into the large science
+class-room below, to see at once that a loving hand and heart had
+furnished it. Not only was there every implement necessary for
+scientific work, but numerous rough diagrams covering the walls showed
+that labour as well as money had been spent in decorating them. It was a
+large oblong room, with four windows to the north, and four to the
+south, in each of which stood a microscope with all the tubes, needles,
+forceps, knives, etc., necessary for dissecting and preparing objects;
+and between the windows were open shelves, on which were ranged
+chemicals of various kinds, besides many strange-looking objects in
+bottles, which would have amused a trained naturalist, for the lads
+collected and preserved whatever took their fancy.
+
+On some of the tables were photographic plates laid ready for printing
+off; on others might be seen drawings of the spectrum, made from the
+small spectroscope fixed at one end of the room; on others lay small
+direct spectroscopes which the lads could use for themselves. But
+nowhere was a telescope to be seen. This was not because there were
+none, for each table had its small hand-telescope, cheap but good. The
+truth is that each of these instruments had been spirited away into the
+dormitories that night, and many heads were lying awake on their
+pillows, listening for the strike of the clock to spring out and see
+the eclipse begin.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 1.
+
+A boy illustrating the phases of the moon.]
+
+A mere glance round the room showed that the moon had been much studied
+lately. On the black-board was drawn a rough diagram, showing how a boy
+can illustrate for himself the moon's journey round the earth, by taking
+a ball and holding it a little above his head at arm's length, while he
+turns slowly round on his heel in a darkened room before a lighted lamp,
+or better still before the lens of a magic lantern (Fig. 1). The lamp or
+lens then represents the sun, the ball is the moon, the boy's head is
+the earth. Beginning with the ball between him and the source of light,
+but either a little above, or a little below the direct line between his
+eye and it, he will see only the dark side of the ball, and the moon
+will be on the point of being "new." Then as he turns slowly, a thin
+crescent of light will creep over the side nearest the sun, and by
+degrees encroach more and more, so that when he has turned through one
+quarter of the round half the disc will be light. When he has turned
+another quarter, and has his back to the sun, a full moon will face him.
+Then as he turns on through the third quarter a crescent of darkness
+creeps slowly over the side away from the sun, and gradually the bright
+disc is eaten away by shadow till at the end of the third quarter half
+the disc again only is light; then, when he has turned through another
+quarter and completed the circle, he faces the light again and has a
+dark moon before him. But he must take care to keep the moon a little
+above or a little below his eye at new and full moon. If he brings it
+exactly on a line with himself and the light at new moon, he will shut
+off the light from himself and see the dark body of the ball against the
+light, causing an _eclipse_ of the sun; while if he does the same at
+full moon his head will cast a shadow on the ball causing an _eclipse_
+of the moon.
+
+There were other diagrams showing how and why such eclipses do really
+happen at different times in the moon's path round the earth; but
+perhaps the most interesting of all was one he had made to explain what
+so few people understand, namely, that though the moon describes a
+complete circle round our earth every month, yet she does not describe a
+circle in space, but a wavy line inwards and outwards across the
+earth's path round the sun. This is because the earth is moving on all
+the while, carrying the moon with it, and it is only by seeing it drawn
+before our eyes that we can realise how it happens.
+
+Thus suppose, in order to make the dates as simple as possible, that
+there is a new moon on the 1st of some month. Then by the 9th (or
+roughly speaking in 7� days) the moon will have described a quarter
+of a circle round the earth as shown by the dotted line (Fig. 2), which
+marks her position night after night with regard to us. Yet because she
+is carried onwards all the while by the earth, she will really have
+passed along the interrupted line - - - - between us and the sun. During
+the next week her quarter of a circle will carry her round behind the
+earth, so that we see her on the 17th as a full moon, yet her actual
+movement has been onwards along the interrupted line on the farther side
+of the earth. During the third week she creeps round another quarter of
+a circle so as to be in advance of the earth on its yearly journey round
+the sun, and reaches the end of her third quarter on the 24th. In her
+last quarter she gradually passes again between the earth and the sun;
+and though, as regards the earth, she appears to be going back round to
+the same place where she was at the beginning of the month, and on the
+31st is again a dark new moon, yet she has travelled onwards exactly as
+much as we have, and therefore has really not described a circle in the
+_heavens_ but a wavy line.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 2.
+
+Diagram showing the moon's course during one month. The moon and the
+earth are both moving onwards in the direction of the arrows. The earth
+moves along the dark line, the moon along the interrupted line - - - -.
+The dotted curved line .... shows the circle gradually described by the
+moon round the earth as they move onwards.]
+
+Near to this last diagram hung another, well loved by the lads, for it
+was a large map of the _face_ of the moon, that is of the side which is
+_always_ turned towards us, because the moon turns once on her axis
+during the month that she is travelling round the earth. On this map
+were marked all the different craters, mountains, plains and shining
+streaks which appear on the moon's face; while round the chart were
+pictures of some of these at sunrise and sunset on the moon, or during
+the long day of nearly a fortnight which each part of the face enjoys in
+its turn.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 3.
+
+Chart of the moon.
+
+Craters--
+
+    1 Tycho.        4 Aristarchus.     7 Plato.      10 Petavius.
+    2 Copernicus.   5 Eratosthenes.    8 Eudoxus.    11 Ptolemy.
+    3 Kepler.       6 Archimedes.      9 Aristotle.
+
+Grey plains formerly believed to be seas--
+
+    A Mare Crisium.              O Mare Imbrium.
+    C ---- Frigoris.             Q Oceanus Procellarum.
+    G ---- Tranquillitatis.      X Mare Foecunditatis.
+    H ---- Serenitatis.          T ---- Humorum.]
+
+By studying this map, and the pictures, they were able, even in their
+small telescopes, to recognise Tycho and Copernicus, and the mountains
+of the moon, after they had once grown accustomed to the strange
+changes in their appearance which take place as daylight or darkness
+creeps over them. They could not however pick out more than some of the
+chief points. Only the magician himself knew every crater and ridge
+under all its varying lights, and now, as he waited for the eclipse to
+begin, he turned to a lad who stood behind him, almost hidden in the
+dark shadow--the one fortunate boy who had earned the right to share
+this night's work.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 3_a_.
+
+The full moon. (From Ball's _Starland_.)]
+
+"We have still half an hour, Alwyn," said he, "before the eclipse will
+begin, and I can show you the moon's face well to-night. Take my place
+here and look at her while I point out the chief features. See first,
+there are the grey plains (A, C, G, etc.) lying chiefly in the lower
+half of the moon. You can often see these on a clear night with the
+naked eye, but you must remember that then they appear more in the upper
+part, because in the telescope we see the moon's face inverted or upside
+down.
+
+"These plains were once thought to be oceans, but are now proved to be
+dry flat regions situated at different levels on the moon, and much like
+what deserts and prairies would appear on our earth if seen from the
+same distance. Looking through the telescope, is it not difficult to
+imagine how people could ever have pictured them as a man's face? But
+not so difficult to understand how some ancient nations thought the moon
+was a kind of mirror, in which our earth was reflected as in a
+looking-glass, with its seas and rivers, mountains and valleys; for it
+does look something like a distant earth, and as the light upon it is
+really reflected from the sun it was very natural to compare it to a
+looking-glass.
+
+"Next cast your eye over the hundreds of craters, some large, others
+quite small, which cover the moon's face with pitted marks, like a man
+with small-pox; while a few of the larger rings look like holes made in
+a window-pane, where a stone has passed through, for brilliant shining
+streaks radiate from them on all sides like the rays of a star, covering
+a large part of the moon. Brightest of all these starred craters is
+Tycho, which you will easily find near the top of the moon (I, Fig. 3),
+for you have often seen it in the small telescope. How grand it looks
+to-night in the full moon (Fig. 3_a_)! It is true you see all the
+craters better when the moon is in her quarters, because the light falls
+sideways upon them and the shadows are more sharply defined; yet even at
+the full the bright ray of light on Tycho's rim marks out the huge
+cavity, and you can even see faintly the magnificent terraces which run
+round the cup within, one below the other."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 4.
+
+Tycho and his surroundings. (From a photograph of the moon taken by Mr.
+De la Rue, 1863.)]
+
+"This cavity measures fifty-four miles across, so that if it could be
+moved down to our earth it would cover by far the largest part of
+Devonshire, or that portion from Bideford on the north, to the sea on
+the south, and from the borders of Cornwall on the east, to Exeter on
+the west, and it is 17,000 feet or nearly three miles in depth. Even in
+the brilliant light of the full moon this enormous cup is dark compared
+to the bright rim, but it is much better seen in about the middle of the
+second quarter, when the rising sun begins to light up one side while
+the other is in black night. The drawing on the wall (Fig. 4), which is
+taken from an actual photograph of the moon's face, shows Tycho at this
+time surrounded by the numerous other craters which cover this part of
+the moon. You may recognise him by the gleaming peak in the centre of
+the cup, and by his bright rim which is so much more perfect than those
+of his companions. The gleaming peak is the top of a steep cone or hill
+rising up 6000 feet, or more than a mile from the base of the crater, so
+that even the summit is about two miles below the rim.
+
+"There is one very interesting point in Tycho, however, which is seen at
+its very best at full moon. Look outside the bright rim and you will see
+that from the shadow which surrounds it there spring on all sides those
+strange brilliant streaks (see Fig. 3_a_) which I spoke of just now.
+There are others quite as bright, or even brighter, round other craters,
+Copernicus (Fig. 6), Kepler, and Aristarchus, lower down on the
+right-hand side of the moon; but these of Tycho are far the most widely
+spread, covering almost all the top of the face.
+
+"What are these streaks? We do not know. During the second quarter of
+the moon, when the sun is rising slowly upon Tycho, lighting up his
+peak and showing the crater beautifully divided into a bright cup in the
+curve to the right, while a dense shadow lies in the left hollow, these
+streaks are only faint, and among the many craters around (see Fig. 4)
+you might even have some difficulty at first in finding the well-known
+giant. But as the sun rises higher and higher they begin to appear, and
+go on increasing in brightness till they shine with that wonderfully
+silvery light you see now in the full moon."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 5.
+
+Plan of the Peak of Teneriffe, showing how it resembles a lunar crater.
+(A. Geikie.)]
+
+"Here is a problem for you young astronomers to solve, as we learn more
+and more how to use the telescope with all its new appliances."
+
+The crater itself is not so difficult to explain, for we have many like
+it on our earth, only not nearly so large. In fact, we might almost say
+that our earthly volcanoes differ from those in the moon only by their
+smaller size and by forming _mountains_ with the crater or cup on the
+top; while the lunar craters lie flat on the surface of the moon, the
+hollow of the cup forming a depression below it. The peak of Teneriffe
+(Fig. 5), which is a dormant volcano, is a good copy in miniature on our
+earth of many craters on the moon. The large plain surrounded by a high
+rocky wall, broken in places by lava streams, the smaller craters
+nestling in the cup, and the high peak or central crater rising up far
+above the others, are so like what we see on the moon that we cannot
+doubt that the same causes have been at work in both cases, even though
+the space enclosed in the rocky wall of Teneriffe measures only eight
+miles across, while that of Tycho measures fifty-four.
+
+"But of the streaks we have no satisfactory explanation. They pass alike
+over plain and valley and mountain, cutting even across other craters
+without swerving from their course. The astronomer Nasmyth thought they
+were the remains of cracks made when the volcanoes were active, and
+filled with molten lava from below, as water oozes up through ice-cracks
+on a pond. But this explanation is not quite satisfactory, for the lava,
+forcing its way through, would cool in ridges which ought to cast a
+shadow in sunlight. These streaks, however, not only cast no shadow, as
+you can see at the full moon but when the sun shines sideways upon them
+in the new or waning moon they disappear as we have seen altogether.
+Thus the streaks, so brilliant at full moon in Tycho, Copernicus,
+Kepler, and Aristarchus, remain a puzzle to astronomers still."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 6.
+
+The crater Copernicus. (As given in Herschel's _Astronomy_, from a
+drawing taken in a reflecting telescope of 20 feet focal length.)]
+
+"We cannot examine these three last-named craters well to-night with the
+full sun upon them; but mark their positions well, for Copernicus, at
+least, you must examine on the first opportunity, when the sun is
+rising upon it in the moon's second quarter. It is larger even than
+Tycho, measuring fifty-six miles across, and has a hill in the centre
+with many peaks; while outside, great spurs or ridges stretch in all
+directions sometimes for more than a hundred miles, and between these
+are scattered innumerable minute craters. But the most striking feature
+in it is the ring, which is composed inside the crater of magnificent
+terraces divided by deep ravines. These terraces are in some ways very
+like those of the great crater of Teneriffe, and astronomers can best
+account for them by supposing that this immense crater was once filled
+with a lake of molten lava rising, cooling at the edges, and then
+falling again, leaving the solid ridge behind. The streaks are also
+beautifully shown in Copernicus (see Fig. 6), but, as in Tycho, they
+fade away as the sun sets on the crater, and only reappear gradually as
+midday approaches.
+
+"And now, looking a little to the left of Copernicus, you will see that
+grand range of mountains, the Lunar Apennines (Fig. 7), which stretches
+400 miles across the face of the moon. Other mountain ranges we could
+find, but none so like mountains on our own globe as these, with their
+gentle sunny slope down to a plain on the left, and steep perpendicular
+cliffs on the right. The highest peak in this range, called Huyghens,
+rises to the height of 21,000 feet, higher than Chimborazo in the Andes.
+Other mountains on the moon, such as those called the Caucasus, south of
+the Apennines, are composed of disconnected peaks, while others again
+stand as solitary pyramids upon the plains."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 7.
+
+The Lunar Apennines.
+
+(Copied by kind permission of MM. Henri from part of a magnificent
+photograph taken by them, March 29, 1890, at the Paris Observatory.)]
+
+"But we must hasten on, for I want you to observe those huge walled
+crater-plains which have no hill in the middle, but smooth steel-grey
+centres shining like mirrors in the moonlight. One of these, called
+Archimedes, you will find just below the Lunar Apennines (Figs. 3 and
+7), and another called Plato, which is sixty miles broad, is still lower
+down the moon's face (Figs. 3 and 8). The centres of these broad
+circles are curiously smooth and shining like quicksilver, with minute
+dots here and there which are miniature craters, while the walls are
+rugged and crowned with turret-shaped peaks."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 8.
+
+The crater Plato as seen soon after sunrise. (After Neison.)]
+
+"It is easy to picture to oneself how these may once have been vast seas
+of lava, not surging as in Copernicus, and heaving up as it cooled into
+one great central cone, but seething as molten lead does in a crucible,
+little bubbles bursting here and there into minute craters; and this is
+the explanation given of them by astronomers.
+
+"And now that you have seen the curious rugged face of the moon and its
+craters and mountains, you will want to know how all this has come
+about. We can only form theories on the point, except that everything
+shows that heat and volcanoes have in some way done the work, though no
+one has ever yet clearly proved that volcanic eruptions have taken place
+in our time. We must look back to ages long gone by for those mighty
+volcanic eruptions which hurled out stones and ashes from the great
+crater of Tycho, and formed the vast seas of lava in Copernicus and
+Plato.
+
+"And when these were over, and the globe was cooling down rapidly, so
+that mountain ranges were formed by the wrinkling and rending of the
+surface, was there then any life on the moon? Who can tell? Our magic
+glasses can reveal what now is, so far as distance will allow; but what
+has been, except where the rugged traces remain, we shall probably never
+know. What we now see is a dead worn-out planet, on which we cannot
+certainly trace any activity except that of heat in the past. That there
+is no life there now, at any rate of the kind on our own earth, we are
+almost certain; first, because we can nowhere find traces of water,
+clouds, nor even mist, and without moisture no life like ours is
+possible; and secondly, because even if there is, as perhaps there may
+be, a thin ocean of gas round the moon there is certainly no atmosphere
+such as surrounds our globe.
+
+"One fact which proves this is, that there are no half-shadows on the
+moon. If you look some night at the mountains and craters during her
+first and second quarters, you will be startled to see what heavy
+shadows they cast, not with faint edges dying away into light, but sharp
+and hard (see Figs. 6-8), so that you pass, as it were by one step, from
+shadow to sunshine. This in itself is enough to show that there is no
+air to scatter the sunlight and spread it into the edges of the shade as
+happens on our earth; but there are other and better proofs. One of
+these is, that during an eclipse of the sun there is no reflection of
+his light round the dark moon as there would be if the moon had an
+atmosphere; another is that the spectroscope, that wonderful instrument
+which shows us invisible gases, gives no hint of air around the moon;
+and another is the sudden disappearance or _occultation_ of a star
+behind the moon, such as I hope to see in a few minutes.
+
+"See here! take the small hand telescope and turn it on to the moon's
+face while I take my place at the large one, and I will tell you what to
+look for. You know that at sunset we see the sun for some time after it
+has dipped below the horizon, because the rays of light which come from
+it are bent in our atmosphere and brought to our eyes, forming in them
+the image of the sun which is already gone. Now in a short time the moon
+which we are watching will be darkened by our earth coming between it
+and the sun, and while it is quite dark it will pass over a little
+bright star. In fact to us the star will appear to set behind the dark
+moon as the sun sets below the horizon, and if the moon had an
+atmosphere like ours, the rays from the star would be bent in it and
+reach our eyes after the star was gone, so that it would only disappear
+gradually. Astronomers have always observed, however, that the star is
+lost to sight quite suddenly, showing that there is no ocean of air
+round the moon to bend the light-rays."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 9.
+
+Diagram of total eclipse of the moon.
+
+S, Sun. E, Earth. M, Moon passing into the earth's shadow and passing
+out at M�.
+
+R, R�, Lines meeting at a point U, U� behind the earth and enclosing a
+space within which all the direct rays of the sun are intercepted by the
+earth, causing a black darkness or _umbra_.
+
+R, P and R�, P�, Lines marking a space within which, behind the earth,
+part of the sun's rays are cut off, causing a half-shadow or _penumbra_,
+P, P�.
+
+_a_, _a_, Points where a few of the sun's rays are bent or refracted in
+the earth's atmosphere, so that they pass along the path marked by the
+dotted lines and shed a lurid light on the sun's face.]
+
+Here the magician paused, for a slight dimness on the lower right-hand
+side of the moon warned him that she was entering into the _penumbra_ or
+half-shadow (see Fig. 9) caused by the earth cutting off part of the
+sun's rays; and soon a deep black shadow creeping over Aristarchus and
+Plato showed that she was passing into that darker space or _umbra_
+where the body of the earth is completely between her and the sun and
+cuts off all his rays. All, did I say? No! not all. For now was seen a
+beautiful sight, which would prove to any one who saw our earth from a
+great distance that it has a deep ocean of air round it.
+
+It was a clear night, with a cloudless sky, and as the deep shadow crept
+slowly over the moon's face, covering the Lunar Apennines and
+Copernicus, and stealing gradually across the brilliant streaks of Tycho
+till the crater itself was swallowed up in darkness, a strange lurid
+light began to appear. The part of the moon which was eclipsed was not
+wholly dark, but tinted with a very faint bluish-green light, which
+changed almost imperceptibly, as the eclipse went on, to rose-red, and
+then to a fiery copper-coloured glow as the moon crept entirely into the
+shadow and became all dark. The lad watching through his small telescope
+noted this weird light, and wondered, as he saw the outlines of the
+Apennines and of several craters dimly visible by it, though the moon
+was totally eclipsed. He noted, but was silent. He would not disturb the
+Principal, for the important moment was at hand, as this dark
+copper-coloured moon, now almost invisible, drew near to the star over
+which it was to pass.
+
+This little star, really a glorious sun billions of miles away behind
+the moon, was perhaps the centre of another system of worlds as unknown
+to us as we to them, and the fact of our tiny moon crossing between it
+and our earth would matter as little as if a grain of sand was blown
+across the heavens. Yet to the watchers it was a great matter--would the
+star give any further clue to the question of an atmosphere round the
+moon? Would its light linger even for a moment, like the light of the
+setting sun? Nearer and nearer came the dark moon; the star shone
+brilliantly against its darkness; one second and it was gone. The long
+looked-for moment had passed, and the magician turned from his
+instrument with a sigh. "I have learnt nothing new, Alwyn," said he,
+"but at least it is satisfactory to have seen for ourselves the proof
+that there is no perceptible atmosphere round the moon. We need wait no
+longer, for before the star reappears on the other side the eclipse will
+be passing away."
+
+"But, master," burst forth the lad, now the silence was broken, "tell me
+why did that strange light of many tints shine upon the dark moon?"
+
+"Did you notice it, Alwyn?" said the Principal, with a pleased smile.
+"Then our evening's work is not lost, for you have made a real
+observation for yourself. That light was caused by the few rays of the
+sun which grazed the edge of our earth passing through the ocean of air
+round it (see Fig. 9). There they were refracted or bent, and so were
+thrown within the shadow cast by our earth, and fell upon the moon. If
+there were such a person as a 'man in the moon,' that lurid light would
+prove to him that our earth has an atmosphere. The cause of the tints is
+the same which gives us our sunset colours, because as the different
+coloured waves which make white light are absorbed one by one, passing
+through the denser atmosphere, the blue are cut off first, then the
+green, then the yellow, till only the orange and red rays reached the
+centre of the shadow, where the moon was darkest. But this is too
+difficult a subject to begin at midnight."
+
+So saying, he lighted his lamp, and covering the object-glass of his
+telescope with its pasteboard cap, detached the instrument from the
+clockwork, and the master and his pupil went down the turret stairs and
+past through the room below. As they did so they heard in the distance a
+scuffling noise like that of rats in the wall. A smile passed over the
+face of the Principal, for he knew that his young pupils, who had been
+making their observations in the gallery above, were hurrying back to
+their beds.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+MAGIC GLASSES, AND HOW TO USE THEM
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The sun shone brightly into the science class-room at mid-day. No gaunt
+shadows nor ghostly moonlight now threw a spell on the magic chamber
+above. The instruments looked bright and business-like, and the
+Principal, moving amongst them, heard the subdued hum of fifty or more
+voices rising from below. It was the lecture hour, and the subject for
+the day was, "Magic glasses, and how to use them." As the large clock in
+the hall sounded twelve, the Principal gathered up a few stray lenses
+and prisms he had selected, and passed down the turret stair to his
+platform. Behind him were arranged his diagrams, before him on the table
+stood various instruments, and the rows of bright faces beyond looked up
+with one consent as the hum quieted down and he began his lecture.
+
+"I have often told you, boys, have I not? that I am a Magician. In my
+chamber near the sky I work spells as did the magicians of old, and by
+the help of my magic glasses I peer into the secrets of nature. Thus I
+read the secrets of the distant stars; I catch the light of wandering
+comets, and make it reveal its origin; I penetrate into the whirlpools
+of the sun; I map out the craters of the moon. Nor can the tiniest being
+on earth hide itself from me. Where others see only a drop of muddy
+water, that water brought into my magic chamber teems with thousands of
+active bodies, darting here and whirling there amid a meadow of tiny
+green plants floating in the water. Nay, my inquisitive glass sees even
+farther than this, for with it I can watch the eddies of water and green
+atoms going on in each of these tiny beings as they feed and grow.
+Again, if I want to break into the secrets of the rock at my feet, I
+have only to put a thin slice of it under my microscope to trace every
+crystal and grain; or, if I wish to learn still more, I subject it to
+fiery heat, and through the magic prisms of my spectroscope I read the
+history of the very substances of which it is composed. If I wish to
+study the treasures of the wide ocean, the slime from a rock-pool teems
+with fairy forms darting about in the live box imprisoned in a crystal
+home. If some distant stars are invisible even in the giant glasses of
+my telescope, I set another power to work, and make them print their own
+image on a photographic plate and so reveal their presence.
+
+"All these things you have seen through my magic glasses, and I
+promised you that one day I would explain to you how they work and do my
+bidding. But I must warn you that you must give all your attention;
+there is no royal road to my magician's power. Every one can attain to
+it, but only by taking trouble. You must open your eyes and ears, and
+use your intelligence to test carefully what your senses show you.
+
+"We have only to consider a little to see that we depend entirely upon
+our senses for our knowledge of the outside world. All kinds of things
+are going on around us, about which we know nothing, because our eyes
+are not keen enough to see, and our ears not sharp enough to hear them.
+Most of all we enjoy and study nature through our eyes, those windows
+which let in to us the light of heaven, and with it the lovely sights
+and scenes of earth; and which are no ordinary windows, but most
+wonderful structures adapted for conveying images to the brain. They are
+of very different power in different people, so that a long-sighted
+person sees a lovely landscape where a short-sighted one sees only a
+confused mist; while a short-sighted person can see minute things close
+to the eye better than a long-sighted one."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 10.
+
+Eye-ball seen from the front. (After Le Gros Clark.)
+
+_w_, White of eye. _i_, Iris. _p_, Pupil.]
+
+"Let us try to understand this before we go on to artificial glasses,
+for it will help us to explain how these glasses show us many things we
+could never see without them. Here are two pictures of the human eyeball
+(Figs. 10 and 11), one as it appears from the front, and the other as we
+should see the parts if we cut an eyeball across from the front to the
+back. From these drawings we see that the eyeball is round; it only
+looks oval, because it is seen through the oval slit of the eyelids.
+It is really a hard, shining, white ball with a thick nerve cord
+(_on_, Fig. 11) passing out at the back, and a dark glassy mound
+_c_, _c_ in the centre of the white in front. In this mound we can
+easily distinguish two parts--first, the coloured _iris_ or elastic
+curtain (_i_, Fig. 10); and secondly, the dark spot or pupil _p_ in the
+centre. The iris is the part which gives the eye its colour; it is
+composed of a number of fibres, the outer ones radiating towards the
+centre, the inner ones forming a ring round the pupil; and behind these
+fibres is a coat of dark pigment or colouring matter, blue in some
+people, grey, brown, or black in others. When the light is very strong,
+and would pain the nerves inside if too much entered the pupil or window
+of the eye, then the ring of the iris contracts so as partly to close
+the opening. When there is very little light, and it is necessary to let
+in as much as possible, the ring expands and the pupil grows large. The
+best way to observe this is to look at a cat's eyes in the dusk, and
+then bring her near to a bright light; for the iris of a cat's eye
+contracts and expands much more than ours does."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 11.
+
+Section of an eye looking at a pencil. (Adapted from Kirke.)
+
+_c_, _c_, Cornea. _w_, White of eye. _cm_, Ciliary muscle. _a_, _a_,
+Aqueous humour. _i_, _i_, Iris. _l_, _l_, Lens. _r_, _r_, Retina. _on_,
+Optic nerve. 1, 2, Pencil. 1�, 2�, Image of pencil on the retina.]
+
+"Now look at the second diagram (Fig. 11) and notice the chief points
+necessary in seeing. First you will observe that the pupil is not a mere
+hole; it is protected by a curved covering _c_. This is the cornea, a
+hard, perfectly transparent membrane, looking much like a curved
+watch-glass. Behind this is a small chamber filled with a watery fluid
+_a_, called the aqueous humour, and near the back of this chamber is the
+dark ring or iris _i_, which you saw from the front through the cornea
+and fluid. Close behind the iris again is the natural 'magic glass' of
+our eye, the crystalline lens _l_, which is composed of perfectly
+transparent fibres and has two rounded or convex surfaces like an
+ordinary magnifying glass. This lens rests on a cushion of a soft
+jelly-like substance _v_, called the vitreous humour, which fills the
+dark chamber or cavity of the eyeball and keeps it in shape, so that the
+retina _r_, which lines the chamber, is kept at a proper distance from
+the lens. This retina is a transparent film of very sensitive nerves; it
+forms a screen at the back of the chamber, and has a coating of very
+dark pigment or colouring matter behind it. Lastly, the nerves of the
+retina all meet in a bundle, called the optic nerve, and passing out of
+the eyeball at a point _on_, go to the brain. These are the chief parts
+we use in seeing; now how do we use them?
+
+"Suppose that a pencil is held in front of the eye at the distance at
+which we see small objects comfortably. Light is reflected from all
+parts of the surface of the pencil, and as the rays spread, a certain
+number enter the pupil of the eye. We will follow only two cones of
+light coming from the points 1 and 2 on the diagram Fig. 11. These you
+see enter the eye, each widely spread over the cornea _c_. They are bent
+in a little by this curved covering, and by the liquid behind it, while
+the iris cuts off the rays near the edges of the lens, which would be
+too much bent to form a clear image. The rest of the rays fall upon the
+lens _l_. In passing through this lens they are very much bent (or
+_refracted_) towards each other, so much so that by the time they reach
+the end of the dark chamber _v_, each cone of light has come to a point
+or focus 1�, 2�, and as rays of this kind have come from every point all
+over the pencil, exactly similar points are formed on the retina, and a
+real picture of the pencil is formed there between 1� and 2�."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 12.
+
+Image of a candle-flame thrown on paper by a lens.]
+
+"We will make a very simple and pretty experiment to illustrate this.
+Darkening the room I light a candle, take a square of white paper in my
+hand, and hold a simple magnifying glass between the two (see Fig. 12)
+about three inches away from the candle. Then I shift the paper nearer
+and farther behind the lens, till we get a clear image of the
+candle-flame upon it. This is exactly what happens in our eye. I have
+drawn a dotted line _c_ round the lens and the paper on the diagram to
+represent the eyeball in which the image of the candle-flame would be on
+the retina instead of on the piece of paper. The first point you will
+notice is that the candle-flame is upside down on the paper, and if you
+turn back to Fig. 11 you will see why, for it is plain that the cones of
+light _cross_ in the lens _l_, 1 going to 1� and 2 to 2�. Every picture
+made on our retina is upside down.
+
+"But it is not there that we see it. As soon as the points of light from
+the pencil strike upon the retina, the thrill passes on along the optic
+nerve _on_, through the back of the eye to the brain; and our mind,
+following back the rays exactly as they have come through the lens, sees
+a pencil, outside the eye, right way upwards.
+
+"This is how we see with our eyes, which adjust themselves most
+beautifully to our needs. For example, not only is the iris always ready
+to expand or contract according as we need more or less light, but there
+is a special muscle, called the ciliary muscle (_cm_, Fig. 11), which
+alters the lens for us to see things far or near. In all, or nearly all,
+perfect eyes the lens is flatter in front than behind, and this enables
+us to see things far off by bringing the rays from them exactly to a
+focus on the retina. But when we look at nearer things the rays require
+to be more bent or refracted, so without any conscious effort on our
+part this ciliary muscle contracts and allows the lens to bulge out
+slightly in front. Instantly we have a stronger magnifier, and the rays
+are brought to the right focus on the retina, so that a clear and
+full-size image of the near object is formed. How little we think, as we
+turn our eyes from one thing to another, and observe, now the distant
+hills, now the sheep feeding close by; or, as night draws on, gaze into
+limitless space and see the stars millions upon millions of miles away,
+that at every moment the focus of our eye is altering, the iris is
+contracting or expanding, and myriads of images are being formed one
+after the other in that little dark chamber, through which pass all the
+scenes of the outer world!
+
+"Yet even this wonderful eye cannot show us everything. Some see farther
+than others, some see more minutely than others, according as the lens
+of the eye is flatter in one person and more rounded in another. But the
+most long-sighted person could never have discovered the planet Neptune,
+more than 2700 millions of miles distant from us, nor could the
+keenest-sighted have known of the existence of those minute and
+beautiful little plants, called diatoms, which live around us wherever
+water is found, and form delicate flint skeletons so infinitesimally
+small that thousands of millions go to form one cubic inch of the stone
+called tripoli, found at Bilin in Bohemia."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 13.
+
+Arrow magnified by a convex lens.
+
+_a_, _b_, Real arrow. C, D, Magnifying-glass. A, B, Enlarged image of
+the arrow.]
+
+"It is here that our 'magic glasses' come to our assistance, and reveal
+to us what was before invisible. We learnt just now that we see near
+things by the lens of our eye becoming more rounded in front; but there
+comes a point beyond which the lens cannot bulge any more, so that when
+a thing is very tiny, and would have to be held very close to the eye
+for us to see it, the lens can no longer collect the rays to a focus, so
+we see nothing but a blur. More than 800 years ago an Arabian, named
+Alhazen, explained why rounded or convex glasses make things appear
+larger when placed before the eye. This glass which I hold in my hand
+is a simple magnifying-glass, such as we used for focusing the
+candle-flame. It bends the rays inwards from any small object (see the
+arrow _a_, _b_, Fig. 13) so that the lens of our eye can use them, and
+then, as we follow out the rays in straight lines to the place where we
+see clearly (at A, B), every point of the object is magnified, and we
+not only see it much larger, but every mark upon it is much more
+distinct. You all know how the little shilling magnifying-glasses you
+carry show the most lovely and delicate structures in flowers, on the
+wings of butterflies, on the head of a bee or fly, and, in fact, in all
+minute living things."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 14.
+
+Student's microscope. _ep_, Eye-piece. _o_, _g_, Object-glass.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 15.
+
+Skeleton of a microscope, showing how an object is magnified.
+
+_o_, _l_, Object-lens. _e_, _g_, Eye-glass. _s_, _s_, Spicule.
+_s�_, _s�_, Magnified image of same in the tube. S, S, Image again
+enlarged by the lens of the eye-piece.]
+
+"But this is only our first step. Those diatoms we spoke of just now
+will only look like minute specks under even the strongest
+magnifying-glass. So we pass on to use two extra lenses to assist our
+eyes, and come to this compound microscope (Fig. 14) through which I
+have before now shown you the delicate markings on shells which were
+themselves so minute that you could not see them with the naked eye. Now
+we have to discover how the microscope performs this feat. Going back
+again for a minute to our candle and magnifying-glass (Fig. 12), you
+will find that the nearer you put the lens to the candle the farther
+away you will have to put the paper to get a clear image. When in a
+microscope we put a powerful lens _o_, _l_ close down to a very minute
+object, say a spicule of a flint sponge _s_, _s_, quite invisible to the
+unaided eye, the rays from this spicule are brought to a focus a long
+way behind it at _s�_, _s�_, making an enlarged image because the lines
+of light have been diverging ever since they crossed in the lens. If you
+could put a piece of paper at _s�_ _s�_, as you did in the candle
+experiment, you would see the actual image of the magnified spicule upon
+it. But as these points of light are only in an empty tube, they pass
+on, spreading out again from the image, as they did before from the
+spicule. Then another convex lens or eye-glass _e_, _g_ is put at the
+top of the microscope at the proper distance to bend these rays so that
+they enter our eye in nearly parallel lines, exactly as we saw in the
+ordinary magnifying-glass (Fig. 13), and our crystalline lens can then
+bring them to a focus on our retina.
+
+"By this time the spicule has been twice magnified; or, in other words,
+the rays of light coming from it have been twice bent towards each
+other, so that when our eye follows them out in straight lines they are
+widely spread, and we see every point of light so clearly that all the
+spots and markings on this minute spicule are as clear as if it were
+really as large as it looks to us.
+
+"This is simply the principle of the microscope. When you come to look
+at your own instruments, though they are very ordinary ones, you will
+find that the object-glass _o_, _l_ is made of three lenses, flat on the
+side nearest the tube, and each lens is composed of two kinds of glass
+in order to correct the unequal refraction of the rays, and prevent
+fringes of colour appearing at the edge of the lens. Then again the
+eye-piece will be a short tube with a lens at each end, and halfway
+between them a black ledge will be seen inside the tube which acts like
+the iris of our eye (_i_, Fig. 11) and cuts off the rays passing through
+the edges of the lens. All these are devices to correct faults in the
+microscope which our eye corrects for itself, and they have enabled
+opticians to make very powerful lenses.
+
+"Look now at the diagram (Fig. 16) showing a group of diatoms which you
+can see under the microscope after the lecture. Notice the lovely
+patterns, the delicate tracery, and the fine lines on the diatoms shown
+there. Yet each of these minute flint skeletons, if laid on a piece of
+glass by itself, would be quite invisible to the naked eye, while
+hundreds of them together only look like a faint mist on the slide on
+which they lie. Nor are they even here shown as much magnified as they
+might be; under a stronger power we should see those delicate lines on
+the diatoms broken up into minute round cups."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 16.
+
+Fossil diatoms seen under the microscope. The largest of these is an
+almost imperceptible speck to the naked eye.]
+
+"Is it not wonderful and delightful to think that we are able to add in
+this way to the power of our eyes, till it seems as if there were no
+limit to the hidden beauties of the minute forms of our earth, if only
+we can discover them?
+
+"But our globe does not stand alone in the universe, and we want not
+only to learn all about everything we find upon it, but also to look out
+into the vast space around us and discover as much as we can about the
+myriads of suns and planets, comets and meteorites, star-mists and
+nebul�, which are to be found there. Even with the naked eye we can
+admire the grand planet Saturn, which is more than 800 millions of miles
+away, and this in itself is very marvellous. Who would have thought that
+our tiny crystalline lens would be able to catch and focus rays, sent
+all this enormous distance, so as actually to make a picture on our
+retina of a planet, which, like the moon, is only sending back to us the
+light of the sun? For, remember, the rays which come to us from Saturn
+must have travelled twice 800 millions of miles--884 millions from the
+sun to the planet, and less or more from the planet back to us,
+according to our position at the time. But this is as nothing when
+compared to the enormous distances over which light travels from the
+stars to us. Even the nearest star we know of, is at least twenty
+_millions_ of _millions_ of miles away, and the light from it, though
+travelling at the rate of 186,300 miles in a second, takes four years
+and four months to reach us, while the light from others, which we can
+see without a telescope, is between twenty and thirty years on its road.
+Does not the thought fill us with awe, that our little eye should be
+able to span such vast distances?
+
+"But we are not yet nearly at the end of our wonder, for the same power
+which devised our eye gave us also the mind capable of inventing an
+instrument which increases the strength of that eye till we can actually
+see stars so far off that their light takes _two thousand years_ coming
+to our globe. If the microscope delights us in helping us to see things
+invisible without it, because they are so small, surely the telescope is
+fascinating beyond all other magic glasses when we think that it brings
+heavenly bodies, thousands of billions of miles away, so close to us
+that we can examine them."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 17.
+
+An astronomical telescope.
+
+_ep_, Eye-piece. _og_, Object-glass. _f_, Finder.]
+
+"A Telescope (Fig. 17) can, like the microscope, be made of only two
+glasses: an object-glass to form an image in the tube and a magnifying
+eye-piece to enlarge it. But there is this difference, that the object
+lens of a microscope is put close down to a minute object, so that the
+rays fall upon it at a wide angle, and the image formed in the tube is
+very much larger than the object outside. In the telescope, on the
+contrary, the thing we look at is far off, so that the rays fall on the
+object-glass at such a very narrow angle as to be practically parallel,
+and the image in the tube is of course _very, very_ much smaller than
+the house, or church, or planet it pictures. What the object-glass of
+the telescope does for us, is to bring a small _real image_ of an object
+very far off close to us in the tube of the telescope so that we can
+examine it.
+
+"Think for a moment what this means. Imagine that star we spoke of (p.
+41), whose light, travelling 186,300 miles in one second, still takes
+2000 years to reach us. Picture the tiny waves of light crossing the
+countless billions of miles of space during those two thousand years,
+and reaching us so widely spread out that the few faint rays which
+strike our eye are quite useless, and for us that star has no existence;
+we cannot see it. Then go and ask the giant telescope, by turning the
+object-glass in the direction where that star lies in infinite space.
+The widespread rays are collected and come to a minute bright image in
+the dark tube. You put the eye-piece to this image, and there, under
+your eye, is a shining point: this is the image of the star, which
+otherwise would be lost to you in the mighty distance.
+
+"Can any magic tale be more marvellous, or any thought grander, or more
+sublime than this? From my little chamber, by making use of the laws of
+light, which are the same wherever we turn, we can penetrate into depths
+so vast that we are not able even to measure them, and bring back unseen
+stars to tell us the secrets of the mighty universe. As far as the stars
+are concerned, whether we see them or not depends entirely upon the
+number of rays collected by the object-glass; for at such enormous
+distances the rays have no angle that we can measure, and magnify as
+you will, the brightest star only remains a point of light. It is in
+order to collect enough rays that astronomers have tried to have larger
+and larger object-glasses; so that while a small good hand telescope,
+such as you use, may have an object-glass measuring only an inch and a
+quarter across, some of the giant telescopes have lenses of two and a
+half feet, or thirty inches, diameter. These enormous lenses are very
+difficult to make and manage, and have many faults, therefore
+astronomical telescopes are often made with curved mirrors to _reflect_
+the rays, and bring them to a focus instead of _refracting_ them as
+curved lenses do.
+
+"We see, then, that one very important use of the telescope is to bring
+objects into view which otherwise we would never see; for, as I have
+already said, though we bring the stars into sight, we cannot magnify
+them. But whenever an object is near enough for the rays to fall even at
+a very small perceptible angle on the object-glass, then we can magnify
+them; and the longer the telescope, and the stronger the eye-piece, the
+more the object is magnified.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 18.
+
+Skeletons of telescopes.
+
+A, A one-foot telescope with a three-inch eye-piece. B, A two-foot
+telescope with a three-inch eye-piece. _e_, _p_, Eye-piece. _o_, _g_,
+Object-glass. _r_, _r_, Rays which enter the telescopes and crossing at
+_x_ form an image at _i_, _i_, which is magnified by the lens _e_, _p_.
+The angles _r_, _x_, _r_ and _i_, _x_, _i_ are the same. In A the angle
+_i_, _o_, _i_ is four times greater than that of _i_, _x_, _i_. In B it
+is eight times greater.]
+
+"I want you to understand the meaning of this, for it is really very
+simple, only it requires a little thought. Here are skeleton drawings of
+two telescopes (Fig. 18), one double the length of the other. Let us
+suppose that two people are using them to look at an arrow on a
+weathercock a long distance off. The rays of light _r_, _r_ from the
+two ends of the arrow will enter both telescopes at the same angle
+_r_, _x_, _r_, cross in the lens, and pass on at _exactly the same
+angle_ into the tubes. So far all is alike, but now comes the
+difference. In the short telescope A the object-glass must be of such a
+curve as to bring the cones of light in each ray to a focus at a
+distance of _one foot_ behind it,[1] and there a small image _i_, _i_ of
+the arrow is formed. But B being twice the length, allows the lens
+to be less curved, and the image to be formed _two feet_ behind the
+object-glass; and as the rays _r_, _r_ have been _diverging_ ever since
+they crossed at _x_, the real image of the arrow formed at _i_, _i_ is
+twice the size of the same image in A. Nevertheless, if you could put a
+piece of paper at _i_, _i_ in both telescopes, and look through the
+_object-glass_ (which you cannot actually do, because your head would
+block out the rays), the arrow would appear the same size in both
+telescopes, because one would be twice as far off from you as the other,
+and the angle _i_, _x_, _i_ is the same in both."
+
+  [1] In our Fig. 18 the distances are inches instead of feet, but the
+  proportions are the same.
+
+"But by going to the proper end of the telescope you can get quite near
+the image, and can see and magnify it, if you put a strong lens to
+collect the rays from it to a focus. This is the use of the eye-piece,
+which in our diagram is placed at a quarter of a foot or three inches
+from the image in both telescopes. Now that we are close to the images,
+the divergence of the points _i_, _i_ makes a great difference. In the
+small telescope, in which the image is only _one foot_ behind the
+object-glass, the eye-piece being a quarter of a foot from it, is four
+times nearer, so the angle _i_, _o_, _i_ is four times the angle
+_i_, _x_, _i_, and the man looking through it sees the image magnified
+_four times_. But in the longer telescope the image is _two feet_ behind
+the lens, while the eye-piece is, as before, a quarter of a foot from
+it. Thus the eyepiece is now eight times nearer, so the angle
+_i_, _o_, _i_ is eight times the angle _i_, _x_, _i_, and the observer
+sees the image magnified _eight times_.
+
+"In real telescopes, where the difference between the focal length of
+the object-glass and that of the eye-glass can be made enormously
+greater, the magnifying power is quite startling, only the object-glass
+must be large, so as to collect enough rays to bear spreading widely.
+Even in your small telescopes, with a focus of eighteen inches, and an
+object-glass measuring one and a quarter inch across, we can put on a
+quarter of an inch eye-piece, and so magnify seventy-two times; while in
+my observatory telescope, eight feet or ninety-six inches long, an
+eye-piece of half an inch magnifies 192 times, and I can put on a
+1/8-inch eye-piece and magnify 768 times! And so we can go on
+lengthening the focus of the object-glass and shortening the focus of
+the eye-piece, till in Lord Rosse's gigantic fifty-six-foot telescope,
+in which the image is fifty-four feet (648 inches) behind the
+object-glass, an eye-piece one-eighth of an inch from the image
+magnifies 5184 times! These giant telescopes, however, require an
+enormous object-glass or mirror, for the points of light are so spread
+out in making the large image that it is very faint unless an enormous
+number of rays are collected. Lord Rosse's telescope has a reflecting
+mirror measuring six feet across, and a man can walk upright in the
+telescope tube. The most powerful telescope yet made is that at the Lick
+Observatory, on Mount Hamilton, in California. It is fifty-six and a
+half feet long, the object-lens measures thirty-six inches across. A
+star seen through this telescope appears 2000 times as bright as when
+seen with the naked eye.
+
+"You need not, however, wait for an opportunity to look through giant
+telescopes, for my small student's telescope, only four feet long, which
+we carry out on to the lawn, will show you endless unseen wonders; while
+your hand telescopes, and even a common opera-glass, will show many
+features on the face of the moon, and enable you to see the crescent of
+Venus, Jupiter's moons, and Saturn's rings, besides hundreds of stars
+unseen by the naked eye.
+
+"Of course you will understand that Fig. 18 only shows the _principle_
+of the telescope. In all good instruments the lenses and other parts are
+more complicated; and in a terrestrial telescope, for looking at
+objects on the earth, another lens has to be put in to turn them right
+way up again. In looking at the sky it does not matter which way up we
+see a planet or a star, so the second glass is not needed, and we lose
+light by using it.
+
+"We have now three magic glasses to work for us--the magnifying-glass,
+the microscope, and the telescope. Besides these, however, we have two
+other helpers, if possible even more wonderful. These are the
+Photographic camera and the Spectroscope."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 19.
+
+Photographic camera.
+
+_l_, _l_, Lenses. _s_, _s_, Screen cutting off diverging rays. _c_, _c_,
+Sliding box. _p_, _p_, Picture formed.]
+
+"Now that we thoroughly understand the use of lenses, I need scarcely
+explain this photographic camera (Fig. 19), for it is clearly an
+artificial eye. In place of the _crystalline lens_ (compare with Fig.
+11) the photographer uses one, or generally two lenses _l_, _l_, with a
+black ledge or stop _s_ between them, which acts like the iris in
+cutting off the rays too near the edge of the lens. The dark camera _c_
+answers to the _dark chamber_ of the eyeball, and the plate _p_, _p_ at
+the back of the chamber, which is made sensitive by chemicals, answers
+our _retina_. The box is formed of two parts, sliding one within the
+other at _c_, so as to place the plate at a proper distance from the
+lens, and then a screw adjusts the focus more exactly by bringing the
+front lens back or forward, instead of altering the curve as the
+_ciliary muscle_ does in our eye. The difference between the two
+instruments is that in our eye the message goes to the brain, and the
+image disappears when we turn our eyes away from the object; but in the
+camera the waves of light work upon the chemicals, and the image can be
+fixed and remain for ever.
+
+"But the camera has at least one weak point. The screen at the back is
+not curved like our retina, but must be flat because of printing off the
+pictures, and therefore the parts of the photograph near the edge are a
+little out of proportion.
+
+"In many ways, however, this photographic eye is a more faithful
+observer than our own, and helps us to make more accurate pictures. For
+instance, instantaneous photographs have been taken of a galloping
+horse, and we find that the movements are very different from what we
+thought we saw with our eye, because our retina does not throw off one
+impression after another quickly enough to be quite certain we see each
+curve truly in succession. Again, the photograph of a face gives minute
+curves and lines, lights and shadows, far more perfectly than even the
+best artist can see them, and when the picture is magnified we see more
+and more details which escaped us before.
+
+"But it is especially when attached to the microscope or the telescope
+that the photographic apparatus tells us such marvellous secrets;
+giving us, for instance, an accurate picture of the most minute
+water-animal quite invisible to the naked eye, so that when we enlarge
+the photograph any one can see the beautiful markings, the finest fibre,
+or the tiniest granule; or affording us accurate pictures, such as the
+one at p. 19 of the face of the moon, and bringing stars into view which
+we cannot otherwise see even with the strongest telescope.
+
+"Our own eye has many weaknesses. For example, when we look through the
+telescope at the sky we can only fix our attention on one part at once,
+and afterwards on another; and the picture which we see in this way, bit
+by bit, we must draw as best we can. But if we put a sensitive
+photographic plate into the telescope just at the point (_i_, _i_, Fig.
+18), where the _image_ of the sky is focused, this plate gives
+attention, so to speak, to the whole picture at once, and registers
+every point exactly as it is; and this picture can be kept and enlarged
+so that every detail can be seen.
+
+"Then, again, if we look at faint stars, they do not grow any brighter
+as we look. Each ray sends its message to the brain, and that is all; we
+cannot heap them up in our eye, and, indeed, after a time we see less,
+because our nerves grow tired. But on a photographic plate in a
+telescope, each ray in its turn does a little work upon the chemicals,
+and the longer the plate remains, the stronger the picture becomes. When
+wet plates were used they could not be left long, but since dry plates
+have been invented, with a film of chemically prepared gelatine, they
+can be left for hours in the telescope, which is kept by clockwork
+accurately opposite to the same objects. In this way thousands of faint
+stars, which we cannot see with the strongest telescope, creep into view
+as their feeble rays work over and over again on the same spot; and, as
+the brighter stars as well as the faint ones are all the time making
+their impression stronger, when the plate comes out each one appears in
+its proper strength. On the other hand, very bright objects often become
+blurred by a long exposure, so that we have sometimes to sacrifice the
+clearness of a bright object in order to print faint objects clearly.
+
+"We now come to our last magic glass--the Spectroscope; and the hour has
+slipped by so fast that I have very little time left to speak of it. But
+this matters less as we have studied it before.[1] I need now only
+remind you of some of the facts. You will remember that when we passed
+sunlight through a three-sided piece of glass called a prism, we broke
+up a ray of white light into a line of beautiful colours gradually
+passing from red, through orange, yellow, green, blue, and indigo, to
+violet, and that these follow in the same order as we see them in the
+rainbow or in the thin film of a soap-bubble. By various experiments we
+proved that these colours are separated from each other because the many
+waves which make up white light are of different sizes, so that because
+the waves, of red light are slow and heavy, they lag behind when bent in
+the three-sided glass, while the rapid violet waves are bent more out of
+their road and run to the farther end of the line, the other colours
+ranging themselves between."
+
+  [1] _Fairyland of Science_, Lecture II.; and _Short History of Natural
+  Science_, chapter xxxiv.
+
+"Now when the light falls through the open window, or through a round
+hole or _large_ slit, the images of the hole made by each coloured wave
+overlap each other very much, and the colours in the spectrum or
+coloured band are crowded together. But when in the spectroscope we pass
+the ray of light through a very narrow slit, each coloured image of the
+upright slit overlaps the next upright image only very little. By using
+several prisms one after the other (see Fig. 21), these upright coloured
+lines are separated more and more till we get a very long band or
+spectrum. Yet, as you know from our experiments with the light of a
+glowing wire or of molten iron, however much you spread out the light
+given by a solid or liquid, you can never separate these coloured lines
+from each other. It is only when you throw the light of a glowing gas or
+vapour into the slit that you get a few bright lines standing out alone.
+This is because _all_ the rays of white light are present in glowing
+solids and liquids, and they follow each other too closely to be
+separated. But a gas, such as glowing hydrogen for example, gives out
+only a few separate rays, which, pouring through the slit, throw red,
+greenish-blue, and dark blue lines on the screen. Thus you have seen the
+double, orange-yellow sodium line (3, Plate I.) which starts out at once
+when salt is held in a flame and its light thrown into the spectroscope,
+and the red line of potassium vapour under the same treatment; and we
+shall observe these again when we study the coloured lights of the sun
+and stars."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 20.
+
+Kirchhoff's spectroscope.
+
+A, The telescope which receives the ray of light through the slit in O.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 21.
+
+Passage of rays through the spectroscope.
+
+S, S�, Slit through which the light falls on the prisms. 1, 2, 3, 4,
+Prisms in which the rays are dispersed more and more. _a_, _b_, Screen
+receiving the spectrum, of which the seven principal colours are
+marked.]
+
+"We see, then, that the work of our magic glass, the spectroscope, is
+simply to sift the waves of light, and that these waves, from their
+colour and their position in the long spectrum, actually tell us what
+glowing gases have started them on their road. Is not this like magic?
+I take a substance made of I know not what; I break it up, and, melting
+it in the intense heat of an electric spark, throw its light into the
+spectroscope. Then, as I examine this light after it has been spread out
+by the prisms, I can actually read by unmistakable lines what metals or
+non-metals it contains. Nay, more; when I catch the light of a star, or
+even of a faint nebula, in my telescope, and pass it through these
+prisms, there, written up on the magic-coloured band, I read off the
+gases which are glowing in that star-sun or star-dust billions of miles
+away.
+
+"Now, boys, I have let you into the secrets of my five magic
+glasses--the magnifying-glass, the microscope, the telescope, the
+photographic camera, and the spectroscope. With these and the help of
+chemistry you can learn to work all my spells. You can peep into the
+mysteries of the life of the tiniest being which moves unseen under your
+feet; you can peer into that vast universe, which we can never visit so
+long as our bodies hold us down to our little earth; you can make the
+unseen stars print their spots of light on the paper you hold in your
+hand, by means of light-waves, which left them hundreds of years ago; or
+you can sift this light in your spectroscope, and make it tell you what
+substances were glowing in that star when they were started on their
+road. All this you can do on one condition, namely, that you seek
+patiently to know the truth.
+
+"Stories of days long gone by tell us of true magicians and false
+magicians, and the good or evil they wrought. Of these I know nothing,
+but I do know this, that the value of the spells you can work with my
+magic glasses depends entirely upon whether you work patiently,
+accurately, and honestly. If you make careless, inaccurate experiments,
+and draw hasty conclusions, you will only do bad work, which it may take
+others years to undo; but if you question your instruments honestly and
+carefully, they will answer truly and faithfully. You may make many
+mistakes, but one experiment will correct the other; and while you are
+storing up in your own mind knowledge which lifts you far above this
+little world, or enables you to look deep below the outward surface of
+life, you may add your little group of facts to the general store, and
+help to pave the way to such grand discoveries as those of Newton in
+astronomy, Bunsen and Kirchhoff in spectrum analysis, and Darwin in the
+world of life."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+FAIRY RINGS AND HOW THEY ARE MADE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It was a lovely warm day in September, the golden corn had been cut and
+carted, and the waggons of the farmers around were free for the use of
+the college lads in their yearly autumn holiday. There they stood in a
+long row, one behind the other in the drive round the grounds, each with
+a pair of sleek, powerful farm-horses, and the waggoners beside them
+with their long whips ornamented with coloured ribbons; and as each
+waggon drew up before the door, it filled rapidly with its merry load
+and went on its way.
+
+They had a long drive of seven miles before them, for they were going to
+cross the wild moor, and then descend gradually along a fairly good road
+to the more wooded and fertile country. Their object that day was to
+reach a certain fairy dell known to a few only among the party as one of
+the loveliest spots in Devon. It was a perfect day for a picnic. As they
+drove over the wide stretches of moorland, with tors to right and tors
+to the left, the stunted furze bushes growing here and there glistened
+with spiders' webs from which the dew had not yet disappeared, and
+mosses in great variety carpeted the ground, from the lovely
+thread-mosses, with their scarlet caps, to the pale sphagnum of the
+bogs, where a halt was made for some of the botanists of the party to
+search for the little Sundew (_Drosera rotundifolia_). Though this
+little plant had now almost ceased to flower, it was not difficult to
+recognise by its rosette of leaves glistening with sticky glands which
+it spreads out in many of the Dartmoor bogs to catch the tiny flies and
+suck out their life's blood, and several specimens were uprooted and
+carefully packed away to plant in moist moss at home.
+
+From this bog onwards the road ran near by one of the lovely streams
+which feed the rivers below, and, passing across a bridge covered with
+ivy, led through a small forest of stunted trees round which the
+woodbine clung, hanging down its crimson berries, and the bracken fern,
+already putting on its brown and yellow tints, grew tall and thick on
+either side. Then, as they passed out of the wood, they came upon the
+dell, a piece of wild moorland lying in a hollow between two granite
+ridges, with large blocks of granite strewn over it here and there, and
+furze bushes growing under their shelter, still covered with yellow
+blossoms together with countless seed-bearing pods, which the
+youngsters soon gathered for the shiny-black seeds within them.
+
+Here the waggons were unspanned, the horses tethered out, the food
+unpacked, and preparations for the picnic soon in full swing. Just at
+this moment, however, a loud shout from one part of the dell called
+every one's attention. "The fairy rings! the fairy rings! we have found
+the fairy rings!" and there truly on the brown sward might be seen three
+delicate green rings, the fresh sprouting grass growing young and tender
+in perfect circles measuring from six feet to nearly three yards across.
+
+"What are they?" The question came from many voices at once, but it was
+the Principal who answered.
+
+"Why, do you not know that they are pixie circles, where the 'elves of
+hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves' hold their revels, whirling
+in giddy round, and making the rings, 'whereof the ewe not bites'? Have
+you forgotten how Mrs. Quickly, in the _Merry Wives of Windsor_, tells
+us that
+
+          "'nightly, meadow-fairies, look you sing,
+    Like to the Garter's compass, in a ring:
+    The expressure that it bears, green let it be,
+    More fertile-fresh than all the field to see'?
+
+"If we are magicians and work spells under magic glasses, why should not
+the pixies work spells on the grass? I brought you here to-day on
+purpose to see them. Which of you now can name the pixie who makes
+them?"
+
+A deep silence followed. If any knew or guessed the truth of the matter,
+they were too shy to risk making a mistake.
+
+"Be off with you then," said the Principal, "and keep well away from
+these rings all day, that you may not disturb the spell. But come back
+to me before we return at night, and perhaps I may show you the
+wonder-working pixie, and we may take him home to examine under the
+microscope."
+
+The day passed as such happy days do, and the glorious harvest moon had
+risen over the distant tors before the horses were spanned and the
+waggons ready. But the Principal was not at the starting place, and
+looking round they saw him at the farther end of the dell.
+
+"Gently, gently," he cried, as there was one general rush towards him;
+"look where you tread, for I stand within a ring of fairies!"
+
+And then they saw that just outside the green circle in which he stood,
+forming here and there a broken ring, were patches of a beautiful tiny
+mushroom, each of which raised its pale brown umbrella in the bright
+moonlight.
+
+"Here are our fairies, boys. I am going to take a few home where they
+can be spared from the ring, and to-morrow we will learn their history."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following day saw the class-room full, and from the benches eager
+eyes were turned to the eight windows, in each of which stood one of the
+elder boys at his microscope ready for work. For under those microscopes
+the Principal always arranged some object referred to in his lecture and
+figured in diagrams on the walls, and it was the duty of each boy, after
+the lecture was over, to show and explain to the class all the points
+of the specimen under his care. These boys were always specially envied,
+for though the others could, it is true, follow all the descriptions
+from the diagrams, yet these had the plant or animal always under their
+eye. Discussion was at this moment running high, for there was a great
+uncertainty of opinion as to whether a mushroom could be really called a
+plant when it had no leaves or flowers. All at once the hush came, as
+the Principal stepped into his desk and began:--
+
+"Life is hard work, boys, and there is no being in this world which has
+not to work for its living. You all know that a plant grows by taking in
+gases and water, and working them up into sap and living tissue by the
+help of the sunshine and the green matter in their leaves; and you know,
+too, that the world is so full of green plants that hundreds and
+thousands of young seedlings can never get a living, but are stifled in
+their babyhood or destroyed before they can grow up.
+
+"Now there are many dark, dank places in the world where plants cannot
+get enough sunlight and air to make green colouring matter and
+manufacture their own food. And so it comes to pass that a certain class
+of plants have found another way of living, by taking their food ready
+made from other decaying plants and animals, and so avoiding the
+necessity of manufacturing it for themselves. These plants can live
+hidden away in dark cellars and damp cupboards, in drains and pipes
+where no light ever enters, under a thick covering of dead leaves in the
+forest, under fallen trunks and mossy stones; in fact, wherever
+decaying matter, whether of plant or animal, can be found for them to
+feed upon.
+
+"It is to this class, called _fungi_, which includes all mushrooms and
+moulds, mildews, smuts, and ferments, that the mushroom belongs which we
+found yesterday making the fairy rings. And, in truth, we were not so
+far wrong when we called them pixies or imps, for many of them are
+indeed imps of mischief, which play sorry pranks in our stores at home
+and in the fields and forest abroad. They grow on our damp bread, or
+cheese, or pickles; they destroy fruit and corn, hop and vine, and even
+take the life of insects and other animals. Yet, on the other hand, they
+are useful in clearing out unhealthy nooks and corners, and purifying
+the air; and they can be made to do good work by those who know how to
+use them; for without ferments we could have neither wine, beer, nor
+vinegar, nor even the yeast which lightens our bread.
+
+"I am going to-day to introduce you to this large vagabond class of
+plants, that we may see how they live, grow, and spread, what good and
+bad work they do, and how they do it. And before we come to the
+mushrooms, which you know so well, we must look at the smaller forms,
+which do all their work above ground, so that we can observe them. For
+the _fungi_ are to be found almost everywhere. The film growing over
+manure-heaps, the yeast plant, the wine fungus, and the vinegar plant;
+the moulds and mildews covering our cellar-walls and cupboards, or
+growing on decayed leaves and wood, on stale fruit, bread, or jam, or
+making black spots on the leaves of the rose, the hop, or the vine; the
+potato fungus, eating into the potato in the dark ground and producing
+disease; the smut filling the grains of wheat and oats with disease, the
+ergot feeding on the rye, the rust which destroys beetroot, the rank
+toadstools and puffballs, the mushroom we eat, and the truffles which
+form even their fruit underground,--all these are _fungi_, or lowly
+plants which have given up making their own food in the sunlight, and
+take it ready made from the dung, the decaying mould, the root, the
+leaf, the fruit, or the germ on which they grow. Lastly, the diseases
+which kill the silkworm and the common house-fly, and even some of the
+worst skin diseases in man, are caused by minute plants of this class
+feeding upon their hosts."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 22.
+
+Three forms of vegetable mould magnified.
+
+1, _Mucor Mucedo_. 2, _Aspergillus glaucus_. 3, _Penicillium glaucum_.]
+
+"In fact, the _fungi_ are so widely spread over all things living and
+dead, that there is scarcely anything free from them in one shape or
+another. The minute spores, now of one kind, now of another, float in
+the air, and settling down wherever they find suitable food, have
+nothing more to do than to feed, fatten, and increase, which they do
+with wonderful rapidity. Let us take as an example one of the moulds
+which covers damp leaves, and even the paste and jam in our cupboard. I
+have some here growing upon a basin of paste, and you see it forms a
+kind of dense white fur all over the surface, with here and there a
+bluish-green tinge upon it. This white fur is the common mould, _Mucor
+Mucedo_ (1, Fig. 22), and the green mould happens in this case to be
+another mould, _Penicillium glaucum_ (3, Fig. 22); but I must warn you
+that these minute moulds look very much alike until you examine them
+under the microscope, and though they are called white, blue, or green
+moulds, yet any one of them may be coloured at different times of its
+growth. Another very common and beautiful mould, _Aspergillus glaucus_
+(2, Fig. 22), often grows with Mucor on the top of jam.
+
+"All these plants begin with a spore or minute colourless cell of living
+matter (_s_, Fig. 23), which spends its energy in sending out tubes in
+all directions into the leaves, fruit, or paste on which it feeds. The
+living matter, flowing now this way now that, lays down the walls of its
+tubes as it flows, and by and by, here and there, a tube, instead of
+working into the paste, grows upwards into the air and swells at the tip
+into a colourless ball in which a number of minute seed-like bodies
+called spores are formed. The ball bursts, the spores fall out, and each
+one begins to form fresh tubes, and so little by little the mould grows
+denser and thicker by new plants starting in all directions.
+
+"Under the first microscope you will see a slide showing the tubes which
+spread through the paste, and which are called the _mycelium_ (_m_, Fig.
+23), and amongst it are three upright tubes, one just starting _a_,
+another with the fruit ball forming _b_, and a third _c_, which is
+bursting and throwing out the spores. The _Aspergillus_ and the
+_Penicillium_ differ from the _Mucor_ in having their spores naked and
+not enclosed in a spore-case. In _Penicillium_ they grow like the beads
+of a necklace one above the other on the top of the upright tube, and
+can very easily be separated (see Fig. 22); while _Aspergillus_, a most
+lovely silvery mould, is more complicated in the growth of its spores,
+for it bears them on many rows branching out from the top of the tube
+like the rays of a star."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 23.
+
+_Mucor Mucedo_, greatly magnified. (After Sachs and Brefeld.)
+
+_m_, Mycelium, or tangle of threads. _a_, _b_, _c_, Upright tubes in
+different stages. _c_, Spore-case bursting and sending out spores. _s_,
+1, 2, 3, A growing spore, in different stages, starting a new mycelium.]
+
+"I want you to look at each of these moulds carefully under the
+microscope, for few people who hastily scrape a mould away, vexed to
+find it on food or damp clothing, have any idea what a delicate and
+beautiful structure lies under their hand. These moulds live on decaying
+matter, but many of the mildews, rusts, and other kinds of fungus, prey
+upon living plants such as the _smut_ of oats (_Ustilago carbo_), and
+the _bunt_ (_Tilletia caria_) which eats away the inside of the grains
+of wheat, while another fungus attacks its leaves. There is scarcely a
+tree or herb which has not one fungus to prey upon it, and many have
+several, as, for example, the common lime-tree, which is infested by
+seventy-four different fungi, and the oak by no less than 200.
+
+"So these colourless food-taking plants prey upon their neighbours,
+while they take their oxygen for breathing from air. The 'ferments,'
+however, which live _inside_ plants or fluids, take even their oxygen
+for breathing from their hosts.
+
+"If you go into the garden in summer and pluck an overripe gooseberry,
+which is bursting like this one I have here, you will probably find that
+the pulp looks unhealthy and rotten near the split, and the gooseberry
+will taste tart and disagreeable. This is because a small fungus has
+grown inside, and worked a change in the juice of the fruit. At first
+this fungus spread its tubes outside and merely _fed_ upon the fruit,
+using oxygen from the air in breathing; but by and by the skin gave way,
+and the fungus crept inside the gooseberry where it could no longer get
+any fresh air. In this dilemma it was forced to break up the sugar in
+the fruit and take the oxygen out of it, leaving behind only alcohol and
+carbonic acid which give the fermented taste to the fruit.
+
+"So the fungus-imp feeds and grows in nature, and when man gets hold of
+it he forces it to do the same work for a useful purpose, for the
+grape-fungus grows in the vats in which grapes are crushed and kept away
+from air, and tearing up the sugar, leaves alcohol behind in the
+grape-juice, which in this way becomes wine. So, too, the yeast-fungus
+grows in the malt and hop liquor, turning it into beer; its spores
+floating in the fluid and increasing at a marvellous rate, as any
+housewife knows who, getting yeast for her bread, tries to keep it in a
+corked bottle.
+
+"The yeast plant has never been found wild. It is only known as a
+cultivated plant, growing on prepared liquor. The brewer has to sow it
+by taking some yeast from other beer, or by leaving the liquor exposed
+to air in which yeast spores are floating; or it will sow itself in the
+same way in a mixture of water, hops, sugar, and salt, to which a
+handful of flour is added. It increases at a marvellous rate, one cell
+budding out of another, while from time to time the living matter in a
+cell will break up into four parts instead of two, and so four new cells
+will start and bud. A drop of yeast will very soon cover a glass slide
+with this tiny plant, as you will see under the second microscope, where
+they are now at work (Fig. 24)."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 24.
+
+Yeast cells growing under the microscope. _a_, Single cells. _b_, Two
+cells forming by division. _c_, A group of cells where division is going
+on in all directions.]
+
+"But perhaps the most curious of all the minute fungi are those which
+grow inside insects and destroy them. At this time of year you may
+often see a dead fly sticking to the window-pane with a cloudy white
+ring round it; this poor fly has been killed by a little fungus called
+_Empusa musc�_. A spore from a former plant has fallen perhaps on the
+window-pane, or some other spot over which the fly has crawled, and
+being sticky has fixed itself under the fly's body. Once settled on a
+favourable spot it sends out a tube, and piercing the skin of the fly,
+begins to grow rapidly inside. There it forms little round cells one
+after the other, something like the yeast-cells, till it fills the whole
+body, feeding on its juices; then each cell sends a tube, like the
+upright tubes of the _Mucor_ (Fig. 23) out again through the fly's skin,
+and this tube bursts at the end, and so new spores are set free. It is
+these tubes, and the spores thrown from them, which you see forming a
+kind of halo round the dead fly as it clings to the pane. Other fungi in
+the same way kill the silkworm and the caterpillars of the cabbage
+butterfly. Nor is it only the lower animals which suffer. When we once
+realise that fungus spores are floating everywhere in the air, we can
+understand how the terrible microscopic fungi called _bacteria_ will
+settle on an open wound and cause it to fester if it is not properly
+dressed.
+
+"Thus we see that these minute fungi are almost everywhere. The larger
+ones, on the contrary, are confined to the fields and forests, damp
+walls and hollow trees; or wherever rotting wood, leaves, or manure
+provide them with sufficient nourishment. Few people have any clear
+ideas about the growth of a mushroom, except that the part we pick
+springs up in a single night. The real fact is, that a whole mushroom
+plant is nothing more than a gigantic mould or mildew, only that it is
+formed of many different shaped cells, and spreads its tubes
+_underground_ or through the trunks of trees instead of in paste or jam,
+as in the case of the mould."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 25.
+
+Early stages of the mushroom. (After Sachs.)
+
+_m_, Mycelium. _b1-3_, Mushroom buds of different ages. _b4_, Button
+mushroom. _g_, Gills forming inside before lower attachment of the cap
+gives way at _v_.]
+
+"The part which we gather and call a mushroom, a toadstool, or a
+puffball is only the fruit, answering to the round balls of the mould.
+The rest of the plant is a thick network of tubes, which you will see
+under the third microscope. These tubes spread underground and suck in
+decayed matter from the earth; they form the _mycelium_ (_m_, Fig. 25)
+such as we found in the mould. The mushroom-growers call it 'mushroom
+spawn' because they use it to spread over the ground for new crops. Out
+of these underground tubes there springs up from time to time a swollen
+round body no bigger at first than a mustard seed (_b1_, Fig. 25). As it
+increases in size it comes above ground and grows into the mushroom or
+spore-case, answering to the round balls which contain the spores of the
+mould. At first this swollen body is egg-shaped, the top half being
+largest and broadest, and the fruit is then called a 'button-mushroom'
+_b4_. Inside this ball are now formed a series of folds made of long
+cells, some of which are soon to bear spores just as the tubes in the
+mould did, and while these are forming and ripening, a way out is
+preparing for them. For as the mushroom grows, the skin of the lower
+part of the ball (_v_, _b4_) is stretched more and more, till it can
+bear the strain no longer and breaks away from the stalk; then the ball
+expands into an umbrella, leaving a piece of torn skin, called the veil
+(_v_, Fig. 26), clinging to the stalk."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 26.
+
+Later stages of the mushroom. (After Gautier.)
+
+1, Button mushroom stage. _c_, Cap. _v_, Veil. _g_, Gills.
+
+2, Full-grown mushroom, showing veil v after the cap is quite free, and
+the gills or lamell� _g_, of which the structure is shown in Fig. 27.]
+
+"All this happens in a single night, and the mushroom is complete, with
+a stem up the centre and a broad cap, under which are the folds which
+bear the spores. Thus much you can see for yourselves at any time by
+finding a place where mushrooms grow and looking for them late at night
+and early in the morning so as to get the different stages. But now we
+must turn to the microscope, and cutting off one of the folds, which
+branch out under the cap like the spokes of a wheel, take a slice across
+it (1, Fig. 27) and examine."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 27.
+
+1, One of the gills or lamell� of the mushroom slightly magnified,
+showing the cells round the edge. _c_, Cells which do not bear spores.
+_fc_, Fertile cells. 2, A piece of the edge of the same powerfully
+magnified, showing how the spores _s_ grow out of the tip of the fertile
+cells _fc_.]
+
+"First, under a moderate power, you will see the cells forming the
+centre of the fold and the layer of long cells (_c_ and _fc_) which are
+closely packed all round the edge. Some of these cells project beyond
+the others, and it is they which bear the spores. We see this plainly
+under a very strong power when you can distinguish the sterile cells _c_
+and the fertile cells _fc_ projecting beyond them, and each bearing
+four spore-cells _s_ on four little horns at its tip.
+
+"These spores fall off very easily, and you can make a pretty experiment
+by cutting off a large mushroom head in the early morning and putting it
+flat upon a piece of paper. In a few hours, if you lift it very
+carefully, you will find a number of dark lines on the paper, radiating
+from a centre like the spokes of a wheel, each line being composed of
+the spores which have fallen from a fold as it grew ripe. They are so
+minute that many thousands would be required to make up the size of the
+head of an ordinary pin, yet if you gather the spores of the several
+kinds of mushroom, and examine them under a strong microscope, you will
+find that even these specks of matter assume different shapes in the
+various species.
+
+"You will be astonished too at the immense number of spores contained in
+a single mushroom head, for they are reckoned by millions; and when we
+remember that each one of these is the starting point of a new plant, it
+reminds us forcibly of the wholesale destruction of spores and seeds
+which must go on in nature, otherwise the mushrooms and their companions
+would soon cover every inch of the whole world.
+
+"As it is, they are spread abroad by the wind, and wherever they escape
+destruction they lie waiting in every nook and corner till, after the
+hot summer, showers of rain hasten the decay of plants and leaves, and
+then the mushrooms, toadstools, and puffballs, grow at an astounding
+pace. If you go into the woods at this season you may see the enormous
+deep-red liver fungus (_Fistulina hepatica_) growing on the oak-trees,
+in patches which weigh from twenty to thirty pounds; or the glorious
+orange-coloured fungus (_Tremella mesenterica_) growing on bare sticks
+or stumps of furze; or among dead leaves you may easily chance on the
+little caps of the crimson, scarlet, snowy white, or orange-coloured
+fungi which grow in almost every wood. From white to yellow, yellow to
+red, red to crimson and purple black, there is hardly any colour you may
+not find among this gaily-decked tribe; and who can wonder that the
+small bright-coloured caps have been supposed to cover tiny imps or
+elves, who used the large mushrooms to serve for their stools and
+tables?
+
+"There they work, thrusting their tubes into twigs and dead branches,
+rotting trunks and decaying leaves, breaking up the hard wood and tough
+fibres, and building them up into delicate cells, which by and by die
+and leave their remains as food for the early growing plants in the
+spring. So we see that in their way the mushrooms and toadstools are
+good imps after all, for the tender shoot of a young seedling plant
+could take no food out of a hard tree-trunk, but it finds the work done
+for it by the fungus, the rich nourishment being spread around its young
+roots ready to be imbibed.
+
+"To find our fairy-ring mushrooms, however, we must leave the wood and
+go out into the open country, especially on the downs and moors and
+rough meadows, where the land is poor and the grass coarse and spare.
+There grow the nourishing kinds, most of which we can eat, and among
+these is the delicate little champignon or 'Scotch-bonnet' mushroom,
+_Marasmius Oreades_,[1] which makes the fairy-rings. When a spore of
+this mushroom begins to grow, it sucks up vegetable food out of the
+earth and spreads its tubes underground, in all directions from the
+centre, so that the mycelium forms a round patch like a thick
+underground circular cobweb. In the summer and autumn, when the weather
+is suitable, it sends up its delicate pale-brown caps, which we may
+gather and eat without stopping the growth of the plant.
+
+  [1] Shown in initial letter of this chapter.
+
+"This goes on year after year underground, new tubes always travelling
+outwards till the circle widens and widens like the rings of water on a
+pond, only that it spreads very slowly, making a new ring each year,
+which is often composed of a mass of tubes as much as a foot thick in
+the ground, and the tender tubes in the centre die away as the new ones
+form a larger hoop outside.
+
+"But all this is below ground; where then are our fairy rings? Here is
+the secret. The tubes, as we have seen, take up food from the earth and
+build it up into delicate cells, which decay very soon, and as they die
+make a rich manure at the roots of the grass. So each season the cells
+of last year's ring make a rich feeding-ground for the young grass,
+which springs up fresh and green in a fairy ring, while _outside_ this
+emerald circle the mushroom tubes are still growing and increasing
+underneath the grass, so that next year, when the present ring is no
+longer richly fed, and has become faded and brown like the rest of the
+moor, another ring will spring up outside it, feeding on the prepared
+food below."
+
+"In bad seasons, though the tubes go on spreading and growing below, the
+mushroom fruit does not always appear above ground. The plant will only
+fruit freely when the ground has been well warmed by the summer sun,
+followed by damp weather to moisten it. This gives us a rich crop of
+mushrooms all over the country, and it is then you can best see the ring
+of fairy mushrooms circling outside the green hoop of fresh grass. In
+any case the early morning is the time to find them; it is only in very
+sheltered spots that they sometimes last through the day, or come up
+towards evening, as I found them last night on the warm damp side of the
+dell.
+
+"This is the true history of fairy rings, and now go and look for
+yourselves under the microscopes. Under the first three you will find
+the three different kinds of mould of our diagram (Fig. 22). Under the
+fourth the spores of the mould are shown in their first growth putting
+out the tubes to form the mycelium. The fifth shows the mould itself
+with its fruit-bearing tubes, one of which is bursting. Under the sixth
+the yeast plant is growing; the seventh shows a slice of one of the
+folds of the common mushroom with its spore-bearing horns; and under the
+eighth I have put some spores from different mushrooms, that you may see
+what curious shapes they assume.
+
+"Lastly, let me remind you, now that the autumn and winter are coming,
+that you will find mushrooms, toadstools, puffballs, and moulds in
+plenty wherever you go. Learn to know them, their different shapes and
+colours, and above all the special nooks each one chooses for its home.
+Look around in the fields and woods and take note of the decaying plants
+and trees, leaves and bark, insects and dead remains of all kinds. Upon
+each of these you will find some fungus growing, breaking up their
+tissues and devouring the nourishing food they provide. Watch these
+spots, and note the soft spongy soil which will collect there, and then
+when the spring comes, notice what tender plants flourish upon these
+rich feeding grounds. You will thus see for yourselves that the fungi,
+though they feed upon others, are not entirely mischief-workers, but
+also perform their part in the general work of life."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE LIFE-HISTORY OF LICHENS AND MOSSES
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The autumn has passed away and we are in the midst of winter. In the
+long winter evenings the stars shine bright and clear, and tempt us to
+work with the telescope and its helpmates the spectroscope and
+photographic plates. But at first sight it would seem as though our
+microscopes would have to stand idle so far at least as plants are
+concerned, or be used only to examine dried specimens and mounted
+sections. Yet this is not the fact, as I remembered last week when
+walking through the bare and leafless wood. A startled pheasant rising
+with a whirr at the sound of my footsteps among the dead leaves roused
+me from my thoughts, and as a young rabbit scudded across the path and I
+watched it disappear among the bushes, I was suddenly struck with the
+great mass of plant life flourishing underfoot and overhead.
+
+Can you guess what plants these were? I do not mean the evergreen pines
+and firs, nor the few hardy ferns, nor the lovely ivy clothing the
+trunks of the trees. Such plants as these live and remain green in the
+winter, but they do not grow. If you wish to find plant life revelling
+in the cold damp days of winter, fearing neither frost nor snow and
+welcoming mist and rain, you must go to the mosses, which as autumn
+passes away begin to cover the wood-paths, to creep over the roots of
+the trees, to suck up the water in the bogs, and even to clothe dead
+walls and stones with a soft green carpet. And with the mosses come the
+lichens, those curious grey and greenish oddities which no one but a
+botanist would think of classing among plants.
+
+The wood is full of them now: the hairy lichens hang from the branches
+of many of the trees, making them look like old greybearded men; the
+leafy lichens encircle the branches, their pale gray, green, and yellow
+patches looking as if they were made of crumpled paper cut into wavy
+plates; and the crusty lichens, scarcely distinguishable from the bark
+of the trees, cover every available space which the mosses have left
+free.
+
+As I looked at these lichens and thought of their curious history I
+determined that we would study them to-day, and gathered a basketful of
+specimens (see Fig. 28). But when I had collected these I found I had
+not the heart to leave the mosses behind. I could not even break off a
+piece of bark with lichen upon it without some little moss coming too,
+especially the small thread-mosses (_Bryum_) which make a home for
+themselves in every nook and corner of the branches; while the
+feather-mosses, hair-mosses, cord-mosses, and many others made such a
+lovely carpet under my feet that each seemed too beautiful to pass by,
+and they found their way into my basket, crowned at the top with a large
+mass of the pale-green Sphagnum, or bog-moss, into which I sank more
+than ankle-deep as I crossed the bog in the centre of the wood on my way
+home.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 28.
+
+Examples of Lichens. (From life.)
+
+1, A hairy lichen. 2, A leafy lichen. 3, A crustaceous lichen. _f_, _f_,
+the fruit.]
+
+So here they all are, and I hope by the help of our magic glass to let
+you into some of the secrets of their lives. It is true we must study
+the structure of lichens chiefly by diagrams, for it is too minute for
+beginners to follow under the microscope, so we must trust to drawings
+made by men more skilful in microscopic botany, at any rate for the
+present. But the mosses we can examine for ourselves and admire their
+delicate leaves and wonderful tiny spore-cases.
+
+Now the first question which I hope you want to ask is, how it is that
+these lowly plants flourish so well in the depth of winter when their
+larger and stronger companions die down to the ground. We will answer
+this first as to the lichens, which are such strange uncanny-looking
+plants that it is almost difficult to imagine they are alive at all; and
+indeed they have been a great puzzle to botanists.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 29.
+
+Single-celled green plants growing and dividing (_Pleurococcus_). (After
+Thuret and Bornet.)]
+
+Before we examine them, however, look for a minute at a small drop of
+this greenish film which I have taken from the rain-water taken outside.
+I have put some under each microscope, and those who can look into them
+will see the slide almost covered with small round green cells very much
+like the yeast cells we saw when studying the Fungi, only that instead
+of being colourless they are a bright green. Some of these cells will I
+suspect be longer than others, and these long cells will be moving over
+the slide very rapidly, swimming hither and thither, and you will see,
+perhaps for the first time, that very low plants can swim about in
+water. These green cells are, indeed, the simplest of all plants, and
+are merely bags of living matter which, by the help of the green
+granules in them, are able to work up water and gases into nourishing
+food, and so to live, grow, and multiply.
+
+There are many kinds of these single-celled plants in the world. You may
+find them on damp paths, in almost any rain-water butt, in ponds and
+ditches, in sparkling waterfalls, along the banks of flowing rivers, and
+in the cold clear springs on the bleak mountains. Some of them take the
+form of tangled threads[1] composed of long strings of cells, and these
+sometimes form long streamers in flowing water, and at other times are
+gathered together in a shapeless film only to be disentangled under a
+microscope. Other kinds[2] wave to and fro on the water, forming dense
+patches of violet, orange-brown, or glossy green scum shining in the
+bright sunlight, and these flourish equally in the ponds of our gardens
+and in pools in the Himalaya mountains, 18,000 feet above the sea.
+Others again[3] seize on every damp patch on tree trunks, rocks, or
+moist walls, covering them with a green powder formed of single plant
+cells. Other species of this family turn a bright red colour when the
+cells are still; and one, under the name of Gory Dew,[4] has often
+frightened the peasants of Italy, by growing very rapidly over damp
+walls and then turning the colour of blood. Another[5] forms the "red
+snow" of the Arctic regions, where it covers wide surfaces of snow with
+a deep red colour. Others[6] form a shiny jelly over rocks and stones,
+and these may be found almost everywhere, from the garden path to the
+warm springs of India, from the marshes of New Zealand up to the shores
+of the Arctic ocean, and even on the surface of floating icebergs.
+
+  [1] _Conferv�._
+
+  [2] _Oscillari�._
+
+  [3] _Protococcus._
+
+  [4] _Palmella cruenta._
+
+  [5] _Protococcus nivalis._
+
+  [6] _Nostoc._
+
+The reason why these plants can live in such very different regions is
+that they do not take their food through roots out of the ground, but
+suck in water and gases through the thin membrane which covers their
+cell, and each cell does its own work. So it matters very little to them
+where they lie, so long as they have moisture and sunlight to help them
+in their work. Wherever they are, if they have these, they can take in
+carbonic acid from the air and work up the carbon with other gases which
+they imbibe with the water, and so make living material. In this way
+they grow, and as a cell grows larger the covering is stretched and part
+of the digested food goes to build up more covering membrane, and by and
+by the cell divides into two and each membrane closes up, so that there
+are two single-celled plants where there was only one before. This will
+sometimes go on so fast that a small pond may be covered in a few hours
+with a green film formed of new cells.
+
+Now we have seen, when studying mushrooms, that the one difference
+between these green plants and the single-celled Fungi is that while the
+green cells make their own food, colourless cells can only take it in
+ready-made, and therefore prey upon all kinds of living matter. This is
+just what happens in the lichens; and botanists have discovered that
+these curious growths are really the result of a _partnership_ between
+single-celled green plants and single-celled fungi. The grey part is a
+fungus; but when it is examined under the microscope we find it is not a
+fungus only; a number of green cells can be seen scattered through it,
+which, when carefully studied, prove to be some species of the green
+single-celled plants.
+
+Here are two drawings of sections cut through two different lichens, and
+enormously magnified so that the cells are clearly seen. 1, Fig. 30 is
+part of a hairy lichen (1, Fig. 28), and 2 is part of a leafy lichen (2,
+Fig. 28). The hairy lichen as you see has a row of green cells all round
+the tiny branch, with fungus cells on all sides of them. The leafy
+lichen, which only presents one surface to the sun and air while the
+other side is against the tree, has only one layer of green cells near
+the surface, but protected by the fungus above.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 30.
+
+Sections of Lichens. (Sachs.)
+
+1, Section of a hairy lichen, _Usnea barbata_. 2, Section of a leafy
+lichen, _Sticta fuliginosa_. 3, Early growth of a lichen. _gc_, Green
+cells. _f_, Fungus.]
+
+The way the lichen has grown is this. A green cell (_gc_ 3, Fig. 30)
+falling on some damp spot has begun to grow and spread, working up food
+in the sunlight. To it comes the spore of the fungus _f_, first
+thrusting its tubes into the tree-bark, or wall, and then spreading
+round the green cells, which remain always in such a position that
+sunlight, air, and moisture can reach them. From this time the two
+classes of plants live as friends, the fungus using part of the food
+made by the green cells, and giving them in return the advantage of
+being spread out to the sunlight, while they are also protected in
+frosty or sultry weather when they would dry up on a bare surface. On
+the whole, however, the fungus probably gains the most, for it has been
+found, as we should expect, that the green cells can live and grow if
+separated out of the lichen, but the fungus cells die when their
+industrious companions are taken from them.
+
+At any rate the partnership succeeds, as you will see if you go into the
+wood, or into an orchard where the apple-trees are neglected, for every
+inch of the branches is covered by lichens if not already taken up by
+mosses or toadstools.
+
+There is hardly any part of the world except the tropics where lichens
+do not abound. In the Alps of Scandinavia close to the limits of
+perpetual snow, in the sandy wastes of Arctic America, and over the
+dreary Tundras of Arctic Siberia, where the ground is frozen hard during
+the greater part of the year, they flourish where nothing else can live.
+
+The little green cells multiply by dividing, as we saw them doing in the
+green film from the water-butt. The fungus, however, has many different
+modes of seeding itself. One of these is by forming little pockets in
+the lichen, out of which, when they burst, small round bodies are
+thrown, which cover the lichen with a minute green powder. There is
+plenty of this powder on the leafy lichen which you have by you. You can
+see it with the magnifying-glass, without putting it under the
+microscope. As long as the lichen is dry these round bodies do not grow,
+but as soon as moisture reaches them they start away and become new
+plants.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 31.
+
+Fructification of a lichen. (From Sachs and Oliver.)
+
+Apothecium or spore-chamber of a lichen. 1, Closed. 2, Open. 3, The
+spore-cases and filaments enlarged, showing the spores. _f_, Filaments.
+_sc_, Spore-cases. _s_, Spores.]
+
+A more complicated and beautiful process is shown in this diagram (Fig.
+31). If you look carefully at the leafy lichen (2, Fig. 28) you will
+find here and there some little cups _f_, while others grow upon the
+tips of the hairy lichen. These cups, or fruits, were once closed,
+flask-shaped chambers (1, Fig. 31) inside which are formed a number of
+oval cells _sc_, which are spore-cases, with from four to eight spores
+or seed-like bodies _s3_ inside them. When these chambers, which are
+called _apothecia_, are ripe, moist or rainy weather causes them to
+swell at the top, and they burst open and the spore-cases throw out the
+spores to grow into new fungi.
+
+In some lichens the chambers remain closed and the spores escape through
+a hole in the top, and they are then called _perithecia_, while in
+others, as these which we have here, they open out into a cup-shape.
+
+This, then, is the curious history of lichens; the green cells and fungi
+flourishing together in the damp winter and bearing the hardest frost
+far better than the summer drought, so that they have their good time
+when most other plants are dead or asleep. Yet though some of them, such
+as the hairy lichens, almost disappear in the summer, they are by no
+means dead, for, like all these very low plants, they can bear being
+dried up for a long time, and then, when moisture visits them again,
+each green cell sets to work, and they revive. There is much more to be
+learnt about them, but this will be sufficient to make you feel an
+interest in their simple lives, and when you look for them in the wood
+you will be surprised to find how many different kinds there are, for it
+is most wonderful that such lowly plants should build up such an immense
+variety of curious and grotesque forms.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And yet, when we turn to the mosses, I am half afraid they will soon
+attract you away from the dull grey lichens, for of all plant histories
+it appears to me that the history of the moss-plant is most fascinating.
+
+As this history is complicated by the moss having, as it were, two
+lives, you must give me your whole attention, and I will explain it
+first from diagrams, though you can see all the steps under the
+microscope.
+
+Take in your hands, in the first place, a piece of this green moss which
+I have brought. How thick it is, like a rich felted carpet! and yet, if
+you pull it apart carefully, you will find that each leafy stem is
+separate, and can be taken away from the others without breaking
+anything. In this dense moss each stem is single and clothed with leaves
+wrapped closely round it (see Fig. 33); in some mosses the stem is
+branched, and in others the leaves grow on side stalks, as in this
+feathery moss (Fig. 32). But in each case every stem is like a separate
+plant, with its own tuft of tender roots _r_.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 32.
+
+A stem of feathery moss. (From life.)
+
+_l_, Leaves. _s_, Stem. _r_, Roots.]
+
+What a delicate growth it is! The stem is scarcely more than a fine
+thread, the leaves minute, transparent, and tender. In this pale
+sphagnum or bog-moss (Fig. 36, p. 93), which is much larger and stouter,
+you can see better how each one of these leaves, though they are so
+thickly packed, is placed so that it can get the utmost light, air, and
+moisture. Yet so closely are the leaves of each stem entangled in those
+of the next that the whole forms a thick springy green carpet under our
+feet.
+
+How is it, then, that these moss stems, though each independent, grow in
+such a dense mass? Partly because moss multiplies so rapidly that new
+stems are always thrusting themselves up to the light, but chiefly
+because the stems were not always separate, but in very early life
+sprang from a common source.
+
+If, instead of bringing the moss home and tearing it apart, you went to
+a spot in the wood where fresh moss was growing, and looked very
+carefully on the surface of the ground or among the water of a marsh,
+you would find a spongy green mass below the growing moss, very much
+like the green scum on a pond. This film, some of which I have brought
+home, is seen under the microscope to be a mass of tangled green threads
+(_t_, Fig. 34, p. 88) like those of the _Conferv�_ (see p. 79), composed
+of rows of cells, while here and there upon these threads you would find
+a bud (_mb_, Fig. 34) rising up into the air.
+
+This tangled mass of green threads, called the _protonema_, is the first
+growth, from which the moss stems spring. It has itself originated from
+a moss-spore; as we shall see by and by. As soon as it has started it
+grows and spreads very rapidly, drinking in water and air through all
+its cells and sending up the moss buds which swell and grow, giving out
+roots below and fine stems above, which soon become crowded with leaves,
+forming the velvety carpet we call moss. Meanwhile the soft threads
+below die away, giving up all their nourishment to the moss-stems, and
+this is why, when you take up the moss, you find each stem separate. But
+now comes the question, How does each stem live after the nourishing
+threads below have died? It is true each stem has a few hairy roots,
+but these are very feeble, and not at all like the roots of higher
+plants. The fact is, the moss is built up entirely of tender cells, like
+the green cells in the lichen, or in the film upon the pond. These cells
+are not shut in behind a thick skin as in the leaves of higher plants,
+but have every one of them the power to take in water and gases through
+their tender membrane.
+
+I made last night a rough drawing of the leaf of the feathery moss put
+under the microscope, but you will see it far better by putting a leaf
+with a little water on a glass slide under the covering glass and
+examining it for yourself. You will see that it is composed of a number
+of oval-shaped cells packed closely together (_c_ Fig. 33), with a few
+long narrow ones _mr_ in the middle of the leaf forming the midrib.
+Every cell is as clear and distinct as if it were floating in the water,
+and the tiny green grains which help it to work up its food are clearly
+visible.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 33.
+
+Moss-leaf magnified. (From life.)
+
+Showing the cells _c_, each of which can take in and work up its own
+food. _mr_, Long cells of the mid-rib.]
+
+Each of these cells can act as a separate plant, drinking in the water
+and air it needs, and feeding and growing quite independently of the
+roots below. Yet at the same time the moss stem has a great advantage
+over single-celled plants in having root-hairs, and being able to grow
+upright and expose its leaves to the sun and air.
+
+Now you will no longer wonder that moss grows so fast and so thick, and
+another curious fact follows from the independence of each cell, namely,
+that new growths can start from almost any part of the plant. For
+example, pieces will often break off from the tangled mass or protonema
+below, and, starting on their own account, form other thread masses.
+Then, after the moss stems have grown, a new mass of threads may grow
+from one of the tiny root-hairs of a stem and make a fresh tangle; nay,
+a thread will sometimes even spring out of a damp moss leaf and make a
+new beginning, while the moss stems themselves often put forth buds and
+branches, which grow root-hairs and settle down on their own account.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 34.
+
+Polytrichum commune. A large hair-moss.
+
+_t_, _t_, Threads of green cells forming the _protonema_ out of which
+moss-buds spring. _mb_, Buds of moss-stems. _a_, Minute green flower in
+which the antherozoids are formed (enlarged in Fig. 35). _p_, _p1_,
+_p2_, _p3_, Minute green flower in which the ovules are formed, and
+urn-plant springing out of it (enlarged in Fig. 35). _us_, Urn stems.
+_c_, Cap. _u_, Urn after cap has fallen off, still protected by its
+lid.]
+
+All this comes from the simple nature of the plants, each cell doing its
+own work. Nor are the mosses in any difficulty as to soil, for as the
+matted threads decay they form a rich manure, and the dying moss-stems
+themselves, being so fragile, turn back very readily into food. This is
+why mosses can spread over the poorest soil where even tough grasses
+cannot live, and clothe walls and roofs with a rich green.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 35.
+
+Fructification of a moss.
+
+A, Male moss-flower stripped of its outer leaves, showing jointed
+filaments and oval sacs os and antherozoid cells _zc_ swarming out of a
+sac. _zc�_, Antherozoid cell enlarged. _z_, Free antherozoid. P, Female
+flower with bottle-shaped sacs _bs_. _bs-c_, Bottle-shaped sac, with cap
+being pushed up. _u_, Urn of _Funaria hygrometrica_, with small cap.
+_u�_, Urn, from which the cap has fallen, showing the teeth _t_ which
+keep in the spores.]
+
+So far, then, we now understand the growth of the mossy-leaf stems, but
+this is only half the life of the plant. After the moss has gone on
+through the damp winter spreading and growing, there appear in the
+spring or summer tiny moss flowers at the tip of some of the stems.
+These flowers (_a_, _p_, Fig. 34) are formed merely of a few green
+leaves shorter and stouter than the rest, enclosing some oval sacs
+surrounded by jointed hairs or filaments (see A and P, Fig. 35). These
+sacs are of two different kinds, one set being short and stout _os_, the
+others having long necks like bottles _bs_. Sometimes these two kinds of
+sac are in one flower, but more often they are in separate flowers, as
+in the hair-moss, _Polytrichum commune_ (_a_ and _p_, Fig. 34). Now when
+the flowers are ripe the short sacs in the flower A open and fling out
+myriads of cells _zc_, and these cells burst, and forth come tiny
+wriggling bodies _z_, called by botanists _antherozoids_, one out of
+each cell. These find their way along the damp moss to the flower P, and
+entering the neck of one of the bottle-shaped sacs _bs_, find out each
+another cell or _ovule_ inside. The two cells together then form a
+_plant-egg_, which answers to the germ in the seeds of higher plants.
+
+Now let us be sure we understand where we are in the life of the plant.
+We have had its green-growing time, its flowering, and the formation of
+what we may roughly call its seed, which last in ordinary higher plants
+would fall down and grow into a new green plant. But with the moss there
+is more to come. The egg does not shake out of the bottle-necked sac,
+but begins to grow inside it, sending down a little tube into the moss
+stem, and using it as other plants use the ground to grow in.
+
+As soon as it is rooted it begins to form a delicate stem, and as this
+grows it pushes up the sac _bs_, stretching the neck tighter and tighter
+till at last it tears away below, and the sac is carried up and hangs
+like an extinguisher or cap (_c_ Figs. 34, 35) over the top of the stem.
+Meanwhile, under this cap the top of the stalk swells into a knob
+which, by degrees, becomes a lovely little covered urn _u_, something
+like a poppy head, which has within it a number of spores. The growth of
+this tiny urn-plant often occupies several months, for you must remember
+that it is not merely a fruit, though it is often called so, but a real
+plant, taking in food through its tubes below and working for its
+living.
+
+When it is finished it is a most lovely little object (_us_, Fig. 34),
+the fine hairlike stalk being covered with a green, yellow, or brilliant
+red fool's cap on the top, yet the whole in most mosses is not bigger
+than an ordinary pin. You may easily see them in the spring or summer,
+or even sometimes in the winter. I have only been able to bring you one
+very little one to-day, the _Funaria hygrometrica_, which fruits early
+in the year. This moss has only a short cap, but in many mosses they are
+very conspicuous. I have often pulled them off as you would pull a cap
+from a boy's head. In nature they fall off after a time, leaving the
+urn, which, though so small, is a most complicated structure. First it
+has an outer skin, with holes or mouths in it which open and close to
+let moisture in and out. Then come two layers of cells, then an open
+space full of air, in which are the green chlorophyll grains which are
+working up food for the tiny plant as the moisture comes in to them.
+Lastly, within this again is a mass of tissue, round which grow the
+spores which are soon to be sown, and which in _Polytrichum commune_ are
+protected by a lid. Even after the extinguisher and the lid have both
+fallen off, the spores cannot fall out, for a thick row of teeth (_t_,
+Fig. 35) is closed over them like the tentacles of an anemone. So long
+as the air is damp these teeth remain closed; it is only in fine dry
+weather that they open and the spores are scattered on the ground.
+_Funaria hygrometrica_ has no lid under its cap, and after the cap falls
+the spores are only protected by the teeth.
+
+When the spores are gone, the life of the tiny urn-plant is over. It
+shrivels and dies, leaving ten, fifteen, or even more spores, which,
+after lying for some time on the ground, sprout and grow into a fresh
+mass of soft threads.
+
+So now we have completed the life-history of the moss and come back to
+the point at which we started. I am afraid it has been rather a
+difficult history to follow step by step, and yet it is perfectly clear
+when once we master the succession of growths. Starting from a spore,
+the thread-mass or protonema gives rise to the moss-stems forming the
+dense green carpet, then the green flowers on some of the leaf-stems
+give rise to a plant-egg, which roots itself in the stem, and grows into
+a perfect plant without leaves, bearing merely the urn in which fresh
+spores are formed, and so the round goes on from year to year.
+
+There are a great number of different varieties of moss, and they differ
+in the shape and arrangement of their stems and leaves, and very much in
+the formation of their urns, yet this sketch will enable you to study
+them with understanding, and when you find in the wood the nodding caps
+of the fruiting plants, some red, some green, some yellow, and some a
+brilliant orange, you will feel that they are acquaintances, and by the
+help of the microscope may soon become friends.
+
+Among them one of the most interesting is the sphagnum or bog-moss (Fig.
+36), which spreads its thick carpet over all the bogs in the woods. You
+cannot miss its little orange-coloured spore-cases if you look closely,
+for they contrast strongly with its pale green leaves, out of which they
+stand on very short stalks. I wish we could examine it, for it differs
+much from other mosses, both in leaves and fruit, but it would take us
+too long. At least, however, you must put one of its lovely transparent
+leaves under the microscope, that you may see the large air-cells which
+lie between the growing cells, and admire the lovely glistening bands
+which run across and across their covering membrane, for the sphagnum
+leaf is so extremely beautiful that you will never forget it when once
+seen. It is through these large cells in the edge of the stem and leaf
+that the water rises up from the swamp, so that the whole moss is like a
+wet sponge.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 36.
+
+Sphagnum moss from a Devonshire bog. (From life.)]
+
+And now, before we part, we had better sum up the history of lichens and
+mosses. With the lichens we have seen that the secret of success seems
+to be mutual help. The green cells provide the food, the fungus cells
+form a surface over which the green cells can spread to find sunlight
+and moisture, and protection from extremes of heat or cold. With the
+mosses the secret lies in their standing on the borderland between two
+classes of plant life. On the one hand, they are still tender-celled
+plants, each cell being able to live its own life and make its own food;
+on the other hand, they have risen into shapely plants with the
+beginnings of feeble roots, and having stems along which their leaves
+are arranged so that they are spread to the light and air. Both lichens
+and mosses keep one great advantage common to all tender-celled plants;
+they can be dried up so that you would think them dead, and yet, because
+they can work all over their surface whenever heat and moisture reach
+them, each cell drinks in food again and the plant revives. So when a
+scorching sun, or a dry season, or a biting frost kills other plants,
+the mosses and lichens bide their time till moisture comes again.
+
+In our own country they grow almost everywhere--on walls, on broken
+ground, on sand-heaps, on roofs and walls, on trees living and dead, and
+over all pastures which are allowed to grow poor and worn out. They
+grow, too, in all damp, marshy spots; especially the bog-mosses forming
+the peat-bogs which cover a large part of Ireland and many regions in
+Scotland; and these same bog-mosses occur in America, New Zealand, and
+Australia.
+
+In the tropics mosses are less abundant, probably because other plants
+flourish so luxuriantly; but in Arctic Siberia and Arctic America both
+lichens and mosses live on the vast Tundras. There, during the three
+short months of summer, when the surface of the ground is soft, the
+lichens spread far and wide where all else is lifeless, while in moister
+parts the Polytrichums or hair-mosses cover the ground, and in swampy
+regions stunted Sphagnums form peat-bogs only a few inches in depth over
+the frozen soil beneath. If, then, the lichens and mosses can flourish
+even in such dreary latitudes as these, we can understand how they defy
+even our coldest winters, appearing fresh and green when the snow melts
+away from over them, and leave their cells bathed in water, so that
+these lowly plants clothe the wood with their beauty when otherwise all
+would be bare and lifeless.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE HISTORY OF A LAVA STREAM
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It is now just twenty-two years ago, boys, since I saw a wonderful
+sight, which is still so fresh in my mind that I have to look round and
+remember that it was before any of you were born, in order to persuade
+myself that it can be nearly a quarter of a century since I stood with
+my feet close to a flowing stream of red-hot lava.
+
+It happened in this way. I was spending the winter with friends in
+Naples, and we were walking quietly one lovely afternoon in November
+along the Villa Reale, the public garden on the sea-shore, when one of
+our party exclaimed, "Look at Vesuvius!" We did so, and saw in the
+bright sunlight a dense dark cloud rising up out of the cone. The
+mountain had been sending out puffs of smoke, with a booming noise, for
+several days, but we thought nothing of that, for it had been common
+enough for slight eruptions to take place at intervals ever since the
+great eruption of 1867. This cloud, however, was far larger and
+wider-spread than usual, and as we were looking at it we saw a thin red
+line begin some way down the side of the mountain and creep onwards
+toward the valley which lies behind the Hermitage near where the
+Observatory is built (see Fig. 37). "A crater has broken out on the
+slope," said our host; "it will be a grand sight to-night. Shall we go
+up and see it?" No sooner proposed than settled, and one of the party
+started off at once to secure horses and men before others engaged them.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 37.
+
+Somma. Vesuvius.
+
+Vesuvius, as seen in eruption by the author, November 1868.]
+
+It was about eight o'clock in the evening when we started in a carriage
+for Resina, and alighting there, with buried Herculaneum under our feet,
+mounted our horses and set forward with the guides. Then followed a long
+ascent of about two hours and a half through the dark night. Silently
+and carefully we travelled on over the broad masses of slaggy lava of
+former years, along which a narrow horse-path had been worn; and ever
+and anon we heard the distant booming in the crater at the summit, and
+caught sight of fresh gleams of light as we took some turning which
+brought the glowing peak into view.
+
+Our object was to get as close as possible to the newly-opened crater in
+the mountain-side, and when we arrived on a small rugged plain not far
+from the spot, we alighted from our horses, which were growing
+frightened with the glare, and walked some distance on foot till we came
+to a ridge running down the slope, and upon this ridge the lava stream
+was flowing.
+
+Above our heads hung a vast cloud of vapour which reflected the bright
+light from the red-hot stream, and threw a pink glow all around, so
+that, where the cloud was broken and we could see the dark sky, the
+stars looked white as silver in contrast. We could now trace clearly the
+outline of the summit towering above us, and even watch the showers of
+ashes and dust which burst forth from time to time, falling back into
+the crater, or on to the steep slopes of the cone.
+
+If the night had not been calm, and such a breeze as there was blowing
+away from us, our position would scarcely have been safe; and indeed we
+were afterwards told we had been rash. But I would have faced even a
+greater risk to see so grand a spectacle, and when the guide helped me
+to scramble up on to the ledge, so that I stood with my feet within a
+few yards of the lava flow, my heart bounded with excitement. I could
+not stay more than a few seconds, for the gases and vapour choked me;
+but for that short time it felt like a dream to be standing close to a
+river of molten rock, which a few hours before had been lying deep in
+the bowels of the earth. Glancing upwards to where this river issued
+from the cone in the mountain-side, I saw it first white-hot, then
+gradually fading to a glowing red as it crept past my feet; and then
+looking down the slope I saw it turn black and gloomy as it cooled
+rapidly at the top, while through the cracks which opened here and there
+as it moved on, puffs of gas and vapour rose into the air, and the red
+lava beneath gleamed through the chinks.
+
+We did not stay long, for the air was suffocating, but took our way back
+to the Hermitage, where another glorious sight awaited us. Some way
+above and behind the hill on which the Observatory stands there is, or
+was, a steep cliff, and over this the lava stream, now densely black,
+fell in its way to the valley below, and as it fell it broke into huge
+masses, which heeling over exposed the red-hot lava under the crust,
+thus forming a magnificent fiery cascade in which black and red were
+mingled in wild confusion.
+
+This is how I saw a fresh red-hot lava stream. I had ascended the
+mountain some years before, when it was comparatively quiet, with only
+two small cones in its central crater sending out miniature flows of
+lava (see Fig. 38). But the crater was too hot for me to cross over to
+these cones, and I could only marvel at the mass of ashes of which the
+top of the mountain was composed, and plunge a stick into an old lava
+stream to see how hot it still remained below. Peaceful and quiet as the
+mountain seemed then, I could never have imagined such a glorious
+outburst as that of November 1868 unless I had seen it, and yet this was
+quite a small eruption compared to those of 1867 and 1872, which in
+their turn were nothing to some of the older eruptions in earlier
+centuries.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 38.
+
+The top of Vesuvius in 1864. (After Nasmyth.)]
+
+Now it is the history of this lava stream which I saw, that we are going
+to consider to-day, and you will first want to know where it came from,
+and what caused it to break out on the mountain-side. The truth is, that
+though we know now a good deal about volcanoes themselves, we know very
+little about the mighty cauldrons deep down in the earth from which
+they come. Our deepest mines only reach to a depth of a little more than
+half a mile, and no borings even have been made beyond three-quarters of
+a mile, so that after this depth we are left very much to guesswork.
+
+We do know that the temperature increases as we go farther down from the
+surface, but the increase is very different in different districts--in
+some places being five times greater than it is in others at an equal
+depth, and it is always greatest in localities where volcanoes have been
+active not long before. Now if there were an ocean of melted rock at a
+certain distance down below the crust all over the globe, there could
+scarcely be such a great difference between one place and another, and
+for this and many other reasons geologists are inclined to think that,
+from some unknown cause, great heat is developed at special points below
+the surface at different times. This would account for our finding
+volcanic rocks in almost all parts of the world, even very far away from
+where there are any active volcanoes now.
+
+But, as I have said, we do not clearly know why great reservoirs of
+melted rock occur from time to time deep under our feet. We may perhaps
+one day find the clue from the fact that nearly all, if not all,
+volcanoes occur near to the water's edge, either on the coast of the
+great oceans or of some enormous inland sea or lake. But at present all
+we can say is, that in certain parts of the globe there must be from
+time to time great masses of rock heated till they are white-hot, and
+having white-hot water mingled with them. These great masses need not,
+however, be liquid, for we know that under enormous pressure white-hot
+metals remain solid, and water instead of flashing into steam is kept
+liquid, pressing with tremendous force upon whatever keeps it confined.
+
+But now suppose that for some reason the mass of solid rock and ground
+above one of these heated spots should crack and become weak, or that
+the pressure from below should become so great as to be more powerful
+than the weight above, then the white-hot rock and water quivering and
+panting to expand, would upheave and burst the walls of their prison.
+Cannot you picture to yourselves how when this happened the rock would
+swell into a liquid state, and how the water would force its way upwards
+into cracks and fissures expanding into steam as it went. Then would be
+heard strange rumbling noises underground, as all these heavily
+oppressed white-hot substances upheaved and rent the crust above them.
+And after a time the country round, or the ground at the bottom of the
+sea, would quake and tremble, till by and by a way out would be found,
+and the water flashing into vapour would break and fling up the masses
+of rock immediately above the passage it had made for itself, and
+following after these would come the molten rock pouring out at the new
+opening.
+
+Such outbursts as these have been seen at sea many times near volcanic
+islands. In 1811 a new island called Sabrina was thrown up off St.
+Michael's in the Azores, and after remaining a short time was washed
+away by the waves. In the same way Graham's Island appeared off the
+coast of Sicily in 1831, and as late as 1885 Mr. Shipley saw a
+magnificent eruption in the Pacific near the Tonga Islands when an
+island about three miles long was formed.
+
+Another very extraordinary outburst, this time on land, took place in
+1538 on the opposite side of the Bay of Naples to where Vesuvius stands.
+There, on the shores of the Bay of Bai�, a mountain 440 feet high was
+built up in one week, where all had before been quiet in the memory of
+man. For two years before the outburst came, rumblings and earthquakes
+had alarmed the people, and at last one day the sea drew back from the
+shore and the ground sank about fourteen feet, and then on the night of
+Sunday, September 29, 1538, it was hurled up again, and steam, fiery
+gases, stones, and mud burst forth, driving away the frightened people
+from the village of Puzzuoli about two miles distant. For a whole week
+jets of lava, fragments of rock, and showers of ashes were poured out,
+till they formed the hill now called Monte Nuovo, 440 feet high and
+measuring a mile and a half round the base. And there it has remained
+till the present day, perfectly quiet after the one great outburst had
+calmed down, and is now covered with thickets of stone-pine trees.
+
+These sudden outbursts show that some great change must occur in the
+state of the earth's crust under the spots where they take place, and we
+know that eruptions may cease for centuries in any particular place and
+then begin afresh quite unexpectedly. Vesuvius was a peaceable mountain
+overgrown with trees and vines in the time of the Greeks till in the
+year A.D. 79 occurred the terrific outburst which destroyed Herculaneum
+and Pompeii, shattering old Vesuvius to pieces, so that only the cliffs
+on the northwest remain and are called Somma (see Fig. 37), while the
+new Vesuvius has grown up in the lap, as it were, of its old self. Yet
+when we visit the cliffs of Somma, and examine the old lava streams in
+them, we see that the ancient peaceful mountain was itself built up by
+volcanic outbursts of molten rock, and showers of clinkers or scori�,
+long before man lived to record it.
+
+Meanwhile, when once an opening is made, we can understand how after an
+eruption is over, and the steam and lava are exhausted, all quiets down
+for awhile, and the melted rock in the crater of the mountain cools and
+hardens, shutting in once more the seething mass below. This was the
+state of the crater when I saw it in 1864, though small streams still
+flowed out of two minute cones; but since then at least one great
+outburst had taken place in 1867, and now on this November night, 1868,
+the imprisoned gases rebelled once more and forced their way through the
+mountain-side.
+
+At this point we can leave off forming conjectures and really study what
+happens; for we do know a great deal about the structure of volcanoes
+themselves, and the history of a lava-flow has been made very clear
+during the last few years, chiefly by the help of the microscope and
+chemical experiments. If we imagine then that on the day of the eruption
+we could have seen the inside of the mountain, the diagram (Fig. 39)
+will fairly represent what was taking place there.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 39.
+
+Diagrammatic section of an active volcano.
+
+_a_, Central pipe or funnel. _b_, _b_, Walls of the crater or cup.
+_c_, _c_, Dark turbid cloud formed by the ascending globular clouds
+_d_, _d_. _e_, Rain-shower from escaped vapour. _f_, _f_, Shower of
+blocks, cooled bombs, stones, and ashes falling back on to the cone.
+_g_, Lava escaping through a fissure, and pouring out of a cone opened
+in the mountain side.]
+
+In the funnel _a_ which passes down from the crater or cup _b_, _b_,
+white-hot lava was surging up, having a large quantity of water and
+steam entangled in it. The lava, or melted rock, would be in much the
+same state as melted iron-slag is, in the huge blast-furnaces in which
+iron-rock is fused, only it would have floating in it great blocks of
+solid rock, and rounded stones called bombs which have been formed from
+pieces of half-melted rock whirled in air and falling back into the
+crater, together with clinkers or scori�, dust and sand, all torn off
+and ground down from the walls of the funnel up which the rush was
+coming. And in the pipe of melted rock, forcing the lava upwards,
+enormous bubbles of steam and gas _d_, _d_ would be rising up one after
+another as bubbles rise in any thick boiling substances, such as boiling
+sugar or tar.
+
+In the morning before the eruption, when only a little smoke was issuing
+from the crater, these bubbles rose very slowly through the loaded
+funnel and the half-cooled lava in the basin, and the booming noise,
+like that of heavy cannon, heard from time to time, was caused by the
+bursting of one of these globes of steam at the top of the funnel, as it
+brought up with it a feeble shower of stones, dust, and scori�.
+Meanwhile the lava surging below was forcing a passage _g_ for itself in
+a weak part of the mountain-side and, just at the time when our
+attention was called to Vesuvius, the violent pressure from below rent
+open a mouth or crater at _h_, so that the lava began to flow down the
+mountain in a steady stream. This, relieving the funnel, enabled the
+huge steam bubbles _d_, _d_ to rise more quickly, and to form the large
+whitish-grey cloud _c_, into which from time to time the red-hot blocks,
+scori�, and pumice were thrown up by the escaping steam and gases. These
+blocks and fragments then fell back again in a fiery shower _f_, _f_
+either into the cup, to be thrown up again by the bursting of the next
+bubble, or on to the sides of the cone, making it both broader and
+higher.
+
+Only one feature in the diagram was fortunately absent the evening we
+went up, namely, the rain-shower _e_. The night, as I said, was calm,
+and the air dry, and the steam floated peacefully away. The next night,
+however, when many people hurried down from Rome to see the sight they
+were woefully disappointed, for rain-showers fell heavily from the
+cloud, bringing down with them the dust and ashes, which covered the
+unfortunate sight-seers.
+
+This was what happened during the eruption, and the result after a few
+days was that the cone was a little higher, with a fresh layer of rough
+slaggy scori� on its slopes, and that on the side of the mountain behind
+the Hermitage a new lava stream was added to the many which have flowed
+there of late years. What then can we learn from this stream about the
+materials which come up out of the depths of the earth, and of the
+manner in which volcanic rocks are formed?
+
+The lava as I saw it when coming first out of the newly-opened crater
+is, as I have said, like white-hot iron slag, but very soon the top
+becomes black and solid, a hard cindery mass full of holes and cavities
+with rough edges, caused by the steam and sulphur and other gases
+breaking through it.[1] In fact, there are so many holes and bubbles in
+it that it is very light and floats on the top of the heavier lava
+below, falling over it on to the mountain-side when it comes to the end
+of the stream. Still, however, the great mass moves on, so that the
+stream slides over these fallen clinkers or scori�. Thus after an
+eruption a new flow consists of three layers; at the top the cooled and
+broken crust of clinkers, then the more solid lava, which often remains
+hot for years, and lastly another cindery layer beneath, formed of the
+scori� which have fallen from above (see Fig. 40).
+
+  [1] For the cindery nature of the surface of such a stream see the
+  initial letter of this chapter.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 40.
+
+Section of a lava-flow. (J. Geikie.)
+
+1, Slaggy crust, formed chiefly of scori� of a glassy nature. 2, Middle
+portion where crystals form. 3, Slaggy crust which has slipped down and
+been covered by the flow.]
+
+You would be surprised to see how quickly the top hardens, so that you
+can actually walk across a stream of lava a day or two after it comes
+out from the mountain. But you must not stand still or your shoes would
+soon be burnt, and if you break the crust with a stick you will at once
+see the red-hot lava below; while after a few days the cavities become
+filled with crystals of common salt, sulphur or soda, as the vapour and
+gases escape.
+
+Then as time goes on the harder minerals gradually crystallise out of
+the melted mass, and iron-pyrites, copper-sulphate, and numerous other
+forms of crystal appear in the lower part of the stream. In the clinkers
+above, where the cooling goes on very rapidly, the lavas formed are
+semi-transparent and look much like common bottle-glass. In fact, if you
+take this piece of obsidian or volcanic glass in your hand, you might
+think that it had come out of an ordinary glass manufactory and had
+nothing remarkable in it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 41.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass showing the lines of crystallites and
+microliths which are the beginnings of crystals.[1] (J. Geikie.)]
+
+  [1] This arrangement in lines is called _fluidal structure_ in lava.
+
+But the microscope tells another tale. I have put a thin slice under the
+first microscope, and this diagram (Fig. 41) shows what you will see.
+Nothing, you say, but a few black specks and some tiny dark rods. True,
+but these specks and rods are the first beginnings of crystals forming
+out of the ground-mass of glassy lava as it cools down. They are not
+real crystals, but the first step toward them, and by a careful
+examination of glassy lavas which have cooled at different rates, they
+have been seen under the microscope in all stages of growth, gradually
+building up different crystalline forms. When we remember how rapidly
+the top of many glassy lavas cool down we can understand that they have
+often only time to grow very small.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 42.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass under the microscope, showing well-developed
+microliths. (After Cohen.)]
+
+The smaller specks are called _crystallites_, the rods are called
+_microliths_.[1] Under the next microscope you can see the microliths
+much more distinctly (Fig. 42) and observe that they grow in very
+regular shapes.
+
+  [1] _Micros_, little; _lithos_, stone.
+
+Our first slice, however (Fig. 41), tells us something more of their
+history, for the fact that they are arranged in lines shows that they
+have grown while the lava was flowing and carrying them along in
+streams. You will notice that each one has its greatest length in the
+direction of the lines, just as pieces of stick are carried along
+lengthways in a river. In the second specimen (Fig. 42) the microliths
+are much larger and the stream has evidently not been flowing fast, for
+they lie in all directions.
+
+This is what we find in the upper part of the stream, but if we look at
+a piece of underlying lava we find that it is much more coarse-grained,
+and the magnifying-glass shows many crystals in it, as well as a number
+of microliths. For this lava, covered by the crust above, has remained
+very hot for a long time, and the crystals have had time to build
+themselves up out of the microliths and crystallites.
+
+Still there is much glassy groundwork even in these lavas. If we want to
+find really stony masses such as porphyry and granite made up entirely
+of crystals we must look inside the mountain where the molten rock is
+kept intensely hot for long periods, as for example in the fissure _g_,
+Fig. 39.
+
+Such fissures sometimes open out on the surface like the one I saw, and
+sometimes only penetrate part of the way through the hill; but in either
+case when the lava in them cools down, it forms solid walls called dykes
+which help to bind the loose materials of the mountain together. We
+cannot, of course, examine these in an active volcano, but there are
+many extinct volcanoes which have been worn and washed by the weather
+for centuries, so that we can see the inside. The dykes laid bare in the
+cliffs of Somma are old fissures filled with molten rock which has
+cooled down, and they show us many stony lavas; and Mr. Judd tells us of
+one beautiful example of a ruined volcano which composes the whole
+island of Mull in the Hebrides, where such dykes can be traced right
+back to a centre. This centre must once have been a mass of melted
+matter far down in the earth, and as you trace the dykes back deeper and
+deeper into it, the rocks grow more and more stony, till at last they
+are composed entirely of large crystals closely crowded together
+without any glassy matter between them. You know this crystalline
+structure well, for we have plenty of blocks of granite scattered about
+on Dartmoor, showing that at some time long ago molten matter must have
+been at work in the depths under Devonshire.
+
+We see then that we can trace the melted rock of volcanoes right
+back--from the surface of the lava stream which cools quickly at the
+top, hurrying the crystallites and microliths along with it--down
+through the volcano to the depths of the earth, where the perfect
+crystals form slowly and deliberately in the underground lakes of
+white-hot rock which are kept in a melted state at an intense heat.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 43.
+
+A piece of Dartmoor Granite, drawn from a specimen.]
+
+But I promised you that we would have no guesswork here, and you will
+perhaps ask how I can be certain what was going on in the depths when
+these crystals were formed. A few years ago I could not have answered
+you, but now chemists, and especially two eminent French chemists, MM.
+Fouqu� and Levy, have actually _made_ lavas and shown us how it is done
+in Nature.
+
+By using powerful furnaces and bellows they have succeeded in getting
+temperatures of all degrees, from a dazzling white heat down to a dull
+red, and to keep any temperature they like for a long time, so as to
+imitate the state of a mass of melted rock at different depths in the
+earth, and in this way they have actually _made_ lavas in their
+crucibles. For example, there is a certain whitish rock common in
+Vesuvius called _leucotephrite_,[1] which is made up chiefly of crystals
+of the minerals called leucite, Labrador felspar, and augite. This they
+proposed to make artificially, so they took proper quantities of silica,
+alumina, oxide of iron, lime, potash, and soda, and putting them in a
+crucible, melted them by keeping them at a white heat. Then they lowered
+the temperature to an orange-heat, that is a heat sufficient to melt
+steel. They kept this heat for forty-eight hours, after which they took
+out some of the mixture and, letting it cool, examined a slice under the
+microscope. Within it they found crystals of _leucite_ already formed,
+showing that these are the first to grow while the melted rock is still
+intensely hot. The rest of the mixture they kept red-hot, or at the
+melting-point of copper, for another forty-eight hours, and when they
+took it out and examined it they found that the whole of it had been
+transformed into microliths of the two other forms of crystals, Labrador
+felspar and augite, except some small eight-sided crystals of magnetite
+and picotite which are also found in the natural rock.
+
+  [1] _Leucos_, white; _tephra_, ashes.
+
+There is no need for you to remember all these names. What I do want you
+to remember is, that, at the different temperatures, the right crystals
+and beginnings of crystals grew up to form the rock which is found in
+Vesuvius. And what is still more interesting, they grew exactly to the
+same stages as in the natural rock, which is composed of _crystals_ of
+leucite and _microliths_ of the two other minerals.
+
+This is only one among numerous experiments by which we have learnt how
+volcanic rocks are formed and at what heat the crystals of different
+substances grow. We are only as yet at the beginning of this new study,
+and there is plenty for you boys to do by and by when you grow up. Many
+experiments have failed as yet to imitate certain rocks, and it is
+remarkable that these are usually rocks of very ancient eruptions, when
+_perhaps_ our globe may have been in a different state to what it is
+now; but this remains for us to find out.
+
+Meanwhile I have still another very interesting slide to show you which
+tells us something of what is going on below the volcano. Under the
+third microscope I have put a slice of volcanic glass (Fig. 44) in which
+you will see really large crystals with dark bands curving round them.
+These crystals have clearly not been formed in the glass while the lava
+was flowing, first because they are too large to have grown up so
+rapidly, and secondly because they are broken at the edges in places and
+sometimes partly melted. They have evidently come up with the lava as it
+flowed out of the mountain, and the dark bands curving round them are
+composed of microliths which have been formed in the flow and have swept
+round them, as floating straws gather round a block of wood in a stream.
+
+Such crystals as these are often found in lava streams, and in fact they
+make a great difference in the rate at which a stream flows, for a
+thoroughly melted lava shoots along at a great pace and often travels
+several miles in a very short time; but an imperfectly melted lava full
+of crystals creeps slowly along, and often does not travel far from the
+crater out of which it flows.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 44.
+
+Slice of volcanic glass under the microscope, showing large included
+crystals brought up from inside the volcano in the fluid lava. The dark
+bands are lines of microliths formed as the lava cooled. (J. Geikie.)]
+
+So you see we have proof in this slice of volcanic glass of two separate
+periods of crystallisation--the period when the large crystals grew in
+the liquid mass under the mountain, and the period when the microliths
+were formed after it was poured out above ground. And as we know that
+different substances form their crystals at very different temperatures,
+it is not surprising that some should be able to take up the material
+they require and grow in the underground lakes of melted matter, even
+though the rest of the lava was sufficiently fluid to be forced up out
+of the mountain.
+
+And here we must leave our lava stream. The microscope can tell us yet
+more, of marvellous tiny cavities inside the crystals, millions in a
+single inch, and of other crystals inside these, all of which have their
+history; but this would lead us too far. We must be content for the
+present with having roughly traced a flow of lava from the depths below,
+where large crystals form in subterranean darkness, to the open air
+above, where we catch the tiny beginnings of crystals hardened into
+glassy lava before they have time to grow further.
+
+If you will think a little for yourselves about these wonderful
+discoveries made with the magic-glass, you will see how many questions
+they suggest to us about the minerals which we find buried in the earth
+and running through it in veins, and you will want to know something
+about the more precious crystals, such as rubies, diamonds, sapphires,
+and garnets, and many others which Nature forms far away out of our
+sight. All these depend, though indirectly, upon the strange effects of
+underground heat, and if you have once formed a picture in your minds of
+what must have been going on before that magnificent lava stream crept
+down the mountain-side and added its small contribution to the surface
+of the earth, you will study eagerly all that comes in your way about
+crystals and minerals, and while you ask questions with the spectroscope
+about what is going on in the sun and stars millions of miles away, you
+will also ask the microscope what it has to tell of the work going on at
+depths many miles under your feet.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+AN HOUR WITH THE SUN
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Before beginning upon the subject of our lecture to-day I want to tell
+you the story of a great puzzle which presented itself to me when I was
+a very young child. I happened to come across a little book--I can see
+it now as though it were yesterday--a small square green book called
+_World without End_, which had upon the cover a little gilt picture of a
+stile with trees on each side of it. That was all. I do not know what
+the book was about, indeed I am almost sure I never opened it or saw it
+again, but that stile and the title "World without End" puzzled me
+terribly. What was on the other side of the stile? If I could cross over
+it and go on and on should I be in a world which had no ending, and what
+would be on the other side? But then there could be no other side if it
+was a world without any end. I was very young, you must remember, and I
+grew confused and bewildered as I imagined myself reaching onwards and
+onwards beyond that stile and never, never resting. At last I consulted
+my greatest friend, an old man who did the weeding in my father's
+garden, and whom I believed to be very wise. He looked at first almost
+as bewildered as I was, but at last light dawned upon him. "I tell you
+what it is, Master Arthur," said he, "I do not rightly know what happens
+when there is no end, but I do know that there is a mighty lot to be
+found out in this world, and I'm thinking we had better learn first all
+about that, and perhaps it may teach us something which will help us to
+understand the other."
+
+I daresay you will wonder what this anecdote can have to do with a
+lecture on the sun--I will tell you. Last night I stood on the balcony
+and looked out far and farther away into the star-depths of the midnight
+sky, marvelling what could be the history of those countless suns of
+which we see ever more and more as we increase the power of our
+telescopes, or catch the faint beams of those we cannot see and make
+them print their image on the photographic plate. And, as I grew
+oppressed at the thought of this never-ending expanse of suns and at my
+own littleness, I remembered all at once the little square book of my
+childish days with its gilt stile, and my old friend's advice to learn
+first all we can of that which lies nearest.
+
+So to-day, before we travel away to the stars, we had better inquire
+what is known about the one star in the heavens which is comparatively
+near to us, our own glorious sun, which sends us all our light and heat,
+causes all the movements of our atmosphere, draws up the moisture from
+the ground to return in refreshing rain, ripens our harvests, awakens
+the seeds and sleeping plants into vigorous growth, and in a word
+sustains all the energy and life upon our earth. Yet even this star,
+which is more than a million times as large as our earth, and bound so
+closely to us that a convulsion on its surface sends a thrill right
+through our atmosphere, is still so far off that it is only by
+questioning the sunbeams it sends to us, that we can know anything about
+it.
+
+You have already learnt[1] a good deal as to the size, the intense heat
+and light, and the photographic power of the sun, and also how his white
+beams of light are composed of countless coloured rays which we can
+separate in a prism. Now let us pass on to the more difficult problem of
+the nature of the sun itself, and what we know of the changes and
+commotions going on in that blazing globe of light.
+
+  [1] _Fairyland of Science_, Chapter II.
+
+We will try first what we can see for ourselves. If you take a card and
+make a pin-hole in it, you can look through this hole straight at the
+sun without injuring your eye, and you will see a round shining disc on
+which, perhaps, you may detect a few dark spots. Then if you take your
+hand telescopes, which I have shaded by putting a piece of smoked glass
+inside the eye-piece, you will find that this shining disc is really a
+round globe, and moreover, although the object-glass of your telescopes
+measures only two-and-a-half inches across, you will be able to see the
+dark spots very distinctly and to observe that they are shaded, having a
+deep spot in the centre with a paler shadow round it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 45.
+
+Face of the sun projected on a sheet of cardboard C. T, Telescope. _f_,
+Finder. _og_, Object-glass. _ep_, Eye-piece. S, Screen shutting off the
+diffused light from the window.]
+
+As, however, you cannot all use the telescopes, and those who can will
+find it difficult to point them truly on to the sun, we will adopt still
+another plan. I will turn the object-glass of my portable telescope full
+upon the sun's face, and bringing a large piece of cardboard on an easel
+near to the other end, draw it slowly backward till the eye-piece forms
+a clear sharp image upon it (see Fig. 45). This you can all see
+clearly, especially as I have passed the eye-piece of the telescope
+through a large screen _s_, which shuts off the light from the window.
+
+You have now an exact image of the face of the sun and the few dark
+spots which are upon it, and we have brought, as it were, into our room
+that great globe of light and heat which sustains all the life and
+vigour upon our earth.
+
+This small image can, however, tell us very little. Let us next see what
+photography can show us. The diagram (Fig. 46) shows a photograph of the
+sun taken by Mr. Selwyn in October 1860. Let me describe how this is
+done. You will remember that there is a point in the telescope tube
+where the rays of light form a real image of the object at which the
+telescope is pointed (see p. 44). Now an astronomer who wishes to take a
+photograph of the sun takes away the eye-piece of his telescope and puts
+a photographic plate in the tube exactly at the place where this real
+image is formed. He takes care to blacken the frame of the plate and
+shuts up this end of the telescope and the plate in a completely dark
+box, so that no diffused light from outside can reach it. Then he turns
+his telescope upon the sun that it may print its image.
+
+But the sun's light is so strong that even in a second of time it would
+print a great deal too much, and all would be black and confused. To
+prevent this he has a strip of metal which slides across the tube of the
+telescope in front of the plate, and in the upper part of this strip a
+very fine slit is cut. Before he begins, he draws the metal up so that
+the slit is outside the tube and the solid portion within, and he
+fastens it in this position by a thread drawn through and tied to a bar
+outside. Then he turns his telescope on the sun, and as soon as he
+wishes to take the photograph he cuts the thread. The metal slides
+across the tube with a flash, the slit passing across it and out again
+below in the hundredth part of a second, and in that time the sun has
+printed through the slit the picture before you.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 46.
+
+Photograph of the face of the sun, taken by Mr. Selwyn, October 1860,
+showing spots, facul�, and mottled surface.]
+
+In it you will observe at least two things not visible on our
+card-image. The spots, though in a different position from where we see
+them to-day, look much the same, but round them we see also some bright
+streaks called _facul�_, or torches, which often appear in any region
+where a spot is forming, while the whole face of the sun appears mottled
+with bright and darker spaces intermixed. Those of you who have the
+telescopes can see this mottling quite distinctly through them if you
+look at the sun. The bright points have been called by many names, and
+are now generally known as "light granules," as good a name, perhaps, as
+any other.
+
+This is all our photograph can tell us, but the round disc there shown,
+which is called the _photosphere_, or light-giving sphere, is by no
+means the whole of the sun, though it is all we see daily with the naked
+eye. Whenever a total eclipse of the sun takes place--by the dark body
+of the moon coming between us and it, so as to shut out the whole of
+this disc--a brilliant white halo, called the crown or _corona_, is seen
+to extend for many thousands of miles all round the darkened globe. It
+varies very much in shape, sometimes forming a kind of irregular square,
+sometimes a circle with off-shoots, as in Fig. 47, which shows what
+Major Tennant saw in India during the total eclipse of August 18, 1868,
+and at other times it shoots out in long pearly white jets and sheets of
+light with dark spaces between. On the whole it varies periodically. At
+the time of few sun-spots its extensions are equatorial; but when the
+sun's face is much covered with spots, they are diagonal, stretching
+away from the spot-zones, but not nearly so far.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 47.
+
+Total eclipse of the sun, as drawn by Major Tennant at Guntoor in India,
+August 18, 1868, showing corona and the protuberances seen at the
+beginning of totality.]
+
+And besides this corona there are seen very curious flaming projections
+on the edge of the sun, which begin to appear as soon as the moon covers
+the bright disc. In our diagram (Fig. 47) you see them on the left side
+where the moon is just creeping over the limits of the photosphere and
+shutting out the strong light of the sun as the eclipse becomes total. A
+very little later they are better seen on the other side just before the
+bright edge of the sun is uncovered as the moon passes on its way. These
+projections in the real sun are of a bright red colour, and they take on
+all manners of strange shapes, sometimes looking like ranges of fiery
+hills, sometimes like gigantic spikes and scimitars, sometimes even like
+branching fiery trees. They were called _prominences_ before their
+nature was well understood, and will probably always keep that name. It
+would be far better, however, if some other name such as "glowing
+clouds" or "red jets" could be used, for there is now no doubt that they
+are jets of gases, chiefly hydrogen, constantly playing over the face of
+the sun, though only seen when his brighter light is quenched. They have
+been found to shoot up 20,000, 80,000, and even as much as 350,000 miles
+beyond the edge of the shining disc; and this last means that the flames
+were so gigantic that if they had started from our earth they would have
+reached beyond the moon. We shall see presently that astronomers are now
+able by the help of the spectroscope to see the prominences even when
+there is no eclipse, and we know them to be permanent parts of the
+bright globe.
+
+This gives us at last the whole of the sun, so far as we know. There is,
+indeed, a strange faint zodiacal light, a kind of pearly glow seen after
+sunset or before sunrise extending far beyond the region of the corona;
+but we understand so little about this that we cannot be sure that it
+actually belongs to the sun.
+
+And now how shall I best give you an idea of what little we do know
+about this great surging monster of light and heat which shines down
+upon us? You must give me all your attention, for I want to make the
+facts quite clear, that you may take a firm hold upon them.
+
+Our first step is to question the sunlight which comes to us; and this
+we do with the spectroscope. Let me remind you how we read the story of
+light through this instrument. Taking in a narrow beam of light through
+a fine slit, we pass the beam through a lens to make the rays parallel,
+and then throw it upon a prism or row of prisms, so that each set of
+waves of coloured light coming through the slit is bent on its own road
+and makes an upright image of the slit on any screen or telescope put to
+receive it (see Fig. 21, p. 52). Now when the light we examine comes
+from a glowing solid, like white-hot iron, or a glowing liquid, or a gas
+under such enormous pressure that it behaves like a liquid, then the
+images of the slit always overlap each other, so that we see a
+continuous unbroken band of colour. However much you spread out the
+light you can never break up or separate the spectrum in any part.[1]
+But when you send the light, of a glowing gas such as hydrogen through
+the spectroscope, or of a substance melted into gas or vapour, such as
+sodium or iron vaporised by great heat, then it is a different story.
+Such gases give only a certain number of bright lines quite separate
+from each other on the dark background, and each kind of gas gives its
+own peculiar lines; so that even when several are glowing together there
+is no confusion, but when you look at them through the spectroscope you
+can detect the presence of each gas by its own lines in the spectrum.
+
+  [1] Two rare earths, Erbia and Didymium, form an exception to this,
+  but they do not concern us here.
+
+[Illustration: TABLE OF SPECTRA. Plate I.]
+
+To make quite sure of this we will close the shutters and put a pinch of
+salt in a spirit-flame. Salt is chloride of sodium, and in the flame the
+sodium glows with a bright yellow light. Look at this light through your
+small direct-vision spectroscopes[1] and you see at once the bright
+yellow double-line of sodium (No. 3, Plate I.) start into view across
+the faint continuous spectrum given by the spirit-flame. Next I will
+show you glowing hydrogen. I have here a glass tube containing hydrogen,
+so arranged that by connecting two wires fastened to it with the
+induction coil of our electric battery it will soon glow with a bright
+red colour. Look at this through your spectroscopes and you will see
+three bright lines, one red, one greenish blue, and one indigo blue,
+standing out on the dark background (No. 4, Plate I.)
+
+  [1] A direct-vision spectroscope is like a small telescope with
+  prisms arranged inside the tube. The object-glass end is covered by
+  two pieces of metal, which slide backwards and forwards by means of
+  a screw, so that a narrow or broad slit can be opened.
+
+Think for a moment what a grand power this gives you of reading as in a
+book the different gases which are glowing in the sky even billions of
+miles away. You would never mistake the lines of hydrogen for the line
+of sodium, but when looking at a nebula or any mass of glowing gas you
+could say at once "sodium is glowing there," or "that cloud must be
+composed of hydrogen."
+
+Now, opening the shutters, look at the sunlight through your
+spectroscopes. Here you have something different from either the
+continuous spectrum of solids, or the bright separate lines of gases,
+for while you have a bright-coloured band you have also some dark lines
+crossing it (No. 2, Plate I.) It is those dark lines which enable us to
+guess what is going on in the sun before the light comes to us. In 1859
+Professor Kirchhoff made an experiment which explained those dark lines,
+and we will repeat it now. Take a good look at the sunlight spectrum, to
+fix the lines in your memory, and then close the shutters again.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 48.
+
+Kirchhoff's experiment, explaining the dark lines in sunlight.
+
+A, Limelight dispersed through a prism. _s_, Slit through which the beam
+of light comes. _l_, Lens bringing it to a focus on the prism _p_. _sp_,
+Continuous spectrum thrown on the wall. B, The same light, with the
+flame _f_ containing glowing sodium placed in front of it. D, Dark
+sodium line appearing in the spectrum.]
+
+I have here our magic-lantern with its lime-light, in which the solid
+lime glows with a white heat, in consequence of the jets of oxygen and
+hydrogen burning round it. This was the light Kirchhoff used, and you
+know it will give a continuous bright band in the spectroscope. I put a
+cap with a narrow slit in it over the lantern tube, so as to get a
+narrow beam of light; in front of this I put a lens _l_, and in front of
+this again the prism _p_. The slit and the prism act exactly like your
+spectroscopes, and you can all see the continuous spectrum on the screen
+(_sp_, A, Fig. 48). Next I put a lighted lamp of very weak spirit in
+front of the slit, and find that it makes no difference, for whatever
+light it gives only strengthens the spectrum. But now notice carefully.
+I am going to put a little salt into the flame, and you would expect
+that the sodium in it, when turned to glowing vapour, causing it to look
+yellow, would strengthen the yellow part of the spectrum and give a
+bright line. This is what Kirchhoff expected, but to his intense
+surprise he saw as you do now a _dark line_ D start out where the bright
+line should have been.
+
+What can have happened? It is this. The oxyhydrogen light is very hot
+indeed, the spirit flame with the sodium is comparatively weak and cool.
+So when those special coloured waves of the oxyhydrogen light which
+agree with those of the sodium light reached the flame, they spent all
+their energy in heating up those waves to their own temperature, and
+while all the other coloured rays travelled on and reached the screen,
+these waves were stopped or _absorbed_ on the way, and consequently
+there was a blank, black space in the spectrum where they should have
+been. If I could put a hydrogen flame cooler than the original light in
+the road, then there would be three dark lines where the bright hydrogen
+lines should be, and so with every other gas. _The cool vapour in front
+of the hot light cuts off from the white ray exactly those waves which
+it gives out itself when burning._
+
+Thus each black line of the sun-spectrum (No. 2, Plate I.), tells us
+that some particular ray of sunlight has been absorbed by a cooler
+vapour _of its own kind_ somewhere between the sun and us, and it must
+be in the sun itself, for when we examine other stars we often find dark
+lines in their spectrum different from those in the sun, and this shows
+that the missing rays must have been stopped close at home, for if they
+were stopped in our atmosphere they would all be alike.
+
+There are, by the bye, some lines which we know are caused by our
+atmosphere, especially when it is full of invisible water vapour, and
+these we easily detect, because they show more distinctly when the sun
+is low and shines through a thicker layer of air than when he is high up
+and shines through less.
+
+But to return to the sun. In your small spectroscopes you see very few
+dark lines, but in larger and more perfect ones they can be counted by
+thousands, and can be compared with the bright lines of glowing gases
+burnt here on earth. In the spectrum of glowing iron vapour 460 lines
+are found to agree with dark lines in the sun-spectrum, and other gases
+have nearly as many. Still, though thousands of lines can now be
+explained, by matching them with the bright lines of known gases, the
+whole secret of sunlight is not yet solved, for the larger number of
+lines still remain a riddle to be read.
+
+We see then that the spectroscope teaches us that the round light-giving
+disc or photosphere of the sun consists of a bright and intensely hot
+light shining behind a layer of cooler though still very hot vapours,
+which form a kind of shell of luminous clouds around it, and in this
+shell, or _reversing layer_--as it is often called, because it turns
+light to darkness--we have proved that iron, lead, copper, zinc,
+aluminum, magnesium, potassium, sodium, carbon, hydrogen, and many other
+substances common to our earth, exist in a state of vapour for a depth
+of perhaps 1000 miles.
+
+You will easily understand that when the spectroscope had told so much,
+astronomers were eager to learn what it would reveal about the
+prominences or red jets seen during eclipses, and they got an answer in
+India during that same eclipse of August 1868 which is shown in our
+diagram (Fig. 47). Making use of the time during which the prominences
+were seen, they turned the telescope upon them with a spectroscope
+attached to it, and saw a number of bright lines start out, of which the
+chief were the three bright lines of hydrogen, showing that these
+curious appearances are really flames of glowing gas.
+
+In the same year Professor Jannsen and Mr. Lockyer succeeded in seeing
+the bright lines of the prominences in full sunlight. This was done in a
+very simple way, when once it was discovered to be possible, and though
+my apparatus (Fig. 49) is very primitive compared with some now made, it
+will serve to explain the method.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 49.
+
+The spectroscope attached to the telescope for the examination of the
+sun. (Lockyer.)
+
+P, Pillar of Telescope. T, Telescope. S, Finder or small telescope for
+pointing the telescope in position. _a_, _a_, _b_, Supports fastening
+the spectroscope to the telescope. _d_, Collimator or tube carrying the
+slit at the end nearest the telescope, and a lens at the other end to
+render the rays parallel. _c_, Plate on which the prisms are fixed. _e_,
+Small telescope through which the observer examines the spectrum after
+the ray has been dispersed in the prisms. _h_, Micrometer for measuring
+the relative distance of the lines.]
+
+When an astronomer wishes to examine the spectrum of any special part of
+the sun, he takes off the eye-piece of his telescope and screws the
+spectroscope upon the draw-tube. The spectroscope is made exactly like
+the large one for ordinary work. The tube _d_ (Fig. 49) carries the slit
+at the end nearest the telescope, and this slit must be so placed as to
+stand precisely at the principal focus of the lens where the sun's image
+is formed (see _i_, _i_, p. 44). This comes to exactly the same thing as
+if we could put the slit close against the face of the sun, so as to
+show only the small strip which it covers, and by moving it to one part
+or another of the image we can see any point that we wish and no other.
+The light then passes through the tube _d_ into the round of prisms
+standing on the tray _c_, and the observer looking through the small
+telescope _e_ sees the spectrum as it emerges from the last prism. In
+this way astronomers can examine the spectrum of a spot, or part of a
+spot, or of a bright streak, or any other mark on the sun's face.
+
+Now in looking at the prominences we have seen that the difficulty is
+caused by the sunlight, between us and them, overpowering the bright
+lines of the gas, nor could we overcome this if it were not for a
+difference which exists between the two kinds of light. The more you
+disperse or spread out the continuous sun-spectrum the fainter it
+becomes, but in spreading out the bright lines of the gas you only send
+them farther and farther apart; they themselves remain almost as bright
+as ever. So, when the telescope forms an image of the red flame in front
+of the slit, though the glowing gas and the sunlight both send rays into
+the spectroscope, you have only to use enough prisms and arrange them in
+such a way that the sunlight is dispersed into a very long faint
+spectrum, and then the bright lines of the flames will stand out bright
+and clear. Of course only a small part of the long spectrum can be seen
+at once, and the lines must be studied separately. On the other hand, if
+you want to compare the strong light of the sun with the bright lines of
+the prominences, you place the slit just at the edge of the sun's image
+in the telescope, so that half the slit is on the sun's face and half on
+the prominence. The prisms then disperse the sunlight between you and
+the prominences, while they only lessen the strong light of the sun
+itself, which still shows clearly. In this way the two spectra are seen
+side by side and the dark and bright lines can be compared accurately
+together (see Fig. 50).
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 50.
+
+Bright lines of prominences.
+
+Sun-spectrum with dark lines.]
+
+Wherever the telescope is turned all round the sun the lines of luminous
+gas are seen, showing that they form a complete layer outside the
+photosphere, or light-giving mass, of the sun. This layer of luminous
+gases is called the _chromosphere_, or coloured sphere. It lies between
+the photosphere and the corona, and is supposed to be at least 5000
+miles deep, while, as we have seen, the flames shoot up from it to
+fabulous heights.
+
+The quiet red flames are found to be composed of hydrogen and another
+new metal called helium; but lower down, near the sun's edge, other
+bright lines are seen, showing that sodium, magnesium, and other metals
+are there, and when violent eruptions occur these often surge up and
+mingle with the purer gas above. At other times the eruptions below
+fling the red flames aloft with marvellous force, as when Professor
+Young saw a long low-lying cloud of hydrogen, 100,000 miles long, blown
+into shreds and flung up to a height of 200,000 miles, when the
+fragments streamed away and vanished in two hours. Yet all these violent
+commotions and storms are unseen by us on earth unless we look through
+our magic glasses.
+
+You will wonder no doubt how the spectroscope can show the height and
+the shape of the flames. I will explain to you, and I hope to show them
+you one day. You must remember that the telescope makes a small real
+image of the flame at its focus, just as in one of our earlier
+experiments you saw the exact image of the candle-flame upside down on
+the paper (see p. 33). The reason why we only see a strip of the flame
+in the spectroscope is because the slit is so narrow. But when once the
+sunlight was dispersed so as no longer to interfere, Dr. Huggins found
+that it is possible to open the slit wide enough to take in the image of
+the whole flame, and then, by turning the spectroscope so as to bring
+one of the bright hydrogen lines into view, the actual shape of the
+prominence is seen, only it will look a different colour, either red,
+greenish-blue, or indigo-blue, according to the line chosen. As the
+image of the whole sun and its appendages in the telescope is so very
+small, you will understand that even a very narrow slit will really take
+in a very large prominence several thousand miles in length. Fig 51
+shows a drawing by Mr. Lockyer of a group of flames he observed very
+soon after Dr. Huggins suggested the open slit, and these shapes did not
+last long, for in another picture he drew ten minutes later their
+appearance had already changed.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 51.
+
+Red prominences, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer during the total eclipse of
+March 14, 1869.]
+
+These then are some of the facts revealed to us by our magic glasses. I
+scarcely expect you to remember all the details I have given you, but
+you will at least understand now how astronomers actually penetrate into
+the secrets of the sun by bringing its image into their observatory, as
+we brought it to-day on the card-board, and then making it tell its own
+tale through the prisms of the spectroscope; and you will retain some
+idea of the central light of the sun with its surrounding atmosphere of
+cooler gases and its layer of luminous lambent gases playing round it
+beyond.
+
+Of the corona I cannot tell you much, except that it is far more subtle
+than anything we have spoken of yet; that it is always strongest when
+the sun is most spotted; that it is partly made up of self-luminous
+gases whose bright lines we can see, especially an unknown green ray;
+while it also shines partly by reflected light from the sun, for we can
+trace in it faint dark lines; lastly it fades away into the mysterious
+zodiacal light, and so the sun ends in mystery at its outer fringe as it
+began at its centre.
+
+And now at last, having learnt something of the material of the sun, we
+can come back to the spots and ask what is known about them. As I have
+said, they are not always the same on the sun's face. On the contrary,
+they vary very much both in number and size. In some years the sun's
+face is quite free from them, at others there are so many that they form
+two wide belts on each side of the sun's equator, with a clear space of
+about six degrees between. No spots ever appear near the poles. Herr
+Schwabe, who watched the sun's face patiently for more than thirty
+years, has shown that it is most spotted about every eleven years, then
+the spots disappear very quickly and reappear slowly till the full-spot
+time comes round again.
+
+Some spots remain a very short time and then break up and disappear, but
+others last for days, weeks, and even months, and when we watch these,
+we find that a spot appears to travel slowly across the face of the sun
+from east to west and then round the western edge so that it disappears.
+It is when it reaches the edge that we can convince ourselves that the
+spot is really part of the sun, for there is no space to be seen between
+them, the edge and the spot are one, as the last trace of the dark
+blotch passes out of sight. In fact, it is not the spot which has
+crossed the sun's face, but the sun itself which has turned, like our
+earth, upon its axis, carrying the spot round with it. As some spots
+remain long enough to reappear, after about twelve or thirteen days, on
+the opposite edge, and even pass round two or three times, astronomers
+can reckon that the sun takes about twenty-five days and five hours in
+performing one revolution. You will wonder why I say only _about_
+twenty-five, but I do so because all spots do not come round in exactly
+the same time, those farthest from the equator lag rather more than a
+day behind those nearer to it, and this is explained by the layer of
+gases in which they are formed, drifting back in higher latitudes as the
+sun turns.
+
+It is by watching a spot as it travels across the sun, that we are able
+to observe that the centre partlies deeper in the sun's face than the
+outer rim. There are many ways of testing this, and you can try one
+yourselves with a telescope if you watch day after day. I will explain
+it by a simple experiment. I have here a round lump of stiff dough, in
+which I have made a small hollow and blackened the bottom with a drop of
+ink. As I turn this round, so that the hollow facing you moves from
+right to left, you will see that after it passes the middle of the face,
+the hole appears narrower and narrower till it disappears, and if you
+observe carefully you will note that the dark centre is the first thing
+you lose sight of, while the edges of the cup are still seen, till just
+before the spot disappears altogether. But now I will stick a wafer on,
+and a pea half into, the dough, marking the centre of each with ink.
+Then I turn the ball again. This time you lose sight of the foremost
+edge first, and the dark centre is seen almost to the last moment. This
+shows that if the spots were either flat marks, or hillocks, on the
+sun's face, the dark centre would remain to the last, but as a fact it
+disappears before the rim. Father Secchi has tried to measure the depth
+of a spot-cavity, and thinks they vary from 1000 to 3000 miles deep. But
+there are many difficulties in interpreting the effects of light and
+shadow at such an enormous distance, and some astronomers still doubt
+whether spots are really depressions.
+
+For many centuries now the spots have been watched forming and
+dispersing, and this is roughly speaking what is seen to happen. When
+the sun is fairly clear and there are few spots, these generally form
+quietly, several black dots appearing and disappearing with bright
+streaks or _facul�_ round their edge, till one grows bigger than the
+rest, and forms a large dark nucleus, round which, after a time, a
+half-shadow or _penumbra_ is seen and we have a sun-spot complete, with
+bright edges, dark shadow, and deep black centre (Fig. 52). This lasts
+for a certain time and then it becomes bridged over with light streaks,
+the dark spot breaks up and disappears, and last of all the half-shadow
+dies away.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 52.
+
+A quiet sun-spot. (Secchi.)]
+
+But things do not always take place so quietly. When the sun's face is
+very troubled and full of spots, the bright _facul�_, which appear with
+a spot, seem to heave and wave, and generally several dark centres form
+with whirling masses of light round them, while in some of them tongues
+of fire appear to leap up from below (Fig. 53). Such spots change
+quickly from day to day, even if they remain for a long time, until at
+last by degrees the dark centres become less distinct, the half-shadows
+disappear, leaving only the bright streaks, which gradually settle down
+into luminous points or _light granules_. These light granules are in
+fact supposed by astronomers to be the tips of glowing clouds heaving up
+everywhere, while the dark spaces between them are cooler currents
+passing downwards.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 53.
+
+A tumultuous sun-spot. (Langley.)]
+
+Below these clouds, no doubt, the great mass of the sun is in a violent
+state of heat and commotion, and when from time to time, whether
+suddenly or steadily, great upheavals and eruptions take place, bright
+flames dart up and luminous clouds gather and swell, so that long
+streaks or _facul�_ surge upon the face of the sun.
+
+Now these hot gases rising up thus on all sides would leave room below
+for cooler gases to pour down from above, and these, as we know, would
+cut off, or absorb, much of the light coming from the body of the sun,
+so that the centre, where the down current was the strongest, would
+appear black even though some light would pass through. This is the best
+explanation we have as yet of the formation of a sun-spot, and many
+facts shown in the spectroscope help to confirm it, as for example the
+thickening of the dark lines of the spectrum when the slit is placed
+over the centre of a spot, and the flashing out of bright lines when an
+uprush of streaks occurs either across the spots or round it.
+
+And now, before you go, I must tell you of one of these wonderful
+uprushes, which sent such a thrill through our own atmosphere, as to
+tell us very plainly the power which the sun has over our globe. The
+year 1859 was remarkable for sun-spots, and on September 1, when two
+astronomers many miles apart were examining them, they both saw, all at
+once, a sudden cloud of light far brighter than the general surface of
+the sun burst out in the midst of a group of spots. The outburst began
+at eight minutes past eleven in the forenoon, and in five minutes it was
+gone again, but in that time it had swept across a space of 35,000 miles
+on the sun! Now both before and after this violent outburst took place
+a magnetic storm raged all round the earth, brilliant auroras were seen
+in all parts of the world, sparks flashed from the telegraph wires, and
+the telegraphic signalmen at Washington and Philadelphia received severe
+electric shocks. Messages were interrupted, for the storm took
+possession of the wires and sent messages of its own, the magnetic
+needles darting to and fro as though seized with madness. At the
+very instant when the bright outburst was seen in the sun, the
+self-registering instruments at Kew marked how three needles jerked all
+at once wildly aside; and the following night the skies were lit up with
+wondrous lights as the storm of electric agitation played round the
+earth.
+
+We are so accustomed to the steady glow of sunshine pouring down upon us
+that we pay very little heed to daylight, though I hope none of us are
+quite so ignorant as the man who praised the moon above the sun, because
+it shone in the dark night, whereas the sun came in the daytime when
+there was light enough already! Yet probably many of us do not actually
+realise how close are the links which bind us to our brilliant star as
+he carries us along with him through space. It is only when an unusual
+outburst occurs, such as I have just described, that we feel how every
+thrill which passes through our atmosphere, through the life-current of
+every plant, and through the fibre and nerve of every animal has some
+relation to the huge source of light, heat, electricity, and magnetism
+at which we are now gazing across a space of more than 93,000,000 miles.
+Yet it is well to remember that the sudden storm and the violent
+eruption are the exceptional occurrences, and that their use to us as
+students is chiefly to lead us to understand the steady and constant
+thrill which, never ceasing, never faltering, fulfils the great purpose
+of the unseen Lawgiver in sustaining all movement and life in our little
+world.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+AN EVENING AMONG THE STARS
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"Do you love the stars?" asked the magician of his lads, as they crowded
+round him on the college green, one evening in March, to look through
+his portable telescope.
+
+"Have you ever sat at the window on a clear frosty night, or in the
+garden in summer, and looked up at those wondrous lights in the sky,
+pondering what they are, and what purpose they serve?"
+
+I will confess to you that when I lived in London I did not think much
+about the stars, for in the streets very few can be seen at a time even
+on a clear night; and during the long evenings in summer, when town
+people visit the country, you must stay up late to see a brilliant
+display of starlight. It is when driving or walking across country on a
+winter's evening week after week, and looking all round the sky, that
+the glorious suns of heaven force you to take notice of them; and Orion
+becomes a companion with his seven brilliant stars and his magnificent
+nebula, which appears as a small pale blue patch, to eyes accustomed to
+look for it, when the night is very bright and clear. It is then that
+Charles's Wain becomes quite a study in all its different positions, its
+horses now careering upwards, now plunging downwards, while the waggon,
+whether upwards or downwards, points ever true, by the two stars of its
+tail-board, to the steadfast pole-star.
+
+It is on such nights as these that, looking southward from Orion, we
+recognise the dog-star Sirius, bright long before other stars have
+conquered the twilight, and feast our eye upon his glorious white beams;
+and then, turning northwards, are startled by the soft lustrous sheen of
+Vega just appearing above the horizon.
+
+But stop, I must remember that I have not yet introduced you to these
+groups of stars; and moreover that, though we shall find them now in the
+positions I mention, yet if you look for them a few hours later
+to-night, or at the same hour later in the year, you will not find them
+in the same places in the sky. For as our earth turns daily on its axis,
+the stars _appear_ to alter their position hour by hour, and in the same
+way as we travel yearly on our journey round the sun, they _appear_ to
+move in the sky month by month. Yet with a little practice it is easy to
+recognise the principal stars, for, as it is our movement and not theirs
+which makes us see them in different parts of the sky, they always
+remain in the same position with regard to each other. In a very short
+time, with the help of such a book as Proctor's _Star Atlas_; you could
+pick out all the chief constellations and most conspicuous stars for
+yourselves.
+
+One of the best ways is to take note of the stars each night as they
+creep out one by one after sunset. If you take your place at the window
+to-morrow night as the twilight fades away, you will see them gradually
+appear, now in one part, now in another of the sky, as
+
+    "One by one each little star
+    Sits on its golden throne."
+
+The first to appear will be Sirius or the dog-star (see Fig. 54), that
+pure white star which you can observe now rather low down to the south,
+and which belongs to the constellation _Canis Major_. As Sirius is one
+of the most brilliant stars in the sky, he can be seen very soon after
+the sun is gone at this time of year. If, however, you had any doubt as
+to what star he was, you would not doubt long, for in a little while two
+beautiful stars start into view above him more to the west, and between
+them three smaller ones in a close row, forming the cross in the
+constellation of Orion, which is always very easy to recognise. Now the
+three stars of Orion's belt which make the short piece of the cross
+always point to Sirius, while Betelgeux in his right shoulder, and Rigel
+in his left foot (see Figs. 54 and 55), complete the long piece, and
+these all show very early in the twilight. You would have to wait longer
+for the other two leading stars, Bellatrix in the right shoulder and
+[Greek: k] Orionis in the right leg, for these stars are feebler and
+only seen when the light has faded quite away.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 54.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking south in March from six to
+nine o'clock.]
+
+By that time you would see that there are an immense number of stars in
+Orion visible even to the naked eye, besides the veil of misty, tiny
+stars called the "Milky Way" which passes over his arm and club. Yet the
+figure of the huntsman is very difficult to trace, and the seven bright
+stars, the five of the cross and those in the left arm and knee, are all
+you need remember.
+
+No! not altogether all, for on a bright clear night like this you can
+detect a faint greenish blue patch (N, Fig. 54) just below the belt, and
+having a bright star in the centre. This is called the "Great Nebula" or
+mist of Orion (see Frontispiece). With your telescopes it looks very
+small indeed, for only the central and brightest part is seen. Really,
+however, it is so widespread that our whole solar system is as nothing
+compared to it. But even your telescopes will show, somewhere near the
+centre, what appears to be a bright and very beautiful star (see Fig.
+55) surrounded by a darker space than the rest of the nebula, while in
+my telescope you will see many stars scattered over the mist.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 55.
+
+Chief stars of Orion, with Aldebaran. (After Proctor.)]
+
+Now first let me tell you that these last stars do not, so far as we
+know, lie _in_ the nebula, but are scattered about in the heavens
+between us and it, perhaps millions of miles nearer our earth. But with
+the bright star in the centre it is different, for the spectroscope
+tells us that the mist passes _over_ it, so that it is either behind or
+in the nebula. Moreover, this star is very interesting, for it is not
+really one star, but six arranged in a group (see Fig. 56). You can see
+four distinctly through my telescope, forming a trapezium or four-sided
+figure, and more powerful instruments show two smaller ones. So [Greek:
+th] Orionis, or the Trapezium of Orion, is a multiple star, probably
+lying in the midst of the nebula.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 56.
+
+The trapezium, [Greek: th] Orionis, in the nebula of Orion. (Herschel.)]
+
+The next question is, What is the mist itself composed of? For a long
+time telescopes could give us no answer. At last one night Lord Rosse,
+looking through his giant telescope at the densest part of the nebula,
+saw myriads of minute stars which had never been seen before. "Then,"
+you will say, "it is after all only a cluster of stars too small for our
+telescopes to distinguish." Wait a bit; it is always dangerous to draw
+hasty conclusions from single observations. What Lord Rosse said was
+true as to that particular part of the nebula, but not the whole truth
+even there, and not at all true of other parts, as the spectroscope
+tells us.
+
+For though the light of nebul�, or luminous mists, is so faint that a
+spectrum can only be got by most delicate operations, yet Dr. Huggins
+has succeeded in examining several. Among these is the nebula of Orion,
+and we now know that when the light of the mist is spread out it gives,
+not a continuous band of colour such as would be given by stars, but
+_faint coloured lines_ on a dark ground (see Fig. 57). Such lines as
+these we have already learnt are always given by gases, and the
+particular bright lines thrown by Orion's nebula answer to those given
+by nitrogen and hydrogen, and some other unknown gases. So we learn at
+last that the true mist of the nebula is formed of glowing gas, while
+parts have probably a great number of minute stars in them.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 57.
+
+Nebula-spectrum.
+
+Sun-spectrum.
+
+Spectrum of Orion's Nebula, showing bright lines, with sun-spectrum
+below for comparison.]
+
+Till within a very short time ago only those people who had access to
+very powerful telescopes could see the real appearance of Orion, for
+drawings made of it were necessarily very imperfect; but now that
+telescopes have been made expressly for carrying photographic
+appliances, even these faint mists print their own image for us. In 1880
+Professor Draper of America photographed the nebula of Orion, in March
+1881 Mr. Common got a still better effect, and last year Mr. Isaac
+Roberts succeeded in taking the most perfect and beautiful photograph[1]
+yet obtained, in which the true beauty of this wonderful mist stands out
+clearly. I have marked on the edge of our copy two points [Greek: th]
+and [Greek: th]�, and if you follow out straight lines from these points
+till they meet, you will arrive at the spot where the multiple star
+lies. It cannot, however, be seen here, because the plate was exposed
+for three hours and a half, and after a time the mist prints itself so
+densely as to smother the light of the stars. Look well at this
+photograph when you go indoors and fix it on your memory, and then on
+clear nights accustom your eye to find the nebula below the three stars
+of the belt, for it tells a wonderful story.
+
+  [1] Reproduced in the Frontispiece with Mr. Roberts's kind permission.
+  The star-halo at the top of the plate is caused by diffraction of
+  light in the telescope, and comes only from an ordinary star.
+
+More than a hundred years ago the great German philosopher Kant
+suggested that our sun, our earth, and all the heavenly bodies might
+have begun as gases, and the astronomer Laplace taught this as the most
+likely history of their formation. After a few years, however, when
+powerful telescopes showed that many of the nebul� were only clusters of
+very minute stars, astronomers thought that Laplace's teaching had been
+wrong. But now the spectroscope has revealed to us glowing gas actually
+filling large spaces in the sky, and every year accurate observations
+and experiments tell us more and more about these marvellous distant
+mists. Some day, though perhaps not while you or I are here to know it,
+Orion's nebula, with its glowing gas and minute star-dust, may give some
+clue to the early history of the heavenly bodies; and for this reason I
+wish you to recognise and ponder over it, as I have often done, when it
+shines down on the rugged moor in the stillness of a clear frosty
+winter's night.
+
+But we must pass on for, while I have been talking, the whole sky has
+become bespangled with hundreds of stars. That glorious one to the west,
+which you can find by following (Fig. 54) a curved line upwards from
+Betelgeux, is the beautiful red star Aldebaran or the hindmost; so
+called by the Arabs, because he drives before him that well-known
+cluster, the Pleiades, which we reach by continuing the curve westwards
+and upwards. Stop to look at this cluster through your telescopes, for
+it will delight you; even with the naked eye you can count from six to
+ten stars in it, and an opera-glass will show about thirty, though they
+are so scattered you will have to move the glass about to find them. Yet
+though my telescope shows a great many more, you cannot even count all
+the chief ones through it, for in powerful telescopes more than 600
+stars have been seen in the single cluster! while a photograph taken by
+Mr. Roberts shows also four lovely patches of nebula.
+
+And now from the Pleiades let us pass on directly overhead to the
+beautiful star Capella, which once was red but now is blue, and drop
+down gently to the south-east, where Castor and Pollux, the two most
+prominent stars in the constellation "Gemini" or the twins, show
+brilliantly against the black sky. Pause here a moment, for I want to
+tell you something about Castor, the one nearest to Capella. If you look
+at Castor through your telescopes, some of you may possibly guess that
+it is really two stars, but you will have to look through mine to see it
+clearly. These two stars have been watched carefully for many years, and
+there is now no doubt that one of them is moving slowly round the other.
+Such stars as these are called "binary," to distinguish them from stars
+that merely _appear_ double because they stand nearly in a line one
+behind the other in the heavens, although they may be millions of miles
+apart. But "binary" stars are actually moving in one system, and revolve
+round each other as our earth moves round the sun.
+
+I wonder if it strikes you what a grand discovery this is? You will
+remember that it is gravitation which keeps the moon held to the earth
+so that it moves round in a circle, and which keeps the earth and other
+planets moving round the sun. But till these binary stars were
+discovered we had no means of guessing that this law had any force
+beyond our own solar system. Now, however, we learn that the same law
+and order which reigns in our small group of planets is in action
+billions of miles away among distant suns, so that they are held
+together and move round each other as our earth moves round our sun. I
+will repeat to you what Sir R. Ball, the Astronomer-Royal of Ireland,
+says about this, for his words have remained in my mind ever since I
+read them, and I should like them to linger in yours till you are old
+enough to feel their force and grandeur. "This discovery," he writes,
+"gave us knowledge we could have gained from no other source. From the
+binary stars came a whisper across the vast abyss of space. That whisper
+told us that the law of gravitation is not peculiar to the solar system.
+It gives us grounds for believing that it is obeyed throughout the
+length, the breadth, the depth, and the height of the entire
+universe."[1]
+
+  [1] _The Story of the Heavens._
+
+And now, leaving Castor and going round to the east, we pass through the
+constellation Leo or the Lion, and I want you particularly to notice six
+stars in the shape of a sickle, which form the front part of the lion,
+the brightest, called Regulus, being the end of the handle.[1] This
+sickle is very interesting, because it marks the part of the heavens
+from which the brilliant shower of November meteors radiates once in
+thirty-three years. This is, however, too long a story to be told
+to-night, so we will pass through Leo, and turning northwards, look high
+up in the north-east (Fig. 58), where "Charles's Wain" stretches far
+across the sky. I need not point this out to you, for every country lad
+knows and delights in it. You could not have seen it in the twilight
+when Sirius first shone out, for these stars are not so powerful as he
+is. But they come out very soon after him, and when once fairly bright,
+the four stars which form the waggon, wider at the top than at the
+bottom, can never be mistaken, and the three stars in front, the last
+bending below the others, are just in the right position for the horses.
+For this reason I prefer the country people's name of Charles's Wain or
+Waggon to that of the "Plough," which astronomers generally give to
+these seven stars. They really form part of an enormous constellation
+called the "Great Bear" (Fig. 59), but, as in the case of Orion, it is
+very difficult to make out the whole of Bruin in the sky.
+
+  [1] In Fig. 54 the sickle alone comes within the picture.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 58.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking north in March from six to
+nine o'clock.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 59.
+
+The Great Bear, showing the position of Charles's Wain, and also the
+small binary star [Greek: x] in the hind foot, whose period has been
+determined.]
+
+Now, although most people know Charles's Wain when they see it, we may
+still learn a good deal about it. Look carefully at the second star from
+the waggon and you will see another star close to it, called by country
+people "Jack by the second horse," and by astronomers "Alcor." Even in
+your small telescopes you can see that Jack or Alcor is not so close as
+he appears to the naked eye, but a long way off from the horse, while in
+my telescope you will find this second horse (called Mizar) split up
+into two stars, one a brilliant white and the other a pale emerald
+green. We do not know whether these two form a binary, for they have not
+yet been observed to move round each other.
+
+Take care in looking that you do not confuse the stars one with another,
+for you must remember that your telescope makes objects appear upside
+down, and Alcor will therefore appear in it _below_ the two stars
+forming the horse.
+
+But though we do not know whether Mizar is binary, there is a little
+star a long way below the waggon, in the left hind paw of the Great Bear
+([Greek: x], Figs. 58 and 59), which has taught us a great deal, for it
+is composed of two stars, one white and the other grey, which move right
+round each other once in sixty years, so that astronomers have observed
+more than one revolution since powerful telescopes were invented. You
+will have to look in my telescope to see the two stars divided, but you
+can make an interesting observation for yourselves by comparing the
+light of this binary star with the light of Castor, for Castor is such
+an immense distance from us that his light takes more than a hundred
+years to reach us, while the light of this smaller star comes in
+sixty-one years, yet see how incomparably brighter Castor is of the two.
+This proves that brilliant stars are not always the nearest, but that a
+near star may be small and faint and a far-off one large and bright.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 60.
+
+The seven stars of Charles's Wain, showing the directions in which they
+are travelling. (After Proctor.)]
+
+There is another very interesting fact known to us about Charles's Wain
+which I should like you to remember when you look at it. This is that
+the seven stars are travelling onwards in the sky, and not all in the
+same direction. It was already suspected centuries ago that, besides the
+_apparent_ motion of all the stars in the heavens caused by our own
+movements, they have each also a _real_ motion and are travelling in
+space, though they are so inconceivably far off that we do not notice
+it. It has now been proved, by very accurate observations with powerful
+instruments, that three of the stars forming the waggon and the two
+horses nearest to it, together with Jack, are drifting forwards (see
+Fig. 60), while the top star of the tailboard of the waggon and the
+leader of the horses are drifting the other way. Thus, thousands of
+years hence Charles's Wain will most likely have quite altered its
+shape, though so very slowly that each generation will think it is
+unchanged.
+
+One more experiment with Charles's Wain, before we leave it, will help
+you to imagine the endless millions of stars which fill the universe.
+Look up at the waggon and try to count how many stars you can see inside
+it with the naked eye. You may, if your eye is keen, be able to count
+twelve. Now take an opera-glass and the twelve become two hundred. With
+your telescopes they will increase again in number. In my telescope
+upstairs the two hundred become hundreds, while in one of the giant
+telescopes, such as Lord Rosse's in Ireland, or the great telescope at
+Washington in the United States, thousands of stars are brought into
+view within that four-sided space!
+
+Now this part of the sky is not fuller of stars than many others; yet at
+first, looking up as any one might on a clear evening, we thought only
+twelve were there. Cast your eyes all round the heavens. On a clear
+night like this you may perhaps, with the naked eye, have in view about
+3000 stars; then consider that a powerful telescope can multiply these
+by thousands upon thousands, so that we can reckon about 20,000,000
+where you see only 3000. If you add to these the stars that rise later
+at night, and those of the southern hemisphere which never rise in our
+latitude, you would have in all about 50,000,000 stars, which we are
+able to see from our tiny world through our most powerful telescopes.
+
+But we can go farther yet. When our telescopes fail, we turn to our
+other magic seer, the photographic camera, and trapping rays of light
+from stars invisible in the most powerful telescope, make them print
+their image on the photographic plate, and at once our numbers are so
+enormously increased that if we could photograph the whole of the
+heavens as visible from our earth, we should have impressions of at
+least 170,000,000 stars!
+
+These numbers are so difficult to grasp that we had better pass on to
+something easier, and our next step brings us to the one star in the
+heavens which never appears to move, as our world turns. To find it we
+have only to draw a line upwards through the two stars in the tailboard
+of the waggon and on into space. Indeed these two stars are called "the
+Pointers," because a line prolonged onwards from them will, with a very
+slight curve, bring us to the "Pole-star" (see Fig. 58). This star,
+though not one of the largest, is important, because it is very near
+that spot in the sky towards which the North Pole of our earth points.
+The consequence is, that though all the other stars appear to move in a
+circle round the heavens, and to be in different places at different
+seasons, this star remains always in the same place, only appearing to
+describe a very tiny circle in the sky round the exact spot to which our
+North Pole points.
+
+Month after month and year after year it shines exactly over that
+thatched cottage yonder, which you see now immediately below it; and
+wherever you are in the northern hemisphere, if you once note a certain
+tree, or chimney, or steeple which points upwards to the Pole-star, it
+will guide you to it at any hour on any night of the year, though the
+other constellations will be now on one side, now on the other side of
+it.
+
+The Pole-star is really the front horse of a small imitation of
+Charles's Wain, which, however, has never been called by any special
+name, but only part of the "Little Bear." Those two hind stars of the
+tiny waggon, which are so much the brightest, are called the "Guards,"
+because they appear to move in a circle round the Pole-star night after
+night and year after year like sentries.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 61.
+
+The constellation of Cassiopeia, and the heavenly bodies which can be
+found by means of it.[1]]
+
+  [1] For Almach see Fig. 58, it has been accidentally omitted from this
+  figure.
+
+Opposite to them, on the farther side of the Pole-star, is a well-marked
+constellation, a widespread W written in the sky by five large stars;
+the second V of the W has rather a longer point than the first, and as
+we see it now the letter is almost upside down (see Fig. 58).
+
+These are the five brightest stars in the constellation Cassiopeia, with
+a sixth not quite so bright in the third stroke of the W. You can never
+miss them when you have once seen them, even though they lie in the
+midst of a dense layer of the stars of the Milky Way, and if you have
+any difficulty at first, you have only to look as far on the one side of
+the Pole-star as the top hind star of Charles's Wain is on the other,
+and you must find them. I want to use them to-night chiefly as guides to
+find two remarkable objects which I hope you will look at again and
+again. The first is a small round misty patch not easy to see, but which
+you will find by following out the _second_ stroke of the first V of the
+W. Beginning at the top, and following the line to the point of the V,
+continue on across the sky, and then search with your telescope till you
+catch a glimpse of this faint mist (_c_, Fig. 58; star-cluster, Fig.
+61). You will see at once that it is sparkling all over with stars, for
+in fact you have actually before you in that tiny cluster more stars
+than you can see with the naked eye all over the heavens! Think for a
+moment what this means. One faint misty spot in the constellation
+Perseus, which we should have passed over unheeded without a telescope,
+proves to be a group of more than 3000 suns!
+
+The second object you will find more easily, for it is larger and
+brighter, and appears as a faint dull spot to the naked eye. Going back
+to Cassiopeia, follow out the _second_ V in the W from the top to the
+point of the V and onwards till your eye rests upon this misty cloud,
+which is called the Great Nebula of Andromeda, and has sometimes been
+mistaken for a comet (Figs. 58 and 61). You will, however, be
+disappointed when you look through the telescope, for it will still only
+appear a mist, and you will be able to make nothing of it, except that
+instead of being of an irregular shape like Orion, it is elliptical; and
+in a powerful telescope two dark rifts can be seen separating the
+streams of nebulous matter. These rifts are now shown in a photograph
+taken by Mr. Roberts, 1st October 1888, to be two vast dusky rings lying
+between the spiral stream of light, which winds in an ellipse till it
+ends in a small nucleus at the centre.
+
+Ah! you will say, this must be a cloud of gas like Orion's nebula, only
+winding round and round. No! the spectroscope steps in here and tells us
+that the light shows something very much like a continuous spectrum, but
+not as long as it ought to be at the red end. Now, since gases give only
+bright lines, this nebula cannot be entirely gaseous. Then it must be
+made of stars too far off to see? If so, it is very strange that though
+it is so dense and bright in some parts, and so spread out and clear in
+others, the most powerful telescopes cannot break it up into stars. In
+fact, the composition of the great nebula of Andromeda is still a
+mystery, and remains for one of you boys to study when he has become a
+great astronomer.
+
+Still one more strange star we will notice before we leave this part of
+the heavens. You will find it, or at least go very near it, by
+continuing northwards the line you drew from Cassiopeia to the Star
+Cluster (_c_, Fig. 58), and as it is a bright star, you will not miss
+it. That is to say, it is bright to-night and will remain so till
+to-morrow night, but if you come to me about nine o'clock to-morrow
+evening I will show you that it is growing dim, and if we had patience
+to watch through the night we should find, three or four hours later
+still, that it looks like one of the smaller stars. Then it will begin
+to brighten again, and in four hours more will be as bright as at first.
+It will remain so for nearly three days, or, to speak accurately, 2
+days, 20 hours, 48 minutes, and 55 seconds, and then will begin to grow
+dull again. This star is called Algol the Variable. There are several
+such stars in the heavens, and we do not know why they vary, unless
+perhaps some dark globe passes round them, cutting off part of their
+light for a time.
+
+And now, if your eyes are not weary, let us go back to the Pole-star and
+draw a line from it straight down the horizon due north. Shortly before
+we arrive there you will see a very brilliant bluish-white star a little
+to the east of this line. This is Vega, one of the brightest stars in
+the heavens except Sirius. It had not risen in the earlier part of the
+evening, but now it is well up and will appear to go on, steadily
+mounting as it circles round the Pole-star, till at four o'clock
+to-morrow morning it will be right overhead towards the south.
+
+But beautiful as Vega is, a still more interesting star lies close to it
+(see Fig. 58). This small star, called [Greek: e] Lyr� by astronomers,
+looks a little longer in one direction than in the other, and even with
+the naked eye some people can see a division in the middle dividing it
+into two stars. Your telescopes will show them easily, and a powerful
+telescope tells a wonderful story, for it reveals that each of these two
+stars is again composed of two stars, so that [Greek: e] Lyr� (Fig. 62)
+is really a double-double star. There is no doubt that each pair is a
+binary star, that is, the two stars move round each other very slowly,
+and possibly both pairs may also revolve round a common centre. There
+are at least 10,000 double stars in the heavens; though, as we have
+seen, they are not all binary. The list of binary stars, however,
+increases every year as they are carefully examined, and probably about
+one star in three over the whole sky is made up of more than one sun.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 62.
+
+[Greek: e] Lyr�. A double-binary star. Each couple revolves, and the
+couples probably also revolve round each other. (After Chambers.)]
+
+Let us turn the telescope for a short time upon a few of the double
+stars and we shall have a great treat, for one of the most interesting
+facts about them is that both stars are rarely of the same colour. It
+seems strange at first to speak of stars as coloured, but they do not by
+any means all give out the same kind of light. Our sun is yellow, and so
+are the Pole-star and Pollux; but Sirius, Vega, and Regulus are
+dazzling white or bluish-white, Arcturus is a yellowish-white,
+Aldebaran is a bright yellow-red, Betelgeux a deep orange-red, as you
+may see now in the telescope, for he is full in view; while Antares, a
+star in the constellation of the Scorpion, which at this time of year
+cannot be seen till four in the morning, is an intense ruby red.
+
+[Illustration: _Plate II._]
+
+COLOURED DOUBLE STARS.
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: g] _Andromed�_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: e] _Bo�tis_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: d] _Geminorum_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: a] _Herculis_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: b] _Cygni_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: �] _Cassiopei�_.]
+
+It appears to be almost a rule with double stars to be of two colours.
+Look up at Almach ([Greek: g] Andromed�), a bright star standing next to
+Algol the Variable in the sweep of four bright stars behind Cassiopeia
+(see Fig. 58). Even to the naked eye he appears to flash in a strange
+way, and in the telescope he appears as two lovely stars, one a deep
+orange and the other a pale green, while in powerful telescopes the
+green one splits again into two (Plate II.) Then again, [Greek: �]
+Cassiope�, the sixth star lying between the two large ones in the second
+V of Cassiopeia, divides into a yellow star and a small rich purple one,
+and [Greek: d] Geminorum, a bright star not far from Pollux in the
+constellation Gemini, is composed of a large green star and a small
+purple one. Another very famous double star ([Greek: b] Cygni), which
+rises only a little later in the evening, lies below Vega a little to
+the left. It is composed of two lovely stars; one an orange yellow and
+the other blue; while [Greek: e] Bo�tis, just visible above the horizon,
+is composed of a large yellow star and a very small green one.[1]
+
+  [1] The plate of coloured stars has been most kindly drawn to scale
+  and coloured for me by Mr. Arthur Cottam, F.R.A.S.
+
+There are many other stars of two colours even among the few
+constellations we have picked out to-night, as, for example, the star
+at the top of the tailboard of Charles's Waggon and the second horse
+Mizar. Rigel in Orion, and the two outer stars of the belt, [Greek: a]
+Herculis, which will rise later in the evening, and the beautiful triple
+star ([Greek: z] Cancer) near the Beehive (see Fig. 54), are all
+composed of two or more stars of different colours.
+
+Why do these suns give out such beautiful coloured light? The telescope
+cannot tell us, but the spectroscope again reveals the secrets so long
+hidden from us. By a series of very delicate experiments, Dr. Huggins
+has shown that the light of all stars is sifted before it comes to us,
+just as the light of our sun is; and those rays which are least cut off
+play most strongly on our eyes, and give the colour to the star. The
+question is a difficult one but I will try to give you some idea of it,
+that you may form some picture in your mind of what happens.
+
+We learnt in our last lecture (p. 131) that the light from our sun
+passes through the great atmosphere of vapours surrounding him before it
+goes out into space, and that many rays are in this way cut off; so that
+when we spread out his light in a long spectrum there are dark lines or
+spaces where no light falls.[1] Now in sunlight these dark lines are
+scattered pretty evenly over the spectrum, so that about as much light
+is cut off in one part as in another, and no one colour is stronger than
+the rest.
+
+  [1] See No. 1 in Table of Spectra, Plate I.
+
+Dr. Huggins found, however, that in coloured stars the dark spaces are
+often crowded into particular parts of the long band of colour forming
+the spectrum; showing that many of those light-rays have been cut off
+in the atmosphere round the star, and thus their particular colours are
+dimmed, leaving the other colour or colours more vivid. In red stars,
+for example, the yellow, blue, and green parts of the spectrum are much
+lined while the red end is strong and clear. With blue stars it is just
+the opposite, and the violet end is most free from dark lines. So there
+are really brilliantly coloured suns shining in the heavens, and in many
+cases two or more of these revolve round each other.
+
+And now I have kept your attention and strained your eyes long enough,
+and you have objects to study for many a long evening before you will
+learn to see them plainly. You must not expect to find them every night,
+for the lightest cloud or the faintest moonlight will hide many of them
+from view; and, moreover, though you may learn to use the telescope
+fairly, you will often not know how to get a clear view with it. Still,
+you may learn a great deal, and before we go in I want to put a thought
+into your minds which will make astronomy still more interesting. We
+have seen that the stronger our telescopes the more stars,
+star-clusters, and nebul� we see, and we cannot doubt that there are
+still countless heavenly bodies quite unknown to us. Some years ago
+Bessel the astronomer found that Sirius, in its real motion through the
+heavens, moves irregularly, travelling sometimes a little more slowly
+than at other times, and he suggested that some unseen companion must be
+pulling at him.
+
+Twenty-eight years later, in 1862, two celebrated opticians, father and
+son, both named Alvan Clark, were trying a new telescope at Chicago
+University, when suddenly the son, who was looking at Sirius, exclaimed,
+"Why, father, the star has a companion!" And so it was. The powerful
+telescope showed what Bessel had foretold, and proved Sirius to be a
+"binary" star--that is, as we have seen, a star which has another moving
+round it.
+
+It has since been proved that this companion is twenty-eight times
+farther from Sirius than we are from our sun, and moves round him in
+about forty-nine years. It is seven times as heavy as our sun, and yet
+gives out so little light that only the keenest telescopes can bring it
+into view.
+
+Now if such a large body as this can give so very faint a light that we
+can scarcely see it, though Sirius, which is close to it, shines
+brightest of any star in the heavens, how many more bodies must there be
+which we shall never see, even among those which give out light, while
+how many there are dark like our earth, who can tell?
+
+Now that we know each of the stars to be a brilliant sun, many of them
+far, far brighter than ours, yet so like in their nature and laws, we
+can scarcely help speculating whether round these glorious suns, worlds
+of some kind may not be moving. If so, and there are people in them,
+what a strange effect those double coloured suns must produce with red
+daylight one day and blue daylight another!
+
+Surely, as we look up at the myriads of stars bespangling the sky, and
+remember that our star-sun has seven planets moving round it of which
+one at least--our own earth--is full of living beings, we must picture
+these glorious suns as the centres of unseen systems, so that those
+twinkling specks become as suggestive as the faint lights of a great
+fleet far out at sea, which tell us of mighty ships, together with
+frigates and gunboats, full of living beings, though we cannot see them,
+nor even guess what they may be like. How insignificant we feel when we
+look upon that starlit sky and remember that the whole of our solar
+system would be but a tiny speck of light if seen as far off as we see
+the stars! If our little earth and our short life upon it were all we
+could boast of we should be mites indeed.
+
+But our very study to-night lifts us above these and reminds us that
+there is a spirit within us which even now can travel beyond the narrow
+bounds of our globe, measure the vast distances between us and the
+stars, gauge their brightness, estimate their weight, and discern their
+movements. As we gaze into the depths of the starlit sky, and travel
+onwards and onwards in imagination to those distant stars which
+photography alone reveals to us, do not our hearts leap at the thought
+of a day which must surely come when, fettered and bound no longer to
+earth, this spirit shall wander forth and penetrate some of the mystery
+of those mighty suns at which we now gaze in silent awe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+LITTLE BEINGS FROM A MINIATURE OCEAN
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+In our last lecture we soared far away into boundless space, and lost
+ourselves for a time among seen and unseen suns. In this lecture we will
+come back not merely to our little world, nor even to one of the
+widespread oceans which cover so much of it, but to one single pool
+lying just above the limits of low tide, so that it is only uncovered
+for a very short time every day. This pool is to be found in a secluded
+bay within an hour's journey by train from this college, and only a few
+miles from Torquay. It has no name, so far as I know, nor do many people
+visit it, otherwise I should not have kept my little pool so long
+undisturbed. As it is, however, for many years past I have had only to
+make sure as to the time of low tide, and put myself in the train; and
+then, unless the sea was very rough and stormy, I could examine the
+little inhabitants of my miniature ocean in peace.
+
+The pool lies in a deep hollow among a group of rocks and boulders,
+close to the entrance of the cove, which can only be entered at low
+water; it does not measure more than two feet across, so that you can
+step over it, if you take care not to slip on the masses of green and
+brown seaweed growing over the rocks on its sides, as I have done many a
+time when collecting specimens for our salt-water aquarium. I find now
+the only way is to lie flat down on the rock, so that my hands and eyes
+are free to observe and handle, and then, bringing my eye down to the
+edge of the pool, to lift the seaweeds and let the sunlight enter into
+the chinks and crannies. In this way I can catch sight of many a small
+being either on the seaweed or the rocky ledges, and even creatures
+transparent as glass become visible by the thin outline gleaming in the
+sunlight. Then I pluck a piece of seaweed, or chip off a fragment of
+rock with a sharp-edged collecting knife, bringing away the specimen
+uninjured upon it, and place it carefully in its own separate bottle to
+be carried home alive and well.
+
+Now though this little pool and I are old friends, I find new treasures
+in it almost every time I go, for it is almost as full of living things
+as the heavens are of stars, and the tide as it comes and goes brings
+many a mother there to find a safe home for her little ones, and many a
+waif and stray to seek shelter from the troublous life of the open
+ocean.
+
+You will perhaps find it difficult to believe that in this rock-bound
+basin there can be millions of living creatures hidden away among the
+fine feathery weeds; yet so it is. Not that they are always the same. At
+one time it may be the home of myriads of infant crabs, not an eighth of
+an inch long, at another of baby sea-urchins only visible to the naked
+eye as minute spots in the water, at another of young jelly-fish growing
+on their tiny stalks, and splitting off one by one as transparent bells
+to float away with the rising tide. Or it may be that the whelk has
+chosen this quiet nook to deposit her leathery eggs; or young barnacles,
+periwinkles, and limpets are growing up among the green and brown
+tangles, while the far-sailing velella and the stay-at-home sea-squirts,
+together with a variety of other sea-animals, find a nursery and shelter
+in their youth in this quiet harbour of rest.
+
+And besides these casual visitors there are numberless creatures which
+have lived and multiplied there, ever since I first visited the pool.
+Tender red, olive-coloured, and green seaweeds, stony corallines, and
+acorn-barnacles lining the floor, sea-anemones clinging to the sides,
+sponges tiny and many-coloured hiding under the ledges, and limpets and
+mussels wedged in the cracks. These can be easily seen with the naked
+eye, but they are not the most numerous inhabitants; for these we must
+search with a magnifying-glass, which will reveal to us wonderful
+fairy-forms, delicate crystal vases with tiny creatures in them whose
+transparent lashes make whirlpools in the water, living crystal bells so
+tiny that whole branches of them look only like a fringe of hair, jelly
+globes rising and falling in the water, patches of living jelly
+clinging to the rocky sides of the pool, and a hundred other forms, some
+so minute that you must examine the fine sand in which they lie under a
+powerful microscope before you can even guess that they are there.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 63.
+
+Group of seaweeds (natural size).
+
+1, _Ulva Linza._ 2, _Sphacelaria filicina._ 3, _Polysiphonia urceolata._
+4, _Corallina officinalis._]
+
+So it has proved a rich hunting-ground, where summer and winter, spring
+and autumn, I find some form to put under my magic glass. There I can
+watch it for weeks growing and multiplying under my care; moved only
+from the aquarium, where I keep it supplied with healthy sea-water, to
+the tiny transparent trough in which I place it for a few hours to see
+the changes it has undergone. I could tell you endless tales of
+transformations in these tiny lives, but I want to-day to show you a
+few of my friends, most of which I brought yesterday fresh from the
+pool, and have prepared for you to examine.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 64.
+
+_Ulva lactuca_, a green seaweed, greatly magnified to show structure.
+(After Oersted.)
+
+_s_, Spores in the cells. _ss_, Spores swimming out. _h_, Holes through
+which spores have escaped.]
+
+Let us begin with seaweeds. I have said that there are three leading
+colours in my pool--green, olive, and red--and these tints mark roughly
+three kinds of weed, though they occur in an endless variety of shapes.
+Here is a piece of the beautiful pale green seaweed, called the Laver or
+Sea-lettuce, _Ulva Linza_ (1, Fig. 63), which grows in long ribbons in a
+sunny nook in the water. I have placed under the first microscope a
+piece of this weed which is just sending out young seaweeds in the shape
+of tiny cells, with lashes very like those we saw coming from the
+moss-flower, and I have pressed them in the position in which they would
+naturally leave the plant (_ss_, Fig. 64.).[1] You will also see on this
+slide several cells in which these tiny spores _s_ are forming, ready to
+burst out and swim; for this green weed is merely a collection of cells,
+like the single-celled plants on land. Each cell can work as a separate
+plant; it feeds, grows, and can send out its own young spores.
+
+  [1] The slice given in Fig. 64 is from a broader-leaved form,
+  _U. lactuca_, because this species, being composed of only one
+  layer of cells, is better seen. _Ulva linza_ is composed of two
+  layers of cells.
+
+This deep olive-green feathery weed (2, Fig. 63), of which a piece is
+magnified under the next microscope (2, Fig. 65), is very different. It
+is a higher plant, and works harder for its living, using the darker
+rays of sunlight which penetrate into shady parts of the pool. So it
+comes to pass that its cells divide the work. Those of the feathery
+threads make the food, while others, growing on short stalks on the
+shafts of the feather make and send out the young spores.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 65.
+
+Three seaweeds of Fig. 63 much magnified to show fruits. (Harvey.)
+
+2, _Sphacelaria filicina._ 3, _Polysiphonia urceolata._ 4, _Corallina
+officinalis._]
+
+Lastly, the lovely red threadlike weeds, such as this _Polysiphonia
+urceolata_ (3, Fig. 63), carry actual urns on their stems like those of
+mosses. In fact, the history of these urns (see No. 3, Fig. 65) is much
+the same in the two classes of plants, only that instead of the urn
+being pushed up on a thin stalk as in the moss, it remains on the
+seaweed close down to the stem, when it grows out of the plant-egg, and
+the tiny plant is shut in till the spores are ready to swim out.
+
+The stony corallines (4, Figs. 63 and 65), which build so much carbonate
+of lime into their stems, are near relations of the red seaweeds. There
+are plenty of them in my pool. Some of them, of a deep purple colour,
+grow upright in stiff groups about three or four inches high; and
+others, which form crusts over the stones and weeds, are a pale rose
+colour; but both kinds, when the plant dies, leaving the stony skeleton
+(1, Fig. 66), are a pure white, and used to be mistaken for corals. They
+belong to the same order of plants as the red weeds, which all live in
+shady nooks in the pools, and are the highest of their race.
+
+My pool is full of different forms of these four weeds. The green
+ribbons float on the surface rooted to the sides of the pool and, as the
+sun shines upon it, the glittering bubbles rising from them show that
+they are working up food out of the air in the water, and giving off
+oxygen. The brown weeds lie chiefly under the shelves of rocks, for they
+can manage with less sunlight, and use the darker rays which pass by the
+green weeds; and last of all, the red weeds and corallines, small and
+delicate in form, line the bottom of the pool in its darkest nooks.
+
+And now if I hand round two specimens--one a coralline, and the other
+something you do not yet know--I am sure you will say at first sight
+that they belong to the same family, and, in fact, if you buy at the
+seaside a group of seaweeds gummed on paper, you will most likely get
+both these among them. Yet the truth is, that while the coralline (1,
+Fig. 66) is a plant, the other specimen (2) which is called _Sertularia
+filicula_, is an animal.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 66.
+
+Coralline and Sertularia, to show likeness between the animal Sertularia
+and the plant Coralline.
+
+1, _Corallina officinalis._ 2, _Sertularia filicula._]
+
+This special sertularian grows upright in my pool on stones or often on
+seaweeds, but I have here (Fig. 67) another and much smaller one which
+lives literally in millions hanging its cups downwards. I find it not
+only under the narrow ledges of the pool sheltered by the seaweed, but
+forming a fringe along all the rocks on each side of the cove near to
+low-water mark, and for a long time I passed it by thinking it was of no
+interest. But I have long since given up thinking this of anything,
+especially in my pool, for my magic glass has taught me that there is
+not even a living speck which does not open out into something
+marvellous and beautiful. So I chipped off a small piece of rock and
+brought the fringe home, and found, when I hung it up in clear sea water
+as I have done over this glass trough (Fig. 67) and looked at it through
+the lens, that each thread of the dense fringe, in itself not a quarter
+of an inch deep, turns out to be a tiny sertularian with at least twenty
+mouths. You can see this with your pocket lens even as it hangs here,
+and when you have examined it you can by and by take off one thread and
+put it carefully in the trough. I promise you a sight of the most
+beautiful little beings which exist in nature.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 67.
+
+_Sertularia tenella_, hanging from a splint of rock over a water trough.
+Also piece enlarged to show the animal protruding.]
+
+Come and look at it after the lecture. It is a horny branched stem with
+a double row of tiny cups all along each side (see Fig. 67). Out of
+these cups there appear from time to time sixteen minute transparent
+tentacles as fine as spun glass, which wave about in the water. If you
+shake the glass a little, in an instant each crystal star vanishes into
+its cup, to come out again a few minutes later; so that now here, now
+there, the delicate animal-flowers spread out on each side of the stem,
+and the tree is covered with moving beings. These tentacles are feelers,
+which lash food into a mouth and stomach in each cup, where it is
+digested and passed, through a hole in the bottom, along a jelly thread
+which runs down the stem and joins all the mouths together. In this way
+the food is distributed all over the tree, which is, in fact, one animal
+with many feeding-cups. Some day I will show you one of these cups with
+the tentacles stretched out and mounted on a slide, so that you can
+examine a tentacle with a very strong magnifying power. You will then
+see that it is dotted over with cells, in which are coiled fine
+threads. The animal uses these threads to paralyse the creatures on
+which it feeds, for at the base of each thread there is a poison gland.
+
+In the larger Sertularia (2, Fig. 66) the whole branched tree is
+connected by jelly threads running through the stem, and all the
+thousands of mouths are spread out in the water. One large form called
+the sea-fir _Sertularia cupressina_ grows sometimes three feet high, and
+bears as many as a hundred thousand cups, with living mouths, on its
+branches.
+
+The next of my minute friends I can only show to the class in a diagram,
+but you will see it under the fourth microscope by and by. I had great
+trouble in finding it yesterday, though I knew its haunts upon the green
+weed, for it is so minute and transparent that even when the weed is in
+a trough a magnifying-glass will scarcely detect it. And I must warn you
+that if you want to know any of the minute creatures we are studying,
+you must visit one place constantly. You may in a casual way find many
+of them on seaweed, or in the damp ooze and mud, but it will be by
+chance only; to look for them with any certainty you must take trouble
+in making their acquaintance.
+
+Turning then to the diagram (Fig. 68) I will describe it as I hope you
+will see it under the microscope--a curious tiny, perfectly transparent
+open-mouthed vase standing upright on the weed, and having an equally
+transparent being rising up in it and waving its tiny lashes in the
+water. This is really all one animal, the vase _hc_ being the horny
+covering or carapace of the body, which last stands up like a tube in
+the centre. If you watch carefully, you may even see the minute atoms of
+food twisting round inside the tube until they are digested, after they
+have been swept in at the wide open mouth by the whirling lashes. You
+will see this more clearly if you put a little rice-flour, very minutely
+powdered and coloured by carmine, into the water; for you can trace
+these red atoms into some round spaces called _vacuoles_ which are
+dotted over the body of the animal, and are really globules of watery
+fluid in which the food is probably partly digested.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 68.
+
+_Thuricolla folliculata_ and _Chilomonas amygdalum_. (Saville Kent.)
+
+1, Thuricolla erect; 2, retracted; 3, dividing. 4, _Chilomonas
+amygdalum_. _hc_, Horny carapace. _cv_, Contractile vesicle. _v_,
+Closing valves.]
+
+You will notice, however, one round clear space (_cv_) into which they
+do not go, and after a time you will be able to observe that this round
+spot closes up or contracts very quickly, and then expands again very
+slowly. As it expands it fills with a clear fluid, and naturalists have
+not yet decided exactly what work it does. It may serve the animal
+either for breathing, or as a very simple heart, making the fluids
+circulate in the tube. The next interesting point about this little
+being is the way it retreats into its sheltering vase. Even while you
+are watching, it is quite likely it may all at once draw itself down to
+the bottom as in No. 2, and folding down the valves _v_, _v_ of horny
+teeth which grow on each side, shut itself in from some fancied danger.
+Another very curious point is that, besides sending forth young ones,
+these creatures multiply by dividing in two (see No. 3, Fig. 68), each
+one closing its own part of the vase into a new home.
+
+There are hundreds of these _Infusoria_, as they are called, in my pond,
+some with vases, some without, some fixed to weeds and stones, others
+swimming about freely. Even in the water-trough in which this Thuricolla
+stands, I saw several smaller forms, and the next microscope has a
+trough filled with the minutest form of all, called a Monad (No. 4, Fig.
+68). These are so small that 2000 of them would lie side by side in an
+inch; that is, if you could make them lie at all, for they are the most
+restless little beings, darting hither and thither, scarcely even
+halting except to turn back. And yet though there are so many of them,
+and as far as we know they have no organs of sight, they never run up
+against each other, but glide past more cleverly than any clear-sighted
+fish. These creatures are mostly to be found among decaying seaweed, and
+though they are so tiny, you can still see distinctly the clear space
+(_cv_) contracting and expanding within them.
+
+But if there are so many thousands of mouths to feed, on the tree-like
+_Sertulari�_ as well as in all these _Infusoria_, where does the food
+come from?
+
+Partly from the numerous atoms of decaying life all around, and the
+minute eggs of animals and spores of plants; but besides these, the pool
+is full of minute living plants--small jelly masses with solid coats of
+flint which are moulded into most lovely shapes. Plants formed of jelly
+and flint! You will think I am joking, but I am not. These plants,
+called _Diatoms_, which live both in salt and fresh water, are single
+cells feeding and growing just like those we took from the water-butt
+(Fig. 29, p. 78), only that instead of a soft covering they build up a
+flinty skeleton. They are so small, that many of them must be magnified
+to fifty times their real size before you can even see them distinctly.
+Yet the skeletons of these almost invisible plants are carved and
+chiselled in the most delicate patterns. I showed you a group of these
+in our lecture on magic glasses (p. 39), and now I have brought a few
+living ones that we may learn to know them. The diagram (Fig. 69) shows
+the chief forms you will see on the different slides.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 69.
+
+Living diatoms.
+
+_a_, _Cocconema lanceolatum_. _b_, _Bacillaria paradoxa_.
+_c_, _Gomphonema marinum_. _d_, _Diatoma hyalina_.]
+
+The first one, _Bacillaria paradoxa_ (_b_, Fig. 69), looks like a number
+of rods clinging one to another in a string, but each one of these is a
+single-celled plant with a jelly cell surrounding the flinty skeleton.
+You will see that they move to and fro over each other in the water.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 70.
+
+A diatom (_Diatoma vulgare_) growing.
+
+_a_, _b_, Flint skeleton inside the jelly-cell. _a_, _c_ and _d_, _b_,
+Two flint skeletons formed by new valves, _c_ and _d_, forming within
+the first skeleton.]
+
+The next two forms, _a_ and _c_, look much more like plants, for the
+cells arrange themselves on a jelly stem, which by and by disappears,
+leaving only the separate flint skeletons such as you see in Fig. 16.
+The last form, _d_, is something midway between the other forms, the
+separate cells hang on to each other and also on to a straight jelly
+stem.
+
+Another species of Diatoma (Fig. 70) called _Diatoma vulgare_, is a very
+simple and common form, and will help to explain how these plants grow.
+The two flinty valves _a_, _b_ inside the cell are not quite the same
+size; the older one _a_ is larger than the younger one _b_ and fits over
+it like the cover of a pill-box. As the plant grows, the cell enlarges
+and forms two more valves, one _c_ fitting into the cover _a_, so as to
+make a complete box _ac_, and a second, _d_, back to back with _c_,
+fitting into the valve _b_, and making another complete box _bd_. This
+goes on very rapidly, and in this plant each new cell separates as it is
+formed, and the free diatoms move about quite actively in the water.
+
+If you consider for a moment, you will see that, as the new valves
+always fit into the old ones, each must be smaller than the last, and so
+there comes a time when the valves have become too small to go on
+increasing. Then the plant must begin afresh. So the two halves of the
+last cell open, and throwing out their flinty skeletons, cover
+themselves with a thin jelly layer, and form a new cell which grows
+larger than any of the old ones. These, which are spore-cells, then form
+flinty valves inside, and the whole thing begins again.
+
+Now though the plants themselves die, or become the food of minute
+animals, the flinty skeletons are not destroyed, but go on accumulating
+in the waters of ponds, lakes, rivers, and seas, all over the world.
+Untold millions have no doubt crumbled to dust and gone back into the
+waters, but untold millions also have survived. The towns of Berlin in
+Europe and of Richmond in the United States are actually built upon
+ground called "infusorial earth," composed almost entirely of valves of
+these minute diatoms which have accumulated to a thickness of more than
+eighty feet! Those under Berlin are fresh-water forms, and must have
+lived in a lake, while those of Richmond belong to salt-water forms.
+Every inch of the ground under those cities represents thousands and
+thousands of living plants which flourished in ages long gone by, and
+were no larger than those you will see presently under the microscope.
+
+These are a very few of the microscopic inhabitants of my pond, but, as
+you will confuse them if I show you too many, we will conclude with two
+rather larger specimens, and examine them carefully. The first, called
+the Cydippe, is a lovely, transparent living ball, which I want to
+explain to you because it is so wondrously beautiful. The second, the
+Sea-mat or Flustra, looks like a crumpled drab-coloured seaweed, but is
+really composed of many thousands of grottos, the homes of tiny
+sea-animals.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 71.
+
+_Cydippe Pileus._
+
+1, Animal with tentacles _t_, bearing small tendrils _t�_. 2, Body of
+animal enlarged. _m_, Mouth. _c_, Digestive cavity. _s_, Sac into which
+the tentacles are withdrawn. _p_, Bands with comb-like plates. 3,
+Portion of a band enlarged to show the moving plates _p_.]
+
+Let us take the Cydippe first (1, Fig. 71). I have six here, each in a
+separate tumbler, and could have brought many more, for when I dipped my
+net in the pool yesterday such numbers were caught in it that I believe
+the retreating tide must just have left a shoal behind. Put a tumbler on
+the desk in front of you, and if the light falls well upon it you will
+see a transparent ball about the size of a large pea marked with eight
+bright bands, which begin at the lower end of the ball and reach nearly
+to the top, dividing the outside into sections like the ribs of a melon.
+The creature is so perfectly transparent that you can count all the
+eight bands.
+
+At the top of the ball is a slight bulge which is the mouth (_m_ 2, Fig.
+71), and from it, inside the ball, hangs a long bag or stomach, which
+opens below into a cavity c, from which two canals branch out, one on
+each side, and these divide again into four canals which go one into
+each of the tubes running down the bands. From this cavity the food,
+which is digested in the stomach, is carried by the canals all over the
+body. The smaller tubes which branch out of these canals cannot be seen
+clearly without a very strong lens, and the only other parts you can
+discern in this transparent ball are two long sacs on each side of the
+lower end. These are the tentacle sacs, in which are coiled up the
+tentacles, which we shall describe presently. Lastly, you can notice
+that the bands outside the globe are broader in the middle than at the
+ends, and are striped across by a number of ridges.
+
+In moving the tumblers the water has naturally been shaken, and the
+creature being alarmed will probably at first remain motionless. But
+very soon it will begin to play in the water, rising and falling, and
+swimming gracefully from side to side. Now you will notice a curious
+effect, for the bands will glitter and become tinged with prismatic
+colours, till, as it moves more and more rapidly these colours,
+reflected in the jelly, seem to tinge the whole ball with colours like
+those on a soap-bubble, while from the two sacs below come forth two
+long transparent threads like spun glass. At first these appear to be
+simple threads, but as they gradually open out to about four or five
+inches, smaller threads uncoil on each side of the line till there are
+about fifty on each line. These short _tendrils_ are never still for
+long; as the main threads wave to and fro, some of the shorter ones coil
+up and hang like tiny beads, then these uncoil and others roll up, so
+that these graceful floating lines are never two seconds alike.
+
+We do not really know their use. Sometimes the creature anchors itself
+by them, rising and falling as they stretch out or coil up; but more
+often they float idly behind it in the water. At first you would perhaps
+think that they served to drive the ball through the water, but this is
+done by a special apparatus. The cross ridges which we noticed on the
+bands are really flat comb-like plates (_p_, Fig. 71), of which there
+are about twenty or thirty on each band; and these vibrate very rapidly,
+so that two hundred or more paddles drive the tiny ball through the
+water. This is the cause of the prismatic colours; for iridescent tints
+are produced by the play of light upon the glittering plates, as they
+incessantly change their angle. Sometimes they move all at once,
+sometimes only a few at a time, and it is evident the creature controls
+them at will.
+
+This lovely fairy-like globe, with its long floating tentacles and
+rainbow tints, was for a long time classed with the jelly-fish; but it
+really is most nearly related to sea-anemones, as it has a true central
+cavity which acts as a stomach, and many other points in common with the
+_Actinozoa_. We cannot help wondering, as the little being glides hither
+and thither, whether it can see where it is going. It has nerves of a
+low kind which start from a little dark spot (_ng_), exactly at the
+south pole of the ball, and at that point a sense-organ of some kind
+exists, but what impression the creature gains from it of the world
+outside we cannot tell.
+
+I am afraid you may think it dull to turn from such a beautiful being as
+this, to the grey leaf which looks only like a dead dry seaweed; yet you
+will be wrong, for a more wonderful history attaches to this crumpled
+dead-looking leaf than to the lovely jelly-globe.
+
+First of all I will pass round pieces of the dry leaf (_r_, Fig. 72),
+and while you are getting them I will tell you where I found the living
+ones. Great masses of the Flustra, as it is called, line the bottom and
+sides of my pool. They grow in tufts, standing upright on the rock, and
+looking exactly like hard grey seaweeds, while there is nothing to lead
+you to suspect that they are anything else. Yesterday I chipped off very
+carefully a piece of rock with a tuft upon it, and have kept it since in
+a glass globe by itself with sea-water, for the little creatures living
+in this marine city require a very good supply of healthy water and air.
+I have called it a "marine city," and now I will tell you why. Take the
+piece in your hand and run your finger gently up and down it; you will
+glide quite comfortably from the lower to the higher part of the leaf,
+but when you come back you will feel your finger catch slightly on a
+rough surface. Your pocket lens will show why this is, for if you look
+through it at the surface of the leaf you will see it is not smooth, but
+composed of hundreds of tiny alcoves with arched tops; and on each side
+of these tops stand two short blunt spines (see 2, Fig. 72), making four
+in all, pointing upwards, so as partly to cover the alcove above. As
+your finger went up it glided over the spines, but on coming back it met
+their points. This is all you can see in the dead specimen; I must show
+you the rest by diagrams, and by and by under the microscope.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 72.
+
+The Sea-mat or Flustra (_Flustra foliacea._)
+
+1, Natural size. 2, Much magnified. _s_, Slit caused by drawing in of
+the animal _a_.]
+
+First, then, in the living specimen which I have here, those alcoves are
+not open as in the dead piece, but covered over with a transparent skin,
+in which, near the top of the alcove just where the curve begins, is a
+slit (_s_ 2, Fig. 72). Unfortunately the membrane covering this alcove
+is too dense for you to distinguish the parts within. Presently,
+however, if you are watching a piece of this living leaf in a flat
+water-cell under the microscope, you will see the slit slowly open, and
+begin to turn as it were inside out, exactly like the finger of a
+glove, which has been pushed in at the tip, gradually rises up when you
+put your finger inside it. As this goes on, a bundle of threads appears,
+at first closed like a bud, but gradually opening out into a crown of
+tentacles (_a_, Fig. 72), each one clothed with hairs. Then you will see
+that the slit was not exactly a slit after all, but the round edge where
+the sac was pushed in. Ah! you will say, you are now showing me a polyp
+like those on the sertularian tree. Not so fast, my friend; you have not
+yet studied what is still under the covering skin and hidden in the
+living animal. I have, however, prepared a slide with this membrane
+removed (see Fig. 73), and there you can observe the different parts,
+and learn that each one of these alcoves contains a complete animal, and
+not merely one among many mouths, like the polyp on the Sertularia.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 73.
+
+Diagram of the animal in the Flustra or Sea-mat.
+
+1, Animal protruding. 2, Animal retracted in the sheath. _sh_, Covering
+sheath. _s_, Slit. _t_, Tentacles. _m_, Mouth. _th_, Throat. _st_,
+Stomach. _i_, Intestine. _r_, Retractor muscle. _e_, Egg-forming parts.
+_g_, Nerve-ganglion.]
+
+Each of these little beings (_a_, Fig 72) living in its alcove has a
+mouth, throat, stomach, intestine, muscles, and nerves starting from the
+ganglion of nervous matter, besides all that is necessary for producing
+eggs and sending forth young ones. You can trace all these under the
+microscope (see 2, Fig. 73) as the creature lies curiously doubled up in
+its bed, with its body bent in a loop; the intestine _i_, out of which
+the refuse food passes, coming back close up to the slit. When it is at
+rest, the top of the sac in which it lies is pulled in by the retractor
+muscle _r_, and looks, as I have said, like the finger of a glove with
+the top pushed in. When it wishes to feed, this top is drawn out by
+muscles running round the sac, and the tentacles open and wave in the
+water (1, Fig. 73).
+
+Look now at the alcoves, the homes of these animals; see how tiny they
+are and how closely they fit together. Mr. Gosse, the naturalist, has
+reckoned that there are 6720 alcoves in a square inch; then if you turn
+the leaf over you will see that there is another set, fixed back to back
+with these, on the other side, making in all 13,440 alcoves. Now a
+moderate-sized leaf of flustra measures about three square inches,
+taking all the rounded lobes into account, so you will see we get 40,320
+as a rough estimate of the number of beings on this one leaf. But if you
+look at this tuft I have brought, you will find it is composed of twelve
+such leaves, and this after all is a very small part of the mass growing
+round my pool. Was I wrong, then, when I said that my miniature ocean
+contains as many millions of beings as there are stars in the heavens?
+
+You will want to know how these leaves grew, and it is in this way.
+First a little free swimming animal, a mere living sac provided with
+lashes, settles down and grows into one little horny alcove, with its
+live creature inside, which in time sends off from it three to five
+buds, forming alcoves all round the top and sides of the first one,
+growing on to it. These again bud out, and you can thus easily
+understand that, in this way, in time a good-sized leaf is formed.
+Meanwhile the creatures also send forth new swimming cells, which settle
+down near to begin new leaves, and thus a tuft is formed; and long after
+the beings in earlier parts of the leaf have died and left their alcoves
+empty, those round the margin are still alive and spreading.
+
+With this history we must stop for to-day, and I expect it will be many
+weeks before you have thoroughly examined the specimens of each kind
+which I have put in the aquarium. If you can trace the spore-cells and
+urns in the seaweeds, observe the polyps in the Sertularia, and count
+the number of mouths on a branch of my animal fringe (_Sertularia
+tenella_); if you make acquaintance with the Thuricolla in its vase, and
+are fortunate enough to see one divide in two; if you learn to know some
+of the beautiful forms of diatoms, and can picture to yourselves the
+life of the tiny inhabitants of the Flustra; then you will have used
+your microscope with some effect, and be prepared for an expedition to
+my pool, where we will go together some day to seek new treasures.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE DARTMOOR PONIES,
+
+OR
+
+THE WANDERINGS OF THE HORSE TRIBE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Put away the telescopes and microscopes to-day, boys, the holidays are
+close at hand, and we will take a rest from peeping and peering till we
+come back in the autumn laden with specimens for the microscope, while
+the rapidly darkening evenings will tempt us again on to the lawn
+star-gazing. On this our last lecture-day I want you to take a journey
+with me which I took in imagination a few days ago, as I lay on my back
+on the sunny moor and watched the Dartmoor ponies.
+
+It was a calm misty morning one day last week, giving promise of a
+bright and sunny day, when I started off for a long walk across the moor
+to visit the famous stone-circles, many of which are to be found not
+far off the track, called Abbot's Way, leading from Buckfast Abbey, on
+the Dart, to the Abbey of Tavistock, on the Tavy.
+
+My mind was full of the olden times as I pictured to myself how, seven
+hundred years or more ago, some Benedictine monk from Tavistock Abbey,
+in his black robe and cowl, paced this narrow path on his way to his
+Cistercian brethren at Buckfast, meeting some of them on his road as
+they wandered over the desolate moor in their white robes and black
+scapularies in search of stray sheep. For the Cistercians were shepherds
+and wool-weavers, while the Benedictines devoted themselves to learning,
+and the track of about twenty-five miles from one abbey to the other,
+which still remains, was worn by the members of the two communities and
+their dependents, the only variety in whose lives consisted probably in
+these occasional visits one to the other.
+
+Yet even these monks belonged to modern times compared to the ancient
+Britons who raised the stone-circles, and buried their dead in the
+barrows scattered here and there over the moor; and my mind drifted back
+to the days when, long before that pathway was worn, men clad in the
+skins of beasts hunted wild animals over the ground on which I was
+treading, and lived in caves and holes of the ground.
+
+I wondered, as I thought of them, whether the cultured monks and the
+uncivilised Britons delighted as much in the rugged scenery of the moor
+as I did that morning. For many miles in front of me the moor stretched
+out wild and treeless; the sun was shining brightly upon the mass of
+yellow furze and deep-red heather, drawing up the moisture from the
+ground, and causing a kind of watery haze to shimmer over the landscape;
+while the early mist was rising off the _tors_, or hill-tops, in the
+distance, curling in fanciful wreaths around the rugged and stony
+summits, as it dispersed gradually in the increasing heat of the day.
+
+The cattle which were scattered in groups here and there feeding on the
+dewy grass were enjoying the happiest time of the year. The moor, which
+in winter affords them scarcely a bare subsistence, is now richly
+covered with fresh young grass, and the sturdy oxen fed solemnly and
+deliberately, while the wild Dartmoor ponies and their colts scampered
+joyously along, shaking their manes and long flowing tails, and neighing
+to each other as they went; or clustered together on some verdant spot,
+where the colts teased and bit each other for fun, as they gambolled
+round their mothers.
+
+It was a pleasure, there on the open moor, with the lark soaring
+overhead, and the butterflies and bees hovering among the sweet-smelling
+furze blossoms, to see horses free and joyous, with no thought of bit or
+bridle, harness or saddle, whose hoofs had never been handled by the
+shoeing-smith, nor their coats touched with the singeing iron. Those
+little colts, with their thick heads, shaggy coats, and flowing tails,
+will have at least two years more freedom before they know what it is to
+be driven or beaten. Only once a year are they gathered together,
+claimed by their owners and branded with an initial, and then left
+again to wander where they will. True, it is a freedom which sometimes
+has its drawbacks, for if the winter is severe the only food they can
+get will be the furze-tops, off which they scrape the snow with their
+feet; yet it is very precious in itself, for they can gallop when and
+where they choose, with head erect, sniffing at the wind and crying to
+each other for the very joy of life.
+
+Now as I strolled across the moor and watched their gambols, thinking
+how like free wild animals they seemed, my thoughts roamed far away, and
+I saw in imagination scenes where other untamed animals of the horse
+tribe are living unfettered all their lives long.
+
+First there rose before my mind the level grass-covered pampas of South
+America, where wild horses share the boundless plains with troops of the
+rhea, or American ostrich, and wander, each horse with as many mares as
+he can collect, in companies of hundreds or even thousands in a troop.
+These horses are now truly wild, and live freely from youth to age,
+unless they are unfortunate enough to be caught in the more inhabited
+regions by the lasso of the hunter. In the broad pampas, the home of
+herds of wild cattle, they dread nothing. There, as they roam with one
+bold stallion as their leader, even beasts of prey hesitate to approach
+them, for, when they form into a dense mass with the mothers and young
+in their centre, their heels deal blows which even the fierce jaguar
+does not care to encounter, and they trample their enemy to death in a
+very short time. Yet these are not the original wild horses we are
+seeking, they are the descendants of tame animals, brought from Europe
+by the Spaniards to Buenos Ayres in 1535, whose descendants have
+regained their freedom on the boundless pampas and prairies.
+
+As I was picturing them careering over the plains, another scene
+presented itself and took their place. Now I no longer saw around me
+tall pampas-grass with the long necks of the rheas appearing above it,
+for I was on the edge of a dreary scantily covered plain between the
+Aral Sea and the Balkash Lake in Tartary. To the south lies a barren
+sandy desert, to the north the fertile plains of the Kirghiz steppes,
+where the Tartar feeds his flocks, and herds of antelopes gallop over
+the fresh green pasture; and between these is a kind of no-man's land,
+where low scanty shrubs and stunted grass seemed to promise but a poor
+feeding-ground.
+
+Yet here the small long-legged but powerful "Tarpans," the wild horses
+of the treeless plains of Russia and Tartary, were picking their morning
+meal. Sturdy wicked little fellows they are, with their shaggy
+light-brown coats, short wiry manes, erect ears, and fiery watchful
+eyes. They might well be supposed to be true wild horses, whose
+ancestors had never been tamed by man; and yet it is more probable that
+even they escaped in early times from the Tartars, and have held their
+own ever since, over the grassy steppes of Russia and on the confines of
+the plains of Tartary. Sometimes they live almost alone, especially on
+the barren wastes where they have been seen in winter, scraping the snow
+off the herbage as our ponies do on Dartmoor. At other times, as in the
+south of Russia, where they wander between the Dnieper and the Don, they
+gather in vast herds and live a free life, not fearing even the wolves,
+which they beat to the ground with their hoofs. From one green oasis to
+another they travel over miles of ground.
+
+    "A thousand horse--and none to ride!
+    With flowing tail, and flying mane,
+    Wide nostrils--never stretch'd by pain,
+    Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,
+    And feet that iron never shod,
+    And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod.
+    A thousand horse, the wild, the free,
+    Like waves that follow o'er the sea."[1]
+
+  [1] Byron's _Mazeppa_.
+
+As I followed them in their course I fancied I saw troops of yet another
+animal of the horse tribe, the "Kulan," or _Equus hemionus_, which is a
+kind of half horse, half ass (Fig. 74), living on the Kirghiz steppes of
+Tartary and spreading far beyond the range of the Tarpan into Tibet.
+Here at last we have a truly wild animal, never probably brought into
+subjection by man. The number of names he possesses shows how widely he
+has spread. The Tartars call him "Kulan," the Tibetans "Kiang," while
+the Mongolians give him the unpronounceable name of "Dschiggetai." He
+will not submit to any of them, but if caught and confined soon breaks
+away again to his old life, a "free and fetterless creature."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 74.
+
+_Equus hemionus_, "Kiang" or "Kulan," the Horse-ass of Tartary and
+Tibet. (Brehm.)]
+
+No one has ever yet settled the question whether he is a horse or an
+ass, probably because he represents an animal truly between the two.
+His head is graceful, his body light, his legs slender and fleet, yet
+his ears are long and ass-like; he has narrow hoofs, and a tail with a
+tuft at the end like all the ass tribe; his colour is a yellow brown,
+and he has a short dark mane and a long dark stripe down his back as a
+donkey has, though this last character you may also see in many of our
+Devonshire ponies. Living often on the high plateaux, sometimes as much
+as 1500 feet above the sea, this "child of the steppes" travels in large
+companies even as far as the rich meadows of Central Asia; in summer
+wandering in green pastures, and in winter seeking the hunger-steppes
+where sturdy plants grow. And when autumn comes the young steeds go off
+alone to the mountain heights to survey the country around and call
+wildly for mates, whom, when found, they will keep close to them through
+all the next year, even though they mingle with thousands of others.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 75.
+
+Przevalsky's Wild Horse, the "Kertag" or "Statur."]
+
+Till about ten years ago the _Equus hemionus_ was the only truly wild
+horse known, but in the winter of 1879-80 the Russian traveller
+Przevalsky brought back from Central Asia a much more horse-like animal,
+called by the Tartars "Kertag" and by the Mongols "Statur." It is a
+clumsy, thick-set, whitish-gray creature with strong legs and a large,
+heavy, reddish-coloured head; its legs have a red tint down to the
+knees, beyond which they are blackish down to the hoofs. But the ears
+are small, and it has the broad hoofs of the true horse, and warts on
+his hind legs, which no animal of the ass tribe has. This horse, like
+the Kiang, travels in small troops of from five to fifteen, led through
+the wildest parts of the Dsungarian desert, between the Altai and
+Tianschan Mountains, by an old stallion. They are extremely shy, and
+see, hear, and smell very quickly, so that they are off like lightning
+whenever anything approaches them.
+
+So having travelled over America, Europe, and Asia, was my quest ended?
+No; for from the dreary Asiatic deserts my thoughts wandered to a far
+warmer and more fertile land, where between the Blue Nile and the Red
+Sea rise the lofty highlands of Abyssinia, among which the African wild
+ass (_Asinus t�niopus_), the probable ancestor of our donkeys, feeds in
+troops on the rich grasses of the slopes, and then onwards to the bank
+of a river in Central Africa where on the edge of a forest, with rich
+pastures beyond, elephants and rhinoceroses, antelopes and buffaloes,
+lions and hy�nas, creep down in the cool of the evening to slake their
+thirst in the flowing stream. There I saw the herds of Zebras in all
+their striped beauty coming down from the mountain regions to the north,
+and mingling with the darker-coloured but graceful quaggas from the
+southern plains, and I half-grieved at the thought how these untamed and
+free rovers are being slowly but surely surrounded by man closing in
+upon them on every side.
+
+I might now have travelled still farther in search of the Onager, or
+wild ass of the Asiatic and Indian deserts, but at this point a more
+interesting and far wider question presented itself, as I flung myself
+down on the moor to ponder over the early history of all these tribes.
+
+Where have they all come from? Where shall we look for the first
+ancestors of these wild and graceful animals? For the answer to this
+question I had to travel back to America, to those Western United States
+where Professor Marsh has made such grand discoveries in horse history.
+For there, in the very country where horses were supposed never to have
+been before the Spaniards brought them a few centuries ago, we have now
+found the true birthplace of the equine race.
+
+Come back with me to a time so remote that we cannot measure it even by
+hundreds of thousands of years, and let us visit the territories of Utah
+and Wyoming. Those highlands were very different then from what they are
+now. Just risen out of the seas of the Cretaceous Period, they were then
+clothed with dense forests of palms, tree-ferns, and screw-pines,
+magnolias and laurels, interspersed with wide-spreading lakes, on the
+margins of which strange and curious animals fed and flourished. There
+were large beasts with teeth like the tapir and the bear, and feet like
+the elephant; and others far more dangerous, half bear, half hy�na,
+prowling around to attack the clumsy paleotherium or the anoplotherium,
+something between a rhinoceros and a horse, which grazed by the
+waterside, while graceful antelopes fed on the rich grass. And among
+these were some little animals no bigger than foxes, with four toes and
+a splint for the fifth, on their front feet, and three toes on the hind
+ones.
+
+These clumsy little animals, whose bones have been found in the rocks of
+Utah and Wyoming, have been called _Eohippus_, or horses of the dawn,
+by naturalists. They were animals with real toes, yet their bones and
+teeth show that they belonged to the horse tribe, and already the fifth
+toe common to most other toed animals was beginning to disappear.
+
+This was in the Eocene period, and before it passed away with its
+screw-pines and tree-ferns, another rather larger animal, called the
+_Orohippus_, had taken the place of the small one, and he had only four
+toes on his front feet. The splint had disappeared, and as time went on
+still other animals followed, always with fewer toes, while they gained
+slender fleet legs, together with an increase in size and in
+gracefulness. First one as large as a sheep (_Mesohippus_) had only
+three toes and a splint. Then the splint again disappeared, and one
+large and two dwindling toes only remained, till finally these two
+became mere splints, leaving one large toe or hoof with almost
+imperceptible splints, which may be seen on the fetlock of a horse's
+skeleton.
+
+The diagram (Fig 76) shows these splints in the horse's or ass's foot of
+to-day. For you must notice that a horse's foot really begins at the
+point _w_ which we call his knee in the front legs, and at his hock _h_
+in the hind legs. His true knee _k_ and elbow _e_ are close up to the
+body. What we call his foot or hoof is really the end of the strong,
+broad, middle toe _t_ covered with a hoof, and farther up his foot at
+_s_ and _s_ we can feel two small splints, which are remains of two
+other toes.
+
+Meanwhile during these long succeeding ages while the foot was
+lengthening out into a slender limb the animals became larger, more
+powerful, and more swift, the neck and head became longer and more
+graceful, the brain-case larger in front and the teeth decreased in
+number, so that there is now a large gap between the biting teeth _i_
+and the grinding teeth _g_ of a horse. Their slender limbs too became
+more flexible and fit for running and galloping, till we find the whole
+skeleton the same in shape, though not in size, as in our own horses and
+asses now.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 76.
+
+Skeleton of Horse or Ass.
+
+_i_, Incisor teeth. _g_, Grinding teeth, with the gap between the two as
+in all grass-feeders. _k_, Knee. _h_, Hock or heel. _f_, Foot. _s_,
+Splints or remains of the two lost toes. _e_, Elbow. _w_, Wrist. _ha_,
+Hand-bone. _t_, middle toe of three joints, 1, 2, 3 forming the hoof.]
+
+They did not, however, during all this time remain confined to America,
+for, from the time when they arrived at an animal called _Miohippus_, or
+lesser horse, which came after the Mesohippus and had only three toes
+on each foot, we find their remains in Europe, where they lived in
+company with the giraffes, opossums, and monkeys which roamed over these
+parts in those ancient times. Then a little later we find them in Africa
+and India; so that the horse tribe, represented by creatures about as
+large as donkeys, had spread far and wide over the world.
+
+And now, curiously enough, they began to forsake, or to die out in, the
+land of their birth. Why they did so we do not know; but while in the
+old world as asses, quaggas, and zebras, and probably horses, they
+flourished in Asia, Europe, and Africa, they certainly died out in
+America, so that ages afterwards, when that land was discovered, no
+animal of the horse tribe was found in it.
+
+And the true horse, where did he arise? Born and bred probably in
+Central Asia from some animal like the "Kulan," or the "Kertag," he
+proved too useful to savage tribes to be allowed his freedom, and it is
+doubtful whether in any part of the world he escaped subjection. In our
+own country he probably roamed as a wild animal till the savages, who
+fed upon him, learned in time to put him to work; and when the Romans
+came they found the Britons with fine and well-trained horses.
+
+Yet though tamed and made to know his master he has, as we have seen,
+broken loose again in almost all parts of the world--in America on the
+prairies and pampas, in Europe and Asia on the steppes, and in Australia
+in the bush. And even in Great Britain, where so few patches of
+uncultivated land still remain, the young colts of Dartmoor, Exmoor,
+and Shetland, though born of domesticated mothers, seem to assert their
+descent from wild and free ancestors as they throw out their heels and
+toss up their heads with a shrill neigh, and fly against the wind with
+streaming manes and outstretched tails as the Kulan, the Tarpan, and the
+Zebra do in the wild desert or grassy plain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE MAGICIAN'S DREAM OF ANCIENT DAYS.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The magician sat in his armchair in the one little room in the house
+which was his, and his only, besides the observatory. And a strange room
+it was. The walls were hung with skulls and bones of men and animals,
+with swords, daggers, and shields, coats of mail, and bronze
+spear-heads. The drawers, many of which stood open, contained
+flint-stones chipped and worn, arrowheads of stone, jade hatchets
+beautifully polished, bronze buckles and iron armlets; while scattered
+among these were pieces of broken pottery, some rough and only
+half-baked, others beautifully finished, as the Romans knew how to
+finish them. Rough needles made of bone lay beside bronze knives with
+richly-ornamented handles and, most precious of all, on the table by the
+magician's side lay a reindeer antler, on which was roughly carved the
+figure of the reindeer itself.
+
+He had been enjoying a six weeks' holiday, and he had employed it in
+visiting some of the bone caves of Europe to learn about the men who
+lived in them long, long ago. He had been to the south of France to see
+the famous caves of the Dordogne, to Belgium to the caves of Engis and
+Engihoul, to the Hartz Mountains and to Hungary. Then hastening home he
+had visited the chief English caves in Yorkshire, Wales, and Devonshire.
+
+Now that he had returned to his college, his mind was so full of facts,
+that he felt perplexed how to lay before his class the wonderful story
+of the life of man before history began. And as the day was hot, and the
+very breeze which played around him made him feel languid and sleepy, he
+fell into a reverie--a waking dream.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+First the room faded from his sight, then the trim villages disappeared;
+the homesteads, the corn-fields, the grazing cattle, all were gone, and
+he saw the whole of England covered with thick forests and rough
+uncultivated land. From the mountains in the north, glaciers were to be
+seen creeping down the valleys between dense masses of fir and oak, pine
+and birch; while the wild horse, the bison, and the Irish elk were
+feeding on the plains. As he looked southward and eastward he saw that
+the sea no longer washed the shores, for the English and Irish Channels
+were not yet scooped out. The British Isles were still part of the
+continent of Europe, so that animals could migrate overland from the
+far south, up to what is now England, Scotland, and Ireland. Many of
+these animals, too, were very different from any now living in the
+country, for in the large rivers of England he saw the hippopotamus
+playing with her calf, while elephants and rhinoceroses were drinking at
+the water's edge. Yet these strange creatures did not have all the
+country to themselves--wolves, bears, and foxes prowled in the woods,
+large beavers built their dams across the streams, and here and there
+over the country human beings were living in caves and holes of the
+earth.
+
+It was these men chiefly who attracted the magician's attention, and
+being curious to know how they lived, he turned towards a cave, at the
+mouth of which was a group of naked children who were knocking pieces of
+flint together, trying to strike off splinters and make rough flint
+tools, such as they saw their fathers use. Not far off from them a woman
+with a wild beast's skin round her waist was gathering firewood, another
+was grubbing up roots, and another, venturing a little way into the
+forest, was searching for honey in the hollows of the tree trunks.
+
+All at once in the dusk of the evening a low growl and a frightened cry
+were heard, and the women rushed towards the cave as they saw near the
+edge of the forest a huge tiger with sabre-shaped teeth struggling with
+a powerful stag. In vain the deer tried to stamp on his savage foe or to
+wound him with his antlers; the strong teeth of the tiger had penetrated
+his throat, and they fell struggling together as the stag uttered his
+death-cry. Just at that moment loud shouts were heard in the forest, and
+the frightened women knew that help was near.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 77.
+
+Pal�olithic times.]
+
+One after another, several men, clothed in skins hung over one shoulder
+and secured round the waist, rushed out of the thicket, their hair
+streaming in the wind, and ran towards the tiger. They held in their
+hands strange weapons made of rough pointed flints fastened into handles
+by thongs of skin, and as the tiger turned upon them with a cry of rage
+they met him with a rapid shower of blows. The fight raged fiercely,
+for the beast was strong and the weapons of the men were rude, but the
+tiger lay dead at last by the side of his victim. His skin and teeth
+were the reward of the hunters, and the stag he had killed became their
+prey.
+
+How skilfully they hacked it to pieces with their stone axes, and then
+loading it upon their shoulders set off up the hill towards the cave,
+where they were welcomed with shouts of joy by the women and children!
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 78.
+
+Pal�olithic relics.
+
+1, Bone needle, from a cave at La Madeleine, � size. 2, Tooth of
+Machairodus or sabre-toothed tiger, from Kent's Cavern, � size. 3, Rough
+stone implement, from Kent's Cavern, � size.]
+
+Then began the feast. First fires were kindled slowly and with
+difficulty by rubbing a sharp-pointed stick in a groove of softer wood
+till the wood-dust burst into flame; then a huge pile was lighted at the
+mouth of the cave to cook the food and keep off wild beasts. How the
+food was cooked the magician could not see, but he guessed that the
+flesh was cut off the bones and thrust in the glowing embers, and he
+watched the men afterwards splitting open the uncooked bones to suck out
+the raw marrow which savages love.
+
+After the feast was over he noticed how they left these split bones
+scattered upon the floor of the cave mingling with the sabre-shaped
+teeth of the tiger, and this reminded him of the bones of the stag and
+the tiger's tooth which he had found in Kent's Cavern in Devonshire only
+a few days before.
+
+By this time the men had lain down to sleep, and in the darkness strange
+cries were heard from the forest. The roar of the lion, mingled with the
+howling of the wolves and the shrill laugh of the hy�nas, told that they
+had come down to feed on the remains of the tiger. But none of these
+animals ventured near the glowing fire at the mouth of the cavern,
+behind which the men slept in security till the sun was high in the
+heavens. Then all was astir again, for weapons had been broken in the
+fight, and some of the men sitting on the ground outside the cave placed
+one flint between their knees, and striking another sharply against it
+drove off splinters, leaving a pointed end and cutting edge. They
+spoiled many before they made one to their liking, and the entrance to
+the cave was strewn with splintered fragments and spoilt flints, but at
+last several useful stones were ready. Meanwhile another man, taking his
+rude stone axe, set to work to hew branches from the trees to form
+handles, while another, choosing a piece remaining of the body of the
+stag, tore a sinew from the thigh, and threading it through the large
+eye of the bone needle, stitched the tiger's skin roughly together into
+a garment.
+
+"_This, then_," said the magician to himself, "_is how ancient man lived
+in the summer-time, but how would he fare when winter came?_" As he
+mused the scene gradually changed. The glaciers crept far lower down
+the valleys, and the hills, and even the lower ground, lay thick in
+snow. The hippopotamus had wandered away southward to warmer climes, as
+animals now migrate over the continent of America in winter, and with
+him had gone the lion, the southern elephant, and other summer visitors.
+In their place large herds of reindeer and shaggy oxen had come down
+from the north and were spread over the plains, scraping away the snow
+with their feet to feed on the grass beneath. The mammoth, too, or hairy
+elephant, of the same extinct species as those which have been found
+frozen in solid ice under a sandbank in Siberia, had come down to feed,
+accompanied by the woolly rhinoceros; and scattered over the hills were
+the curious horned musk-sheep, which have long ago disappeared off the
+face of the earth. Still, bitterly cold as it was, the hunter clad in
+his wild-beast skin came out from time to time to chase the mammoth, the
+reindeer, and the oxen for food, and cut wood in the forest to feed the
+cavern fires.
+
+This time the magician's thoughts wandered down to the south-west of
+France, where, on the banks of a river in that part now called the
+Dordogne, a number of caves not far from each other formed the home of
+savage man. Here he saw many new things, for the men used arrows of
+deer-horn and of wood pointed with flint, and with these they shot the
+birds, which were hovering near in hopes of finding food during the
+bitter weather. By the side of the river a man was throwing a small dart
+of deer-horn fastened to a cord of sinews, with which from time to time
+he speared a large fish and drew it to the bank.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 79.
+
+Mammoth engraved on ivory by Pal�olithic man.]
+
+But the most curious sight of all, among such a rude people, was a man
+sitting by the glowing fire at the mouth of one of the caves scratching
+a piece of reindeer horn with a pointed flint, while the children
+gathered round him to watch his work. What was he doing? See! gradually
+the rude scratches began to take shape, and two reindeer fighting
+together could be recognised upon the horn handle. This he laid
+carefully aside, and taking a piece of ivory, part of the tusk of a
+mammoth, he worked away slowly and carefully till the children grew
+tired of watching and went off to play behind the fire. Then the
+magician, glancing over his shoulder, saw a true figure of the mammoth
+scratched upon the ivory, his hairy skin, long mane, and up-curved tusks
+distinguishing him from all elephants living now. "_Ah_," exclaimed the
+magician aloud, "_that is the drawing on ivory found in the cave of La
+Madeleine in Dordogne, proving that man existed ages ago, and even knew
+how to draw figures, at a time when the mammoth, or hairy elephant, long
+since extinct, was still living on the earth!_"
+
+With these words he started from his reverie, and knew that he had been
+dreaming of Pal�olithic man who, with his tools of rough flints, had
+lived in Europe so long ago that his date cannot be fixed by years, or
+centuries, or even thousands of years. Only this is known, that, since
+he lived, the mammoth, the sabre-toothed tiger, the cave-bear, the
+woolly rhinoceros, the cave-hy�na, the musk-sheep, and many other
+animals have died out from off the face of the earth; the hippopotamus
+and the lion have left Europe and retired to Africa, and the sea has
+flowed in where land once was, cutting off Great Britain and Ireland
+from the continent.
+
+How long all these changes were in taking place no one knows. When the
+magician drifted back again into his dream the land had long been
+desolate, and the hy�nas, which had always taken possession of the caves
+whenever the men deserted them for awhile, had now been undisturbed for
+a long time, and had left on the floor of the cave gnawed skulls and
+bones, and jaws of animals, more or less scored with the marks of their
+teeth, and these had become buried in a thick layer of earth. The
+magician knew that these teeth marks had been made by hy�nas, both
+because living hy�nas leave exactly such marks on bones in the present
+day, and because the hy�na bones alone were not gnawed, showing that no
+animals preyed upon their flesh. He knew too that the hy�nas had been
+there long after man had ceased to use the caves, because no flint
+tools were found among the bones. But now the age of hy�nas, too, was
+past and gone, and the caves had been left so long undisturbed that in
+many of them the water dripping from the roof had left film after film
+of carbonate of lime upon the floor, which as the centuries went by
+became a layer of stalagmite many feet thick, sealing down the secrets
+of the past.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The face of the country was now entirely changed. The glaciers were
+gone, and so, too, were all the strange animals. True, the reindeer, the
+wild ox, and even here and there the Irish elk, were still feeding in
+the valleys; wolves and bears still made the country dangerous, and
+beavers built their dams across the streams, which were now much smaller
+than formerly, and flowed in deeper channels, carved out by water during
+the interval; but the elephants, rhinoceroses, lions, and tigers were
+gone never to return, and near the caves in which some of the people
+lived, and the rude underground huts which formed the homes of others,
+tame sheep and goats were lying with dogs to watch them. Also, though
+the land was still covered with dense forests, yet here and there small
+clearings had been made, where patches of corn and flax were growing.
+Naked children still played about as before, but now they were moulding
+cups of clay like those in which food was being cooked on the fire
+outside the caves or huts. Some of the women, dressed partly in skins of
+beasts, partly in rough woven linen, were spinning flax into thread,
+using as a spinning-whorl a small round stone with a hole in the middle
+tied to the end of the flax, as a weight to enable them to twirl it.
+Others were grinding corn in the hollow of a large stone by rubbing
+another stone within it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 80.
+
+Neolithic implements.
+
+1, Stone hatchet mounted in wood. 2, Jade celt, a polished stone weapon,
+from Livermore in Suffolk, � size. 3, Spindle whorl, � size.]
+
+The men, while they still spent much time in hunting, had now other
+duties in tending the sheep and goats, or looking after the hogs as they
+turned up the ground in the forest for roots, or sowing and reaping
+their crops. Yet still all the tools were made of stone, no longer rough
+and merely chipped like the old stone weapons, but neatly cut and
+polished. Stone axes with handles of deer-horn, stone spears and
+javelins, stone arrowheads beautifully finished, sling-stones and
+scrapers, were among their weapons and tools, and with them they made
+many delicate implements of bone. On the broad lakes which here and
+there broke the monotony of the forests, canoes, made of the trunks of
+trees hollowed out by fire, were being paddled by one man, while
+another threw out his fishing line armed with delicate bone-hooks; and
+on the banks of the lakes, nets weighted with drilled stones tied on to
+the meshes were dragged up full of fish.
+
+For these Neolithic men, or men of the New Stone Period, who used
+polished stone weapons, were farmers and shepherds and fishermen. They
+knew how to make rude pottery, and kept domestic animals. Moreover, they
+either came from the east or exchanged goods by barter with tribes
+living more to the eastward, now that canoes enabled them to cross the
+sea; for many of their weapons were made of greenstone or jade, and of
+other kinds of stone not to be found in Europe, and their sheep and
+goats were animals of eastern origin. They understood how to unite to
+protect their homes, for they made underground huts by digging down
+several feet into the ground and roofing the hole over with wood coated
+with clay; and often long passages underground united these huts, while
+in many places on the hills, camps, made of ramparts of earth surrounded
+by ditches, served as strongholds for the women and children and the
+flocks and herds, when some neighbouring tribe attacked their
+homesteads.
+
+Still, however, where caves were ready to hand they used them for
+houses, and the same shelter which had been the home of the ancient
+hunters, now resounded with the voices of the shepherds, who, treading
+on the sealed floor, little dreamt that under their feet lay the remains
+of a bygone age.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 81.
+
+A burial in Neolithic times.]
+
+And now, as our dreamer watched this new race of men fashioning their
+weapons, feeding their oxen, and hunting the wild stag, his attention
+was arrested by a long train of people crossing a neighbouring plain,
+weeping and wailing as they went. At the head of this procession, lying
+on a stretcher made of tree-boughs, lay a dead chieftain, and as the
+line moved on, men threw down their tools, and women their spinning, and
+joined the throng. On they went to where two upright slabs of stone with
+another laid across them formed the opening to a long mound or chamber.
+Into this the bearers passed with lighted torches, and in a niche ready
+prepared placed the dead chieftain in a sitting posture with the knees
+drawn up, placing by his side his flint spear and polished axe, his
+necklace of shells, and the bowl from which he had fed. Then followed
+the funeral feast, when, with shouts and wailing, fires were lighted,
+and animals slaughtered and cooked, while the chieftain was not
+forgotten, but portions were left for his use, and then the earth was
+piled up again around the mouth of the chamber, till it should be opened
+at some future time to place another member of his family by his side,
+or till in after ages the antiquary should rifle his resting-place to
+study the mode of burial in the Neolithic or Polished Stone Age.
+
+Time passed on in the magician's dream, and little by little the caves
+were entirely deserted as men learnt to build huts of wood and stone.
+And as they advanced in knowledge they began to melt metals and pour
+them into moulds, making bronze knives and hatchets, swords and spears;
+and they fashioned brooches and bracelets of bronze and gold, though
+they still also used their necklaces of shells and their polished stone
+weapons. They began, too, to keep ducks and fowls, cows and horses; they
+knew how to weave in looms, and to make cloaks and tunics; and when they
+buried their dead it was no longer in a crouching position. They laid
+them decently to rest, as if in sleep, in the barrows where they are
+found to this day with bronze weapons by their side.
+
+Then as time went on they learnt to melt even hard iron, and to beat it
+into swords and plough-shares, and they lived in well-built huts with
+stone foundations. Their custom of burial, too, was again changed, and
+they burnt their dead, placing the ashes in a funeral urn.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 82.
+
+British relics.
+
+1, A coin of the age of Constantine. 2, Bronze weapon from a Suffolk
+barrow. 3, Bronze bracelet from Liss in Hampshire.]
+
+By this time the Britons, as they were now called, had begun to gather
+together in villages and towns, and the Romans ruled over them. Now when
+men passed through the wild country they were often finely dressed in
+cloth tunics, wearing arm rings of gold, some even driving in
+war-chariots, carrying shields made of wickerwork covered with leather.
+Still many of the country people who laboured in the field kept their
+old clothing of beast skins; they grew their corn and stored it in
+cavities of the rocks; they made basket-work boats covered with skin, in
+which they ventured out to sea. So things went on for a long period till
+at last a troubled time came, and the quiet valleys were disturbed by
+wandering people who fled from the towns and took refuge in the
+forests; for the Romans after three hundred and fifty years of rule had
+gone back home to Italy, and a new and barbarous people called the
+Jutes, Angles, and Saxons, came over the sea from Jutland and drove the
+Britons from their homes.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 83.
+
+Britons taking refuge in the Cave.]
+
+And so once more the caves became the abode of man, for the harassed
+Britons brought what few things they could carry away from their houses
+and hid themselves there from their enemies. How little they thought, as
+they lay down to sleep on the cavern floor, that beneath them lay the
+remains of two ages of men! They knew nothing of the woman who had
+dropped her stone spindle-whorl into the fire, on which the food of
+Neolithic man had been cooking in rough pots of clay; they never dug
+down to the layer of gnawed bones, nor did they even in their dreams
+picture the hy�na haunting his ancient den, for a hy�na was an animal
+they had never seen. Still less would they have believed that at one
+time, countless ages before, their island had been part of the
+continent, and that men, living in the cave where they now lay, had cut
+down trees with rough flints, and fought with such unknown animals as
+the mammoth and the sabre-toothed tiger.
+
+But the magician saw it all passing before him, even as he also saw
+these Britons carrying into the cave their brooches, bracelets, and
+finger rings, their iron spears and bronze daggers, and all their little
+household treasures which they had saved in their flight. And among
+these, mingling in the heap, he recognised Roman coins bearing the
+inscription of the Emperor Constantine, and he knew that it was by these
+coins that he had, a few days before in Yorkshire, been able to fix the
+date of the British occupation of a cave.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And with this his dream ended, and he found himself clutching firmly the
+horn on which Pal�olithic man had engraved the figure of the reindeer.
+He rose, and stretching himself crossed the sunny grass plot of the
+quadrangle and entered his classroom. The boys wondered as he began his
+lecture at the far-away look in his eyes. They did not know how he had
+passed through a vision of countless ages; but that afternoon, for the
+first time, they realised, as he unfolded scene after scene, the history
+of "The Men of Ancient Days."
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+    Abbot's Way across Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Absorption of rays of sunlight, 129
+
+    Abyssinia, wild ass of, 203
+
+    _Actinozoa_, Cydippe allied to the, 190
+
+    Ages, lapse of between old and new stone age, 217
+
+    Alcor, or Jack, 158
+
+    Aldebaran, 149;
+      called so by the Arabs, 153;
+      colour of, 167
+
+    Algol the Variable, 162, 165
+
+    Almach, [Greek: g] Andromed�, 156;
+      a coloured double star, 167
+
+    America, extinction of original horse in, 207
+
+    Andromeda, the great nebula of, 162, 164;
+      double coloured star in, 167
+
+    Animal of the Sea-mat, 191;
+      number in one leaf, 193
+
+    Animal-trees and stony plants, 178
+
+    Animals, extinct, living with man, 211
+
+    Antares, a ruby-red star, 167
+
+    Antherozoids of mosses, 89
+
+    Apothecia of lichens, 83
+
+    Apennines, Lunar, figured, 19
+
+    Archimedes, a lunar crater, 10;
+      smooth centre of, 19
+
+    Arctic lands, lichens in, 82
+
+    Arcturus, colour of, 166
+
+    Aristarchus, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      streaks around, 17
+
+    Aristotle, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Arrows, old stone, 215
+
+    Asia, horse of Central, 201
+
+    _Asinus t�niopus_, 203
+
+    _Aspergillus glaucus_, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Ass tribe, forms allied to the, 201
+
+    Ass, wild of Africa, 203
+
+    Atmosphere, absence of in the moon, 21
+
+    Australia, wild horses of, 207
+
+
+    _Bacillaria Paradoxa_, a diatom, 185
+
+    Bacteria growing on wounds, 66
+
+    Bai�, hill thrown up on Bay of, 103
+
+    Ball, Sir R., on binary stars, 154
+
+    Beehive, triple star near the, 168
+
+    Beer, fermentation of, 65
+
+    Bellatrix, a star in Orion, 148
+
+    Berlin, ground beneath, formed of diatoms, 186
+
+    Bessel, on movements of Sirius, 169
+
+    Betelgeux, a star in Orion, 148
+
+    Binary star in Great Bear, 157, 158
+
+    Binary stars, 154, 166, 170
+
+    Bog-moss or Sphagnum, 93
+
+    Bog-mosses, distribution of, 94
+
+    Bombs, volcanic, 105
+
+    Bo�tis [Greek: e], a coloured double star, 167
+
+    Britons inhabiting caves, 224;
+      ornaments and customs of, 223
+
+    Britons of Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Bronze weapon and bracelet, 223
+
+    Bryum or thread moss, 77
+
+    Buckfast Abbey, monks of, 196
+
+    Bunt, a fungus, 64
+
+    Burial in Neolithic times, 221
+
+    Cassiopeia, the constellation, 162;
+      coloured double star in, 167
+
+    Castor, a binary star, 154
+
+    Camera, photographic, 47;
+      attached to the telescope, 121
+
+    Cancer [Greek: z], a triple coloured star, 168
+
+    Candle-flame, image of, formed by lens, 33
+
+    Canis Major, constellation of, 148
+
+    Capella, colour of the star, 153
+
+    Castor, light of compared with a near star, 158
+
+    Caterpillars destroyed by fungus, 66
+
+    Caucasus Mountains on the Moon, 18
+
+    Cave, the three periods of a, 225
+
+    Caves, Pal�olithic and Neolithic, 210;
+      Pal�olithic life in, 211;
+      hy�nas roamed in, 217;
+      Neolithic life in, 218;
+      Britons took refuge in, 224
+
+    Cells, fertile of mushroom, 69;
+      of moss-plant, 89
+
+    Celt, jade, from Suffolk, 219
+
+    Chambers, Mr., his drawing of [Greek: e] Lyr�, 166
+
+    Charles's Wain, 155;
+      part of Great Bear, 157;
+      stars of drifting, 159;
+      stars visible in waggon of, 160;
+      double coloured star in, 158, 167
+
+    _Chilomonas amygdalum_, a monad, 182
+
+    Ciliary muscle, action of the, 34
+
+    Clark, Alvan, on companion of Sirius, 169
+
+    Clockwork of telescope, 2
+
+    _Cocconema lanceolatum_, a diatom, 184
+
+    Coin of age of Constantine, 223
+
+    _Conferv�_, growth of, 79
+
+    Commons, Mr., photographed Orion's nebula, 152
+
+    Constantine, coin of age of, 223
+
+    Constellations, maps of, 148, 156
+
+    Copernicus, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      figured, 17;
+      bright streaks around, 18
+
+    Copper-sulphate in lava, 108
+
+    _Corallina_, a stony seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177;
+      appearance like _Sertularia_, 179
+
+    Cornea of the eye, 31
+
+    Corona, nature of the sun's, 123, 137
+
+    Cottam, Mr. A., his plate of coloured stars, 167
+
+    Crater, lava flowing from a, 98;
+      interior of Vesuvius, 100
+
+    Crater-plains, 19-21
+
+    Craters on the moon, 10, 13, 17, 19, 20;
+      of earth and moon compared, 16
+
+    Crystallites in volcanic glass, 109
+
+    Crystallisation, two periods of, in lava, 115
+
+    Crystals forming in artificial lavas, 114;
+      precious, 116
+
+    _Cydippe pileus_, a living jelly-ball, 187;
+      structure of, 188-190
+
+    Cygni [Greek: b], a coloured double star, 167
+
+
+    Dartmoor, fairy rings on, 57, 58;
+      the Sundew on, 56;
+      granite figured, 112;
+      ponies, 195
+
+    De la Rue, his photograph of moon, 13
+
+    Devonshire ponies, black stripe on, 201
+
+    Diatom, a growing, 185
+
+    _Diatoma hyalina_, 184
+
+    Diatoms, magnified fossil, 39;
+      living marine, 184
+
+    Didymium, giving a broken spectrum, 126
+
+    Dordogne, caves of the, 210, 215
+
+    Draper, Prof., photographed Orion's nebula, 152
+
+    _Drosera rotundifolia_ on Dartmoor, 56
+
+    Dschiggetai, horse-ass of Tibet, 200
+
+    Dsungarian desert, wild horse of the, 203
+
+    Dykes, nature of volcanic, 111
+
+
+    Earth, path of the moon round the, 8;
+      magnetic storm on, caused by sun, 14;
+      reservoirs of melted matter in the, 101
+
+    Earthquakes accompanying volcanic outbursts, 102
+
+    Eclipse of sun, red jets and corona seen during, 125
+
+    Eclipse, total, of the moon, 23;
+      lurid light during, 25
+
+    Eclipses, how caused, 7
+
+    Elephant, hairy, engraved on ivory, 216
+
+    _Empusa musc�_, 66
+
+    Engis and Engihoul caves, 210
+
+    England, ancient caves in, 210;
+      in Pal�olithic times, 211
+
+    Eocene, toed horses of the, 205
+
+    _Eohippus_, or horse of the dawn, 205
+
+    _Equus hemionus_, the horse-ass, 202
+
+    Eratosthenes, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Erbia, giving a broken spectrum, 126
+
+    Ergot, a fungus, 61
+
+    Eruptions of Vesuvius, 97, 100, 104
+
+    Eudoxus, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Experiments, necessity for accurate, 54
+
+    Eye, structure of the, 29-32;
+      mode of seeing with the, 32;
+      short-sighted, 29, 35;
+      distances spanned by the naked, 40
+
+
+    Facul� on the sun's face, 122, 140
+
+    Fairy rings, 55;
+      mentioned in _Merry Wives of Windsor_, 57;
+      growth of, 71-73
+
+    Ferments caused by fungi, 60, 64
+
+    Fishing in ancient times, 215, 220
+
+    _Fistulina hepatica_, a fungus, 71
+
+    Flint skeletons of plants, 185
+
+    Flustra or sea-mat, 187;
+      structure of, 191-193
+
+    Fly, fungus killing a, 66
+
+    Focal images, 33;
+      distances, 44
+
+    Fouqu�, M., artificial lava made by, 112
+
+    Fructification of mushrooms, 69;
+      of lichens, 83;
+      of mosses, 91;
+      of seaweeds, 177
+
+    _Funaria hygrometrica_, urn of the, 89, 91;
+      has no urn lid, 92
+
+    Fungi, nature of, 59;
+      different kinds of, 60;
+      attacking insects, 66;
+      growing on wounds, 66;
+      the use of, 74
+
+    Fungus and green cells in lichen, 81
+
+
+    Gardener, advice of the old, 118
+
+    Gas, spectrum of a, 126
+
+    Gases revealed by spectroscope, 52
+
+    Gemini, the constellation, 154
+
+    Geminorum, [Greek: d], a double coloured star, 167
+
+    Gills of mushroom, 69
+
+    _Gomphonema marinum_, 184
+
+    Gooseberry, fermentation in a, 64
+
+    Gory dew, _Palmella cruenta_, 79
+
+    Graham's island thrown up, 102
+
+    Granular appearance of sun's face, 123
+
+    Grape fungus, 65
+
+    Great Bear, the constellation, 157;
+      binary star in, 158;
+      coloured double star in, 158, 168
+
+    Greenstone, Neolithic weapons of, 220
+
+    Guards, the, in the Little Bear, 162
+
+
+    Hartz Mountains, caves of the, 210
+
+    Hatchet, a Neolithic stone, 219
+
+    Hebrides, volcanic islands of, 111
+
+    Henri, MM., photograph of moon's face by, 19
+
+    Herculaneum, buried, 98, 104
+
+    Herculis [Greek: a], a coloured double star, 168
+
+    Hermitage, lava stream flowing behind the, 97, 99
+
+    Herschel's drawing of Copernicus, 17
+
+    Huggins, Dr., on shape of prominences, 135;
+      on spectra of nebul�, 151;
+      on cause of colour in stars, 168
+
+    Himalayas, single-celled plants in the, 79
+
+    Horse, wild, of the Pampas, 198;
+      of Tartary, 199;
+      of Kirghiz steppes, 200;
+      Przevalsky's, 202;
+      early history of toed, 204;
+      structure of foot and hoof of, 205;
+      skeleton of, 206;
+      origin and migration of early, 207
+
+    Hungary, ancient caves of, 210
+
+    Huyghens, the highest peak in Lunar Apennines, 19
+
+
+    Image formed at focus of lens, 33;
+      of sky in telescope, 49
+
+    Implements, old stone, 213;
+      new stone, 219
+
+    Imps of plant-life, 59
+
+    India, low plants in springs of, 79;
+      solar eclipse seen in, 124;
+      wild ass of, 203
+
+    Infusorial earth, 186
+
+    Infusorians in a seaside pool, 183
+
+    Inhabitants of a seaside pool, 172-174
+
+    Iris of the eye, 30
+
+    Iron pyrites in lava, 108
+
+    Iron slag, lava compared to, 105
+
+    Islands, volcanic thrown up, 102
+
+
+    Jack by the second horse, 157
+
+    Jade, Neolithic weapons of, 220
+
+    Jannsen, Prof., on sun prominences, 131
+
+    Judd, Mr., on volcano of Mull, 111
+
+    Jutes and Angles invading Britain, 224
+
+
+    Kant on nebular hypothesis, 152
+
+    Kent's Cavern, rough stone implement from, 213
+
+    Kepler, a lunar crater, 10;
+      streaks around, 17
+
+    Kertag, or wild horse, 202
+
+    Kew, sun-storm registered at, 143
+
+    Kiang or Kulan, 200
+
+    Kirchhoff, Prof., on sunlight, 128
+
+    Kulan or Kiang, 200
+
+
+    Labrador felspar artificially made, 113
+
+    Langley, Prof., sun-spot drawn by, 141
+
+    Laplace, nebular hypothesis of, 152
+
+    Lava, aspect of flowing, 99;
+      reservoirs of molten, 101;
+      nature of, 107;
+      artificially made, 113;
+      two periods of crystallisation in, 115
+
+    Lava-stream, history of a, 100;
+      section of a, 108;
+      rapid cooling of surface, 108
+
+    Laver or sea-lettuce, structure of, 176
+
+    Leo, the constellation, 155
+
+    Leucotephrite artificially made, 113
+
+    Lens, natural, of the eye, 31;
+      simple magnifying, 35
+
+    Levy, M., artificial lava made by, 112
+
+    Lichens, specimens of from life, 77;
+      the life-history of, 80-84;
+      sections of, 81;
+      distribution of 82, 95;
+      fructification of, 83;
+      causes of success of, 94
+
+    Lick telescope, magnifying power of, 46
+
+    Light, lurid, on moon during eclipse, 24;
+      sifted by spectroscope, 126
+
+    Light-granules on sun's face, 123;
+      supposed explanation of, 141
+
+    Lime-tree, fungi on the, 64
+
+    Liss, bronze bracelet from, 223
+
+    Little Bear, pole-star and guards in the, 162
+
+    Lockyer, Mr., on sun-prominences, 131, 136
+
+    Lunar Apennines figured, 19
+
+    Lyr� [Greek: epsilon], a double-binary star, 166
+
+
+    Machairodus, tooth of, 213
+
+    Madeleine, La, carvings from cave of, 216
+
+    Magic glasses and how to use them, 27;
+      what can be done by, 28, 53
+
+    Magician's chamber, 1;
+      his pupils, 4;
+      spells, 28;
+      his dream of ancient days, 209
+
+    Magnetic connection of sun and earth, 142
+
+    Magnifying-glass, action of a, 35
+
+    Mammoth engraved on ivory, 216
+
+    Maps of constellations, 148, 156
+
+    _Marasmius oreastes_, fairy-ring mushroom, 55, 72
+
+    _Mazeppa_, quotation from Byron's, 201
+
+    Men of older stone age, 212;
+      of Neolithic age, 218
+
+    _Mesohippus_, a toed horse, 205
+
+    Microliths in volcanic glass, 109, 110, 113, 115;
+      formed in artificial lava, 113
+
+    Microscope, 3;
+      action of the, 36-38
+
+    Mildews are fungi, 60
+
+    Milky Way, 149;
+      Cassiopeia in the, 163
+
+    Minerals crystallising in lava, 108
+
+    Mines, increase of temperature in, 101
+
+    Miohippus, or lesser toed horse, 206
+
+    Mizar, a double-coloured star in the Great Bear, 158, 168
+
+    Monads, size and activity of, 183
+
+    Monks, ancient, of Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Monte Nuovo thrown up in 1538, 103
+
+    Moon, phases of the, 6;
+      course in the heavens, 8;
+      map of the, 10;
+      craters of the, 10, 13, 17, 19, 20;
+      face of full, 11;
+      a worn-out planet, 21;
+      no atmosphere in the, 21;
+      diagram of eclipse of, 23;
+      lurid light on during eclipse, 24
+
+    Moss-leaf magnified, 87
+
+    Moss, life-history of a, 84, 92;
+      a stem of feathery, 85;
+      protonema of a, 86;
+      modes of new growth of a, 88;
+      fructification of a, 89;
+      urns of a, 89, 91
+
+    Mosses, different kinds of, 77;
+      advantages and distribution of, 94
+
+    Moulds are fungi, 60;
+      how they grow, 63
+
+    Mountains of the moon, 19;
+      formation of, 21
+
+    _Mucor Mucedo_, figured, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Mull, volcanic dykes in the island of, 111
+
+    Mushroom, early stages and spawn of, 67;
+      mycelium of, 67;
+      later stages of, 68;
+      section of gills of, 69;
+      spores of, 70;
+      fairy or Scotch bonnet, 72
+
+    Mycelium of mould, 63;
+      of mushroom, 67;
+      of fairy rings, 72
+
+
+    Naples, volcanic eruption seen at, 96;
+      Monte Nuovo thrown up near, 103
+
+    Nasmyth on bright lunar streaks, 16
+
+    Nebula of Orion, 149;
+      spectrum of, 151;
+      photographs of, 152;
+      of Pleiades, 153;
+      of Andromeda, 163-164
+
+    Needle, bone, from a cave, 212
+
+    Neolithic implements, 219;
+      industries and habits, 218-220;
+      burials, 221
+
+    Neptune, invisible to naked eye, 35
+
+    Neison, Mr., his drawing of Plato, 20
+
+    _Nostoc_, growing on stones, 79
+
+
+    Oak, fungi on the, 64
+
+    Observatory, the Magician's, 2;
+      astronomical on Vesuvius, 97;
+      cascade of lava behind the, 99
+
+    Obsidian, or volcanic glass, 109
+
+    Occultation of a star, 22, 25
+
+    Onager, or wild ass of Asia, 203
+
+    Optic nerve of eye, 34
+
+    Orion, constellation of, 147, 149;
+      great nebula of, 149;
+      photographs of Nebula of, 152;
+      coloured double stars in, 168
+
+    Orionis [Greek: th], or Trapezium, 150
+
+    Ornaments of ancient Britons, 222
+
+    Orohippus, a toed horse, 205
+
+    _Oscillari�_, growth of, 79
+
+
+    Pal�olithic man, 212;
+      relics, 213;
+      life, 214, 216
+
+    Pampas, wild horses of the, 198
+
+    _Penicillium glaucum_, figured, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Penumbra of an eclipse, 23;
+      of sun-spots, 140
+
+    Perithecia of lichens, 84
+
+    Petavius, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Photographic camera, 3, 47;
+      attached to telescope, 121
+
+    Photographs of the moon, 13, 19;
+      of galloping horse, 48;
+      of the stars, 49, 161;
+      of the sun, 121
+
+    Photosphere of the sun, 123
+
+    Philadelphia, electric shocks at during sun-storm, 143
+
+    Pixies of plant life, 59
+
+    Plains of the moon, 10;
+      nature of the, 12
+
+    Plants, colourless, single-celled, 65;
+      single-celled green, 78;
+      two kinds of in lichens, 80;
+      with flint skeletons, 185
+
+    Plato, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      figured, 20
+
+    Pleiades, the, 153;
+      nebul� in, 153
+
+    _Pleurococcus_, a single-celled plant, 78
+
+    Plough, the, or Charles's Wain, 157
+
+    Pointers, in Charles's Wain, 161
+
+    Pole-star, the, 161;
+      a yellow sun, 166
+
+    Pollux, a yellow sun, 166
+
+    _Polysiphonia_, a red seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177
+
+    _Polytrichum commune_, a hair moss, 88;
+      its urns protected by a lid, 91
+
+    Pool, inhabitants of a seaside, 172-74
+
+    Precious stones, formation of, 116
+
+    Proctor, his star atlas, 146;
+      on drifting of Charles's Wain, 159
+
+    Prominence-spectrum and sun-spectrum compared, 134
+
+    Prominences, red, of the sun, 125;
+      seen in full daylight, 131-133;
+      shape of, 135
+
+    _Protococcus nivalis_, 79
+
+    Protonema of a moss, 86
+
+    Przevalsky's wild horse, 202
+
+    Ptolemy, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Puffballs, 67, 70;
+      use of in nature, 73
+
+    Pupil of the eye, 30
+
+    Puzzuoli, eruption near, 1538, 103
+
+
+    Quaggas, herds of, 203
+
+
+    Rain-band in the solar spectrum, 130
+
+    Rain-shower during volcanic eruption, 107
+
+    Readings in the sky, 53, 127, 151, 168
+
+    Red snow, a single-celled plant, 79
+
+    Regulus, the star, 155, 166
+
+    Reindeer, carving on horn of, 216
+
+    Reservoirs of molten rock underground, 101
+
+    Resina, ascent of Vesuvius from, 98
+
+    Retina of the eye, 31;
+      image of object on the, 33
+
+    Richmond, Virginia, infusorial earth of, 186
+
+    Rigel, a star in Orion, 149;
+      a coloured double star, 168
+
+    Rings, growth of fairy, 73
+
+    Roberts, Mr. I., his photograph of Orion's nebula, 152;
+      and of nebula of the Pleiades, 153;
+      and of nebula of Andromeda, 164
+
+    Rosse, Lord, his telescope, 46;
+      on Orion's nebula, 150;
+      stars visible in his telescope, 160
+
+    Rue, De la, his photograph of the moon, 13
+
+    Rust on plants, 61
+
+
+    Sabrina island formed, 102
+
+    Saturn, distance of, 40
+
+    Saxons, invasion of the, 224
+
+    Schwabe, Herr, on sun-spots cycle, 137
+
+    Scori� of volcanoes, 108
+
+    "Scotch bonnet" mushroom, 72
+
+    Sea-mat, _see_ Flustra
+
+    "Seas" lunar, so-called, 10
+
+    Seaweeds, a group of, 175;
+      fruits of, 177
+
+    Secchi, Father, on depth of a sun-spot, 139
+
+    Selwyn, Mr., photograph of sun by, 122
+
+    Senses alone tell us of outer world, 29
+
+    _Sertularia tenella_, structure of, 180;
+      _cupressina_, 181
+
+    Sertularian and coralline, resemblance of, 179
+
+    Shakespeare on fairy rings, 57
+
+    Shipley, Mr., saw volcanic island formed, 103
+
+    Sight, far and near, 35
+
+    Silkworm destroyed by fungi, 66
+
+    Sirius, 146;
+      a bluish white sun, 166;
+      irregularities of caused by a companion, 169
+
+    Skeleton of the horse, 206
+
+    Skin diseases caused by fungi, 61, 66
+
+    Sky, light readings in the, 53, 127, 151, 168
+
+    Smut, a fungus, 61
+
+    Sodium lime in the spectrum, 128
+
+    Somma, part of ancient Vesuvius, 97, 104
+
+    Spawn of mushroom, 67
+
+    Spectra, plate of coloured, 127
+
+    Spectroscope, 3;
+      Kirchhoff's, 51;
+      gases revealed by the, 52;
+      direct vision, 127;
+      sifting light, 126;
+      attached to telescope, 132
+
+    Spectrum of sunlight, 127, 130
+
+    Sphacelaria, a brown-green seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177
+
+    Sphagnum or bog moss, 77, 93;
+      structure of leaves of, 93
+
+    Spindle-whorl from Neolithic caves, 219
+
+    Spore-cases of mosses, 89, 91, 93
+
+    Spores of moulds, 63;
+      of mushroom, 70;
+      of lichens, 83;
+      of mosses, 91
+
+    Star, occultation of, by the moon, 24;
+      a double-binary, 166;
+      a dark, travelling round Sirius, 169
+
+    Star-cluster in Perseus, 162
+
+    Star-depths, 160, 171
+
+    Stars, light from the, 40, 42;
+      visible in the country, 145;
+      apparent motion of the, 146;
+      maps of, 148, 156;
+      of milky way, 149;
+      binary, 154;
+      real motion of, 159;
+      drifting, 159;
+      number of known and estimated, 161;
+      colours of, 166;
+      double coloured, 167;
+      cause of colour in, 168;
+      are they centres of solar systems? 170
+
+    Statur or wild horse, 202
+
+    Streaks, bright, on the moon, 14-17
+
+    Suffolk, bronze weapon from barrow in, 223
+
+    Sun, path of the moon round the, 8;
+      one of the stars, 119;
+      how to look at the, 119;
+      face of, thrown on a screen, 120;
+      photograph of the, 122;
+      prominences, corona, and facul� of, 122-125;
+      mottling of face of, 123;
+      total eclipse of, 124;
+      zodiacal line round, 125;
+      dark lines in spectrum of, 128;
+      reversing layer of, 131;
+      metals in the, 131;
+      sudden outburst in the, 142;
+      magnetic connection with the earth, 143;
+      a yellow star, 166
+
+    Sun's rays touching moon during eclipse, 24
+
+    Sun-spots, cycle of, 137;
+      proving sun's rotation, 138;
+      nature of, 139;
+      quiet and unquiet, 140;
+      formation of, 142
+
+    Sundew on Dartmoor, 56
+
+
+    Tarpan, a wild horse, 199
+
+    Tartary, wild horses of, 199
+
+    Tavistock Abbey, monks of, 196
+
+    Telescope, clock-work, adjusting a, 2;
+      an astronomical, 41;
+      magnifying power of the, 43-46;
+      giant, 46;
+      terrestrial, 47;
+      what can be seen in a small, 46;
+      how the sun is photographed in the, 122;
+      how the spectroscope is worked with the, 132
+
+    Teneriffe, peak of compared to lunar craters, 15
+
+    Tennant, Major, drawing of eclipsed sun by, 123
+
+    Temperature, underground, 101
+
+    _Thuricolla follicula_, a transparent infusorian, 182
+
+    Tiger, sabre-toothed, 211, 213
+
+    _Tilletia caria_ or bunt, 64
+
+    Toadstools, 67, 70;
+      use of in nature, 73
+
+    Tools, of ancient stone period, 214, 215
+
+    Tooth of machairodus, 213
+
+    Torquay, the Magician's pool near, 172
+
+    Tors of Dartmoor, 197
+
+    Trapezium of Orion, 150
+
+    _Tremella mesenterica_ fungus, 71
+
+    Tripoli formed of diatoms, 35
+
+    Tundras, lichens and mosses of the, 82, 95
+
+    Tycho, a lunar crater, 10;
+      description of, 13;
+      bright streaks of, 14
+
+
+    _Ulva_, a green seaweed, 175;
+      a section magnified, 176
+
+    Umbra of an eclipse, 23
+
+    Urns of mosses, 89, 91
+
+    _Ustilago carbo_, or smut, 64
+
+    Variable stars, 165
+
+    Vega, a bluish-white sun, 166;
+      double-binary star near, 165
+
+    Veil of mushroom, 68
+
+    Vesuvian lavas imitated, 113
+
+    Vesuvius, eruption of 1868 described, 97, 99, 104;
+      dormant, 103;
+      eruption of in A.D. 79, 104
+
+    Volcanic craters of earth and moon compared, 16;
+      eruptions in the moon, 21;
+      glass under the microscope, 109, 110, 115
+
+    Volcano, diagram of an active, 105
+
+    Volcanoes, the cause of discussed, 101, 102;
+      ancient, laid bare, 111
+
+
+    Washington, electric shocks at during sun-storm, 143
+
+    Winter in Pal�olithic times, 215
+
+    Wood, winter growth in a, 76
+
+    "World without End," 115
+
+
+    Yeast, growth of, 65
+
+    Yorkshire, Roman coins in caves of, 225
+
+
+    Zebra, herds of, 203
+
+    Zodiacal light, 125
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS.
+
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+
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+
+
+  _A SHORT HISTORY OF NATURAL SCIENCE; and of the Progress of
+     Discovery from the Time of the Greeks to the Present Time._ By
+     ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY. New edition, revised and rearranged. With
+     77 Illustrations. Cloth, $2.00.
+
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+     Nature._ A Book for Young Readers. With 322 Illustrations on
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+Curiosities of the Insect and Reptile World; Marvels of Bird and Beast
+Life; Phenomenal Forces of Nature.
+
+
+  _AROUND AND ABOUT SOUTH AMERICA: Twenty Months of Quest and
+     Query._ By FRANK VINCENT, author of "The Land of the White
+     Elephant," etc. With Maps, Plans, and 54 full-page
+     Illustrations. 8vo, xxiv-473 pages. Ornamental cloth, $5.00.
+
+No former traveler has made so comprehensive and thorough a tour of
+Spanish and Portuguese America as did Mr. Vincent. He visited every
+capital, chief city, and important seaport, made several expeditions
+into the interior of Brazil and the Argentine Republic, and ascended the
+Paran�, Paraguay, Amazon, Orinoco, and Magdalena Rivers; he visited the
+crater of Pichinchas, 16,000 feet above the sea-level; he explored falls
+in the center of the continent, which, though meriting the title of
+"Niagara of South America," are all but unknown to the outside world; he
+spent months in the picturesque capital of Rio Janeiro; he visited the
+coffee districts, studied the slaves, descended the gold-mines, viewed
+the greatest rapids of the globe, entered the isolated Guianas, and so
+on.
+
+
+  _BRAZIL: Its Condition and Prospects._ By C. C. ANDREWS,
+     ex-Consul-General to Brazil. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
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+Government, during which period I made a few journeys into the
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+
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+     Siberia._ By LIONEL F. GOWING. With Map and 30 Illustrations in
+     Text. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
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+addition to the scant literature on a singularly interesting
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+
+
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+     Study of its Civilization and Possibilities. With a Glance at
+     Japan. By JAMES HARRISON WILSON, late Major-General United
+     States Volunteers and Brevet Major-General United States Army.
+     12mo. Cloth, $1.75.
+
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+
+
+  _THE GARDEN'S STORY; or, Pleasures and Trials of an Amateur
+     Gardener._ By GEORGE H. ELLWANGER. With Head and Tail Pieces by
+     Rhead. 12mo. Cloth extra, $1.50.
+
+"Mr. Ellwanger's instinct rarely errs in matters of taste. He writes out
+of the fullness of experimental knowledge, but his knowledge differs
+from that of many a trained cultivator in that his skill in garden
+practice is guided by a refined �sthetic sensibility, and his
+appreciation of what is beautiful in nature is healthy, hearty, and
+catholic. His record of the garden year, as we have said, begins with
+the earliest violet, and it follows the season through until the
+witch-hazel is blossoming on the border of the wintry woods.... This
+little book can not fail to give pleasure to all who take a genuine
+interest in rural life. They will sympathize with most of the author's
+robust and positive judgments, and with his strong aversions as well as
+his tender attachments."--_The Tribune_, New York.
+
+
+  _THE FOLK-LORE OF PLANTS._ By T. F. THISELTON DYER, M.A. 12mo.
+     Cloth, $1.50.
+
+"The Folk-Lore of Plants" traces the superstitions and fancies connected
+with plants in fairy-lore, in witchcraft and demonology, in religion, in
+charms, in medicine, in plant language, etc. The author is an eminent
+English botanist, and superintendent of the gardens at Kew.
+
+"A handsome and deeply interesting volume.... In all respects the book
+is excellent. Its arrangement is simple and intelligible, its style
+bright and alluring; authorities are cited at the foot of the page, and
+a full index is appended.... To all who seek an introduction to one of
+the most attractive branches of folk-lore, this delightful volume may be
+warmly commended."--_Notes and Queries._
+
+
+  _FLOWERS AND THEIR PEDIGREES._ By GRANT ALLEN, author of
+     "Vignettes of Nature," etc. Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
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+style as Mr. Grant Allen. His sketches in the magazines have well been
+called fascinating, and the present volume, being a collection of
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+entertaining and suggestive writer.
+
+"'Flowers and their Pedigrees,' by Grant Allen, with many illustrations,
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+a scientific study of the migration and transformation of plants,
+illustrated by the daisy, the strawberry, the cleavers, wheat, the
+mountain tulip, the cuckoo-pint, and a few others. The study is a
+delightful one, and the book is fascinating to any one who has either
+love for flowers or curiosity about them."--_Hartford Courant._
+
+
+  _THE HISTORY OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATION._ A Hand-book based upon
+     M. Gustave Ducoudray's "Histoire Sommaire de la Civilisation."
+     Edited by the Rev. J. VERSCHOYLE, M.A. With numerous
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+
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+
+
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+     By E. GUHL and W. KONER. Translated from the third German
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+<body>
+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures, by
+Arabella B. Buckley</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures</p>
+<p>       A Sequel to The Fairyland of Science</p>
+<p>Author: Arabella B. Buckley</p>
+<p>Release Date: October 1, 2011  [eBook #37589]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES AND OTHER LECTURES***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>E-text prepared by Chris Curnow, Robin Shaw,<br />
+    and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br />
+    from page images generously made available by<br />
+    Internet Archive<br />
+    (<a href="http://www.archive.org">http://www.archive.org</a>)</h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10">
+  <tr>
+    <td valign="top">
+      Note:
+    </td>
+    <td>
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/throughmagicglas00buck">
+      http://www.archive.org/details/throughmagicglas00buck</a>
+   </td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<img src="images/i_cover.jpg" width="600" height="910" alt="Cover" title="" />
+</div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="Frontispiece" id="Frontispiece"></a>
+<table summary="frontispiece" width="100%">
+<tr><td align="left">For Description see Page 152</td><td align="right">Frontispiece</td></tr>
+</table>
+<img src="images/i_002.jpg" width="600" height="825" alt="frontispiece" title="" />
+<span class="caption"><b>THE GREAT NEBULA OF ORION</b></span>
+<p class="center">From a photograph taken on February 4<sup>th</sup> 1889<br />
+by M<sup>r</sup> Isaac Roberts.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h1><span>THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES</span><br />
+<span class="adjust">AND OTHER LECTURES</span><br /><br />
+<span class="adjust">A SEQUEL TO THE FAIRYLAND OF SCIENCE</span><br />
+</h1>
+<h3><small>BY</small><br />
+<big>ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY</big><br />
+<small>(MRS. FISHER)</small><br />
+<span class="adjust">AUTHOR OF LIFE AND HER CHILDREN, WINNERS IN LIFE'S RACE,</span><br />
+<span class="adjust">A SHORT HISTORY OF NATURAL SCIENCE, ETC.</span><br /><br />
+<br />
+<i>WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS</i></h3>
+<p><br /></p>
+
+<h4><span>NEW YORK</span><br />
+<span>D. APPLETON AND COMPANY</span><br />
+<span>1890</span></h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h5><i>Authorized Edition.</i></h5>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p>
+<h2>PREFACE</h2>
+
+
+<p>The present volume is chiefly intended for those of
+my young friends who have read, and been interested
+in, the <i>Fairyland of Science</i>. It travels over a wide
+field, pointing out a few of the marvellous facts which
+can be studied and enjoyed by the help of optical
+instruments. It will be seen at a glance that any
+one of the subjects dealt with might be made the
+study of a lifetime, and that the little information
+given in each lecture is only enough to make the
+reader long for more.</p>
+
+<p>In these days, when moderate-priced instruments
+and good books and lectures are so easily accessible,
+I hope some eager minds may be thus led to take up
+one of the branches of science opened out to us by
+magic glasses; while those who go no further will at
+least understand something of the hitherto unseen
+world which is now being studied by their help.
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The two last lectures wander away from this path,
+and yet form a natural conclusion to the Magician's
+lectures to his young Devonshire lads. They have
+been published before, one in the <i>Youth's Companion</i> of
+Boston, U.S., and the other in <i>Atalanta</i>, in which the
+essay on Fungi also appeared in a shorter form.
+All three lectures have, however, been revised and
+fully illustrated, and I trust that the volume, as a
+whole, may prove a pleasant Christmas companion.</p>
+
+<p>For the magnificent photograph of Orion's nebula,
+forming the Frontispiece, I am indebted to the courtesy
+of Mr. Isaac Roberts, F.R.A.S., who most kindly lent
+me the plate for reproduction; and I have had the
+great good fortune to obtain permission from MM.
+Henri of the Paris Observatory to copy the illustration
+of the Lunar Apennines from a most beautiful
+and perfect photograph of part of the moon, taken by
+them only last March. My cordial thanks are also
+due to Mr. A. Cottam, F.R.A.S., for preparing the
+plate of coloured double stars, and to my friend
+Mr. Knobel, Hon. Sec. of the R.A.S., for much
+valuable assistance; to Mr. James Geikie for the
+loan of some illustrations from his <i>Geology</i>; and to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span>
+Messrs. Longman for permission to copy Herschel's
+fine drawing of Copernicus.</p>
+
+<p>With the exception of these illustrations and a
+few others, three of which were kindly given me
+by Messrs. Macmillan, all the woodcuts have been
+drawn and executed under the superintendence of
+Mr. Carreras, jun., who has made my task easier by
+the skill and patience he has exercised under the
+difficulties incidental to receiving instructions from a
+distance.</p>
+
+<p style='text-align: right'>ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY.</p>
+<p>
+<span class="smcap">Upcott Avenel</span>, <i>Oct. 1890</i>.<br />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span></p>
+<h2>TABLE OF CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<table summary="table of contents">
+<tr><td></td><td class = "right"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+
+
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER I</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Magician's Chamber by Moonlight</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER II</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Magic Glasses and how to use them</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER III</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Fairy Rings and how they are made</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_55">55</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER IV</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Life-History of Lichens and Mosses</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_75">75</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER V</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The History of a Lava Stream</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_96">96</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER VI</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">An Hour with the Sun</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span><br />CHAPTER VII</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">An Evening among the Stars</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER VIII</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Little Beings from a Miniature Ocean</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_172">172</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER IX</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Dartmoor Ponies</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td colspan='2' align="center"><br />CHAPTER X</td></tr>
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Magician's Dream of Ancient Days</span></td>
+<td  align="right"><a href="#Page_209">209</a></td></tr>
+
+</table>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p>
+<h2>LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+<h3>PLATES</h3>
+<table style= "width: 80%;" summary="plates">
+
+
+<tr><td></td><td></td><td class = "right"><span class="smcap">Page</span></td></tr>
+<tr><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Photograph of the nebula of Orion</span></td><td></td>
+<td class = "right"><i><a href="#Frontispiece">Frontispiece</a></i></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Table of coloured spectra</span></td>
+<td> Plate I.</td> <td class = "right"><a href="#Plate_I"><i>facing pg.</i>127</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Coloured double stars</span></td>
+<td>Plate II.</td><td class = "right"><a href="#Plate_II"><i>facing pg.</i>167</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<h3>WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT</h3>
+
+<table style= "width: 80%;" summary="woodcuts in text">
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Partial eclipse of the moon</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td>
+<td><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A boy illustrating the phases of the moon</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_6">6</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Course of the moon in the heavens</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_8">8</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Chart of the moon</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_10">10</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Face of the full moon</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Tycho and his surroundings</span></td>
+<td>(from a photograph by De la Rue)</td><td><a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Plan of the peak of Teneriffe</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_15">15</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The crater Copernicus</span></td>
+<td></td> <td><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The lunar Appennines</span></td>
+<td>(from a photograph by M.M. Henri)</td><td><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The crater Plato seen soon after sunrise</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Diagram of total eclipse of the moon</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_23">23</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Boy and microscope</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Eye-ball seen from the front</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_30">30</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Section of an eye looking at a pencil</span></td>
+<td></td> <td><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Image of a candle-flame thrown on paper by a lens</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Arrow magnified by a convex lens</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr>
+
+
+<tr><td><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[Pg xii]</a></span>
+<span class="smcap">Student's microscope</span></td><td></td><td>
+<a href="#Page_36">36</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Skeleton of a microscope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Fossil diatoms seen under the microscope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">An astronomical telescope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_41">41</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Two skeletons of telescopes</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The photographic camera</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Kirchhoff's spectroscope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Passage of rays through the spectroscope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A group of fairy-ring mushrooms</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_55">55</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Three forms of vegetable mould magnified</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Mucor Mucedo</i> greatly magnified</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Yeast cells growing under the microscope</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Early stages of the mushroom</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Later stages of the mushroom</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_68">68</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Microscopic structure of mushroom gills</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A group of cup lichens</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_75">75</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Examples of lichens from life</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_77">77</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Singe-celled plants growing</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Sections of lichens</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_81">81</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Fructification of a lichen</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_83">83</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A stem of feathery moss from life</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_85">85</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Moss-leaf magnified</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_87">87</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Polytrichum Commune</i>, a large hair-moss</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Fructification of a moss</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_89">89</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Sphagnum moss from a Devonshire bog</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Surface of a lava-flow</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_96">96</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Vesuvius as seen in eruption</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Top of Vesuvius in 1864</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_100">100</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Diagrammatic section of an active volcano</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_105">105</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Section of a lava-flow</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_108">108</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Volcanic glass with crystallites and microliths</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_109">109</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Volcanic glass with well-developed microliths</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_110">110</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A piece of Dartmoor granite</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_112">112</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Volcanic glass showing large included crystals</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_115">115</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A total eclipse of the sun</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Face of the sun projected on a piece of cardboard</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_120">120</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[Pg xiii]</a></span>
+<span class="smcap">Photograph of the sun's face</span>, taken by Mr. Selwyn</td>
+<td>(Secchi, <i>Le Soleil</i>)</td><td><a href="#Page_122">122</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Total eclipse of the sun, showing corona and prominences</span></td>
+<td>(Guillemin, <i>Le Ciel</i>)</td><td><a href="#Page_124">124</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Kirchhoff's experiment on the dark sodium line</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_128">128</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The spectroscope attached to the telescope for solar work</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_132">132</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Sun-spectrum and prominence spectrum compared</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_134">134</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Red prominences</span>, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer 1869</td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_136">136</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A quiet sun-spot</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_140">140</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A tumultuous sun-spot</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_141">141</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A star-cluster</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Some constellations seen on looking south in March from
+six to nine o'clock</span></td><td></td><td><a href="#Page_148">148</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The chief stars of Orion, with Aldebaran</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The trapezium</span> &#952; <span class="smcap">Orionis</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_150">150</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Spectrum of Orion's nebula and sun-spectrum compared</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_151">151</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Some constellations seen on looking north in March
+from six to nine o'clock</span></td><td></td><td><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Great Bear, showing position of the binary star</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_157">157</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Drifting of the seven stars of Charles's Wain</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Cassiopeia and the heavenly bodies near</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_162">162</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td>&#949; <span class="smcap">Lyr�, a double-binary star</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_166">166</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A seaside pool</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_172">172</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A group of seaweeds</span> (natural size)</td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_175">175</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>ULVA LACTUCA</i></span>, a piece greatly magnified</td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_176">176</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Seaweeds</span>, magnified to show fruits</td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_177">177</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A Coralline and Sertularian compared</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Sertularia Tenella</i> hanging in water</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_180">180</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Thuricolla Folliculata</i> and
+<i>Chilomonas Amygdalum</i></span></td><td></td><td><a href="#Page_182">182</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A group of living diatoms</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_184">184</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A diatom growing</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_185">185</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Cydippe Pileus</i>, animal and structure</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_187">187</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">The Sea-mat, <i>Flustra Foliacea</i></span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_191">191</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Diagram of the Flustra animal</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Dartmoor ponies</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap"><i>Equus Hemionus</i>, the horse-ass of
+Tartary and Tibet</span></td><td></td><td><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Przevalsky's wild horse</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">skeleton of an animal of the horse-tribe</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Pal�olithic man chipping flint tools</span></td>
+<td><i>Initial letter</i></td><td><a href="#Page_209">209</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Scene in Pal�olithic times</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_212">212</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Pal�olithic relics&mdash;needle, tooth, implement</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_213">213</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Mammoth engraved on ivory</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Neolithic implements&mdash;hatchet, celt, spindle whorl</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_219">219</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">A burial in Neolithic times</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_221">221</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">British relics&mdash;coin, bronze celt, and bracelet</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td><span class="smcap">Britons taking refuge in the cave</span></td>
+<td></td><td><a href="#Page_224">224</a></td></tr>
+
+</table>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES</h2>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+
+<h4>THE MAGICIAN'S CHAMBER BY MOONLIGHT</h4>
+
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_015.jpg" width="100" height="130" alt="ornate capital t" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>he full moon was shining in all
+its splendour one lovely August
+night, as the magician sat in
+his turret chamber bathed in
+her pure white beams, which
+streamed upon him through the
+open shutter in the wooden
+dome above. It is true a faint
+gleam of warmer light shone
+from below through the open
+door, for this room was but an offshoot at the top
+of the building, and on looking down the turret
+stairs a lecture-room might be seen below where a
+bright light was burning. Very little, however, of
+this warm glow reached the magician, and the implements
+of his art around him looked like weird
+gaunt skeletons as they cast their long shadows
+across the floor in the moonlight.
+</p>
+
+<p>The small observatory, for such it was, was a
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>
+circular building with four windows in the walls, and
+roofed with a wooden dome, so made that it could
+be shifted round and round by pulling certain cords.
+One section of this dome was a shutter, which now
+stood open, and the strip, thus laid bare to the night,
+was so turned as to face that part of the sky along
+which the moon was moving. In the centre of the
+room, with its long tube directed towards the opening,
+stood the largest magic glass, the <span class="smcap">Telescope</span>, and in
+the dead stillness of the night, could be heard distinctly
+the tick-tick of the clockwork, which kept the instrument
+pointing to the face of the moon, while the
+room, and all in it, was being carried slowly and
+steadily onwards by the earth's rotation on its axis.
+It was only a moderate-sized instrument, about six
+feet long, mounted on a solid iron pillar firmly fixed
+to the floor and fitted with the clockwork, the sound
+of which we have mentioned; yet it looked like a
+giant as the pale moonlight threw its huge shadow
+on the wall behind and the roof above.</p>
+
+<p>Far away from this instrument in one of the
+windows, all of which were now closed with shutters,
+another instrument was dimly visible. This was
+a round iron table, with clawed feet, and upon it,
+fastened by screws, were three tubes, so arranged
+that they all pointed towards the centre of the table,
+where six glass prisms were arranged in a semicircle,
+each one fixed on a small brass tripod. A strange
+uncanny-looking instrument this, especially as the
+prisms caught the edge of the glow streaming up the
+turret stair, and shot forth faint beams of coloured
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>
+light on the table below them. Yet the magician's
+pupils thought it still more uncanny and mysterious
+when their master used it to read the alphabet of
+light, and to discover by vivid lines even the faintest
+trace of a metal otherwise invisible to mortal eye.</p>
+
+<p>For this instrument was the <span class="smcap">Spectroscope</span>, by
+which he could break up rays of light and make them
+tell him from what substances they came. Lying
+around it were other curious prisms mounted in
+metal rims and fitted with tubes and many strange
+devices, not to be understood by the uninitiated, but
+magical in their effect when fixed on to the telescope
+and used to break up the light of distant stars and
+nebul�.</p>
+
+<p>Compared with these mysterious glasses the <span class="smcap">Photographic
+Camera</span>, standing in the background, with
+its tall black covering cloth, like a hooded monk,
+looked comparatively natural and familiar, yet it, too,
+had puzzling plates and apparatus on the table near
+it, which could be fitted on to the telescope, so that
+by their means pictures might be taken even in the
+dark night, and stars, invisible with the strongest lens,
+might be forced to write their own story, and leave
+their image on the plate for after study.</p>
+
+<p>All these instruments told of the magician's
+power in unveiling the secrets of distant space and
+exploring realms unknown, but in another window,
+now almost hidden in the shadow, stood a fourth
+and highly-prized helpmate, which belonged in one
+sense more to our earth, since everything examined
+by it had to be brought near, and lie close under its
+magnifying-glass. Yet the <span class="smcap">Microscope</span> too could
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>
+carry its master into an unseen world, hidden to
+mortal eye by minuteness instead of by distance.
+If in the stillness of night the telescope was his most
+cherished servant and familiar friend, the microscope
+by day opened out to him the fairyland of nature.</p>
+
+<p>As he sat on his high pedestal stool on this
+summer night with the moonlight full upon him, his
+whole attention was centred on the telescope, and
+his mind was far away from that turret-room,
+wandering into the distant space brought so near to
+him; for he was waiting to watch an event which
+brought some new interest every time it took place&mdash;a
+total eclipse of the moon. To-night he looked
+forward to it eagerly, for it happened that, just as
+the moon would pass into the shadow of our earth,
+it would also cross directly in front of a star, causing
+what is known as an "occultation" of the star, which
+would disappear suddenly behind the rim of the
+dark moon, and after a short time flash out on the
+other side as the satellite went on its way.</p>
+
+<p>How he wished as he sat there that he could
+have shown this sight to all the eager lads whom he
+was teaching to handle and love his magic glasses.
+For this magician was not only a student himself,
+he was a rich man and the Founder and Principal
+of a large public school for boys of the artisan class.
+He had erected a well-planned and handsome building
+in the midst of the open country, and received
+there, on terms within the means of their parents,
+working-lads from all parts of England, who, besides
+the usual book-learning, received a good technical
+education in all its branches. And, while he left to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>
+other masters the regular school lessons, he kept for
+himself the intense pleasure of opening the minds of
+these lads to the wonders of God's universe around
+them.</p>
+
+<p>You had only to pass down the turret stairs, into
+the large science class-room below, to see at once
+that a loving hand and heart had furnished it. Not
+only was there every implement necessary for
+scientific work, but numerous rough diagrams covering
+the walls showed that labour as well as money
+had been spent in decorating them. It was a large
+oblong room, with four windows to the north, and four
+to the south, in each of which stood a microscope
+with all the tubes, needles, forceps, knives, etc.,
+necessary for dissecting and preparing objects;
+and between the windows were open shelves, on which
+were ranged chemicals of various kinds, besides many
+strange-looking objects in bottles, which would have
+amused a trained naturalist, for the lads collected
+and preserved whatever took their fancy.</p>
+
+<p>On some of the tables were photographic plates
+laid ready for printing off; on others might be seen
+drawings of the spectrum, made from the small
+spectroscope fixed at one end of the room; on
+others lay small direct spectroscopes which the
+lads could use for themselves. But nowhere was
+a telescope to be seen. This was not because
+there were none, for each table had its small
+hand-telescope, cheap but good. The truth is
+that each of these instruments had been spirited
+away into the dormitories that night, and many
+heads were lying awake on their pillows, listening
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>
+for the strike of the clock to spring out and see the
+eclipse begin.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 1.</span>
+<img src="images/i_020.jpg" width="600" height="444" alt="Fig. 1.
+
+A boy illustrating the phases of the moon." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A boy illustrating the phases of the moon.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>A mere glance round the room showed that the
+moon had been much studied lately. On the black-board
+was drawn a rough diagram, showing how a
+boy can illustrate for himself the moon's journey
+round the earth, by taking a ball and holding it a
+little above his head at arm's length, while he turns
+slowly round on his heel in a darkened room before
+a lighted lamp, or better still before the lens of a
+magic lantern (Fig. 1). The lamp or lens then represents
+the sun, the ball is the moon, the boy's
+head is the earth. Beginning with the ball between
+him and the source of light, but either a little above,
+or a little below the direct line between his eye and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>
+it, he will see only the dark side of the ball, and
+the moon will be on the point of being "new." Then
+as he turns slowly, a thin crescent of light will creep
+over the side nearest the sun, and by degrees encroach
+more and more, so that when he has turned
+through one quarter of the round half the disc will
+be light. When he has turned another quarter,
+and has his back to the sun, a full moon will face
+him. Then as he turns on through the third quarter
+a crescent of darkness creeps slowly over the side
+away from the sun, and gradually the bright disc is
+eaten away by shadow till at the end of the third
+quarter half the disc again only is light; then, when
+he has turned through another quarter and completed
+the circle, he faces the light again and has a dark
+moon before him. But he must take care to keep
+the moon a little above or a little below his eye at
+new and full moon. If he brings it exactly on a
+line with himself and the light at new moon, he will
+shut off the light from himself and see the dark
+body of the ball against the light, causing an <i>eclipse</i>
+of the sun; while if he does the same at full moon
+his head will cast a shadow on the ball causing an
+<i>eclipse</i> of the moon.</p>
+
+<p>There were other diagrams showing how and why
+such eclipses do really happen at different times in
+the moon's path round the earth; but perhaps the
+most interesting of all was one he had made to
+explain what so few people understand, namely, that
+though the moon describes a complete circle round
+our earth every month, yet she does not describe
+a circle in space, but a wavy line inwards and outwards
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>
+across the
+earth's path round the
+sun. This is because
+the earth is moving
+on all the while, carrying
+the moon with it,
+and it is only by seeing
+it drawn before
+our eyes that we can
+realise how it happens.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 2.</span>
+<img src="images/i_022.jpg" width="600" height="148" alt="Fig. 2.
+
+Diagram showing the moon&#39;s course during one month. The moon and the
+earth are both moving onwards in the direction of the arrows. The earth
+moves along the dark line, the moon along the interrupted line &#45;&#45;. The
+dotted curved line .... shows the circle gradually described by the moon
+round the earth as they move onwards." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Diagram showing the moon&#39;s course during one month. The moon and the
+earth are both moving onwards in the direction of the arrows. The earth
+moves along the dark line, the moon along the interrupted line &#45;&nbsp;&#45;&nbsp;&#45;&nbsp;&#45;. The
+dotted curved line &#183;&nbsp;&#183;&nbsp;&#183;&nbsp;&#183;&nbsp; shows the circle gradually described by the moon
+round the earth as they move onwards.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Thus suppose, in
+order to make the
+dates as simple as
+possible, that there is
+a new moon on the
+1st of some month.
+Then by the 9th (or
+roughly speaking in
+7&frac34; days) the moon
+will have described a
+quarter of a circle
+round the earth as
+shown by the dotted
+line (Fig. 2), which
+marks her position
+night after night with
+regard to us. Yet
+because she is carried
+onwards all the while
+by the earth, she will
+really have passed
+along the interrupted
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>
+line &#45;&nbsp;&#45;&nbsp;&#45;&nbsp;&#45; between us and the sun. During the next
+week her quarter of a circle will carry her round behind
+the earth, so that we see her on the 17th as a
+full moon, yet her actual movement has been onwards
+along the interrupted line on the farther side of the
+earth. During the third week she creeps round
+another quarter of a circle so as to be in advance of
+the earth on its yearly journey round the sun, and
+reaches the end of her third quarter on the 24th.
+In her last quarter she gradually passes again
+between the earth and the sun; and though, as regards
+the earth, she appears to be going back round to the
+same place where she was at the beginning of the
+month, and on the 31st is again a dark new moon,
+yet she has travelled onwards exactly as much as
+we have, and therefore has really not described a
+circle in the <i>heavens</i> but a wavy line.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>Near to this last diagram hung another, well loved
+by the lads, for it was a large map of the <i>face</i> of
+the moon, that is of the side which is <i>always</i> turned
+towards us, because the moon turns once on her
+axis during the month that she is travelling round
+the earth. On this map were marked all the different
+craters, mountains, plains and shining streaks which
+appear on the moon's face; while round the chart
+were pictures of some of these at sunrise and sunset
+on the moon, or during the long day of nearly a
+fortnight which each part of the face enjoys in its
+turn.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 3.</span>
+<img src="images/i_025.jpg" width="600" height="600" alt="Fig. 3.
+Chart of the moon." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Chart of the moon.</span>
+<p class="center">Craters&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" summary="">
+<tr><td align='left'>1 Tycho.</td><td align='left'>2 Copernicus.</td><td align='left'>3 Kepler.</td><td align='left'>4 Aristarchus.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>5 Eratosthenes. &nbsp; &nbsp;</td><td align='left'>6 Archimedes. &nbsp; &nbsp;</td><td align='left'>7 Plato.</td><td align='left'>8 Eudoxus.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>9 Aristotle.</td><td align='left'>10 Petavius.</td><td align='left'>11 Ptolemy.</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+<p class="center">Grey plains formerly believed to be seas&mdash;</p>
+<div class='center'>
+<table border="0" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" summary="">
+<tr><td align='left'>A Mare Crisium.</td><td align='left'>O Mare Imbrium.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>C &mdash;&mdash; Frigoris.</td><td align='left'>Q Oceanus Procellarum.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>G &mdash;&mdash; Tranquillitatis. &nbsp; &nbsp;</td><td align='left'>X Mare F&#339;cunditatis.</td></tr>
+<tr><td align='left'>H &mdash;&mdash; Serenitatis.</td><td align='left'>T &mdash;&mdash; Humorum.</td></tr>
+</table></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<p>By studying this map, and the pictures, they
+were able, even in their small telescopes, to recognise
+Tycho and Copernicus, and the mountains of the
+moon, after they had once grown accustomed to the
+strange changes in their appearance which take
+place as daylight or darkness creeps over them.
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>
+They could not however pick out more than some of
+the chief points. Only the magician himself knew
+every crater and ridge under all its varying lights,
+and now, as he waited for the eclipse to begin, he
+turned to a lad who stood behind him, almost hidden
+in the dark shadow&mdash;the one fortunate boy who had
+earned the right to share this night's work.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 3<i>a</i>.</span>
+<img src="images/i_026.jpg" width="600" height="625" alt="Fig. 3a.
+
+The full moon. (From Ball&#39;s Starland.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The full moon. (From Ball's <i>Starland</i>.)</span>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"We have still half an hour, Alwyn," said he,
+"before the eclipse will begin, and I can show you the
+moon's face well to-night. Take my place here and
+look at her while I point out the chief features.
+See first, there are the grey plains (A, C, G, etc.)
+lying chiefly in the lower half of the moon. You
+can often see these on a clear night with the
+naked eye, but you must remember that then they
+appear more in the upper part, because in the telescope
+we see the moon's face inverted or upside down.</p>
+
+<p>"These plains were once thought to be oceans, but
+are now proved to be dry flat regions situated at
+different levels on the moon, and much like what
+deserts and prairies would appear on our earth if seen
+from the same distance. Looking through the
+telescope, is it not difficult to imagine how people
+could ever have pictured them as a man's face? But
+not so difficult to understand how some ancient
+nations thought the moon was a kind of mirror, in
+which our earth was reflected as in a looking-glass,
+with its seas and rivers, mountains and valleys; for
+it does look something like a distant earth, and as
+the light upon it is really reflected from the sun it
+was very natural to compare it to a looking-glass.</p>
+
+<p>"Next cast your eye over the hundreds of craters,
+some large, others quite small, which cover the moon's
+face with pitted marks, like a man with small-pox;
+while a few of the larger rings look like holes
+made in a window-pane, where a stone has passed
+through, for brilliant shining streaks radiate from
+them on all sides like the rays of a star, covering
+a large part of the moon. Brightest of all these
+starred craters is Tycho, which you will easily find
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>
+near the top of the moon (I, Fig. 3), for you have
+often seen it in the small telescope. How grand it
+looks to-night in the full moon (Fig. 3<i>a</i>)! It is
+true you see all the craters better when the moon
+is in her quarters, because the light falls sideways
+upon them and the shadows are more sharply defined;
+yet even at the full the bright ray of light on
+Tycho's rim marks out the huge cavity, and you can
+even see faintly the magnificent terraces which run
+round the cup within, one below the other."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 4.</span>
+<img src="images/i_028.jpg" width="600" height="583" alt="Fig. 4.
+
+Tycho and his surroundings.
+(From a photograph of the moon taken by Mr. De la Rue, 1863.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Tycho and his surroundings.<br />
+(From a photograph of the moon taken by Mr. De la Rue, 1863.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"This cavity measures fifty-four miles across,
+so that if it could be moved down to our earth
+it would cover by far the largest part of Devonshire,
+or that portion from Bideford on the north,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>
+to the sea on the south, and from the borders of
+Cornwall on the east, to Exeter on the west, and
+it is 17,000 feet or nearly three miles in depth.
+Even in the brilliant light of the full moon this
+enormous cup is dark compared to the bright rim,
+but it is much better seen in about the middle of the
+second quarter, when the rising sun begins to light
+up one side while the other is in black night.
+The drawing on the wall (Fig. 4), which is taken
+from an actual photograph of the moon's face, shows
+Tycho at this time surrounded by the numerous
+other craters which cover this part of the moon.
+You may recognise him by the gleaming peak in the
+centre of the cup, and by his bright rim which is so
+much more perfect than those of his companions.
+The gleaming peak is the top of a steep cone or hill
+rising up 6000 feet, or more than a mile from the base
+of the crater, so that even the summit is about two
+miles below the rim.</p>
+
+<p>"There is one very interesting point in Tycho,
+however, which is seen at its very best at full moon.
+Look outside the bright rim and you will see that
+from the shadow which surrounds it there spring
+on all sides those strange brilliant streaks (see Fig.
+3<i>a</i>) which I spoke of just now. There are others
+quite as bright, or even brighter, round other craters,
+Copernicus (Fig. 6), Kepler, and Aristarchus, lower
+down on the right-hand side of the moon; but
+these of Tycho are far the most widely spread, covering
+almost all the top of the face.</p>
+
+<p>"What are these streaks? We do not know.
+During the second quarter of the moon, when the sun
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>
+is rising slowly upon Tycho, lighting up his peak and
+showing the crater beautifully divided into a bright
+cup in the curve to the right, while a dense shadow lies
+in the left hollow, these streaks are only faint, and
+among the many craters around (see Fig. 4) you
+might even have some difficulty at first in finding
+the well-known giant. But as the sun rises higher
+and higher they begin to appear, and go on increasing
+in brightness till they shine with that wonderfully
+silvery light you see now in the full moon."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 5.</span>
+<img src="images/i_030.jpg" width="600" height="496" alt="Fig. 5.
+
+Plan of the Peak of Teneriffe, showing how it resembles
+a lunar crater. (A. Geikie.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Plan of the Peak of Teneriffe, showing how it resembles
+a lunar crater. (A. Geikie.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"Here is a problem for you young astronomers to
+solve, as we learn more and more how to use the
+telescope with all its new appliances."</p>
+
+<p>The crater itself is not so difficult to explain, for
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>
+we have many like it on our earth, only not nearly
+so large. In fact, we might almost say that our earthly
+volcanoes differ from those in the moon only by their
+smaller size and by forming <i>mountains</i> with the crater
+or cup on the top; while the lunar craters lie flat on
+the surface of the moon, the hollow of the cup forming
+a depression below it. The peak of Teneriffe (Fig. 5),
+which is a dormant volcano, is a good copy in miniature
+on our earth of many craters on the moon. The
+large plain surrounded by a high rocky wall, broken
+in places by lava streams, the smaller craters nestling
+in the cup, and the high peak or central crater
+rising up far above the others, are so like what we
+see on the moon that we cannot doubt that the same
+causes have been at work in both cases, even though
+the space enclosed in the rocky wall of Teneriffe
+measures only eight miles across, while that of Tycho
+measures fifty-four.</p>
+
+<p>"But of the streaks we have no satisfactory explanation.
+They pass alike over plain and valley and
+mountain, cutting even across other craters without
+swerving from their course. The astronomer
+Nasmyth thought they were the remains of cracks
+made when the volcanoes were active, and filled
+with molten lava from below, as water oozes up
+through ice-cracks on a pond. But this explanation
+is not quite satisfactory, for the lava, forcing
+its way through, would cool in ridges which ought to
+cast a shadow in sunlight. These streaks, however,
+not only cast no shadow, as you can see at the full
+moon but when the sun shines sideways upon them
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>
+in the new or waning moon they disappear as we
+have seen altogether. Thus the streaks, so brilliant
+at full moon in Tycho, Copernicus, Kepler, and
+Aristarchus, remain a puzzle to astronomers still."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 6.</span>
+<img src="images/i_032.jpg" width="600" height="647" alt="Fig. 6.
+
+The crater Copernicus.
+(As given in Herschel&#39;s Astronomy, from a drawing taken in a
+reflecting telescope of 20 feet focal length.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The crater Copernicus.<br />
+(As given in Herschel&#39;s <i>Astronomy</i>, from a drawing taken in a
+reflecting telescope of 20 feet focal length.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"We cannot examine these three last-named craters
+well to-night with the full sun upon them; but mark
+their positions well, for Copernicus, at least, you must
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>
+examine on the first opportunity, when the sun is
+rising upon it in the moon's second quarter. It is
+larger even than Tycho, measuring fifty-six miles
+across, and has a hill in the centre with many peaks;
+while outside, great spurs or ridges stretch in all
+directions sometimes for more than a hundred miles,
+and between these are scattered innumerable minute
+craters. But the most striking feature in it is the
+ring, which is composed inside the crater of magnificent
+terraces divided by deep ravines. These
+terraces are in some ways very like those of the
+great crater of Teneriffe, and astronomers can best
+account for them by supposing that this immense
+crater was once filled with a lake of molten lava
+rising, cooling at the edges, and then falling again,
+leaving the solid ridge behind. The streaks are
+also beautifully shown in Copernicus (see Fig. 6),
+but, as in Tycho, they fade away as the sun sets
+on the crater, and only reappear gradually as midday
+approaches.</p>
+
+<p>"And now, looking a little to the left of Copernicus,
+you will see that grand range of mountains, the
+Lunar Apennines (Fig. 7), which stretches 400 miles
+across the face of the moon. Other mountain
+ranges we could find, but none so like mountains
+on our own globe as these, with their gentle sunny
+slope down to a plain on the left, and steep
+perpendicular cliffs on the right. The highest
+peak in this range, called Huyghens, rises to the
+height of 21,000 feet, higher than Chimborazo in
+the Andes. Other mountains on the moon, such as
+those called the Caucasus, south of the Apennines,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>
+are composed of disconnected peaks, while others
+again stand as solitary pyramids upon the plains."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 7.</span>
+<img src="images/i_034.jpg" width="600" height="609" alt="Fig. 7.
+
+The Lunar Apennines.
+
+(Copied by kind permission of MM. Henri from part of a
+magnificent photograph
+taken by them, March 29, 1890, at the Paris Observatory.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The Lunar Apennines.<br />
+
+(Copied by kind permission of MM. Henri from part of a
+magnificent photograph
+taken by them, March 29, 1890, at the Paris Observatory.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"But we must hasten on, for I want you to observe
+those huge walled crater-plains which have no hill
+in the middle, but smooth steel-grey centres shining
+like mirrors in the moonlight. One of these, called
+Archimedes, you will find just below the Lunar
+Apennines (Figs. 3 and 7), and another called Plato,
+which is sixty miles broad, is still lower down the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>
+moon's face (Figs. 3 and 8). The centres of these broad
+circles are curiously smooth and shining like quicksilver,
+with minute dots here and there which are
+miniature craters, while the walls are rugged and
+crowned with turret-shaped peaks."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 8.</span>
+<img src="images/i_035.jpg" width="600" height="509" alt="Fig. 8.
+
+The crater Plato as seen soon after sunrise. (After Neison.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The crater Plato as seen soon after sunrise. (After Neison.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"It is easy to picture to oneself how these may
+once have been vast seas of lava, not surging as
+in Copernicus, and heaving up as it cooled into
+one great central cone, but seething as molten lead
+does in a crucible, little bubbles bursting here and
+there into minute craters; and this is the explanation
+given of them by astronomers.
+</p>
+
+<p>"And now that you have seen the curious rugged
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span>
+face of the moon and its craters and mountains, you
+will want to know how all this has come about. We
+can only form theories on the point, except that
+everything shows that heat and volcanoes have in
+some way done the work, though no one has ever yet
+clearly proved that volcanic eruptions have taken
+place in our time. We must look back to ages long
+gone by for those mighty volcanic eruptions which
+hurled out stones and ashes from the great crater of
+Tycho, and formed the vast seas of lava in Copernicus
+and Plato.</p>
+
+<p>"And when these were over, and the globe was
+cooling down rapidly, so that mountain ranges
+were formed by the wrinkling and rending of the
+surface, was there then any life on the moon? Who
+can tell? Our magic glasses can reveal what now
+is, so far as distance will allow; but what has
+been, except where the rugged traces remain, we
+shall probably never know. What we now see is a
+dead worn-out planet, on which we cannot certainly
+trace any activity except that of heat in the past.
+That there is no life there now, at any rate of the
+kind on our own earth, we are almost certain; first,
+because we can nowhere find traces of water, clouds,
+nor even mist, and without moisture no life like ours is
+possible; and secondly, because even if there is, as
+perhaps there may be, a thin ocean of gas round
+the moon there is certainly no atmosphere such as
+surrounds our globe.</p>
+
+<p>"One fact which proves this is, that there are
+no half-shadows on the moon. If you look some
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span>
+night at the mountains and craters during her first
+and second quarters, you will be startled to see what
+heavy shadows they cast, not with faint edges dying
+away into light, but sharp and hard (see Figs. 6-8),
+so that you pass, as it were by one step, from shadow
+to sunshine. This in itself is enough to show that
+there is no air to scatter the sunlight and spread it into
+the edges of the shade as happens on our earth; but
+there are other and better proofs. One of these is,
+that during an eclipse of the sun there is no reflection
+of his light round the dark moon as there
+would be if the moon had an atmosphere; another is
+that the spectroscope, that wonderful instrument
+which shows us invisible gases, gives no hint of air
+around the moon; and another is the sudden disappearance
+or <i>occultation</i> of a star behind the moon,
+such as I hope to see in a few minutes.</p>
+
+<p>"See here! take the small hand telescope and turn
+it on to the moon's face while I take my place at
+the large one, and I will tell you what to look for.
+You know that at sunset we see the sun for some
+time after it has dipped below the horizon, because
+the rays of light which come from it are bent in our
+atmosphere and brought to our eyes, forming in
+them the image of the sun which is already gone.
+Now in a short time the moon which we are watching
+will be darkened by our earth coming between it
+and the sun, and while it is quite dark it will pass
+over a little bright star. In fact to us the star will
+appear to set behind the dark moon as the sun sets
+below the horizon, and if the moon had an atmosphere
+like ours, the rays from the star would be bent
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>
+in it and reach our eyes after the star was gone, so
+that it would only disappear gradually. Astronomers
+have always observed, however, that the star is lost
+to sight quite suddenly, showing that there is no
+ocean of air round the moon to bend the light-rays."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 9.</span>
+<img src="images/i_038.jpg" width="600" height="289" alt="Fig. 9.
+
+Diagram of total eclipse of the moon.
+
+S, Sun. E, Earth. M, Moon passing into the earth&#39;s shadow
+and passing out at M�.
+
+R, R�, Lines meeting at a point U, U� behind the earth and
+enclosing a space within which all the direct rays of the
+sun are intercepted by the earth, causing a black darkness
+or umbra.
+
+R, P and R�, P�, Lines marking a space within which, behind
+the earth, part of the sun&#39;s rays are cut off, causing a half-shadow
+or penumbra, P, P�.
+
+a, a, Points where a few of the sun&#39;s rays
+are bent or refracted
+in the earth&#39;s atmosphere, so that they pass along the path
+marked by the dotted lines and shed a lurid light on the
+sun&#39;s face." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Diagram of total eclipse of the moon.</span>
+
+<p>S, Sun. E, Earth. M, Moon passing into the earth&#39;s shadow
+and passing out at M�.</p>
+<p>R, R�, Lines meeting at a point U, U� behind the earth and
+enclosing a space within which all the direct rays of the
+sun are intercepted by the earth, causing a black darkness
+or <i>umbra</i>.</p>
+<p>R, P and R�, P�, Lines marking a space within which, behind
+the earth, part of the sun&#39;s rays are cut off, causing a half-shadow
+or <i>penumbra</i>, P, P�.</p>
+<p><i>a</i>, <i>a</i>, Points where a few of the sun&#39;s rays
+are bent or refracted
+in the earth&#39;s atmosphere, so that they pass along the path
+marked by the dotted lines and shed a lurid light on the
+sun&#39;s face.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Here the magician paused, for a slight dimness
+on the lower right-hand side of the moon warned
+him that she was entering into the <i>penumbra</i> or
+half-shadow (see Fig. 9) caused by the earth cutting
+off part of the sun's rays; and soon a deep black
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
+shadow creeping over Aristarchus and Plato showed
+that she was passing into that darker space or
+<i>umbra</i> where the body of the earth is completely
+between her and the sun and cuts off all his rays.
+All, did I say? No! not all. For now was seen a
+beautiful sight, which would prove to any one who
+saw our earth from a great distance that it has a
+deep ocean of air round it.</p>
+
+<p>It was a clear night, with a cloudless sky, and
+as the deep shadow crept slowly over the moon's
+face, covering the Lunar Apennines and Copernicus,
+and stealing gradually across the brilliant streaks of
+Tycho till the crater itself was swallowed up in darkness,
+a strange lurid light began to appear. The
+part of the moon which was eclipsed was not wholly
+dark, but tinted with a very faint bluish-green light,
+which changed almost imperceptibly, as the eclipse
+went on, to rose-red, and then to a fiery copper-coloured
+glow as the moon crept entirely into the
+shadow and became all dark. The lad watching
+through his small telescope noted this weird light, and
+wondered, as he saw the outlines of the Apennines
+and of several craters dimly visible by it, though
+the moon was totally eclipsed. He noted, but was
+silent. He would not disturb the Principal, for the
+important moment was at hand, as this dark copper-coloured
+moon, now almost invisible, drew near to
+the star over which it was to pass.</p>
+
+<p>This little star, really a glorious sun billions of miles
+away behind the moon, was perhaps the centre of
+another system of worlds as unknown to us as we to
+them, and the fact of our tiny moon crossing between
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>
+it and our earth would matter as little as if a grain
+of sand was blown across the heavens. Yet to the
+watchers it was a great matter&mdash;would the star give
+any further clue to the question of an atmosphere
+round the moon? Would its light linger even for
+a moment, like the light of the setting sun? Nearer
+and nearer came the dark moon; the star shone
+brilliantly against its darkness; one second and it was
+gone. The long looked-for moment had passed, and
+the magician turned from his instrument with a sigh.
+"I have learnt nothing new, Alwyn," said he, "but at
+least it is satisfactory to have seen for ourselves
+the proof that there is no perceptible atmosphere
+round the moon. We need wait no longer, for
+before the star reappears on the other side the
+eclipse will be passing away."</p>
+
+<p>"But, master," burst forth the lad, now the silence
+was broken, "tell me why did that strange light of
+many tints shine upon the dark moon?"</p>
+
+<p>"Did you notice it, Alwyn?" said the Principal,
+with a pleased smile. "Then our evening's work is
+not lost, for you have made a real observation for
+yourself. That light was caused by the few rays of
+the sun which grazed the edge of our earth passing
+through the ocean of air round it (see Fig. 9). There
+they were refracted or bent, and so were thrown
+within the shadow cast by our earth, and fell upon
+the moon. If there were such a person as a 'man
+in the moon,' that lurid light would prove to him
+that our earth has an atmosphere. The cause of
+the tints is the same which gives us our sunset
+colours, because as the different coloured waves which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>
+make white light are absorbed one by one, passing
+through the denser atmosphere, the blue are cut off
+first, then the green, then the yellow, till only the
+orange and red rays reached the centre of the shadow,
+where the moon was darkest. But this is too difficult
+a subject to begin at midnight."</p>
+
+<p>So saying, he lighted his lamp, and covering the
+object-glass of his telescope with its pasteboard cap,
+detached the instrument from the clockwork, and the
+master and his pupil went down the turret stairs and
+past through the room below. As they did so they
+heard in the distance a scuffling noise like that of rats
+in the wall. A smile passed over the face of the
+Principal, for he knew that his young pupils, who
+had been making their observations in the gallery
+above, were hurrying back to their beds.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+<h4>MAGIC GLASSES, AND HOW TO USE THEM</h4>
+
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_042.jpg" width="100" height="127" alt="ornate capital t" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>he sun shone brightly into
+the science class-room
+at mid-day. No gaunt
+shadows nor ghostly
+moonlight now threw a
+spell on the magic chamber
+above. The instruments
+looked bright and business-like,
+and the Principal, moving
+amongst them, heard the subdued
+hum of fifty or more voices
+rising from below. It was the
+lecture hour, and the subject for the day was,
+"Magic glasses, and how to use them." As the
+large clock in the hall sounded twelve, the Principal
+gathered up a few stray lenses and prisms he had
+selected, and passed down the turret stair to his
+platform. Behind him were arranged his diagrams,
+before him on the table stood various instruments,
+and the rows of bright faces beyond looked up with
+one consent as the hum quieted down and he began
+his lecture.
+</p>
+
+<p>"I have often told you, boys, have I not? that I am
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>
+a Magician. In my chamber near the sky I work
+spells as did the magicians of old, and by the help
+of my magic glasses I peer into the secrets of nature.
+Thus I read the secrets of the distant stars; I catch
+the light of wandering comets, and make it reveal
+its origin; I penetrate into the whirlpools of the
+sun; I map out the craters of the moon. Nor
+can the tiniest being on earth hide itself from me.
+Where others see only a drop of muddy water, that
+water brought into my magic chamber teems with
+thousands of active bodies, darting here and whirling
+there amid a meadow of tiny green plants floating
+in the water. Nay, my inquisitive glass sees even
+farther than this, for with it I can watch the eddies
+of water and green atoms going on in each of these
+tiny beings as they feed and grow. Again, if I want
+to break into the secrets of the rock at my feet, I
+have only to put a thin slice of it under my microscope
+to trace every crystal and grain; or, if I wish
+to learn still more, I subject it to fiery heat, and
+through the magic prisms of my spectroscope I read
+the history of the very substances of which it is
+composed. If I wish to study the treasures of the
+wide ocean, the slime from a rock-pool teems with
+fairy forms darting about in the live box imprisoned
+in a crystal home. If some distant stars are invisible
+even in the giant glasses of my telescope, I
+set another power to work, and make them print
+their own image on a photographic plate and so
+reveal their presence.</p>
+
+<p>"All these things you have seen through my magic
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>
+glasses, and I promised you that one day I would
+explain to you how they work and do my bidding.
+But I must warn you that you must give all your
+attention; there is no royal road to my magician's
+power. Every one can attain to it, but only by
+taking trouble. You must open your eyes and ears,
+and use your intelligence to test carefully what your
+senses show you.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 275px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 10.</span>
+<img src="images/i_045.jpg" width="275" height="276" alt="Fig. 10.
+
+Eye-ball seen from the front.
+
+(After Le Gros Clark.)
+
+w, White of eye. i, Iris. p, Pupil." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Eye-ball seen from the front.<br />
+
+(After Le Gros Clark.)</span>
+
+<p class="center"><i>w</i>, White of eye. <i>i</i>, Iris. <i>p</i>, Pupil.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"We have only to consider a little to see that we
+depend entirely upon our senses for our knowledge
+of the outside world. All kinds of things are going
+on around us, about which we know nothing, because
+our eyes are not keen enough to see, and our ears
+not sharp enough to hear them. Most of all we
+enjoy and study nature through our eyes, those
+windows which let in to us the light of heaven, and
+with it the lovely sights and scenes of earth; and
+which are no ordinary windows, but most wonderful
+structures adapted for conveying images to the brain.
+They are of very different power in different people,
+so that a long-sighted person sees a lovely landscape
+where a short-sighted one sees only a confused
+mist; while a short-sighted person can see minute
+things close to the eye better than a long-sighted
+one."</p>
+
+<p>"Let us try to understand this before we go on to
+artificial glasses, for it will help us to explain how
+these glasses show us many things we could never
+see without them. Here are two pictures of the
+human eyeball (Figs. 10 and 11), one as it appears
+from the front, and the other as we should see the
+parts if we cut an eyeball across from the front to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>
+the back. From these drawings we see that the
+eyeball is round; it only looks oval, because it is
+seen through the oval slit of the eyelids. It is really
+a hard, shining, white
+ball with a thick nerve
+cord (<i>on</i>, Fig. 11) passing
+out at the back,
+and a dark glassy
+mound <i>c, c</i> in the centre
+of the white in front.
+In this mound we
+can easily distinguish
+two parts&mdash;first, the
+coloured <i>iris</i> or elastic
+curtain (<i>i</i>, Fig. 10); and
+secondly, the dark spot
+or pupil <i>p</i> in the centre.
+The iris is the part
+which gives the eye its colour; it is composed
+of a number of fibres, the outer ones radiating towards
+the centre, the inner ones forming a ring
+round the pupil; and behind these fibres is a coat
+of dark pigment or colouring matter, blue in some
+people, grey, brown, or black in others. When the
+light is very strong, and would pain the nerves inside
+if too much entered the pupil or window of the eye,
+then the ring of the iris contracts so as partly to
+close the opening. When there is very little light,
+and it is necessary to let in as much as possible, the
+ring expands and the pupil grows large. The best
+way to observe this is to look at a cat's eyes in the
+dusk, and then bring her near to a bright light; for
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>
+the iris of a cat's eye contracts and expands much
+more than ours does."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 11.</span>
+<img src="images/i_046.jpg" width="600" height="370" alt="Fig. 11.
+
+Section of an eye looking at a pencil. (Adapted from Kirke.)
+
+c,c, Cornea. w, White of eye. cm, Ciliary muscle. a,a, Aqueous
+humour. i,i, Iris. l,l, Lens, r,r, Retina, on, Optic nerve.
+1, 2, Pencil. 1�, 2�, Image of pencil on the retina." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Section of an eye looking at a pencil. (Adapted from Kirke.)</span>
+
+<p><i>c</i>, <i>c</i>, Cornea. <i>w</i>, White of eye. <i>cm</i>, Ciliary muscle. <i>a</i>, <i>a</i>, Aqueous
+humour. <i>i</i>, <i>i</i>, Iris. <i>l</i>, <i>l</i>, Lens. <i>r</i>, <i>r</i>, Retina. <i>on</i>, Optic nerve.
+1, 2, Pencil. 1�, 2�, Image of pencil on the retina.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"Now look at the second diagram (Fig. 11) and notice
+the chief points necessary in seeing. First you will
+observe that the pupil is not a mere hole; it is protected
+by a curved covering <i>c</i>. This is the cornea, a
+hard, perfectly transparent membrane, looking much
+like a curved watch-glass. Behind this is a small
+chamber filled with a watery fluid <i>a</i>, called the
+aqueous humour, and near the back of this chamber
+is the dark ring or iris <i>i</i>, which you saw from the
+front through the cornea and fluid. Close behind
+the iris again is the natural 'magic glass' of our
+eye, the crystalline lens <i>l</i>, which is composed of perfectly
+transparent fibres and has two rounded or
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>
+convex surfaces like an ordinary magnifying glass.
+This lens rests on a cushion of a soft jelly-like substance
+<i>v</i>, called the vitreous humour, which fills the
+dark chamber or cavity of the eyeball and keeps it
+in shape, so that the retina <i>r</i>, which lines the chamber,
+is kept at a proper distance from the lens. This
+retina is a transparent film of very sensitive nerves;
+it forms a screen at the back of the chamber, and has
+a coating of very dark pigment or colouring matter
+behind it. Lastly, the nerves of the retina all meet
+in a bundle, called the optic nerve, and passing out
+of the eyeball at a point <i>on</i>, go to the brain.
+These are the chief parts we use in seeing; now how
+do we use them?</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose that a pencil is held in front of the
+eye at the distance at which we see small objects
+comfortably. Light is reflected from all parts of the
+surface of the pencil, and as the rays spread, a certain
+number enter the pupil of the eye. We will follow
+only two cones of light coming from the points 1
+and 2 on the diagram Fig. 11. These you see enter
+the eye, each widely spread over the cornea <i>c</i>. They
+are bent in a little by this curved covering, and by
+the liquid behind it, while the iris cuts off the rays
+near the edges of the lens, which would be too much
+bent to form a clear image. The rest of the rays
+fall upon the lens <i>l</i>. In passing through this lens
+they are very much bent (or <i>refracted</i>) towards each
+other, so much so that by the time they reach the
+end of the dark chamber <i>v</i>, each cone of light has
+come to a point or focus 1�, 2�, and as rays of this
+kind have come from every point all over the pencil,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>
+exactly similar points are formed on the retina, and
+a real picture of the pencil is formed there between
+1� and 2�."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 12.</span>
+<img src="images/i_048.jpg" width="600" height="331" alt="Fig. 12.
+
+Image of a candle-flame thrown on paper by a lens." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Image of a candle-flame thrown on paper by a lens.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>"We will make a very simple and pretty experiment
+to illustrate this. Darkening the room I light
+a candle, take a square of white paper in my hand,
+and hold a simple magnifying glass between the two
+(see Fig. 12) about three inches away from the candle.
+Then I shift the paper nearer and farther behind the
+lens, till we get a clear image of the candle-flame
+upon it. This is exactly what happens in our eye.
+I have drawn a dotted line <i>c</i> round the lens and the
+paper on the diagram to represent the eyeball in
+which the image of the candle-flame would be on the
+retina instead of on the piece of paper. The first
+point you will notice is that the candle-flame is upside
+down on the paper, and if you turn back to Fig. 11
+you will see why, for it is plain that the cones of
+light <i>cross</i> in the lens <i>l</i>, 1 going to 1� and 2 to 2�.
+Every picture made on our retina is upside down.
+</p>
+
+<p>"But it is not there that we see it. As soon as the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>
+points of light from the pencil strike upon the retina,
+the thrill passes on along the optic nerve <i>on</i>, through
+the back of the eye to the brain; and our mind,
+following back the rays exactly as they have come
+through the lens, sees a pencil, outside the eye, right
+way upwards.</p>
+
+<p>"This is how we see with our eyes, which adjust
+themselves most beautifully to our needs. For
+example, not only is the iris always ready to expand
+or contract according as we need more or less light,
+but there is a special muscle, called the ciliary muscle
+(<i>cm</i>, Fig. 11), which alters the lens for us to see things
+far or near. In all, or nearly all, perfect eyes the
+lens is flatter in front than behind, and this enables
+us to see things far off by bringing the rays from them
+exactly to a focus on the retina. But when we look
+at nearer things the rays require to be more bent or
+refracted, so without any conscious effort on our part
+this ciliary muscle contracts and allows the lens to
+bulge out slightly in front. Instantly we have a
+stronger magnifier, and the rays are brought to the
+right focus on the retina, so that a clear and full-size
+image of the near object is formed. How little we
+think, as we turn our eyes from one thing to another,
+and observe, now the distant hills, now the sheep
+feeding close by; or, as night draws on, gaze into
+limitless space and see the stars millions upon
+millions of miles away, that at every moment the
+focus of our eye is altering, the iris is contracting
+or expanding, and myriads of images are being
+formed one after the other in that little dark chamber,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>
+through which pass all the scenes of the outer
+world!</p>
+
+<p>"Yet even this wonderful eye cannot show us everything.
+Some see farther than others, some see more
+minutely than others, according as the lens of the eye
+is flatter in one person and more rounded in another.
+But the most long-sighted person could never have
+discovered the planet Neptune, more than 2700
+millions of miles distant from us, nor could the keenest-sighted
+have known of the existence of those minute
+and beautiful little plants, called diatoms, which live
+around us wherever water is found, and form delicate
+flint skeletons so infinitesimally small that thousands
+of millions go to form one cubic inch of the stone
+called tripoli, found at Bilin in Bohemia."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 13.</span>
+<img src="images/i_050.jpg" width="600" height="352" alt="Fig. 13.
+
+Arrow magnified by a convex lens.
+a, b, Real arrow. C, D, Magnifying-glass. A, B, Enlarged
+image of the arrow." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Arrow magnified by a convex lens.</span>
+<p class="center"><i>a</i>, <i>b</i>, Real arrow. C, D, Magnifying-glass. A, B, Enlarged
+image of the arrow.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"It is here that our 'magic glasses' come to our
+assistance, and reveal to us what was before invisible.
+We learnt just now that we see near things by the
+lens of our eye becoming more rounded in front; but
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>
+there comes a point beyond which the lens cannot
+bulge any more, so that when a thing is very tiny,
+and would have to be held very close to the eye for
+us to see it, the lens can no longer collect the rays
+to a focus, so we see nothing but a blur. More than
+800 years ago an Arabian, named Alhazen, explained
+why rounded or convex glasses make things appear
+larger when placed before the eye. This glass which
+I hold in my hand is a simple
+magnifying-glass, such as we
+used for focusing the candle-flame.
+It bends the rays inwards
+from any small object
+(see the arrow <i>a, b</i>, Fig. 13) so
+that the lens of our eye can
+use them, and then, as we
+follow out the rays in straight
+lines to the place where we
+see clearly (at A, B), every
+point of the object is magnified,
+and we not only see it
+much larger, but every mark
+upon it is much more distinct.
+You all know how the little
+shilling magnifying-glasses
+you carry show the most
+lovely and delicate structures
+in flowers, on the wings of
+butterflies, on the head of a bee or fly, and, in fact,
+in all minute living things."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 14.</span>
+<img src="images/i_051.jpg" width="300" height="564" alt="Fig. 14.
+
+Student&#39;s microscope.
+ep, Eye-piece, o, g, Object-glass." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Student&#39;s microscope.</span>
+<p class="center"><i>ep</i>, Eye-piece. <i>o</i>, <i>g</i>, Object-glass.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 15.</span>
+<img src="images/i_052.jpg" width="300" height="810" alt="Fig. 15.
+
+Skeleton of a microscope, showing
+how an object is magnified.
+
+o, l, Object-lens. e, g, Eye-glass.
+s, s, Spicule. s�, s�, Magnified
+image of same in the tube.
+S, S, Image again enlarged by
+the lens of the eye-piece." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Skeleton of a microscope, showing
+how an object is magnified.</span>
+
+<p><i>o</i>, <i>l</i>, Object-lens. <i>e</i>, <i>g</i>, Eye-glass.
+<i>s</i>, <i>s</i>, Spicule. <i>s</i>�, <i>s</i>�, Magnified
+image of same in the tube.
+S, S, Image again enlarged by
+the lens of the eye-piece.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"But this is only our first step. Those diatoms we
+spoke of just now will only look like minute specks
+under even the strongest magnifying-glass. So we
+pass on to use two extra
+lenses to assist our eyes,
+and come to this compound
+microscope (Fig. 14)
+through which I have before
+now shown you the
+delicate markings on shells
+which were themselves so
+minute that you could not
+see them with the naked
+eye. Now we have to discover
+how the microscope
+performs this feat. Going
+back again for a minute
+to our candle and magnifying-glass
+(Fig. 12), you will
+find that the nearer you put
+the lens to the candle the
+farther away you will have
+to put the paper to get a
+clear image. When in a
+microscope we put a
+powerful lens <i>o, l</i> close
+down to a very minute
+object, say a spicule of a
+flint sponge <i>s, s</i>, quite invisible
+to the unaided eye,
+the rays from this spicule
+are brought to a focus a
+long way behind it at <i>s�, s�</i>,
+making an enlarged image
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>
+because the lines of light have been diverging ever
+since they crossed in the lens. If you could put a
+piece of paper at <i>s� s�</i>, as you did in the candle
+experiment, you would see the actual image of the
+magnified spicule upon it. But as these points of
+light are only in an empty tube, they pass on, spreading
+out again from the image, as they did before from
+the spicule. Then another convex lens or eye-glass
+<i>e, g</i> is put at the top of the microscope at
+the proper distance to bend these rays so that they
+enter our eye in nearly parallel lines, exactly as we
+saw in the ordinary magnifying-glass (Fig. 13), and
+our crystalline lens can then bring them to a focus
+on our retina.</p>
+
+<p>"By this time the spicule has been twice magnified;
+or, in other words, the rays of light coming from it
+have been twice bent towards each other, so that
+when our eye follows them out in straight lines they
+are widely spread, and we see every point of light so
+clearly that all the spots and markings on this
+minute spicule are as clear as if it were really as
+large as it looks to us.</p>
+
+<p>"This is simply the principle of the microscope.
+When you come to look at your own instruments,
+though they are very ordinary ones, you will find that
+the object-glass <i>o, l</i> is made of three lenses, flat on the
+side nearest the tube, and each lens is composed of
+two kinds of glass in order to correct the unequal
+refraction of the rays, and prevent fringes of colour
+appearing at the edge of the lens. Then again the
+eye-piece will be a short tube with a lens at each
+end, and halfway between them a black ledge will be
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>
+seen inside the tube which acts like the iris of our
+eye (<i>i</i>, Fig. 11) and cuts off the rays passing through
+the edges of the lens. All these are devices to correct
+faults in the microscope which our eye corrects
+for itself, and they have enabled opticians to make
+very powerful lenses.</p>
+
+<p>"Look now at the diagram (Fig. 16) showing a group of diatoms which you
+can see under the microscope after the lecture. Notice the lovely
+patterns, the delicate tracery, and the fine lines on the diatoms shown
+there. Yet each of these minute flint skeletons, if laid on a piece of
+glass by itself, would be quite invisible to the naked eye, while
+hundreds of them together only look like a faint mist on the slide on
+which they lie. Nor are they even here shown as much magnified as they
+might be; under a stronger power we should see those delicate lines on
+the diatoms broken up into minute round cups."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 16.</span>
+<img src="images/i_054.jpg" width="400" height="404" alt="Fig. 16.
+
+Fossil diatoms seen under the microscope.
+The largest of these is an almost imperceptible
+speck to the naked eye." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Fossil diatoms seen under the microscope.</span>
+<p class="center">The largest of these is an almost imperceptible
+speck to the naked eye.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"Is it not wonderful and delightful to think that
+we are able to add in this way to the power of our
+eyes, till it seems as if there were no limit to the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>
+hidden beauties of the minute forms of our earth, if
+only we can discover them?</p>
+
+<p>"But our globe does not stand alone in the universe,
+and we want not only to learn all about everything
+we find upon it, but also to look out into the vast
+space around us and discover as much as we can
+about the myriads of suns and planets, comets and
+meteorites, star-mists and nebul�, which are to be
+found there. Even with the naked eye we can admire
+the grand planet Saturn, which is more than 800
+millions of miles away, and this in itself is very
+marvellous. Who would have thought that our tiny
+crystalline lens would be able to catch and focus
+rays, sent all this enormous distance, so as actually
+to make a picture on our retina of a planet, which,
+like the moon, is only sending back to us the light
+of the sun? For, remember, the rays which come to
+us from Saturn must have travelled twice 800 millions
+of miles&mdash;884 millions from the sun to the planet,
+and less or more from the planet back to us, according
+to our position at the time. But this is as nothing
+when compared to the enormous distances over which
+light travels from the stars to us. Even the nearest
+star we know of, is at least twenty <i>millions</i> of <i>millions</i>
+of miles away, and the light from it, though travelling
+at the rate of 186,300 miles in a second, takes four
+years and four months to reach us, while the light from
+others, which we can see without a telescope, is between
+twenty and thirty years on its road. Does not
+the thought fill us with awe, that our little eye should
+be able to span such vast distances?</p>
+
+<p>"But we are not yet nearly at the end of our
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>
+wonder, for the same power which devised our eye
+gave us also the mind capable of inventing an instrument
+which increases the strength of that eye till we
+can actually see stars so far off that their light takes
+<i>two thousand years</i> coming to our globe. If the
+microscope delights us in helping us to see things
+invisible without it, because they are so small, surely
+the telescope is fascinating beyond all other magic
+glasses when we think that it brings heavenly bodies,
+thousands of billions of miles away, so close to us
+that we can examine them."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 17.</span>
+<img src="images/i_056.jpg" width="300" height="371" alt="Fig. 17.
+
+An astronomical telescope.
+ep, Eye-piece. og, Object-glass.
+f, Finder." title="" />
+<span class="caption">An astronomical telescope.</span>
+<p class="center"><i>ep</i>, Eye-piece. <i>og</i>, Object-glass.
+<i>f</i>, Finder.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"A Telescope (Fig. 17) can, like the microscope, be
+made of only two glasses: an object-glass to form
+an image in the tube and
+a magnifying eye-piece
+to enlarge it. But there
+is this difference, that the
+object lens of a microscope
+is put close down
+to a minute object, so
+that the rays fall upon
+it at a wide angle, and
+the image formed in the
+tube is very much larger
+than the object outside.
+In the telescope, on the
+contrary, the thing we
+look at is far off, so that
+the rays fall on the
+object-glass at such a
+very narrow angle as to be practically parallel, and the
+image in the tube is of course <i>very, very</i> much smaller
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>
+than the house, or church, or planet it pictures.
+What the object-glass of the telescope does for us, is
+to bring a small <i>real image</i> of an object very far off
+close to us in the tube of the telescope so that we
+can examine it.</p>
+
+<p>"Think for a moment what this means. Imagine
+that star we spoke of (p. 41), whose light, travelling
+186,300 miles in one second, still takes 2000
+years to reach us. Picture the tiny waves of light
+crossing the countless billions of miles of space
+during those two thousand years, and reaching us so
+widely spread out that the few faint rays which
+strike our eye are quite useless, and for us that star
+has no existence; we cannot see it. Then go and
+ask the giant telescope, by turning the object-glass
+in the direction where that star lies in infinite space.
+The widespread rays are collected and come to a
+minute bright image in the dark tube. You put the
+eye-piece to this image, and there, under your eye, is
+a shining point: this is the image of the star, which
+otherwise would be lost to you in the mighty
+distance.</p>
+
+<p>"Can any magic tale be more marvellous, or any
+thought grander, or more sublime than this? From
+my little chamber, by making use of the laws of light,
+which are the same wherever we turn, we can penetrate
+into depths so vast that we are not able even
+to measure them, and bring back unseen stars to tell
+us the secrets of the mighty universe. As far as the
+stars are concerned, whether we see them or not
+depends entirely upon the number of rays collected
+by the object-glass; for at such enormous distances
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>
+the rays have no angle that we can measure, and
+magnify as you will, the brightest star only remains
+a point of light. It is in order to collect enough
+rays that astronomers have tried to have larger and
+larger object-glasses; so that while a small good
+hand telescope, such as you use, may have an object-glass
+measuring only an inch and a quarter across,
+some of the giant telescopes have lenses of two and a
+half feet, or thirty inches, diameter. These enormous
+lenses are very difficult to make and manage, and have
+many faults, therefore astronomical telescopes are
+often made with curved mirrors to <i>reflect</i> the rays,
+and bring them to a focus instead of <i>refracting</i> them
+as curved lenses do.</p>
+
+<p>"We see, then, that one very important use of the
+telescope is to bring objects into view which otherwise
+we would never see; for, as I have already said,
+though we bring the stars into sight, we cannot
+magnify them. But whenever an object is near
+enough for the rays to fall even at a very small
+perceptible angle on the object-glass, then we can
+magnify them; and the longer the telescope, and the
+stronger the eye-piece, the more the object is magnified.</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to understand the meaning of this, for
+it is really very simple, only it requires a little thought.
+Here are skeleton drawings of two telescopes (Fig.
+18), one double the length of the other. Let us
+suppose that two people are using them to look at
+an arrow on a weathercock a long distance off. The
+rays of light <i>r</i>, <i>r</i> from the two ends of the arrow will
+enter both telescopes at the same angle <i>r, x, r</i>, cross
+in the lens, and pass on at <i>exactly the same angle</i> into
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>
+the tubes. So far all is alike,
+but now comes the difference.
+In the short telescope A the
+object-glass must be of such a
+curve as to bring the cones of
+light in each ray to a focus at
+a distance of <i>one foot</i> behind
+it,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a>
+<a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> and there a small image <i>i, i</i>
+of the arrow is formed. But B
+being twice the length, allows
+the lens to be less curved, and
+the image to be formed <i>two feet</i>
+behind the object-glass; and
+as the rays <i>r</i>, <i>r</i> have been <i>diverging</i>
+ever since they crossed
+at <i>x</i>, the real image of the
+arrow formed at <i>i, i</i> is twice the
+size of the same image in A.
+Nevertheless, if you could put
+a piece of paper at <i>i, i</i> in both
+telescopes, and look through
+the <i>object-glass</i> (which you
+cannot actually do, because
+your head would block out the
+rays), the arrow would appear
+the same size in both telescopes,
+because one would be
+twice as far off from you as
+the other, and the angle <i>i, x, i</i>
+is the same in both."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 320px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 18.</span>
+
+<img src="images/i_059.jpg" width="300" height="648" alt="Fig. 18.
+
+Skeletons of telescopes.
+
+A, A one-foot telescope with
+a three-inch eye-piece. B, A
+two-foot telescope with a three-inch
+eye-piece. e, p, Eye-piece.
+o, g, Object-glass. r, r, Rays
+which enter the telescopes and
+crossing at x form an image
+at i, i, which is magnified by
+the lens e, p. The angles r, x, r
+and i, x, i are the same. In
+A the angle i, o, i is four times
+greater than that of i, x, i. In
+B it is eight times greater." title="" /><br />
+<span class="caption">Skeletons of telescopes.</span>
+
+<p>A, A one-foot telescope with
+a three-inch eye-piece.<br />B, A
+two-foot telescope with a three-inch
+eye-piece.<br /><br />
+<i>e</i>, <i>p</i>, Eye-piece.
+<i>o</i>, <i>g</i>, Object-glass. <i>r</i>, <i>r</i>, Rays
+which enter the telescopes and
+crossing at <i>x</i> form an image
+at <i>i</i>, <i>i</i>, which is magnified by
+the lens <i>e</i>, <i>p</i>. The angles <i>r</i>, <i>x</i>, <i>r</i>
+and <i>i</i>, <i>x</i>, <i>i</i> are the same. In
+A the angle <i>i</i>, <i>o</i>, <i>i</i> is four times
+greater than that of <i>i</i>, <i>x</i>, <i>i</i>. In
+B it is eight times greater.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"But by going to the proper end of the telescope
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>
+you can get quite near the image, and can see and
+magnify it, if you put a strong lens to collect the rays
+from it to a focus. This is the use of the eye-piece,
+which in our diagram is placed at a quarter of a
+foot or three inches from the image in both telescopes.
+Now that we are close to the images, the
+divergence of the points <i>i</i>, <i>i</i> makes a great difference.
+In the small telescope, in which the image is only
+<i>one foot</i> behind the object-glass, the eye-piece being
+a quarter of a foot from it, is four times nearer, so
+the angle <i>i</i>, <i>o</i>, <i>i</i> is four times the angle <i>i</i>, <i>x</i>, <i>i</i>, and the
+man looking through it sees the image magnified
+<i>four times</i>. But in the longer telescope the image
+is <i>two feet</i> behind the lens, while the eye-piece is,
+as before, a quarter of a foot from it. Thus the eyepiece
+is now eight times nearer, so the angle <i>i</i>, <i>o</i>, <i>i</i> is
+eight times the angle <i>i</i>, <i>x</i>, <i>i</i>, and the observer sees the
+image magnified <i>eight times</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"In real telescopes, where the difference between
+the focal length of the object-glass and that of the
+eye-glass can be made enormously greater, the
+magnifying power is quite startling, only the object-glass
+must be large, so as to collect enough rays to
+bear spreading widely. Even in your small telescopes,
+with a focus of eighteen inches, and an object-glass
+measuring one and a quarter inch across, we
+can put on a quarter of an inch eye-piece, and so
+magnify seventy-two times; while in my observatory
+telescope, eight feet or ninety-six inches long, an
+eye-piece of half an inch magnifies 192 times, and I
+can put on a 1/8-inch eye-piece and magnify 768
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>
+times! And so we can go on lengthening the
+focus of the object-glass and shortening the focus
+of the eye-piece, till in Lord Rosse's gigantic
+fifty-six-foot telescope, in which the image is fifty-four
+feet (648 inches) behind the object-glass, an
+eye-piece one-eighth of an inch from the image
+magnifies 5184 times! These giant telescopes, however,
+require an enormous object-glass or mirror, for
+the points of light are so spread out in making the
+large image that it is very faint unless an enormous
+number of rays are collected. Lord Rosse's
+telescope has a reflecting mirror measuring six feet
+across, and a man can walk upright in the telescope
+tube. The most powerful telescope yet made is that
+at the Lick Observatory, on Mount Hamilton, in
+California. It is fifty-six and a half feet long, the
+object-lens measures thirty-six inches across. A
+star seen through this telescope appears 2000 times
+as bright as when seen with the naked eye.</p>
+
+<p>"You need not, however, wait for an opportunity
+to look through giant telescopes, for my small
+student's telescope, only four feet long, which we
+carry out on to the lawn, will show you endless
+unseen wonders; while your hand telescopes, and
+even a common opera-glass, will show many features
+on the face of the moon, and enable you to see the
+crescent of Venus, Jupiter's moons, and Saturn's
+rings, besides hundreds of stars unseen by the naked
+eye.</p>
+
+<p>"Of course you will understand that Fig. 18 only
+shows the <i>principle</i> of the telescope. In all good
+instruments the lenses and other parts are more
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>
+complicated; and in a terrestrial telescope, for looking
+at objects on the earth, another lens has to be put
+in to turn them right way up again. In looking at
+the sky it does not matter which way up we see a
+planet or a star, so the second glass is not needed,
+and we lose light by using it.</p>
+
+<p>"We have now three magic glasses to work for
+us&mdash;the magnifying-glass, the microscope, and the
+telescope. Besides these, however, we have two other
+helpers, if possible even more wonderful. These are
+the Photographic camera and the Spectroscope."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 19.</span>
+<img src="images/i_062.jpg" width="300" height="393" alt="Fig. 19.
+
+Photographic camera.
+
+l, l, Lenses. s, s, Screen cutting
+off diverging rays. c c, Sliding
+box. p, p, Picture formed.
+" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Photographic camera.</span>
+
+<p><i>l</i>, <i>l</i>, Lenses. <i>s</i>, <i>s</i>, Screen cutting
+off diverging rays. <i>c</i>, <i>c</i>, Sliding
+box. <i>p</i>, <i>p</i> Picture formed.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"Now that we thoroughly understand the use of
+lenses, I need scarcely
+explain this photographic
+camera (Fig. 19), for it is
+clearly an artificial eye. In
+place of the <i>crystalline lens</i>
+(compare with Fig. 11) the
+photographer uses one, or
+generally two lenses <i>l</i>, <i>l</i>, with
+a black ledge or stop <i>s</i> between
+them, which acts like
+the iris in cutting off the
+rays too near the edge of the
+lens. The dark camera <i>c</i>
+answers to the <i>dark chamber</i>
+of the eyeball, and the
+plate <i>p</i>, <i>p</i> at the back of
+the chamber, which is made
+sensitive by chemicals, answers our <i>retina</i>. The box
+is formed of two parts, sliding one within the other
+at <i>c</i>, so as to place the plate at a proper distance
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>
+from the lens, and then a screw adjusts the focus
+more exactly by bringing the front lens back or forward,
+instead of altering the curve as the <i>ciliary
+muscle</i> does in our eye. The difference between the
+two instruments is that in our eye the message
+goes to the brain, and the image disappears when
+we turn our eyes away from the object; but in
+the camera the waves of light work upon the
+chemicals, and the image can be fixed and remain
+for ever.</p>
+
+<p>"But the camera has at least one weak point. The
+screen at the back is not curved like our retina, but
+must be flat because of printing off the pictures, and
+therefore the parts of the photograph near the edge
+are a little out of proportion.</p>
+
+<p>"In many ways, however, this photographic eye is
+a more faithful observer than our own, and helps us
+to make more accurate pictures. For instance, instantaneous
+photographs have been taken of a
+galloping horse, and we find that the movements are
+very different from what we thought we saw with
+our eye, because our retina does not throw off one
+impression after another quickly enough to be quite
+certain we see each curve truly in succession. Again,
+the photograph of a face gives minute curves and
+lines, lights and shadows, far more perfectly than
+even the best artist can see them, and when the
+picture is magnified we see more and more details
+which escaped us before.</p>
+
+<p>"But it is especially when attached to the microscope
+or the telescope that the photographic
+apparatus tells us such marvellous secrets; giving
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>
+us, for instance, an accurate picture of the most
+minute water-animal quite invisible to the naked eye,
+so that when we enlarge the photograph any one can
+see the beautiful markings, the finest fibre, or the
+tiniest granule; or affording us accurate pictures,
+such as the one at p. 19 of the face of the moon, and
+bringing stars into view which we cannot otherwise
+see even with the strongest telescope.</p>
+
+<p>"Our own eye has many weaknesses. For example,
+when we look through the telescope at the
+sky we can only fix our attention on one part at
+once, and afterwards on another; and the picture
+which we see in this way, bit by bit, we must draw
+as best we can. But if we put a sensitive photographic
+plate into the telescope just at the point (<i>i</i>, <i>i</i>,
+Fig. 18), where the <i>image</i> of the sky is focused,
+this plate gives attention, so to speak, to the whole
+picture at once, and registers every point exactly as
+it is; and this picture can be kept and enlarged so
+that every detail can be seen.</p>
+
+<p>"Then, again, if we look at faint stars, they do not
+grow any brighter as we look. Each ray sends its
+message to the brain, and that is all; we cannot
+heap them up in our eye, and, indeed, after a time
+we see less, because our nerves grow tired. But on
+a photographic plate in a telescope, each ray in its
+turn does a little work upon the chemicals, and the
+longer the plate remains, the stronger the picture
+becomes. When wet plates were used they could
+not be left long, but since dry plates have been
+invented, with a film of chemically prepared gelatine,
+they can be left for hours in the telescope, which is
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>
+kept by clockwork accurately opposite to the same
+objects. In this way thousands of faint stars, which
+we cannot see with the strongest telescope, creep
+into view as their feeble rays work over and over
+again on the same spot; and, as the brighter stars
+as well as the faint ones are all the time making
+their impression stronger, when the plate comes out
+each one appears in its proper strength. On the
+other hand, very bright objects often become blurred
+by a long exposure, so that we have sometimes to
+sacrifice the clearness of a bright object in order to
+print faint objects clearly.</p>
+
+<p>"We now come to our last magic glass&mdash;the
+Spectroscope; and the hour has slipped by so fast
+that I have very little time left to speak of it. But
+this matters less as we have studied it before.<a name="FNanchor_1_2" id="FNanchor_1_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> I
+need now only remind you of some of the facts. You
+will remember that when we passed sunlight through
+a three-sided piece of glass called a prism, we broke
+up a ray of white light into a line of beautiful
+colours gradually passing from red, through orange,
+yellow, green, blue, and indigo, to violet, and that
+these follow in the same order as we see them in the
+rainbow or in the thin film of a soap-bubble. By
+various experiments we proved that these colours are
+separated from each other because the many waves
+which make up white light are of different sizes, so
+that because the waves, of red light are slow and
+heavy, they lag behind when bent in the three-sided
+glass, while the rapid violet waves are bent more out
+of their road and run to the farther end of the line,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>
+the other colours ranging themselves between."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 598px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 20.</span>
+<img src="images/i_066.jpg" width="598" height="441" alt="Fig. 20.
+
+Kirchhoff&#39;s spectroscope.
+
+A, The telescope which receives the ray of light
+through the slit in O." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Kirchhoff&#39;s spectroscope.</span>
+
+<p class="center">A, The telescope which receives the ray of light
+through the slit in O.</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 21.</span>
+<img src="images/i_067.jpg" width="300" height="287" alt="Fig. 21.
+
+Passage of rays through the spectroscope.
+
+S, S�, Slit through which the light falls
+on the prisms. 1, 2, 3, 4, Prisms in
+which the rays are dispersed more and
+more. a, b, Screen receiving the spectrum,
+of which the seven principal colours are
+marked." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Passage of rays through the spectroscope.</span>
+
+<p>S, S�, Slit through which the light falls
+on the prisms. 1, 2, 3, 4, Prisms in
+which the rays are dispersed more and
+more. <i>a</i>, <i>b</i>, Screen receiving the spectrum,
+of which the seven principal colours are
+marked.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"Now when the light falls through the open
+window, or through a round hole or <i>large</i> slit, the
+images of the hole made by each coloured wave
+overlap each other very much, and the colours in
+the spectrum or coloured band are crowded together.
+But when in the spectroscope we pass the ray of light
+through a very narrow slit, each coloured image of the
+upright slit overlaps the next upright image only
+very little. By using several prisms one after the
+other (see Fig. 21), these upright coloured lines are
+separated more and more till we get a very long
+band or spectrum. Yet, as you know from our
+experiments with the light of a glowing wire or of
+molten iron, however much you spread out the light
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>
+given by a solid or liquid, you can never separate
+these coloured lines from each other. It is only
+when you throw the light of a glowing gas or vapour
+into the slit that you get a few bright lines standing
+out alone. This is because <i>all</i> the rays of white light
+are present in glowing solids and liquids, and they
+follow each other too closely to be separated. But
+a gas, such as glowing hydrogen for example, gives
+out only a few separate rays, which, pouring through
+the slit, throw red, greenish-blue, and dark blue lines
+on the screen. Thus
+you have seen the
+double, orange-yellow
+sodium line (3, Plate I.)
+which starts out at
+once when salt is held
+in a flame and its
+light thrown into the
+spectroscope, and the
+red line of potassium
+vapour under the same
+treatment; and we
+shall observe these
+again when we study
+the coloured lights of
+the sun and stars."</p>
+
+
+<p>"We see, then, that
+the work of our magic
+glass, the spectroscope, is simply to sift the waves
+of light, and that these waves, from their colour
+and their position in the long spectrum, actually tell
+us what glowing gases have started them on their
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>
+road. Is not this like magic? I take a substance
+made of I know not what; I break it up, and, melting
+it in the intense heat of an electric spark, throw its
+light into the spectroscope. Then, as I examine this
+light after it has been spread out by the prisms, I
+can actually read by unmistakable lines what metals
+or non-metals it contains. Nay, more; when I catch
+the light of a star, or even of a faint nebula, in my
+telescope, and pass it through these prisms, there,
+written up on the magic-coloured band, I read off
+the gases which are glowing in that star-sun or
+star-dust billions of miles away.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, boys, I have let you into the secrets of my
+five magic glasses&mdash;the magnifying-glass, the microscope,
+the telescope, the photographic camera, and
+the spectroscope. With these and the help of
+chemistry you can learn to work all my spells. You
+can peep into the mysteries of the life of the tiniest
+being which moves unseen under your feet; you
+can peer into that vast universe, which we can never
+visit so long as our bodies hold us down to our
+little earth; you can make the unseen stars print
+their spots of light on the paper you hold in your
+hand, by means of light-waves, which left them
+hundreds of years ago; or you can sift this light in
+your spectroscope, and make it tell you what substances
+were glowing in that star when they were
+started on their road. All this you can do on one
+condition, namely, that you seek patiently to know
+the truth.</p>
+
+<p>"Stories of days long gone by tell us of true magicians
+and false magicians, and the good or evil they
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>
+wrought. Of these I know nothing, but I do know
+this, that the value of the spells you can work with
+my magic glasses depends entirely upon whether you
+work patiently, accurately, and honestly. If you
+make careless, inaccurate experiments, and draw
+hasty conclusions, you will only do bad work, which
+it may take others years to undo; but if you
+question your instruments honestly and carefully,
+they will answer truly and faithfully. You may
+make many mistakes, but one experiment will correct
+the other; and while you are storing up in your
+own mind knowledge which lifts you far above this
+little world, or enables you to look deep below the
+outward surface of life, you may add your little
+group of facts to the general store, and help to pave
+the way to such grand discoveries as those of Newton
+in astronomy, Bunsen and Kirchhoff in spectrum
+analysis, and Darwin in the world of life."
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> In our Fig. 18 the distances are inches instead of feet, but the proportions
+are the same.
+</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_2" id="Footnote_1_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <i>Fairyland of Science</i>, Lecture II.; and <i>Short History of Natural
+Science</i>, chapter xxxiv.
+</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+
+<h4>FAIRY RINGS AND HOW THEY ARE MADE</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_070.jpg" width="100" height="142" alt="ornate capital i" title="" />
+</div>
+<p>t was a lovely warm day in
+September, the golden corn
+had been cut and carted,
+and the waggons of the
+farmers around were free
+for the use of the college
+lads in their yearly autumn
+holiday. There they stood
+in a long row, one behind
+the other in the drive round the
+grounds, each with a pair of
+sleek, powerful farm-horses, and
+the waggoners beside them with
+their long whips ornamented with coloured ribbons;
+and as each waggon drew up before the door, it
+filled rapidly with its merry load and went on its
+way.</p>
+
+<p>They had a long drive of seven miles before them,
+for they were going to cross the wild moor, and then
+descend gradually along a fairly good road to the
+more wooded and fertile country. Their object that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>
+day was to reach a certain fairy dell known to a few
+only among the party as one of the loveliest spots in
+Devon. It was a perfect day for a picnic. As
+they drove over the wide stretches of moorland, with
+tors to right and tors to the left, the stunted furze
+bushes growing here and there glistened with spiders'
+webs from which the dew had not yet disappeared,
+and mosses in great variety carpeted the ground,
+from the lovely thread-mosses, with their scarlet
+caps, to the pale sphagnum of the bogs, where a halt
+was made for some of the botanists of the party to
+search for the little Sundew (<i>Drosera rotundifolia</i>).
+Though this little plant had now almost ceased to
+flower, it was not difficult to recognise by its rosette
+of leaves glistening with sticky glands which it
+spreads out in many of the Dartmoor bogs to catch
+the tiny flies and suck out their life's blood, and
+several specimens were uprooted and carefully packed
+away to plant in moist moss at home.</p>
+
+<p>From this bog onwards the road ran near by one
+of the lovely streams which feed the rivers below, and,
+passing across a bridge covered with ivy, led through
+a small forest of stunted trees round which the woodbine
+clung, hanging down its crimson berries, and the
+bracken fern, already putting on its brown and yellow
+tints, grew tall and thick on either side. Then, as
+they passed out of the wood, they came upon the
+dell, a piece of wild moorland lying in a hollow
+between two granite ridges, with large blocks of
+granite strewn over it here and there, and furze bushes
+growing under their shelter, still covered with yellow
+blossoms together with countless seed-bearing pods,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>
+which the youngsters soon gathered for the shiny-black
+seeds within them.</p>
+
+<p>Here the waggons were unspanned, the horses
+tethered out, the food unpacked, and preparations for
+the picnic soon in full swing. Just at this moment,
+however, a loud shout from one part of the dell called
+every one's attention. "The fairy rings! the fairy
+rings! we have found the fairy rings!" and there
+truly on the brown sward might be seen three delicate
+green rings, the fresh sprouting grass growing
+young and tender in perfect circles measuring from
+six feet to nearly three yards across.</p>
+
+<p>"What are they?" The question came from many
+voices at once, but it was the Principal who answered.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, do you not know that they are pixie circles,
+where the 'elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and
+groves' hold their revels, whirling in giddy round,
+and making the rings, 'whereof the ewe not bites'?
+Have you forgotten how Mrs. Quickly, in the <i>Merry
+Wives of Windsor</i>, tells us that</p>
+
+<p class="footnote">
+<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"'nightly, meadow-fairies, look you sing,</span><br />
+Like to the Garter's compass, in a ring:<br />
+The expressure that it bears, green let it be,<br />
+More fertile-fresh than all the field to see'?<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>"If we are magicians and work spells under magic
+glasses, why should not the pixies work spells on the
+grass? I brought you here to-day on purpose to
+see them. Which of you now can name the pixie
+who makes them?"</p>
+
+<p>A deep silence followed. If any knew or guessed
+the truth of the matter, they were too shy to risk
+making a mistake.
+</p>
+
+<p>"Be off with you then," said the Principal, "and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>
+keep well away from these rings all day, that you
+may not disturb the spell. But come back to me
+before we return at night, and perhaps I may show
+you the wonder-working pixie, and we may take him
+home to examine under the microscope."</p>
+
+<p>The day passed as such happy days do, and the
+glorious harvest moon had risen over the distant
+tors before the horses were spanned and the waggons
+ready. But the Principal was not at the starting
+place, and looking round they saw him at the farther
+end of the dell.</p>
+
+<p>"Gently, gently," he cried, as there was one general
+rush towards him; "look where you tread, for I stand
+within a ring of fairies!"</p>
+
+<p>And then they saw that just outside the green
+circle in which he stood, forming here and there a
+broken ring, were patches of a beautiful tiny mushroom,
+each of which raised its pale brown umbrella
+in the bright moonlight.</p>
+
+<p>"Here are our fairies, boys. I am going to take
+a few home where they can be spared from the ring,
+and to-morrow we will learn their history."</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 25%;" />
+
+<p>The following day saw the class-room full, and
+from the benches eager eyes were turned to the
+eight windows, in each of which stood one of the
+elder boys at his microscope ready for work. For
+under those microscopes the Principal always arranged
+some object referred to in his lecture and figured in
+diagrams on the walls, and it was the duty of each
+boy, after the lecture was over, to show and explain
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>
+to the class all the points of the specimen under
+his care. These boys were always specially envied,
+for though the others could, it is true, follow all the
+descriptions from the diagrams, yet these had the
+plant or animal always under their eye. Discussion
+was at this moment running high, for there was a
+great uncertainty of opinion as to whether a mushroom
+could be really called a plant when it had no
+leaves or flowers. All at once the hush came, as the
+Principal stepped into his desk and began:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Life is hard work, boys, and there is no being
+in this world which has not to work for its living.
+You all know that a plant grows by taking in gases
+and water, and working them up into sap and living
+tissue by the help of the sunshine and the green
+matter in their leaves; and you know, too, that
+the world is so full of green plants that hundreds
+and thousands of young seedlings can never get a
+living, but are stifled in their babyhood or destroyed
+before they can grow up.</p>
+
+<p>"Now there are many dark, dank places in the
+world where plants cannot get enough sunlight
+and air to make green colouring matter and manufacture
+their own food. And so it comes to pass
+that a certain class of plants have found another
+way of living, by taking their food ready made
+from other decaying plants and animals, and so
+avoiding the necessity of manufacturing it for themselves.
+These plants can live hidden away in dark
+cellars and damp cupboards, in drains and pipes
+where no light ever enters, under a thick covering of
+dead leaves in the forest, under fallen trunks and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>
+mossy stones; in fact, wherever decaying matter,
+whether of plant or animal, can be found for them
+to feed upon.</p>
+
+<p>"It is to this class, called <i>fungi</i>, which includes
+all mushrooms and moulds, mildews, smuts, and
+ferments, that the mushroom belongs which we
+found yesterday making the fairy rings. And, in
+truth, we were not so far wrong when we called
+them pixies or imps, for many of them are indeed
+imps of mischief, which play sorry pranks in our
+stores at home and in the fields and forest abroad.
+They grow on our damp bread, or cheese, or pickles;
+they destroy fruit and corn, hop and vine, and even
+take the life of insects and other animals. Yet, on
+the other hand, they are useful in clearing out unhealthy
+nooks and corners, and purifying the air;
+and they can be made to do good work by those
+who know how to use them; for without ferments
+we could have neither wine, beer, nor vinegar, nor
+even the yeast which lightens our bread.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to-day to introduce you to this large
+vagabond class of plants, that we may see how they
+live, grow, and spread, what good and bad work
+they do, and how they do it. And before we come
+to the mushrooms, which you know so well, we must
+look at the smaller forms, which do all their work
+above ground, so that we can observe them. For the
+<i>fungi</i> are to be found almost everywhere. The film
+growing over manure-heaps, the yeast plant, the wine
+fungus, and the vinegar plant; the moulds and mildews
+covering our cellar-walls and cupboards, or
+growing on decayed leaves and wood, on stale fruit,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>
+bread, or jam, or making black spots on the leaves
+of the rose, the hop, or the vine; the potato fungus,
+eating into the potato in the dark ground and producing
+disease; the smut filling the grains of wheat
+and oats with disease, the ergot feeding on the rye,
+the rust which destroys beetroot, the rank toadstools
+and puffballs, the mushroom we eat, and the truffles
+which form even their fruit underground,&mdash;all these
+are <i>fungi</i>, or lowly plants which have given up making
+their own food in the sunlight, and take it ready
+made from the dung, the decaying mould, the root,
+the leaf, the fruit, or the germ on which they grow.
+Lastly, the diseases which kill the silkworm and the
+common house-fly, and even some of the worst skin
+diseases in man, are caused by minute plants of this
+class feeding upon their hosts."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 22.</span>
+<img src="images/i_076.jpg" width="600" height="191" alt="Fig. 22.
+
+Three forms of vegetable mould magnified.
+
+
+1, Mucor Mucedo. 2, Aspergillus glaucus. 3, Penicillium glaucum.
+
+" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Three forms of vegetable mould magnified.</span>
+
+<p class="center">
+1, <i>Mucor Mucedo</i>. 2, <i>Aspergillus glaucus</i>. 3, <i>Penicillium glaucum</i>.
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"In fact, the <i>fungi</i> are so widely spread over all
+things living and dead, that there is scarcely anything
+free from them in one shape or another. The
+minute spores, now of one kind, now of another,
+float in the air, and settling down wherever they
+find suitable food, have nothing more to do than
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>
+to feed, fatten, and increase, which they do with
+wonderful rapidity. Let us take as an example
+one of the moulds which covers damp leaves, and
+even the paste and jam in our cupboard. I have
+some here growing upon a basin of paste, and you
+see it forms a kind of dense white fur all over the
+surface, with here and there a bluish-green tinge
+upon it. This white fur is the common mould, <i>Mucor
+Mucedo</i> (1, Fig. 22), and the green mould happens in
+this case to be another mould, <i>Penicillium glaucum</i>
+(3, Fig. 22); but I must warn you that these minute
+moulds look very much alike until you examine
+them under the microscope, and though they are
+called white, blue, or green moulds, yet any one of
+them may be coloured at different times of its
+growth. Another very common and beautiful mould,
+<i>Aspergillus glaucus</i> (2, Fig. 22), often grows with
+Mucor on the top of jam.</p>
+
+<p>"All these plants begin with a spore or minute
+colourless cell of living matter (<i>s</i>, Fig. 23), which
+spends its energy in sending out tubes in all directions
+into the leaves, fruit, or paste on which it feeds.
+The living matter, flowing now this way now that,
+lays down the walls of its tubes as it flows, and by
+and by, here and there, a tube, instead of working
+into the paste, grows upwards into the air and
+swells at the tip into a colourless ball in which
+a number of minute seed-like bodies called spores are
+formed. The ball bursts, the spores fall out, and each
+one begins to form fresh tubes, and so little by little
+the mould grows denser and thicker by new plants
+starting in all directions.
+</p>
+
+<p>"Under the first microscope you will see a slide
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>
+showing the tubes which spread through the paste,
+and which are called the <i>mycelium</i> (<i>m</i>, Fig. 23), and
+amongst it are three upright
+tubes, one just starting <i>a</i>,
+another with the fruit ball
+forming <i>b</i>, and a third <i>c</i>,
+which is bursting and throwing
+out the spores. The
+<i>Aspergillus</i> and the <i>Penicillium</i>
+differ from the <i>Mucor</i> in
+having their spores naked
+and not enclosed in a spore-case.
+In <i>Penicillium</i> they
+grow like the beads of a
+necklace one above the other
+on the top of the upright
+tube, and can very easily be
+separated (see Fig. 22); while
+<i>Aspergillus</i>, a most lovely
+silvery mould, is more complicated
+in the growth of its
+spores, for it bears them on
+many rows branching out
+from the top of the tube like
+the rays of a star."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 23.</span>
+<img src="images/i_078.jpg" width="300" height="647" alt="Fig. 23.
+
+Mucor Mucedo, greatly magnified.
+(After Sachs and
+Brefeld.)
+
+m, Mycelium, or tangle of
+threads. a, b, c, Upright tubes
+in different stages. c, Spore-case
+bursting and sending out
+spores. s, 1, 2, 3, A growing
+spore, in different stages, starting
+a new mycelium." title="" />
+<span class="caption"><i>Mucor Mucedo</i>, greatly magnified.
+(After Sachs and
+Brefeld.)</span>
+
+<p><i>m</i>, Mycelium, or tangle of
+threads. <i>a</i>, <i>b</i>, <i>c</i>, Upright tubes
+in different stages. <i>c</i>, Spore-case
+bursting and sending out
+spores. <i>s</i>, 1, 2, 3, A growing
+spore, in different stages, starting
+a new mycelium.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"I want you to look at
+each of these moulds carefully
+under the microscope,
+for few people who hastily
+scrape a mould away, vexed to find it on food or
+damp clothing, have any idea what a delicate and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>
+beautiful structure lies under their hand. These
+moulds live on decaying matter, but many of the
+mildews, rusts, and other kinds of fungus, prey upon
+living plants such as the <i>smut</i> of oats (<i>Ustilago carbo</i>),
+and the <i>bunt</i> (<i>Tilletia caria</i>) which eats away the
+inside of the grains of wheat, while another fungus
+attacks its leaves. There is scarcely a tree or herb
+which has not one fungus to prey upon it, and many
+have several, as, for example, the common lime-tree,
+which is infested by seventy-four different fungi, and
+the oak by no less than 200.</p>
+
+<p>"So these colourless food-taking plants prey upon
+their neighbours, while they take their oxygen for
+breathing from air. The 'ferments,' however, which
+live <i>inside</i> plants or fluids, take even their oxygen
+for breathing from their hosts.</p>
+
+<p>"If you go into the garden in summer and pluck
+an overripe gooseberry, which is bursting like this
+one I have here, you will probably find that the pulp
+looks unhealthy and rotten near the split, and the
+gooseberry will taste tart and disagreeable. This is
+because a small fungus has grown inside, and worked
+a change in the juice of the fruit. At first this
+fungus spread its tubes outside and merely <i>fed</i> upon
+the fruit, using oxygen from the air in breathing;
+but by and by the skin gave way, and the fungus
+crept inside the gooseberry where it could no longer
+get any fresh air. In this dilemma it was forced to
+break up the sugar in the fruit and take the oxygen
+out of it, leaving behind only alcohol and carbonic
+acid which give the fermented taste to the fruit.</p>
+
+<p>"So the fungus-imp feeds and grows in nature,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>
+and when man gets hold of it he forces it to do
+the same work for a useful purpose, for the grape-fungus
+grows in the vats in which grapes are crushed
+and kept away from air, and tearing up the sugar,
+leaves alcohol behind in the grape-juice, which in
+this way becomes wine. So, too, the yeast-fungus
+grows in the malt and hop liquor, turning it into
+beer; its spores floating in the fluid and increasing
+at a marvellous rate, as any housewife knows who,
+getting yeast for her bread, tries to keep it in a
+corked bottle.</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 150px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 24.</span>
+<img src="images/i_080.jpg" width="150" height="160" alt="Fig. 24.
+
+Yeast cells growing
+under the microscope.
+a, Single cells. b, Two
+cells forming by division.
+c, A group of cells where
+division is going on in
+all directions." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Yeast cells growing
+under the microscope.</span>
+<p><i>a</i>, Single cells. <i>b</i>, Two
+cells forming by division.
+<i>c</i>, A group of cells where
+division is going on in
+all directions.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"The yeast plant has never been found wild. It
+is only known as a cultivated plant, growing on
+prepared liquor. The brewer has to sow it by taking
+some yeast from other beer, or by leaving the liquor
+exposed to air in which yeast spores are floating;
+or it will sow itself in the same
+way in a mixture of water, hops,
+sugar, and salt, to which a handful
+of flour is added. It increases at
+a marvellous rate, one cell budding
+out of another, while from time to
+time the living matter in a cell will
+break up into four parts instead of
+two, and so four new cells will start
+and bud. A drop of yeast will very
+soon cover a glass slide with this
+tiny plant, as you will see under
+the second microscope, where they
+are now at work (Fig. 24)."</p>
+
+<p>"But perhaps the most curious of all the minute
+fungi are those which grow inside insects and destroy
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>
+them. At this time of year you may often see a
+dead fly sticking to the window-pane with a cloudy
+white ring round it; this poor fly has been killed by
+a little fungus called <i>Empusa musc�</i>. A spore from
+a former plant has fallen perhaps on the window-pane,
+or some other spot over which the fly has
+crawled, and being sticky has fixed itself under the
+fly's body. Once settled on a favourable spot it
+sends out a tube, and piercing the skin of the fly,
+begins to grow rapidly inside. There it forms little
+round cells one after the other, something like the
+yeast-cells, till it fills the whole body, feeding on its
+juices; then each cell sends a tube, like the upright
+tubes of the <i>Mucor</i> (Fig. 23) out again through the
+fly's skin, and this tube bursts at the end, and so
+new spores are set free. It is these tubes, and the
+spores thrown from them, which you see forming a
+kind of halo round the dead fly as it clings to the
+pane. Other fungi in the same way kill the silkworm
+and the caterpillars of the cabbage butterfly.
+Nor is it only the lower animals which suffer. When
+we once realise that fungus spores are floating everywhere
+in the air, we can understand how the terrible
+microscopic fungi called <i>bacteria</i> will settle on an
+open wound and cause it to fester if it is not properly
+dressed.</p>
+
+<p>"Thus we see that these minute fungi are almost
+everywhere. The larger ones, on the contrary, are
+confined to the fields and forests, damp walls and
+hollow trees; or wherever rotting wood, leaves, or
+manure provide them with sufficient nourishment.
+Few people have any clear ideas about the growth
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>
+of a mushroom, except that the part we pick springs
+up in a single night. The real fact is, that a whole
+mushroom plant is nothing more than a gigantic
+mould or mildew, only that it is formed of many
+different shaped
+cells, and spreads
+its tubes <i>underground</i>
+or through
+the trunks of trees
+instead of in paste
+or jam, as in the
+case of the mould."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 25.</span>
+<img src="images/i_082.jpg" width="300" height="247" alt="Fig. 25.
+
+Early stages of the mushroom.
+(After Sachs.)
+
+m, Mycelium. b1-3, Mushroom buds of
+different ages. b4, Button mushroom. g,
+Gills forming inside before lower attachment
+of the cap gives way at v." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Early stages of the mushroom.
+(After Sachs.)</span>
+
+<p><i>m</i>, Mycelium. <i>b</i>1-3, Mushroom buds of
+different ages. <i>b</i>4, Button mushroom. <i>g</i>,
+Gills forming inside before lower attachment
+of the cap gives way at <i>v</i>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"The part which
+we gather and call a
+mushroom, a toadstool,
+or a puffball is
+only the fruit, answering
+to the round balls
+of the mould. The
+rest of the plant is
+a thick network of
+tubes, which you will see under the third microscope.
+These tubes spread underground and suck
+in decayed matter from the earth; they form the
+<i>mycelium</i> (<i>m</i>, Fig. 25) such as we found in the
+mould. The mushroom-growers call it 'mushroom
+spawn' because they use it to spread over the
+ground for new crops. Out of these underground
+tubes there springs up from time to time a
+swollen round body no bigger at first than a mustard
+seed (<i>b</i>1, Fig. 25). As it increases in size it comes
+above ground and grows into the mushroom or
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>
+spore-case, answering to the round balls which
+contain the spores of the mould. At first this
+swollen body is egg-shaped, the top half being
+largest and broadest, and the fruit is then called
+a 'button-mushroom' <i>b</i>4. Inside this ball are
+now formed a series of folds made of long cells,
+some of which are soon to bear spores just as the
+tubes in the mould did, and while these are forming
+and ripening, a way out is preparing for them. For
+as the mushroom grows, the skin of the lower part
+of the ball (<i>v</i>, <i>b</i>4) is stretched more and more, till it
+can bear the strain no longer and breaks away from
+the stalk; then the ball expands into an umbrella,
+leaving a piece of torn skin, called the veil (<i>v</i>, Fig. 26),
+clinging to the stalk."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 26.</span>
+<img src="images/i_083.jpg" width="600" height="341" alt="Fig. 26.
+
+Later stages of the mushroom. (After Gautier.)
+
+1, Button mushroom stage. c, Cap. v, Veil. g, Gills.
+
+2, Full-grown mushroom, showing veil v after the cap is quite
+free, and the gills or lamell� g, of which the structure is shown in
+Fig. 27." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Later stages of the mushroom. (After Gautier.)</span>
+
+<p>1, Button mushroom stage. <i>c</i>, Cap. <i>v</i>, Veil. <i>g</i>, Gills.</p>
+
+<p>2, Full-grown mushroom, showing veil v after the cap is quite
+free, and the gills or lamell� <i>g</i>, of which the structure is shown in
+Fig. 27.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"All this happens in a single night, and the mushroom
+is complete, with a stem up the centre and a
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>
+broad cap, under which are the folds which bear the
+spores. Thus much you can see for yourselves at any
+time by finding a place where mushrooms grow and
+looking for them late at night and early in the
+morning so as to get the different stages. But now
+we must turn to the microscope, and cutting off one
+of the folds, which branch out under the cap like the
+spokes of a wheel, take a slice across it (1, Fig. 27)
+and examine."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 27.</span>
+<img src="images/i_084.jpg" width="600" height="324" alt="Fig. 27.
+
+1, One of the gills or lamell� of the mushroom slightly magnified,
+showing the cells round the edge. c, Cells which do not bear
+spores. fc, Fertile cells. 2, A piece of the edge of the same
+powerfully magnified, showing how the spores s grow out of the
+tip of the fertile cells fc." title="" />
+<p>1, One of the gills or lamell� of the mushroom slightly magnified,
+showing the cells round the edge. <i>c</i>, Cells which do not bear
+spores. <i>fc</i>, Fertile cells. 2, A piece of the edge of the same
+powerfully magnified, showing how the spores <i>s</i> grow out of the
+tip of the fertile cells <i>fc</i>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>"First, under a moderate power, you will see the
+cells forming the centre of the fold and the layer of
+long cells (<i>c</i> and <i>fc</i>) which are closely packed all round
+the edge. Some of these cells project beyond the
+others, and it is they which bear the spores. We
+see this plainly under a very strong power when you
+can distinguish the sterile cells <i>c</i> and the fertile cells
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>
+<i>fc</i> projecting beyond them, and each bearing four
+spore-cells <i>s</i> on four little horns at its tip.</p>
+
+<p>"These spores fall off very easily, and you can
+make a pretty experiment by cutting off a large
+mushroom head in the early morning and putting it
+flat upon a piece of paper. In a few hours, if you
+lift it very carefully, you will find a number of dark
+lines on the paper, radiating from a centre like the
+spokes of a wheel, each line being composed of the
+spores which have fallen from a fold as it grew ripe.
+They are so minute that many thousands would be
+required to make up the size of the head of an ordinary
+pin, yet if you gather the spores of the several
+kinds of mushroom, and examine them under a strong
+microscope, you will find that even these specks of
+matter assume different shapes in the various species.</p>
+
+<p>"You will be astonished too at the immense
+number of spores contained in a single mushroom
+head, for they are reckoned by millions; and when
+we remember that each one of these is the starting
+point of a new plant, it reminds us forcibly of the
+wholesale destruction of spores and seeds which must
+go on in nature, otherwise the mushrooms and their
+companions would soon cover every inch of the
+whole world.</p>
+
+<p>"As it is, they are spread abroad by the wind, and
+wherever they escape destruction they lie waiting in
+every nook and corner till, after the hot summer,
+showers of rain hasten the decay of plants and leaves,
+and then the mushrooms, toadstools, and puffballs,
+grow at an astounding pace. If you go into the woods
+at this season you may see the enormous deep-red liver
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>
+fungus (<i>Fistulina hepatica</i>) growing on the oak-trees,
+in patches which weigh from twenty to thirty pounds;
+or the glorious orange-coloured fungus (<i>Tremella
+mesenterica</i>) growing on bare sticks or stumps of
+furze; or among dead leaves you may easily chance
+on the little caps of the crimson, scarlet, snowy white,
+or orange-coloured fungi which grow in almost every
+wood. From white to yellow, yellow to red, red to
+crimson and purple black, there is hardly any colour
+you may not find among this gaily-decked tribe; and
+who can wonder that the small bright-coloured caps
+have been supposed to cover tiny imps or elves, who
+used the large mushrooms to serve for their stools
+and tables?</p>
+
+<p>"There they work, thrusting their tubes into twigs
+and dead branches, rotting trunks and decaying
+leaves, breaking up the hard wood and tough
+fibres, and building them up into delicate cells,
+which by and by die and leave their remains as food
+for the early growing plants in the spring. So we
+see that in their way the mushrooms and toadstools
+are good imps after all, for the tender shoot of a
+young seedling plant could take no food out of a
+hard tree-trunk, but it finds the work done for it by
+the fungus, the rich nourishment being spread around
+its young roots ready to be imbibed.</p>
+
+<p>"To find our fairy-ring mushrooms, however, we
+must leave the wood and go out into the open
+country, especially on the downs and moors and
+rough meadows, where the land is poor and the grass
+coarse and spare. There grow the nourishing kinds,
+most of which we can eat, and among these is the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>
+delicate little champignon or 'Scotch-bonnet' mushroom,
+<i>Marasmius Oreades</i>,<a name="FNanchor_1_3" id="FNanchor_1_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_3" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> which makes the fairy-rings.
+When a spore of this mushroom begins to
+grow, it sucks up vegetable food out of the earth and
+spreads its tubes underground, in all directions from
+the centre, so that the mycelium forms a round patch
+like a thick underground circular cobweb. In the
+summer and autumn, when the weather is suitable, it
+sends up its delicate pale-brown caps, which we may
+gather and eat without stopping the growth of the
+plant.</p>
+
+<p>"This goes on year after year underground, new
+tubes always travelling outwards till the circle widens
+and widens like the rings of water on a pond, only
+that it spreads very slowly, making a new ring each
+year, which is often composed of a mass of tubes as
+much as a foot thick in the ground, and the tender
+tubes in the centre die away as the new ones form a
+larger hoop outside.</p>
+
+<p>"But all this is below ground; where then are
+our fairy rings? Here is the secret. The tubes, as
+we have seen, take up food from the earth and
+build it up into delicate cells, which decay very soon,
+and as they die make a rich manure at the roots of
+the grass. So each season the cells of last year's ring
+make a rich feeding-ground for the young grass,
+which springs up fresh and green in a fairy ring,
+while <i>outside</i> this emerald circle the mushroom tubes
+are still growing and increasing underneath the grass,
+so that next year, when the present ring is no longer
+richly fed, and has become faded and brown like the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>
+rest of the moor, another ring will spring up outside
+it, feeding on the prepared food below."</p>
+
+<p>"In bad seasons, though the tubes go on spreading
+and growing below, the mushroom fruit does not
+always appear above ground. The plant will only
+fruit freely when the ground has been well warmed
+by the summer sun, followed by damp weather to
+moisten it. This gives us a rich crop of mushrooms
+all over the country, and it is then you can best
+see the ring of fairy mushrooms circling outside the
+green hoop of fresh grass. In any case the early
+morning is the time to find them; it is only in very
+sheltered spots that they sometimes last through the
+day, or come up towards evening, as I found them
+last night on the warm damp side of the dell.</p>
+
+<p>"This is the true history of fairy rings, and now go
+and look for yourselves under the microscopes.
+Under the first three you will find the three different
+kinds of mould of our diagram (Fig. 22). Under the
+fourth the spores of the mould are shown in their
+first growth putting out the tubes to form the
+mycelium. The fifth shows the mould itself with its
+fruit-bearing tubes, one of which is bursting. Under
+the sixth the yeast plant is growing; the seventh
+shows a slice of one of the folds of the common
+mushroom with its spore-bearing horns; and under
+the eighth I have put some spores from different
+mushrooms, that you may see what curious shapes
+they assume.</p>
+
+<p>"Lastly, let me remind you, now that the autumn
+and winter are coming, that you will find mushrooms,
+toadstools, puffballs, and moulds in plenty
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>
+wherever you go. Learn to know them, their different
+shapes and colours, and above all the special
+nooks each one chooses for its home. Look around
+in the fields and woods and take note of the decaying
+plants and trees, leaves and bark, insects and
+dead remains of all kinds. Upon each of these you
+will find some fungus growing, breaking up their
+tissues and devouring the nourishing food they provide.
+Watch these spots, and note the soft spongy
+soil which will collect there, and then when the
+spring comes, notice what tender plants flourish upon
+these rich feeding grounds. You will thus see for
+yourselves that the fungi, though they feed upon
+others, are not entirely mischief-workers, but also
+perform their part in the general work of life."
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_3" id="Footnote_1_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_3"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Shown in initial letter of this chapter.</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+
+<h4>THE LIFE-HISTORY OF LICHENS AND MOSSES</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_090.jpg" width="100" height="143" alt="ornate capital t" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>he autumn has passed away
+and we are in the midst
+of winter. In the long
+winter evenings the stars
+shine bright and clear, and
+tempt us to work with the telescope
+and its helpmates the spectroscope
+and photographic plates. But at
+first sight it would seem as though
+our microscopes would have to stand
+idle so far at least as plants are
+concerned, or be used only to examine
+dried specimens and mounted
+sections. Yet this is not the fact, as I remembered
+last week when walking through the bare and leafless
+wood. A startled pheasant rising with a whirr at
+the sound of my footsteps among the dead leaves
+roused me from my thoughts, and as a young rabbit
+scudded across the path and I watched it disappear
+among the bushes, I was suddenly struck with the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>
+great mass of plant life flourishing underfoot and
+overhead.</p>
+
+<p>Can you guess what plants these were? I do
+not mean the evergreen pines and firs, nor the few
+hardy ferns, nor the lovely ivy clothing the trunks
+of the trees. Such plants as these live and remain
+green in the winter, but they do not grow. If you
+wish to find plant life revelling in the cold damp
+days of winter, fearing neither frost nor snow and
+welcoming mist and rain, you must go to the mosses,
+which as autumn passes away begin to cover the
+wood-paths, to creep over the roots of the trees, to
+suck up the water in the bogs, and even to clothe
+dead walls and stones with a soft green carpet.
+And with the mosses come the lichens, those curious
+grey and greenish oddities which no one but a
+botanist would think of classing among plants.</p>
+
+<p>The wood is full of them now: the hairy lichens
+hang from the branches of many of the trees, making
+them look like old greybearded men; the leafy
+lichens encircle the branches, their pale gray, green,
+and yellow patches looking as if they were made of
+crumpled paper cut into wavy plates; and the crusty
+lichens, scarcely distinguishable from the bark of the
+trees, cover every available space which the mosses
+have left free.</p>
+
+<p>As I looked at these lichens and thought of their
+curious history I determined that we would study
+them to-day, and gathered a basketful of specimens
+(see Fig. 28). But when I had collected these I found
+I had not the heart to leave the mosses behind. I
+could not even break off a piece of bark with lichen
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>
+upon it without some little moss coming too, especially
+the small thread-mosses (<i>Bryum</i>) which make a
+home for themselves in every nook and corner of the
+branches; while the feather-mosses, hair-mosses,
+cord-mosses, and many others made such a lovely
+carpet under my feet that each seemed too beautiful
+to pass by, and they found their way into my basket,
+crowned at the top with a large mass of the pale-green
+Sphagnum, or bog-moss, into which I sank
+more than ankle-deep as I crossed the bog in the
+centre of the wood on my way home.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 28.</span>
+<img src="images/i_092.jpg" width="600" height="247" alt="Fig. 28.
+
+Examples of Lichens. (From life.)
+
+1, A hairy lichen. 2, A leafy lichen. 3, A crustaceous lichen.
+f, f, the fruit." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Examples of Lichens. (From life.)</span>
+
+<p class="center">1, A hairy lichen.  2, A leafy lichen. 3, A crustaceous lichen.<br />
+<i>f</i>, <i>f</i>, the fruit.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>So here they all are, and I hope by the help of
+our magic glass to let you into some of the secrets
+of their lives. It is true we must study the structure
+of lichens chiefly by diagrams, for it is too minute
+for beginners to follow under the microscope, so we
+must trust to drawings made by men more skilful in
+microscopic botany, at any rate for the present. But
+the mosses we can examine for ourselves and admire
+their delicate leaves and wonderful tiny spore-cases.
+</p>
+
+<p>Now the first question which I hope you want to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span>
+ask is, how it is that these lowly plants flourish so
+well in the depth of winter when their larger and
+stronger companions die down to the ground. We
+will answer this first as to the lichens, which are such
+strange uncanny-looking plants that it is almost
+difficult to imagine they are alive at all; and indeed
+they have been a great puzzle to botanists.</p>
+
+<div class="figleft" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 29.</span>
+<img src="images/i_093.jpg" width="300" height="300" alt="Fig. 29.
+
+Single-celled green plants growing
+and dividing (Pleurococcus).
+(After Thuret and Bornet.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Single-celled green plants growing<br />
+and dividing (<i>Pleurococcus</i>).<br />
+(After Thuret and Bornet.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Before we examine them, however, look for a
+minute at a small drop of this greenish film which I
+have taken from the rain-water taken outside. I
+have put some under each microscope, and those
+who can look into them will
+see the slide almost covered
+with small round green cells
+very much like the yeast
+cells we saw when studying
+the Fungi, only that instead
+of being colourless they are
+a bright green. Some of
+these cells will I suspect be
+longer than others, and these
+long cells will be moving
+over the slide very rapidly,
+swimming hither and thither,
+and you will see, perhaps for the first time, that very
+low plants can swim about in water. These green
+cells are, indeed, the simplest of all plants, and
+are merely bags of living matter which, by the help
+of the green granules in them, are able to work up
+water and gases into nourishing food, and so to live,
+grow, and multiply.
+</p>
+
+<p>There are many kinds of these single-celled plants
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>
+in the world. You may find them on damp paths,
+in almost any rain-water butt, in ponds and ditches,
+in sparkling waterfalls, along the banks of flowing
+rivers, and in the cold clear springs on the bleak
+mountains. Some of them take the form of tangled
+threads<a name="FNanchor_1_4" id="FNanchor_1_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_4" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> composed of long strings of cells, and these
+sometimes form long streamers in flowing water, and
+at other times are gathered together in a shapeless
+film only to be disentangled under a microscope.
+Other kinds<a name="FNanchor_2_5" id="FNanchor_2_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_5" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> wave to and fro on the water, forming
+dense patches of violet, orange-brown, or glossy green
+scum shining in the bright sunlight, and these flourish
+equally in the ponds of our gardens and in pools in
+the Himalaya mountains, 18,000 feet above the sea.
+Others again<a name="FNanchor_3_6" id="FNanchor_3_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_6" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> seize on every damp patch on tree
+trunks, rocks, or moist walls, covering them with a
+green powder formed of single plant cells. Other
+species of this family turn a bright red colour when
+the cells are still; and one, under the name of Gory
+Dew,<a name="FNanchor_4_7" id="FNanchor_4_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_7" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> has often frightened the peasants of Italy, by
+growing very rapidly over damp walls and then
+turning the colour of blood. Another<a name="FNanchor_5_8" id="FNanchor_5_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_8" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> forms the
+"red snow" of the Arctic regions, where it covers
+wide surfaces of snow with a deep red colour. Others<a name="FNanchor_6_9" id="FNanchor_6_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_9" class="fnanchor">[6]</a>
+form a shiny jelly over rocks and stones, and these
+may be found almost everywhere, from the garden
+path to the warm springs of India, from the marshes
+of New Zealand up to the shores of the Arctic ocean,
+and even on the surface of floating icebergs.</p>
+
+<p>The reason why these plants can live in such very
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>
+different regions is that they do not take their food
+through roots out of the ground, but suck in water
+and gases through the thin membrane which covers
+their cell, and each cell does its own work. So it
+matters very little to them where they lie, so long as
+they have moisture and sunlight to help them in
+their work. Wherever they are, if they have these,
+they can take in carbonic acid from the air and
+work up the carbon with other gases which they
+imbibe with the water, and so make living material.
+In this way they grow, and as a cell grows larger
+the covering is stretched and part of the digested
+food goes to build up more covering membrane, and
+by and by the cell divides into two and each membrane
+closes up, so that there are two single-celled
+plants where there was only one before. This will
+sometimes go on so fast that a small pond may be
+covered in a few hours with a green film formed of
+new cells.</p>
+
+<p>Now we have seen, when studying mushrooms, that
+the one difference between these green plants and the
+single-celled Fungi is that while the green cells make
+their own food, colourless cells can only take it in
+ready-made, and therefore prey upon all kinds of
+living matter. This is just what happens in the
+lichens; and botanists have discovered that these
+curious growths are really the result of a <i>partnership</i>
+between single-celled green plants and single-celled
+fungi. The grey part is a fungus; but when it is
+examined under the microscope we find it is not a
+fungus only; a number of green cells can be seen
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>
+scattered through it, which, when carefully studied,
+prove to be some species of the green single-celled
+plants.</p>
+
+<p>Here are two drawings of sections cut through
+two different lichens, and
+enormously magnified so
+that the cells are clearly
+seen. 1, Fig. 30 is part of
+a hairy lichen (1, Fig. 28),
+and 2 is part of a leafy
+lichen (2, Fig. 28). The
+hairy lichen as you see has
+a row of green cells all round
+the tiny branch, with fungus
+cells on all sides of them.
+The leafy lichen, which only
+presents one surface to the
+sun and air while the other
+side is against the tree, has
+only one layer of green cells
+near the surface, but protected
+by the fungus above.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 30.</span>
+<img src="images/i_096.jpg" width="300" height="480" alt="Fig. 30.
+
+Sections of Lichens. (Sachs.)
+
+1, Section of a hairy lichen,
+Usnea barbata. 2, Section of a
+leafy lichen, Sticta fuliginosa.
+3, Early growth of a lichen.
+gc, Green cells. f, Fungus." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Sections of Lichens. (Sachs.)</span>
+
+<p>1, Section of a hairy lichen,
+<i>Usnea barbata</i>.<br />
+2, Section of a
+leafy lichen, <i>Sticta fuliginosa</i>.<br />
+3, Early growth of a lichen.<br />
+<i>gc</i>, Green cells. <i>f</i>, Fungus.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The way the lichen has
+grown is this. A green cell
+(<i>gc</i> 3, Fig. 30) falling on
+some damp spot has begun to grow and spread,
+working up food in the sunlight. To it comes
+the spore of the fungus <i>f</i>, first thrusting its tubes
+into the tree-bark, or wall, and then spreading
+round the green cells, which remain always in
+such a position that sunlight, air, and moisture
+can reach them. From this time the two classes of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span>
+plants live as friends, the fungus using part of the
+food made by the green cells, and giving them in
+return the advantage of being spread out to the
+sunlight, while they are also protected in frosty or
+sultry weather when they would dry up on a bare
+surface. On the whole, however, the fungus probably
+gains the most, for it has been found, as we should
+expect, that the green cells can live and grow if
+separated out of the lichen, but the fungus cells die
+when their industrious companions are taken from
+them.</p>
+
+<p>At any rate the partnership succeeds, as you will
+see if you go into the wood, or into an orchard where
+the apple-trees are neglected, for every inch of the
+branches is covered by lichens if not already taken
+up by mosses or toadstools.</p>
+
+<p>There is hardly any part of the world except the
+tropics where lichens do not abound. In the Alps
+of Scandinavia close to the limits of perpetual snow,
+in the sandy wastes of Arctic America, and over the
+dreary Tundras of Arctic Siberia, where the ground
+is frozen hard during the greater part of the year,
+they flourish where nothing else can live.</p>
+
+<p>The little green cells multiply by dividing, as we
+saw them doing in the green film from the water-butt.
+The fungus, however, has many different
+modes of seeding itself. One of these is by forming
+little pockets in the lichen, out of which, when
+they burst, small round bodies are thrown, which
+cover the lichen with a minute green powder. There
+is plenty of this powder on the leafy lichen which
+you have by you. You can see it with the magnifying-glass,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>
+without putting it under the microscope.
+As long as the lichen is dry these round bodies do
+not grow, but as soon as moisture reaches them they
+start away and become new plants.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 31.</span>
+<img src="images/i_098.jpg" width="600" height="343" alt="Fig. 31.
+
+Fructification of a lichen. (From Sachs and Oliver.)
+
+Apothecium or spore-chamber of a lichen. 1, Closed. 2, Open.
+3, The spore-cases and filaments enlarged, showing the spores. f, Filaments.
+sc, Spore-cases. s, Spores." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Fructification of a lichen. (From Sachs and Oliver.)</span>
+
+<p>Apothecium or spore-chamber of a lichen.  1, Closed.  2, Open.
+3, The spore-cases and filaments enlarged, showing the spores. <i>f</i>, Filaments.
+<i>sc</i>, Spore-cases. <i>s</i>, Spores.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A more complicated and beautiful process is shown
+in this diagram (Fig. 31). If you look carefully at
+the leafy lichen (2, Fig. 28) you will find here and
+there some little cups <i>f</i>, while others grow upon the
+tips of the hairy lichen. These cups, or fruits,
+were once closed, flask-shaped chambers (1, Fig.
+31) inside which are formed a number of oval
+cells <i>sc</i>, which are spore-cases, with from four to eight
+spores or seed-like bodies <i>s</i>3 inside them. When
+these chambers, which are called <i>apothecia</i>, are ripe,
+moist or rainy weather causes them to swell at the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span>
+top, and they burst open and the spore-cases throw
+out the spores to grow into new fungi.</p>
+
+<p>In some lichens the chambers remain closed and
+the spores escape through a hole in the top, and they
+are then called <i>perithecia</i>, while in others, as these
+which we have here, they open out into a cup-shape.</p>
+
+<p>This, then, is the curious history of lichens; the
+green cells and fungi flourishing together in the damp
+winter and bearing the hardest frost far better than
+the summer drought, so that they have their good
+time when most other plants are dead or asleep.
+Yet though some of them, such as the hairy
+lichens, almost disappear in the summer, they are by
+no means dead, for, like all these very low plants,
+they can bear being dried up for a long time, and then,
+when moisture visits them again, each green cell sets
+to work, and they revive. There is much more to be
+learnt about them, but this will be sufficient to make
+you feel an interest in their simple lives, and when
+you look for them in the wood you will be surprised to
+find how many different kinds there are, for it is most
+wonderful that such lowly plants should build up such
+an immense variety of curious and grotesque forms.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 25%;" />
+
+<p>And yet, when we turn to the mosses, I am half
+afraid they will soon attract you away from the dull
+grey lichens, for of all plant histories it appears to
+me that the history of the moss-plant is most
+fascinating.</p>
+
+<p>As this history is complicated by the moss having,
+as it were, two lives, you must give me your whole
+attention, and I will explain it first from diagrams,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>
+though you can see all the steps under the microscope.</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 150px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 32.</span>
+<img src="images/i_100.jpg" width="150" height="249" alt="Fig. 32.
+
+A stem of feathery
+moss. (From life.)
+
+l, Leaves. s, Stem.
+r, Roots." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A stem of feathery
+moss. (From life.)</span>
+
+<p class="center"><i>l</i>, Leaves. <i>s</i>, Stem.<br />
+<i>r</i>, Roots.</p>
+</div>
+<p>Take in your hands, in the first place, a piece of
+this green moss which I have brought. How thick
+it is, like a rich felted carpet! and yet,
+if you pull it apart carefully, you will
+find that each leafy stem is separate,
+and can be taken away from the
+others without breaking anything.
+In this dense moss each stem is
+single and clothed with leaves
+wrapped closely round it (see Fig.
+33); in some mosses the stem is
+branched, and in others the leaves
+grow on side stalks, as in this
+feathery moss (Fig. 32). But in each
+case every stem is like a separate
+plant, with its own tuft of tender
+roots <i>r</i>.</p>
+
+
+<p>What a delicate growth it is! The stem is
+scarcely more than a fine thread, the leaves minute,
+transparent, and tender. In this pale sphagnum or
+bog-moss (Fig. 36, p. 93), which is much larger and
+stouter, you can see better how each one of these
+leaves, though they are so thickly packed, is placed
+so that it can get the utmost light, air, and moisture.
+Yet so closely are the leaves of each stem entangled
+in those of the next that the whole forms a thick
+springy green carpet under our feet.</p>
+
+<p>How is it, then, that these moss stems, though
+each independent, grow in such a dense mass?
+Partly because moss multiplies so rapidly that new
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>
+stems are always thrusting themselves up to the
+light, but chiefly because the stems were not always
+separate, but in very early life sprang from a
+common source.</p>
+
+<p>If, instead of bringing the moss home and tearing
+it apart, you went to a spot in the wood where fresh
+moss was growing, and looked very carefully on
+the surface of the ground or among the water
+of a marsh, you would find a spongy green mass
+below the growing moss, very much like the green
+scum on a pond. This film, some of which I
+have brought home, is seen under the microscope
+to be a mass of tangled green threads (<i>t</i>, Fig. 34,
+p. 88) like those of the <i>Conferv�</i> (see p. 79), composed
+of rows of cells, while here and there upon
+these threads you would find a bud (<i>mb</i>, Fig. 34)
+rising up into the air.</p>
+
+<p>This tangled mass of green threads, called the
+<i>protonema</i>, is the first growth, from which the moss
+stems spring. It has itself originated from a moss-spore;
+as we shall see by and by. As soon as it has
+started it grows and spreads very rapidly, drinking
+in water and air through all its cells and sending up
+the moss buds which swell and grow, giving out roots
+below and fine stems above, which soon become
+crowded with leaves, forming the velvety carpet we
+call moss. Meanwhile the soft threads below die
+away, giving up all their nourishment to the moss-stems,
+and this is why, when you take up the moss,
+you find each stem separate. But now comes the
+question, How does each stem live after the nourishing
+threads below have died? It is true each stem has
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span>
+a few hairy roots, but these are very feeble, and not
+at all like the roots of higher plants. The fact is,
+the moss is built up entirely of tender cells, like the
+green cells in the lichen, or in
+the film upon the pond. These
+cells are not shut in behind a
+thick skin as in the leaves of
+higher plants, but have every
+one of them the power to take
+in water and gases through their
+tender membrane.</p>
+
+<p>I made last night a rough
+drawing of the leaf of the
+feathery moss put under the
+microscope, but you will see it
+far better by putting a leaf with
+a little water on a glass slide
+under the covering glass and examining
+it for yourself. You
+will see that it is composed of
+a number of oval-shaped cells
+packed closely together (<i>c</i> Fig. 33), with a few long
+narrow ones <i>mr</i> in the middle of the leaf forming the
+midrib. Every cell is as clear and distinct as if it
+were floating in the water, and the tiny green
+grains which help it to work up its food are clearly
+visible.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 250px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 33.</span>
+<img src="images/i_102.jpg" width="250" height="383" alt="Fig. 33.
+
+Moss-leaf magnified.
+(From life.)
+
+Showing the cells c,
+each of which can take in
+and work up its own food.
+mr, Long cells of the mid-rib." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Moss-leaf magnified.
+(From life.)</span>
+
+<p>Showing the cells <i>c</i>,
+each of which can take in
+and work up its own food.
+<i>mr</i>, Long cells of the mid-rib.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Each of these cells can act as a separate plant,
+drinking in the water and air it needs, and feeding
+and growing quite independently of the roots below.
+Yet at the same time the moss stem has a great
+advantage over single-celled plants in having root-hairs,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span>
+and being able to grow upright and expose
+its leaves to the sun and air.</p>
+
+<p>Now you will no longer
+wonder that moss grows
+so fast and so thick, and
+another curious fact follows
+from the independence
+of each cell, namely,
+that new growths can
+start from almost any
+part of the plant. For
+example, pieces will often
+break off from the
+tangled mass or protonema
+below, and, starting
+on their own account,
+form other thread masses.
+Then, after the moss
+stems have grown, a
+new mass of threads may
+grow from one of the
+tiny root-hairs of a stem
+and make a fresh tangle;
+nay, a thread will sometimes
+even spring out
+of a damp moss leaf
+and make a new beginning,
+while the moss
+stems themselves often
+put forth buds and
+branches, which grow
+root-hairs and settle down on their own account.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 34.</span>
+<img src="images/i_103.jpg" width="300" height="486" alt="Fig. 34.
+
+Polytrichum commune. A large
+hair-moss.
+
+t, t, Threads of green cells forming
+the protonema out of which moss-buds
+spring. mb, Buds of moss-stems.
+a, Minute green flower in which the
+antherozoids are formed (enlarged in
+Fig. 35). p, p1, p2, p3, Minute green
+flower in which the ovules are formed,
+and urn-plant springing out of it (enlarged
+in Fig. 35). us, Urn stems.
+c, Cap. u, Urn after cap has fallen off,
+still protected by its lid." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Polytrichum commune. A large
+hair-moss.</span>
+
+<p><i>t</i>, <i>t</i>, Threads of green cells forming
+the <i>protonema</i> out of which moss-buds
+spring. <i>mb</i>, Buds of moss-stems.
+<i>a</i>, Minute green flower in which the
+antherozoids are formed (enlarged in
+Fig. 35). <i>p</i>, <i>p</i>1, <i>p</i>2, <i>p</i>3, Minute green
+flower in which the ovules are formed,
+and urn-plant springing out of it (enlarged
+in Fig. 35). <i>us</i>, Urn stems.
+<i>c</i>, Cap. <i>u</i>, Urn after cap has fallen off,
+still protected by its lid.</p>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>All this comes from the simple nature of the plants,
+each cell doing its own work. Nor are the mosses in
+any difficulty as to soil, for as the matted threads
+decay they form a rich manure, and the dying moss-stems
+themselves, being so fragile, turn back very
+readily into food. This is why mosses can spread
+over the poorest soil where even tough grasses cannot
+live, and clothe walls and roofs with a rich green.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 35.</span>
+<img src="images/i_104.jpg" width="600" height="258" alt="Fig. 35.
+
+Fructification of a moss.
+
+A, Male moss-flower stripped of its outer leaves, showing jointed filaments
+and oval sacs os and antherozoid cells zc swarming out of a sac.
+zc�, Antherozoid cell enlarged. z, Free antherozoid. P, Female flower
+with bottle-shaped sacs bs. bs-c, Bottle-shaped sac, with cap being pushed
+up. u, Urn of Funaria hygrometrica, with small cap. u�, Urn, from
+which the cap has fallen, showing the teeth t which keep in the spores." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Fructification of a moss.</span>
+
+<p>A, Male moss-flower stripped of its outer leaves, showing jointed filaments
+and oval sacs os and antherozoid cells <i>zc</i> swarming out of a sac.
+<i>zc�</i>, Antherozoid cell enlarged. <i>z</i>, Free antherozoid. P, Female flower
+with bottle-shaped sacs <i>bs</i>. <i>bs-c</i>, Bottle-shaped sac, with cap being pushed
+up. <i>u</i>, Urn of <i>Funaria hygrometrica</i>, with small cap. <i>u�</i>, Urn, from
+which the cap has fallen, showing the teeth <i>t</i> which keep in the spores.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>So far, then, we now understand the growth of the
+mossy-leaf stems, but this is only half the life of the
+plant. After the moss has gone on through the
+damp winter spreading and growing, there appear in
+the spring or summer tiny moss flowers at the tip of
+some of the stems. These flowers (<i>a</i>, <i>p</i>, Fig. 34) are
+formed merely of a few green leaves shorter and stouter
+than the rest, enclosing some oval sacs surrounded by
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>
+jointed hairs or filaments (see A and P, Fig. 35).
+These sacs are of two different kinds, one set being
+short and stout <i>os</i>, the others having long necks
+like bottles <i>bs</i>. Sometimes these two kinds of sac
+are in one flower, but more often they are in separate
+flowers, as in the hair-moss, <i>Polytrichum commune</i>
+(<i>a</i> and <i>p</i>, Fig. 34). Now when the flowers are ripe the
+short sacs in the flower A open and fling out myriads
+of cells <i>zc</i>, and these cells burst, and forth come
+tiny wriggling bodies <i>z</i>, called by botanists <i>antherozoids</i>,
+one out of each cell. These find their way
+along the damp moss to the flower P, and entering
+the neck of one of the bottle-shaped sacs <i>bs</i>, find
+out each another cell or <i>ovule</i> inside. The two cells
+together then form a <i>plant-egg</i>, which answers to the
+germ in the seeds of higher plants.</p>
+
+<p>Now let us be sure we understand where we are
+in the life of the plant. We have had its green-growing
+time, its flowering, and the formation of
+what we may roughly call its seed, which last in
+ordinary higher plants would fall down and grow
+into a new green plant. But with the moss there is
+more to come. The egg does not shake out of the
+bottle-necked sac, but begins to grow inside it, sending
+down a little tube into the moss stem, and using
+it as other plants use the ground to grow in.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as it is rooted it begins to form a delicate
+stem, and as this grows it pushes up the sac <i>bs</i>,
+stretching the neck tighter and tighter till at last it
+tears away below, and the sac is carried up and hangs
+like an extinguisher or cap (<i>c</i> Figs. 34, 35) over the
+top of the stem. Meanwhile, under this cap the top
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>
+of the stalk swells into a knob which, by degrees, becomes
+a lovely little covered urn <i>u</i>, something like a
+poppy head, which has within it a number of spores.
+The growth of this tiny urn-plant often occupies several
+months, for you must remember that it is not merely
+a fruit, though it is often called so, but a real plant,
+taking in food through its tubes below and working
+for its living.</p>
+
+<p>When it is finished it is a most lovely little object
+(<i>us</i>, Fig. 34), the fine hairlike stalk being covered with
+a green, yellow, or brilliant red fool's cap on the top,
+yet the whole in most mosses is not bigger than an
+ordinary pin. You may easily see them in the spring
+or summer, or even sometimes in the winter. I have
+only been able to bring you one very little one to-day,
+the <i>Funaria hygrometrica</i>, which fruits early in
+the year. This moss has only a short cap, but
+in many mosses they are very conspicuous. I have
+often pulled them off as you would pull a cap from
+a boy's head. In nature they fall off after a time,
+leaving the urn, which, though so small, is a most
+complicated structure. First it has an outer skin,
+with holes or mouths in it which open and close to
+let moisture in and out. Then come two layers of
+cells, then an open space full of air, in which are
+the green chlorophyll grains which are working
+up food for the tiny plant as the moisture comes
+in to them. Lastly, within this again is a mass
+of tissue, round which grow the spores which are
+soon to be sown, and which in <i>Polytrichum commune</i>
+are protected by a lid. Even after the
+extinguisher and the lid have both fallen off, the
+spores cannot fall out, for a thick row of teeth (<i>t</i>, Fig.
+35) is closed over them like the tentacles of an
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>
+anemone. So long as the air is damp these teeth
+remain closed; it is only in fine dry weather that they
+open and the spores are scattered on the ground.
+<i>Funaria hygrometrica</i> has no lid under its cap, and
+after the cap falls the spores are only protected by
+the teeth.</p>
+
+<p>When the spores are gone, the life of the tiny urn-plant
+is over. It shrivels and dies, leaving ten,
+fifteen, or even more spores, which, after lying for
+some time on the ground, sprout and grow into a
+fresh mass of soft threads.</p>
+
+<p>So now we have completed the life-history of the
+moss and come back to the point at which we started.
+I am afraid it has been rather a difficult history to
+follow step by step, and yet it is perfectly clear when
+once we master the succession of growths. Starting
+from a spore, the thread-mass or protonema gives
+rise to the moss-stems forming the dense green
+carpet, then the green flowers on some of the leaf-stems
+give rise to a plant-egg, which roots itself in the
+stem, and grows into a perfect plant without leaves,
+bearing merely the urn in which fresh spores are
+formed, and so the round goes on from year to year.</p>
+
+<p>There are a great number of different varieties of
+moss, and they differ in the shape and arrangement
+of their stems and leaves, and very much in the
+formation of their urns, yet this sketch will enable
+you to study them with understanding, and when
+you find in the wood the nodding caps of the fruiting
+plants, some red, some green, some yellow, and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>
+some a brilliant orange, you will feel that they are
+acquaintances, and by the help of the microscope
+may soon become friends.</p>
+
+<div class="figright" style="width: 250px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 36.</span>
+<img src="images/i_108.jpg" width="250" height="447" alt="Fig. 36.
+
+Sphagnum moss from a
+Devonshire bog.
+(From life.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Sphagnum moss from a
+Devonshire bog.
+(From life.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Among them one of the most interesting is the
+sphagnum or bog-moss (Fig. 36), which spreads
+its thick carpet over all the bogs
+in the woods. You cannot miss
+its little orange-coloured spore-cases
+if you look closely, for they
+contrast strongly with its pale
+green leaves, out of which they
+stand on very short stalks. I
+wish we could examine it, for it
+differs much from other mosses,
+both in leaves and fruit, but it
+would take us too long. At
+least, however, you must put
+one of its lovely transparent
+leaves under the microscope,
+that you may see the large
+air-cells which lie between the
+growing cells, and admire the
+lovely glistening bands which
+run across and across their
+covering membrane, for the sphagnum leaf is so
+extremely beautiful that you will never forget it
+when once seen. It is through these large cells in
+the edge of the stem and leaf that the water rises
+up from the swamp, so that the whole moss is like a
+wet sponge.</p>
+
+<p>And now, before we part, we had better sum
+up the history of lichens and mosses. With the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>
+lichens we have seen that the secret of success
+seems to be mutual help. The green cells provide
+the food, the fungus cells form a surface over
+which the green cells can spread to find sunlight
+and moisture, and protection from extremes of heat
+or cold. With the mosses the secret lies in their
+standing on the borderland between two classes of
+plant life. On the one hand, they are still tender-celled
+plants, each cell being able to live its own
+life and make its own food; on the other hand,
+they have risen into shapely plants with the beginnings
+of feeble roots, and having stems along which
+their leaves are arranged so that they are spread to
+the light and air. Both lichens and mosses keep
+one great advantage common to all tender-celled
+plants; they can be dried up so that you would
+think them dead, and yet, because they can work all
+over their surface whenever heat and moisture reach
+them, each cell drinks in food again and the plant
+revives. So when a scorching sun, or a dry season,
+or a biting frost kills other plants, the mosses and
+lichens bide their time till moisture comes again.</p>
+
+<p>In our own country they grow almost everywhere&mdash;on
+walls, on broken ground, on sand-heaps,
+on roofs and walls, on trees living and dead, and
+over all pastures which are allowed to grow poor
+and worn out. They grow, too, in all damp, marshy
+spots; especially the bog-mosses forming the peat-bogs
+which cover a large part of Ireland and many
+regions in Scotland; and these same bog-mosses
+occur in America, New Zealand, and Australia.</p>
+
+<p>In the tropics mosses are less abundant, probably
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>
+because other plants flourish so luxuriantly; but in
+Arctic Siberia and Arctic America both lichens and
+mosses live on the vast Tundras. There, during the
+three short months of summer, when the surface of
+the ground is soft, the lichens spread far and wide
+where all else is lifeless, while in moister parts the
+Polytrichums or hair-mosses cover the ground, and
+in swampy regions stunted Sphagnums form peat-bogs
+only a few inches in depth over the frozen
+soil beneath. If, then, the lichens and mosses can
+flourish even in such dreary latitudes as these, we
+can understand how they defy even our coldest
+winters, appearing fresh and green when the snow
+melts away from over them, and leave their cells
+bathed in water, so that these lowly plants clothe
+the wood with their beauty when otherwise all
+would be bare and lifeless.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_4" id="Footnote_1_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_4"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>Conferv�.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_5" id="Footnote_2_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_5"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <i>Oscillari�.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_6" id="Footnote_3_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_6"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <i>Protococcus.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_7" id="Footnote_4_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_7"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> <i>Palmella cruenta.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_8" id="Footnote_5_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_8"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> <i>Protococcus nivalis.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_9" id="Footnote_6_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_9"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> <i>Nostoc.</i>
+</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+<h4>THE HISTORY OF A LAVA STREAM</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_111.jpg" width="100" height="117" alt="ornate capital i" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>t is now just twenty-two
+years ago, boys,
+since I saw a wonderful
+sight, which is still
+so fresh in my mind
+that I have to look
+round and remember that it was
+before any of you were born, in
+order to persuade myself that it
+can be nearly a quarter of a century
+since I stood with my feet close to
+a flowing stream of red-hot lava.</p>
+
+<p>It happened in this way. I was spending the
+winter with friends in Naples, and we were walking
+quietly one lovely afternoon in November along the
+Villa Reale, the public garden on the sea-shore,
+when one of our party exclaimed, "Look at Vesuvius!"
+We did so, and saw in the bright sunlight a dense
+dark cloud rising up out of the cone. The mountain
+had been sending out puffs of smoke, with a booming
+noise, for several days, but we thought nothing of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>
+that, for it had been common enough for slight
+eruptions to take place at intervals ever since the
+great eruption of 1867. This cloud, however, was far
+larger and wider-spread than usual, and as we were
+looking at it we saw a thin red line begin some way
+down the side of the mountain and creep onwards
+toward the valley which lies behind the Hermitage
+near where the Observatory is built (see Fig. 37).
+"A crater has broken out on the slope," said our
+host; "it will be a grand sight to-night. Shall we go
+up and see it?" No sooner proposed than settled,
+and one of the party started off at once to secure
+horses and men before others engaged them.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 37.</span>
+<img src="images/i_112.jpg" width="600" height="446" alt="Fig. 37.
+
+Somma. Vesuvius.
+
+Vesuvius, as seen in eruption by the author, November 1868." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Somma. Vesuvius.<br />
+
+Vesuvius, as seen in eruption by the author, November 1868.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It was about eight o'clock in the evening when we
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>
+started in a carriage for Resina, and alighting there,
+with buried Herculaneum under our feet, mounted
+our horses and set forward with the guides. Then
+followed a long ascent of about two hours and a half
+through the dark night. Silently and carefully we
+travelled on over the broad masses of slaggy lava of
+former years, along which a narrow horse-path had
+been worn; and ever and anon we heard the distant
+booming in the crater at the summit, and caught
+sight of fresh gleams of light as we took some turning
+which brought the glowing peak into view.</p>
+
+<p>Our object was to get as close as possible to the
+newly-opened crater in the mountain-side, and when
+we arrived on a small rugged plain not far from the
+spot, we alighted from our horses, which were growing
+frightened with the glare, and walked some distance
+on foot till we came to a ridge running down the slope,
+and upon this ridge the lava stream was flowing.</p>
+
+<p>Above our heads hung a vast cloud of vapour
+which reflected the bright light from the red-hot
+stream, and threw a pink glow all around, so that,
+where the cloud was broken and we could see the
+dark sky, the stars looked white as silver in contrast.
+We could now trace clearly the outline of the summit
+towering above us, and even watch the showers of
+ashes and dust which burst forth from time to time,
+falling back into the crater, or on to the steep slopes
+of the cone.</p>
+
+<p>If the night had not been calm, and such a breeze
+as there was blowing away from us, our position
+would scarcely have been safe; and indeed we were
+afterwards told we had been rash. But I would
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>
+have faced even a greater risk to see so grand a
+spectacle, and when the guide helped me to scramble
+up on to the ledge, so that I stood with my feet
+within a few yards of the lava flow, my heart bounded
+with excitement. I could not stay more than a few
+seconds, for the gases and vapour choked me; but
+for that short time it felt like a dream to be standing
+close to a river of molten rock, which a few hours before
+had been lying deep in the bowels of the earth.
+Glancing upwards to where this river issued from
+the cone in the mountain-side, I saw it first white-hot,
+then gradually fading to a glowing red as it
+crept past my feet; and then looking down the slope
+I saw it turn black and gloomy as it cooled rapidly
+at the top, while through the cracks which opened
+here and there as it moved on, puffs of gas and
+vapour rose into the air, and the red lava beneath
+gleamed through the chinks.</p>
+
+<p>We did not stay long, for the air was suffocating,
+but took our way back to the Hermitage, where
+another glorious sight awaited us. Some way
+above and behind the hill on which the Observatory
+stands there is, or was, a steep cliff, and over this
+the lava stream, now densely black, fell in its way to
+the valley below, and as it fell it broke into huge
+masses, which heeling over exposed the red-hot lava
+under the crust, thus forming a magnificent fiery
+cascade in which black and red were mingled in wild
+confusion.</p>
+
+<p>This is how I saw a fresh red-hot lava stream.
+I had ascended the mountain some years before,
+when it was comparatively quiet, with only two
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>
+small cones in its central crater sending out miniature
+flows of lava (see Fig. 38). But the crater was too
+hot for me to cross over to these cones, and I could
+only marvel at the mass of ashes of which the top of
+the mountain was composed, and plunge a stick into
+an old lava stream to see how hot it still remained
+below. Peaceful and quiet as the mountain seemed
+then, I could never have imagined such a glorious
+outburst as that of November 1868 unless I had
+seen it, and yet this was quite a small eruption compared
+to those of 1867 and 1872, which in their
+turn were nothing to some of the older eruptions in
+earlier centuries.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 38.</span>
+<img src="images/i_115.jpg" width="600" height="359" alt="Fig. 38.
+
+The top of Vesuvius in 1864. (After Nasmyth.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The top of Vesuvius in 1864. (After Nasmyth.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Now it is the history of this lava stream which I
+saw, that we are going to consider to-day, and you
+will first want to know where it came from, and what
+caused it to break out on the mountain-side. The
+truth is, that though we know now a good deal about
+volcanoes themselves, we know very little about the
+mighty cauldrons deep down in the earth from which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span>
+they come. Our deepest mines only reach to a depth
+of a little more than half a mile, and no borings even
+have been made beyond three-quarters of a mile, so
+that after this depth we are left very much to guesswork.</p>
+
+<p>We do know that the temperature increases as we
+go farther down from the surface, but the increase is
+very different in different districts&mdash;in some places
+being five times greater than it is in others at an
+equal depth, and it is always greatest in localities where
+volcanoes have been active not long before. Now if
+there were an ocean of melted rock at a certain distance
+down below the crust all over the globe, there could
+scarcely be such a great difference between one place
+and another, and for this and many other reasons
+geologists are inclined to think that, from some unknown
+cause, great heat is developed at special points
+below the surface at different times. This would
+account for our finding volcanic rocks in almost all
+parts of the world, even very far away from where
+there are any active volcanoes now.</p>
+
+<p>But, as I have said, we do not clearly know why
+great reservoirs of melted rock occur from time to
+time deep under our feet. We may perhaps one day
+find the clue from the fact that nearly all, if not all,
+volcanoes occur near to the water's edge, either on
+the coast of the great oceans or of some enormous
+inland sea or lake. But at present all we can say is,
+that in certain parts of the globe there must be from
+time to time great masses of rock heated till they
+are white-hot, and having white-hot water mingled
+with them. These great masses need not, however,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>
+be liquid, for we know that under enormous pressure
+white-hot metals remain solid, and water instead of
+flashing into steam is kept liquid, pressing with
+tremendous force upon whatever keeps it confined.</p>
+
+<p>But now suppose that for some reason the mass of
+solid rock and ground above one of these heated
+spots should crack and become weak, or that the
+pressure from below should become so great as to
+be more powerful than the weight above, then the
+white-hot rock and water quivering and panting to
+expand, would upheave and burst the walls of their
+prison. Cannot you picture to yourselves how
+when this happened the rock would swell into a
+liquid state, and how the water would force its way
+upwards into cracks and fissures expanding into
+steam as it went. Then would be heard strange
+rumbling noises underground, as all these heavily
+oppressed white-hot substances upheaved and rent
+the crust above them. And after a time the country
+round, or the ground at the bottom of the sea, would
+quake and tremble, till by and by a way out would
+be found, and the water flashing into vapour would
+break and fling up the masses of rock immediately
+above the passage it had made for itself, and
+following after these would come the molten rock
+pouring out at the new opening.</p>
+
+<p>Such outbursts as these have been seen at sea
+many times near volcanic islands. In 1811 a new
+island called Sabrina was thrown up off St. Michael's
+in the Azores, and after remaining a short time
+was washed away by the waves. In the same way
+Graham's Island appeared off the coast of Sicily in
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>
+1831, and as late as 1885 Mr. Shipley saw a
+magnificent eruption in the Pacific near the Tonga
+Islands when an island about three miles long was
+formed.</p>
+
+<p>Another very extraordinary outburst, this time on
+land, took place in 1538 on the opposite side of the
+Bay of Naples to where Vesuvius stands. There, on
+the shores of the Bay of Bai�, a mountain 440 feet
+high was built up in one week, where all had before been
+quiet in the memory of man. For two years before
+the outburst came, rumblings and earthquakes had
+alarmed the people, and at last one day the sea drew
+back from the shore and the ground sank about fourteen
+feet, and then on the night of Sunday, September
+29, 1538, it was hurled up again, and steam, fiery
+gases, stones, and mud burst forth, driving away the
+frightened people from the village of Puzzuoli about
+two miles distant. For a whole week jets of lava,
+fragments of rock, and showers of ashes were poured
+out, till they formed the hill now called Monte Nuovo,
+440 feet high and measuring a mile and a half round
+the base. And there it has remained till the present
+day, perfectly quiet after the one great outburst had
+calmed down, and is now covered with thickets of
+stone-pine trees.</p>
+
+<p>These sudden outbursts show that some great
+change must occur in the state of the earth's crust
+under the spots where they take place, and we know
+that eruptions may cease for centuries in any particular
+place and then begin afresh quite unexpectedly.
+Vesuvius was a peaceable mountain overgrown with
+trees and vines in the time of the Greeks till in the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span>
+year <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> 79 occurred the terrific outburst which
+destroyed Herculaneum and Pompeii, shattering old
+Vesuvius to pieces, so that only the cliffs on the northwest
+remain and are called Somma (see Fig. 37), while
+the new Vesuvius has grown up in the lap, as it were,
+of its old self. Yet when we visit the cliffs of Somma,
+and examine the old lava streams in them, we see
+that the ancient peaceful mountain was itself built
+up by volcanic outbursts of molten rock, and showers
+of clinkers or scori�, long before man lived to record it.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, when once an opening is made, we
+can understand how after an eruption is over, and
+the steam and lava are exhausted, all quiets down
+for awhile, and the melted rock in the crater of the
+mountain cools and hardens, shutting in once more
+the seething mass below. This was the state of the
+crater when I saw it in 1864, though small streams
+still flowed out of two minute cones; but since then at
+least one great outburst had taken place in 1867,
+and now on this November night, 1868, the imprisoned
+gases rebelled once more and forced their way through
+the mountain-side.</p>
+
+<p>At this point we can leave off forming conjectures
+and really study what happens; for we do know a
+great deal about the structure of volcanoes themselves,
+and the history of a lava-flow has been made very
+clear during the last few years, chiefly by the help of
+the microscope and chemical experiments. If we
+imagine then that on the day of the eruption we
+could have seen the inside of the mountain, the
+diagram (Fig. 39) will fairly represent what was
+taking place there.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 39.</span>
+<img src="images/i_120.jpg" width="600" height="506" alt="Fig. 39.
+
+Diagrammatic section of an active volcano.
+
+a, Central pipe or funnel. b, b, Walls of the crater or cup. c, c, Dark
+turbid cloud formed by the ascending globular clouds d, d. e, Rain-shower
+from escaped vapour. f, f, Shower of blocks, cooled bombs,
+stones, and ashes falling back on to the cone. g, Lava escaping through
+a fissure, and pouring out of a cone opened in the mountain side." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Diagrammatic section of an active volcano.</span>
+
+<p><i>a</i>, Central pipe or funnel. <i>b, b</i>, Walls of the crater or cup. <i>c, c</i>, Dark
+turbid cloud formed by the ascending globular clouds <i>d, d.</i> <i>e</i>, Rain-shower
+from escaped vapour. <i>f, f</i>, Shower of blocks, cooled bombs,
+stones, and ashes falling back on to the cone. <i>g</i>, Lava escaping through
+a fissure, and pouring out of a cone opened in the mountain side.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the funnel <i>a</i> which passes down from the
+crater or cup <i>b, b</i>, white-hot lava was surging up,
+having a large quantity of water and steam entangled
+in it. The lava, or melted rock, would be
+in much the same state as melted iron-slag is, in the
+huge blast-furnaces in which iron-rock is fused, only
+it would have floating in it great blocks of solid
+rock, and rounded stones called bombs which have
+been formed from pieces of half-melted rock
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span>
+whirled in air and falling back into the crater, together
+with clinkers or scori�, dust and sand, all
+torn off and ground down from the walls of the funnel
+up which the rush was coming. And in the
+pipe of melted rock, forcing the lava upwards, enormous
+bubbles of steam and gas <i>d, d</i> would be rising up one
+after another as bubbles rise in any thick boiling
+substances, such as boiling sugar or tar.</p>
+
+<p>In the morning before the eruption, when only a
+little smoke was issuing from the crater, these
+bubbles rose very slowly through the loaded funnel
+and the half-cooled lava in the basin, and the booming
+noise, like that of heavy cannon, heard from time to
+time, was caused by the bursting of one of these
+globes of steam at the top of the funnel, as it brought
+up with it a feeble shower of stones, dust, and
+scori�. Meanwhile the lava surging below was
+forcing a passage <i>g</i> for itself in a weak part of the
+mountain-side and, just at the time when our attention
+was called to Vesuvius, the violent pressure from
+below rent open a mouth or crater at <i>h</i>, so that the
+lava began to flow down the mountain in a steady
+stream. This, relieving the funnel, enabled the
+huge steam bubbles <i>d, d</i> to rise more quickly, and to
+form the large whitish-grey cloud <i>c</i>, into which from
+time to time the red-hot blocks, scori�, and pumice
+were thrown up by the escaping steam and gases.
+These blocks and fragments then fell back again in
+a fiery shower <i>f, f</i> either into the cup, to be thrown up
+again by the bursting of the next bubble, or on to the
+sides of the cone, making it both broader and higher.
+</p>
+
+<p>Only one feature in the diagram was fortunately
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>
+absent the evening we went up, namely, the rain-shower
+<i>e</i>. The night, as I said, was calm, and the air
+dry, and the steam floated peacefully away. The
+next night, however, when many people hurried
+down from Rome to see the sight they were woefully
+disappointed, for rain-showers fell heavily from the
+cloud, bringing down with them the dust and ashes,
+which covered the unfortunate sight-seers.</p>
+
+<p>This was what happened during the eruption, and
+the result after a few days was that the cone was a
+little higher, with a fresh layer of rough slaggy
+scori� on its slopes, and that on the side of the
+mountain behind the Hermitage a new lava stream
+was added to the many which have flowed there of
+late years. What then can we learn from this
+stream about the materials which come up out of
+the depths of the earth, and of the manner in which
+volcanic rocks are formed?</p>
+
+<p>The lava as I saw it when coming first out of
+the newly-opened crater is, as I have said, like white-hot
+iron slag, but very soon the top becomes black
+and solid, a hard cindery mass full of holes and
+cavities with rough edges, caused by the steam and
+sulphur and other gases breaking through it.<a name="FNanchor_1_10" id="FNanchor_1_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_10" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> In
+fact, there are so many holes and bubbles in it that
+it is very light and floats on the top of the heavier
+lava below, falling over it on to the mountain-side
+when it comes to the end of the stream. Still, however,
+the great mass moves on, so that the stream
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>
+slides over these fallen clinkers or scori�. Thus
+after an eruption a new flow consists of three layers; at
+the top the cooled and broken crust of clinkers, then
+the more solid lava, which often remains hot for years,
+and lastly another cindery layer beneath, formed of
+the scori� which have fallen from above (see Fig. 40).</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 40.</span>
+<img src="images/i_123.jpg" width="600" height="203" alt="Fig. 40.
+
+Section of a lava-flow. (J. Geikie.)
+
+1, Slaggy crust, formed chiefly of scori� of a glassy nature. 2, Middle
+portion where crystals form. 3, Slaggy crust which has slipped down and
+been covered by the flow." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Section of a lava-flow. (J. Geikie.)</span>
+
+<p>1, Slaggy crust, formed chiefly of scori� of a glassy nature. 2, Middle
+portion where crystals form. 3, Slaggy crust which has slipped down and
+been covered by the flow.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>You would be surprised to see how quickly the top
+hardens, so that you can actually walk across a
+stream of lava a day or two after it comes out from
+the mountain. But you must not stand still or
+your shoes would soon be burnt, and if you break the
+crust with a stick you will at once see the red-hot
+lava below; while after a few days the cavities become
+filled with crystals of common salt, sulphur or soda,
+as the vapour and gases escape.</p>
+
+<p>Then as time goes on the harder minerals gradually
+crystallise out of the melted mass, and iron-pyrites,
+copper-sulphate, and numerous other forms of
+crystal appear in the lower part of the stream. In
+the clinkers above, where the cooling goes on very
+rapidly, the lavas formed are semi-transparent and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span>
+look much like common bottle-glass. In fact, if you
+take this piece of
+obsidian or volcanic
+glass in your
+hand, you might
+think that it had
+come out of an
+ordinary glass
+manufactory and
+had nothing remarkable
+in it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 41.</span>
+<img src="images/i_124.jpg" width="300" height="286" alt="Fig. 41.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass showing the lines of
+crystallites and microliths which are the beginnings
+of crystals." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A slice of volcanic glass showing the lines of
+crystallites and microliths which are the beginnings
+of crystals. (J. Geikie.)</span><a name="FNanchor_1_11" id="FNanchor_1_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_11" class="fnanchor">[2]</a>
+</div>
+
+<p>But the microscope
+tells another
+tale. I have put
+a thin slice under
+the first microscope,
+and this
+diagram (Fig. 41)
+shows what you will see. Nothing, you say, but
+a few black specks and some tiny dark rods.
+True, but these specks and rods are the first beginnings
+of crystals forming out of the ground-mass
+of glassy lava as it cools down. They are
+not real crystals, but the first step toward them,
+and by a careful examination of glassy lavas
+which have cooled at different rates, they have
+been seen under the microscope in all stages of
+growth, gradually building up different crystalline
+forms. When we remember how rapidly the top
+of many glassy lavas cool down we can understand
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span>
+that they have often only time to grow
+very small.</p>
+
+<p>The smaller specks are called <i>crystallites</i>, the
+rods are called <i>microliths</i>.<a name="FNanchor_1_12" id="FNanchor_1_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_12" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> Under the next microscope
+you can see the microliths much more distinctly
+(Fig. 42) and observe that they grow in very
+regular shapes.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 42.</span>
+<img src="images/i_125.jpg" width="400" height="392" alt="Fig. 42.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass under the microscope,
+showing well-developed microliths. (After
+Cohen.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">A slice of volcanic glass under the microscope,
+showing well-developed microliths. (After
+Cohen.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Our first slice, however (Fig. 41), tells us something
+more of their history, for the fact that they are
+arranged in lines
+shows that they
+have grown while
+the lava was flowing
+and carrying
+them along in
+streams. You
+will notice that
+each one has its
+greatest length in
+the direction of
+the lines, just as
+pieces of stick
+are carried along
+lengthways in a
+river. In the
+second specimen
+(Fig. 42) the microliths are much larger and the
+stream has evidently not been flowing fast, for they
+lie in all directions.</p>
+
+<p>This is what we find in the upper part of the
+stream, but if we look at a piece of underlying lava
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>
+we find that it is much more coarse-grained, and the
+magnifying-glass shows many crystals in it, as well
+as a number of microliths. For this lava, covered
+by the crust above, has remained very hot for a long
+time, and the crystals have had time to build themselves
+up out of the microliths and crystallites.</p>
+
+<p>Still there is much glassy groundwork even in
+these lavas. If we want to find really stony masses
+such as porphyry and granite made up entirely of
+crystals we must look inside the mountain where the
+molten rock is kept intensely hot for long periods, as
+for example in the fissure <i>g</i>, Fig. 39.</p>
+
+<p>Such fissures sometimes open out on the surface
+like the one I saw, and sometimes only penetrate part
+of the way through the hill; but in either case when
+the lava in them cools down, it forms solid walls
+called dykes which help to bind the loose materials
+of the mountain together. We cannot, of course,
+examine these in an active volcano, but there are
+many extinct volcanoes which have been worn and
+washed by the weather for centuries, so that we can
+see the inside. The dykes laid bare in the cliffs of
+Somma are old fissures filled with molten rock which
+has cooled down, and they show us many stony lavas;
+and Mr. Judd tells us of one beautiful example of a
+ruined volcano which composes the whole island of
+Mull in the Hebrides, where such dykes can be
+traced right back to a centre. This centre must
+once have been a mass of melted matter far down
+in the earth, and as you trace the dykes back
+deeper and deeper into it, the rocks grow more and
+more stony, till at last they are composed entirely of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>
+large crystals closely crowded together without any
+glassy matter between them. You know this crystalline
+structure well, for we have
+plenty of blocks of granite
+scattered about on Dartmoor,
+showing that at some time long
+ago molten matter must have
+been at work in the depths
+under Devonshire.</p>
+
+<p>We see then that we can
+trace the melted rock of volcanoes
+right back&mdash;from the
+surface of the lava stream which
+cools quickly at the top, hurrying
+the crystallites and microliths along with it&mdash;down
+through the volcano to the depths of the earth, where
+the perfect crystals form slowly and deliberately in
+the underground lakes of white-hot rock which are
+kept in a melted state at an intense heat.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 299px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 43.</span>
+<img src="images/i_127.jpg" width="299" height="280" alt="Fig. 43.
+
+A piece of Dartmoor Granite,
+drawn from a specimen." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A piece of Dartmoor Granite,
+drawn from a specimen.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>But I promised you that we would have no guesswork
+here, and you will perhaps ask how I can be
+certain what was going on in the depths when
+these crystals were formed. A few years ago I
+could not have answered you, but now chemists, and
+especially two eminent French chemists, MM. Fouqu�
+and Levy, have actually <i>made</i> lavas and shown us
+how it is done in Nature.</p>
+
+<p>By using powerful furnaces and bellows they
+have succeeded in getting temperatures of all degrees,
+from a dazzling white heat down to a dull red, and
+to keep any temperature they like for a long time,
+so as to imitate the state of a mass of melted rock
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>
+at different depths in the earth, and in this way they
+have actually <i>made</i> lavas in their crucibles. For
+example, there is a certain whitish rock common
+in Vesuvius called <i>leucotephrite</i>,<a name="FNanchor_1_13" id="FNanchor_1_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_13" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> which is made
+up chiefly of crystals of the minerals called leucite,
+Labrador felspar, and augite. This they proposed
+to make artificially, so they took proper
+quantities of silica, alumina, oxide of iron, lime,
+potash, and soda, and putting them in a crucible,
+melted them by keeping them at a white heat.
+Then they lowered the temperature to an orange-heat,
+that is a heat sufficient to melt steel. They
+kept this heat for forty-eight hours, after which they
+took out some of the mixture and, letting it cool,
+examined a slice under the microscope. Within it
+they found crystals of <i>leucite</i> already formed, showing
+that these are the first to grow while the melted
+rock is still intensely hot. The rest of the mixture
+they kept red-hot, or at the melting-point of copper,
+for another forty-eight hours, and when they took it
+out and examined it they found that the whole
+of it had been transformed into microliths of the
+two other forms of crystals, Labrador felspar and
+augite, except some small eight-sided crystals of
+magnetite and picotite which are also found in the
+natural rock.</p>
+
+<p>There is no need for you to remember all these
+names. What I do want you to remember is, that, at
+the different temperatures, the right crystals and
+beginnings of crystals grew up to form the rock
+which is found in Vesuvius. And what is still more
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>
+interesting, they grew exactly to the same stages as
+in the natural rock, which is composed of <i>crystals</i>
+of leucite and <i>microliths</i> of the two other minerals.</p>
+
+<p>This is only one among numerous experiments
+by which we have learnt how volcanic rocks are
+formed and at what heat the crystals of different
+substances grow. We are only as yet at the beginning
+of this new study, and there is plenty for you
+boys to do by and by when you grow up. Many
+experiments have failed as yet to imitate certain
+rocks, and it is remarkable that these are usually
+rocks of very ancient eruptions, when <i>perhaps</i> our
+globe may have been in a different state to what it
+is now; but this remains for us to find out.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile I have still another very interesting
+slide to show you which tells us something of what
+is going on below the volcano. Under the third
+microscope I have put a slice of volcanic glass (Fig.
+44) in which you will see really large crystals with
+dark bands curving round them. These crystals have
+clearly not been formed in the glass while the lava
+was flowing, first because they are too large to have
+grown up so rapidly, and secondly because they are
+broken at the edges in places and sometimes partly
+melted. They have evidently come up with the
+lava as it flowed out of the mountain, and the dark
+bands curving round them are composed of microliths
+which have been formed in the flow and have
+swept round them, as floating straws gather round a
+block of wood in a stream.</p>
+
+<p>Such crystals as these are often found in lava
+streams, and in fact they make a great difference in
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>
+the rate at which a stream flows, for a thoroughly
+melted lava shoots along at a great pace and often
+travels several
+miles in a very
+short time; but
+an imperfectly
+melted lava full
+of crystals creeps
+slowly along, and
+often does not
+travel far from
+the crater out of
+which it flows.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 44.</span>
+<img src="images/i_130.jpg" width="400" height="382" alt="Fig. 44.
+
+Slice of volcanic glass under the microscope,
+showing large included crystals brought up
+from inside the volcano in the fluid lava. The
+dark bands are lines of microliths formed as
+the lava cooled. (J. Geikie.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Slice of volcanic glass under the microscope,
+showing large included crystals brought up
+from inside the volcano in the fluid lava. The
+dark bands are lines of microliths formed as
+the lava cooled. (J. Geikie.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>So you see we
+have proof in this
+slice of volcanic
+glass of two
+separate periods
+of crystallisation&mdash;the
+period
+when the large
+crystals grew in the liquid mass under the mountain,
+and the period when the microliths were formed after
+it was poured out above ground. And as we know
+that different substances form their crystals at very
+different temperatures, it is not surprising that some
+should be able to take up the material they require
+and grow in the underground lakes of melted matter,
+even though the rest of the lava was sufficiently
+fluid to be forced up out of the mountain.</p>
+
+<p>And here we must leave our lava stream. The
+microscope can tell us yet more, of marvellous tiny
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>
+cavities inside the crystals, millions in a single inch,
+and of other crystals inside these, all of which have
+their history; but this would lead us too far. We
+must be content for the present with having roughly
+traced a flow of lava from the depths below, where
+large crystals form in subterranean darkness, to the
+open air above, where we catch the tiny beginnings
+of crystals hardened into glassy lava before they have
+time to grow further.</p>
+
+<p>If you will think a little for yourselves about these
+wonderful discoveries made with the magic-glass, you
+will see how many questions they suggest to us about
+the minerals which we find buried in the earth and
+running through it in veins, and you will want to
+know something about the more precious crystals,
+such as rubies, diamonds, sapphires, and garnets, and
+many others which Nature forms far away out of
+our sight. All these depend, though indirectly,
+upon the strange effects of underground heat, and
+if you have once formed a picture in your minds of
+what must have been going on before that magnificent
+lava stream crept down the mountain-side and
+added its small contribution to the surface of the
+earth, you will study eagerly all that comes in your
+way about crystals and minerals, and while you
+ask questions with the spectroscope about what is
+going on in the sun and stars millions of miles away,
+you will also ask the microscope what it has to tell
+of the work going on at depths many miles under
+your feet.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_10" id="Footnote_1_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_10"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> For the cindery nature of the surface of such a stream see the initial
+letter of this chapter.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_11" id="Footnote_1_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_11"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> This arrangement in lines is called <i>fluidal structure</i> in lava.
+</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_12" id="Footnote_1_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_12"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <i>Micros</i>, little; <i>lithos</i>, stone.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_13" id="Footnote_1_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_13"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> <i>Leucos</i>, white; <i>tephra</i>, ashes.</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+<h4>AN HOUR WITH THE SUN</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_132.jpg" width="100" height="129" alt="ornate capital d" title="" />
+</div>
+<p>efore beginning upon
+the subject of our lecture
+to-day I want to tell you
+the story of a great puzzle
+which presented itself to
+me when I was a very
+young child. I happened to
+come across a little book&mdash;I
+can see it now as though it were
+yesterday&mdash;a small square green
+book called <i>World without End</i>,
+which had upon the cover a little
+gilt picture of a stile with trees on each side of
+it. That was all. I do not know what the book
+was about, indeed I am almost sure I never opened
+it or saw it again, but that stile and the title
+"World without End" puzzled me terribly. What was
+on the other side of the stile? If I could cross
+over it and go on and on should I be in a world
+which had no ending, and what would be on the other
+side? But then there could be no other side if it was
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>
+a world without any end. I was very young, you
+must remember, and I grew confused and bewildered
+as I imagined myself reaching onwards and onwards
+beyond that stile and never, never resting. At last
+I consulted my greatest friend, an old man who did
+the weeding in my father's garden, and whom I believed
+to be very wise. He looked at first almost
+as bewildered as I was, but at last light dawned upon
+him. "I tell you what it is, Master Arthur," said
+he, "I do not rightly know what happens when there
+is no end, but I do know that there is a mighty lot
+to be found out in this world, and I'm thinking we
+had better learn first all about that, and perhaps it
+may teach us something which will help us to understand
+the other."</p>
+
+<p>I daresay you will wonder what this anecdote can
+have to do with a lecture on the sun&mdash;I will tell you.
+Last night I stood on the balcony and looked out
+far and farther away into the star-depths of the midnight
+sky, marvelling what could be the history of
+those countless suns of which we see ever more and
+more as we increase the power of our telescopes, or
+catch the faint beams of those we cannot see and
+make them print their image on the photographic
+plate. And, as I grew oppressed at the thought of
+this never-ending expanse of suns and at my own
+littleness, I remembered all at once the little square
+book of my childish days with its gilt stile, and my
+old friend's advice to learn first all we can of that
+which lies nearest.</p>
+
+<p>So to-day, before we travel away to the stars, we
+had better inquire what is known about the one star
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span>
+in the heavens which is comparatively near to us, our
+own glorious sun, which sends us all our light and
+heat, causes all the movements of our atmosphere,
+draws up the moisture from the ground to return in
+refreshing rain, ripens our harvests, awakens the seeds
+and sleeping plants into vigorous growth, and in a
+word sustains all the energy and life upon our earth.
+Yet even this star, which is more than a million times
+as large as our earth, and bound so closely to us
+that a convulsion on its surface sends a thrill right
+through our atmosphere, is still so far off that it is
+only by questioning the sunbeams it sends to us, that
+we can know anything about it.</p>
+
+<p>You have already learnt<a name="FNanchor_1_14" id="FNanchor_1_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_14" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> a good deal as to the
+size, the intense heat and light, and the photographic
+power of the sun, and also how his white beams of
+light are composed of countless coloured rays which
+we can separate in a prism. Now let us pass on to
+the more difficult problem of the nature of the sun
+itself, and what we know of the changes and commotions
+going on in that blazing globe of light.</p>
+
+<p>We will try first what we can see for ourselves.
+If you take a card and make a pin-hole in it, you
+can look through this hole straight at the sun without
+injuring your eye, and you will see a round shining
+disc on which, perhaps, you may detect a few
+dark spots. Then if you take your hand telescopes,
+which I have shaded by putting a piece of smoked
+glass inside the eye-piece, you will find that this
+shining disc is really a round globe, and moreover,
+although the object-glass of your telescopes measures
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span>
+only two-and-a-half inches across, you will be able to
+see the dark spots very distinctly and to observe that
+they are shaded, having a deep spot in the centre
+with a paler shadow round it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 45.</span>
+<img src="images/i_135.jpg" width="600" height="478" alt="Fig. 45.
+
+Face of the sun projected on a sheet of cardboard C.
+T, Telescope. f, Finder. og, Object-glass. ep, Eye-piece. S, Screen
+shutting off the diffused light from the window." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Face of the sun projected on a sheet of cardboard C.</span>
+<p>T, Telescope. <i>f</i>, Finder. <i>og</i>, Object-glass. <i>ep</i>, Eye-piece. S, Screen
+shutting off the diffused light from the window.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>As, however, you cannot all use the telescopes, and
+those who can will find it difficult to point them truly
+on to the sun, we will adopt still another plan. I
+will turn the object-glass of my portable telescope
+full upon the sun's face, and bringing a large piece
+of cardboard on an easel near to the other end,
+draw it slowly backward till the eye-piece forms a
+clear sharp image upon it (see Fig. 45). This you
+can all see clearly, especially as I have passed the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>
+eye-piece of the telescope through a large screen <i>s</i>,
+which shuts off the light from the window.</p>
+
+<p>You have now an exact image of the face of the
+sun and the few dark spots which are upon it, and
+we have brought, as it were, into our room that great
+globe of light and heat which sustains all the life
+and vigour upon our earth.</p>
+
+<p>This small image can, however, tell us very little.
+Let us next see what photography can show us.
+The diagram (Fig. 46) shows a photograph of the sun
+taken by Mr. Selwyn in October 1860. Let me
+describe how this is done. You will remember that
+there is a point in the telescope tube where the rays
+of light form a real image of the object at which the
+telescope is pointed (see p. 44). Now an astronomer
+who wishes to take a photograph of the sun takes
+away the eye-piece of his telescope and puts a
+photographic plate in the tube exactly at the place
+where this real image is formed. He takes care to
+blacken the frame of the plate and shuts up this end
+of the telescope and the plate in a completely dark
+box, so that no diffused light from outside can
+reach it. Then he turns his telescope upon the sun
+that it may print its image.</p>
+
+<p>But the sun's light is so strong that even in a second
+of time it would print a great deal too much, and all
+would be black and confused. To prevent this he has
+a strip of metal which slides across the tube of the
+telescope in front of the plate, and in the upper part
+of this strip a very fine slit is cut. Before he begins,
+he draws the metal up so that the slit is outside the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>
+tube and the solid portion within, and he fastens it
+in this position by a thread drawn through and tied
+to a bar outside. Then he turns his telescope on the
+sun, and as soon as he wishes to take the photograph
+he cuts the thread. The metal slides across the
+tube with a flash, the slit passing across it and out
+again below in the hundredth part of a second, and
+in that time the sun has printed through the slit the
+picture before you.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 509px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 46.</span>
+<img src="images/i_137.jpg" width="509" height="426" alt="Fig. 46.
+
+Photograph of the face of the sun, taken by Mr. Selwyn, October 1860,
+showing spots, facul�, and mottled surface." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Photograph of the face of the sun, taken by Mr. Selwyn, October 1860,
+showing spots, facul�, and mottled surface.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>In it you will observe at least two things not
+visible on our card-image. The spots, though in a
+different position from where we see them to-day,
+look much the same, but round them we see also
+some bright streaks called <i>facul�</i>, or torches, which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>
+often appear in any region where a spot is forming,
+while the whole face of the sun appears mottled with
+bright and darker spaces intermixed. Those of you
+who have the telescopes can see this mottling quite
+distinctly through them if you look at the sun. The
+bright points have been called by many names, and
+are now generally known as "light granules," as good
+a name, perhaps, as any other.</p>
+
+<p>This is all our photograph can tell us, but the
+round disc there shown, which is called the <i>photosphere</i>,
+or light-giving sphere, is by no means the whole of
+the sun, though it is all we see daily with the naked
+eye. Whenever a total eclipse of the sun takes place&mdash;by
+the dark body of the moon coming between us
+and it, so as to shut out the whole of this disc&mdash;a
+brilliant white halo, called the crown or <i>corona</i>, is seen
+to extend for many thousands of miles all round the
+darkened globe. It varies very much in shape, sometimes
+forming a kind of irregular square, sometimes
+a circle with off-shoots, as in Fig. 47, which shows
+what Major Tennant saw in India during the total
+eclipse of August 18, 1868, and at other times it
+shoots out in long pearly white jets and sheets of
+light with dark spaces between. On the whole it
+varies periodically. At the time of few sun-spots its
+extensions are equatorial; but when the sun's face is
+much covered with spots, they are diagonal, stretching
+away from the spot-zones, but not nearly so far.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 542px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 47.</span>
+<img src="images/i_139.jpg" width="542" height="545" alt="Fig. 47.
+
+Total eclipse of the sun, as drawn by Major Tennant at Guntoor in India,
+August 18, 1868, showing corona and the protuberances seen at the
+beginning of totality." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Total eclipse of the sun, as drawn by Major Tennant at Guntoor in India,
+August 18, 1868, showing corona and the protuberances seen at the
+beginning of totality.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>And besides this corona there are seen very
+curious flaming projections on the edge of the sun,
+which begin to appear as soon as the moon covers
+the bright disc. In our diagram (Fig. 47) you see them
+on the left side where the moon is just creeping over
+the limits of the photosphere and shutting out the
+strong light of the sun as the eclipse becomes total.
+A very little later they are better seen on the other
+side just before the bright edge of the sun is uncovered
+as the moon passes on its way. These projections
+in the real sun are of a bright red colour, and
+they take on all manners of strange shapes, sometimes
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span>
+looking like ranges of fiery hills, sometimes like
+gigantic spikes and scimitars, sometimes even like
+branching fiery trees. They were called <i>prominences</i>
+before their nature was well understood, and will probably
+always keep that name. It would be far better,
+however, if some other name such as "glowing
+clouds" or "red jets" could be used, for there is now
+no doubt that they are jets of gases, chiefly hydrogen,
+constantly playing over the face of the sun, though
+only seen when his brighter light is quenched. They
+have been found to shoot up 20,000, 80,000, and even
+as much as 350,000 miles beyond the edge of the
+shining disc; and this last means that the flames were
+so gigantic that if they had started from our earth
+they would have reached beyond the moon. We shall
+see presently that astronomers are now able by the help
+of the spectroscope to see the prominences even
+when there is no eclipse, and we know them to be
+permanent parts of the bright globe.</p>
+
+<p>This gives us at last the whole of the sun, so far
+as we know. There is, indeed, a strange faint
+zodiacal light, a kind of pearly glow seen after sunset
+or before sunrise extending far beyond the region
+of the corona; but we understand so little about this
+that we cannot be sure that it actually belongs to
+the sun.</p>
+
+<p>And now how shall I best give you an idea of
+what little we do know about this great surging
+monster of light and heat which shines down upon
+us? You must give me all your attention, for I want
+to make the facts quite clear, that you may take a
+firm hold upon them.
+</p>
+
+<p>Our first step is to question the sunlight which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span>
+comes to us; and this we do with the spectroscope.
+Let me remind you how we read the story of light
+through this instrument. Taking in a narrow beam
+of light through a fine slit, we pass the beam through
+a lens to make the rays parallel, and then throw it
+upon a prism or row of prisms, so that each set of
+waves of coloured light coming through the slit is
+bent on its own road and makes an upright image
+of the slit on any screen or telescope put to receive
+it (see Fig. 21, p. 52). Now when the light we
+examine comes from a glowing solid, like white-hot
+iron, or a glowing liquid, or a gas under such enormous
+pressure that it behaves like a liquid, then the images
+of the slit always overlap each other, so that we see a
+continuous unbroken band of colour. However much
+you spread out the light you can never break up or
+separate the spectrum in any part.<a name="FNanchor_1_15" id="FNanchor_1_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_15" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> But when
+you send the light, of a glowing gas such as
+hydrogen through the spectroscope, or of a substance
+melted into gas or vapour, such as sodium or iron
+vaporised by great heat, then it is a different story.
+Such gases give only a certain number of bright
+lines quite separate from each other on the dark background,
+and each kind of gas gives its own peculiar
+lines; so that even when several are glowing together
+there is no confusion, but when you look at them
+through the spectroscope you can detect the presence
+of each gas by its own lines in the spectrum.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="Plate_I" id="Plate_I"></a>
+<p style='text-align: right'> Plate I.</p>
+<img src="images/i_143.jpg" width="600" height="405" alt="TABLE OF SPECTRA.    Plate I." title="" />
+<span class="caption">TABLE OF SPECTRA.</span>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>To make quite sure of this we will close the
+shutters and put a pinch of salt in a spirit-flame.
+Salt is chloride of sodium, and in the flame the sodium
+glows with a bright yellow light. Look at this light
+through your small direct-vision spectroscopes<a name="FNanchor_1_16" id="FNanchor_1_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_16" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> and
+you see at once the bright yellow double-line of sodium
+(No. 3, Plate I.) start into view across the faint continuous
+spectrum given by the spirit-flame. Next
+I will show you glowing hydrogen. I have here a
+glass tube containing hydrogen, so arranged that
+by connecting two wires fastened to it with the induction
+coil of our electric battery it will soon glow
+with a bright red colour. Look at this through your
+spectroscopes and you will see three bright lines, one
+red, one greenish blue, and one indigo blue, standing
+out on the dark background (No. 4, Plate I.)</p>
+
+<p>Think for a moment what a grand power this
+gives you of reading as in a book the different gases
+which are glowing in the sky even billions of miles
+away. You would never mistake the lines of hydrogen
+for the line of sodium, but when looking at a
+nebula or any mass of glowing gas you could say at
+once "sodium is glowing there," or "that cloud must
+be composed of hydrogen."</p>
+
+<p>Now, opening the shutters, look at the sunlight
+through your spectroscopes. Here you have something
+different from either the continuous spectrum of
+solids, or the bright separate lines of gases, for while
+you have a bright-coloured band you have also some
+dark lines crossing it (No. 2, Plate I.) It is those
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span>
+dark lines which enable us to guess what is going on
+in the sun before the light comes to us. In 1859
+Professor Kirchhoff made an experiment which explained
+those dark lines, and we will repeat it now.
+Take a good look at the sunlight spectrum, to fix
+the lines in your memory, and then close the shutters
+again.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 48.</span>
+<img src="images/i_145.jpg" width="600" height="486" alt="Fig. 48.
+
+Kirchhoff&#39;s experiment, explaining the dark lines in sunlight.
+
+A, Limelight dispersed through a prism. s, Slit through
+which the beam of light comes. l, Lens bringing it to a focus
+on the prism p. sp, Continuous spectrum thrown on the wall.
+B, The same light, with the flame f containing glowing sodium
+placed in front of it. D, Dark sodium line appearing in the
+spectrum." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Kirchhoff&#39;s experiment, explaining the dark lines in sunlight.</span>
+
+<p>A, Limelight dispersed through a prism. <i>s</i>, Slit through
+which the beam of light comes. <i>l</i>, Lens bringing it to a focus
+on the prism <i>p</i>. <i>sp</i>, Continuous spectrum thrown on the wall.
+B, The same light, with the flame <i>f</i> containing glowing sodium
+placed in front of it. D, Dark sodium line appearing in the
+spectrum.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>I have here our magic-lantern with its lime-light,
+in which the solid lime glows with a white heat, in
+consequence of the jets of oxygen and hydrogen
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>
+burning round it. This was the light Kirchhoff used,
+and you know it will give a continuous bright band
+in the spectroscope. I put a cap with a narrow slit
+in it over the lantern tube, so as to get a narrow
+beam of light; in front of this I put a lens <i>l</i>, and in
+front of this again the prism <i>p</i>. The slit and the
+prism act exactly like your spectroscopes, and you
+can all see the continuous spectrum on the screen
+(<i>sp</i>, A, Fig. 48). Next I put a lighted lamp of very
+weak spirit in front of the slit, and find that it
+makes no difference, for whatever light it gives only
+strengthens the spectrum. But now notice carefully.
+I am going to put a little salt into the flame, and
+you would expect that the sodium in it, when turned
+to glowing vapour, causing it to look yellow, would
+strengthen the yellow part of the spectrum and give
+a bright line. This is what Kirchhoff expected, but
+to his intense surprise he saw as you do now a <i>dark
+line</i> D start out where the bright line should have
+been.</p>
+
+<p>What can have happened? It is this. The oxyhydrogen
+light is very hot indeed, the spirit flame with
+the sodium is comparatively weak and cool. So when
+those special coloured waves of the oxyhydrogen light
+which agree with those of the sodium light reached
+the flame, they spent all their energy in heating up
+those waves to their own temperature, and while all
+the other coloured rays travelled on and reached the
+screen, these waves were stopped or <i>absorbed</i> on the
+way, and consequently there was a blank, black space
+in the spectrum where they should have been. If I
+could put a hydrogen flame cooler than the original
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>
+light in the road, then there would be three dark lines
+where the bright hydrogen lines should be, and so
+with every other gas. <i>The cool vapour in front of
+the hot light cuts off from the white ray exactly those
+waves which it gives out itself when burning.</i></p>
+
+<p>Thus each black line of the sun-spectrum (No. 2,
+Plate I.), tells us that some particular ray of sunlight
+has been absorbed by a cooler vapour <i>of its own kind</i>
+somewhere between the sun and us, and it must be
+in the sun itself, for when we examine other stars we
+often find dark lines in their spectrum different from
+those in the sun, and this shows that the missing rays
+must have been stopped close at home, for if they were
+stopped in our atmosphere they would all be alike.</p>
+
+<p>There are, by the bye, some lines which we know
+are caused by our atmosphere, especially when
+it is full of invisible water vapour, and these we
+easily detect, because they show more distinctly when
+the sun is low and shines through a thicker layer of
+air than when he is high up and shines through less.</p>
+
+<p>But to return to the sun. In your small spectroscopes
+you see very few dark lines, but in larger and
+more perfect ones they can be counted by thousands,
+and can be compared with the bright lines of glowing
+gases burnt here on earth. In the spectrum of
+glowing iron vapour 460 lines are found to agree
+with dark lines in the sun-spectrum, and other gases
+have nearly as many. Still, though thousands of
+lines can now be explained, by matching them with
+the bright lines of known gases, the whole secret
+of sunlight is not yet solved, for the larger number
+of lines still remain a riddle to be read.
+</p>
+
+<p>We see then that the spectroscope teaches us that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>
+the round light-giving disc or photosphere of the sun
+consists of a bright and intensely hot light shining
+behind a layer of cooler though still very hot vapours,
+which form a kind of shell of luminous clouds around it,
+and in this shell, or <i>reversing layer</i>&mdash;as it is often
+called, because it turns light to darkness&mdash;we have
+proved that iron, lead, copper, zinc, aluminum, magnesium,
+potassium, sodium, carbon, hydrogen, and many
+other substances common to our earth, exist in a
+state of vapour for a depth of perhaps 1000 miles.</p>
+
+<p>You will easily understand that when the spectroscope
+had told so much, astronomers were eager to
+learn what it would reveal about the prominences
+or red jets seen during eclipses, and they got an
+answer in India during that same eclipse of August
+1868 which is shown in our diagram (Fig. 47).
+Making use of the time during which the prominences
+were seen, they turned the telescope upon them with
+a spectroscope attached to it, and saw a number of
+bright lines start out, of which the chief were the
+three bright lines of hydrogen, showing that these
+curious appearances are really flames of glowing gas.</p>
+
+<p>In the same year Professor Jannsen and Mr.
+Lockyer succeeded in seeing the bright lines of the
+prominences in full sunlight. This was done in a very
+simple way, when once it was discovered to be possible,
+and though my apparatus (Fig. 49) is very primitive
+compared with some now made, it will serve to explain
+the method.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 49.</span>
+<img src="images/i_149.jpg" width="600" height="701" alt="Fig. 49.
+
+The spectroscope attached to the telescope for the examination
+of the sun. (Lockyer.)
+
+P, Pillar of Telescope. T, Telescope. S, Finder or small
+telescope for pointing the telescope in position. a, a, b, Supports
+fastening the spectroscope to the telescope. d, Collimator or tube
+carrying the slit at the end nearest the telescope, and a lens at the
+other end to render the rays parallel. c, Plate on which the prisms
+are fixed. e, Small telescope through which the observer examines
+the spectrum after the ray has been dispersed in the prisms. h,
+Micrometer for measuring the relative distance of the lines." title="" />
+<span class="caption">The spectroscope attached to the telescope for the examination
+of the sun. (Lockyer.)</span>
+
+<p>P, Pillar of Telescope. T, Telescope. S, Finder or small
+telescope for pointing the telescope in position. <i>a</i>, <i>a</i>, <i>b</i>, Supports
+fastening the spectroscope to the telescope. <i>d</i>, Collimator or tube
+carrying the slit at the end nearest the telescope, and a lens at the
+other end to render the rays parallel. <i>c</i>, Plate on which the prisms
+are fixed. <i>e</i>, Small telescope through which the observer examines
+the spectrum after the ray has been dispersed in the prisms. <i>h</i>,
+Micrometer for measuring the relative distance of the lines.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>When an astronomer wishes to examine the
+spectrum of any special part of the sun, he takes off
+the eye-piece of his telescope and screws the spectroscope
+upon the draw-tube. The spectroscope is
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span>
+made exactly like the large one for ordinary work.
+The tube <i>d</i> (Fig. 49) carries the slit at the end
+nearest the telescope, and this slit must be so
+placed as to stand precisely at the principal focus
+of the lens where the sun's image is formed (see <i>i</i>, <i>i</i>,
+p. 44). This comes to exactly the same thing
+as if we could put the slit close against the face
+of the sun, so as to show only the small strip
+which it covers, and by moving it to one part or
+another of the image we can see any point that we
+wish and no other. The light then passes through
+the tube <i>d</i> into the round of prisms standing on the
+tray <i>c</i>, and the observer looking through the small
+telescope <i>e</i> sees the spectrum as it emerges from the
+last prism. In this way astronomers can examine
+the spectrum of a spot, or part of a spot, or of a
+bright streak, or any other mark on the sun's
+face.</p>
+
+<p>Now in looking at the prominences we have seen
+that the difficulty is caused by the sunlight, between
+us and them, overpowering the bright lines of the
+gas, nor could we overcome this if it were not for a
+difference which exists between the two kinds of light.
+The more you disperse or spread out the continuous
+sun-spectrum the fainter it becomes, but in spreading
+out the bright lines of the gas you only send them
+farther and farther apart; they themselves remain
+almost as bright as ever. So, when the telescope
+forms an image of the red flame in front of the slit,
+though the glowing gas and the sunlight both send
+rays into the spectroscope, you have only to use
+enough prisms and arrange them in such a way that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>
+the sunlight is dispersed into a very long faint spectrum,
+and then the bright lines of the flames will
+stand out bright and clear. Of course only a small part
+of the long spectrum can be seen at once, and the lines
+must be studied separately. On the other hand, if
+you want to compare the strong light of the sun with
+the bright lines of the prominences, you place the slit
+just at the edge of the sun's image in the telescope,
+so that half the slit is on the sun's face and half on
+the prominence. The prisms then disperse the sunlight
+between you and the prominences, while they
+only lessen the strong light of the sun itself, which still
+shows clearly. In this way the two spectra are seen
+side by side and the dark and bright lines can be
+compared accurately together (see Fig. 50).</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 589px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 50.<br />
+
+Bright lines of prominences.</span>
+<img src="images/i_151.jpg" width="589" height="185" alt="Fig. 50.
+
+Bright lines of prominences.
+
+Sun-spectrum with dark lines." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Sun-spectrum with dark lines.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Wherever the telescope is turned all round the
+sun the lines of luminous gas are seen, showing that
+they form a complete layer outside the photosphere,
+or light-giving mass, of the sun. This layer of
+luminous gases is called the <i>chromosphere</i>, or coloured
+sphere. It lies between the photosphere and the corona,
+and is supposed to be at least 5000 miles deep, while,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span>
+as we have seen, the flames shoot up from it to
+fabulous heights.</p>
+
+<p>The quiet red flames are found to be composed
+of hydrogen and another new metal called helium;
+but lower down, near the sun's edge, other bright lines
+are seen, showing that sodium, magnesium, and other
+metals are there, and when violent eruptions occur
+these often surge up and mingle with the purer gas
+above. At other times the eruptions below fling the
+red flames aloft with marvellous force, as when Professor
+Young saw a long low-lying cloud of hydrogen,
+100,000 miles long, blown into shreds and flung up
+to a height of 200,000 miles, when the fragments
+streamed away and vanished in two hours. Yet all
+these violent commotions and storms are unseen by
+us on earth unless we look through our magic glasses.</p>
+
+<p>You will wonder no doubt how the spectroscope
+can show the height and the shape of the flames. I
+will explain to you, and I hope to show them you
+one day. You must remember that the telescope
+makes a small real image of the flame at its focus,
+just as in one of our earlier experiments you saw the
+exact image of the candle-flame upside down on the
+paper (see p. 33). The reason why we only see a strip
+of the flame in the spectroscope is because the slit is so
+narrow. But when once the sunlight was dispersed
+so as no longer to interfere, Dr. Huggins found that
+it is possible to open the slit wide enough to take
+in the image of the whole flame, and then, by turning
+the spectroscope so as to bring one of the bright
+hydrogen lines into view, the actual shape of the
+prominence is seen, only it will look a different
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span>
+colour, either red, greenish-blue, or indigo-blue,
+according to the line chosen. As the image of the
+whole sun and its appendages in the telescope is so very
+small, you will understand that even a very narrow slit
+will really take in a very large prominence several
+thousand miles in length. Fig 51 shows a drawing
+by Mr. Lockyer of a group of flames he observed
+very soon after Dr. Huggins suggested the open slit,
+and these shapes did not last long, for in another
+picture he drew ten minutes later their appearance
+had already changed.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 565px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 51.</span>
+<img src="images/i_153.jpg" width="565" height="564" alt="Fig. 51.
+
+Red prominences, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer during the
+total eclipse of March 14, 1869." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Red prominences, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer during the
+total eclipse of March 14, 1869.</span>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>These then are some of the facts revealed to us
+by our magic glasses. I scarcely expect you to
+remember all the details I have given you, but you
+will at least understand now how astronomers
+actually penetrate into the secrets of the sun by
+bringing its image into their observatory, as we
+brought it to-day on the card-board, and then making
+it tell its own tale through the prisms of the spectroscope;
+and you will retain some idea of the central
+light of the sun with its surrounding atmosphere of
+cooler gases and its layer of luminous lambent gases
+playing round it beyond.</p>
+
+<p>Of the corona I cannot tell you much, except
+that it is far more subtle than anything we have
+spoken of yet; that it is always strongest when the
+sun is most spotted; that it is partly made up of self-luminous
+gases whose bright lines we can see,
+especially an unknown green ray; while it also shines
+partly by reflected light from the sun, for we can
+trace in it faint dark lines; lastly it fades away into
+the mysterious zodiacal light, and so the sun ends in
+mystery at its outer fringe as it began at its centre.</p>
+
+<p>And now at last, having learnt something of the
+material of the sun, we can come back to the spots
+and ask what is known about them. As I have
+said, they are not always the same on the sun's face.
+On the contrary, they vary very much both in number
+and size. In some years the sun's face is quite free
+from them, at others there are so many that they form
+two wide belts on each side of the sun's equator, with
+a clear space of about six degrees between. No spots
+ever appear near the poles. Herr Schwabe, who
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>
+watched the sun's face patiently for more than thirty
+years, has shown that it is most spotted about every
+eleven years, then the spots disappear very quickly
+and reappear slowly till the full-spot time comes round
+again.</p>
+
+<p>Some spots remain a very short time and then
+break up and disappear, but others last for days,
+weeks, and even months, and when we watch these,
+we find that a spot appears to travel slowly across
+the face of the sun from east to west and then round
+the western edge so that it disappears. It is when it
+reaches the edge that we can convince ourselves
+that the spot is really part of the sun, for there is no
+space to be seen between them, the edge and the
+spot are one, as the last trace of the dark blotch
+passes out of sight. In fact, it is not the spot which
+has crossed the sun's face, but the sun itself which
+has turned, like our earth, upon its axis, carrying the
+spot round with it. As some spots remain long
+enough to reappear, after about twelve or thirteen days,
+on the opposite edge, and even pass round two or three
+times, astronomers can reckon that the sun takes
+about twenty-five days and five hours in performing
+one revolution. You will wonder why I say only
+<i>about</i> twenty-five, but I do so because all spots do
+not come round in exactly the same time, those
+farthest from the equator lag rather more than a
+day behind those nearer to it, and this is explained
+by the layer of gases in which they are formed,
+drifting back in higher latitudes as the sun turns.</p>
+
+<p>It is by watching a spot as it travels across the
+sun, that we are able to observe that the centre part
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>
+lies deeper in the sun's face than the outer rim.
+There are many ways of testing this, and you can
+try one yourselves with a telescope if you watch
+day after day. I will explain it by a simple experiment.
+I have here a round lump of stiff dough,
+in which I have made a small hollow and blackened
+the bottom with a drop of ink. As I turn this round,
+so that the hollow facing you moves from right to
+left, you will see that after it passes the middle of
+the face, the hole appears narrower and narrower till
+it disappears, and if you observe carefully you will note
+that the dark centre is the first thing you lose sight
+of, while the edges of the cup are still seen, till just
+before the spot disappears altogether. But now I
+will stick a wafer on, and a pea half into, the dough,
+marking the centre of each with ink. Then I turn
+the ball again. This time you lose sight of the
+foremost edge first, and the dark centre is seen
+almost to the last moment. This shows that if the
+spots were either flat marks, or hillocks, on the sun's
+face, the dark centre would remain to the last, but
+as a fact it disappears before the rim. Father Secchi
+has tried to measure the depth of a spot-cavity, and
+thinks they vary from 1000 to 3000 miles deep.
+But there are many difficulties in interpreting the
+effects of light and shadow at such an enormous
+distance, and some astronomers still doubt whether
+spots are really depressions.</p>
+
+<p>For many centuries now the spots have been watched
+forming and dispersing, and this is roughly speaking
+what is seen to happen. When the sun is fairly
+clear and there are few spots, these generally form
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>
+quietly, several black dots appearing and disappearing
+with bright streaks or <i>facul�</i> round their edge,
+till one grows bigger than the rest, and forms a large
+dark nucleus, round which, after a time, a half-shadow
+or <i>penumbra</i> is seen and we have a sun-spot complete,
+with bright edges, dark shadow, and deep black
+centre (Fig. 52). This lasts for a certain time and
+then it becomes bridged over with light streaks, the
+dark spot breaks up and disappears, and last of all
+the half-shadow dies away.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 551px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 52.</span>
+<img src="images/i_157.jpg" width="551" height="463" alt="Fig. 52.
+
+A quiet sun-spot. (Secchi.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">A quiet sun-spot. (Secchi.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>But things do not always take place so quietly.
+When the sun's face is very troubled and full of
+spots, the bright <i>facul�</i>, which appear with a spot,
+seem to heave and wave, and generally several dark
+centres form with whirling masses of light round
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>
+them, while in some of them tongues of fire appear
+to leap up from below (Fig. 53). Such spots change
+quickly from day to day, even if they remain for a
+long time, until at last by degrees the dark centres
+become less distinct, the half-shadows disappear,
+leaving only the bright streaks, which gradually settle
+down into luminous points or <i>light granules</i>. These
+light granules are in fact supposed by astronomers to
+be the tips of glowing clouds heaving up everywhere,
+while the dark spaces between them are cooler
+currents passing downwards.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 53.</span>
+<img src="images/i_158.jpg" width="600" height="536" alt="Fig. 53.
+
+A tumultuous sun-spot. (Langley.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">A tumultuous sun-spot. (Langley.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Below these clouds, no doubt, the great mass of
+the sun is in a violent state of heat and commotion,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span>
+and when from time to time, whether suddenly or
+steadily, great upheavals and eruptions take place,
+bright flames dart up and luminous clouds gather and
+swell, so that long streaks or <i>facul�</i> surge upon the
+face of the sun.</p>
+
+<p>Now these hot gases rising up thus on all sides
+would leave room below for cooler gases to pour
+down from above, and these, as we know, would
+cut off, or absorb, much of the light coming from
+the body of the sun, so that the centre, where
+the down current was the strongest, would appear
+black even though some light would pass through.
+This is the best explanation we have as yet of the
+formation of a sun-spot, and many facts shown in the
+spectroscope help to confirm it, as for example the
+thickening of the dark lines of the spectrum when
+the slit is placed over the centre of a spot, and the
+flashing out of bright lines when an uprush of
+streaks occurs either across the spots or round it.</p>
+
+<p>And now, before you go, I must tell you of one
+of these wonderful uprushes, which sent such a thrill
+through our own atmosphere, as to tell us very
+plainly the power which the sun has over our globe.
+The year 1859 was remarkable for sun-spots, and on
+September 1, when two astronomers many miles
+apart were examining them, they both saw, all at
+once, a sudden cloud of light far brighter than the
+general surface of the sun burst out in the midst of
+a group of spots. The outburst began at eight minutes
+past eleven in the forenoon, and in five minutes it
+was gone again, but in that time it had swept across
+a space of 35,000 miles on the sun! Now both
+before and after this violent outburst took place a
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>
+magnetic storm raged all round the earth, brilliant
+auroras were seen in all parts of the world, sparks
+flashed from the telegraph wires, and the telegraphic
+signalmen at Washington and Philadelphia received
+severe electric shocks. Messages were interrupted,
+for the storm took possession of the wires and sent
+messages of its own, the magnetic needles darting to
+and fro as though seized with madness. At the
+very instant when the bright outburst was seen in
+the sun, the self-registering instruments at Kew
+marked how three needles jerked all at once wildly
+aside; and the following night the skies were lit up
+with wondrous lights as the storm of electric agitation
+played round the earth.</p>
+
+<p>We are so accustomed to the steady glow of sunshine
+pouring down upon us that we pay very little
+heed to daylight, though I hope none of us are quite
+so ignorant as the man who praised the moon above
+the sun, because it shone in the dark night, whereas
+the sun came in the daytime when there was light
+enough already! Yet probably many of us do not
+actually realise how close are the links which bind
+us to our brilliant star as he carries us along with
+him through space. It is only when an unusual outburst
+occurs, such as I have just described, that we
+feel how every thrill which passes through our atmosphere,
+through the life-current of every plant, and
+through the fibre and nerve of every animal has some
+relation to the huge source of light, heat, electricity,
+and magnetism at which we are now gazing across a
+space of more than 93,000,000 miles. Yet it is well
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>
+to remember that the sudden storm and the violent
+eruption are the exceptional occurrences, and that
+their use to us as students is chiefly to lead us to
+understand the steady and constant thrill which,
+never ceasing, never faltering, fulfils the great purpose
+of the unseen Lawgiver in sustaining all movement
+and life in our little world.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_14" id="Footnote_1_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_14"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>Fairyland of Science</i>, Chapter II.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_15" id="Footnote_1_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_15"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Two rare earths, Erbia and Didymium, form an exception to this,
+but they do not concern us here.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_16" id="Footnote_1_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_16"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> A direct-vision spectroscope is like a small telescope with prisms
+arranged inside the tube. The object-glass end is covered by two
+pieces of metal, which slide backwards and forwards by means of a
+screw, so that a narrow or broad slit can be opened.</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+<h4>AN EVENING AMONG THE STARS</h4>
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_162.jpg" width="100" height="121" alt="ornate capital d" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>o you love the stars?" asked
+the magician of his lads, as
+they crowded round him
+on the college green, one
+evening in March, to look
+through his portable telescope.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you ever sat at the
+window on a clear frosty night,
+or in the garden in summer,
+and looked up at those wondrous
+lights in the sky, pondering what
+they are, and what purpose they serve?"</p>
+
+<p>I will confess to you that when I lived in London
+I did not think much about the stars, for in the
+streets very few can be seen at a time even on a
+clear night; and during the long evenings in summer,
+when town people visit the country, you must stay
+up late to see a brilliant display of starlight. It is
+when driving or walking across country on a winter's
+evening week after week, and looking all round the
+sky, that the glorious suns of heaven force you to
+take notice of them; and Orion becomes a companion
+with his seven brilliant stars and his magnificent
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span>
+nebula, which appears as a small pale blue
+patch, to eyes accustomed to look for it, when the
+night is very bright and clear. It is then that
+Charles's Wain becomes quite a study in all its
+different positions, its horses now careering upwards,
+now plunging downwards, while the waggon, whether
+upwards or downwards, points ever true, by the two
+stars of its tail-board, to the steadfast pole-star.</p>
+
+<p>It is on such nights as these that, looking southward
+from Orion, we recognise the dog-star Sirius, bright
+long before other stars have conquered the twilight,
+and feast our eye upon his glorious white beams;
+and then, turning northwards, are startled by the soft
+lustrous sheen of Vega just appearing above the
+horizon.</p>
+
+<p>But stop, I must remember that I have not yet
+introduced you to these groups of stars; and moreover
+that, though we shall find them now in the positions
+I mention, yet if you look for them a few hours later
+to-night, or at the same hour later in the year, you
+will not find them in the same places in the sky.
+For as our earth turns daily on its axis, the stars
+<i>appear</i> to alter their position hour by hour, and in
+the same way as we travel yearly on our journey
+round the sun, they <i>appear</i> to move in the sky month
+by month. Yet with a little practice it is easy to
+recognise the principal stars, for, as it is our movement
+and not theirs which makes us see them in
+different parts of the sky, they always remain in the
+same position with regard to each other. In a very
+short time, with the help of such a book as Proctor's
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span>
+<i>Star Atlas</i>; you could pick out all the chief constellations
+and most conspicuous stars for yourselves.</p>
+
+<p>One of the best ways is to take note of the stars
+each night as they creep out one by one after sunset.
+If you take your place at the window to-morrow
+night as the twilight fades away, you will see them
+gradually appear, now in one part, now in another of
+the sky, as</p>
+
+<p class="footnote">
+"One by one each little star<br />
+Sits on its golden throne."<br />
+</p>
+
+<p>The first to appear will be Sirius or the dog-star
+(see Fig. 54), that pure white star which you can
+observe now rather low down to the south, and
+which belongs to the constellation <i>Canis Major</i>.
+As Sirius is one of the most brilliant stars in
+the sky, he can be seen very soon after the sun
+is gone at this time of year. If, however, you had
+any doubt as to what star he was, you would not
+doubt long, for in a little while two beautiful stars
+start into view above him more to the west, and
+between them three smaller ones in a close row,
+forming the cross in the constellation of Orion,
+which is always very easy to recognise. Now the
+three stars of Orion's belt which make the short
+piece of the cross always point to Sirius, while
+Betelgeux in his right shoulder, and Rigel in his
+left foot (see Figs. 54 and 55), complete the long
+piece, and these all show very early in the twilight.
+You would have to wait longer for the other two
+leading stars, Bellatrix in the right shoulder and
+&#954; Orionis in the right leg, for these stars are feebler
+and only seen when the light has faded quite away.
+</p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 54.</span>
+<img src="images/i_165.jpg" width="600" height="365" alt="Fig. 54.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking south in March from six to nine o&#39;clock." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Some of the constellations seen when looking south in March from six to nine o&#39;clock.</span>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>By that time you would see that there are an immense
+number of stars in Orion visible even to the
+naked eye, besides the veil of misty, tiny stars called the
+"Milky Way" which passes over his arm and club.
+Yet the figure of the huntsman is very difficult to trace,
+and the seven bright stars, the five of the cross and
+those in the left arm and knee, are all you need remember.</p>
+
+<p>No! not altogether all, for on a bright clear night
+like this you can detect
+a faint greenish blue
+patch (N, Fig. 54) just
+below the belt, and
+having a bright star in
+the centre. This is
+called the "Great Nebula"
+or mist of Orion
+(see Frontispiece). With
+your telescopes it looks
+very small indeed, for
+only the central and
+brightest part is seen.
+Really, however, it is
+so widespread that our
+whole solar system is as
+nothing compared to it.
+But even your telescopes
+will show, somewhere
+near the centre, what appears to be a bright and very
+beautiful star (see Fig. 55) surrounded by a darker
+space than the rest of the nebula, while in my telescope
+you will see many stars scattered over the mist.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 55.</span>
+<img src="images/i_166.jpg" width="300" height="427" alt="Fig. 55.
+
+Chief stars of Orion, with Aldebaran.
+(After Proctor.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Chief stars of Orion, with Aldebaran.<br />
+(After Proctor.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Now first let me tell you that these last stars do
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>
+not, so far as we know, lie <i>in</i> the nebula, but are
+scattered about in the heavens between us and
+it, perhaps millions of miles nearer our earth. But
+with the bright star in the centre it is different,
+for the spectroscope tells us that the mist passes
+<i>over</i> it, so that it is either
+behind or in the nebula.
+Moreover, this star is very
+interesting, for it is not
+really one star, but six
+arranged in a group (see
+Fig. 56). You can see
+four distinctly through my
+telescope, forming a trapezium
+or four-sided figure,
+and more powerful instruments
+show two smaller
+ones. So &#952; Orionis, or the
+Trapezium of Orion, is a
+multiple star, probably lying in the midst of the
+nebula.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 56.</span>
+<img src="images/i_167.jpg" width="300" height="303" alt="Fig. 56.
+
+The trapezium, &#952; Orionis, in the
+nebula of Orion. (Herschel.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The trapezium, &#952; Orionis, in the
+nebula of Orion. (Herschel.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>The next question is, What is the mist itself
+composed of? For a long time telescopes could give
+us no answer. At last one night Lord Rosse, looking
+through his giant telescope at the densest part of the
+nebula, saw myriads of minute stars which had never
+been seen before. "Then," you will say, "it is after all
+only a cluster of stars too small for our telescopes
+to distinguish." Wait a bit; it is always dangerous
+to draw hasty conclusions from single observations.
+What Lord Rosse said was true as to that particular
+part of the nebula, but not the whole truth even
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>
+there, and not at all true of other parts, as the
+spectroscope tells us.</p>
+
+<p>For though the light of nebul�, or luminous mists,
+is so faint that a spectrum can only be got by most
+delicate operations, yet Dr. Huggins has succeeded
+in examining several. Among these is the nebula
+of Orion, and we now know that when the light of
+the mist is spread out it gives, not a continuous band
+of colour such as would be given by stars, but <i>faint
+coloured lines</i> on a dark ground (see Fig. 57). Such
+lines as these we have already learnt are always
+given by gases, and the particular bright lines thrown
+by Orion's nebula answer to those given by nitrogen
+and hydrogen, and some other unknown gases. So
+we learn at last that the true mist of the nebula is
+formed of glowing gas, while parts have probably a
+great number of minute stars in them.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 57.<br />
+
+Nebula-spectrum.</span>
+<img src="images/i_168.jpg" width="600" height="158" alt="Fig. 57.
+
+Nebula-spectrum.
+
+Sun-spectrum.
+
+Spectrum of Orion&#39;s Nebula, showing bright lines, with sun-spectrum
+below for comparison." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Sun-spectrum.<br />
+
+Spectrum of Orion&#39;s Nebula, showing bright lines, with sun-spectrum
+below for comparison.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Till within a very short time ago only those people
+who had access to very powerful telescopes could
+see the real appearance of Orion, for drawings made
+of it were necessarily very imperfect; but now that
+telescopes have been made expressly for carrying
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>
+photographic appliances, even these faint mists print
+their own image for us. In 1880 Professor Draper
+of America photographed the nebula of Orion, in
+March 1881 Mr. Common got a still better effect,
+and last year Mr. Isaac Roberts succeeded in taking
+the most perfect and beautiful photograph<a name="FNanchor_1_17" id="FNanchor_1_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_17" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> yet
+obtained, in which the true beauty of this wonderful
+mist stands out clearly. I have marked on the edge
+of our copy two points &#952; and &#952;�, and if you follow
+out straight lines from these points till they meet,
+you will arrive at the spot where the multiple star
+lies. It cannot, however, be seen here, because the
+plate was exposed for three hours and a half, and
+after a time the mist prints itself so densely as to
+smother the light of the stars. Look well at this
+photograph when you go indoors and fix it on your
+memory, and then on clear nights accustom your eye
+to find the nebula below the three stars of the belt,
+for it tells a wonderful story.</p>
+
+<p>More than a hundred years ago the great
+German philosopher Kant suggested that our
+sun, our earth, and all the heavenly bodies might
+have begun as gases, and the astronomer Laplace
+taught this as the most likely history of their
+formation. After a few years, however, when powerful
+telescopes showed that many of the nebul�
+were only clusters of very minute stars, astronomers
+thought that Laplace's teaching had been wrong.
+But now the spectroscope has revealed to us glowing
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>gas actually filling large spaces in the sky, and every
+year accurate observations and experiments tell us
+more and more about these marvellous distant mists.
+Some day, though perhaps not while you or I are
+here to know it, Orion's nebula, with its glowing gas
+and minute star-dust, may give some clue to the
+early history of the heavenly bodies; and for this
+reason I wish you to recognise and ponder over it, as
+I have often done, when it shines down on the rugged
+moor in the stillness of a clear frosty winter's night.</p>
+
+<p>But we must pass on for, while I have been talking,
+the whole sky has become bespangled with
+hundreds of stars. That glorious one to the west,
+which you can find by following (Fig. 54) a curved
+line upwards from Betelgeux, is the beautiful red star
+Aldebaran or the hindmost; so called by the Arabs,
+because he drives before him that well-known cluster,
+the Pleiades, which we reach by continuing the curve
+westwards and upwards. Stop to look at this cluster
+through your telescopes, for it will delight you; even
+with the naked eye you can count from six to ten
+stars in it, and an opera-glass will show about thirty,
+though they are so scattered you will have to
+move the glass about to find them. Yet though my
+telescope shows a great many more, you cannot even
+count all the chief ones through it, for in powerful
+telescopes more than 600 stars have been seen in the
+single cluster! while a photograph taken by Mr.
+Roberts shows also four lovely patches of nebula.</p>
+
+<p>And now from the Pleiades let us pass on directly
+overhead to the beautiful star Capella, which once
+was red but now is blue, and drop down gently to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>
+the south-east, where Castor and Pollux, the two most
+prominent stars in the constellation "Gemini" or
+the twins, show brilliantly against the black sky.
+Pause here a moment, for I want to tell you something
+about Castor, the one nearest to Capella. If
+you look at Castor through your telescopes, some of
+you may possibly guess that it is really two stars, but
+you will have to look through mine to see it clearly.
+These two stars have been watched carefully for
+many years, and there is now no doubt that one of
+them is moving slowly round the other. Such stars
+as these are called "binary," to distinguish them from
+stars that merely <i>appear</i> double because they stand
+nearly in a line one behind the other in the heavens,
+although they may be millions of miles apart. But
+"binary" stars are actually moving in one system,
+and revolve round each other as our earth moves
+round the sun.</p>
+
+<p>I wonder if it strikes you what a grand discovery
+this is? You will remember that it is gravitation
+which keeps the moon held to the earth so that it
+moves round in a circle, and which keeps the earth
+and other planets moving round the sun. But till
+these binary stars were discovered we had no means
+of guessing that this law had any force beyond our
+own solar system. Now, however, we learn that the
+same law and order which reigns in our small group
+of planets is in action billions of miles away among
+distant suns, so that they are held together and move
+round each other as our earth moves round our sun.
+I will repeat to you what Sir R. Ball, the Astronomer-Royal
+of Ireland, says about this, for his words
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>
+have remained in my mind ever since I read them,
+and I should like them to linger in yours till you
+are old enough to feel their force and grandeur.
+"This discovery," he writes, "gave us knowledge we
+could have gained from no other source. From the
+binary stars came a whisper across the vast abyss of
+space. That whisper told us that the law of gravitation
+is not peculiar to the solar system. It gives
+us grounds for believing that it is obeyed throughout
+the length, the breadth, the depth, and the height of
+the entire universe."<a name="FNanchor_1_18" id="FNanchor_1_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_18" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 58.</span>
+<img src="images/i_173.jpg" width="600" height="378" alt="Fig. 58.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking north in March from six to nine o&#39;clock." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Some of the constellations seen when looking north in March from six to nine o&#39;clock.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>And now, leaving Castor and going round to the
+east, we pass through the constellation Leo or the
+Lion, and I want you particularly to notice six stars
+in the shape of a sickle, which form the front part of
+the lion, the brightest, called Regulus, being the end
+of the handle.<a name="FNanchor_2_19" id="FNanchor_2_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_19" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> This sickle is very interesting,
+because it marks the part of the heavens from which
+the brilliant shower of November meteors radiates
+once in thirty-three years. This is, however, too
+long a story to be told to-night, so we will pass
+through Leo, and turning northwards, look high up
+in the north-east (Fig. 58), where "Charles's Wain"
+stretches far across the sky. I need not point this
+out to you, for every country lad knows and delights
+in it. You could not have seen it in the twilight
+when Sirius first shone out, for these stars are not so
+powerful as he is. But they come out very soon
+after him, and when once fairly bright, the four stars
+which form the waggon, wider at the top than at the
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>
+bottom, can never be mistaken, and the three stars in
+front, the last bending below the others, are just in
+the right position for the horses. For this reason I
+prefer the country people's name of Charles's Wain or
+Waggon to that of the "Plough," which astronomers
+generally give to these seven stars. They really
+form part of an enormous constellation called the
+"Great Bear" (Fig. 59), but, as in the case of Orion,
+it is very difficult to make out the whole of Bruin
+in the sky.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 59.</span>
+<img src="images/i_174.jpg" width="600" height="400" alt="Fig. 59.
+
+The Great Bear, showing the position of Charles&#39;s Wain, and also
+the small binary star &#958; in the hind foot, whose period
+has been determined." title="" />
+<span class="caption">The Great Bear, showing the position of Charles&#39;s Wain, and also
+the small binary star &#958; in the hind foot, whose period
+has been determined.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Now, although most people know Charles's Wain
+when they see it, we may still learn a good deal
+about it. Look carefully at the second star from
+the waggon and you will see another star close to it,
+called by country people "Jack by the second horse,"
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span>
+and by astronomers "Alcor." Even in your small
+telescopes you can see that Jack or Alcor is not so
+close as he appears to the naked eye, but a long way
+off from the horse, while in my telescope you will
+find this second horse (called Mizar) split up into two
+stars, one a brilliant white and the other a pale
+emerald green. We do not know whether these two
+form a binary, for they have not yet been observed
+to move round each other.</p>
+
+<p>Take care in looking that you do not confuse the
+stars one with another, for you must remember that
+your telescope makes objects appear upside down,
+and Alcor will therefore appear in it <i>below</i> the two
+stars forming the horse.</p>
+
+<p>But though we do not know whether Mizar is
+binary, there is a little star a long way below the
+waggon, in the left hind paw of the Great Bear (&#958;, Figs.
+58 and 59), which has taught us a great deal, for it
+is composed of two stars, one white and the other
+grey, which move right round each other once in
+sixty years, so that astronomers have observed more
+than one revolution since powerful telescopes were
+invented. You will have to look in my telescope to
+see the two stars divided, but you can make an
+interesting observation for yourselves by comparing
+the light of this binary star with the light of Castor,
+for Castor is such an immense distance from us that
+his light takes more than a hundred years to reach
+us, while the light of this smaller star comes in sixty-one
+years, yet see how incomparably brighter Castor
+is of the two. This proves that brilliant stars are
+not always the nearest, but that a near star may
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span>
+be small and faint and a far-off one large and
+bright.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 578px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 60.</span>
+<img src="images/i_176.jpg" width="578" height="253" alt="Fig. 60.
+
+The seven stars of Charles&#39;s Wain, showing the directions in which they
+are travelling. (After Proctor.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption">The seven stars of Charles&#39;s Wain, showing the directions in which they
+are travelling. (After Proctor.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>There is another very interesting fact known to us
+about Charles's Wain which I should like you to
+remember when you look at it. This is that the
+seven stars are travelling onwards in the sky, and not
+all in the same direction. It was already suspected
+centuries ago that, besides the <i>apparent</i> motion of
+all the stars in the heavens caused by our own
+movements, they have each also a <i>real</i> motion and
+are travelling in space, though they are so inconceivably
+far off that we do not notice it. It
+has now been proved, by very accurate observations
+with powerful instruments, that three of
+the stars forming the waggon and the two horses
+nearest to it, together with Jack, are drifting forwards
+(see Fig. 60), while the top star of the tailboard of
+the waggon and the leader of the horses are drifting
+the other way. Thus, thousands of years hence
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span>
+Charles's Wain will most likely have quite altered its
+shape, though so very slowly that each generation
+will think it is unchanged.</p>
+
+<p>One more experiment with Charles's Wain, before
+we leave it, will help you to imagine the endless
+millions of stars which fill the universe. Look up at
+the waggon and try to count how many stars you
+can see inside it with the naked eye. You may, if
+your eye is keen, be able to count twelve. Now
+take an opera-glass and the twelve become two hundred.
+With your telescopes they will increase again in
+number. In my telescope upstairs the two hundred
+become hundreds, while in one of the giant telescopes,
+such as Lord Rosse's in Ireland, or the great telescope
+at Washington in the United States, thousands of stars
+are brought into view within that four-sided space!</p>
+
+<p>Now this part of the sky is not fuller of stars than
+many others; yet at first, looking up as any one might
+on a clear evening, we thought only twelve were
+there. Cast your eyes all round the heavens. On a
+clear night like this you may perhaps, with the naked
+eye, have in view about 3000 stars; then consider
+that a powerful telescope can multiply these
+by thousands upon thousands, so that we can reckon
+about 20,000,000 where you see only 3000. If
+you add to these the stars that rise later at night,
+and those of the southern hemisphere which never
+rise in our latitude, you would have in all about
+50,000,000 stars, which we are able to see from our
+tiny world through our most powerful telescopes.</p>
+
+<p>But we can go farther yet. When our telescopes
+fail, we turn to our other magic seer, the photographic
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>
+camera, and trapping rays of light from stars invisible
+in the most powerful telescope, make them print their
+image on the photographic plate, and at once our
+numbers are so enormously increased that if we could
+photograph the whole of the heavens as visible from
+our earth, we should have impressions of at least
+170,000,000 stars!</p>
+
+<p>These numbers are so difficult to grasp that we
+had better pass on to something easier, and our next
+step brings us to the one star in the heavens which
+never appears to move, as our world turns. To find
+it we have only to draw a line upwards through the
+two stars in the tailboard of the waggon and on into
+space. Indeed these two stars are called "the
+Pointers," because a line prolonged onwards from
+them will, with a very slight curve, bring us to the
+"Pole-star" (see Fig. 58). This star, though not one of
+the largest, is important, because it is very near that
+spot in the sky towards which the North Pole of our
+earth points. The consequence is, that though all the
+other stars appear to move in a circle round the heavens,
+and to be in different places at different seasons, this
+star remains always in the same place, only appearing
+to describe a very tiny circle in the sky round the
+exact spot to which our North Pole points.</p>
+
+<p>Month after month and year after year it shines
+exactly over that thatched cottage yonder, which you
+see now immediately below it; and wherever you are
+in the northern hemisphere, if you once note a certain
+tree, or chimney, or steeple which points upwards to
+the Pole-star, it will guide you to it at any hour on
+any night of the year, though the other constellations
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>
+will be now on one side, now on the other
+side of it.</p>
+
+<p>The Pole-star is really the front horse of a small
+imitation of Charles's Wain, which, however, has never
+been called by any special name, but only part of the
+"Little Bear." Those two hind stars of the tiny
+waggon, which are so much the brightest, are called
+the "Guards," because they appear to move in a
+circle round the Pole-star night after night and year
+after year like sentries.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 640px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 61.</span>
+<img src="images/i_179.jpg" width="600" height="371" alt="Fig. 61.
+
+The constellation of Cassiopeia, and the heavenly bodies which
+can be found by means of it." title="" /><br />
+<span class="caption">The constellation of Cassiopeia, and the heavenly bodies which
+can be found by means of it.<a name="FNanchor_1_20" id="FNanchor_1_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_20" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Opposite to them, on the farther side of the Pole-star,
+is a well-marked constellation, a widespread W
+written in the sky by five large stars; the second V
+of the W has rather a longer point than the first, and
+as we see it now the letter is almost upside down (see Fig. 58).</p>
+
+<p>These are the five brightest stars in the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span>
+constellation Cassiopeia, with a sixth not quite so
+bright in the third stroke of the W. You can never
+miss them when you have once seen them, even
+though they lie in the midst of a dense layer of the
+stars of the Milky Way, and if you have any difficulty
+at first, you have only to look as far on the one
+side of the Pole-star as the top hind star of Charles's
+Wain is on the other, and you must find them. I
+want to use them to-night chiefly as guides to find
+two remarkable objects which I hope you will look at
+again and again. The first is a small round misty
+patch not easy to see, but which you will find by
+following out the <i>second</i> stroke of the first V of the
+W. Beginning at the top, and following the line to
+the point of the V, continue on across the sky, and
+then search with your telescope till you catch a
+glimpse of this faint mist (<i>c</i>, Fig. 58; star-cluster,
+Fig. 61). You will see at once that it is sparkling
+all over with stars, for in fact you have actually before
+you in that tiny cluster more stars than you can see
+with the naked eye all over the heavens! Think for
+a moment what this means. One faint misty spot
+in the constellation Perseus, which we should have
+passed over unheeded without a telescope, proves to
+be a group of more than 3000 suns!</p>
+
+<p>The second object you will find more easily, for it
+is larger and brighter, and appears as a faint dull spot
+to the naked eye. Going back to Cassiopeia, follow
+out the <i>second</i> V in the W from the top to the point
+of the V and onwards till your eye rests upon this
+misty cloud, which is called the Great Nebula of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span>
+Andromeda, and has sometimes been mistaken for a
+comet (Figs. 58 and 61). You will, however, be
+disappointed when you look through the telescope,
+for it will still only appear a mist, and you will be
+able to make nothing of it, except that instead of
+being of an irregular shape like Orion, it is elliptical;
+and in a powerful telescope two dark rifts can be
+seen separating the streams of nebulous matter.
+These rifts are now shown in a photograph taken by
+Mr. Roberts, 1st October 1888, to be two vast dusky
+rings lying between the spiral stream of light, which
+winds in an ellipse till it ends in a small nucleus at
+the centre.</p>
+
+<p>Ah! you will say, this must be a cloud of gas like
+Orion's nebula, only winding round and round.
+No! the spectroscope steps in here and tells us that
+the light shows something very much like a continuous
+spectrum, but not as long as it ought to be
+at the red end. Now, since gases give only bright
+lines, this nebula cannot be entirely gaseous. Then
+it must be made of stars too far off to see? If so,
+it is very strange that though it is so dense and
+bright in some parts, and so spread out and clear in
+others, the most powerful telescopes cannot break it
+up into stars. In fact, the composition of the great
+nebula of Andromeda is still a mystery, and remains
+for one of you boys to study when he has become a
+great astronomer.</p>
+
+<p>Still one more strange star we will notice before
+we leave this part of the heavens. You will find it,
+or at least go very near it, by continuing northwards
+the line you drew from Cassiopeia to the Star
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span>
+Cluster (<i>c</i>, Fig. 58), and as it is a bright star, you
+will not miss it. That is to say, it is bright to-night
+and will remain so till to-morrow night, but if you
+come to me about nine o'clock to-morrow evening I
+will show you that it is growing dim, and if we had
+patience to watch through the night we should find,
+three or four hours later still, that it looks like one of
+the smaller stars. Then it will begin to brighten
+again, and in four hours more will be as bright as at first.
+It will remain so for nearly three days, or, to speak
+accurately, 2 days, 20 hours, 48 minutes, and 55
+seconds, and then will begin to grow dull again.
+This star is called Algol the Variable. There are
+several such stars in the heavens, and we do not
+know why they vary, unless perhaps some dark globe
+passes round them, cutting off part of their light for
+a time.</p>
+
+<p>And now, if your eyes are not weary, let us go
+back to the Pole-star and draw a line from it straight
+down the horizon due north. Shortly before we arrive
+there you will see a very brilliant bluish-white star a
+little to the east of this line. This is Vega, one of
+the brightest stars in the heavens except Sirius. It
+had not risen in the earlier part of the evening, but
+now it is well up and will appear to go on, steadily
+mounting as it circles round the Pole-star, till at four
+o'clock to-morrow morning it will be right overhead
+towards the south.</p>
+
+<p>But beautiful as Vega is, a still more interesting
+star lies close to it (see Fig. 58). This small star,
+called &#951; Lyr� by astronomers, looks a little longer in
+one direction than in the other, and even with the naked
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span>
+eye some people can see a division in the middle dividing
+it into two stars. Your telescopes will show them
+easily, and a powerful telescope
+tells a wonderful
+story, for it reveals that
+each of these two stars is
+again composed of two
+stars, so that &#951; Lyr� (Fig.
+62) is really a double-double
+star. There is no
+doubt that each pair is a
+binary star, that is, the two
+stars move round each other
+very slowly, and possibly
+both pairs may also revolve
+round a common centre.
+There are at least 10,000
+double stars in the heavens; though, as we have
+seen, they are not all binary. The list of binary
+stars, however, increases every year as they are
+carefully examined, and probably about one star
+in three over the whole sky is made up of more
+than one sun.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 62.</span>
+<img src="images/i_183.jpg" width="300" height="290" alt="Fig. 62.
+
+&#951; Lyr�. A double-binary star.
+Each couple revolves, and
+the couples probably also revolve
+round each other. (After
+Chambers.)" title="" />
+<p>&#951; Lyr�. A double-binary star.
+Each couple revolves, and
+the couples probably also revolve
+round each other. (After
+Chambers.)</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Let us turn the telescope for a short time
+upon a few of the double stars and we shall
+have a great treat, for one of the most interesting
+facts about them is that both stars are rarely
+of the same colour. It seems strange at first to
+speak of stars as coloured, but they do not by
+any means all give out the same kind of light.
+Our sun is yellow, and so are the Pole-star and
+Pollux; but Sirius, Vega, and Regulus are dazzling
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>
+white or bluish-white, Arcturus is a yellowish-white,
+Aldebaran is a bright yellow-red, Betelgeux a deep
+orange-red, as you may see now in the telescope, for
+he is full in view; while Antares, a star in the constellation
+of the Scorpion, which at this time of year
+cannot be seen till four in the morning, is an intense
+ruby red.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<a name="Plate_II" id="Plate_II"></a>
+<p style='text-align: right'><i>Plate II.</i></p>
+<img src="images/i_185.jpg" width="600" height="976" alt="Plate II.
+
+COLOURED DOUBLE STARS.
+
+Illustration: &#947; Andromed�.
+
+Illustration: &#949; Bo�tis.
+
+Illustration: &#948; Geminorum.
+
+Illustration: &#945; Herculis.
+
+Illustration: &#946; Cygni.
+
+Illustration: &#951; Cassiopei�" title="" />
+<span class="caption">COLOURED DOUBLE STARS.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>It appears to be almost a rule with double stars
+to be of two colours. Look up at Almach (&#947; Andromed�),
+a bright star standing next to Algol the
+Variable in the sweep of four bright stars behind
+Cassiopeia (see Fig. 58). Even to the naked eye he
+appears to flash in a strange way, and in the telescope
+he appears as two lovely stars, one a deep orange and
+the other a pale green, while in powerful telescopes
+the green one splits again into two (Plate II.) Then
+again, &#951; Cassiope�, the sixth star lying between the
+two large ones in the second V of Cassiopeia, divides
+into a yellow star and a small rich purple one, and
+&#948; Geminorum, a bright star not far from Pollux in the
+constellation Gemini, is composed of a large green
+star and a small purple one. Another very famous
+double star (&#946; Cygni), which rises only a little later
+in the evening, lies below Vega a little to the left.
+It is composed of two lovely stars; one an orange
+yellow and the other blue; while &#949; Bo�tis, just
+visible above the horizon, is composed of a large
+yellow star and a very small green one.<a name="FNanchor_1_21" id="FNanchor_1_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_21" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p>
+
+<p>There are many other stars of two colours even
+among the few constellations we have picked out to-night,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>
+as, for example, the star at the top of the tailboard
+of Charles's Waggon and the second horse Mizar.
+Rigel in Orion, and the two outer stars of the belt,
+&#945; Herculis, which will rise later in the evening, and
+the beautiful triple star (&#950; Cancer) near the Beehive
+(see Fig. 54), are all composed of two or more stars
+of different colours.</p>
+
+<p>Why do these suns give out such beautiful coloured
+light? The telescope cannot tell us, but the spectroscope
+again reveals the secrets so long hidden from
+us. By a series of very delicate experiments, Dr.
+Huggins has shown that the light of all stars is sifted
+before it comes to us, just as the light of our sun is;
+and those rays which are least cut off play most
+strongly on our eyes, and give the colour to the star.
+The question is a difficult one but I will try to give
+you some idea of it, that you may form some picture
+in your mind of what happens.</p>
+
+<p>We learnt in our last lecture (p. 131) that the light
+from our sun passes through the great atmosphere of
+vapours surrounding him before it goes out into space,
+and that many rays are in this way cut off; so that
+when we spread out his light in a long spectrum
+there are dark lines or spaces where no light falls.<a name="FNanchor_1_22" id="FNanchor_1_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_22" class="fnanchor">[6]</a>
+Now in sunlight these dark lines are scattered pretty
+evenly over the spectrum, so that about as much light
+is cut off in one part as in another, and no one
+colour is stronger than the rest.</p>
+
+<p>Dr. Huggins found, however, that in coloured stars
+the dark spaces are often crowded into particular
+parts of the long band of colour forming the spectrum;
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>
+showing that many of those light-rays have been cut
+off in the atmosphere round the star, and thus their
+particular colours are dimmed, leaving the other colour
+or colours more vivid. In red stars, for example, the
+yellow, blue, and green parts of the spectrum are
+much lined while the red end is strong and clear.
+With blue stars it is just the opposite, and the violet
+end is most free from dark lines. So there are
+really brilliantly coloured suns shining in the heavens,
+and in many cases two or more of these revolve round
+each other.</p>
+
+<p>And now I have kept your attention and strained
+your eyes long enough, and you have objects to
+study for many a long evening before you will learn
+to see them plainly. You must not expect to find
+them every night, for the lightest cloud or the
+faintest moonlight will hide many of them from view;
+and, moreover, though you may learn to use the
+telescope fairly, you will often not know how to get
+a clear view with it. Still, you may learn a great
+deal, and before we go in I want to put a thought
+into your minds which will make astronomy still
+more interesting. We have seen that the stronger
+our telescopes the more stars, star-clusters, and
+nebul� we see, and we cannot doubt that there are
+still countless heavenly bodies quite unknown to us.
+Some years ago Bessel the astronomer found
+that Sirius, in its real motion through the heavens,
+moves irregularly, travelling sometimes a little more
+slowly than at other times, and he suggested that
+some unseen companion must be pulling at him.</p>
+
+<p>Twenty-eight years later, in 1862, two celebrated
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>
+opticians, father and son, both named Alvan Clark,
+were trying a new telescope at Chicago University,
+when suddenly the son, who was looking at Sirius,
+exclaimed, "Why, father, the star has a companion!"
+And so it was. The powerful telescope showed
+what Bessel had foretold, and proved Sirius to be
+a "binary" star&mdash;that is, as we have seen, a star
+which has another moving round it.</p>
+
+<p>It has since been proved that this companion is
+twenty-eight times farther from Sirius than we are
+from our sun, and moves round him in about forty-nine
+years. It is seven times as heavy as our sun,
+and yet gives out so little light that only the keenest
+telescopes can bring it into view.</p>
+
+<p>Now if such a large body as this can give so very
+faint a light that we can scarcely see it, though
+Sirius, which is close to it, shines brightest of any star
+in the heavens, how many more bodies must there be
+which we shall never see, even among those which
+give out light, while how many there are dark like
+our earth, who can tell?</p>
+
+<p>Now that we know each of the stars to be a
+brilliant sun, many of them far, far brighter than
+ours, yet so like in their nature and laws, we can
+scarcely help speculating whether round these glorious
+suns, worlds of some kind may not be moving. If
+so, and there are people in them, what a strange effect
+those double coloured suns must produce with red
+daylight one day and blue daylight another!</p>
+
+<p>Surely, as we look up at the myriads of stars
+bespangling the sky, and remember that our star-sun
+has seven planets moving round it of which one at
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>
+least&mdash;our own earth&mdash;is full of living beings, we must
+picture these glorious suns as the centres of unseen
+systems, so that those twinkling specks become as
+suggestive as the faint lights of a great fleet far out
+at sea, which tell us of mighty ships, together with
+frigates and gunboats, full of living beings, though we
+cannot see them, nor even guess what they may be like.
+How insignificant we feel when we look upon that
+starlit sky and remember that the whole of our solar
+system would be but a tiny speck of light if seen as
+far off as we see the stars! If our little earth and
+our short life upon it were all we could boast of we
+should be mites indeed.</p>
+
+<p>But our very study to-night lifts us above these
+and reminds us that there is a spirit within us
+which even now can travel beyond the narrow
+bounds of our globe, measure the vast distances
+between us and the stars, gauge their brightness,
+estimate their weight, and discern their movements.
+As we gaze into the depths of the starlit sky,
+and travel onwards and onwards in imagination
+to those distant stars which photography alone
+reveals to us, do not our hearts leap at the thought
+of a day which must surely come when, fettered and
+bound no longer to earth, this spirit shall wander
+forth and penetrate some of the mystery of those
+mighty suns at which we now gaze in silent awe.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_17" id="Footnote_1_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_17"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Reproduced in the Frontispiece with Mr. Roberts's kind permission.
+The star-halo at the top of the plate is caused by diffraction
+of light in the telescope, and comes only from an ordinary star.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_18" id="Footnote_1_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_18"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <i>The Story of the Heavens.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_19" id="Footnote_2_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_19"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> In Fig. 54 the sickle alone comes within the picture.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_20" id="Footnote_1_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_20"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> For Almach see Fig. 58, it has been accidentally omitted from
+this figure.
+</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_21" id="Footnote_1_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_21"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> The plate of coloured stars has been most kindly drawn to scale
+and coloured for me by Mr. Arthur Cottam, F.R.A.S.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_22" id="Footnote_1_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_22"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> See No. 1 in Table of Spectra, Plate I.</p></div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+<h4>LITTLE BEINGS FROM A MINIATURE OCEAN</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_191.jpg" width="100" height="122" alt="ornate capital i" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>n our last lecture we soared
+far away into boundless
+space, and lost ourselves
+for a time among seen
+and unseen suns. In this
+lecture we will come back
+not merely to our little world,
+nor even to one of the widespread
+oceans which cover so much of it,
+but to one single pool lying just
+above the limits of low tide, so
+that it is only uncovered for a very
+short time every day. This pool is to be found in a
+secluded bay within an hour's journey by train from
+this college, and only a few miles from Torquay.
+It has no name, so far as I know, nor do many people
+visit it, otherwise I should not have kept my little
+pool so long undisturbed. As it is, however, for many
+years past I have had only to make sure as to the
+time of low tide, and put myself in the train; and then,
+unless the sea was very rough and stormy, I could
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span>
+examine the little inhabitants of my miniature ocean
+in peace.</p>
+
+<p>The pool lies in a deep hollow among a group of
+rocks and boulders, close to the entrance of the cove,
+which can only be entered at low water; it does not
+measure more than two feet across, so that you can
+step over it, if you take care not to slip on the
+masses of green and brown seaweed growing over
+the rocks on its sides, as I have done many a time
+when collecting specimens for our salt-water aquarium.
+I find now the only way is to lie flat down on the
+rock, so that my hands and eyes are free to observe
+and handle, and then, bringing my eye down to the
+edge of the pool, to lift the seaweeds and let the
+sunlight enter into the chinks and crannies. In this way
+I can catch sight of many a small being either on the
+seaweed or the rocky ledges, and even creatures
+transparent as glass become visible by the thin outline
+gleaming in the sunlight. Then I pluck a piece
+of seaweed, or chip off a fragment of rock with a
+sharp-edged collecting knife, bringing away the specimen
+uninjured upon it, and place it carefully in its
+own separate bottle to be carried home alive and
+well.</p>
+
+<p>Now though this little pool and I are old friends,
+I find new treasures in it almost every time I go,
+for it is almost as full of living things as the heavens
+are of stars, and the tide as it comes and goes brings
+many a mother there to find a safe home for her
+little ones, and many a waif and stray to seek shelter
+from the troublous life of the open ocean.</p>
+
+<p>You will perhaps find it difficult to believe that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>
+in this rock-bound basin there can be millions of
+living creatures hidden away among the fine feathery
+weeds; yet so it is. Not that they are always the
+same. At one time it may be the home of myriads
+of infant crabs, not an eighth of an inch long, at
+another of baby sea-urchins only visible to the
+naked eye as minute spots in the water, at another
+of young jelly-fish growing on their tiny stalks, and
+splitting off one by one as transparent bells to float
+away with the rising tide. Or it may be that the
+whelk has chosen this quiet nook to deposit her
+leathery eggs; or young barnacles, periwinkles, and
+limpets are growing up among the green and brown
+tangles, while the far-sailing velella and the stay-at-home
+sea-squirts, together with a variety of other
+sea-animals, find a nursery and shelter in their youth
+in this quiet harbour of rest.</p>
+
+<p>And besides these casual visitors there are numberless
+creatures which have lived and multiplied there,
+ever since I first visited the pool. Tender red, olive-coloured,
+and green seaweeds, stony corallines, and
+acorn-barnacles lining the floor, sea-anemones clinging
+to the sides, sponges tiny and many-coloured hiding
+under the ledges, and limpets and mussels wedged
+in the cracks. These can be easily seen with the naked
+eye, but they are not the most numerous inhabitants;
+for these we must search with a magnifying-glass,
+which will reveal to us wonderful fairy-forms,
+delicate crystal vases with tiny creatures in them
+whose transparent lashes make whirlpools in the
+water, living crystal bells so tiny that whole branches
+of them look only like a fringe of hair, jelly globes
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span>
+rising and falling in the water, patches of living jelly
+clinging to the rocky sides of the pool, and a hundred
+other forms, some so minute that you must examine
+the fine sand in which they lie under a powerful
+microscope before you can even guess that they are
+there.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 599px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 63.</span>
+<img src="images/i_194.jpg" width="599" height="384" alt="Fig. 63.
+
+Group of seaweeds (natural size).
+
+1, Ulva Linza. 2, Sphacelaria filicina. 3, Polysiphonia urceolata.
+4, Corallina officinalis." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Group of seaweeds (natural size).</span>
+
+<p>1, <i>Ulva Linza.</i>  2, <i>Sphacelaria filicina.</i> 3, <i>Polysiphonia urceolata.</i>
+4, <i>Corallina officinalis.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>So it has proved a rich hunting-ground, where
+summer and winter, spring and autumn, I find some
+form to put under my magic glass. There I can
+watch it for weeks growing and multiplying under
+my care; moved only from the aquarium, where I
+keep it supplied with healthy sea-water, to the tiny
+transparent trough in which I place it for a few
+hours to see the changes it has undergone. I could
+tell you endless tales of transformations in these
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span>
+tiny lives, but I want to-day to show you a few
+of my friends, most of which I brought yesterday
+fresh from the pool, and have prepared for you to
+examine.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 64.</span>
+<img src="images/i_195.jpg" width="300" height="293" alt="Fig. 64.
+
+Ulva lactuca, a green seaweed,
+greatly magnified to show structure.
+(After Oersted.)
+
+s, Spores in the cells. ss, Spores
+swimming out. h, Holes through
+which spores have escaped." title="" />
+<span class="caption"><i>Ulva lactuca</i>, a green seaweed,
+greatly magnified to show structure.
+(After Oersted.)</span>
+
+<p><i>s</i>, Spores in the cells. <i>ss</i>, Spores
+swimming out. <i>h</i>, Holes through
+which spores have escaped.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Let us begin with seaweeds. I have said that
+there are three leading colours in my pool&mdash;green,
+olive, and red&mdash;and these tints mark roughly three
+kinds of weed, though they occur in an endless
+variety of shapes. Here is a piece of the beautiful
+pale green seaweed, called the Laver or Sea-lettuce,
+<i>Ulva Linza</i> (1, Fig. 63), which grows in long ribbons
+in a sunny nook in the
+water. I have placed under
+the first microscope a piece
+of this weed which is just
+sending out young seaweeds
+in the shape of tiny
+cells, with lashes very like
+those we saw coming from
+the moss-flower, and I have
+pressed them in the position
+in which they would naturally
+leave the plant (<i>ss</i>,
+Fig. 64.).<a name="FNanchor_1_23" id="FNanchor_1_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_23" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> You will also
+see on this slide several
+cells in which these tiny
+spores <i>s</i> are forming, ready
+to burst out and swim; for
+this green weed is merely a collection of cells,
+like the single-celled plants on land. Each cell can
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span>
+work as a separate plant; it feeds, grows, and can
+send out its own young spores.</p>
+
+<p>This deep olive-green feathery weed (2, Fig. 63),
+of which a piece is magnified under the next microscope
+(2, Fig. 65), is very different. It is a higher
+plant, and works harder for its living, using the
+darker rays of sunlight which penetrate into shady
+parts of the pool. So it comes to pass that its cells
+divide the work. Those of the feathery threads
+make the food, while others, growing on short stalks
+on the shafts of the feather make and send out the
+young spores.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 65.</span>
+<img src="images/i_196.jpg" width="300" height="226" alt="Fig. 65.
+
+Three seaweeds of Fig. 63 much magnified to
+show fruits. (Harvey.)
+
+2, Sphacelaria filicina. 3, Polysiphonia
+urceolata. 4, Corallina officinalis." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Three seaweeds of Fig. 63 much magnified to
+show fruits. (Harvey.)</span>
+
+<p>2, <i>Sphacelaria filicina.</i> 3, <i>Polysiphonia
+urceolata.</i> 4, <i>Corallina officinalis.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Lastly, the lovely red threadlike weeds, such as
+this <i>Polysiphonia
+urceolata</i> (3, Fig.
+63), carry actual
+urns on their
+stems like those
+of mosses. In
+fact, the history
+of these urns (see
+No. 3, Fig. 65) is
+much the same in
+the two classes of
+plants, only that
+instead of the urn
+being pushed up
+on a thin stalk as
+in the moss, it remains
+on the seaweed close down to the stem,
+when it grows out of the plant-egg, and the tiny
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span>
+plant is shut in till the spores are ready to
+swim out.</p>
+
+<p>The stony corallines (4, Figs. 63 and 65), which
+build so much carbonate of lime into their stems,
+are near relations of the red seaweeds. There are
+plenty of them in my pool. Some of them, of a
+deep purple colour, grow upright in stiff groups
+about three or four inches high; and others, which
+form crusts over the stones and weeds, are a pale
+rose colour; but both kinds, when the plant dies,
+leaving the stony skeleton (1, Fig. 66), are a pure
+white, and used to be mistaken for corals. They
+belong to the same order of plants as the red weeds,
+which all live in shady nooks in the pools, and are
+the highest of their race.</p>
+
+<p>My pool is full of different forms of these four
+weeds. The green ribbons float on the surface rooted
+to the sides of the pool and, as the sun shines upon
+it, the glittering bubbles rising from them show that
+they are working up food out of the air in the
+water, and giving off oxygen. The brown weeds
+lie chiefly under the shelves of rocks, for they can
+manage with less sunlight, and use the darker rays
+which pass by the green weeds; and last of all, the
+red weeds and corallines, small and delicate in form,
+line the bottom of the pool in its darkest nooks.</p>
+
+<p>And now if I hand round two specimens&mdash;one a
+coralline, and the other something you do not yet
+know&mdash;I am sure you will say at first sight that
+they belong to the same family, and, in fact, if you
+buy at the seaside a group of seaweeds gummed on
+paper, you will most likely get both these among
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>
+them. Yet the truth is, that while the coralline
+(1, Fig. 66) is a plant, the other specimen (2) which
+is called <i>Sertularia
+filicula</i>,
+is an
+animal.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 66.</span>
+<img src="images/i_198.jpg" width="400" height="202" alt="Fig. 66.
+
+Coralline and Sertularia, to show likeness between the
+animal Sertularia and the plant Coralline.
+
+1, Corallina officinalis. 2, Sertularia filicula." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Coralline and Sertularia, to show likeness between the
+animal Sertularia and the plant Coralline.</span>
+
+<p class="center">1, <i>Corallina officinalis.</i> 2, <i>Sertularia filicula.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This special
+sertularian
+grows upright
+in my pool on
+stones or often
+on seaweeds,
+but I have
+here (Fig. 67)
+another and much smaller one which lives literally in
+millions hanging its cups downwards. I find it not only
+under the narrow ledges of the pool sheltered by the
+seaweed, but forming a fringe along all the rocks on
+each side of the cove near to low-water mark, and
+for a long time I passed it by thinking it was of no
+interest. But I have long since given up thinking
+this of anything, especially in my pool, for my magic
+glass has taught me that there is not even a living
+speck which does not open out into something
+marvellous and beautiful. So I chipped off a small
+piece of rock and brought the fringe home, and
+found, when I hung it up in clear sea water as
+I have done over this glass trough (Fig. 67) and
+looked at it through the lens, that each thread of
+the dense fringe, in itself not a quarter of an inch
+deep, turns out to be a tiny sertularian with at least
+twenty mouths. You can see this with your pocket
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span>
+lens even as it hangs here, and when you have
+examined it you can by and by take off one thread
+and put it carefully
+in the trough. I
+promise you a sight
+of the most beautiful
+little beings which
+exist in nature.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 67.</span>
+<img src="images/i_199.jpg" width="300" height="132" alt="Fig. 67.
+
+Sertularia tenella, hanging from a splint of
+rock over a water trough. Also piece enlarged
+to show the animal protruding." title="" />
+<p><i>Sertularia tenella</i>, hanging from a splint of
+rock over a water trough. Also piece enlarged
+to show the animal protruding.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Come and look at
+it after the lecture.
+It is a horny
+branched stem with
+a double row of tiny cups all along each side
+(see Fig. 67). Out of these cups there appear
+from time to time sixteen minute transparent tentacles
+as fine as spun glass, which wave about
+in the water. If you shake the glass a little, in
+an instant each crystal star vanishes into its cup,
+to come out again a few minutes later; so that now
+here, now there, the delicate animal-flowers spread
+out on each side of the stem, and the tree is covered
+with moving beings. These tentacles are feelers,
+which lash food into a mouth and stomach in each
+cup, where it is digested and passed, through a hole
+in the bottom, along a jelly thread which runs down
+the stem and joins all the mouths together. In this
+way the food is distributed all over the tree, which is,
+in fact, one animal with many feeding-cups. Some
+day I will show you one of these cups with the
+tentacles stretched out and mounted on a slide, so
+that you can examine a tentacle with a very strong
+magnifying power. You will then see that it is
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span>
+dotted over with cells, in which are coiled fine
+threads. The animal uses these threads to paralyse
+the creatures on which it feeds, for at the base of
+each thread there is a poison gland.</p>
+
+<p>In the larger Sertularia (2, Fig. 66) the whole
+branched tree is connected by jelly threads running
+through the stem, and all the thousands of mouths
+are spread out in the water. One large form called
+the sea-fir <i>Sertularia cupressina</i> grows sometimes
+three feet high, and bears as many as a hundred
+thousand cups, with living mouths, on its branches.</p>
+
+<p>The next of my minute friends I can only show to
+the class in a diagram, but you will see it under the
+fourth microscope by and by. I had great trouble
+in finding it yesterday, though I knew its haunts
+upon the green weed, for it is so minute and transparent
+that even when the weed is in a trough a
+magnifying-glass will scarcely detect it. And I
+must warn you that if you want to know any of the
+minute creatures we are studying, you must visit one
+place constantly. You may in a casual way find
+many of them on seaweed, or in the damp ooze and
+mud, but it will be by chance only; to look for them
+with any certainty you must take trouble in making
+their acquaintance.</p>
+
+<p>Turning then to the diagram (Fig. 68) I will
+describe it as I hope you will see it under the
+microscope&mdash;a curious tiny, perfectly transparent
+open-mouthed vase standing upright on the weed,
+and having an equally transparent being rising up
+in it and waving its tiny lashes in the water. This
+is really all one animal, the vase <i>hc</i> being the horny
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span>
+covering or carapace of the body, which last stands
+up like a tube in the centre. If you watch carefully,
+you may even see
+the minute atoms of
+food twisting round
+inside the tube until
+they are digested,
+after they have been
+swept in at the wide
+open mouth by the
+whirling lashes. You
+will see this more
+clearly if you put a
+little rice-flour, very
+minutely powdered
+and coloured by carmine,
+into the water;
+for you can trace
+these red atoms into
+some round spaces called <i>vacuoles</i> which are dotted
+over the body of the animal, and are really globules
+of watery fluid in which the food is probably partly
+digested.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 68.</span>
+<img src="images/i_201.jpg" width="600" height="461" alt="Fig. 68.
+
+Thuricolla folliculata and Chilomonas
+amygdalum. (Saville Kent.)
+
+1, Thuricolla erect; 2, retracted; 3,
+dividing. 4, Chilomonas amygdalum. hc,
+Horny carapace. cv, Contractile vesicle.
+v, Closing valves." title="" />
+<span class="caption"><i>Thuricolla folliculata</i> and <i>Chilomonas
+amygdalum</i>.  (Saville Kent.)</span>
+
+<p>1, Thuricolla erect; 2, retracted; 3,
+dividing. 4, <i>Chilomonas amygdalum</i>. <i>hc</i>,
+Horny carapace. <i>cv</i>, Contractile vesicle.
+<i>v</i>, Closing valves.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>You will notice, however, one round clear space
+(<i>cv</i>) into which they do not go, and after a time you
+will be able to observe that this round spot closes up
+or contracts very quickly, and then expands again
+very slowly. As it expands it fills with a clear fluid,
+and naturalists have not yet decided exactly what work
+it does. It may serve the animal either for breathing,
+or as a very simple heart, making the fluids
+circulate in the tube. The next interesting point
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span>
+about this little being is the way it retreats into its
+sheltering vase. Even while you are watching, it is
+quite likely it may all at once draw itself down to
+the bottom as in No. 2, and folding down the valves
+<i>v</i>, <i>v</i> of horny teeth which grow on each side, shut
+itself in from some fancied danger. Another very
+curious point is that, besides sending forth young
+ones, these creatures multiply by dividing in two
+(see No. 3, Fig. 68), each one closing its own part
+of the vase into a new home.</p>
+
+<p>There are hundreds of these <i>Infusoria</i>, as they are
+called, in my pond, some with vases, some without,
+some fixed to weeds and stones, others swimming
+about freely. Even in the water-trough in which
+this Thuricolla stands, I saw several smaller forms,
+and the next microscope has a trough filled with the
+minutest form of all, called a Monad (No. 4, Fig.
+68). These are so small that 2000 of them would
+lie side by side in an inch; that is, if you could
+make them lie at all, for they are the most restless
+little beings, darting hither and thither, scarcely even
+halting except to turn back. And yet though there
+are so many of them, and as far as we know they
+have no organs of sight, they never run up against
+each other, but glide past more cleverly than any
+clear-sighted fish. These creatures are mostly to be
+found among decaying seaweed, and though they
+are so tiny, you can still see distinctly the clear
+space (<i>cv</i>) contracting and expanding within them.</p>
+
+<p>But if there are so many thousands of mouths
+to feed, on the tree-like <i>Sertulari�</i> as well as in all
+these <i>Infusoria</i>, where does the food come from?
+</p>
+
+<p>Partly from the numerous atoms of decaying life
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>
+all around, and the minute eggs of animals and
+spores of plants; but besides these, the pool is
+full of minute living plants&mdash;small jelly masses with
+solid coats of flint which are moulded into most lovely
+shapes. Plants formed of jelly and flint! You
+will think I am joking, but I am not. These
+plants, called <i>Diatoms</i>, which live both in salt and
+fresh water, are single cells feeding and growing just
+like those we took from the water-butt (Fig. 29, p.
+78), only that instead of a soft covering they build
+up a flinty skeleton.
+They are so small,
+that many of them
+must be magnified
+to fifty times their
+real size before you
+can even see them
+distinctly. Yet the
+skeletons of these
+almost invisible
+plants are carved
+and chiselled in the
+most delicate patterns.
+I showed
+you a group of
+these in our lecture
+on magic glasses (p.
+39), and now I have
+brought a few living ones that we may learn to know
+them. The diagram (Fig. 69) shows the chief forms
+you will see on the different slides.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 69.</span>
+<img src="images/i_203.jpg" width="300" height="291" alt="Fig. 69.
+
+Living diatoms.
+
+a, Cocconema lanceolatum. b, Bacillaria
+paradoxa. c, Gomphonema marinum. d,
+Diatoma hyalina." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Living diatoms.</span>
+
+<p><i>a, Cocconema lanceolatum.</i> <i>b, Bacillaria
+paradoxa.</i>  <i>c, Gomphonema marinum.</i>  <i>d,
+Diatoma hyalina.</i></p>
+</div>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The first one, <i>Bacillaria paradoxa</i> (<i>b</i>, Fig. 69), looks
+like a number of rods clinging one to another in a
+string, but each one of these is a single-celled plant
+with a jelly cell surrounding the flinty skeleton.
+You will see that they move to and fro over each
+other in the water.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 70.</span>
+<img src="images/i_204.jpg" width="500" height="424" alt="Fig. 70.
+
+A diatom (Diatoma
+vulgare) growing.
+
+a, b, Flint skeleton inside
+the jelly-cell. a, c
+and d, b, Two flint skeletons
+formed by new
+valves, c and d, forming
+within the first skeleton." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A diatom (<i>Diatoma
+vulgare</i>) growing.</span>
+
+<p><i>a</i>, <i>b</i>, Flint skeleton inside
+the jelly-cell. <i>a</i>, <i>c</i>
+and <i>d</i>, <i>b</i>, Two flint skeletons
+formed by new
+valves, <i>c</i> and <i>d</i>, forming
+within the first skeleton.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The next two forms, <i>a</i> and <i>c</i>, look much more
+like plants, for the cells arrange themselves on a
+jelly stem, which by and by
+disappears, leaving only the
+separate flint skeletons such as
+you see in Fig. 16. The last
+form, <i>d</i>, is something midway
+between the other forms, the
+separate cells hang on to each
+other and also on to a straight
+jelly stem.</p>
+
+<p>Another species of Diatoma
+(Fig. 70) called <i>Diatoma vulgare</i>,
+is a very simple and common
+form, and will help to explain
+how these plants grow. The
+two flinty valves <i>a</i>, <i>b</i> inside the cell are not quite
+the same size; the older one <i>a</i> is larger than the
+younger one <i>b</i> and fits over it like the cover of
+a pill-box. As the plant grows, the cell enlarges
+and forms two more valves, one <i>c</i> fitting into the
+cover <i>a</i>, so as to make a complete box <i>ac</i>, and
+a second, <i>d</i>, back to back with <i>c</i>, fitting into the
+valve <i>b</i>, and making another complete box <i>bd</i>.
+This goes on very rapidly, and in this plant
+each new cell separates as it is formed, and the
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span>
+free diatoms move about quite actively in the
+water.</p>
+
+<p>If you consider for a moment, you will see that,
+as the new valves always fit into the old ones, each
+must be smaller than the last, and so there comes
+a time when the valves have become too small to
+go on increasing. Then the plant must begin afresh.
+So the two halves of the last cell open, and throwing
+out their flinty skeletons, cover themselves with a
+thin jelly layer, and form a new cell which grows
+larger than any of the old ones. These, which are
+spore-cells, then form flinty valves inside, and the
+whole thing begins again.</p>
+
+<p>Now though the plants themselves die, or become
+the food of minute animals, the flinty
+skeletons are not destroyed, but go on accumulating
+in the waters of ponds, lakes, rivers, and seas, all over
+the world. Untold millions have no doubt crumbled
+to dust and gone back into the waters, but untold
+millions also have survived. The towns of Berlin
+in Europe and of Richmond in the United States
+are actually built upon ground called "infusorial
+earth," composed almost entirely of valves of these
+minute diatoms which have accumulated to a thickness
+of more than eighty feet! Those under Berlin
+are fresh-water forms, and must have lived in a lake,
+while those of Richmond belong to salt-water forms.
+Every inch of the ground under those cities represents
+thousands and thousands of living plants which
+flourished in ages long gone by, and were no larger
+than those you will see presently under the microscope.
+</p>
+
+<p>These are a very few of the microscopic inhabitants
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>
+of my pond, but, as you will confuse them if I show
+you too many, we will conclude with two rather
+larger specimens, and examine them carefully. The
+first, called the Cydippe, is a lovely, transparent living
+ball, which I want to explain to you because it is so
+wondrously beautiful. The second, the Sea-mat or
+Flustra, looks like a crumpled drab-coloured seaweed,
+but is really composed of many thousands of grottos,
+the homes of tiny sea-animals.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 71.</span>
+<img src="images/i_206.jpg" width="600" height="264" alt="Fig. 71.
+
+Cydippe Pileus.
+
+1, Animal with tentacles t, bearing small tendrils t�. 2, Body of animal
+enlarged. m, Mouth. c, Digestive cavity. s, Sac into which the tentacles
+are withdrawn. p, Bands with comb-like plates. 3, Portion of a
+band enlarged to show the moving plates p." title="" />
+<span class="caption"><i>Cydippe Pileus.</i></span>
+
+<p>1, Animal with tentacles <i>t</i>, bearing small tendrils <i>t�</i>. 2, Body of animal
+enlarged. <i>m</i>, Mouth. <i>c</i>, Digestive cavity. <i>s</i>, Sac into which the tentacles
+are withdrawn. <i>p</i>, Bands with comb-like plates. 3, Portion of a
+band enlarged to show the moving plates <i>p</i>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Let us take the Cydippe first (1, Fig. 71). I have
+six here, each in a separate tumbler, and could have
+brought many more, for when I dipped my net in the
+pool yesterday such numbers were caught in it that I
+believe the retreating tide must just have left a shoal
+behind. Put a tumbler on the desk in front of you,
+and if the light falls well upon it you will see a
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>
+transparent ball about the size of a large pea marked
+with eight bright bands, which begin at the lower end
+of the ball and reach nearly to the top, dividing the
+outside into sections like the ribs of a melon. The
+creature is so perfectly transparent that you can
+count all the eight bands.</p>
+
+<p>At the top of the ball is a slight bulge which is
+the mouth (<i>m</i> 2, Fig. 71), and from it, inside the
+ball, hangs a long bag or stomach, which opens
+below into a cavity c, from which two canals branch
+out, one on each side, and these divide again
+into four canals which go one into each of the tubes
+running down the bands. From this cavity the
+food, which is digested in the stomach, is carried by
+the canals all over the body. The smaller tubes
+which branch out of these canals cannot be seen
+clearly without a very strong lens, and the only
+other parts you can discern in this transparent ball
+are two long sacs on each side of the lower end.
+These are the tentacle sacs, in which are coiled up
+the tentacles, which we shall describe presently.
+Lastly, you can notice that the bands outside the
+globe are broader in the middle than at the ends,
+and are striped across by a number of ridges.</p>
+
+<p>In moving the tumblers the water has naturally
+been shaken, and the creature being alarmed will
+probably at first remain motionless. But very soon
+it will begin to play in the water, rising and falling,
+and swimming gracefully from side to side. Now
+you will notice a curious effect, for the bands will
+glitter and become tinged with prismatic colours, till,
+as it moves more and more rapidly these colours,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span>
+reflected in the jelly, seem to tinge the whole ball
+with colours like those on a soap-bubble, while from
+the two sacs below come forth two long transparent
+threads like spun glass. At first these appear to
+be simple threads, but as they gradually open out
+to about four or five inches, smaller threads uncoil
+on each side of the line till there are about fifty
+on each line. These short <i>tendrils</i> are never still
+for long; as the main threads wave to and fro, some
+of the shorter ones coil up and hang like tiny beads,
+then these uncoil and others roll up, so that these
+graceful floating lines are never two seconds alike.</p>
+
+<p>We do not really know their use. Sometimes
+the creature anchors itself by them, rising and falling
+as they stretch out or coil up; but more often they
+float idly behind it in the water. At first you
+would perhaps think that they served to drive the
+ball through the water, but this is done by a
+special apparatus. The cross ridges which we
+noticed on the bands are really flat comb-like plates
+(<i>p</i>, Fig. 71), of which there are about twenty or thirty
+on each band; and these vibrate very rapidly, so that
+two hundred or more paddles drive the tiny ball
+through the water. This is the cause of the prismatic
+colours; for iridescent tints are produced by
+the play of light upon the glittering plates, as they
+incessantly change their angle. Sometimes they
+move all at once, sometimes only a few at a time,
+and it is evident the creature controls them at will.</p>
+
+<p>This lovely fairy-like globe, with its long floating
+tentacles and rainbow tints, was for a long time
+classed with the jelly-fish; but it really is most nearly
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span>
+related to sea-anemones, as it has a true central
+cavity which acts as a stomach, and many other
+points in common with the <i>Actinozoa</i>. We cannot
+help wondering, as the little being glides hither and
+thither, whether it can see where it is going. It has
+nerves of a low kind which start from a little dark
+spot (<i>ng</i>), exactly at the south pole of the ball, and
+at that point a sense-organ of some kind exists, but
+what impression the creature gains from it of the
+world outside we cannot tell.</p>
+
+<p>I am afraid you may think it dull to turn from
+such a beautiful being as this, to the grey leaf which
+looks only like a dead dry seaweed; yet you will be
+wrong, for a more wonderful history attaches to this
+crumpled dead-looking leaf than to the lovely jelly-globe.</p>
+
+<p>First of all I will pass round pieces of the dry leaf
+(<i>r</i>, Fig. 72), and while you are getting them I will tell
+you where I found the living ones. Great masses of
+the Flustra, as it is called, line the bottom and sides
+of my pool. They grow in tufts, standing upright
+on the rock, and looking exactly like hard grey
+seaweeds, while there is nothing to lead you to
+suspect that they are anything else. Yesterday I
+chipped off very carefully a piece of rock with a tuft
+upon it, and have kept it since in a glass globe by
+itself with sea-water, for the little creatures living in
+this marine city require a very good supply of healthy
+water and air. I have called it a "marine city," and
+now I will tell you why. Take the piece in your
+hand and run your finger gently up and down it;
+you will glide quite comfortably from the lower to
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span>
+the higher part of the leaf, but when you come back
+you will feel your finger catch slightly on a rough
+surface. Your pocket lens will show why this is,
+for if you look
+through it at the
+surface of the leaf
+you will see it is
+not smooth, but
+composed of hundreds
+of tiny alcoves
+with arched
+tops; and on each
+side of these tops
+stand two short
+blunt spines (see
+2, Fig. 72), making
+four in all, pointing upwards, so as partly to cover
+the alcove above. As your finger went up it glided
+over the spines, but on coming back it met their
+points. This is all you can see in the dead specimen;
+I must show you the rest by diagrams, and by and
+by under the microscope.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 72.</span>
+<img src="images/i_210.jpg" width="300" height="214" alt="Fig. 72.
+
+The Sea-mat or Flustra (Flustra foliacea.)
+
+1, Natural size. 2, Much magnified.
+s, Slit caused by drawing in of the animal a." title="" />
+<span class="caption">The Sea-mat or Flustra (<i>Flustra foliacea.</i>)</span>
+
+<p>1, Natural size. 2, Much magnified.
+<i>s</i>, Slit caused by drawing in of the animal <i>a</i>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>First, then, in the living specimen which I have here,
+those alcoves are not open as in the dead piece, but
+covered over with a transparent skin, in which, near
+the top of the alcove just where the curve begins, is
+a slit (<i>s</i> 2, Fig. 72). Unfortunately the membrane
+covering this alcove is too dense for you to distinguish
+the parts within. Presently, however, if you are
+watching a piece of this living leaf in a flat water-cell
+under the microscope, you will see the slit slowly
+open, and begin to turn as it were inside out, exactly
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span>
+like the finger of a glove, which has been pushed in
+at the tip, gradually rises up when you put your
+finger inside it. As this goes on, a bundle of threads
+appears, at first closed like a bud, but gradually
+opening out into a crown of tentacles (<i>a</i>, Fig. 72), each
+one clothed with hairs. Then you will see that the
+slit was not exactly a slit after all, but the round edge
+where the sac was pushed in. Ah! you will say, you are
+now showing me a polyp like those on the sertularian
+tree. Not so fast, my
+friend; you have not yet
+studied what is still under
+the covering skin and
+hidden in the living animal.
+I have, however,
+prepared a slide with this
+membrane removed (see
+Fig. 73), and there you
+can observe the different
+parts, and learn that each
+one of these alcoves
+contains a complete
+animal, and not merely
+one among many mouths,
+like the polyp on the
+Sertularia.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 73.</span>
+<img src="images/i_211.jpg" width="300" height="323" alt="Fig. 73.
+
+Diagram of the animal in the
+Flustra or Sea-mat.
+
+1, Animal protruding. 2, Animal
+retracted in the sheath. sh, Covering
+sheath. s, Slit. t, Tentacles.
+m, Mouth. th, Throat. st, Stomach.
+i, Intestine. r, Retractor muscle.
+e, Egg-forming parts. g, Nerve-ganglion." title="" /><br />
+<span class="caption">Diagram of the animal in the
+Flustra or Sea-mat.</span>
+
+<p>1, Animal protruding. 2, Animal
+retracted in the sheath. <i>sh</i>, Covering
+sheath. <i>s</i>, Slit. <i>t</i>, Tentacles.
+<i>m</i>, Mouth. <i>th</i>, Throat. <i>st</i>, Stomach.
+<i>i</i>, Intestine. <i>r</i>, Retractor muscle.
+<i>e</i>, Egg-forming parts. <i>g</i>, Nerve-ganglion.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Each of these little
+beings (<i>a</i>, Fig 72) living
+in its alcove has a mouth,
+throat, stomach, intestine, muscles, and nerves starting
+from the ganglion of nervous matter, besides
+all that is necessary for producing eggs and sending
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span>
+forth young ones. You can trace all these
+under the microscope (see 2, Fig. 73) as the creature
+lies curiously doubled up in its bed, with its body
+bent in a loop; the intestine <i>i</i>, out of which the
+refuse food passes, coming back close up to the slit.
+When it is at rest, the top of the sac in which it
+lies is pulled in by the retractor muscle <i>r</i>, and looks,
+as I have said, like the finger of a glove with the
+top pushed in. When it wishes to feed, this top
+is drawn out by muscles running round the sac, and
+the tentacles open and wave in the water (1, Fig. 73).</p>
+
+<p>Look now at the alcoves, the homes of these
+animals; see how tiny they are and how closely they
+fit together. Mr. Gosse, the naturalist, has reckoned
+that there are 6720 alcoves in a square inch; then
+if you turn the leaf over you will see that there is
+another set, fixed back to back with these, on the
+other side, making in all 13,440 alcoves. Now a
+moderate-sized leaf of flustra measures about three
+square inches, taking all the rounded lobes into
+account, so you will see we get 40,320 as a rough
+estimate of the number of beings on this one leaf.
+But if you look at this tuft I have brought, you will
+find it is composed of twelve such leaves, and this
+after all is a very small part of the mass growing
+round my pool. Was I wrong, then, when I said
+that my miniature ocean contains as many millions
+of beings as there are stars in the heavens?</p>
+
+<p>You will want to know how these leaves grew, and
+it is in this way. First a little free swimming animal,
+a mere living sac provided with lashes, settles down
+and grows into one little horny alcove, with its live
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span>
+creature inside, which in time sends off from it
+three to five buds, forming alcoves all round the
+top and sides of the first one, growing on to it.
+These again bud out, and you can thus easily understand
+that, in this way, in time a good-sized leaf is
+formed. Meanwhile the creatures also send forth
+new swimming cells, which settle down near to
+begin new leaves, and thus a tuft is formed; and
+long after the beings in earlier parts of the leaf
+have died and left their alcoves empty, those round
+the margin are still alive and spreading.</p>
+
+<p>With this history we must stop for to-day, and I
+expect it will be many weeks before you have
+thoroughly examined the specimens of each kind
+which I have put in the aquarium. If you can trace
+the spore-cells and urns in the seaweeds, observe the
+polyps in the Sertularia, and count the number of
+mouths on a branch of my animal fringe (<i>Sertularia
+tenella</i>); if you make acquaintance with the Thuricolla
+in its vase, and are fortunate enough to see one
+divide in two; if you learn to know some of the
+beautiful forms of diatoms, and can picture to yourselves
+the life of the tiny inhabitants of the Flustra;
+then you will have used your microscope with some
+effect, and be prepared for an expedition to my pool,
+where we will go together some day to seek new
+treasures.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_23" id="Footnote_1_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_23"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The slice given in Fig. 64 is from a broader-leaved form, <i>U.
+lactuca</i>, because this species, being composed of only one layer of cells,
+is better seen. <i>Ulva linza</i> is composed of two layers of cells.
+</p></div>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+<h4>THE DARTMOOR PONIES,</h4>
+
+<h5>OR</h5>
+
+<h4>THE WANDERINGS OF THE HORSE TRIBE</h4>
+
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_214.jpg" width="100" height="107" alt="ornate capital p" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p>ut away the telescopes
+and microscopes to-day,
+boys, the holidays
+are close at hand, and we
+will take a rest from peeping
+and peering till we come
+back in the autumn laden
+with specimens for the microscope,
+while the rapidly darkening
+evenings will tempt us again
+on to the lawn star-gazing. On
+this our last lecture-day I want you
+to take a journey with me which I took in imagination
+a few days ago, as I lay on my back on the
+sunny moor and watched the Dartmoor ponies.</p>
+
+<p>It was a calm misty morning one day last week,
+giving promise of a bright and sunny day, when I
+started off for a long walk across the moor to visit
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>
+the famous stone-circles, many of which are to be
+found not far off the track, called Abbot's Way,
+leading from Buckfast Abbey, on the Dart, to the
+Abbey of Tavistock, on the Tavy.</p>
+
+<p>My mind was full of the olden times as I pictured
+to myself how, seven hundred years or more ago, some
+Benedictine monk from Tavistock Abbey, in his black
+robe and cowl, paced this narrow path on his way to
+his Cistercian brethren at Buckfast, meeting some of
+them on his road as they wandered over the desolate
+moor in their white robes and black scapularies in
+search of stray sheep. For the Cistercians were
+shepherds and wool-weavers, while the Benedictines
+devoted themselves to learning, and the track of about
+twenty-five miles from one abbey to the other,
+which still remains, was worn by the members of the
+two communities and their dependents, the only
+variety in whose lives consisted probably in these
+occasional visits one to the other.</p>
+
+<p>Yet even these monks belonged to modern times
+compared to the ancient Britons who raised the stone-circles,
+and buried their dead in the barrows scattered
+here and there over the moor; and my mind drifted
+back to the days when, long before that pathway
+was worn, men clad in the skins of beasts hunted
+wild animals over the ground on which I was treading,
+and lived in caves and holes of the ground.</p>
+
+<p>I wondered, as I thought of them, whether the
+cultured monks and the uncivilised Britons delighted
+as much in the rugged scenery of the moor as I did
+that morning. For many miles in front of me the
+moor stretched out wild and treeless; the sun was
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>
+shining brightly upon the mass of yellow furze and
+deep-red heather, drawing up the moisture from the
+ground, and causing a kind of watery haze to shimmer
+over the landscape; while the early mist was
+rising off the <i>tors</i>, or hill-tops, in the distance,
+curling in fanciful wreaths around the rugged and
+stony summits, as it dispersed gradually in the
+increasing heat of the day.</p>
+
+<p>The cattle which were scattered in groups here
+and there feeding on the dewy grass were enjoying
+the happiest time of the year. The moor, which in
+winter affords them scarcely a bare subsistence, is
+now richly covered with fresh young grass, and the
+sturdy oxen fed solemnly and deliberately, while the
+wild Dartmoor ponies and their colts scampered
+joyously along, shaking their manes and long flowing
+tails, and neighing to each other as they went; or
+clustered together on some verdant spot, where the
+colts teased and bit each other for fun, as they gambolled
+round their mothers.</p>
+
+<p>It was a pleasure, there on the open moor, with
+the lark soaring overhead, and the butterflies and
+bees hovering among the sweet-smelling furze blossoms,
+to see horses free and joyous, with no thought
+of bit or bridle, harness or saddle, whose hoofs had
+never been handled by the shoeing-smith, nor their
+coats touched with the singeing iron. Those little
+colts, with their thick heads, shaggy coats, and flowing
+tails, will have at least two years more freedom
+before they know what it is to be driven or beaten.
+Only once a year are they gathered together, claimed
+by their owners and branded with an initial, and then
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span>
+left again to wander where they will. True, it is a
+freedom which sometimes has its drawbacks, for if
+the winter is severe the only food they can get will
+be the furze-tops, off which they scrape the snow
+with their feet; yet it is very precious in itself, for
+they can gallop when and where they choose, with
+head erect, sniffing at the wind and crying to each
+other for the very joy of life.</p>
+
+<p>Now as I strolled across the moor and watched
+their gambols, thinking how like free wild animals
+they seemed, my thoughts roamed far away, and I
+saw in imagination scenes where other untamed
+animals of the horse tribe are living unfettered all
+their lives long.</p>
+
+<p>First there rose before my mind the level grass-covered
+pampas of South America, where wild horses
+share the boundless plains with troops of the rhea,
+or American ostrich, and wander, each horse with
+as many mares as he can collect, in companies of
+hundreds or even thousands in a troop. These
+horses are now truly wild, and live freely from youth
+to age, unless they are unfortunate enough to be
+caught in the more inhabited regions by the lasso
+of the hunter. In the broad pampas, the home of
+herds of wild cattle, they dread nothing. There, as
+they roam with one bold stallion as their leader, even
+beasts of prey hesitate to approach them, for, when
+they form into a dense mass with the mothers and
+young in their centre, their heels deal blows which
+even the fierce jaguar does not care to encounter, and
+they trample their enemy to death in a very short
+time. Yet these are not the original wild horses we
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>
+are seeking, they are the descendants of tame animals,
+brought from Europe by the Spaniards to Buenos
+Ayres in 1535, whose descendants have regained
+their freedom on the boundless pampas and prairies.</p>
+
+<p>As I was picturing them careering over the plains,
+another scene presented itself and took their place.
+Now I no longer saw around me tall pampas-grass
+with the long necks of the rheas appearing above it,
+for I was on the edge of a dreary scantily covered
+plain between the Aral Sea and the Balkash Lake
+in Tartary. To the south lies a barren sandy
+desert, to the north the fertile plains of the Kirghiz
+steppes, where the Tartar feeds his flocks, and herds
+of antelopes gallop over the fresh green pasture; and
+between these is a kind of no-man's land, where low
+scanty shrubs and stunted grass seemed to promise
+but a poor feeding-ground.</p>
+
+<p>Yet here the small long-legged but powerful
+"Tarpans," the wild horses of the treeless plains of
+Russia and Tartary, were picking their morning
+meal. Sturdy wicked little fellows they are, with
+their shaggy light-brown coats, short wiry manes,
+erect ears, and fiery watchful eyes. They might well
+be supposed to be true wild horses, whose ancestors
+had never been tamed by man; and yet it is more
+probable that even they escaped in early times from
+the Tartars, and have held their own ever since, over
+the grassy steppes of Russia and on the confines of
+the plains of Tartary. Sometimes they live almost
+alone, especially on the barren wastes where they
+have been seen in winter, scraping the snow off the
+herbage as our ponies do on Dartmoor. At other
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>
+times, as in the south of Russia, where they wander
+between the Dnieper and the Don, they gather in
+vast herds and live a free life, not fearing even the
+wolves, which they beat to the ground with their
+hoofs. From one green oasis to another they travel
+over miles of ground.</p>
+
+<p class="footnote">
+"A thousand horse&mdash;and none to ride!<br />
+With flowing tail, and flying mane,<br />
+Wide nostrils&mdash;never stretch'd by pain,<br />
+Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,<br />
+And feet that iron never shod,<br />
+And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod.<br />
+A thousand horse, the wild, the free,<br />
+Like waves that follow o'er the sea."<a name="FNanchor_1_24" id="FNanchor_1_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_24" class="fnanchor">[1]</a><br />
+</p>
+
+<p>As I followed them in their course I fancied I
+saw troops of yet another animal of the horse tribe,
+the "Kulan," or <i>Equus hemionus</i>, which is a kind of
+half horse, half ass (Fig. 74), living on the Kirghiz
+steppes of Tartary and spreading far beyond the
+range of the Tarpan into Tibet. Here at last we
+have a truly wild animal, never probably brought
+into subjection by man. The number of names he
+possesses shows how widely he has spread. The
+Tartars call him "Kulan," the Tibetans "Kiang,"
+while the Mongolians give him the unpronounceable
+name of "Dschiggetai." He will not submit to any
+of them, but if caught and confined soon breaks
+away again to his old life, a "free and fetterless
+creature."</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 74.</span>
+<img src="images/i_220.jpg" width="600" height="417" alt="Fig. 74.
+
+Equus hemionus, &quot;Kiang&quot; or &quot;Kulan,&quot; the Horse-ass of
+Tartary and Tibet. (Brehm.)" title="" />
+<span class="caption"><i>Equus hemionus</i>, &quot;Kiang&quot; or &quot;Kulan,&quot; the Horse-ass of
+Tartary and Tibet. (Brehm.)</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>No one has ever yet settled the question whether
+he is a horse or an ass, probably because he represents
+an animal truly between the two. His head
+is graceful, his body light, his legs slender and fleet,
+yet his ears are long and ass-like; he has narrow
+hoofs, and a tail with a tuft at the end like all the
+ass tribe; his colour is a yellow brown, and he has a
+short dark mane and a long dark stripe down his
+back as a donkey has, though this last character you
+may also see in many of our Devonshire ponies.
+Living often on the high plateaux, sometimes as
+much as 1500 feet above the sea, this "child of the
+steppes" travels in large companies even as far as
+the rich meadows of Central Asia; in summer
+wandering in green pastures, and in winter seeking the
+hunger-steppes where sturdy plants grow. And when
+autumn comes the young steeds go off alone to the
+mountain heights to survey the country around and
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>
+call wildly for mates, whom, when found, they will
+keep close to them through all the next year, even
+though they mingle with thousands of others.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 75.</span>
+<img src="images/i_221.jpg" width="600" height="431" alt="Fig. 75.
+
+Przevalsky&#39;s Wild Horse, the &quot;Kertag&quot; or &quot;Statur.&quot;" title="" />
+<span class="caption">Przevalsky&#39;s Wild Horse, the &quot;Kertag&quot; or &quot;Statur.&quot;</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>Till about ten years ago the <i>Equus hemionus</i>
+was the only truly wild horse known, but in the
+winter of 1879-80 the Russian traveller Przevalsky
+brought back from Central Asia a much more horse-like
+animal, called by the Tartars "Kertag" and by
+the Mongols "Statur." It is a clumsy, thick-set,
+whitish-gray creature with strong legs and a large,
+heavy, reddish-coloured head; its legs have a red tint
+down to the knees, beyond which they are blackish
+down to the hoofs. But the ears are small, and it
+has the broad hoofs of the true horse, and warts on
+his hind legs, which no animal of the ass tribe has.
+This horse, like the Kiang, travels in small troops of
+from five to fifteen, led through the wildest parts of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>
+the Dsungarian desert, between the Altai and Tianschan
+Mountains, by an old stallion. They are
+extremely shy, and see, hear, and smell very quickly,
+so that they are off like lightning whenever anything
+approaches them.</p>
+
+<p>So having travelled over America, Europe, and
+Asia, was my quest ended? No; for from the dreary
+Asiatic deserts my thoughts wandered to a far
+warmer and more fertile land, where between the
+Blue Nile and the Red Sea rise the lofty highlands
+of Abyssinia, among which the African wild ass
+(<i>Asinus t�niopus</i>), the probable ancestor of our
+donkeys, feeds in troops on the rich grasses of the
+slopes, and then onwards to the bank of a river in
+Central Africa where on the edge of a forest, with
+rich pastures beyond, elephants and rhinoceroses,
+antelopes and buffaloes, lions and hy�nas, creep
+down in the cool of the evening to slake their thirst
+in the flowing stream. There I saw the herds of
+Zebras in all their striped beauty coming down
+from the mountain regions to the north, and mingling
+with the darker-coloured but graceful quaggas
+from the southern plains, and I half-grieved at the
+thought how these untamed and free rovers are
+being slowly but surely surrounded by man closing
+in upon them on every side.</p>
+
+<p>I might now have travelled still farther in search
+of the Onager, or wild ass of the Asiatic and
+Indian deserts, but at this point a more interesting
+and far wider question presented itself, as I flung
+myself down on the moor to ponder over the early
+history of all these tribes.
+</p>
+
+<p>Where have they all come from? Where shall
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>
+we look for the first ancestors of these wild and
+graceful animals? For the answer to this question
+I had to travel back to America, to those Western
+United States where Professor Marsh has made such
+grand discoveries in horse history. For there, in the
+very country where horses were supposed never to
+have been before the Spaniards brought them a few
+centuries ago, we have now found the true birthplace
+of the equine race.</p>
+
+<p>Come back with me to a time so remote that we
+cannot measure it even by hundreds of thousands of
+years, and let us visit the territories of Utah and
+Wyoming. Those highlands were very different
+then from what they are now. Just risen out of the
+seas of the Cretaceous Period, they were then clothed
+with dense forests of palms, tree-ferns, and screw-pines,
+magnolias and laurels, interspersed with wide-spreading
+lakes, on the margins of which strange and
+curious animals fed and flourished. There were
+large beasts with teeth like the tapir and the bear,
+and feet like the elephant; and others far more
+dangerous, half bear, half hy�na, prowling around
+to attack the clumsy paleotherium or the anoplotherium,
+something between a rhinoceros and a
+horse, which grazed by the waterside, while graceful
+antelopes fed on the rich grass. And among these
+were some little animals no bigger than foxes, with
+four toes and a splint for the fifth, on their front
+feet, and three toes on the hind ones.</p>
+
+<p>These clumsy little animals, whose bones have
+been found in the rocks of Utah and Wyoming,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>
+have been called <i>Eohippus</i>, or horses of the dawn, by
+naturalists. They were animals with real toes, yet
+their bones and teeth show that they belonged to
+the horse tribe, and already the fifth toe common to
+most other toed animals was beginning to disappear.</p>
+
+<p>This was in the Eocene period, and before it passed
+away with its screw-pines and tree-ferns, another
+rather larger animal, called the <i>Orohippus</i>, had taken
+the place of the small one, and he had only four
+toes on his front feet. The splint had disappeared,
+and as time went on still other animals followed,
+always with fewer toes, while they gained slender
+fleet legs, together with an increase in size and in
+gracefulness. First one as large as a sheep (<i>Mesohippus</i>)
+had only three toes and a splint. Then the
+splint again disappeared, and one large and two
+dwindling toes only remained, till finally these two
+became mere splints, leaving one large toe or hoof
+with almost imperceptible splints, which may be
+seen on the fetlock of a horse's skeleton.</p>
+
+<p>The diagram (Fig 76) shows these splints in the
+horse's or ass's foot of to-day. For you must notice
+that a horse's foot really begins at the point <i>w</i> which
+we call his knee in the front legs, and at his hock <i>h</i> in
+the hind legs. His true knee <i>k</i> and elbow <i>e</i> are close
+up to the body. What we call his foot or hoof is
+really the end of the strong, broad, middle toe <i>t</i>
+covered with a hoof, and farther up his foot at <i>s</i> and
+<i>s</i> we can feel two small splints, which are remains of
+two other toes.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile during these long succeeding ages
+while the foot was lengthening out into a slender
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>
+limb the animals became larger, more powerful, and
+more swift, the neck and head became longer and
+more graceful, the brain-case larger in front and the
+teeth decreased in number, so that there is now a
+large gap between the biting teeth <i>i</i> and the grinding
+teeth <i>g</i> of a horse. Their slender limbs too became
+more flexible and fit for running and galloping, till
+we find the whole skeleton the same in shape, though
+not in size, as in our own horses and asses now.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 596px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 76.</span>
+<img src="images/i_225.jpg" width="596" height="418" alt="Fig. 76.
+
+Skeleton of Horse or Ass.
+
+i, Incisor teeth. g, Grinding teeth, with the gap between the two as in
+all grass-feeders. k, Knee. h, Hock or heel. f, Foot. s, Splints or
+remains of the two lost toes. e, Elbow. w, Wrist. ha, Hand-bone.
+t, middle toe of three joints, 1, 2, 3 forming the hoof." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Skeleton of Horse or Ass.</span>
+
+<p><i>i</i>, Incisor teeth. <i>g</i>, Grinding teeth, with the gap between the two as in
+all grass-feeders. <i>k</i>, Knee. <i>h</i>, Hock or heel. <i>f</i>, Foot. <i>s</i>, Splints or
+remains of the two lost toes. <i>e</i>, Elbow.  <i>w</i>, Wrist. <i>ha</i>, Hand-bone.
+<i>t</i>, middle toe of three joints, 1, 2, 3 forming the hoof.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>They did not, however, during all this time remain
+confined to America, for, from the time when they
+arrived at an animal called <i>Miohippus</i>, or lesser
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>
+horse, which came after the Mesohippus and had
+only three toes on each foot, we find their remains
+in Europe, where they lived in company with the
+giraffes, opossums, and monkeys which roamed over
+these parts in those ancient times. Then a little
+later we find them in Africa and India; so that the
+horse tribe, represented by creatures about as large
+as donkeys, had spread far and wide over the world.</p>
+
+<p>And now, curiously enough, they began to forsake,
+or to die out in, the land of their birth. Why they
+did so we do not know; but while in the old world
+as asses, quaggas, and zebras, and probably horses,
+they flourished in Asia, Europe, and Africa, they
+certainly died out in America, so that ages afterwards,
+when that land was discovered, no animal
+of the horse tribe was found in it.</p>
+
+<p>And the true horse, where did he arise? Born
+and bred probably in Central Asia from some animal
+like the "Kulan," or the "Kertag," he proved too
+useful to savage tribes to be allowed his freedom,
+and it is doubtful whether in any part of the world
+he escaped subjection. In our own country he
+probably roamed as a wild animal till the savages,
+who fed upon him, learned in time to put him to
+work; and when the Romans came they found the
+Britons with fine and well-trained horses.</p>
+
+<p>Yet though tamed and made to know his master
+he has, as we have seen, broken loose again in
+almost all parts of the world&mdash;in America on the
+prairies and pampas, in Europe and Asia on the
+steppes, and in Australia in the bush. And even in
+Great Britain, where so few patches of uncultivated
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span>
+land still remain, the young colts of Dartmoor, Exmoor,
+and Shetland, though born of domesticated
+mothers, seem to assert their descent from wild and
+free ancestors as they throw out their heels and toss
+up their heads with a shrill neigh, and fly against
+the wind with streaming manes and outstretched
+tails as the Kulan, the Tarpan, and the Zebra do in
+the wild desert or grassy plain.
+</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_24" id="Footnote_1_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_24"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Byron's <i>Mazeppa</i>.</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p>
+<h2>CHAPTER X</h2>
+<h4>THE MAGICIAN'S DREAM OF ANCIENT DAYS.</h4>
+
+<div class="dropcap" style="width: 100px;">
+<img src="images/i_228.jpg" width="100" height="134" alt="ornate capital t" title="" />
+</div>
+
+
+<p>he magician sat in his armchair
+in the one little room
+in the house which was his,
+and his only, besides the observatory.
+And a strange
+room it was. The walls were
+hung with skulls and bones of
+men and animals, with swords,
+daggers, and shields, coats of mail,
+and bronze spear-heads. The
+drawers, many of which stood
+open, contained flint-stones chipped
+and worn, arrowheads of stone, jade hatchets beautifully
+polished, bronze buckles and iron armlets;
+while scattered among these were pieces of broken
+pottery, some rough and only half-baked, others
+beautifully finished, as the Romans knew how to
+finish them. Rough needles made of bone lay
+beside bronze knives with richly-ornamented handles
+and, most precious of all, on the table by the
+magician's side lay a reindeer antler, on which
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span>
+was roughly carved the figure of the reindeer
+itself.</p>
+
+<p>He had been enjoying a six weeks' holiday, and
+he had employed it in visiting some of the bone
+caves of Europe to learn about the men who lived
+in them long, long ago. He had been to the south
+of France to see the famous caves of the Dordogne,
+to Belgium to the caves of Engis and Engihoul,
+to the Hartz Mountains and to Hungary. Then
+hastening home he had visited the chief English
+caves in Yorkshire, Wales, and Devonshire.</p>
+
+<p>Now that he had returned to his college, his
+mind was so full of facts, that he felt perplexed how
+to lay before his class the wonderful story of the life
+of man before history began. And as the day was
+hot, and the very breeze which played around him
+made him feel languid and sleepy, he fell into a
+reverie&mdash;a waking dream.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 25%;" />
+
+<p>First the room faded from his sight, then the trim
+villages disappeared; the homesteads, the corn-fields,
+the grazing cattle, all were gone, and he saw the
+whole of England covered with thick forests and
+rough uncultivated land. From the mountains in
+the north, glaciers were to be seen creeping down
+the valleys between dense masses of fir and oak, pine
+and birch; while the wild horse, the bison, and the
+Irish elk were feeding on the plains. As he looked
+southward and eastward he saw that the sea no
+longer washed the shores, for the English and Irish
+Channels were not yet scooped out. The British
+Isles were still part of the continent of Europe, so
+that animals could migrate overland from the far
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span>
+south, up to what is now England, Scotland, and
+Ireland. Many of these animals, too, were very
+different from any now living in the country, for in
+the large rivers of England he saw the hippopotamus
+playing with her calf, while elephants and rhinoceroses
+were drinking at the water's edge. Yet these
+strange creatures did not have all the country to
+themselves&mdash;wolves, bears, and foxes prowled in the
+woods, large beavers built their dams across the
+streams, and here and there over the country human
+beings were living in caves and holes of the earth.</p>
+
+<p>It was these men chiefly who attracted the magician's
+attention, and being curious to know how
+they lived, he turned towards a cave, at the mouth
+of which was a group of naked children who were
+knocking pieces of flint together, trying to strike off
+splinters and make rough flint tools, such as they saw
+their fathers use. Not far off from them a woman
+with a wild beast's skin round her waist was gathering
+firewood, another was grubbing up roots, and
+another, venturing a little way into the forest, was
+searching for honey in the hollows of the tree
+trunks.</p>
+
+<p>All at once in the dusk of the evening a low
+growl and a frightened cry were heard, and the
+women rushed towards the cave as they saw near
+the edge of the forest a huge tiger with sabre-shaped
+teeth struggling with a powerful stag. In vain the
+deer tried to stamp on his savage foe or to wound
+him with his antlers; the strong teeth of the tiger
+had penetrated his throat, and they fell struggling
+together as the stag uttered his death-cry. Just at
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>
+that moment loud shouts were heard in the forest,
+and the frightened women knew that help was near.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 77.</span>
+<img src="images/i_231.jpg" width="600" height="558" alt="Fig. 77.
+
+Pal�olithic times." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Pal�olithic times.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>One after another, several men, clothed in skins
+hung over one shoulder and secured round the waist,
+rushed out of the thicket, their hair streaming in the
+wind, and ran towards the tiger. They held in their
+hands strange weapons made of rough pointed flints
+fastened into handles by thongs of skin, and as the
+tiger turned upon them with a cry of rage they met
+him with a rapid shower of blows. The fight raged
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span>
+fiercely, for the beast was strong and the weapons of
+the men were rude, but the tiger lay dead at last by
+the side of his victim. His skin and teeth were
+the reward of the hunters, and the stag he had killed
+became their prey.</p>
+
+<p>How skilfully they hacked it to pieces with their
+stone axes, and then loading it upon their shoulders
+set off up the hill towards the cave, where they were
+welcomed with shouts of joy by the women and
+children!</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 78.</span>
+<img src="images/i_232.jpg" width="300" height="293" alt="Fig. 78.
+
+Pal�olithic relics.
+
+1, Bone needle, from a cave at La
+Madeleine, � size. 2, Tooth of Machairodus
+or sabre-toothed tiger, from Kent&#39;s
+Cavern, � size. 3, Rough stone implement,
+from Kent&#39;s Cavern, � size." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Pal�olithic relics.</span>
+
+<p>1, Bone needle, from a cave at La
+Madeleine, � size. 2, Tooth of Machairodus
+or sabre-toothed tiger, from Kent&#39;s
+Cavern, � size. 3, Rough stone implement,
+from Kent&#39;s Cavern, � size.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Then began the feast. First fires were kindled
+slowly and with difficulty
+by rubbing a
+sharp-pointed stick in
+a groove of softer wood
+till the wood-dust burst
+into flame; then a huge
+pile was lighted at the
+mouth of the cave to
+cook the food and keep
+off wild beasts. How
+the food was cooked
+the magician could not
+see, but he guessed that
+the flesh was cut off the
+bones and thrust in the
+glowing embers, and he
+watched the men afterwards
+splitting open the
+uncooked bones to suck out the raw marrow which
+savages love.</p>
+
+<p>After the feast was over he noticed how they left
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>
+these split bones scattered upon the floor of the cave
+mingling with the sabre-shaped teeth of the tiger, and
+this reminded him of the bones of the stag and the
+tiger's tooth which he had found in Kent's Cavern
+in Devonshire only a few days before.</p>
+
+<p>By this time the men had lain down to sleep, and
+in the darkness strange cries were heard from the
+forest. The roar of the lion, mingled with the howling
+of the wolves and the shrill laugh of the hy�nas,
+told that they had come down to feed on the remains
+of the tiger. But none of these animals ventured
+near the glowing fire at the mouth of the cavern,
+behind which the men slept in security till the sun
+was high in the heavens. Then all was astir again,
+for weapons had been broken in the fight, and some
+of the men sitting on the ground outside the cave
+placed one flint between their knees, and striking
+another sharply against it drove off splinters, leaving
+a pointed end and cutting edge. They spoiled
+many before they made one to their liking, and the
+entrance to the cave was strewn with splintered
+fragments and spoilt flints, but at last several useful
+stones were ready. Meanwhile another man, taking
+his rude stone axe, set to work to hew branches from
+the trees to form handles, while another, choosing a
+piece remaining of the body of the stag, tore a sinew
+from the thigh, and threading it through the large
+eye of the bone needle, stitched the tiger's skin
+roughly together into a garment.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>This, then</i>," said the magician to himself, "<i>is
+how ancient man lived in the summer-time, but how
+would he fare when winter came?</i>" As he mused
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span>
+the scene gradually changed. The glaciers crept
+far lower down the valleys, and the hills, and even
+the lower ground, lay thick in snow. The hippopotamus
+had wandered away southward to warmer
+climes, as animals now migrate over the continent
+of America in winter, and with him had gone the
+lion, the southern elephant, and other summer
+visitors. In their place large herds of reindeer and
+shaggy oxen had come down from the north and
+were spread over the plains, scraping away the snow
+with their feet to feed on the grass beneath. The
+mammoth, too, or hairy elephant, of the same extinct
+species as those which have been found frozen in
+solid ice under a sandbank in Siberia, had come
+down to feed, accompanied by the woolly rhinoceros;
+and scattered over the hills were the curious horned
+musk-sheep, which have long ago disappeared off the
+face of the earth. Still, bitterly cold as it was, the
+hunter clad in his wild-beast skin came out from
+time to time to chase the mammoth, the reindeer,
+and the oxen for food, and cut wood in the forest to
+feed the cavern fires.</p>
+
+<p>This time the magician's thoughts wandered down
+to the south-west of France, where, on the banks of
+a river in that part now called the Dordogne, a
+number of caves not far from each other formed the
+home of savage man. Here he saw many new
+things, for the men used arrows of deer-horn and of
+wood pointed with flint, and with these they shot
+the birds, which were hovering near in hopes of
+finding food during the bitter weather. By the side
+of the river a man was throwing a small dart of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span>
+deer-horn fastened to a cord of sinews, with which
+from time to time he speared a large fish and drew
+it to the bank.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 79.</span>
+<img src="images/i_235.jpg" width="600" height="297" alt="Fig. 79.
+
+Mammoth engraved on ivory by Pal�olithic man." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Mammoth engraved on ivory by Pal�olithic man.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>But the most curious sight of all, among such a
+rude people, was a man sitting by the glowing fire at
+the mouth of one of the caves scratching a piece of
+reindeer horn with a pointed flint, while the children
+gathered round him to watch his work. What was
+he doing? See! gradually the rude scratches began
+to take shape, and two reindeer fighting together
+could be recognised upon the horn handle. This
+he laid carefully aside, and taking a piece of ivory,
+part of the tusk of a mammoth, he worked away
+slowly and carefully till the children grew tired of
+watching and went off to play behind the fire. Then
+the magician, glancing over his shoulder, saw a true
+figure of the mammoth scratched upon the ivory,
+his hairy skin, long mane, and up-curved tusks distinguishing
+him from all elephants living now. "<i>Ah</i>,"
+exclaimed the magician aloud, "<i>that is the drawing
+on ivory found in the cave of La Madeleine in Dordogne,
+proving that man existed ages ago, and even</i>
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>
+<i>knew how to draw figures, at a time when the mammoth,
+or hairy elephant, long since extinct, was still
+living on the earth!</i>"</p>
+
+<p>With these words he started from his reverie, and
+knew that he had been dreaming of Pal�olithic man
+who, with his tools of rough flints, had lived in
+Europe so long ago that his date cannot be fixed by
+years, or centuries, or even thousands of years.
+Only this is known, that, since he lived, the mammoth,
+the sabre-toothed tiger, the cave-bear, the
+woolly rhinoceros, the cave-hy�na, the musk-sheep,
+and many other animals have died out from off the
+face of the earth; the hippopotamus and the lion
+have left Europe and retired to Africa, and the sea has
+flowed in where land once was, cutting off Great
+Britain and Ireland from the continent.</p>
+
+<p>How long all these changes were in taking place
+no one knows. When the magician drifted back
+again into his dream the land had long been
+desolate, and the hy�nas, which had always taken
+possession of the caves whenever the men deserted
+them for awhile, had now been undisturbed for a
+long time, and had left on the floor of the cave
+gnawed skulls and bones, and jaws of animals, more
+or less scored with the marks of their teeth, and
+these had become buried in a thick layer of earth.
+The magician knew that these teeth marks had been
+made by hy�nas, both because living hy�nas leave
+exactly such marks on bones in the present day, and
+because the hy�na bones alone were not gnawed,
+showing that no animals preyed upon their flesh. He
+knew too that the hy�nas had been there long after
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span>
+man had ceased to use the caves, because no flint
+tools were found among the bones. But now the
+age of hy�nas, too, was past and gone, and the caves
+had been left so long undisturbed that in many of
+them the water dripping from the roof had left film
+after film of carbonate of lime upon the floor, which
+as the centuries went by became a layer of stalagmite
+many feet thick, sealing down the secrets of the
+past.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 25%;" />
+
+<p>The face of the country was now entirely changed.
+The glaciers were gone, and so, too, were all the
+strange animals. True, the reindeer, the wild ox,
+and even here and there the Irish elk, were still feeding
+in the valleys; wolves and bears still made the
+country dangerous, and beavers built their dams
+across the streams, which were now much smaller
+than formerly, and flowed in deeper channels, carved
+out by water during the interval; but the elephants,
+rhinoceroses, lions, and tigers were gone never to
+return, and near the caves in which some of the
+people lived, and the rude underground huts which
+formed the homes of others, tame sheep and goats
+were lying with dogs to watch them. Also, though
+the land was still covered with dense forests, yet here
+and there small clearings had been made, where
+patches of corn and flax were growing. Naked
+children still played about as before, but now they
+were moulding cups of clay like those in which food
+was being cooked on the fire outside the caves or
+huts. Some of the women, dressed partly in skins
+of beasts, partly in rough woven linen, were spinning
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span>
+flax into thread, using as a spinning-whorl a small
+round stone with a hole in the middle tied to the end
+of the flax, as a weight to enable them to twirl it.
+Others were grinding corn in the hollow of a large
+stone by rubbing another stone within it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 80.</span>
+<img src="images/i_238.jpg" width="600" height="251" alt="Fig. 80.
+
+Neolithic implements.
+
+1, Stone hatchet mounted in wood. 2, Jade celt, a polished stone
+weapon, from Livermore in Suffolk, � size. 3, Spindle whorl, �
+size." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Neolithic implements.</span>
+
+<p>1, Stone hatchet mounted in wood. 2, Jade celt, a polished stone
+weapon, from Livermore in Suffolk, � size. 3, Spindle whorl, �
+size.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The men, while they still spent much time in
+hunting, had now other duties in tending the sheep
+and goats, or looking after the hogs as they turned
+up the ground in the forest for roots, or sowing and
+reaping their crops. Yet still all the tools were
+made of stone, no longer rough and merely chipped
+like the old stone weapons, but neatly cut and
+polished. Stone axes with handles of deer-horn,
+stone spears and javelins, stone arrowheads beautifully
+finished, sling-stones and scrapers, were among
+their weapons and tools, and with them they made
+many delicate implements of bone. On the broad
+lakes which here and there broke the monotony of
+the forests, canoes, made of the trunks of trees
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span>
+hollowed out by fire, were being paddled by one
+man, while another threw out his fishing line armed
+with delicate bone-hooks; and on the banks of the
+lakes, nets weighted with drilled stones tied on to
+the meshes were dragged up full of fish.</p>
+
+<p>For these Neolithic men, or men of the New
+Stone Period, who used polished stone weapons,
+were farmers and shepherds and fishermen. They
+knew how to make rude pottery, and kept domestic
+animals. Moreover, they either came from the east
+or exchanged goods by barter with tribes living
+more to the eastward, now that canoes enabled them
+to cross the sea; for many of their weapons were
+made of greenstone or jade, and of other kinds of
+stone not to be found in Europe, and their sheep and
+goats were animals of eastern origin. They understood
+how to unite to protect their homes, for they
+made underground huts by digging down several feet
+into the ground and roofing the hole over with wood
+coated with clay; and often long passages underground
+united these huts, while in many places on
+the hills, camps, made of ramparts of earth surrounded
+by ditches, served as strongholds for the women and
+children and the flocks and herds, when some neighbouring
+tribe attacked their homesteads.</p>
+
+<p>Still, however, where caves were ready to hand
+they used them for houses, and the same shelter
+which had been the home of the ancient hunters,
+now resounded with the voices of the shepherds,
+who, treading on the sealed floor, little dreamt that
+under their feet lay the remains of a bygone age.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>
+<span class="caption">Fig. 81.</span>
+<img src="images/i_240.jpg" width="600" height="553" alt="Fig. 81.
+
+A burial in Neolithic times." title="" />
+<span class="caption">A burial in Neolithic times.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>And now, as our dreamer watched this new race
+of men fashioning their weapons, feeding their oxen,
+and hunting the wild stag, his attention was arrested
+by a long train of people crossing a neighbouring
+plain, weeping and wailing as they went. At the
+head of this procession, lying on a stretcher made of
+tree-boughs, lay a dead chieftain, and as the line
+moved on, men threw down their tools, and women
+their spinning, and joined the throng. On they
+went to where two upright slabs of stone with
+another laid across them formed the opening to a
+long mound or chamber. Into this the bearers
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>
+passed with lighted torches, and in a niche ready
+prepared placed the dead chieftain in a sitting
+posture with the knees drawn up, placing by his
+side his flint spear and polished axe, his necklace of
+shells, and the bowl from which he had fed. Then
+followed the funeral feast, when, with shouts and
+wailing, fires were lighted, and animals slaughtered
+and cooked, while the chieftain was not forgotten,
+but portions were left for his use, and then the earth
+was piled up again around the mouth of the chamber,
+till it should be opened at some future time to place
+another member of his family by his side, or till in
+after ages the antiquary should rifle his resting-place
+to study the mode of burial in the Neolithic or
+Polished Stone Age.</p>
+
+<p>Time passed on in the magician's dream, and little
+by little the caves were entirely deserted as men
+learnt to build huts of wood and stone. And as
+they advanced in knowledge they began to melt
+metals and pour them into moulds, making bronze
+knives and hatchets, swords and spears; and they
+fashioned brooches and bracelets of bronze and gold,
+though they still also used their necklaces of shells
+and their polished stone weapons. They began, too,
+to keep ducks and fowls, cows and horses; they knew
+how to weave in looms, and to make cloaks and tunics;
+and when they buried their dead it was no longer in
+a crouching position. They laid them decently to
+rest, as if in sleep, in the barrows where they are
+found to this day with bronze weapons by their side.</p>
+
+<p>Then as time went on they learnt to melt even
+hard iron, and to beat it into swords and plough-shares,
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>
+and they lived in well-built huts with stone
+foundations. Their custom of burial, too, was again
+changed, and they burnt their dead, placing the ashes
+in a funeral urn.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 82.</span>
+<img src="images/i_242.jpg" width="600" height="289" alt="Fig. 82.
+
+British relics.
+
+1, A coin of the age of Constantine. 2, Bronze weapon from a Suffolk
+barrow. 3, Bronze bracelet from Liss in Hampshire." title="" />
+<span class="caption">British relics.</span>
+
+<p>1, A coin of the age of Constantine. 2, Bronze weapon from a Suffolk
+barrow. 3, Bronze bracelet from Liss in Hampshire.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>By this time the Britons, as they were now called,
+had begun to gather together in villages and towns,
+and the Romans ruled over them. Now when men
+passed through the wild country they were often finely
+dressed in cloth tunics, wearing arm rings of gold,
+some even driving in war-chariots, carrying shields
+made of wickerwork covered with leather. Still many
+of the country people who laboured in the field kept
+their old clothing of beast skins; they grew their
+corn and stored it in cavities of the rocks; they made
+basket-work boats covered with skin, in which they
+ventured out to sea. So things went on for a long
+period till at last a troubled time came, and the quiet
+valleys were disturbed by wandering people who fled
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>
+from the towns and took refuge in the forests; for
+the Romans after three hundred and fifty years of
+rule had gone back home to Italy, and a new and
+barbarous people called the Jutes, Angles, and
+Saxons, came over the sea from Jutland and drove
+the Britons from their homes.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;">
+<span class="caption">Fig. 83.</span>
+<img src="images/i_243.jpg" width="600" height="523" alt="Fig. 83.
+
+Britons taking refuge in the Cave." title="" />
+<span class="caption">Britons taking refuge in the Cave.</span>
+</div>
+
+<p>And so once more the caves became the abode of
+man, for the harassed Britons brought what few things
+they could carry away from their houses and hid
+themselves there from their enemies. How little
+they thought, as they lay down to sleep on the
+cavern floor, that beneath them lay the remains of
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span>
+two ages of men! They knew nothing of the
+woman who had dropped her stone spindle-whorl
+into the fire, on which the food of Neolithic man
+had been cooking in rough pots of clay; they never
+dug down to the layer of gnawed bones, nor did
+they even in their dreams picture the hy�na haunting
+his ancient den, for a hy�na was an animal
+they had never seen. Still less would they have
+believed that at one time, countless ages before,
+their island had been part of the continent, and
+that men, living in the cave where they now lay,
+had cut down trees with rough flints, and fought
+with such unknown animals as the mammoth and
+the sabre-toothed tiger.</p>
+
+<p>But the magician saw it all passing before him,
+even as he also saw these Britons carrying into the
+cave their brooches, bracelets, and finger rings, their
+iron spears and bronze daggers, and all their little
+household treasures which they had saved in their
+flight. And among these, mingling in the heap, he
+recognised Roman coins bearing the inscription of
+the Emperor Constantine, and he knew that it was
+by these coins that he had, a few days before in
+Yorkshire, been able to fix the date of the British
+occupation of a cave.</p>
+
+<hr style="width: 25%;" />
+
+<p>And with this his dream ended, and he found
+himself clutching firmly the horn on which Pal�olithic
+man had engraved the figure of the reindeer.
+He rose, and stretching himself crossed the sunny
+grass plot of the quadrangle and entered his classroom.
+The boys wondered as he began his lecture
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span>
+at the far-away look in his eyes. They did not know
+how he had passed through a vision of countless
+ages; but that afternoon, for the first time, they realised,
+as he unfolded scene after scene, the history of
+"The Men of Ancient Days."
+</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<h2>INDEX</h2>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p>
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Abbot's Way across Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li>
+<li>Absorption of rays of sunlight, <a href="#Page_129">129</a></li>
+<li>Abyssinia, wild ass of, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li><i>Actinozoa</i>, Cydippe allied to the, <a href="#Page_190">190</a></li>
+<li>Ages, lapse of between old and new stone age, <a href="#Page_217">217</a></li>
+<li>Alcor, or Jack, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li>
+<li>Aldebaran, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>called so by the Arabs, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li>
+  <li>colour of, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Algol the Variable, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li>
+<li>Almach, &#947; Andromed�, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a coloured double star, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>America, extinction of original horse in, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li>
+<li>Andromeda, the great nebula of, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>double coloured star in, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Animal of the Sea-mat, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>number in one leaf, <a href="#Page_193">193</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Animal-trees and stony plants, <a href="#Page_178">178</a></li>
+<li>Animals, extinct, living with man, <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li>
+<li>Antares, a ruby-red star, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+<li>Antherozoids of mosses, <a href="#Page_89">89</a></li>
+<li>Apothecia of lichens, <a href="#Page_83">83</a></li>
+<li>Apennines, Lunar, figured, <a href="#Page_19">19</a></li>
+<li>Archimedes, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>smooth centre of, <a href="#Page_19">19</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Arctic lands, lichens in, <a href="#Page_82">82</a></li>
+<li>Arcturus, colour of, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+<li>Aristarchus, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>streaks around, <a href="#Page_17">17</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Aristotle, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Arrows, old stone, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li>
+<li>Asia, horse of Central, <a href="#Page_201">201</a></li>
+<li><i>Asinus t�niopus</i>, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li><i>Aspergillus glaucus</i>, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>growth of, <a href="#Page_63">63</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Ass tribe, forms allied to the, <a href="#Page_201">201</a></li>
+<li>&mdash;&mdash;, wild of Africa, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li>Atmosphere, absence of in the moon, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+<li>Australia, wild horses of, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li><i>Bacillaria Paradoxa</i>, a diatom, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li>
+<li>Bacteria growing on wounds, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Bai�, hill thrown up on Bay of, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+<li>Ball, Sir R., on binary stars, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li>
+<li>Beehive, triple star near the, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Beer, fermentation of, <a href="#Page_65">65</a></li>
+<li>Bellatrix, a star in Orion, <a href="#Page_148">148</a></li>
+<li>Berlin, ground beneath, formed of diatoms, <a href="#Page_186">186</a></li>
+<li>Bessel, on movements of Sirius, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li>
+<li>Betelgeux, a star in Orion, <a href="#Page_148">148</a></li>
+<li>Binary star in Great Bear, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li>
+<li>&mdash;&mdash; stars, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a></li>
+<li>Bog-moss or Sphagnum, <a href="#Page_93">93</a></li>
+<li>Bog-mosses, distribution of, <a href="#Page_94">94</a></li>
+<li>Bombs, volcanic, <a href="#Page_105">105</a></li>
+<li>Bo�tis &#949;, a coloured double star, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+<li>Britons inhabiting caves, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>ornaments and customs of, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>&mdash;&mdash; of Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li>
+<li>Bronze weapon and bracelet, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+<li>Bryum or thread moss, <a href="#Page_77">77</a></li>
+<li>Buckfast Abbey, monks of, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li>
+<li>Bunt, a fungus, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Burial in Neolithic times, <a href="#Page_221">221</a></li></ul>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span></p>
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Cassiopeia, the constellation, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>coloured double star in, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Castor, a binary star, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li>
+<li>Camera, photographic, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>attached to the telescope, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Cancer &#950;, a triple coloured star, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Candle-flame, image of, formed by lens, <a href="#Page_33">33</a></li>
+<li>Canis Major, constellation of, <a href="#Page_148">148</a></li>
+<li>Capella, colour of the star, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li>
+<li>Castor, light of compared with a near star, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li>
+<li>Caterpillars destroyed by fungus, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Caucasus Mountains on the Moon, <a href="#Page_18">18</a></li>
+<li>Cave, the three periods of a, <a href="#Page_225">225</a></li>
+<li>Caves, Pal�olithic and Neolithic, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>Pal�olithic life in, <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li>
+  <li>hy�nas roamed in, <a href="#Page_217">217</a></li>
+  <li>Neolithic life in, <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li>
+  <li>Britons took refuge in, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Cells, fertile of mushroom, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of moss-plant, <a href="#Page_89">89</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Celt, jade, from Suffolk, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li>
+<li>Chambers, Mr., his drawing of &#949; Lyr�, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+<li>Charles's Wain, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>part of Great Bear, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li>
+  <li>stars of drifting, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li>
+  <li>stars visible in waggon of, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li>
+  <li>double coloured star in, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Chilomonas amygdalum</i>, a monad, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li>
+<li>Ciliary muscle, action of the, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li>
+<li>Clark, Alvan, on companion of Sirius, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li>
+<li>Clockwork of telescope, <a href="#Page_2">2</a></li>
+<li><i>Cocconema lanceolatum</i>, a diatom, <a href="#Page_184">184</a></li>
+<li>Coin of age of Constantine, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+<li><i>Conferv�</i>, growth of, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+<li>Commons, Mr., photographed Orion's nebula, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+<li>Constantine, coin of age of, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+<li>Constellations, maps of, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a></li>
+<li>Copernicus, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>figured, <a href="#Page_17">17</a></li>
+  <li>bright streaks around, <a href="#Page_18">18</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Copper-sulphate in lava, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+<li><i>Corallina</i>, a stony seaweed, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>fruit of, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li>
+  <li>appearance like <i>Sertularia</i>, <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Cornea of the eye, <a href="#Page_31">31</a></li>
+<li>Corona, nature of the sun's, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li>
+<li>Cottam, Mr. A., his plate of coloured stars, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+<li>Crater, lava flowing from a, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>interior of Vesuvius, <a href="#Page_100">100</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Crater-plains, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>-<a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+<li>Craters on the moon, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of earth and moon compared, <a href="#Page_16">16</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Crystallites in volcanic glass, <a href="#Page_109">109</a></li>
+<li>Crystallisation, two periods of, in lava, <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li>
+<li>Crystals forming in artificial lavas, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>precious, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Cydippe pileus</i>, a living jelly-ball, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>structure of, <a href="#Page_188">188</a>-<a href="#Page_190">190</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Cygni &#946;, a coloured double star, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Dartmoor, fairy rings on, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>the Sundew on, <a href="#Page_56">56</a></li>
+  <li>granite figured, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li>
+  <li>ponies, <a href="#Page_195">195</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>De la Rue, his photograph of moon, <a href="#Page_13">13</a></li>
+<li>Devonshire ponies, black stripe on, <a href="#Page_201">201</a></li>
+<li>Diatom, a growing, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li>
+<li><i>Diatoma hyalina</i>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a></li>
+<li>Diatoms, magnified fossil, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>living marine, <a href="#Page_184">184</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Didymium, giving a broken spectrum, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li>
+<li>Dordogne, caves of the, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li>
+<li>Draper, Prof., photographed Orion's nebula, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+<li><i>Drosera rotundifolia</i> on Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_56">56</a></li>
+<li>Dschiggetai, horse-ass of Tibet, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li>
+<li>Dsungarian desert, wild horse of the, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li>Dykes, nature of volcanic, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Earth, path of the moon round the, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>magnetic storm on, caused by sun, <a href="#Page_14">14</a></li>
+  <li>reservoirs of melted matter in the, <a href="#Page_101">101</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Earthquakes accompanying volcanic outbursts, <a href="#Page_102">102</a></li>
+<li>Eclipse of sun, red jets and corona seen during, <a href="#Page_125">125</a></li>
+  <li>&mdash;&mdash;, total, of the moon, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>lurid light during, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span></li>
+<li>Eclipses, how caused, <a href="#Page_7">7</a></li>
+<li>Elephant, hairy, engraved on ivory, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li>
+<li><i>Empusa musc�</i>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Engis and Engihoul caves, <a href="#Page_210">210</a></li>
+<li>England, ancient caves in, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>in Pal�olithic times, <a href="#Page_211">211</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Eocene, toed horses of the, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li>
+<li><i>Eohippus</i>, or horse of the dawn, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li>
+<li><i>Equus hemionus</i>, the horse-ass, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li>
+<li>Eratosthenes, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Erbia, giving a broken spectrum, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li>
+<li>Ergot, a fungus, <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li>
+<li>Eruptions of Vesuvius, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a></li>
+<li>Eudoxus, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Experiments, necessity for accurate, <a href="#Page_54">54</a></li>
+<li>Eye, structure of the, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>-<a href="#Page_32">32</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>mode of seeing with the, <a href="#Page_32">32</a></li>
+  <li>short-sighted, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+  <li>distances spanned by the naked, <a href="#Page_40">40</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Facul� on the sun's face, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a></li>
+<li>Fairy rings, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>mentioned in <i>Merry Wives of Windsor</i>, <a href="#Page_57">57</a></li>
+  <li>growth of, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>-<a href="#Page_73">73</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Ferments caused by fungi, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Fishing in ancient times, <a href="#Page_215">215</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a></li>
+<li><i>Fistulina hepatica</i>, a fungus, <a href="#Page_71">71</a></li>
+<li>Flint skeletons of plants, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li>
+<li>Flustra or sea-mat, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>structure of, <a href="#Page_191">191</a>-<a href="#Page_193">193</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Fly, fungus killing a, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Focal images, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>distances, <a href="#Page_44">44</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Fouqu�, M., artificial lava made by, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li>
+<li>Fructification of mushrooms, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of lichens, <a href="#Page_83">83</a></li>
+  <li>of mosses, <a href="#Page_91">91</a></li>
+  <li>of seaweeds, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Funaria hygrometrica</i>, urn of the, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>has no urn lid, <a href="#Page_92">92</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Fungi, nature of, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>different kinds of, <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li>
+  <li>attacking insects, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+  <li>growing on wounds, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+  <li>the use of, <a href="#Page_74">74</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Fungus and green cells in lichen, <a href="#Page_81">81</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Gardener, advice of the old, <a href="#Page_118">118</a></li>
+<li>Gas, spectrum of a, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li>
+<li>Gases revealed by spectroscope, <a href="#Page_52">52</a></li>
+<li>Gemini, the constellation, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li>
+<li>Geminorum, &#948;, a double coloured star, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+<li>Gills of mushroom, <a href="#Page_69">69</a></li>
+<li><i>Gomphonema marinum</i>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a></li>
+<li>Gooseberry, fermentation in a, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Gory dew, <i>Palmella cruenta</i>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+<li>Graham's island thrown up, <a href="#Page_102">102</a></li>
+<li>Granular appearance of sun's face, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li>
+<li>Grape fungus, <a href="#Page_65">65</a></li>
+<li>Great Bear, the constellation, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>binary star in, <a href="#Page_158">158</a></li>
+  <li>coloured double star in, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Greenstone, Neolithic weapons of, <a href="#Page_220">220</a></li>
+<li>Guards, the, in the Little Bear, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Hartz Mountains, caves of the, <a href="#Page_210">210</a></li>
+<li>Hatchet, a Neolithic stone, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li>
+<li>Hebrides, volcanic islands of, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li>
+<li>Henri, MM., photograph of moon's face by, <a href="#Page_19">19</a></li>
+<li>Herculaneum, buried, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a></li>
+<li>Herculis &#945;, a coloured double star, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Hermitage, lava stream flowing behind the, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a></li>
+<li>Herschel's drawing of Copernicus, <a href="#Page_17">17</a></li>
+<li>Huggins, Dr., on shape of prominences, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>on spectra of nebul�, <a href="#Page_151">151</a></li>
+  <li>on cause of colour in stars, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Himalayas, single-celled plants in the, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+<li>Horse, wild, of the Pampas, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of Tartary, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li>
+  <li>of Kirghiz steppes, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li>
+  <li>Przevalsky's, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li>
+  <li>early history of toed, <a href="#Page_204">204</a></li>
+  <li>structure of foot and hoof of, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li>
+  <li>skeleton of, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li>
+  <li>origin and migration of early, <a href="#Page_207">207</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Hungary, ancient caves of, <a href="#Page_210">210</a></li>
+<li>Huyghens, the highest peak in Lunar Apennines, <a href="#Page_19">19</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Image formed at focus of lens, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of sky in telescope, <a href="#Page_49">49</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+
+
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span></li>
+
+<li>Implements, old stone, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>new stone, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Imps of plant-life, <a href="#Page_59">59</a></li>
+<li>India, low plants in springs of, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>solar eclipse seen in, <a href="#Page_124">124</a></li>
+  <li>wild ass of, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Infusorial earth, <a href="#Page_186">186</a></li>
+<li>Infusorians in a seaside pool, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li>
+<li>Inhabitants of a seaside pool, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>-<a href="#Page_174">174</a></li>
+<li>Iris of the eye, <a href="#Page_30">30</a></li>
+<li>Iron pyrites in lava, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+<li>Iron slag, lava compared to, <a href="#Page_105">105</a></li>
+<li>Islands, volcanic thrown up, <a href="#Page_102">102</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Jack by the second horse, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li>
+<li>Jade, Neolithic weapons of, <a href="#Page_220">220</a></li>
+<li>Jannsen, Prof., on sun prominences, <a href="#Page_131">131</a></li>
+<li>Judd, Mr., on volcano of Mull, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li>
+<li>Jutes and Angles invading Britain, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Kant on nebular hypothesis, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+<li>Kent's Cavern, rough stone implement from, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li>
+<li>Kepler, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>streaks around, <a href="#Page_17">17</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Kertag, or wild horse, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li>
+<li>Kew, sun-storm registered at, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li>
+<li>Kiang or Kulan, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li>
+<li>Kirchhoff, Prof., on sunlight, <a href="#Page_128">128</a></li>
+<li>Kulan or Kiang, <a href="#Page_200">200</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Labrador felspar artificially made, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li>
+<li>Langley, Prof., sun-spot drawn by, <a href="#Page_141">141</a></li>
+<li>Laplace, nebular hypothesis of, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+<li>Lava, aspect of flowing, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>reservoirs of molten, <a href="#Page_101">101</a></li>
+  <li>nature of, <a href="#Page_107">107</a></li>
+  <li>artificially made, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li>
+  <li>two periods of crystallisation in, <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Lava-stream, history of a, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>section of a, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+  <li>rapid cooling of surface, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Laver or sea-lettuce, structure of, <a href="#Page_176">176</a></li>
+<li>Leo, the constellation, <a href="#Page_155">155</a></li>
+<li>Leucotephrite artificially made, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li>
+<li>Lens, natural, of the eye, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>simple magnifying, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Levy, M., artificial lava made by, <a href="#Page_112">112</a></li>
+<li>Lichens, specimens of from life, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>the life-history of, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>-<a href="#Page_84">84</a></li>
+  <li>sections of, <a href="#Page_81">81</a></li>
+  <li>distribution of <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a></li>
+  <li>fructification of, <a href="#Page_83">83</a></li>
+  <li>causes of success of, <a href="#Page_94">94</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Lick telescope, magnifying power of, <a href="#Page_46">46</a></li>
+<li>Light, lurid, on moon during eclipse, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>sifted by spectroscope, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Light-granules on sun's face, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>supposed explanation of, <a href="#Page_141">141</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Lime-tree, fungi on the, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Liss, bronze bracelet from, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+<li>Little Bear, pole-star and guards in the, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li>
+<li>Lockyer, Mr., on sun-prominences, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_136">136</a></li>
+<li>Lunar Apennines figured, <a href="#Page_19">19</a></li>
+<li>Lyr� &#949;, a double-binary star, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Machairodus, tooth of, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li>
+<li>Madeleine, La, carvings from cave of, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li>
+<li>Magic glasses and how to use them, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>what can be done by, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Magician's chamber, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>his pupils, <a href="#Page_4">4</a></li>
+  <li>spells, <a href="#Page_28">28</a></li>
+  <li>his dream of ancient days, <a href="#Page_209">209</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Magnetic connection of sun and earth, <a href="#Page_142">142</a></li>
+<li>Magnifying-glass, action of a, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+<li>Mammoth engraved on ivory, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li>
+<li>Maps of constellations, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a></li>
+<li><i>Marasmius oreastes</i>, fairy-ring mushroom, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a></li>
+<li><i>Mazeppa</i>, quotation from Byron's, <a href="#Page_201">201</a></li>
+<li>Men of older stone age, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of Neolithic age, <a href="#Page_218">218</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Mesohippus</i>, a toed horse, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li>
+<li>Microliths in volcanic glass, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>formed in artificial lava, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Microscope, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>action of the, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>-<a href="#Page_38">38</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Mildews are fungi, <a href="#Page_60">60</a></li>
+<li>Milky Way, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>Cassiopeia in the, <a href="#Page_163">163</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span></li>
+<li>Minerals crystallising in lava, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+<li>Mines, increase of temperature in, <a href="#Page_101">101</a></li>
+<li>Miohippus, or lesser toed horse, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li>
+<li>Mizar, a double-coloured star in the Great Bear, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Monads, size and activity of, <a href="#Page_183">183</a></li>
+<li>Monks, ancient, of Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li>
+<li>Monte Nuovo thrown up in 1538, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+<li>Moon, phases of the, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>course in the heavens, <a href="#Page_8">8</a></li>
+  <li>map of the, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+  <li>craters of the, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a></li>
+  <li>face of full, <a href="#Page_11">11</a></li>
+  <li>a worn-out planet, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+  <li>no atmosphere in the, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+  <li>diagram of eclipse of, <a href="#Page_23">23</a></li>
+  <li>lurid light on during eclipse, <a href="#Page_24">24</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Moss-leaf magnified, <a href="#Page_87">87</a></li>
+<li>Moss, life-history of a, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_92">92</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a stem of feathery, <a href="#Page_85">85</a></li>
+  <li>protonema of a, <a href="#Page_86">86</a></li>
+  <li>modes of new growth of a, <a href="#Page_88">88</a></li>
+  <li>fructification of a, <a href="#Page_89">89</a></li>
+  <li>urns of a, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Mosses, different kinds of, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>advantages and distribution of, <a href="#Page_94">94</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Moulds are fungi, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>how they grow, <a href="#Page_63">63</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Mountains of the moon, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>formation of, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Mucor Mucedo</i>, figured, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>growth of, <a href="#Page_63">63</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Mull, volcanic dykes in the island of, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li>
+<li>Mushroom, early stages and spawn of, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>mycelium of, <a href="#Page_67">67</a></li>
+  <li>later stages of, <a href="#Page_68">68</a></li>
+  <li>section of gills of, <a href="#Page_69">69</a></li>
+  <li>spores of, <a href="#Page_70">70</a></li>
+  <li>fairy or Scotch bonnet, <a href="#Page_72">72</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Mycelium of mould, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of mushroom, <a href="#Page_67">67</a></li>
+  <li>of fairy rings, <a href="#Page_72">72</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Naples, volcanic eruption seen at, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>Monte Nuovo thrown up near, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Nasmyth on bright lunar streaks, <a href="#Page_16">16</a></li>
+<li>Nebula of Orion, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>spectrum of, <a href="#Page_151">151</a></li>
+  <li>photographs of, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+  <li>of Pleiades, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li>
+  <li>of Andromeda, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>-<a href="#Page_164">164</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Needle, bone, from a cave, <a href="#Page_212">212</a></li>
+<li>Neolithic implements, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>industries and habits, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>-<a href="#Page_220">220</a></li>
+  <li>burials, <a href="#Page_221">221</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Neptune, invisible to naked eye, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+<li>Neison, Mr., his drawing of Plato, <a href="#Page_20">20</a></li>
+<li><i>Nostoc</i>, growing on stones, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Oak, fungi on the, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Observatory, the Magician's, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>astronomical on Vesuvius, <a href="#Page_97">97</a></li>
+  <li>cascade of lava behind the, <a href="#Page_99">99</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Obsidian, or volcanic glass, <a href="#Page_109">109</a></li>
+<li>Occultation of a star, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>, <a href="#Page_25">25</a></li>
+<li>Onager, or wild ass of Asia, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li>Optic nerve of eye, <a href="#Page_34">34</a></li>
+<li>Orion, constellation of, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>great nebula of, <a href="#Page_149">149</a></li>
+  <li>photographs of Nebula of, <a href="#Page_152">152</a></li>
+  <li>coloured double stars in, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Orionis &#952;, or Trapezium, <a href="#Page_150">150</a></li>
+<li>Ornaments of ancient Britons, <a href="#Page_222">222</a></li>
+<li>Orohippus, a toed horse, <a href="#Page_205">205</a></li>
+<li><i>Oscillari�</i>, growth of, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Pal�olithic man, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>relics, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li>
+  <li>life, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Pampas, wild horses of the, <a href="#Page_198">198</a></li>
+<li><i>Penicillium glaucum</i>, figured, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>growth of, <a href="#Page_63">63</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Penumbra of an eclipse, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>
+   <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of sun-spots, <a href="#Page_140">140</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Perithecia of lichens, <a href="#Page_84">84</a></li>
+<li>Petavius, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Photographic camera, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>attached to telescope, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Photographs of the moon, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of galloping horse, <a href="#Page_48">48</a></li>
+  <li>of the stars, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li>
+  <li>of the sun, <a href="#Page_121">121</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Photosphere of the sun, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li>
+<li>Philadelphia, electric shocks at during sun-storm, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li>
+<li>Pixies of plant life, <a href="#Page_59">59</a></li>
+<li>Plains of the moon, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>nature of the, <a href="#Page_12">12</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span></li>
+<li>Plants, colourless, single-celled, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>single-celled green, <a href="#Page_78">78</a></li>
+  <li>two kinds of in lichens, <a href="#Page_80">80</a></li>
+  <li>with flint skeletons, <a href="#Page_185">185</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Plato, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>figured, <a href="#Page_20">20</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Pleiades, the, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>nebul� in, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Pleurococcus</i>, a single-celled plant, <a href="#Page_78">78</a></li>
+<li>Plough, the, or Charles's Wain, <a href="#Page_157">157</a></li>
+<li>Pointers, in Charles's Wain, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li>
+<li>Pole-star, the, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a yellow sun, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Pollux, a yellow sun, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+<li><i>Polysiphonia</i>, a red seaweed, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>fruit of, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Polytrichum commune</i>, a hair moss, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>its urns protected by a lid, <a href="#Page_91">91</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Pool, inhabitants of a seaside, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>-<a href="#Page_174">174</a></li>
+<li>Precious stones, formation of, <a href="#Page_116">116</a></li>
+<li>Proctor, his star atlas, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>on drifting of Charles's Wain, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Prominence-spectrum and sun-spectrum compared, <a href="#Page_134">134</a></li>
+<li>Prominences, red, of the sun, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>seen in full daylight, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>-<a href="#Page_133">133</a></li>
+  <li>shape of, <a href="#Page_135">135</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li><i>Protococcus nivalis</i>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+<li>Protonema of a moss, <a href="#Page_86">86</a></li>
+<li>Przevalsky's wild horse, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li>
+<li>Ptolemy, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Puffballs, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>use of in nature, <a href="#Page_73">73</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Pupil of the eye, <a href="#Page_30">30</a></li>
+<li>Puzzuoli, eruption near, 1538, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Quaggas, herds of, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Rain-band in the solar spectrum, <a href="#Page_130">130</a></li>
+<li>Rain-shower during volcanic eruption, <a href="#Page_107">107</a></li>
+<li>Readings in the sky, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Red snow, a single-celled plant, <a href="#Page_79">79</a></li>
+<li>Regulus, the star, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+<li>Reindeer, carving on horn of, <a href="#Page_216">216</a></li>
+<li>Reservoirs of molten rock underground, <a href="#Page_101">101</a></li>
+<li>Resina, ascent of Vesuvius from, <a href="#Page_98">98</a></li>
+<li>Retina of the eye, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>image of object on the, <a href="#Page_33">33</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Richmond, Virginia, infusorial earth of, <a href="#Page_186">186</a></li>
+<li>Rigel, a star in Orion, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a coloured double star, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Rings, growth of fairy, <a href="#Page_73">73</a></li>
+<li>Roberts, Mr. I., his photograph of Orion's nebula, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>and of nebula of the Pleiades, <a href="#Page_153">153</a></li>
+  <li>and of nebula of Andromeda, <a href="#Page_164">164</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Rosse, Lord, his telescope, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>on Orion's nebula, <a href="#Page_150">150</a></li>
+  <li>stars visible in his telescope, <a href="#Page_160">160</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Rue, De la, his photograph of the moon, <a href="#Page_13">13</a></li>
+<li>Rust on plants, <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Sabrina island formed, <a href="#Page_102">102</a></li>
+<li>Saturn, distance of, <a href="#Page_40">40</a></li>
+<li>Saxons, invasion of the, <a href="#Page_224">224</a></li>
+<li>Schwabe, Herr, on sun-spots cycle, <a href="#Page_137">137</a></li>
+<li>Scori� of volcanoes, <a href="#Page_108">108</a></li>
+<li>"Scotch bonnet" mushroom, <a href="#Page_72">72</a></li>
+<li>Sea-mat, <i>see</i> Flustra</li>
+<li>"Seas" lunar, so-called, <a href="#Page_10">10</a></li>
+<li>Seaweeds, a group of, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>fruits of, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Secchi, Father, on depth of a sun-spot, <a href="#Page_139">139</a></li>
+<li>Selwyn, Mr., photograph of sun by, <a href="#Page_122">122</a></li>
+<li>Senses alone tell us of outer world, <a href="#Page_29">29</a></li>
+<li><i>Sertularia tenella</i>, structure of, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li><i>cupressina</i>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Sertularian and coralline, resemblance of, <a href="#Page_179">179</a></li>
+<li>Shakespeare on fairy rings, <a href="#Page_57">57</a></li>
+<li>Shipley, Mr., saw volcanic island formed, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+<li>Sight, far and near, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+<li>Silkworm destroyed by fungi, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Sirius, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a bluish white sun, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+  <li>irregularities of caused by a companion, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Skeleton of the horse, <a href="#Page_206">206</a></li>
+<li>Skin diseases caused by fungi, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_66">66</a></li>
+<li>Sky, light readings in the, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+<li>Smut, a fungus, <a href="#Page_61">61</a></li>
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></li>
+<li>Sodium lime in the spectrum, <a href="#Page_128">128</a></li>
+<li>Somma, part of ancient Vesuvius, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a></li>
+<li>Spawn of mushroom, <a href="#Page_67">67</a></li>
+<li>Spectra, plate of coloured, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li>
+<li>Spectroscope, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>Kirchhoff's, <a href="#Page_51">51</a></li>
+  <li>gases revealed by the, <a href="#Page_52">52</a></li>
+  <li>direct vision, <a href="#Page_127">127</a></li>
+  <li>sifting light, <a href="#Page_126">126</a></li>
+  <li>attached to telescope, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Spectrum of sunlight, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a></li>
+<li>Sphacelaria, a brown-green seaweed, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>fruit of, <a href="#Page_177">177</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Sphagnum or bog moss, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>structure of leaves of, <a href="#Page_93">93</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Spindle-whorl from Neolithic caves, <a href="#Page_219">219</a></li>
+<li>Spore-cases of mosses, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>, <a href="#Page_93">93</a></li>
+<li>Spores of moulds, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>of mushroom, <a href="#Page_70">70</a></li>
+  <li>of lichens, <a href="#Page_83">83</a></li>
+  <li>of mosses, <a href="#Page_91">91</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Star, occultation of, by the moon, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a double-binary, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+  <li>a dark, travelling round Sirius, <a href="#Page_169">169</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Star-cluster in Perseus, <a href="#Page_162">162</a></li>
+<li>Star-depths, <a href="#Page_160">160</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a></li>
+<li>Stars, light from the, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>visible in the country, <a href="#Page_145">145</a></li>
+  <li>apparent motion of the, <a href="#Page_146">146</a></li>
+  <li>maps of, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a></li>
+  <li>of milky way, <a href="#Page_149">149</a></li>
+  <li>binary, <a href="#Page_154">154</a></li>
+  <li>real motion of, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li>
+  <li>drifting, <a href="#Page_159">159</a></li>
+  <li>number of known and estimated, <a href="#Page_161">161</a></li>
+  <li>colours of, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+  <li>double coloured, <a href="#Page_167">167</a></li>
+  <li>cause of colour in, <a href="#Page_168">168</a></li>
+  <li>are they centres of solar systems? <a href="#Page_170">170</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Statur or wild horse, <a href="#Page_202">202</a></li>
+<li>Streaks, bright, on the moon, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>-<a href="#Page_17">17</a></li>
+<li>Suffolk, bronze weapon from barrow in, <a href="#Page_223">223</a></li>
+<li>Sun, path of the moon round the, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>one of the stars, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li>
+  <li>how to look at the, <a href="#Page_119">119</a></li>
+  <li>face of, thrown on a screen, <a href="#Page_120">120</a></li>
+  <li>photograph of the, <a href="#Page_122">122</a></li>
+  <li>prominences, corona, and facul� of, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>-<a href="#Page_125">125</a></li>
+  <li>mottling of face of, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li>
+  <li>total eclipse of, <a href="#Page_124">124</a></li>
+  <li>zodiacal line round, <a href="#Page_125">125</a></li>
+  <li>dark lines in spectrum of, <a href="#Page_128">128</a></li>
+  <li>reversing layer of, <a href="#Page_131">131</a></li>
+  <li>metals in the, <a href="#Page_131">131</a></li>
+  <li>sudden outburst in the, <a href="#Page_142">142</a></li>
+  <li>magnetic connection with the earth, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li>
+  <li>a yellow star, <a href="#Page_166">166</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Sun's rays touching moon during eclipse, <a href="#Page_24">24</a></li>
+<li>Sun-spots, cycle of, <a href="#Page_137">137</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>proving sun's rotation, <a href="#Page_138">138</a></li>
+  <li>nature of, <a href="#Page_139">139</a></li>
+  <li>quiet and unquiet, <a href="#Page_140">140</a></li>
+  <li>formation of, <a href="#Page_142">142</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Sundew on Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_56">56</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Tarpan, a wild horse, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li>
+<li>Tartary, wild horses of, <a href="#Page_199">199</a></li>
+<li>Tavistock Abbey, monks of, <a href="#Page_196">196</a></li>
+<li>Telescope, clock-work, adjusting a, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>an astronomical, <a href="#Page_41">41</a></li>
+  <li>magnifying power of the, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>-<a href="#Page_46">46</a></li>
+  <li>giant, <a href="#Page_46">46</a></li>
+  <li>terrestrial, <a href="#Page_47">47</a></li>
+  <li>what can be seen in a small, <a href="#Page_46">46</a></li>
+  <li>how the sun is photographed in the, <a href="#Page_122">122</a></li>
+  <li>how the spectroscope is worked with the, <a href="#Page_132">132</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Teneriffe, peak of compared to lunar craters, <a href="#Page_15">15</a></li>
+<li>Tennant, Major, drawing of eclipsed sun by, <a href="#Page_123">123</a></li>
+<li>Temperature, underground, <a href="#Page_101">101</a></li>
+<li><i>Thuricolla follicula</i>, a transparent infusorian, <a href="#Page_182">182</a></li>
+<li>Tiger, sabre-toothed, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li>
+<li><i>Tilletia caria</i> or bunt, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+<li>Toadstools, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>use of in nature, <a href="#Page_73">73</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Tools, of ancient stone period, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li>
+<li>Tooth of machairodus, <a href="#Page_213">213</a></li>
+<li>Torquay, the Magician's pool near, <a href="#Page_172">172</a></li>
+<li>Tors of Dartmoor, <a href="#Page_197">197</a></li>
+<li>Trapezium of Orion, <a href="#Page_150">150</a></li>
+<li><i>Tremella mesenterica</i> fungus, <a href="#Page_71">71</a></li>
+<li>Tripoli formed of diatoms, <a href="#Page_35">35</a></li>
+<li>Tundras, lichens and mosses of the, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a></li>
+<li>Tycho, a lunar crater, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>description of, <a href="#Page_13">13</a></li>
+  <li>bright streaks of, <a href="#Page_14">14</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li><i>Ulva</i>, a green seaweed, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>a section magnified, <a href="#Page_176">176</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Umbra of an eclipse, <a href="#Page_23">23</a></li>
+<li>Urns of mosses, <a href="#Page_89">89</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a></li>
+<li><i>Ustilago carbo</i>, or smut, <a href="#Page_64">64</a></li>
+</ul>
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span></p>
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Variable stars, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li>
+<li>Vega, a bluish-white sun, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>double-binary star near, <a href="#Page_165">165</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Veil of mushroom, <a href="#Page_68">68</a></li>
+<li>Vesuvian lavas imitated, <a href="#Page_113">113</a></li>
+<li>Vesuvius, eruption of 1868 described, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>dormant, <a href="#Page_103">103</a></li>
+  <li>eruption of in A.D. 79, <a href="#Page_104">104</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Volcanic craters of earth and moon compared, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>eruptions in the moon, <a href="#Page_21">21</a></li>
+  <li>glass under the microscope, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+<li>Volcano, diagram of an active, <a href="#Page_105">105</a></li>
+<li>Volcanoes, the cause of discussed, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>
+  <ul class="IX">
+  <li>ancient, laid bare, <a href="#Page_111">111</a></li>
+  </ul></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Washington, electric shocks at during sun-storm, <a href="#Page_143">143</a></li>
+<li>Winter in Pal�olithic times, <a href="#Page_215">215</a></li>
+<li>Wood, winter growth in a, <a href="#Page_76">76</a></li>
+<li>"World without End," <a href="#Page_115">115</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Yeast, growth of, <a href="#Page_65">65</a></li>
+<li>Yorkshire, Roman coins in caves of, <a href="#Page_225">225</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<ul class="IX">
+<li>Zebra, herds of, <a href="#Page_203">203</a></li>
+<li>Zodiacal light, <a href="#Page_125">125</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+
+
+
+
+<h4>THE END</h4>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 100%;" />
+<h2>D. APPLETON &amp; CO.'S PUBLICATIONS.</h2>
+
+
+<blockquote><p><i>THE FAIRYLAND OF SCIENCE.</i> By <span class="smcap">Arabella
+B. Buckley</span>. With 74 Illustrations. Cloth, gilt, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"Deserves to take a permanent place in the literature of youth."&mdash;<i>London
+Times.</i></p>
+
+<p>"So interesting that, having once opened the book, we do not know how
+to leave off reading."&mdash;<i>Saturday Review.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>LIFE AND HER CHILDREN: Glimpses of Animal
+Life from the Am&#339;ba to the Insects.</i> By <span class="smcap">Arabella B.
+Buckley</span>. With over 100 Illustrations. Cloth, gilt, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"The work forms a charming introduction to the study of zo�logy&mdash;the
+science of living things&mdash;which, we trust, will find its way into many
+hands."&mdash;<i>Nature.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>WINNERS IN LIFE'S RACE; or, the Great
+Backboned Family.</i> By <span class="smcap">Arabella B. Buckley</span>. With numerous
+Illustrations. Cloth, gilt, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"We can conceive no better gift-book than this volume. Miss Buckley
+has spared no pains to incorporate in her book the latest results of scientific
+research. The illustrations in the book deserve the highest praise&mdash;they are
+numerous, accurate, and striking."&mdash;<i>Spectator.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>A SHORT HISTORY OF NATURAL SCIENCE;
+and of the Progress of Discovery from the Time of the
+Greeks to the Present Time.</i> By <span class="smcap">Arabella B. Buckley</span>. New
+edition, revised and rearranged. With 77 Illustrations. Cloth,
+$2.00.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"The work, though mainly intended for children and young persons,
+may be most advantageously read by many persons of riper age, and may
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+
+<blockquote><p><i>A WORLD OF WONDERS; or, Marvels in Animate
+and Inanimate Nature.</i> A Book for Young Readers.
+With 322 Illustrations on Wood. Large 12mo. Cloth, illuminated,
+$2.00.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p><i>CONTENTS.</i>&mdash;Wonders of Marine Life; Curiosities of Vegetable Life;
+Curiosities of the Insect and Reptile World; Marvels of Bird and Beast
+Life; Phenomenal Forces of Nature.</p>
+
+
+
+<blockquote><p><i>AROUND AND ABOUT SOUTH AMERICA:
+Twenty Months of Quest and Query.</i> By <span class="smcap">Frank Vincent</span>,
+author of "The Land of the White Elephant," etc. With Maps,
+Plans, and 54 full-page Illustrations. 8vo, xxiv-473 pages.
+Ornamental cloth, $5.00.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>No former traveler has made so comprehensive and thorough a tour of Spanish and
+Portuguese America as did Mr. Vincent. He visited every capital, chief city, and
+important seaport, made several expeditions into the interior of Brazil and the Argentine
+Republic, and ascended the Paran�, Paraguay, Amazon, Orinoco, and Magdalena
+Rivers; he visited the crater of Pichinchas, 16,000 feet above the sea-level; he explored
+falls in the center of the continent, which, though meriting the title of "Niagara
+of South America," are all but unknown to the outside world; he spent months in the
+picturesque capital of Rio Janeiro; he visited the coffee districts, studied the slaves,
+descended the gold-mines, viewed the greatest rapids of the globe, entered the isolated
+Guianas, and so on.</p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>BRAZIL: Its Condition and Prospects.</i> By <span class="smcap">C. C.
+Andrews</span>, ex-Consul-General to Brazil. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
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+of acquaintance with that empire are principally derived from a residence of three
+years at Rio de Janeiro, its capital, while employed in the service of the United States
+Government, during which period I made a few journeys into the interior."&mdash;<i>From
+the Preface.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>FIVE THOUSAND MILES IN A SLEDGE: A
+Mid-Winter Journey across Siberia.</i> By <span class="smcap">Lionel F. Gowing</span>.
+With Map and 30 Illustrations in Text. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"The book is most certainly one to be read, and will be welcomed as an addition to
+the scant literature on a singularly interesting country."&mdash;<i>Courier.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>CHINA: Travels and Investigations in the "Middle
+Kingdom."</i> A Study of its Civilization and Possibilities.
+With a Glance at Japan. By <span class="smcap">James Harrison Wilson</span>, late
+Major-General United States Volunteers and Brevet Major-General
+United States Army. 12mo. Cloth, $1.75.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"The book presents China and Japan in all these aspects; the manners and customs
+of the people; the institutions, tendencies, and social ideas; the government and
+leading men."&mdash;<i>Boston Traveller.</i></p>
+
+
+
+<blockquote><p><i>THE GARDEN'S STORY; or, Pleasures and Trials
+of an Amateur Gardener.</i> By <span class="smcap">George H. Ellwanger</span>. With
+Head and Tail Pieces by Rhead. 12mo. Cloth extra, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"Mr. Ellwanger's instinct rarely errs in matters of taste. He writes out of the
+fullness of experimental knowledge, but his knowledge differs from that of many a
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+sensibility, and his appreciation of what is beautiful in nature is healthy, hearty, and
+catholic. His record of the garden year, as we have said, begins with the earliest
+violet, and it follows the season through until the witch-hazel is blossoming on the
+border of the wintry woods.... This little book can not fail to give pleasure to all
+who take a genuine interest in rural life. They will sympathize with most of the
+author's robust and positive judgments, and with his strong aversions as well as his
+tender attachments."&mdash;<i>The Tribune</i>, New York.</p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>THE FOLK-LORE OF PLANTS.</i> By <span class="smcap">T. F. Thiselton
+Dyer</span>, M.A. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"The Folk-Lore of Plants" traces the superstitions and fancies connected with
+plants in fairy-lore, in witchcraft and demonology, in religion, in charms, in medicine,
+in plant language, etc. The author is an eminent English botanist, and superintendent
+of the gardens at Kew.</p>
+
+<p>"A handsome and deeply interesting volume.... In all respects the book is
+excellent. Its arrangement is simple and intelligible, its style bright and alluring;
+authorities are cited at the foot of the page, and a full index is appended.... To all
+who seek an introduction to one of the most attractive branches of folk-lore, this delightful
+volume may be warmly commended."&mdash;<i>Notes and Queries.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>FLOWERS AND THEIR PEDIGREES.</i> By
+<span class="smcap">Grant Allen</span>, author of "Vignettes of Nature," etc. Illustrated.
+12mo. Cloth, $1.50.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>No writer treats scientific subjects with so much ease and charm of style as Mr.
+Grant Allen. His sketches in the magazines have well been called fascinating, and
+the present volume, being a collection of various papers, will fully sustain his reputation
+as an eminently entertaining and suggestive writer.</p>
+
+<p>"'Flowers and their Pedigrees,' by Grant Allen, with many illustrations, is not
+merely a description of British wild flowers, but a discussion of why they are, what
+they are, and how they come to be so; in other words, a scientific study of the migration
+and transformation of plants, illustrated by the daisy, the strawberry, the cleavers,
+wheat, the mountain tulip, the cuckoo-pint, and a few others. The study is a delightful
+one, and the book is fascinating to any one who has either love for flowers or curiosity
+about them."&mdash;<i>Hartford Courant.</i></p>
+
+
+<blockquote><p><i>THE HISTORY OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATION.</i>
+A Hand-book based upon M. Gustave Ducoudray's "Histoire
+Sommaire de la Civilisation." Edited by the Rev. <span class="smcap">J. Verschoyle</span>,
+M.A. With numerous Illustrations. Large 12mo.
+Cloth, $1.75.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>"With M. Ducoudray's work as a basis, many additions having been made, derived
+from special writers, Mr. Verschoyle has produced an excellent work, which gives a
+comprehensive view of early civilization.... As to the world of the past, the volume
+under notice treats of Egypt, Assyria, the Far East, of Greece and Rome in the most
+comprehensive manner. It is not the arts alone which are fully illustrated, but the
+literature, laws, manners, and customs, the beliefs of all these countries are contrasted.
+If the book gave alone the history of the monuments of the past it would be valuable,
+but it is its all-around character which renders it so useful. A great many volumes
+have been produced treating of a past civilization, but we have seen none which in the
+same space gives such varied information."&mdash;<i>The New York Times.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>GREAT LEADERS: Historic Portraits from the
+Great Historians.</i> Selected, with Notes and Brief Biographical
+Sketches, by <span class="smcap">G. T. Ferris</span>. With sixteen engraved Portraits.
+12mo. Cloth, $1.75.</p></blockquote>
+
+<p>The Historic Portraits of this work are eighty in number, drawn from the writings
+of <span class="smcap">Plutarch</span>, <span class="smcap">Grote</span>, <span class="smcap">Gibbon</span>, <span class="smcap">Curtius</span>, <span class="smcap">Mommsen</span>, <span class="smcap">Froude</span>, <span class="smcap">Hume</span>, <span class="smcap">Macaulay</span>,
+<span class="smcap">Lecky</span>, <span class="smcap">Green</span>, <span class="smcap">Thiers</span>, <span class="smcap">Taine</span>, <span class="smcap">Prescott</span>, <span class="smcap">Motley</span>, and other historians. The subjects
+extend from Themistocles to Wellington.</p>
+
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+concentrated upon them all their powers of penetration and all their skill in graphic
+delineation. Few things in literature are marked by analysis so close, discernment so
+keen, or effects so brilliant and dramatic."&mdash;<i>From the Preface.</i></p>
+
+<blockquote><p><i>LIFE OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS</i>, described
+from Ancient Monuments. By <span class="smcap">E. Guhl</span> and <span class="smcap">W.
+Koner</span>. Translated from the third German edition by <span class="smcap">F.
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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures, by
+Arabella B. Buckley
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Through Magic Glasses and Other Lectures
+       A Sequel to The Fairyland of Science
+
+
+Author: Arabella B. Buckley
+
+
+
+Release Date: October 1, 2011  [eBook #37589]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES AND OTHER
+LECTURES***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Chris Curnow, Robin Shaw, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made
+available by Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 37589-h.htm or 37589-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/37589/37589-h/37589-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/37589/37589-h.zip)
+
+
+      Images of the original pages are available through
+      Internet Archive. See
+      http://www.archive.org/details/throughmagicglas00buck
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: For Description see Page 152           Frontispiece
+
+THE GREAT NEBULA OF ORION
+
+From a photograph taken on February 4th, 1889 by Mr Isaac Roberts.]
+
+
+THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES AND OTHER LECTURES
+
+A Sequel to The Fairyland of Science
+
+by
+
+ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY
+(Mrs. Fisher)
+
+Author of Life and Her Children, Winners in Life's Race,
+A Short History of Natural Science, Etc.
+
+With Numerous Illustrations
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+New York
+D. Appleton and Company
+1890
+
+Authorized Edition.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+The present volume is chiefly intended for those of my young friends who
+have read, and been interested in, the _Fairyland of Science_. It
+travels over a wide field, pointing out a few of the marvellous facts
+which can be studied and enjoyed by the help of optical instruments. It
+will be seen at a glance that any one of the subjects dealt with might
+be made the study of a lifetime, and that the little information given
+in each lecture is only enough to make the reader long for more.
+
+In these days, when moderate-priced instruments and good books and
+lectures are so easily accessible, I hope some eager minds may be thus
+led to take up one of the branches of science opened out to us by magic
+glasses; while those who go no further will at least understand
+something of the hitherto unseen world which is now being studied by
+their help.
+
+The two last lectures wander away from this path, and yet form a natural
+conclusion to the Magician's lectures to his young Devonshire lads. They
+have been published before, one in the _Youth's Companion_ of Boston,
+U.S., and the other in _Atalanta_, in which the essay on Fungi also
+appeared in a shorter form. All three lectures have, however, been
+revised and fully illustrated, and I trust that the volume, as a whole,
+may prove a pleasant Christmas companion.
+
+For the magnificent photograph of Orion's nebula, forming the
+Frontispiece, I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Isaac Roberts,
+F.R.A.S., who most kindly lent me the plate for reproduction; and I have
+had the great good fortune to obtain permission from MM. Henri of the
+Paris Observatory to copy the illustration of the Lunar Apennines from a
+most beautiful and perfect photograph of part of the moon, taken by them
+only last March. My cordial thanks are also due to Mr. A. Cottam,
+F.R.A.S., for preparing the plate of coloured double stars, and to my
+friend Mr. Knobel, Hon. Sec. of the R.A.S., for much valuable
+assistance; to Mr. James Geikie for the loan of some illustrations from
+his _Geology_; and to Messrs. Longman for permission to copy Herschel's
+fine drawing of Copernicus.
+
+With the exception of these illustrations and a few others, three of
+which were kindly given me by Messrs. Macmillan, all the woodcuts have
+been drawn and executed under the superintendence of Mr. Carreras, jun.,
+who has made my task easier by the skill and patience he has exercised
+under the difficulties incidental to receiving instructions from a
+distance.
+
+                                                  ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY.
+
+UPCOTT AVENEL, _Oct. 1890_.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS
+
+
+    CHAPTER I                                                       PAGE
+    THE MAGICIAN'S CHAMBER BY MOONLIGHT                                1
+
+    CHAPTER II
+    MAGIC GLASSES AND HOW TO USE THEM                                 27
+
+    CHAPTER III
+    FAIRY RINGS AND HOW THEY ARE MADE                                 55
+
+    CHAPTER IV
+    THE LIFE-HISTORY OF LICHENS AND MOSSES                            75
+
+    CHAPTER V
+    THE HISTORY OF A LAVA STREAM                                      96
+
+    CHAPTER VI
+    AN HOUR WITH THE SUN                                             117
+
+    CHAPTER VII
+    AN EVENING AMONG THE STARS                                       145
+
+    CHAPTER VIII
+    LITTLE BEINGS FROM A MINIATURE OCEAN                             172
+
+    CHAPTER IX
+    THE DARTMOOR PONIES                                              195
+
+    CHAPTER X
+    THE MAGICIAN'S DREAM OF ANCIENT DAYS                             209
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+  PLATES
+
+    PHOTOGRAPH OF THE NEBULA OF ORION                     _Frontispiece_
+
+    TABLE OF COLOURED SPECTRA              Plate I.      _facing p._ 127
+
+    COLOURED DOUBLE STARS                  Plate II.     _facing p._ 167
+
+
+  WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT                                              PAGE
+
+    PARTIAL ECLIPSE OF THE MOON _Initial letter_                       1
+
+    A BOY ILLUSTRATING THE PHASES OF THE MOON                          6
+
+    COURSE OF THE MOON IN THE HEAVENS                                  8
+
+    CHART OF THE MOON                                                 10
+
+    FACE OF THE FULL MOON                                             11
+
+    TYCHO AND HIS SURROUNDINGS (from a photograph by De la Rue)       13
+
+    PLAN OF THE PEAK OF TENERIFFE                                     15
+
+    THE CRATER COPERNICUS                                             17
+
+    THE LUNAR APPENNINES (from a photograph by M.M. Henri)            19
+
+    THE CRATER PLATO SEEN SOON AFTER SUNRISE                          20
+
+    DIAGRAM OF TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE MOON                              23
+
+    BOY AND MICROSCOPE _Initial letter_                               27
+
+    EYE-BALL SEEN FROM THE FRONT                                      30
+
+    SECTION OF AN EYE LOOKING AT A PENCIL                             31
+
+    IMAGE OF A CANDLE-FLAME THROWN ON PAPER BY A LENS                 33
+
+    ARROW MAGNIFIED BY A CONVEX LENS                                  35
+
+    STUDENT'S MICROSCOPE                                              36
+
+    SKELETON OF A MICROSCOPE                                          37
+
+    FOSSIL DIATOMS SEEN UNDER THE MICROSCOPE                          39
+
+    AN ASTRONOMICAL TELESCOPE                                         41
+
+    TWO SKELETONS OF TELESCOPES                                       44
+
+    THE PHOTOGRAPHIC CAMERA                                           47
+
+    KIRCHHOFF'S SPECTROSCOPE                                          51
+
+    PASSAGE OF RAYS THROUGH THE SPECTROSCOPE                          52
+
+    A GROUP OF FAIRY-RING MUSHROOMS _Initial letter_                  55
+
+    THREE FORMS OF VEGETABLE MOULD MAGNIFIED                          61
+
+    _MUCOR MUCEDO_ GREATLY MAGNIFIED                                  63
+
+    YEAST CELLS GROWING UNDER THE MICROSCOPE                          65
+
+    EARLY STAGES OF THE MUSHROOM                                      67
+
+    LATER STAGES OF THE MUSHROOM                                      68
+
+    MICROSCOPIC STRUCTURE OF MUSHROOM GILLS                           69
+
+    A GROUP OF CUP LICHENS _Initial letter_                           75
+
+    EXAMPLES OF LICHENS FROM LIFE                                     77
+
+    SINGE-CELLED PLANTS GROWING                                       78
+
+    SECTIONS OF LICHENS                                               81
+
+    FRUCTIFICATION OF A LICHEN                                        83
+
+    A STEM OF FEATHERY MOSS FROM LIFE                                 85
+
+    MOSS-LEAF MAGNIFIED                                               87
+
+    _POLYTRICHUM COMMUNE_, A LARGE HAIR-MOSS                          88
+
+    FRUCTIFICATION OF A MOSS                                          89
+
+    SPHAGNUM MOSS FROM A DEVONSHIRE BOG                               93
+
+    SURFACE OF A LAVA-FLOW _Initial letter_                           96
+
+    VESUVIUS AS SEEN IN ERUPTION                                      97
+
+    TOP OF VESUVIUS IN 1864                                          100
+
+    DIAGRAMMATIC SECTION OF AN ACTIVE VOLCANO                        105
+
+    SECTION OF A LAVA-FLOW                                           108
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS WITH CRYSTALLITES AND MICROLITHS                  109
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS WITH WELL-DEVELOPED MICROLITHS                    110
+
+    A PIECE OF DARTMOOR GRANITE                                      112
+
+    VOLCANIC GLASS SHOWING LARGE INCLUDED CRYSTALS                   115
+
+    A TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN _Initial letter_                      117
+
+    FACE OF THE SUN PROJECTED ON A PIECE OF CARDBOARD                120
+
+    PHOTOGRAPH OF THE SUN'S FACE, taken by Mr. Selwyn
+    (Secchi, _Le Soleil_)                                            122
+
+    TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE SUN, SHOWING CORONA AND PROMINENCES
+    (Guillemin, _Le Ciel_)                                           124
+
+    KIRCHHOFF'S EXPERIMENT ON THE DARK SODIUM LINE                   128
+
+    THE SPECTROSCOPE ATTACHED TO THE TELESCOPE FOR SOLAR WORK        132
+
+    SUN-SPECTRUM AND PROMINENCE SPECTRUM COMPARED                    134
+
+    RED PROMINENCES, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer 1869                    136
+
+    A QUIET SUN-SPOT                                                 140
+
+    A TUMULTUOUS SUN-SPOT                                            141
+
+    A STAR-CLUSTER _Initial letter_                                  145
+
+    SOME CONSTELLATIONS SEEN ON LOOKING SOUTH IN MARCH FROM
+    SIX TO NINE O'CLOCK                                              148
+
+    THE CHIEF STARS OF ORION, WITH ALDEBARAN                         149
+
+    THE TRAPEZIUM [Greek: th] ORIONIS                                150
+
+    SPECTRUM OF ORION'S NEBULA AND SUN-SPECTRUM COMPARED             151
+
+    SOME CONSTELLATIONS SEEN ON LOOKING NORTH IN MARCH FROM
+    SIX TO NINE O'CLOCK                                              156
+
+    THE GREAT BEAR, SHOWING POSITION OF THE BINARY STAR              157
+
+    DRIFTING OF THE SEVEN STARS OF CHARLES'S WAIN                    159
+
+    CASSIOPEIA AND THE HEAVENLY BODIES NEAR                          162
+
+    [Greek: e] LYRAE, A DOUBLE-BINARY STAR                           166
+
+    A SEASIDE POOL _Initial letter_                                  172
+
+    A GROUP OF SEAWEEDS (natural size)                               175
+
+    _ULVA LACTUCA_, a piece greatly magnified                        176
+
+    SEAWEEDS, magnified to show fruits                               177
+
+    A CORALLINE AND SERTULARIAN COMPARED                             179
+
+    _SERTULARIA TENELLA_ HANGING IN WATER                            180
+
+    _THURICOLLA FOLLICULATA_ AND _CHILOMONAS AMYGDALUM_              182
+
+    A GROUP OF LIVING DIATOMS                                        184
+
+    A DIATOM GROWING                                                 185
+
+    _CYDIPPE PILEUS_, ANIMAL AND STRUCTURE                           187
+
+    THE SEA-MAT, _FLUSTRA FOLIACEA_                                  191
+
+    DIAGRAM OF THE FLUSTRA ANIMAL                                    192
+
+    DARTMOOR PONIES _Initial letter_                                 195
+
+    _EQUUS HEMIONUS_, THE HORSE-ASS OF TARTARY AND TIBET             201
+
+    PRZEVALSKY'S WILD HORSE                                          202
+
+    SKELETON OF AN ANIMAL OF THE HORSE-TRIBE                         206
+
+    PALAEOLITHIC MAN CHIPPING FLINT TOOLS _Initial letter_           209
+
+    SCENE IN PALAEOLITHIC TIMES                                      212
+
+    PALAEOLITHIC RELICS--NEEDLE, TOOTH, IMPLEMENT                     213
+
+    MAMMOTH ENGRAVED ON IVORY                                        216
+
+    NEOLITHIC IMPLEMENTS--HATCHET, CELT, SPINDLE WHORL               219
+
+    A BURIAL IN NEOLITHIC TIMES                                      221
+
+    BRITISH RELICS--COIN, BRONZE CELT, AND BRACELET                  223
+
+    BRITONS TAKING REFUGE IN THE CAVE                                224
+
+
+
+
+THROUGH MAGIC GLASSES
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE MAGICIAN'S CHAMBER BY MOONLIGHT
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The full moon was shining in all its splendour one lovely August night,
+as the magician sat in his turret chamber bathed in her pure white
+beams, which streamed upon him through the open shutter in the wooden
+dome above. It is true a faint gleam of warmer light shone from below
+through the open door, for this room was but an offshoot at the top of
+the building, and on looking down the turret stairs a lecture-room might
+be seen below where a bright light was burning. Very little, however, of
+this warm glow reached the magician, and the implements of his art
+around him looked like weird gaunt skeletons as they cast their long
+shadows across the floor in the moonlight.
+
+The small observatory, for such it was, was a circular building with
+four windows in the walls, and roofed with a wooden dome, so made that
+it could be shifted round and round by pulling certain cords. One
+section of this dome was a shutter, which now stood open, and the strip,
+thus laid bare to the night, was so turned as to face that part of the
+sky along which the moon was moving. In the centre of the room, with its
+long tube directed towards the opening, stood the largest magic glass,
+the TELESCOPE, and in the dead stillness of the night, could be heard
+distinctly the tick-tick of the clockwork, which kept the instrument
+pointing to the face of the moon, while the room, and all in it, was
+being carried slowly and steadily onwards by the earth's rotation on its
+axis. It was only a moderate-sized instrument, about six feet long,
+mounted on a solid iron pillar firmly fixed to the floor and fitted with
+the clockwork, the sound of which we have mentioned; yet it looked like
+a giant as the pale moonlight threw its huge shadow on the wall behind
+and the roof above.
+
+Far away from this instrument in one of the windows, all of which were
+now closed with shutters, another instrument was dimly visible. This was
+a round iron table, with clawed feet, and upon it, fastened by screws,
+were three tubes, so arranged that they all pointed towards the centre
+of the table, where six glass prisms were arranged in a semicircle, each
+one fixed on a small brass tripod. A strange uncanny-looking instrument
+this, especially as the prisms caught the edge of the glow streaming up
+the turret stair, and shot forth faint beams of coloured light on the
+table below them. Yet the magician's pupils thought it still more
+uncanny and mysterious when their master used it to read the alphabet of
+light, and to discover by vivid lines even the faintest trace of a metal
+otherwise invisible to mortal eye.
+
+For this instrument was the SPECTROSCOPE, by which he could break up
+rays of light and make them tell him from what substances they came.
+Lying around it were other curious prisms mounted in metal rims and
+fitted with tubes and many strange devices, not to be understood by the
+uninitiated, but magical in their effect when fixed on to the telescope
+and used to break up the light of distant stars and nebulae.
+
+Compared with these mysterious glasses the PHOTOGRAPHIC CAMERA, standing
+in the background, with its tall black covering cloth, like a hooded
+monk, looked comparatively natural and familiar, yet it, too, had
+puzzling plates and apparatus on the table near it, which could be
+fitted on to the telescope, so that by their means pictures might be
+taken even in the dark night, and stars, invisible with the strongest
+lens, might be forced to write their own story, and leave their image on
+the plate for after study.
+
+All these instruments told of the magician's power in unveiling the
+secrets of distant space and exploring realms unknown, but in another
+window, now almost hidden in the shadow, stood a fourth and
+highly-prized helpmate, which belonged in one sense more to our earth,
+since everything examined by it had to be brought near, and lie close
+under its magnifying-glass. Yet the MICROSCOPE too could carry its
+master into an unseen world, hidden to mortal eye by minuteness instead
+of by distance. If in the stillness of night the telescope was his most
+cherished servant and familiar friend, the microscope by day opened out
+to him the fairyland of nature.
+
+As he sat on his high pedestal stool on this summer night with the
+moonlight full upon him, his whole attention was centred on the
+telescope, and his mind was far away from that turret-room, wandering
+into the distant space brought so near to him; for he was waiting to
+watch an event which brought some new interest every time it took
+place--a total eclipse of the moon. To-night he looked forward to it
+eagerly, for it happened that, just as the moon would pass into the
+shadow of our earth, it would also cross directly in front of a star,
+causing what is known as an "occultation" of the star, which would
+disappear suddenly behind the rim of the dark moon, and after a short
+time flash out on the other side as the satellite went on its way.
+
+How he wished as he sat there that he could have shown this sight to all
+the eager lads whom he was teaching to handle and love his magic
+glasses. For this magician was not only a student himself, he was a rich
+man and the Founder and Principal of a large public school for boys of
+the artisan class. He had erected a well-planned and handsome building
+in the midst of the open country, and received there, on terms within
+the means of their parents, working-lads from all parts of England, who,
+besides the usual book-learning, received a good technical education in
+all its branches. And, while he left to other masters the regular
+school lessons, he kept for himself the intense pleasure of opening the
+minds of these lads to the wonders of God's universe around them.
+
+You had only to pass down the turret stairs, into the large science
+class-room below, to see at once that a loving hand and heart had
+furnished it. Not only was there every implement necessary for
+scientific work, but numerous rough diagrams covering the walls showed
+that labour as well as money had been spent in decorating them. It was a
+large oblong room, with four windows to the north, and four to the
+south, in each of which stood a microscope with all the tubes, needles,
+forceps, knives, etc., necessary for dissecting and preparing objects;
+and between the windows were open shelves, on which were ranged
+chemicals of various kinds, besides many strange-looking objects in
+bottles, which would have amused a trained naturalist, for the lads
+collected and preserved whatever took their fancy.
+
+On some of the tables were photographic plates laid ready for printing
+off; on others might be seen drawings of the spectrum, made from the
+small spectroscope fixed at one end of the room; on others lay small
+direct spectroscopes which the lads could use for themselves. But
+nowhere was a telescope to be seen. This was not because there were
+none, for each table had its small hand-telescope, cheap but good. The
+truth is that each of these instruments had been spirited away into the
+dormitories that night, and many heads were lying awake on their
+pillows, listening for the strike of the clock to spring out and see
+the eclipse begin.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 1.
+
+A boy illustrating the phases of the moon.]
+
+A mere glance round the room showed that the moon had been much studied
+lately. On the black-board was drawn a rough diagram, showing how a boy
+can illustrate for himself the moon's journey round the earth, by taking
+a ball and holding it a little above his head at arm's length, while he
+turns slowly round on his heel in a darkened room before a lighted lamp,
+or better still before the lens of a magic lantern (Fig. 1). The lamp or
+lens then represents the sun, the ball is the moon, the boy's head is
+the earth. Beginning with the ball between him and the source of light,
+but either a little above, or a little below the direct line between his
+eye and it, he will see only the dark side of the ball, and the moon
+will be on the point of being "new." Then as he turns slowly, a thin
+crescent of light will creep over the side nearest the sun, and by
+degrees encroach more and more, so that when he has turned through one
+quarter of the round half the disc will be light. When he has turned
+another quarter, and has his back to the sun, a full moon will face him.
+Then as he turns on through the third quarter a crescent of darkness
+creeps slowly over the side away from the sun, and gradually the bright
+disc is eaten away by shadow till at the end of the third quarter half
+the disc again only is light; then, when he has turned through another
+quarter and completed the circle, he faces the light again and has a
+dark moon before him. But he must take care to keep the moon a little
+above or a little below his eye at new and full moon. If he brings it
+exactly on a line with himself and the light at new moon, he will shut
+off the light from himself and see the dark body of the ball against the
+light, causing an _eclipse_ of the sun; while if he does the same at
+full moon his head will cast a shadow on the ball causing an _eclipse_
+of the moon.
+
+There were other diagrams showing how and why such eclipses do really
+happen at different times in the moon's path round the earth; but
+perhaps the most interesting of all was one he had made to explain what
+so few people understand, namely, that though the moon describes a
+complete circle round our earth every month, yet she does not describe a
+circle in space, but a wavy line inwards and outwards across the
+earth's path round the sun. This is because the earth is moving on all
+the while, carrying the moon with it, and it is only by seeing it drawn
+before our eyes that we can realise how it happens.
+
+Thus suppose, in order to make the dates as simple as possible, that
+there is a new moon on the 1st of some month. Then by the 9th (or
+roughly speaking in 7-3/4 days) the moon will have described a quarter
+of a circle round the earth as shown by the dotted line (Fig. 2), which
+marks her position night after night with regard to us. Yet because she
+is carried onwards all the while by the earth, she will really have
+passed along the interrupted line - - - - between us and the sun. During
+the next week her quarter of a circle will carry her round behind the
+earth, so that we see her on the 17th as a full moon, yet her actual
+movement has been onwards along the interrupted line on the farther side
+of the earth. During the third week she creeps round another quarter of
+a circle so as to be in advance of the earth on its yearly journey round
+the sun, and reaches the end of her third quarter on the 24th. In her
+last quarter she gradually passes again between the earth and the sun;
+and though, as regards the earth, she appears to be going back round to
+the same place where she was at the beginning of the month, and on the
+31st is again a dark new moon, yet she has travelled onwards exactly as
+much as we have, and therefore has really not described a circle in the
+_heavens_ but a wavy line.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 2.
+
+Diagram showing the moon's course during one month. The moon and the
+earth are both moving onwards in the direction of the arrows. The earth
+moves along the dark line, the moon along the interrupted line - - - -.
+The dotted curved line .... shows the circle gradually described by the
+moon round the earth as they move onwards.]
+
+Near to this last diagram hung another, well loved by the lads, for it
+was a large map of the _face_ of the moon, that is of the side which is
+_always_ turned towards us, because the moon turns once on her axis
+during the month that she is travelling round the earth. On this map
+were marked all the different craters, mountains, plains and shining
+streaks which appear on the moon's face; while round the chart were
+pictures of some of these at sunrise and sunset on the moon, or during
+the long day of nearly a fortnight which each part of the face enjoys in
+its turn.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 3.
+
+Chart of the moon.
+
+Craters--
+
+    1 Tycho.        4 Aristarchus.     7 Plato.      10 Petavius.
+    2 Copernicus.   5 Eratosthenes.    8 Eudoxus.    11 Ptolemy.
+    3 Kepler.       6 Archimedes.      9 Aristotle.
+
+Grey plains formerly believed to be seas--
+
+    A Mare Crisium.              O Mare Imbrium.
+    C ---- Frigoris.             Q Oceanus Procellarum.
+    G ---- Tranquillitatis.      X Mare Foecunditatis.
+    H ---- Serenitatis.          T ---- Humorum.]
+
+By studying this map, and the pictures, they were able, even in their
+small telescopes, to recognise Tycho and Copernicus, and the mountains
+of the moon, after they had once grown accustomed to the strange
+changes in their appearance which take place as daylight or darkness
+creeps over them. They could not however pick out more than some of the
+chief points. Only the magician himself knew every crater and ridge
+under all its varying lights, and now, as he waited for the eclipse to
+begin, he turned to a lad who stood behind him, almost hidden in the
+dark shadow--the one fortunate boy who had earned the right to share
+this night's work.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 3_a_.
+
+The full moon. (From Ball's _Starland_.)]
+
+"We have still half an hour, Alwyn," said he, "before the eclipse will
+begin, and I can show you the moon's face well to-night. Take my place
+here and look at her while I point out the chief features. See first,
+there are the grey plains (A, C, G, etc.) lying chiefly in the lower
+half of the moon. You can often see these on a clear night with the
+naked eye, but you must remember that then they appear more in the upper
+part, because in the telescope we see the moon's face inverted or upside
+down.
+
+"These plains were once thought to be oceans, but are now proved to be
+dry flat regions situated at different levels on the moon, and much like
+what deserts and prairies would appear on our earth if seen from the
+same distance. Looking through the telescope, is it not difficult to
+imagine how people could ever have pictured them as a man's face? But
+not so difficult to understand how some ancient nations thought the moon
+was a kind of mirror, in which our earth was reflected as in a
+looking-glass, with its seas and rivers, mountains and valleys; for it
+does look something like a distant earth, and as the light upon it is
+really reflected from the sun it was very natural to compare it to a
+looking-glass.
+
+"Next cast your eye over the hundreds of craters, some large, others
+quite small, which cover the moon's face with pitted marks, like a man
+with small-pox; while a few of the larger rings look like holes made in
+a window-pane, where a stone has passed through, for brilliant shining
+streaks radiate from them on all sides like the rays of a star, covering
+a large part of the moon. Brightest of all these starred craters is
+Tycho, which you will easily find near the top of the moon (I, Fig. 3),
+for you have often seen it in the small telescope. How grand it looks
+to-night in the full moon (Fig. 3_a_)! It is true you see all the
+craters better when the moon is in her quarters, because the light falls
+sideways upon them and the shadows are more sharply defined; yet even at
+the full the bright ray of light on Tycho's rim marks out the huge
+cavity, and you can even see faintly the magnificent terraces which run
+round the cup within, one below the other."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 4.
+
+Tycho and his surroundings. (From a photograph of the moon taken by Mr.
+De la Rue, 1863.)]
+
+"This cavity measures fifty-four miles across, so that if it could be
+moved down to our earth it would cover by far the largest part of
+Devonshire, or that portion from Bideford on the north, to the sea on
+the south, and from the borders of Cornwall on the east, to Exeter on
+the west, and it is 17,000 feet or nearly three miles in depth. Even in
+the brilliant light of the full moon this enormous cup is dark compared
+to the bright rim, but it is much better seen in about the middle of the
+second quarter, when the rising sun begins to light up one side while
+the other is in black night. The drawing on the wall (Fig. 4), which is
+taken from an actual photograph of the moon's face, shows Tycho at this
+time surrounded by the numerous other craters which cover this part of
+the moon. You may recognise him by the gleaming peak in the centre of
+the cup, and by his bright rim which is so much more perfect than those
+of his companions. The gleaming peak is the top of a steep cone or hill
+rising up 6000 feet, or more than a mile from the base of the crater, so
+that even the summit is about two miles below the rim.
+
+"There is one very interesting point in Tycho, however, which is seen at
+its very best at full moon. Look outside the bright rim and you will see
+that from the shadow which surrounds it there spring on all sides those
+strange brilliant streaks (see Fig. 3_a_) which I spoke of just now.
+There are others quite as bright, or even brighter, round other craters,
+Copernicus (Fig. 6), Kepler, and Aristarchus, lower down on the
+right-hand side of the moon; but these of Tycho are far the most widely
+spread, covering almost all the top of the face.
+
+"What are these streaks? We do not know. During the second quarter of
+the moon, when the sun is rising slowly upon Tycho, lighting up his
+peak and showing the crater beautifully divided into a bright cup in the
+curve to the right, while a dense shadow lies in the left hollow, these
+streaks are only faint, and among the many craters around (see Fig. 4)
+you might even have some difficulty at first in finding the well-known
+giant. But as the sun rises higher and higher they begin to appear, and
+go on increasing in brightness till they shine with that wonderfully
+silvery light you see now in the full moon."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 5.
+
+Plan of the Peak of Teneriffe, showing how it resembles a lunar crater.
+(A. Geikie.)]
+
+"Here is a problem for you young astronomers to solve, as we learn more
+and more how to use the telescope with all its new appliances."
+
+The crater itself is not so difficult to explain, for we have many like
+it on our earth, only not nearly so large. In fact, we might almost say
+that our earthly volcanoes differ from those in the moon only by their
+smaller size and by forming _mountains_ with the crater or cup on the
+top; while the lunar craters lie flat on the surface of the moon, the
+hollow of the cup forming a depression below it. The peak of Teneriffe
+(Fig. 5), which is a dormant volcano, is a good copy in miniature on our
+earth of many craters on the moon. The large plain surrounded by a high
+rocky wall, broken in places by lava streams, the smaller craters
+nestling in the cup, and the high peak or central crater rising up far
+above the others, are so like what we see on the moon that we cannot
+doubt that the same causes have been at work in both cases, even though
+the space enclosed in the rocky wall of Teneriffe measures only eight
+miles across, while that of Tycho measures fifty-four.
+
+"But of the streaks we have no satisfactory explanation. They pass alike
+over plain and valley and mountain, cutting even across other craters
+without swerving from their course. The astronomer Nasmyth thought they
+were the remains of cracks made when the volcanoes were active, and
+filled with molten lava from below, as water oozes up through ice-cracks
+on a pond. But this explanation is not quite satisfactory, for the lava,
+forcing its way through, would cool in ridges which ought to cast a
+shadow in sunlight. These streaks, however, not only cast no shadow, as
+you can see at the full moon but when the sun shines sideways upon them
+in the new or waning moon they disappear as we have seen altogether.
+Thus the streaks, so brilliant at full moon in Tycho, Copernicus,
+Kepler, and Aristarchus, remain a puzzle to astronomers still."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 6.
+
+The crater Copernicus. (As given in Herschel's _Astronomy_, from a
+drawing taken in a reflecting telescope of 20 feet focal length.)]
+
+"We cannot examine these three last-named craters well to-night with the
+full sun upon them; but mark their positions well, for Copernicus, at
+least, you must examine on the first opportunity, when the sun is
+rising upon it in the moon's second quarter. It is larger even than
+Tycho, measuring fifty-six miles across, and has a hill in the centre
+with many peaks; while outside, great spurs or ridges stretch in all
+directions sometimes for more than a hundred miles, and between these
+are scattered innumerable minute craters. But the most striking feature
+in it is the ring, which is composed inside the crater of magnificent
+terraces divided by deep ravines. These terraces are in some ways very
+like those of the great crater of Teneriffe, and astronomers can best
+account for them by supposing that this immense crater was once filled
+with a lake of molten lava rising, cooling at the edges, and then
+falling again, leaving the solid ridge behind. The streaks are also
+beautifully shown in Copernicus (see Fig. 6), but, as in Tycho, they
+fade away as the sun sets on the crater, and only reappear gradually as
+midday approaches.
+
+"And now, looking a little to the left of Copernicus, you will see that
+grand range of mountains, the Lunar Apennines (Fig. 7), which stretches
+400 miles across the face of the moon. Other mountain ranges we could
+find, but none so like mountains on our own globe as these, with their
+gentle sunny slope down to a plain on the left, and steep perpendicular
+cliffs on the right. The highest peak in this range, called Huyghens,
+rises to the height of 21,000 feet, higher than Chimborazo in the Andes.
+Other mountains on the moon, such as those called the Caucasus, south of
+the Apennines, are composed of disconnected peaks, while others again
+stand as solitary pyramids upon the plains."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 7.
+
+The Lunar Apennines.
+
+(Copied by kind permission of MM. Henri from part of a magnificent
+photograph taken by them, March 29, 1890, at the Paris Observatory.)]
+
+"But we must hasten on, for I want you to observe those huge walled
+crater-plains which have no hill in the middle, but smooth steel-grey
+centres shining like mirrors in the moonlight. One of these, called
+Archimedes, you will find just below the Lunar Apennines (Figs. 3 and
+7), and another called Plato, which is sixty miles broad, is still lower
+down the moon's face (Figs. 3 and 8). The centres of these broad
+circles are curiously smooth and shining like quicksilver, with minute
+dots here and there which are miniature craters, while the walls are
+rugged and crowned with turret-shaped peaks."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 8.
+
+The crater Plato as seen soon after sunrise. (After Neison.)]
+
+"It is easy to picture to oneself how these may once have been vast seas
+of lava, not surging as in Copernicus, and heaving up as it cooled into
+one great central cone, but seething as molten lead does in a crucible,
+little bubbles bursting here and there into minute craters; and this is
+the explanation given of them by astronomers.
+
+"And now that you have seen the curious rugged face of the moon and its
+craters and mountains, you will want to know how all this has come
+about. We can only form theories on the point, except that everything
+shows that heat and volcanoes have in some way done the work, though no
+one has ever yet clearly proved that volcanic eruptions have taken place
+in our time. We must look back to ages long gone by for those mighty
+volcanic eruptions which hurled out stones and ashes from the great
+crater of Tycho, and formed the vast seas of lava in Copernicus and
+Plato.
+
+"And when these were over, and the globe was cooling down rapidly, so
+that mountain ranges were formed by the wrinkling and rending of the
+surface, was there then any life on the moon? Who can tell? Our magic
+glasses can reveal what now is, so far as distance will allow; but what
+has been, except where the rugged traces remain, we shall probably never
+know. What we now see is a dead worn-out planet, on which we cannot
+certainly trace any activity except that of heat in the past. That there
+is no life there now, at any rate of the kind on our own earth, we are
+almost certain; first, because we can nowhere find traces of water,
+clouds, nor even mist, and without moisture no life like ours is
+possible; and secondly, because even if there is, as perhaps there may
+be, a thin ocean of gas round the moon there is certainly no atmosphere
+such as surrounds our globe.
+
+"One fact which proves this is, that there are no half-shadows on the
+moon. If you look some night at the mountains and craters during her
+first and second quarters, you will be startled to see what heavy
+shadows they cast, not with faint edges dying away into light, but sharp
+and hard (see Figs. 6-8), so that you pass, as it were by one step, from
+shadow to sunshine. This in itself is enough to show that there is no
+air to scatter the sunlight and spread it into the edges of the shade as
+happens on our earth; but there are other and better proofs. One of
+these is, that during an eclipse of the sun there is no reflection of
+his light round the dark moon as there would be if the moon had an
+atmosphere; another is that the spectroscope, that wonderful instrument
+which shows us invisible gases, gives no hint of air around the moon;
+and another is the sudden disappearance or _occultation_ of a star
+behind the moon, such as I hope to see in a few minutes.
+
+"See here! take the small hand telescope and turn it on to the moon's
+face while I take my place at the large one, and I will tell you what to
+look for. You know that at sunset we see the sun for some time after it
+has dipped below the horizon, because the rays of light which come from
+it are bent in our atmosphere and brought to our eyes, forming in them
+the image of the sun which is already gone. Now in a short time the moon
+which we are watching will be darkened by our earth coming between it
+and the sun, and while it is quite dark it will pass over a little
+bright star. In fact to us the star will appear to set behind the dark
+moon as the sun sets below the horizon, and if the moon had an
+atmosphere like ours, the rays from the star would be bent in it and
+reach our eyes after the star was gone, so that it would only disappear
+gradually. Astronomers have always observed, however, that the star is
+lost to sight quite suddenly, showing that there is no ocean of air
+round the moon to bend the light-rays."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 9.
+
+Diagram of total eclipse of the moon.
+
+S, Sun. E, Earth. M, Moon passing into the earth's shadow and passing
+out at M'.
+
+R, R', Lines meeting at a point U, U' behind the earth and enclosing a
+space within which all the direct rays of the sun are intercepted by the
+earth, causing a black darkness or _umbra_.
+
+R, P and R', P', Lines marking a space within which, behind the earth,
+part of the sun's rays are cut off, causing a half-shadow or _penumbra_,
+P, P'.
+
+_a_, _a_, Points where a few of the sun's rays are bent or refracted in
+the earth's atmosphere, so that they pass along the path marked by the
+dotted lines and shed a lurid light on the sun's face.]
+
+Here the magician paused, for a slight dimness on the lower right-hand
+side of the moon warned him that she was entering into the _penumbra_ or
+half-shadow (see Fig. 9) caused by the earth cutting off part of the
+sun's rays; and soon a deep black shadow creeping over Aristarchus and
+Plato showed that she was passing into that darker space or _umbra_
+where the body of the earth is completely between her and the sun and
+cuts off all his rays. All, did I say? No! not all. For now was seen a
+beautiful sight, which would prove to any one who saw our earth from a
+great distance that it has a deep ocean of air round it.
+
+It was a clear night, with a cloudless sky, and as the deep shadow crept
+slowly over the moon's face, covering the Lunar Apennines and
+Copernicus, and stealing gradually across the brilliant streaks of Tycho
+till the crater itself was swallowed up in darkness, a strange lurid
+light began to appear. The part of the moon which was eclipsed was not
+wholly dark, but tinted with a very faint bluish-green light, which
+changed almost imperceptibly, as the eclipse went on, to rose-red, and
+then to a fiery copper-coloured glow as the moon crept entirely into the
+shadow and became all dark. The lad watching through his small telescope
+noted this weird light, and wondered, as he saw the outlines of the
+Apennines and of several craters dimly visible by it, though the moon
+was totally eclipsed. He noted, but was silent. He would not disturb the
+Principal, for the important moment was at hand, as this dark
+copper-coloured moon, now almost invisible, drew near to the star over
+which it was to pass.
+
+This little star, really a glorious sun billions of miles away behind
+the moon, was perhaps the centre of another system of worlds as unknown
+to us as we to them, and the fact of our tiny moon crossing between it
+and our earth would matter as little as if a grain of sand was blown
+across the heavens. Yet to the watchers it was a great matter--would the
+star give any further clue to the question of an atmosphere round the
+moon? Would its light linger even for a moment, like the light of the
+setting sun? Nearer and nearer came the dark moon; the star shone
+brilliantly against its darkness; one second and it was gone. The long
+looked-for moment had passed, and the magician turned from his
+instrument with a sigh. "I have learnt nothing new, Alwyn," said he,
+"but at least it is satisfactory to have seen for ourselves the proof
+that there is no perceptible atmosphere round the moon. We need wait no
+longer, for before the star reappears on the other side the eclipse will
+be passing away."
+
+"But, master," burst forth the lad, now the silence was broken, "tell me
+why did that strange light of many tints shine upon the dark moon?"
+
+"Did you notice it, Alwyn?" said the Principal, with a pleased smile.
+"Then our evening's work is not lost, for you have made a real
+observation for yourself. That light was caused by the few rays of the
+sun which grazed the edge of our earth passing through the ocean of air
+round it (see Fig. 9). There they were refracted or bent, and so were
+thrown within the shadow cast by our earth, and fell upon the moon. If
+there were such a person as a 'man in the moon,' that lurid light would
+prove to him that our earth has an atmosphere. The cause of the tints is
+the same which gives us our sunset colours, because as the different
+coloured waves which make white light are absorbed one by one, passing
+through the denser atmosphere, the blue are cut off first, then the
+green, then the yellow, till only the orange and red rays reached the
+centre of the shadow, where the moon was darkest. But this is too
+difficult a subject to begin at midnight."
+
+So saying, he lighted his lamp, and covering the object-glass of his
+telescope with its pasteboard cap, detached the instrument from the
+clockwork, and the master and his pupil went down the turret stairs and
+past through the room below. As they did so they heard in the distance a
+scuffling noise like that of rats in the wall. A smile passed over the
+face of the Principal, for he knew that his young pupils, who had been
+making their observations in the gallery above, were hurrying back to
+their beds.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+MAGIC GLASSES, AND HOW TO USE THEM
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The sun shone brightly into the science class-room at mid-day. No gaunt
+shadows nor ghostly moonlight now threw a spell on the magic chamber
+above. The instruments looked bright and business-like, and the
+Principal, moving amongst them, heard the subdued hum of fifty or more
+voices rising from below. It was the lecture hour, and the subject for
+the day was, "Magic glasses, and how to use them." As the large clock in
+the hall sounded twelve, the Principal gathered up a few stray lenses
+and prisms he had selected, and passed down the turret stair to his
+platform. Behind him were arranged his diagrams, before him on the table
+stood various instruments, and the rows of bright faces beyond looked up
+with one consent as the hum quieted down and he began his lecture.
+
+"I have often told you, boys, have I not? that I am a Magician. In my
+chamber near the sky I work spells as did the magicians of old, and by
+the help of my magic glasses I peer into the secrets of nature. Thus I
+read the secrets of the distant stars; I catch the light of wandering
+comets, and make it reveal its origin; I penetrate into the whirlpools
+of the sun; I map out the craters of the moon. Nor can the tiniest being
+on earth hide itself from me. Where others see only a drop of muddy
+water, that water brought into my magic chamber teems with thousands of
+active bodies, darting here and whirling there amid a meadow of tiny
+green plants floating in the water. Nay, my inquisitive glass sees even
+farther than this, for with it I can watch the eddies of water and green
+atoms going on in each of these tiny beings as they feed and grow.
+Again, if I want to break into the secrets of the rock at my feet, I
+have only to put a thin slice of it under my microscope to trace every
+crystal and grain; or, if I wish to learn still more, I subject it to
+fiery heat, and through the magic prisms of my spectroscope I read the
+history of the very substances of which it is composed. If I wish to
+study the treasures of the wide ocean, the slime from a rock-pool teems
+with fairy forms darting about in the live box imprisoned in a crystal
+home. If some distant stars are invisible even in the giant glasses of
+my telescope, I set another power to work, and make them print their own
+image on a photographic plate and so reveal their presence.
+
+"All these things you have seen through my magic glasses, and I
+promised you that one day I would explain to you how they work and do my
+bidding. But I must warn you that you must give all your attention;
+there is no royal road to my magician's power. Every one can attain to
+it, but only by taking trouble. You must open your eyes and ears, and
+use your intelligence to test carefully what your senses show you.
+
+"We have only to consider a little to see that we depend entirely upon
+our senses for our knowledge of the outside world. All kinds of things
+are going on around us, about which we know nothing, because our eyes
+are not keen enough to see, and our ears not sharp enough to hear them.
+Most of all we enjoy and study nature through our eyes, those windows
+which let in to us the light of heaven, and with it the lovely sights
+and scenes of earth; and which are no ordinary windows, but most
+wonderful structures adapted for conveying images to the brain. They are
+of very different power in different people, so that a long-sighted
+person sees a lovely landscape where a short-sighted one sees only a
+confused mist; while a short-sighted person can see minute things close
+to the eye better than a long-sighted one."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 10.
+
+Eye-ball seen from the front. (After Le Gros Clark.)
+
+_w_, White of eye. _i_, Iris. _p_, Pupil.]
+
+"Let us try to understand this before we go on to artificial glasses,
+for it will help us to explain how these glasses show us many things we
+could never see without them. Here are two pictures of the human eyeball
+(Figs. 10 and 11), one as it appears from the front, and the other as we
+should see the parts if we cut an eyeball across from the front to the
+back. From these drawings we see that the eyeball is round; it only
+looks oval, because it is seen through the oval slit of the eyelids.
+It is really a hard, shining, white ball with a thick nerve cord
+(_on_, Fig. 11) passing out at the back, and a dark glassy mound
+_c_, _c_ in the centre of the white in front. In this mound we can
+easily distinguish two parts--first, the coloured _iris_ or elastic
+curtain (_i_, Fig. 10); and secondly, the dark spot or pupil _p_ in the
+centre. The iris is the part which gives the eye its colour; it is
+composed of a number of fibres, the outer ones radiating towards the
+centre, the inner ones forming a ring round the pupil; and behind these
+fibres is a coat of dark pigment or colouring matter, blue in some
+people, grey, brown, or black in others. When the light is very strong,
+and would pain the nerves inside if too much entered the pupil or window
+of the eye, then the ring of the iris contracts so as partly to close
+the opening. When there is very little light, and it is necessary to let
+in as much as possible, the ring expands and the pupil grows large. The
+best way to observe this is to look at a cat's eyes in the dusk, and
+then bring her near to a bright light; for the iris of a cat's eye
+contracts and expands much more than ours does."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 11.
+
+Section of an eye looking at a pencil. (Adapted from Kirke.)
+
+_c_, _c_, Cornea. _w_, White of eye. _cm_, Ciliary muscle. _a_, _a_,
+Aqueous humour. _i_, _i_, Iris. _l_, _l_, Lens. _r_, _r_, Retina. _on_,
+Optic nerve. 1, 2, Pencil. 1', 2', Image of pencil on the retina.]
+
+"Now look at the second diagram (Fig. 11) and notice the chief points
+necessary in seeing. First you will observe that the pupil is not a mere
+hole; it is protected by a curved covering _c_. This is the cornea, a
+hard, perfectly transparent membrane, looking much like a curved
+watch-glass. Behind this is a small chamber filled with a watery fluid
+_a_, called the aqueous humour, and near the back of this chamber is the
+dark ring or iris _i_, which you saw from the front through the cornea
+and fluid. Close behind the iris again is the natural 'magic glass' of
+our eye, the crystalline lens _l_, which is composed of perfectly
+transparent fibres and has two rounded or convex surfaces like an
+ordinary magnifying glass. This lens rests on a cushion of a soft
+jelly-like substance _v_, called the vitreous humour, which fills the
+dark chamber or cavity of the eyeball and keeps it in shape, so that the
+retina _r_, which lines the chamber, is kept at a proper distance from
+the lens. This retina is a transparent film of very sensitive nerves; it
+forms a screen at the back of the chamber, and has a coating of very
+dark pigment or colouring matter behind it. Lastly, the nerves of the
+retina all meet in a bundle, called the optic nerve, and passing out of
+the eyeball at a point _on_, go to the brain. These are the chief parts
+we use in seeing; now how do we use them?
+
+"Suppose that a pencil is held in front of the eye at the distance at
+which we see small objects comfortably. Light is reflected from all
+parts of the surface of the pencil, and as the rays spread, a certain
+number enter the pupil of the eye. We will follow only two cones of
+light coming from the points 1 and 2 on the diagram Fig. 11. These you
+see enter the eye, each widely spread over the cornea _c_. They are bent
+in a little by this curved covering, and by the liquid behind it, while
+the iris cuts off the rays near the edges of the lens, which would be
+too much bent to form a clear image. The rest of the rays fall upon the
+lens _l_. In passing through this lens they are very much bent (or
+_refracted_) towards each other, so much so that by the time they reach
+the end of the dark chamber _v_, each cone of light has come to a point
+or focus 1', 2', and as rays of this kind have come from every point all
+over the pencil, exactly similar points are formed on the retina, and a
+real picture of the pencil is formed there between 1' and 2'."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 12.
+
+Image of a candle-flame thrown on paper by a lens.]
+
+"We will make a very simple and pretty experiment to illustrate this.
+Darkening the room I light a candle, take a square of white paper in my
+hand, and hold a simple magnifying glass between the two (see Fig. 12)
+about three inches away from the candle. Then I shift the paper nearer
+and farther behind the lens, till we get a clear image of the
+candle-flame upon it. This is exactly what happens in our eye. I have
+drawn a dotted line _c_ round the lens and the paper on the diagram to
+represent the eyeball in which the image of the candle-flame would be on
+the retina instead of on the piece of paper. The first point you will
+notice is that the candle-flame is upside down on the paper, and if you
+turn back to Fig. 11 you will see why, for it is plain that the cones of
+light _cross_ in the lens _l_, 1 going to 1' and 2 to 2'. Every picture
+made on our retina is upside down.
+
+"But it is not there that we see it. As soon as the points of light from
+the pencil strike upon the retina, the thrill passes on along the optic
+nerve _on_, through the back of the eye to the brain; and our mind,
+following back the rays exactly as they have come through the lens, sees
+a pencil, outside the eye, right way upwards.
+
+"This is how we see with our eyes, which adjust themselves most
+beautifully to our needs. For example, not only is the iris always ready
+to expand or contract according as we need more or less light, but there
+is a special muscle, called the ciliary muscle (_cm_, Fig. 11), which
+alters the lens for us to see things far or near. In all, or nearly all,
+perfect eyes the lens is flatter in front than behind, and this enables
+us to see things far off by bringing the rays from them exactly to a
+focus on the retina. But when we look at nearer things the rays require
+to be more bent or refracted, so without any conscious effort on our
+part this ciliary muscle contracts and allows the lens to bulge out
+slightly in front. Instantly we have a stronger magnifier, and the rays
+are brought to the right focus on the retina, so that a clear and
+full-size image of the near object is formed. How little we think, as we
+turn our eyes from one thing to another, and observe, now the distant
+hills, now the sheep feeding close by; or, as night draws on, gaze into
+limitless space and see the stars millions upon millions of miles away,
+that at every moment the focus of our eye is altering, the iris is
+contracting or expanding, and myriads of images are being formed one
+after the other in that little dark chamber, through which pass all the
+scenes of the outer world!
+
+"Yet even this wonderful eye cannot show us everything. Some see farther
+than others, some see more minutely than others, according as the lens
+of the eye is flatter in one person and more rounded in another. But the
+most long-sighted person could never have discovered the planet Neptune,
+more than 2700 millions of miles distant from us, nor could the
+keenest-sighted have known of the existence of those minute and
+beautiful little plants, called diatoms, which live around us wherever
+water is found, and form delicate flint skeletons so infinitesimally
+small that thousands of millions go to form one cubic inch of the stone
+called tripoli, found at Bilin in Bohemia."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 13.
+
+Arrow magnified by a convex lens.
+
+_a_, _b_, Real arrow. C, D, Magnifying-glass. A, B, Enlarged image of
+the arrow.]
+
+"It is here that our 'magic glasses' come to our assistance, and reveal
+to us what was before invisible. We learnt just now that we see near
+things by the lens of our eye becoming more rounded in front; but there
+comes a point beyond which the lens cannot bulge any more, so that when
+a thing is very tiny, and would have to be held very close to the eye
+for us to see it, the lens can no longer collect the rays to a focus, so
+we see nothing but a blur. More than 800 years ago an Arabian, named
+Alhazen, explained why rounded or convex glasses make things appear
+larger when placed before the eye. This glass which I hold in my hand
+is a simple magnifying-glass, such as we used for focusing the
+candle-flame. It bends the rays inwards from any small object (see the
+arrow _a_, _b_, Fig. 13) so that the lens of our eye can use them, and
+then, as we follow out the rays in straight lines to the place where we
+see clearly (at A, B), every point of the object is magnified, and we
+not only see it much larger, but every mark upon it is much more
+distinct. You all know how the little shilling magnifying-glasses you
+carry show the most lovely and delicate structures in flowers, on the
+wings of butterflies, on the head of a bee or fly, and, in fact, in all
+minute living things."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 14.
+
+Student's microscope. _ep_, Eye-piece. _o_, _g_, Object-glass.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 15.
+
+Skeleton of a microscope, showing how an object is magnified.
+
+_o_, _l_, Object-lens. _e_, _g_, Eye-glass. _s_, _s_, Spicule.
+_s'_, _s'_, Magnified image of same in the tube. S, S, Image again
+enlarged by the lens of the eye-piece.]
+
+"But this is only our first step. Those diatoms we spoke of just now
+will only look like minute specks under even the strongest
+magnifying-glass. So we pass on to use two extra lenses to assist our
+eyes, and come to this compound microscope (Fig. 14) through which I
+have before now shown you the delicate markings on shells which were
+themselves so minute that you could not see them with the naked eye. Now
+we have to discover how the microscope performs this feat. Going back
+again for a minute to our candle and magnifying-glass (Fig. 12), you
+will find that the nearer you put the lens to the candle the farther
+away you will have to put the paper to get a clear image. When in a
+microscope we put a powerful lens _o_, _l_ close down to a very minute
+object, say a spicule of a flint sponge _s_, _s_, quite invisible to the
+unaided eye, the rays from this spicule are brought to a focus a long
+way behind it at _s'_, _s'_, making an enlarged image because the lines
+of light have been diverging ever since they crossed in the lens. If you
+could put a piece of paper at _s'_ _s'_, as you did in the candle
+experiment, you would see the actual image of the magnified spicule upon
+it. But as these points of light are only in an empty tube, they pass
+on, spreading out again from the image, as they did before from the
+spicule. Then another convex lens or eye-glass _e_, _g_ is put at the
+top of the microscope at the proper distance to bend these rays so that
+they enter our eye in nearly parallel lines, exactly as we saw in the
+ordinary magnifying-glass (Fig. 13), and our crystalline lens can then
+bring them to a focus on our retina.
+
+"By this time the spicule has been twice magnified; or, in other words,
+the rays of light coming from it have been twice bent towards each
+other, so that when our eye follows them out in straight lines they are
+widely spread, and we see every point of light so clearly that all the
+spots and markings on this minute spicule are as clear as if it were
+really as large as it looks to us.
+
+"This is simply the principle of the microscope. When you come to look
+at your own instruments, though they are very ordinary ones, you will
+find that the object-glass _o_, _l_ is made of three lenses, flat on the
+side nearest the tube, and each lens is composed of two kinds of glass
+in order to correct the unequal refraction of the rays, and prevent
+fringes of colour appearing at the edge of the lens. Then again the
+eye-piece will be a short tube with a lens at each end, and halfway
+between them a black ledge will be seen inside the tube which acts like
+the iris of our eye (_i_, Fig. 11) and cuts off the rays passing through
+the edges of the lens. All these are devices to correct faults in the
+microscope which our eye corrects for itself, and they have enabled
+opticians to make very powerful lenses.
+
+"Look now at the diagram (Fig. 16) showing a group of diatoms which you
+can see under the microscope after the lecture. Notice the lovely
+patterns, the delicate tracery, and the fine lines on the diatoms shown
+there. Yet each of these minute flint skeletons, if laid on a piece of
+glass by itself, would be quite invisible to the naked eye, while
+hundreds of them together only look like a faint mist on the slide on
+which they lie. Nor are they even here shown as much magnified as they
+might be; under a stronger power we should see those delicate lines on
+the diatoms broken up into minute round cups."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 16.
+
+Fossil diatoms seen under the microscope. The largest of these is an
+almost imperceptible speck to the naked eye.]
+
+"Is it not wonderful and delightful to think that we are able to add in
+this way to the power of our eyes, till it seems as if there were no
+limit to the hidden beauties of the minute forms of our earth, if only
+we can discover them?
+
+"But our globe does not stand alone in the universe, and we want not
+only to learn all about everything we find upon it, but also to look out
+into the vast space around us and discover as much as we can about the
+myriads of suns and planets, comets and meteorites, star-mists and
+nebulae, which are to be found there. Even with the naked eye we can
+admire the grand planet Saturn, which is more than 800 millions of miles
+away, and this in itself is very marvellous. Who would have thought that
+our tiny crystalline lens would be able to catch and focus rays, sent
+all this enormous distance, so as actually to make a picture on our
+retina of a planet, which, like the moon, is only sending back to us the
+light of the sun? For, remember, the rays which come to us from Saturn
+must have travelled twice 800 millions of miles--884 millions from the
+sun to the planet, and less or more from the planet back to us,
+according to our position at the time. But this is as nothing when
+compared to the enormous distances over which light travels from the
+stars to us. Even the nearest star we know of, is at least twenty
+_millions_ of _millions_ of miles away, and the light from it, though
+travelling at the rate of 186,300 miles in a second, takes four years
+and four months to reach us, while the light from others, which we can
+see without a telescope, is between twenty and thirty years on its road.
+Does not the thought fill us with awe, that our little eye should be
+able to span such vast distances?
+
+"But we are not yet nearly at the end of our wonder, for the same power
+which devised our eye gave us also the mind capable of inventing an
+instrument which increases the strength of that eye till we can actually
+see stars so far off that their light takes _two thousand years_ coming
+to our globe. If the microscope delights us in helping us to see things
+invisible without it, because they are so small, surely the telescope is
+fascinating beyond all other magic glasses when we think that it brings
+heavenly bodies, thousands of billions of miles away, so close to us
+that we can examine them."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 17.
+
+An astronomical telescope.
+
+_ep_, Eye-piece. _og_, Object-glass. _f_, Finder.]
+
+"A Telescope (Fig. 17) can, like the microscope, be made of only two
+glasses: an object-glass to form an image in the tube and a magnifying
+eye-piece to enlarge it. But there is this difference, that the object
+lens of a microscope is put close down to a minute object, so that the
+rays fall upon it at a wide angle, and the image formed in the tube is
+very much larger than the object outside. In the telescope, on the
+contrary, the thing we look at is far off, so that the rays fall on the
+object-glass at such a very narrow angle as to be practically parallel,
+and the image in the tube is of course _very, very_ much smaller than
+the house, or church, or planet it pictures. What the object-glass of
+the telescope does for us, is to bring a small _real image_ of an object
+very far off close to us in the tube of the telescope so that we can
+examine it.
+
+"Think for a moment what this means. Imagine that star we spoke of (p.
+41), whose light, travelling 186,300 miles in one second, still takes
+2000 years to reach us. Picture the tiny waves of light crossing the
+countless billions of miles of space during those two thousand years,
+and reaching us so widely spread out that the few faint rays which
+strike our eye are quite useless, and for us that star has no existence;
+we cannot see it. Then go and ask the giant telescope, by turning the
+object-glass in the direction where that star lies in infinite space.
+The widespread rays are collected and come to a minute bright image in
+the dark tube. You put the eye-piece to this image, and there, under
+your eye, is a shining point: this is the image of the star, which
+otherwise would be lost to you in the mighty distance.
+
+"Can any magic tale be more marvellous, or any thought grander, or more
+sublime than this? From my little chamber, by making use of the laws of
+light, which are the same wherever we turn, we can penetrate into depths
+so vast that we are not able even to measure them, and bring back unseen
+stars to tell us the secrets of the mighty universe. As far as the stars
+are concerned, whether we see them or not depends entirely upon the
+number of rays collected by the object-glass; for at such enormous
+distances the rays have no angle that we can measure, and magnify as
+you will, the brightest star only remains a point of light. It is in
+order to collect enough rays that astronomers have tried to have larger
+and larger object-glasses; so that while a small good hand telescope,
+such as you use, may have an object-glass measuring only an inch and a
+quarter across, some of the giant telescopes have lenses of two and a
+half feet, or thirty inches, diameter. These enormous lenses are very
+difficult to make and manage, and have many faults, therefore
+astronomical telescopes are often made with curved mirrors to _reflect_
+the rays, and bring them to a focus instead of _refracting_ them as
+curved lenses do.
+
+"We see, then, that one very important use of the telescope is to bring
+objects into view which otherwise we would never see; for, as I have
+already said, though we bring the stars into sight, we cannot magnify
+them. But whenever an object is near enough for the rays to fall even at
+a very small perceptible angle on the object-glass, then we can magnify
+them; and the longer the telescope, and the stronger the eye-piece, the
+more the object is magnified.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 18.
+
+Skeletons of telescopes.
+
+A, A one-foot telescope with a three-inch eye-piece. B, A two-foot
+telescope with a three-inch eye-piece. _e_, _p_, Eye-piece. _o_, _g_,
+Object-glass. _r_, _r_, Rays which enter the telescopes and crossing at
+_x_ form an image at _i_, _i_, which is magnified by the lens _e_, _p_.
+The angles _r_, _x_, _r_ and _i_, _x_, _i_ are the same. In A the angle
+_i_, _o_, _i_ is four times greater than that of _i_, _x_, _i_. In B it
+is eight times greater.]
+
+"I want you to understand the meaning of this, for it is really very
+simple, only it requires a little thought. Here are skeleton drawings of
+two telescopes (Fig. 18), one double the length of the other. Let us
+suppose that two people are using them to look at an arrow on a
+weathercock a long distance off. The rays of light _r_, _r_ from the
+two ends of the arrow will enter both telescopes at the same angle
+_r_, _x_, _r_, cross in the lens, and pass on at _exactly the same
+angle_ into the tubes. So far all is alike, but now comes the
+difference. In the short telescope A the object-glass must be of such a
+curve as to bring the cones of light in each ray to a focus at a
+distance of _one foot_ behind it,[1] and there a small image _i_, _i_ of
+the arrow is formed. But B being twice the length, allows the lens
+to be less curved, and the image to be formed _two feet_ behind the
+object-glass; and as the rays _r_, _r_ have been _diverging_ ever since
+they crossed at _x_, the real image of the arrow formed at _i_, _i_ is
+twice the size of the same image in A. Nevertheless, if you could put a
+piece of paper at _i_, _i_ in both telescopes, and look through the
+_object-glass_ (which you cannot actually do, because your head would
+block out the rays), the arrow would appear the same size in both
+telescopes, because one would be twice as far off from you as the other,
+and the angle _i_, _x_, _i_ is the same in both."
+
+  [1] In our Fig. 18 the distances are inches instead of feet, but the
+  proportions are the same.
+
+"But by going to the proper end of the telescope you can get quite near
+the image, and can see and magnify it, if you put a strong lens to
+collect the rays from it to a focus. This is the use of the eye-piece,
+which in our diagram is placed at a quarter of a foot or three inches
+from the image in both telescopes. Now that we are close to the images,
+the divergence of the points _i_, _i_ makes a great difference. In the
+small telescope, in which the image is only _one foot_ behind the
+object-glass, the eye-piece being a quarter of a foot from it, is four
+times nearer, so the angle _i_, _o_, _i_ is four times the angle
+_i_, _x_, _i_, and the man looking through it sees the image magnified
+_four times_. But in the longer telescope the image is _two feet_ behind
+the lens, while the eye-piece is, as before, a quarter of a foot from
+it. Thus the eyepiece is now eight times nearer, so the angle
+_i_, _o_, _i_ is eight times the angle _i_, _x_, _i_, and the observer
+sees the image magnified _eight times_.
+
+"In real telescopes, where the difference between the focal length of
+the object-glass and that of the eye-glass can be made enormously
+greater, the magnifying power is quite startling, only the object-glass
+must be large, so as to collect enough rays to bear spreading widely.
+Even in your small telescopes, with a focus of eighteen inches, and an
+object-glass measuring one and a quarter inch across, we can put on a
+quarter of an inch eye-piece, and so magnify seventy-two times; while in
+my observatory telescope, eight feet or ninety-six inches long, an
+eye-piece of half an inch magnifies 192 times, and I can put on a
+1/8-inch eye-piece and magnify 768 times! And so we can go on
+lengthening the focus of the object-glass and shortening the focus of
+the eye-piece, till in Lord Rosse's gigantic fifty-six-foot telescope,
+in which the image is fifty-four feet (648 inches) behind the
+object-glass, an eye-piece one-eighth of an inch from the image
+magnifies 5184 times! These giant telescopes, however, require an
+enormous object-glass or mirror, for the points of light are so spread
+out in making the large image that it is very faint unless an enormous
+number of rays are collected. Lord Rosse's telescope has a reflecting
+mirror measuring six feet across, and a man can walk upright in the
+telescope tube. The most powerful telescope yet made is that at the Lick
+Observatory, on Mount Hamilton, in California. It is fifty-six and a
+half feet long, the object-lens measures thirty-six inches across. A
+star seen through this telescope appears 2000 times as bright as when
+seen with the naked eye.
+
+"You need not, however, wait for an opportunity to look through giant
+telescopes, for my small student's telescope, only four feet long, which
+we carry out on to the lawn, will show you endless unseen wonders; while
+your hand telescopes, and even a common opera-glass, will show many
+features on the face of the moon, and enable you to see the crescent of
+Venus, Jupiter's moons, and Saturn's rings, besides hundreds of stars
+unseen by the naked eye.
+
+"Of course you will understand that Fig. 18 only shows the _principle_
+of the telescope. In all good instruments the lenses and other parts are
+more complicated; and in a terrestrial telescope, for looking at
+objects on the earth, another lens has to be put in to turn them right
+way up again. In looking at the sky it does not matter which way up we
+see a planet or a star, so the second glass is not needed, and we lose
+light by using it.
+
+"We have now three magic glasses to work for us--the magnifying-glass,
+the microscope, and the telescope. Besides these, however, we have two
+other helpers, if possible even more wonderful. These are the
+Photographic camera and the Spectroscope."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 19.
+
+Photographic camera.
+
+_l_, _l_, Lenses. _s_, _s_, Screen cutting off diverging rays. _c_, _c_,
+Sliding box. _p_, _p_, Picture formed.]
+
+"Now that we thoroughly understand the use of lenses, I need scarcely
+explain this photographic camera (Fig. 19), for it is clearly an
+artificial eye. In place of the _crystalline lens_ (compare with Fig.
+11) the photographer uses one, or generally two lenses _l_, _l_, with a
+black ledge or stop _s_ between them, which acts like the iris in
+cutting off the rays too near the edge of the lens. The dark camera _c_
+answers to the _dark chamber_ of the eyeball, and the plate _p_, _p_ at
+the back of the chamber, which is made sensitive by chemicals, answers
+our _retina_. The box is formed of two parts, sliding one within the
+other at _c_, so as to place the plate at a proper distance from the
+lens, and then a screw adjusts the focus more exactly by bringing the
+front lens back or forward, instead of altering the curve as the
+_ciliary muscle_ does in our eye. The difference between the two
+instruments is that in our eye the message goes to the brain, and the
+image disappears when we turn our eyes away from the object; but in the
+camera the waves of light work upon the chemicals, and the image can be
+fixed and remain for ever.
+
+"But the camera has at least one weak point. The screen at the back is
+not curved like our retina, but must be flat because of printing off the
+pictures, and therefore the parts of the photograph near the edge are a
+little out of proportion.
+
+"In many ways, however, this photographic eye is a more faithful
+observer than our own, and helps us to make more accurate pictures. For
+instance, instantaneous photographs have been taken of a galloping
+horse, and we find that the movements are very different from what we
+thought we saw with our eye, because our retina does not throw off one
+impression after another quickly enough to be quite certain we see each
+curve truly in succession. Again, the photograph of a face gives minute
+curves and lines, lights and shadows, far more perfectly than even the
+best artist can see them, and when the picture is magnified we see more
+and more details which escaped us before.
+
+"But it is especially when attached to the microscope or the telescope
+that the photographic apparatus tells us such marvellous secrets;
+giving us, for instance, an accurate picture of the most minute
+water-animal quite invisible to the naked eye, so that when we enlarge
+the photograph any one can see the beautiful markings, the finest fibre,
+or the tiniest granule; or affording us accurate pictures, such as the
+one at p. 19 of the face of the moon, and bringing stars into view which
+we cannot otherwise see even with the strongest telescope.
+
+"Our own eye has many weaknesses. For example, when we look through the
+telescope at the sky we can only fix our attention on one part at once,
+and afterwards on another; and the picture which we see in this way, bit
+by bit, we must draw as best we can. But if we put a sensitive
+photographic plate into the telescope just at the point (_i_, _i_, Fig.
+18), where the _image_ of the sky is focused, this plate gives
+attention, so to speak, to the whole picture at once, and registers
+every point exactly as it is; and this picture can be kept and enlarged
+so that every detail can be seen.
+
+"Then, again, if we look at faint stars, they do not grow any brighter
+as we look. Each ray sends its message to the brain, and that is all; we
+cannot heap them up in our eye, and, indeed, after a time we see less,
+because our nerves grow tired. But on a photographic plate in a
+telescope, each ray in its turn does a little work upon the chemicals,
+and the longer the plate remains, the stronger the picture becomes. When
+wet plates were used they could not be left long, but since dry plates
+have been invented, with a film of chemically prepared gelatine, they
+can be left for hours in the telescope, which is kept by clockwork
+accurately opposite to the same objects. In this way thousands of faint
+stars, which we cannot see with the strongest telescope, creep into view
+as their feeble rays work over and over again on the same spot; and, as
+the brighter stars as well as the faint ones are all the time making
+their impression stronger, when the plate comes out each one appears in
+its proper strength. On the other hand, very bright objects often become
+blurred by a long exposure, so that we have sometimes to sacrifice the
+clearness of a bright object in order to print faint objects clearly.
+
+"We now come to our last magic glass--the Spectroscope; and the hour has
+slipped by so fast that I have very little time left to speak of it. But
+this matters less as we have studied it before.[1] I need now only
+remind you of some of the facts. You will remember that when we passed
+sunlight through a three-sided piece of glass called a prism, we broke
+up a ray of white light into a line of beautiful colours gradually
+passing from red, through orange, yellow, green, blue, and indigo, to
+violet, and that these follow in the same order as we see them in the
+rainbow or in the thin film of a soap-bubble. By various experiments we
+proved that these colours are separated from each other because the many
+waves which make up white light are of different sizes, so that because
+the waves, of red light are slow and heavy, they lag behind when bent in
+the three-sided glass, while the rapid violet waves are bent more out of
+their road and run to the farther end of the line, the other colours
+ranging themselves between."
+
+  [1] _Fairyland of Science_, Lecture II.; and _Short History of Natural
+  Science_, chapter xxxiv.
+
+"Now when the light falls through the open window, or through a round
+hole or _large_ slit, the images of the hole made by each coloured wave
+overlap each other very much, and the colours in the spectrum or
+coloured band are crowded together. But when in the spectroscope we pass
+the ray of light through a very narrow slit, each coloured image of the
+upright slit overlaps the next upright image only very little. By using
+several prisms one after the other (see Fig. 21), these upright coloured
+lines are separated more and more till we get a very long band or
+spectrum. Yet, as you know from our experiments with the light of a
+glowing wire or of molten iron, however much you spread out the light
+given by a solid or liquid, you can never separate these coloured lines
+from each other. It is only when you throw the light of a glowing gas or
+vapour into the slit that you get a few bright lines standing out alone.
+This is because _all_ the rays of white light are present in glowing
+solids and liquids, and they follow each other too closely to be
+separated. But a gas, such as glowing hydrogen for example, gives out
+only a few separate rays, which, pouring through the slit, throw red,
+greenish-blue, and dark blue lines on the screen. Thus you have seen the
+double, orange-yellow sodium line (3, Plate I.) which starts out at once
+when salt is held in a flame and its light thrown into the spectroscope,
+and the red line of potassium vapour under the same treatment; and we
+shall observe these again when we study the coloured lights of the sun
+and stars."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 20.
+
+Kirchhoff's spectroscope.
+
+A, The telescope which receives the ray of light through the slit in O.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 21.
+
+Passage of rays through the spectroscope.
+
+S, S', Slit through which the light falls on the prisms. 1, 2, 3, 4,
+Prisms in which the rays are dispersed more and more. _a_, _b_, Screen
+receiving the spectrum, of which the seven principal colours are
+marked.]
+
+"We see, then, that the work of our magic glass, the spectroscope, is
+simply to sift the waves of light, and that these waves, from their
+colour and their position in the long spectrum, actually tell us what
+glowing gases have started them on their road. Is not this like magic?
+I take a substance made of I know not what; I break it up, and, melting
+it in the intense heat of an electric spark, throw its light into the
+spectroscope. Then, as I examine this light after it has been spread out
+by the prisms, I can actually read by unmistakable lines what metals or
+non-metals it contains. Nay, more; when I catch the light of a star, or
+even of a faint nebula, in my telescope, and pass it through these
+prisms, there, written up on the magic-coloured band, I read off the
+gases which are glowing in that star-sun or star-dust billions of miles
+away.
+
+"Now, boys, I have let you into the secrets of my five magic
+glasses--the magnifying-glass, the microscope, the telescope, the
+photographic camera, and the spectroscope. With these and the help of
+chemistry you can learn to work all my spells. You can peep into the
+mysteries of the life of the tiniest being which moves unseen under your
+feet; you can peer into that vast universe, which we can never visit so
+long as our bodies hold us down to our little earth; you can make the
+unseen stars print their spots of light on the paper you hold in your
+hand, by means of light-waves, which left them hundreds of years ago; or
+you can sift this light in your spectroscope, and make it tell you what
+substances were glowing in that star when they were started on their
+road. All this you can do on one condition, namely, that you seek
+patiently to know the truth.
+
+"Stories of days long gone by tell us of true magicians and false
+magicians, and the good or evil they wrought. Of these I know nothing,
+but I do know this, that the value of the spells you can work with my
+magic glasses depends entirely upon whether you work patiently,
+accurately, and honestly. If you make careless, inaccurate experiments,
+and draw hasty conclusions, you will only do bad work, which it may take
+others years to undo; but if you question your instruments honestly and
+carefully, they will answer truly and faithfully. You may make many
+mistakes, but one experiment will correct the other; and while you are
+storing up in your own mind knowledge which lifts you far above this
+little world, or enables you to look deep below the outward surface of
+life, you may add your little group of facts to the general store, and
+help to pave the way to such grand discoveries as those of Newton in
+astronomy, Bunsen and Kirchhoff in spectrum analysis, and Darwin in the
+world of life."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+FAIRY RINGS AND HOW THEY ARE MADE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It was a lovely warm day in September, the golden corn had been cut and
+carted, and the waggons of the farmers around were free for the use of
+the college lads in their yearly autumn holiday. There they stood in a
+long row, one behind the other in the drive round the grounds, each with
+a pair of sleek, powerful farm-horses, and the waggoners beside them
+with their long whips ornamented with coloured ribbons; and as each
+waggon drew up before the door, it filled rapidly with its merry load
+and went on its way.
+
+They had a long drive of seven miles before them, for they were going to
+cross the wild moor, and then descend gradually along a fairly good road
+to the more wooded and fertile country. Their object that day was to
+reach a certain fairy dell known to a few only among the party as one of
+the loveliest spots in Devon. It was a perfect day for a picnic. As they
+drove over the wide stretches of moorland, with tors to right and tors
+to the left, the stunted furze bushes growing here and there glistened
+with spiders' webs from which the dew had not yet disappeared, and
+mosses in great variety carpeted the ground, from the lovely
+thread-mosses, with their scarlet caps, to the pale sphagnum of the
+bogs, where a halt was made for some of the botanists of the party to
+search for the little Sundew (_Drosera rotundifolia_). Though this
+little plant had now almost ceased to flower, it was not difficult to
+recognise by its rosette of leaves glistening with sticky glands which
+it spreads out in many of the Dartmoor bogs to catch the tiny flies and
+suck out their life's blood, and several specimens were uprooted and
+carefully packed away to plant in moist moss at home.
+
+From this bog onwards the road ran near by one of the lovely streams
+which feed the rivers below, and, passing across a bridge covered with
+ivy, led through a small forest of stunted trees round which the
+woodbine clung, hanging down its crimson berries, and the bracken fern,
+already putting on its brown and yellow tints, grew tall and thick on
+either side. Then, as they passed out of the wood, they came upon the
+dell, a piece of wild moorland lying in a hollow between two granite
+ridges, with large blocks of granite strewn over it here and there, and
+furze bushes growing under their shelter, still covered with yellow
+blossoms together with countless seed-bearing pods, which the
+youngsters soon gathered for the shiny-black seeds within them.
+
+Here the waggons were unspanned, the horses tethered out, the food
+unpacked, and preparations for the picnic soon in full swing. Just at
+this moment, however, a loud shout from one part of the dell called
+every one's attention. "The fairy rings! the fairy rings! we have found
+the fairy rings!" and there truly on the brown sward might be seen three
+delicate green rings, the fresh sprouting grass growing young and tender
+in perfect circles measuring from six feet to nearly three yards across.
+
+"What are they?" The question came from many voices at once, but it was
+the Principal who answered.
+
+"Why, do you not know that they are pixie circles, where the 'elves of
+hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves' hold their revels, whirling
+in giddy round, and making the rings, 'whereof the ewe not bites'? Have
+you forgotten how Mrs. Quickly, in the _Merry Wives of Windsor_, tells
+us that
+
+          "'nightly, meadow-fairies, look you sing,
+    Like to the Garter's compass, in a ring:
+    The expressure that it bears, green let it be,
+    More fertile-fresh than all the field to see'?
+
+"If we are magicians and work spells under magic glasses, why should not
+the pixies work spells on the grass? I brought you here to-day on
+purpose to see them. Which of you now can name the pixie who makes
+them?"
+
+A deep silence followed. If any knew or guessed the truth of the matter,
+they were too shy to risk making a mistake.
+
+"Be off with you then," said the Principal, "and keep well away from
+these rings all day, that you may not disturb the spell. But come back
+to me before we return at night, and perhaps I may show you the
+wonder-working pixie, and we may take him home to examine under the
+microscope."
+
+The day passed as such happy days do, and the glorious harvest moon had
+risen over the distant tors before the horses were spanned and the
+waggons ready. But the Principal was not at the starting place, and
+looking round they saw him at the farther end of the dell.
+
+"Gently, gently," he cried, as there was one general rush towards him;
+"look where you tread, for I stand within a ring of fairies!"
+
+And then they saw that just outside the green circle in which he stood,
+forming here and there a broken ring, were patches of a beautiful tiny
+mushroom, each of which raised its pale brown umbrella in the bright
+moonlight.
+
+"Here are our fairies, boys. I am going to take a few home where they
+can be spared from the ring, and to-morrow we will learn their history."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following day saw the class-room full, and from the benches eager
+eyes were turned to the eight windows, in each of which stood one of the
+elder boys at his microscope ready for work. For under those microscopes
+the Principal always arranged some object referred to in his lecture and
+figured in diagrams on the walls, and it was the duty of each boy, after
+the lecture was over, to show and explain to the class all the points
+of the specimen under his care. These boys were always specially envied,
+for though the others could, it is true, follow all the descriptions
+from the diagrams, yet these had the plant or animal always under their
+eye. Discussion was at this moment running high, for there was a great
+uncertainty of opinion as to whether a mushroom could be really called a
+plant when it had no leaves or flowers. All at once the hush came, as
+the Principal stepped into his desk and began:--
+
+"Life is hard work, boys, and there is no being in this world which has
+not to work for its living. You all know that a plant grows by taking in
+gases and water, and working them up into sap and living tissue by the
+help of the sunshine and the green matter in their leaves; and you know,
+too, that the world is so full of green plants that hundreds and
+thousands of young seedlings can never get a living, but are stifled in
+their babyhood or destroyed before they can grow up.
+
+"Now there are many dark, dank places in the world where plants cannot
+get enough sunlight and air to make green colouring matter and
+manufacture their own food. And so it comes to pass that a certain class
+of plants have found another way of living, by taking their food ready
+made from other decaying plants and animals, and so avoiding the
+necessity of manufacturing it for themselves. These plants can live
+hidden away in dark cellars and damp cupboards, in drains and pipes
+where no light ever enters, under a thick covering of dead leaves in the
+forest, under fallen trunks and mossy stones; in fact, wherever
+decaying matter, whether of plant or animal, can be found for them to
+feed upon.
+
+"It is to this class, called _fungi_, which includes all mushrooms and
+moulds, mildews, smuts, and ferments, that the mushroom belongs which we
+found yesterday making the fairy rings. And, in truth, we were not so
+far wrong when we called them pixies or imps, for many of them are
+indeed imps of mischief, which play sorry pranks in our stores at home
+and in the fields and forest abroad. They grow on our damp bread, or
+cheese, or pickles; they destroy fruit and corn, hop and vine, and even
+take the life of insects and other animals. Yet, on the other hand, they
+are useful in clearing out unhealthy nooks and corners, and purifying
+the air; and they can be made to do good work by those who know how to
+use them; for without ferments we could have neither wine, beer, nor
+vinegar, nor even the yeast which lightens our bread.
+
+"I am going to-day to introduce you to this large vagabond class of
+plants, that we may see how they live, grow, and spread, what good and
+bad work they do, and how they do it. And before we come to the
+mushrooms, which you know so well, we must look at the smaller forms,
+which do all their work above ground, so that we can observe them. For
+the _fungi_ are to be found almost everywhere. The film growing over
+manure-heaps, the yeast plant, the wine fungus, and the vinegar plant;
+the moulds and mildews covering our cellar-walls and cupboards, or
+growing on decayed leaves and wood, on stale fruit, bread, or jam, or
+making black spots on the leaves of the rose, the hop, or the vine; the
+potato fungus, eating into the potato in the dark ground and producing
+disease; the smut filling the grains of wheat and oats with disease, the
+ergot feeding on the rye, the rust which destroys beetroot, the rank
+toadstools and puffballs, the mushroom we eat, and the truffles which
+form even their fruit underground,--all these are _fungi_, or lowly
+plants which have given up making their own food in the sunlight, and
+take it ready made from the dung, the decaying mould, the root, the
+leaf, the fruit, or the germ on which they grow. Lastly, the diseases
+which kill the silkworm and the common house-fly, and even some of the
+worst skin diseases in man, are caused by minute plants of this class
+feeding upon their hosts."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 22.
+
+Three forms of vegetable mould magnified.
+
+1, _Mucor Mucedo_. 2, _Aspergillus glaucus_. 3, _Penicillium glaucum_.]
+
+"In fact, the _fungi_ are so widely spread over all things living and
+dead, that there is scarcely anything free from them in one shape or
+another. The minute spores, now of one kind, now of another, float in
+the air, and settling down wherever they find suitable food, have
+nothing more to do than to feed, fatten, and increase, which they do
+with wonderful rapidity. Let us take as an example one of the moulds
+which covers damp leaves, and even the paste and jam in our cupboard. I
+have some here growing upon a basin of paste, and you see it forms a
+kind of dense white fur all over the surface, with here and there a
+bluish-green tinge upon it. This white fur is the common mould, _Mucor
+Mucedo_ (1, Fig. 22), and the green mould happens in this case to be
+another mould, _Penicillium glaucum_ (3, Fig. 22); but I must warn you
+that these minute moulds look very much alike until you examine them
+under the microscope, and though they are called white, blue, or green
+moulds, yet any one of them may be coloured at different times of its
+growth. Another very common and beautiful mould, _Aspergillus glaucus_
+(2, Fig. 22), often grows with Mucor on the top of jam.
+
+"All these plants begin with a spore or minute colourless cell of living
+matter (_s_, Fig. 23), which spends its energy in sending out tubes in
+all directions into the leaves, fruit, or paste on which it feeds. The
+living matter, flowing now this way now that, lays down the walls of its
+tubes as it flows, and by and by, here and there, a tube, instead of
+working into the paste, grows upwards into the air and swells at the tip
+into a colourless ball in which a number of minute seed-like bodies
+called spores are formed. The ball bursts, the spores fall out, and each
+one begins to form fresh tubes, and so little by little the mould grows
+denser and thicker by new plants starting in all directions.
+
+"Under the first microscope you will see a slide showing the tubes which
+spread through the paste, and which are called the _mycelium_ (_m_, Fig.
+23), and amongst it are three upright tubes, one just starting _a_,
+another with the fruit ball forming _b_, and a third _c_, which is
+bursting and throwing out the spores. The _Aspergillus_ and the
+_Penicillium_ differ from the _Mucor_ in having their spores naked and
+not enclosed in a spore-case. In _Penicillium_ they grow like the beads
+of a necklace one above the other on the top of the upright tube, and
+can very easily be separated (see Fig. 22); while _Aspergillus_, a most
+lovely silvery mould, is more complicated in the growth of its spores,
+for it bears them on many rows branching out from the top of the tube
+like the rays of a star."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 23.
+
+_Mucor Mucedo_, greatly magnified. (After Sachs and Brefeld.)
+
+_m_, Mycelium, or tangle of threads. _a_, _b_, _c_, Upright tubes in
+different stages. _c_, Spore-case bursting and sending out spores. _s_,
+1, 2, 3, A growing spore, in different stages, starting a new mycelium.]
+
+"I want you to look at each of these moulds carefully under the
+microscope, for few people who hastily scrape a mould away, vexed to
+find it on food or damp clothing, have any idea what a delicate and
+beautiful structure lies under their hand. These moulds live on decaying
+matter, but many of the mildews, rusts, and other kinds of fungus, prey
+upon living plants such as the _smut_ of oats (_Ustilago carbo_), and
+the _bunt_ (_Tilletia caria_) which eats away the inside of the grains
+of wheat, while another fungus attacks its leaves. There is scarcely a
+tree or herb which has not one fungus to prey upon it, and many have
+several, as, for example, the common lime-tree, which is infested by
+seventy-four different fungi, and the oak by no less than 200.
+
+"So these colourless food-taking plants prey upon their neighbours,
+while they take their oxygen for breathing from air. The 'ferments,'
+however, which live _inside_ plants or fluids, take even their oxygen
+for breathing from their hosts.
+
+"If you go into the garden in summer and pluck an overripe gooseberry,
+which is bursting like this one I have here, you will probably find that
+the pulp looks unhealthy and rotten near the split, and the gooseberry
+will taste tart and disagreeable. This is because a small fungus has
+grown inside, and worked a change in the juice of the fruit. At first
+this fungus spread its tubes outside and merely _fed_ upon the fruit,
+using oxygen from the air in breathing; but by and by the skin gave way,
+and the fungus crept inside the gooseberry where it could no longer get
+any fresh air. In this dilemma it was forced to break up the sugar in
+the fruit and take the oxygen out of it, leaving behind only alcohol and
+carbonic acid which give the fermented taste to the fruit.
+
+"So the fungus-imp feeds and grows in nature, and when man gets hold of
+it he forces it to do the same work for a useful purpose, for the
+grape-fungus grows in the vats in which grapes are crushed and kept away
+from air, and tearing up the sugar, leaves alcohol behind in the
+grape-juice, which in this way becomes wine. So, too, the yeast-fungus
+grows in the malt and hop liquor, turning it into beer; its spores
+floating in the fluid and increasing at a marvellous rate, as any
+housewife knows who, getting yeast for her bread, tries to keep it in a
+corked bottle.
+
+"The yeast plant has never been found wild. It is only known as a
+cultivated plant, growing on prepared liquor. The brewer has to sow it
+by taking some yeast from other beer, or by leaving the liquor exposed
+to air in which yeast spores are floating; or it will sow itself in the
+same way in a mixture of water, hops, sugar, and salt, to which a
+handful of flour is added. It increases at a marvellous rate, one cell
+budding out of another, while from time to time the living matter in a
+cell will break up into four parts instead of two, and so four new cells
+will start and bud. A drop of yeast will very soon cover a glass slide
+with this tiny plant, as you will see under the second microscope, where
+they are now at work (Fig. 24)."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 24.
+
+Yeast cells growing under the microscope. _a_, Single cells. _b_, Two
+cells forming by division. _c_, A group of cells where division is going
+on in all directions.]
+
+"But perhaps the most curious of all the minute fungi are those which
+grow inside insects and destroy them. At this time of year you may
+often see a dead fly sticking to the window-pane with a cloudy white
+ring round it; this poor fly has been killed by a little fungus called
+_Empusa muscae_. A spore from a former plant has fallen perhaps on the
+window-pane, or some other spot over which the fly has crawled, and
+being sticky has fixed itself under the fly's body. Once settled on a
+favourable spot it sends out a tube, and piercing the skin of the fly,
+begins to grow rapidly inside. There it forms little round cells one
+after the other, something like the yeast-cells, till it fills the whole
+body, feeding on its juices; then each cell sends a tube, like the
+upright tubes of the _Mucor_ (Fig. 23) out again through the fly's skin,
+and this tube bursts at the end, and so new spores are set free. It is
+these tubes, and the spores thrown from them, which you see forming a
+kind of halo round the dead fly as it clings to the pane. Other fungi in
+the same way kill the silkworm and the caterpillars of the cabbage
+butterfly. Nor is it only the lower animals which suffer. When we once
+realise that fungus spores are floating everywhere in the air, we can
+understand how the terrible microscopic fungi called _bacteria_ will
+settle on an open wound and cause it to fester if it is not properly
+dressed.
+
+"Thus we see that these minute fungi are almost everywhere. The larger
+ones, on the contrary, are confined to the fields and forests, damp
+walls and hollow trees; or wherever rotting wood, leaves, or manure
+provide them with sufficient nourishment. Few people have any clear
+ideas about the growth of a mushroom, except that the part we pick
+springs up in a single night. The real fact is, that a whole mushroom
+plant is nothing more than a gigantic mould or mildew, only that it is
+formed of many different shaped cells, and spreads its tubes
+_underground_ or through the trunks of trees instead of in paste or jam,
+as in the case of the mould."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 25.
+
+Early stages of the mushroom. (After Sachs.)
+
+_m_, Mycelium. _b1-3_, Mushroom buds of different ages. _b4_, Button
+mushroom. _g_, Gills forming inside before lower attachment of the cap
+gives way at _v_.]
+
+"The part which we gather and call a mushroom, a toadstool, or a
+puffball is only the fruit, answering to the round balls of the mould.
+The rest of the plant is a thick network of tubes, which you will see
+under the third microscope. These tubes spread underground and suck in
+decayed matter from the earth; they form the _mycelium_ (_m_, Fig. 25)
+such as we found in the mould. The mushroom-growers call it 'mushroom
+spawn' because they use it to spread over the ground for new crops. Out
+of these underground tubes there springs up from time to time a swollen
+round body no bigger at first than a mustard seed (_b1_, Fig. 25). As it
+increases in size it comes above ground and grows into the mushroom or
+spore-case, answering to the round balls which contain the spores of the
+mould. At first this swollen body is egg-shaped, the top half being
+largest and broadest, and the fruit is then called a 'button-mushroom'
+_b4_. Inside this ball are now formed a series of folds made of long
+cells, some of which are soon to bear spores just as the tubes in the
+mould did, and while these are forming and ripening, a way out is
+preparing for them. For as the mushroom grows, the skin of the lower
+part of the ball (_v_, _b4_) is stretched more and more, till it can
+bear the strain no longer and breaks away from the stalk; then the ball
+expands into an umbrella, leaving a piece of torn skin, called the veil
+(_v_, Fig. 26), clinging to the stalk."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 26.
+
+Later stages of the mushroom. (After Gautier.)
+
+1, Button mushroom stage. _c_, Cap. _v_, Veil. _g_, Gills.
+
+2, Full-grown mushroom, showing veil v after the cap is quite free, and
+the gills or lamellae _g_, of which the structure is shown in Fig. 27.]
+
+"All this happens in a single night, and the mushroom is complete, with
+a stem up the centre and a broad cap, under which are the folds which
+bear the spores. Thus much you can see for yourselves at any time by
+finding a place where mushrooms grow and looking for them late at night
+and early in the morning so as to get the different stages. But now we
+must turn to the microscope, and cutting off one of the folds, which
+branch out under the cap like the spokes of a wheel, take a slice across
+it (1, Fig. 27) and examine."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 27.
+
+1, One of the gills or lamellae of the mushroom slightly magnified,
+showing the cells round the edge. _c_, Cells which do not bear spores.
+_fc_, Fertile cells. 2, A piece of the edge of the same powerfully
+magnified, showing how the spores _s_ grow out of the tip of the fertile
+cells _fc_.]
+
+"First, under a moderate power, you will see the cells forming the
+centre of the fold and the layer of long cells (_c_ and _fc_) which are
+closely packed all round the edge. Some of these cells project beyond
+the others, and it is they which bear the spores. We see this plainly
+under a very strong power when you can distinguish the sterile cells _c_
+and the fertile cells _fc_ projecting beyond them, and each bearing
+four spore-cells _s_ on four little horns at its tip.
+
+"These spores fall off very easily, and you can make a pretty experiment
+by cutting off a large mushroom head in the early morning and putting it
+flat upon a piece of paper. In a few hours, if you lift it very
+carefully, you will find a number of dark lines on the paper, radiating
+from a centre like the spokes of a wheel, each line being composed of
+the spores which have fallen from a fold as it grew ripe. They are so
+minute that many thousands would be required to make up the size of the
+head of an ordinary pin, yet if you gather the spores of the several
+kinds of mushroom, and examine them under a strong microscope, you will
+find that even these specks of matter assume different shapes in the
+various species.
+
+"You will be astonished too at the immense number of spores contained in
+a single mushroom head, for they are reckoned by millions; and when we
+remember that each one of these is the starting point of a new plant, it
+reminds us forcibly of the wholesale destruction of spores and seeds
+which must go on in nature, otherwise the mushrooms and their companions
+would soon cover every inch of the whole world.
+
+"As it is, they are spread abroad by the wind, and wherever they escape
+destruction they lie waiting in every nook and corner till, after the
+hot summer, showers of rain hasten the decay of plants and leaves, and
+then the mushrooms, toadstools, and puffballs, grow at an astounding
+pace. If you go into the woods at this season you may see the enormous
+deep-red liver fungus (_Fistulina hepatica_) growing on the oak-trees,
+in patches which weigh from twenty to thirty pounds; or the glorious
+orange-coloured fungus (_Tremella mesenterica_) growing on bare sticks
+or stumps of furze; or among dead leaves you may easily chance on the
+little caps of the crimson, scarlet, snowy white, or orange-coloured
+fungi which grow in almost every wood. From white to yellow, yellow to
+red, red to crimson and purple black, there is hardly any colour you may
+not find among this gaily-decked tribe; and who can wonder that the
+small bright-coloured caps have been supposed to cover tiny imps or
+elves, who used the large mushrooms to serve for their stools and
+tables?
+
+"There they work, thrusting their tubes into twigs and dead branches,
+rotting trunks and decaying leaves, breaking up the hard wood and tough
+fibres, and building them up into delicate cells, which by and by die
+and leave their remains as food for the early growing plants in the
+spring. So we see that in their way the mushrooms and toadstools are
+good imps after all, for the tender shoot of a young seedling plant
+could take no food out of a hard tree-trunk, but it finds the work done
+for it by the fungus, the rich nourishment being spread around its young
+roots ready to be imbibed.
+
+"To find our fairy-ring mushrooms, however, we must leave the wood and
+go out into the open country, especially on the downs and moors and
+rough meadows, where the land is poor and the grass coarse and spare.
+There grow the nourishing kinds, most of which we can eat, and among
+these is the delicate little champignon or 'Scotch-bonnet' mushroom,
+_Marasmius Oreades_,[1] which makes the fairy-rings. When a spore of
+this mushroom begins to grow, it sucks up vegetable food out of the
+earth and spreads its tubes underground, in all directions from the
+centre, so that the mycelium forms a round patch like a thick
+underground circular cobweb. In the summer and autumn, when the weather
+is suitable, it sends up its delicate pale-brown caps, which we may
+gather and eat without stopping the growth of the plant.
+
+  [1] Shown in initial letter of this chapter.
+
+"This goes on year after year underground, new tubes always travelling
+outwards till the circle widens and widens like the rings of water on a
+pond, only that it spreads very slowly, making a new ring each year,
+which is often composed of a mass of tubes as much as a foot thick in
+the ground, and the tender tubes in the centre die away as the new ones
+form a larger hoop outside.
+
+"But all this is below ground; where then are our fairy rings? Here is
+the secret. The tubes, as we have seen, take up food from the earth and
+build it up into delicate cells, which decay very soon, and as they die
+make a rich manure at the roots of the grass. So each season the cells
+of last year's ring make a rich feeding-ground for the young grass,
+which springs up fresh and green in a fairy ring, while _outside_ this
+emerald circle the mushroom tubes are still growing and increasing
+underneath the grass, so that next year, when the present ring is no
+longer richly fed, and has become faded and brown like the rest of the
+moor, another ring will spring up outside it, feeding on the prepared
+food below."
+
+"In bad seasons, though the tubes go on spreading and growing below, the
+mushroom fruit does not always appear above ground. The plant will only
+fruit freely when the ground has been well warmed by the summer sun,
+followed by damp weather to moisten it. This gives us a rich crop of
+mushrooms all over the country, and it is then you can best see the ring
+of fairy mushrooms circling outside the green hoop of fresh grass. In
+any case the early morning is the time to find them; it is only in very
+sheltered spots that they sometimes last through the day, or come up
+towards evening, as I found them last night on the warm damp side of the
+dell.
+
+"This is the true history of fairy rings, and now go and look for
+yourselves under the microscopes. Under the first three you will find
+the three different kinds of mould of our diagram (Fig. 22). Under the
+fourth the spores of the mould are shown in their first growth putting
+out the tubes to form the mycelium. The fifth shows the mould itself
+with its fruit-bearing tubes, one of which is bursting. Under the sixth
+the yeast plant is growing; the seventh shows a slice of one of the
+folds of the common mushroom with its spore-bearing horns; and under the
+eighth I have put some spores from different mushrooms, that you may see
+what curious shapes they assume.
+
+"Lastly, let me remind you, now that the autumn and winter are coming,
+that you will find mushrooms, toadstools, puffballs, and moulds in
+plenty wherever you go. Learn to know them, their different shapes and
+colours, and above all the special nooks each one chooses for its home.
+Look around in the fields and woods and take note of the decaying plants
+and trees, leaves and bark, insects and dead remains of all kinds. Upon
+each of these you will find some fungus growing, breaking up their
+tissues and devouring the nourishing food they provide. Watch these
+spots, and note the soft spongy soil which will collect there, and then
+when the spring comes, notice what tender plants flourish upon these
+rich feeding grounds. You will thus see for yourselves that the fungi,
+though they feed upon others, are not entirely mischief-workers, but
+also perform their part in the general work of life."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE LIFE-HISTORY OF LICHENS AND MOSSES
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The autumn has passed away and we are in the midst of winter. In the
+long winter evenings the stars shine bright and clear, and tempt us to
+work with the telescope and its helpmates the spectroscope and
+photographic plates. But at first sight it would seem as though our
+microscopes would have to stand idle so far at least as plants are
+concerned, or be used only to examine dried specimens and mounted
+sections. Yet this is not the fact, as I remembered last week when
+walking through the bare and leafless wood. A startled pheasant rising
+with a whirr at the sound of my footsteps among the dead leaves roused
+me from my thoughts, and as a young rabbit scudded across the path and I
+watched it disappear among the bushes, I was suddenly struck with the
+great mass of plant life flourishing underfoot and overhead.
+
+Can you guess what plants these were? I do not mean the evergreen pines
+and firs, nor the few hardy ferns, nor the lovely ivy clothing the
+trunks of the trees. Such plants as these live and remain green in the
+winter, but they do not grow. If you wish to find plant life revelling
+in the cold damp days of winter, fearing neither frost nor snow and
+welcoming mist and rain, you must go to the mosses, which as autumn
+passes away begin to cover the wood-paths, to creep over the roots of
+the trees, to suck up the water in the bogs, and even to clothe dead
+walls and stones with a soft green carpet. And with the mosses come the
+lichens, those curious grey and greenish oddities which no one but a
+botanist would think of classing among plants.
+
+The wood is full of them now: the hairy lichens hang from the branches
+of many of the trees, making them look like old greybearded men; the
+leafy lichens encircle the branches, their pale gray, green, and yellow
+patches looking as if they were made of crumpled paper cut into wavy
+plates; and the crusty lichens, scarcely distinguishable from the bark
+of the trees, cover every available space which the mosses have left
+free.
+
+As I looked at these lichens and thought of their curious history I
+determined that we would study them to-day, and gathered a basketful of
+specimens (see Fig. 28). But when I had collected these I found I had
+not the heart to leave the mosses behind. I could not even break off a
+piece of bark with lichen upon it without some little moss coming too,
+especially the small thread-mosses (_Bryum_) which make a home for
+themselves in every nook and corner of the branches; while the
+feather-mosses, hair-mosses, cord-mosses, and many others made such a
+lovely carpet under my feet that each seemed too beautiful to pass by,
+and they found their way into my basket, crowned at the top with a large
+mass of the pale-green Sphagnum, or bog-moss, into which I sank more
+than ankle-deep as I crossed the bog in the centre of the wood on my way
+home.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 28.
+
+Examples of Lichens. (From life.)
+
+1, A hairy lichen. 2, A leafy lichen. 3, A crustaceous lichen. _f_, _f_,
+the fruit.]
+
+So here they all are, and I hope by the help of our magic glass to let
+you into some of the secrets of their lives. It is true we must study
+the structure of lichens chiefly by diagrams, for it is too minute for
+beginners to follow under the microscope, so we must trust to drawings
+made by men more skilful in microscopic botany, at any rate for the
+present. But the mosses we can examine for ourselves and admire their
+delicate leaves and wonderful tiny spore-cases.
+
+Now the first question which I hope you want to ask is, how it is that
+these lowly plants flourish so well in the depth of winter when their
+larger and stronger companions die down to the ground. We will answer
+this first as to the lichens, which are such strange uncanny-looking
+plants that it is almost difficult to imagine they are alive at all; and
+indeed they have been a great puzzle to botanists.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 29.
+
+Single-celled green plants growing and dividing (_Pleurococcus_). (After
+Thuret and Bornet.)]
+
+Before we examine them, however, look for a minute at a small drop of
+this greenish film which I have taken from the rain-water taken outside.
+I have put some under each microscope, and those who can look into them
+will see the slide almost covered with small round green cells very much
+like the yeast cells we saw when studying the Fungi, only that instead
+of being colourless they are a bright green. Some of these cells will I
+suspect be longer than others, and these long cells will be moving over
+the slide very rapidly, swimming hither and thither, and you will see,
+perhaps for the first time, that very low plants can swim about in
+water. These green cells are, indeed, the simplest of all plants, and
+are merely bags of living matter which, by the help of the green
+granules in them, are able to work up water and gases into nourishing
+food, and so to live, grow, and multiply.
+
+There are many kinds of these single-celled plants in the world. You may
+find them on damp paths, in almost any rain-water butt, in ponds and
+ditches, in sparkling waterfalls, along the banks of flowing rivers, and
+in the cold clear springs on the bleak mountains. Some of them take the
+form of tangled threads[1] composed of long strings of cells, and these
+sometimes form long streamers in flowing water, and at other times are
+gathered together in a shapeless film only to be disentangled under a
+microscope. Other kinds[2] wave to and fro on the water, forming dense
+patches of violet, orange-brown, or glossy green scum shining in the
+bright sunlight, and these flourish equally in the ponds of our gardens
+and in pools in the Himalaya mountains, 18,000 feet above the sea.
+Others again[3] seize on every damp patch on tree trunks, rocks, or
+moist walls, covering them with a green powder formed of single plant
+cells. Other species of this family turn a bright red colour when the
+cells are still; and one, under the name of Gory Dew,[4] has often
+frightened the peasants of Italy, by growing very rapidly over damp
+walls and then turning the colour of blood. Another[5] forms the "red
+snow" of the Arctic regions, where it covers wide surfaces of snow with
+a deep red colour. Others[6] form a shiny jelly over rocks and stones,
+and these may be found almost everywhere, from the garden path to the
+warm springs of India, from the marshes of New Zealand up to the shores
+of the Arctic ocean, and even on the surface of floating icebergs.
+
+  [1] _Confervae._
+
+  [2] _Oscillariae._
+
+  [3] _Protococcus._
+
+  [4] _Palmella cruenta._
+
+  [5] _Protococcus nivalis._
+
+  [6] _Nostoc._
+
+The reason why these plants can live in such very different regions is
+that they do not take their food through roots out of the ground, but
+suck in water and gases through the thin membrane which covers their
+cell, and each cell does its own work. So it matters very little to them
+where they lie, so long as they have moisture and sunlight to help them
+in their work. Wherever they are, if they have these, they can take in
+carbonic acid from the air and work up the carbon with other gases which
+they imbibe with the water, and so make living material. In this way
+they grow, and as a cell grows larger the covering is stretched and part
+of the digested food goes to build up more covering membrane, and by and
+by the cell divides into two and each membrane closes up, so that there
+are two single-celled plants where there was only one before. This will
+sometimes go on so fast that a small pond may be covered in a few hours
+with a green film formed of new cells.
+
+Now we have seen, when studying mushrooms, that the one difference
+between these green plants and the single-celled Fungi is that while the
+green cells make their own food, colourless cells can only take it in
+ready-made, and therefore prey upon all kinds of living matter. This is
+just what happens in the lichens; and botanists have discovered that
+these curious growths are really the result of a _partnership_ between
+single-celled green plants and single-celled fungi. The grey part is a
+fungus; but when it is examined under the microscope we find it is not a
+fungus only; a number of green cells can be seen scattered through it,
+which, when carefully studied, prove to be some species of the green
+single-celled plants.
+
+Here are two drawings of sections cut through two different lichens, and
+enormously magnified so that the cells are clearly seen. 1, Fig. 30 is
+part of a hairy lichen (1, Fig. 28), and 2 is part of a leafy lichen (2,
+Fig. 28). The hairy lichen as you see has a row of green cells all round
+the tiny branch, with fungus cells on all sides of them. The leafy
+lichen, which only presents one surface to the sun and air while the
+other side is against the tree, has only one layer of green cells near
+the surface, but protected by the fungus above.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 30.
+
+Sections of Lichens. (Sachs.)
+
+1, Section of a hairy lichen, _Usnea barbata_. 2, Section of a leafy
+lichen, _Sticta fuliginosa_. 3, Early growth of a lichen. _gc_, Green
+cells. _f_, Fungus.]
+
+The way the lichen has grown is this. A green cell (_gc_ 3, Fig. 30)
+falling on some damp spot has begun to grow and spread, working up food
+in the sunlight. To it comes the spore of the fungus _f_, first
+thrusting its tubes into the tree-bark, or wall, and then spreading
+round the green cells, which remain always in such a position that
+sunlight, air, and moisture can reach them. From this time the two
+classes of plants live as friends, the fungus using part of the food
+made by the green cells, and giving them in return the advantage of
+being spread out to the sunlight, while they are also protected in
+frosty or sultry weather when they would dry up on a bare surface. On
+the whole, however, the fungus probably gains the most, for it has been
+found, as we should expect, that the green cells can live and grow if
+separated out of the lichen, but the fungus cells die when their
+industrious companions are taken from them.
+
+At any rate the partnership succeeds, as you will see if you go into the
+wood, or into an orchard where the apple-trees are neglected, for every
+inch of the branches is covered by lichens if not already taken up by
+mosses or toadstools.
+
+There is hardly any part of the world except the tropics where lichens
+do not abound. In the Alps of Scandinavia close to the limits of
+perpetual snow, in the sandy wastes of Arctic America, and over the
+dreary Tundras of Arctic Siberia, where the ground is frozen hard during
+the greater part of the year, they flourish where nothing else can live.
+
+The little green cells multiply by dividing, as we saw them doing in the
+green film from the water-butt. The fungus, however, has many different
+modes of seeding itself. One of these is by forming little pockets in
+the lichen, out of which, when they burst, small round bodies are
+thrown, which cover the lichen with a minute green powder. There is
+plenty of this powder on the leafy lichen which you have by you. You can
+see it with the magnifying-glass, without putting it under the
+microscope. As long as the lichen is dry these round bodies do not grow,
+but as soon as moisture reaches them they start away and become new
+plants.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 31.
+
+Fructification of a lichen. (From Sachs and Oliver.)
+
+Apothecium or spore-chamber of a lichen. 1, Closed. 2, Open. 3, The
+spore-cases and filaments enlarged, showing the spores. _f_, Filaments.
+_sc_, Spore-cases. _s_, Spores.]
+
+A more complicated and beautiful process is shown in this diagram (Fig.
+31). If you look carefully at the leafy lichen (2, Fig. 28) you will
+find here and there some little cups _f_, while others grow upon the
+tips of the hairy lichen. These cups, or fruits, were once closed,
+flask-shaped chambers (1, Fig. 31) inside which are formed a number of
+oval cells _sc_, which are spore-cases, with from four to eight spores
+or seed-like bodies _s3_ inside them. When these chambers, which are
+called _apothecia_, are ripe, moist or rainy weather causes them to
+swell at the top, and they burst open and the spore-cases throw out the
+spores to grow into new fungi.
+
+In some lichens the chambers remain closed and the spores escape through
+a hole in the top, and they are then called _perithecia_, while in
+others, as these which we have here, they open out into a cup-shape.
+
+This, then, is the curious history of lichens; the green cells and fungi
+flourishing together in the damp winter and bearing the hardest frost
+far better than the summer drought, so that they have their good time
+when most other plants are dead or asleep. Yet though some of them, such
+as the hairy lichens, almost disappear in the summer, they are by no
+means dead, for, like all these very low plants, they can bear being
+dried up for a long time, and then, when moisture visits them again,
+each green cell sets to work, and they revive. There is much more to be
+learnt about them, but this will be sufficient to make you feel an
+interest in their simple lives, and when you look for them in the wood
+you will be surprised to find how many different kinds there are, for it
+is most wonderful that such lowly plants should build up such an immense
+variety of curious and grotesque forms.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And yet, when we turn to the mosses, I am half afraid they will soon
+attract you away from the dull grey lichens, for of all plant histories
+it appears to me that the history of the moss-plant is most fascinating.
+
+As this history is complicated by the moss having, as it were, two
+lives, you must give me your whole attention, and I will explain it
+first from diagrams, though you can see all the steps under the
+microscope.
+
+Take in your hands, in the first place, a piece of this green moss which
+I have brought. How thick it is, like a rich felted carpet! and yet, if
+you pull it apart carefully, you will find that each leafy stem is
+separate, and can be taken away from the others without breaking
+anything. In this dense moss each stem is single and clothed with leaves
+wrapped closely round it (see Fig. 33); in some mosses the stem is
+branched, and in others the leaves grow on side stalks, as in this
+feathery moss (Fig. 32). But in each case every stem is like a separate
+plant, with its own tuft of tender roots _r_.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 32.
+
+A stem of feathery moss. (From life.)
+
+_l_, Leaves. _s_, Stem. _r_, Roots.]
+
+What a delicate growth it is! The stem is scarcely more than a fine
+thread, the leaves minute, transparent, and tender. In this pale
+sphagnum or bog-moss (Fig. 36, p. 93), which is much larger and stouter,
+you can see better how each one of these leaves, though they are so
+thickly packed, is placed so that it can get the utmost light, air, and
+moisture. Yet so closely are the leaves of each stem entangled in those
+of the next that the whole forms a thick springy green carpet under our
+feet.
+
+How is it, then, that these moss stems, though each independent, grow in
+such a dense mass? Partly because moss multiplies so rapidly that new
+stems are always thrusting themselves up to the light, but chiefly
+because the stems were not always separate, but in very early life
+sprang from a common source.
+
+If, instead of bringing the moss home and tearing it apart, you went to
+a spot in the wood where fresh moss was growing, and looked very
+carefully on the surface of the ground or among the water of a marsh,
+you would find a spongy green mass below the growing moss, very much
+like the green scum on a pond. This film, some of which I have brought
+home, is seen under the microscope to be a mass of tangled green threads
+(_t_, Fig. 34, p. 88) like those of the _Confervae_ (see p. 79), composed
+of rows of cells, while here and there upon these threads you would find
+a bud (_mb_, Fig. 34) rising up into the air.
+
+This tangled mass of green threads, called the _protonema_, is the first
+growth, from which the moss stems spring. It has itself originated from
+a moss-spore; as we shall see by and by. As soon as it has started it
+grows and spreads very rapidly, drinking in water and air through all
+its cells and sending up the moss buds which swell and grow, giving out
+roots below and fine stems above, which soon become crowded with leaves,
+forming the velvety carpet we call moss. Meanwhile the soft threads
+below die away, giving up all their nourishment to the moss-stems, and
+this is why, when you take up the moss, you find each stem separate. But
+now comes the question, How does each stem live after the nourishing
+threads below have died? It is true each stem has a few hairy roots,
+but these are very feeble, and not at all like the roots of higher
+plants. The fact is, the moss is built up entirely of tender cells, like
+the green cells in the lichen, or in the film upon the pond. These cells
+are not shut in behind a thick skin as in the leaves of higher plants,
+but have every one of them the power to take in water and gases through
+their tender membrane.
+
+I made last night a rough drawing of the leaf of the feathery moss put
+under the microscope, but you will see it far better by putting a leaf
+with a little water on a glass slide under the covering glass and
+examining it for yourself. You will see that it is composed of a number
+of oval-shaped cells packed closely together (_c_ Fig. 33), with a few
+long narrow ones _mr_ in the middle of the leaf forming the midrib.
+Every cell is as clear and distinct as if it were floating in the water,
+and the tiny green grains which help it to work up its food are clearly
+visible.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 33.
+
+Moss-leaf magnified. (From life.)
+
+Showing the cells _c_, each of which can take in and work up its own
+food. _mr_, Long cells of the mid-rib.]
+
+Each of these cells can act as a separate plant, drinking in the water
+and air it needs, and feeding and growing quite independently of the
+roots below. Yet at the same time the moss stem has a great advantage
+over single-celled plants in having root-hairs, and being able to grow
+upright and expose its leaves to the sun and air.
+
+Now you will no longer wonder that moss grows so fast and so thick, and
+another curious fact follows from the independence of each cell, namely,
+that new growths can start from almost any part of the plant. For
+example, pieces will often break off from the tangled mass or protonema
+below, and, starting on their own account, form other thread masses.
+Then, after the moss stems have grown, a new mass of threads may grow
+from one of the tiny root-hairs of a stem and make a fresh tangle; nay,
+a thread will sometimes even spring out of a damp moss leaf and make a
+new beginning, while the moss stems themselves often put forth buds and
+branches, which grow root-hairs and settle down on their own account.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 34.
+
+Polytrichum commune. A large hair-moss.
+
+_t_, _t_, Threads of green cells forming the _protonema_ out of which
+moss-buds spring. _mb_, Buds of moss-stems. _a_, Minute green flower in
+which the antherozoids are formed (enlarged in Fig. 35). _p_, _p1_,
+_p2_, _p3_, Minute green flower in which the ovules are formed, and
+urn-plant springing out of it (enlarged in Fig. 35). _us_, Urn stems.
+_c_, Cap. _u_, Urn after cap has fallen off, still protected by its
+lid.]
+
+All this comes from the simple nature of the plants, each cell doing its
+own work. Nor are the mosses in any difficulty as to soil, for as the
+matted threads decay they form a rich manure, and the dying moss-stems
+themselves, being so fragile, turn back very readily into food. This is
+why mosses can spread over the poorest soil where even tough grasses
+cannot live, and clothe walls and roofs with a rich green.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 35.
+
+Fructification of a moss.
+
+A, Male moss-flower stripped of its outer leaves, showing jointed
+filaments and oval sacs os and antherozoid cells _zc_ swarming out of a
+sac. _zc'_, Antherozoid cell enlarged. _z_, Free antherozoid. P, Female
+flower with bottle-shaped sacs _bs_. _bs-c_, Bottle-shaped sac, with cap
+being pushed up. _u_, Urn of _Funaria hygrometrica_, with small cap.
+_u'_, Urn, from which the cap has fallen, showing the teeth _t_ which
+keep in the spores.]
+
+So far, then, we now understand the growth of the mossy-leaf stems, but
+this is only half the life of the plant. After the moss has gone on
+through the damp winter spreading and growing, there appear in the
+spring or summer tiny moss flowers at the tip of some of the stems.
+These flowers (_a_, _p_, Fig. 34) are formed merely of a few green
+leaves shorter and stouter than the rest, enclosing some oval sacs
+surrounded by jointed hairs or filaments (see A and P, Fig. 35). These
+sacs are of two different kinds, one set being short and stout _os_, the
+others having long necks like bottles _bs_. Sometimes these two kinds of
+sac are in one flower, but more often they are in separate flowers, as
+in the hair-moss, _Polytrichum commune_ (_a_ and _p_, Fig. 34). Now when
+the flowers are ripe the short sacs in the flower A open and fling out
+myriads of cells _zc_, and these cells burst, and forth come tiny
+wriggling bodies _z_, called by botanists _antherozoids_, one out of
+each cell. These find their way along the damp moss to the flower P, and
+entering the neck of one of the bottle-shaped sacs _bs_, find out each
+another cell or _ovule_ inside. The two cells together then form a
+_plant-egg_, which answers to the germ in the seeds of higher plants.
+
+Now let us be sure we understand where we are in the life of the plant.
+We have had its green-growing time, its flowering, and the formation of
+what we may roughly call its seed, which last in ordinary higher plants
+would fall down and grow into a new green plant. But with the moss there
+is more to come. The egg does not shake out of the bottle-necked sac,
+but begins to grow inside it, sending down a little tube into the moss
+stem, and using it as other plants use the ground to grow in.
+
+As soon as it is rooted it begins to form a delicate stem, and as this
+grows it pushes up the sac _bs_, stretching the neck tighter and tighter
+till at last it tears away below, and the sac is carried up and hangs
+like an extinguisher or cap (_c_ Figs. 34, 35) over the top of the stem.
+Meanwhile, under this cap the top of the stalk swells into a knob
+which, by degrees, becomes a lovely little covered urn _u_, something
+like a poppy head, which has within it a number of spores. The growth of
+this tiny urn-plant often occupies several months, for you must remember
+that it is not merely a fruit, though it is often called so, but a real
+plant, taking in food through its tubes below and working for its
+living.
+
+When it is finished it is a most lovely little object (_us_, Fig. 34),
+the fine hairlike stalk being covered with a green, yellow, or brilliant
+red fool's cap on the top, yet the whole in most mosses is not bigger
+than an ordinary pin. You may easily see them in the spring or summer,
+or even sometimes in the winter. I have only been able to bring you one
+very little one to-day, the _Funaria hygrometrica_, which fruits early
+in the year. This moss has only a short cap, but in many mosses they are
+very conspicuous. I have often pulled them off as you would pull a cap
+from a boy's head. In nature they fall off after a time, leaving the
+urn, which, though so small, is a most complicated structure. First it
+has an outer skin, with holes or mouths in it which open and close to
+let moisture in and out. Then come two layers of cells, then an open
+space full of air, in which are the green chlorophyll grains which are
+working up food for the tiny plant as the moisture comes in to them.
+Lastly, within this again is a mass of tissue, round which grow the
+spores which are soon to be sown, and which in _Polytrichum commune_ are
+protected by a lid. Even after the extinguisher and the lid have both
+fallen off, the spores cannot fall out, for a thick row of teeth (_t_,
+Fig. 35) is closed over them like the tentacles of an anemone. So long
+as the air is damp these teeth remain closed; it is only in fine dry
+weather that they open and the spores are scattered on the ground.
+_Funaria hygrometrica_ has no lid under its cap, and after the cap falls
+the spores are only protected by the teeth.
+
+When the spores are gone, the life of the tiny urn-plant is over. It
+shrivels and dies, leaving ten, fifteen, or even more spores, which,
+after lying for some time on the ground, sprout and grow into a fresh
+mass of soft threads.
+
+So now we have completed the life-history of the moss and come back to
+the point at which we started. I am afraid it has been rather a
+difficult history to follow step by step, and yet it is perfectly clear
+when once we master the succession of growths. Starting from a spore,
+the thread-mass or protonema gives rise to the moss-stems forming the
+dense green carpet, then the green flowers on some of the leaf-stems
+give rise to a plant-egg, which roots itself in the stem, and grows into
+a perfect plant without leaves, bearing merely the urn in which fresh
+spores are formed, and so the round goes on from year to year.
+
+There are a great number of different varieties of moss, and they differ
+in the shape and arrangement of their stems and leaves, and very much in
+the formation of their urns, yet this sketch will enable you to study
+them with understanding, and when you find in the wood the nodding caps
+of the fruiting plants, some red, some green, some yellow, and some a
+brilliant orange, you will feel that they are acquaintances, and by the
+help of the microscope may soon become friends.
+
+Among them one of the most interesting is the sphagnum or bog-moss (Fig.
+36), which spreads its thick carpet over all the bogs in the woods. You
+cannot miss its little orange-coloured spore-cases if you look closely,
+for they contrast strongly with its pale green leaves, out of which they
+stand on very short stalks. I wish we could examine it, for it differs
+much from other mosses, both in leaves and fruit, but it would take us
+too long. At least, however, you must put one of its lovely transparent
+leaves under the microscope, that you may see the large air-cells which
+lie between the growing cells, and admire the lovely glistening bands
+which run across and across their covering membrane, for the sphagnum
+leaf is so extremely beautiful that you will never forget it when once
+seen. It is through these large cells in the edge of the stem and leaf
+that the water rises up from the swamp, so that the whole moss is like a
+wet sponge.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 36.
+
+Sphagnum moss from a Devonshire bog. (From life.)]
+
+And now, before we part, we had better sum up the history of lichens and
+mosses. With the lichens we have seen that the secret of success seems
+to be mutual help. The green cells provide the food, the fungus cells
+form a surface over which the green cells can spread to find sunlight
+and moisture, and protection from extremes of heat or cold. With the
+mosses the secret lies in their standing on the borderland between two
+classes of plant life. On the one hand, they are still tender-celled
+plants, each cell being able to live its own life and make its own food;
+on the other hand, they have risen into shapely plants with the
+beginnings of feeble roots, and having stems along which their leaves
+are arranged so that they are spread to the light and air. Both lichens
+and mosses keep one great advantage common to all tender-celled plants;
+they can be dried up so that you would think them dead, and yet, because
+they can work all over their surface whenever heat and moisture reach
+them, each cell drinks in food again and the plant revives. So when a
+scorching sun, or a dry season, or a biting frost kills other plants,
+the mosses and lichens bide their time till moisture comes again.
+
+In our own country they grow almost everywhere--on walls, on broken
+ground, on sand-heaps, on roofs and walls, on trees living and dead, and
+over all pastures which are allowed to grow poor and worn out. They
+grow, too, in all damp, marshy spots; especially the bog-mosses forming
+the peat-bogs which cover a large part of Ireland and many regions in
+Scotland; and these same bog-mosses occur in America, New Zealand, and
+Australia.
+
+In the tropics mosses are less abundant, probably because other plants
+flourish so luxuriantly; but in Arctic Siberia and Arctic America both
+lichens and mosses live on the vast Tundras. There, during the three
+short months of summer, when the surface of the ground is soft, the
+lichens spread far and wide where all else is lifeless, while in moister
+parts the Polytrichums or hair-mosses cover the ground, and in swampy
+regions stunted Sphagnums form peat-bogs only a few inches in depth over
+the frozen soil beneath. If, then, the lichens and mosses can flourish
+even in such dreary latitudes as these, we can understand how they defy
+even our coldest winters, appearing fresh and green when the snow melts
+away from over them, and leave their cells bathed in water, so that
+these lowly plants clothe the wood with their beauty when otherwise all
+would be bare and lifeless.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE HISTORY OF A LAVA STREAM
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It is now just twenty-two years ago, boys, since I saw a wonderful
+sight, which is still so fresh in my mind that I have to look round and
+remember that it was before any of you were born, in order to persuade
+myself that it can be nearly a quarter of a century since I stood with
+my feet close to a flowing stream of red-hot lava.
+
+It happened in this way. I was spending the winter with friends in
+Naples, and we were walking quietly one lovely afternoon in November
+along the Villa Reale, the public garden on the sea-shore, when one of
+our party exclaimed, "Look at Vesuvius!" We did so, and saw in the
+bright sunlight a dense dark cloud rising up out of the cone. The
+mountain had been sending out puffs of smoke, with a booming noise, for
+several days, but we thought nothing of that, for it had been common
+enough for slight eruptions to take place at intervals ever since the
+great eruption of 1867. This cloud, however, was far larger and
+wider-spread than usual, and as we were looking at it we saw a thin red
+line begin some way down the side of the mountain and creep onwards
+toward the valley which lies behind the Hermitage near where the
+Observatory is built (see Fig. 37). "A crater has broken out on the
+slope," said our host; "it will be a grand sight to-night. Shall we go
+up and see it?" No sooner proposed than settled, and one of the party
+started off at once to secure horses and men before others engaged them.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 37.
+
+Somma. Vesuvius.
+
+Vesuvius, as seen in eruption by the author, November 1868.]
+
+It was about eight o'clock in the evening when we started in a carriage
+for Resina, and alighting there, with buried Herculaneum under our feet,
+mounted our horses and set forward with the guides. Then followed a long
+ascent of about two hours and a half through the dark night. Silently
+and carefully we travelled on over the broad masses of slaggy lava of
+former years, along which a narrow horse-path had been worn; and ever
+and anon we heard the distant booming in the crater at the summit, and
+caught sight of fresh gleams of light as we took some turning which
+brought the glowing peak into view.
+
+Our object was to get as close as possible to the newly-opened crater in
+the mountain-side, and when we arrived on a small rugged plain not far
+from the spot, we alighted from our horses, which were growing
+frightened with the glare, and walked some distance on foot till we came
+to a ridge running down the slope, and upon this ridge the lava stream
+was flowing.
+
+Above our heads hung a vast cloud of vapour which reflected the bright
+light from the red-hot stream, and threw a pink glow all around, so
+that, where the cloud was broken and we could see the dark sky, the
+stars looked white as silver in contrast. We could now trace clearly the
+outline of the summit towering above us, and even watch the showers of
+ashes and dust which burst forth from time to time, falling back into
+the crater, or on to the steep slopes of the cone.
+
+If the night had not been calm, and such a breeze as there was blowing
+away from us, our position would scarcely have been safe; and indeed we
+were afterwards told we had been rash. But I would have faced even a
+greater risk to see so grand a spectacle, and when the guide helped me
+to scramble up on to the ledge, so that I stood with my feet within a
+few yards of the lava flow, my heart bounded with excitement. I could
+not stay more than a few seconds, for the gases and vapour choked me;
+but for that short time it felt like a dream to be standing close to a
+river of molten rock, which a few hours before had been lying deep in
+the bowels of the earth. Glancing upwards to where this river issued
+from the cone in the mountain-side, I saw it first white-hot, then
+gradually fading to a glowing red as it crept past my feet; and then
+looking down the slope I saw it turn black and gloomy as it cooled
+rapidly at the top, while through the cracks which opened here and there
+as it moved on, puffs of gas and vapour rose into the air, and the red
+lava beneath gleamed through the chinks.
+
+We did not stay long, for the air was suffocating, but took our way back
+to the Hermitage, where another glorious sight awaited us. Some way
+above and behind the hill on which the Observatory stands there is, or
+was, a steep cliff, and over this the lava stream, now densely black,
+fell in its way to the valley below, and as it fell it broke into huge
+masses, which heeling over exposed the red-hot lava under the crust,
+thus forming a magnificent fiery cascade in which black and red were
+mingled in wild confusion.
+
+This is how I saw a fresh red-hot lava stream. I had ascended the
+mountain some years before, when it was comparatively quiet, with only
+two small cones in its central crater sending out miniature flows of
+lava (see Fig. 38). But the crater was too hot for me to cross over to
+these cones, and I could only marvel at the mass of ashes of which the
+top of the mountain was composed, and plunge a stick into an old lava
+stream to see how hot it still remained below. Peaceful and quiet as the
+mountain seemed then, I could never have imagined such a glorious
+outburst as that of November 1868 unless I had seen it, and yet this was
+quite a small eruption compared to those of 1867 and 1872, which in
+their turn were nothing to some of the older eruptions in earlier
+centuries.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 38.
+
+The top of Vesuvius in 1864. (After Nasmyth.)]
+
+Now it is the history of this lava stream which I saw, that we are going
+to consider to-day, and you will first want to know where it came from,
+and what caused it to break out on the mountain-side. The truth is, that
+though we know now a good deal about volcanoes themselves, we know very
+little about the mighty cauldrons deep down in the earth from which
+they come. Our deepest mines only reach to a depth of a little more than
+half a mile, and no borings even have been made beyond three-quarters of
+a mile, so that after this depth we are left very much to guesswork.
+
+We do know that the temperature increases as we go farther down from the
+surface, but the increase is very different in different districts--in
+some places being five times greater than it is in others at an equal
+depth, and it is always greatest in localities where volcanoes have been
+active not long before. Now if there were an ocean of melted rock at a
+certain distance down below the crust all over the globe, there could
+scarcely be such a great difference between one place and another, and
+for this and many other reasons geologists are inclined to think that,
+from some unknown cause, great heat is developed at special points below
+the surface at different times. This would account for our finding
+volcanic rocks in almost all parts of the world, even very far away from
+where there are any active volcanoes now.
+
+But, as I have said, we do not clearly know why great reservoirs of
+melted rock occur from time to time deep under our feet. We may perhaps
+one day find the clue from the fact that nearly all, if not all,
+volcanoes occur near to the water's edge, either on the coast of the
+great oceans or of some enormous inland sea or lake. But at present all
+we can say is, that in certain parts of the globe there must be from
+time to time great masses of rock heated till they are white-hot, and
+having white-hot water mingled with them. These great masses need not,
+however, be liquid, for we know that under enormous pressure white-hot
+metals remain solid, and water instead of flashing into steam is kept
+liquid, pressing with tremendous force upon whatever keeps it confined.
+
+But now suppose that for some reason the mass of solid rock and ground
+above one of these heated spots should crack and become weak, or that
+the pressure from below should become so great as to be more powerful
+than the weight above, then the white-hot rock and water quivering and
+panting to expand, would upheave and burst the walls of their prison.
+Cannot you picture to yourselves how when this happened the rock would
+swell into a liquid state, and how the water would force its way upwards
+into cracks and fissures expanding into steam as it went. Then would be
+heard strange rumbling noises underground, as all these heavily
+oppressed white-hot substances upheaved and rent the crust above them.
+And after a time the country round, or the ground at the bottom of the
+sea, would quake and tremble, till by and by a way out would be found,
+and the water flashing into vapour would break and fling up the masses
+of rock immediately above the passage it had made for itself, and
+following after these would come the molten rock pouring out at the new
+opening.
+
+Such outbursts as these have been seen at sea many times near volcanic
+islands. In 1811 a new island called Sabrina was thrown up off St.
+Michael's in the Azores, and after remaining a short time was washed
+away by the waves. In the same way Graham's Island appeared off the
+coast of Sicily in 1831, and as late as 1885 Mr. Shipley saw a
+magnificent eruption in the Pacific near the Tonga Islands when an
+island about three miles long was formed.
+
+Another very extraordinary outburst, this time on land, took place in
+1538 on the opposite side of the Bay of Naples to where Vesuvius stands.
+There, on the shores of the Bay of Baiae, a mountain 440 feet high was
+built up in one week, where all had before been quiet in the memory of
+man. For two years before the outburst came, rumblings and earthquakes
+had alarmed the people, and at last one day the sea drew back from the
+shore and the ground sank about fourteen feet, and then on the night of
+Sunday, September 29, 1538, it was hurled up again, and steam, fiery
+gases, stones, and mud burst forth, driving away the frightened people
+from the village of Puzzuoli about two miles distant. For a whole week
+jets of lava, fragments of rock, and showers of ashes were poured out,
+till they formed the hill now called Monte Nuovo, 440 feet high and
+measuring a mile and a half round the base. And there it has remained
+till the present day, perfectly quiet after the one great outburst had
+calmed down, and is now covered with thickets of stone-pine trees.
+
+These sudden outbursts show that some great change must occur in the
+state of the earth's crust under the spots where they take place, and we
+know that eruptions may cease for centuries in any particular place and
+then begin afresh quite unexpectedly. Vesuvius was a peaceable mountain
+overgrown with trees and vines in the time of the Greeks till in the
+year A.D. 79 occurred the terrific outburst which destroyed Herculaneum
+and Pompeii, shattering old Vesuvius to pieces, so that only the cliffs
+on the northwest remain and are called Somma (see Fig. 37), while the
+new Vesuvius has grown up in the lap, as it were, of its old self. Yet
+when we visit the cliffs of Somma, and examine the old lava streams in
+them, we see that the ancient peaceful mountain was itself built up by
+volcanic outbursts of molten rock, and showers of clinkers or scoriae,
+long before man lived to record it.
+
+Meanwhile, when once an opening is made, we can understand how after an
+eruption is over, and the steam and lava are exhausted, all quiets down
+for awhile, and the melted rock in the crater of the mountain cools and
+hardens, shutting in once more the seething mass below. This was the
+state of the crater when I saw it in 1864, though small streams still
+flowed out of two minute cones; but since then at least one great
+outburst had taken place in 1867, and now on this November night, 1868,
+the imprisoned gases rebelled once more and forced their way through the
+mountain-side.
+
+At this point we can leave off forming conjectures and really study what
+happens; for we do know a great deal about the structure of volcanoes
+themselves, and the history of a lava-flow has been made very clear
+during the last few years, chiefly by the help of the microscope and
+chemical experiments. If we imagine then that on the day of the eruption
+we could have seen the inside of the mountain, the diagram (Fig. 39)
+will fairly represent what was taking place there.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 39.
+
+Diagrammatic section of an active volcano.
+
+_a_, Central pipe or funnel. _b_, _b_, Walls of the crater or cup.
+_c_, _c_, Dark turbid cloud formed by the ascending globular clouds
+_d_, _d_. _e_, Rain-shower from escaped vapour. _f_, _f_, Shower of
+blocks, cooled bombs, stones, and ashes falling back on to the cone.
+_g_, Lava escaping through a fissure, and pouring out of a cone opened
+in the mountain side.]
+
+In the funnel _a_ which passes down from the crater or cup _b_, _b_,
+white-hot lava was surging up, having a large quantity of water and
+steam entangled in it. The lava, or melted rock, would be in much the
+same state as melted iron-slag is, in the huge blast-furnaces in which
+iron-rock is fused, only it would have floating in it great blocks of
+solid rock, and rounded stones called bombs which have been formed from
+pieces of half-melted rock whirled in air and falling back into the
+crater, together with clinkers or scoriae, dust and sand, all torn off
+and ground down from the walls of the funnel up which the rush was
+coming. And in the pipe of melted rock, forcing the lava upwards,
+enormous bubbles of steam and gas _d_, _d_ would be rising up one after
+another as bubbles rise in any thick boiling substances, such as boiling
+sugar or tar.
+
+In the morning before the eruption, when only a little smoke was issuing
+from the crater, these bubbles rose very slowly through the loaded
+funnel and the half-cooled lava in the basin, and the booming noise,
+like that of heavy cannon, heard from time to time, was caused by the
+bursting of one of these globes of steam at the top of the funnel, as it
+brought up with it a feeble shower of stones, dust, and scoriae.
+Meanwhile the lava surging below was forcing a passage _g_ for itself in
+a weak part of the mountain-side and, just at the time when our
+attention was called to Vesuvius, the violent pressure from below rent
+open a mouth or crater at _h_, so that the lava began to flow down the
+mountain in a steady stream. This, relieving the funnel, enabled the
+huge steam bubbles _d_, _d_ to rise more quickly, and to form the large
+whitish-grey cloud _c_, into which from time to time the red-hot blocks,
+scoriae, and pumice were thrown up by the escaping steam and gases. These
+blocks and fragments then fell back again in a fiery shower _f_, _f_
+either into the cup, to be thrown up again by the bursting of the next
+bubble, or on to the sides of the cone, making it both broader and
+higher.
+
+Only one feature in the diagram was fortunately absent the evening we
+went up, namely, the rain-shower _e_. The night, as I said, was calm,
+and the air dry, and the steam floated peacefully away. The next night,
+however, when many people hurried down from Rome to see the sight they
+were woefully disappointed, for rain-showers fell heavily from the
+cloud, bringing down with them the dust and ashes, which covered the
+unfortunate sight-seers.
+
+This was what happened during the eruption, and the result after a few
+days was that the cone was a little higher, with a fresh layer of rough
+slaggy scoriae on its slopes, and that on the side of the mountain behind
+the Hermitage a new lava stream was added to the many which have flowed
+there of late years. What then can we learn from this stream about the
+materials which come up out of the depths of the earth, and of the
+manner in which volcanic rocks are formed?
+
+The lava as I saw it when coming first out of the newly-opened crater
+is, as I have said, like white-hot iron slag, but very soon the top
+becomes black and solid, a hard cindery mass full of holes and cavities
+with rough edges, caused by the steam and sulphur and other gases
+breaking through it.[1] In fact, there are so many holes and bubbles in
+it that it is very light and floats on the top of the heavier lava
+below, falling over it on to the mountain-side when it comes to the end
+of the stream. Still, however, the great mass moves on, so that the
+stream slides over these fallen clinkers or scoriae. Thus after an
+eruption a new flow consists of three layers; at the top the cooled and
+broken crust of clinkers, then the more solid lava, which often remains
+hot for years, and lastly another cindery layer beneath, formed of the
+scoriae which have fallen from above (see Fig. 40).
+
+  [1] For the cindery nature of the surface of such a stream see the
+  initial letter of this chapter.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 40.
+
+Section of a lava-flow. (J. Geikie.)
+
+1, Slaggy crust, formed chiefly of scoriae of a glassy nature. 2, Middle
+portion where crystals form. 3, Slaggy crust which has slipped down and
+been covered by the flow.]
+
+You would be surprised to see how quickly the top hardens, so that you
+can actually walk across a stream of lava a day or two after it comes
+out from the mountain. But you must not stand still or your shoes would
+soon be burnt, and if you break the crust with a stick you will at once
+see the red-hot lava below; while after a few days the cavities become
+filled with crystals of common salt, sulphur or soda, as the vapour and
+gases escape.
+
+Then as time goes on the harder minerals gradually crystallise out of
+the melted mass, and iron-pyrites, copper-sulphate, and numerous other
+forms of crystal appear in the lower part of the stream. In the clinkers
+above, where the cooling goes on very rapidly, the lavas formed are
+semi-transparent and look much like common bottle-glass. In fact, if you
+take this piece of obsidian or volcanic glass in your hand, you might
+think that it had come out of an ordinary glass manufactory and had
+nothing remarkable in it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 41.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass showing the lines of crystallites and
+microliths which are the beginnings of crystals.[1] (J. Geikie.)]
+
+  [1] This arrangement in lines is called _fluidal structure_ in lava.
+
+But the microscope tells another tale. I have put a thin slice under the
+first microscope, and this diagram (Fig. 41) shows what you will see.
+Nothing, you say, but a few black specks and some tiny dark rods. True,
+but these specks and rods are the first beginnings of crystals forming
+out of the ground-mass of glassy lava as it cools down. They are not
+real crystals, but the first step toward them, and by a careful
+examination of glassy lavas which have cooled at different rates, they
+have been seen under the microscope in all stages of growth, gradually
+building up different crystalline forms. When we remember how rapidly
+the top of many glassy lavas cool down we can understand that they have
+often only time to grow very small.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 42.
+
+A slice of volcanic glass under the microscope, showing well-developed
+microliths. (After Cohen.)]
+
+The smaller specks are called _crystallites_, the rods are called
+_microliths_.[1] Under the next microscope you can see the microliths
+much more distinctly (Fig. 42) and observe that they grow in very
+regular shapes.
+
+  [1] _Micros_, little; _lithos_, stone.
+
+Our first slice, however (Fig. 41), tells us something more of their
+history, for the fact that they are arranged in lines shows that they
+have grown while the lava was flowing and carrying them along in
+streams. You will notice that each one has its greatest length in the
+direction of the lines, just as pieces of stick are carried along
+lengthways in a river. In the second specimen (Fig. 42) the microliths
+are much larger and the stream has evidently not been flowing fast, for
+they lie in all directions.
+
+This is what we find in the upper part of the stream, but if we look at
+a piece of underlying lava we find that it is much more coarse-grained,
+and the magnifying-glass shows many crystals in it, as well as a number
+of microliths. For this lava, covered by the crust above, has remained
+very hot for a long time, and the crystals have had time to build
+themselves up out of the microliths and crystallites.
+
+Still there is much glassy groundwork even in these lavas. If we want to
+find really stony masses such as porphyry and granite made up entirely
+of crystals we must look inside the mountain where the molten rock is
+kept intensely hot for long periods, as for example in the fissure _g_,
+Fig. 39.
+
+Such fissures sometimes open out on the surface like the one I saw, and
+sometimes only penetrate part of the way through the hill; but in either
+case when the lava in them cools down, it forms solid walls called dykes
+which help to bind the loose materials of the mountain together. We
+cannot, of course, examine these in an active volcano, but there are
+many extinct volcanoes which have been worn and washed by the weather
+for centuries, so that we can see the inside. The dykes laid bare in the
+cliffs of Somma are old fissures filled with molten rock which has
+cooled down, and they show us many stony lavas; and Mr. Judd tells us of
+one beautiful example of a ruined volcano which composes the whole
+island of Mull in the Hebrides, where such dykes can be traced right
+back to a centre. This centre must once have been a mass of melted
+matter far down in the earth, and as you trace the dykes back deeper and
+deeper into it, the rocks grow more and more stony, till at last they
+are composed entirely of large crystals closely crowded together
+without any glassy matter between them. You know this crystalline
+structure well, for we have plenty of blocks of granite scattered about
+on Dartmoor, showing that at some time long ago molten matter must have
+been at work in the depths under Devonshire.
+
+We see then that we can trace the melted rock of volcanoes right
+back--from the surface of the lava stream which cools quickly at the
+top, hurrying the crystallites and microliths along with it--down
+through the volcano to the depths of the earth, where the perfect
+crystals form slowly and deliberately in the underground lakes of
+white-hot rock which are kept in a melted state at an intense heat.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 43.
+
+A piece of Dartmoor Granite, drawn from a specimen.]
+
+But I promised you that we would have no guesswork here, and you will
+perhaps ask how I can be certain what was going on in the depths when
+these crystals were formed. A few years ago I could not have answered
+you, but now chemists, and especially two eminent French chemists, MM.
+Fouque and Levy, have actually _made_ lavas and shown us how it is done
+in Nature.
+
+By using powerful furnaces and bellows they have succeeded in getting
+temperatures of all degrees, from a dazzling white heat down to a dull
+red, and to keep any temperature they like for a long time, so as to
+imitate the state of a mass of melted rock at different depths in the
+earth, and in this way they have actually _made_ lavas in their
+crucibles. For example, there is a certain whitish rock common in
+Vesuvius called _leucotephrite_,[1] which is made up chiefly of crystals
+of the minerals called leucite, Labrador felspar, and augite. This they
+proposed to make artificially, so they took proper quantities of silica,
+alumina, oxide of iron, lime, potash, and soda, and putting them in a
+crucible, melted them by keeping them at a white heat. Then they lowered
+the temperature to an orange-heat, that is a heat sufficient to melt
+steel. They kept this heat for forty-eight hours, after which they took
+out some of the mixture and, letting it cool, examined a slice under the
+microscope. Within it they found crystals of _leucite_ already formed,
+showing that these are the first to grow while the melted rock is still
+intensely hot. The rest of the mixture they kept red-hot, or at the
+melting-point of copper, for another forty-eight hours, and when they
+took it out and examined it they found that the whole of it had been
+transformed into microliths of the two other forms of crystals, Labrador
+felspar and augite, except some small eight-sided crystals of magnetite
+and picotite which are also found in the natural rock.
+
+  [1] _Leucos_, white; _tephra_, ashes.
+
+There is no need for you to remember all these names. What I do want you
+to remember is, that, at the different temperatures, the right crystals
+and beginnings of crystals grew up to form the rock which is found in
+Vesuvius. And what is still more interesting, they grew exactly to the
+same stages as in the natural rock, which is composed of _crystals_ of
+leucite and _microliths_ of the two other minerals.
+
+This is only one among numerous experiments by which we have learnt how
+volcanic rocks are formed and at what heat the crystals of different
+substances grow. We are only as yet at the beginning of this new study,
+and there is plenty for you boys to do by and by when you grow up. Many
+experiments have failed as yet to imitate certain rocks, and it is
+remarkable that these are usually rocks of very ancient eruptions, when
+_perhaps_ our globe may have been in a different state to what it is
+now; but this remains for us to find out.
+
+Meanwhile I have still another very interesting slide to show you which
+tells us something of what is going on below the volcano. Under the
+third microscope I have put a slice of volcanic glass (Fig. 44) in which
+you will see really large crystals with dark bands curving round them.
+These crystals have clearly not been formed in the glass while the lava
+was flowing, first because they are too large to have grown up so
+rapidly, and secondly because they are broken at the edges in places and
+sometimes partly melted. They have evidently come up with the lava as it
+flowed out of the mountain, and the dark bands curving round them are
+composed of microliths which have been formed in the flow and have swept
+round them, as floating straws gather round a block of wood in a stream.
+
+Such crystals as these are often found in lava streams, and in fact they
+make a great difference in the rate at which a stream flows, for a
+thoroughly melted lava shoots along at a great pace and often travels
+several miles in a very short time; but an imperfectly melted lava full
+of crystals creeps slowly along, and often does not travel far from the
+crater out of which it flows.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 44.
+
+Slice of volcanic glass under the microscope, showing large included
+crystals brought up from inside the volcano in the fluid lava. The dark
+bands are lines of microliths formed as the lava cooled. (J. Geikie.)]
+
+So you see we have proof in this slice of volcanic glass of two separate
+periods of crystallisation--the period when the large crystals grew in
+the liquid mass under the mountain, and the period when the microliths
+were formed after it was poured out above ground. And as we know that
+different substances form their crystals at very different temperatures,
+it is not surprising that some should be able to take up the material
+they require and grow in the underground lakes of melted matter, even
+though the rest of the lava was sufficiently fluid to be forced up out
+of the mountain.
+
+And here we must leave our lava stream. The microscope can tell us yet
+more, of marvellous tiny cavities inside the crystals, millions in a
+single inch, and of other crystals inside these, all of which have their
+history; but this would lead us too far. We must be content for the
+present with having roughly traced a flow of lava from the depths below,
+where large crystals form in subterranean darkness, to the open air
+above, where we catch the tiny beginnings of crystals hardened into
+glassy lava before they have time to grow further.
+
+If you will think a little for yourselves about these wonderful
+discoveries made with the magic-glass, you will see how many questions
+they suggest to us about the minerals which we find buried in the earth
+and running through it in veins, and you will want to know something
+about the more precious crystals, such as rubies, diamonds, sapphires,
+and garnets, and many others which Nature forms far away out of our
+sight. All these depend, though indirectly, upon the strange effects of
+underground heat, and if you have once formed a picture in your minds of
+what must have been going on before that magnificent lava stream crept
+down the mountain-side and added its small contribution to the surface
+of the earth, you will study eagerly all that comes in your way about
+crystals and minerals, and while you ask questions with the spectroscope
+about what is going on in the sun and stars millions of miles away, you
+will also ask the microscope what it has to tell of the work going on at
+depths many miles under your feet.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+AN HOUR WITH THE SUN
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Before beginning upon the subject of our lecture to-day I want to tell
+you the story of a great puzzle which presented itself to me when I was
+a very young child. I happened to come across a little book--I can see
+it now as though it were yesterday--a small square green book called
+_World without End_, which had upon the cover a little gilt picture of a
+stile with trees on each side of it. That was all. I do not know what
+the book was about, indeed I am almost sure I never opened it or saw it
+again, but that stile and the title "World without End" puzzled me
+terribly. What was on the other side of the stile? If I could cross over
+it and go on and on should I be in a world which had no ending, and what
+would be on the other side? But then there could be no other side if it
+was a world without any end. I was very young, you must remember, and I
+grew confused and bewildered as I imagined myself reaching onwards and
+onwards beyond that stile and never, never resting. At last I consulted
+my greatest friend, an old man who did the weeding in my father's
+garden, and whom I believed to be very wise. He looked at first almost
+as bewildered as I was, but at last light dawned upon him. "I tell you
+what it is, Master Arthur," said he, "I do not rightly know what happens
+when there is no end, but I do know that there is a mighty lot to be
+found out in this world, and I'm thinking we had better learn first all
+about that, and perhaps it may teach us something which will help us to
+understand the other."
+
+I daresay you will wonder what this anecdote can have to do with a
+lecture on the sun--I will tell you. Last night I stood on the balcony
+and looked out far and farther away into the star-depths of the midnight
+sky, marvelling what could be the history of those countless suns of
+which we see ever more and more as we increase the power of our
+telescopes, or catch the faint beams of those we cannot see and make
+them print their image on the photographic plate. And, as I grew
+oppressed at the thought of this never-ending expanse of suns and at my
+own littleness, I remembered all at once the little square book of my
+childish days with its gilt stile, and my old friend's advice to learn
+first all we can of that which lies nearest.
+
+So to-day, before we travel away to the stars, we had better inquire
+what is known about the one star in the heavens which is comparatively
+near to us, our own glorious sun, which sends us all our light and heat,
+causes all the movements of our atmosphere, draws up the moisture from
+the ground to return in refreshing rain, ripens our harvests, awakens
+the seeds and sleeping plants into vigorous growth, and in a word
+sustains all the energy and life upon our earth. Yet even this star,
+which is more than a million times as large as our earth, and bound so
+closely to us that a convulsion on its surface sends a thrill right
+through our atmosphere, is still so far off that it is only by
+questioning the sunbeams it sends to us, that we can know anything about
+it.
+
+You have already learnt[1] a good deal as to the size, the intense heat
+and light, and the photographic power of the sun, and also how his white
+beams of light are composed of countless coloured rays which we can
+separate in a prism. Now let us pass on to the more difficult problem of
+the nature of the sun itself, and what we know of the changes and
+commotions going on in that blazing globe of light.
+
+  [1] _Fairyland of Science_, Chapter II.
+
+We will try first what we can see for ourselves. If you take a card and
+make a pin-hole in it, you can look through this hole straight at the
+sun without injuring your eye, and you will see a round shining disc on
+which, perhaps, you may detect a few dark spots. Then if you take your
+hand telescopes, which I have shaded by putting a piece of smoked glass
+inside the eye-piece, you will find that this shining disc is really a
+round globe, and moreover, although the object-glass of your telescopes
+measures only two-and-a-half inches across, you will be able to see the
+dark spots very distinctly and to observe that they are shaded, having a
+deep spot in the centre with a paler shadow round it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 45.
+
+Face of the sun projected on a sheet of cardboard C. T, Telescope. _f_,
+Finder. _og_, Object-glass. _ep_, Eye-piece. S, Screen shutting off the
+diffused light from the window.]
+
+As, however, you cannot all use the telescopes, and those who can will
+find it difficult to point them truly on to the sun, we will adopt still
+another plan. I will turn the object-glass of my portable telescope full
+upon the sun's face, and bringing a large piece of cardboard on an easel
+near to the other end, draw it slowly backward till the eye-piece forms
+a clear sharp image upon it (see Fig. 45). This you can all see
+clearly, especially as I have passed the eye-piece of the telescope
+through a large screen _s_, which shuts off the light from the window.
+
+You have now an exact image of the face of the sun and the few dark
+spots which are upon it, and we have brought, as it were, into our room
+that great globe of light and heat which sustains all the life and
+vigour upon our earth.
+
+This small image can, however, tell us very little. Let us next see what
+photography can show us. The diagram (Fig. 46) shows a photograph of the
+sun taken by Mr. Selwyn in October 1860. Let me describe how this is
+done. You will remember that there is a point in the telescope tube
+where the rays of light form a real image of the object at which the
+telescope is pointed (see p. 44). Now an astronomer who wishes to take a
+photograph of the sun takes away the eye-piece of his telescope and puts
+a photographic plate in the tube exactly at the place where this real
+image is formed. He takes care to blacken the frame of the plate and
+shuts up this end of the telescope and the plate in a completely dark
+box, so that no diffused light from outside can reach it. Then he turns
+his telescope upon the sun that it may print its image.
+
+But the sun's light is so strong that even in a second of time it would
+print a great deal too much, and all would be black and confused. To
+prevent this he has a strip of metal which slides across the tube of the
+telescope in front of the plate, and in the upper part of this strip a
+very fine slit is cut. Before he begins, he draws the metal up so that
+the slit is outside the tube and the solid portion within, and he
+fastens it in this position by a thread drawn through and tied to a bar
+outside. Then he turns his telescope on the sun, and as soon as he
+wishes to take the photograph he cuts the thread. The metal slides
+across the tube with a flash, the slit passing across it and out again
+below in the hundredth part of a second, and in that time the sun has
+printed through the slit the picture before you.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 46.
+
+Photograph of the face of the sun, taken by Mr. Selwyn, October 1860,
+showing spots, faculae, and mottled surface.]
+
+In it you will observe at least two things not visible on our
+card-image. The spots, though in a different position from where we see
+them to-day, look much the same, but round them we see also some bright
+streaks called _faculae_, or torches, which often appear in any region
+where a spot is forming, while the whole face of the sun appears mottled
+with bright and darker spaces intermixed. Those of you who have the
+telescopes can see this mottling quite distinctly through them if you
+look at the sun. The bright points have been called by many names, and
+are now generally known as "light granules," as good a name, perhaps, as
+any other.
+
+This is all our photograph can tell us, but the round disc there shown,
+which is called the _photosphere_, or light-giving sphere, is by no
+means the whole of the sun, though it is all we see daily with the naked
+eye. Whenever a total eclipse of the sun takes place--by the dark body
+of the moon coming between us and it, so as to shut out the whole of
+this disc--a brilliant white halo, called the crown or _corona_, is seen
+to extend for many thousands of miles all round the darkened globe. It
+varies very much in shape, sometimes forming a kind of irregular square,
+sometimes a circle with off-shoots, as in Fig. 47, which shows what
+Major Tennant saw in India during the total eclipse of August 18, 1868,
+and at other times it shoots out in long pearly white jets and sheets of
+light with dark spaces between. On the whole it varies periodically. At
+the time of few sun-spots its extensions are equatorial; but when the
+sun's face is much covered with spots, they are diagonal, stretching
+away from the spot-zones, but not nearly so far.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 47.
+
+Total eclipse of the sun, as drawn by Major Tennant at Guntoor in India,
+August 18, 1868, showing corona and the protuberances seen at the
+beginning of totality.]
+
+And besides this corona there are seen very curious flaming projections
+on the edge of the sun, which begin to appear as soon as the moon covers
+the bright disc. In our diagram (Fig. 47) you see them on the left side
+where the moon is just creeping over the limits of the photosphere and
+shutting out the strong light of the sun as the eclipse becomes total. A
+very little later they are better seen on the other side just before the
+bright edge of the sun is uncovered as the moon passes on its way. These
+projections in the real sun are of a bright red colour, and they take on
+all manners of strange shapes, sometimes looking like ranges of fiery
+hills, sometimes like gigantic spikes and scimitars, sometimes even like
+branching fiery trees. They were called _prominences_ before their
+nature was well understood, and will probably always keep that name. It
+would be far better, however, if some other name such as "glowing
+clouds" or "red jets" could be used, for there is now no doubt that they
+are jets of gases, chiefly hydrogen, constantly playing over the face of
+the sun, though only seen when his brighter light is quenched. They have
+been found to shoot up 20,000, 80,000, and even as much as 350,000 miles
+beyond the edge of the shining disc; and this last means that the flames
+were so gigantic that if they had started from our earth they would have
+reached beyond the moon. We shall see presently that astronomers are now
+able by the help of the spectroscope to see the prominences even when
+there is no eclipse, and we know them to be permanent parts of the
+bright globe.
+
+This gives us at last the whole of the sun, so far as we know. There is,
+indeed, a strange faint zodiacal light, a kind of pearly glow seen after
+sunset or before sunrise extending far beyond the region of the corona;
+but we understand so little about this that we cannot be sure that it
+actually belongs to the sun.
+
+And now how shall I best give you an idea of what little we do know
+about this great surging monster of light and heat which shines down
+upon us? You must give me all your attention, for I want to make the
+facts quite clear, that you may take a firm hold upon them.
+
+Our first step is to question the sunlight which comes to us; and this
+we do with the spectroscope. Let me remind you how we read the story of
+light through this instrument. Taking in a narrow beam of light through
+a fine slit, we pass the beam through a lens to make the rays parallel,
+and then throw it upon a prism or row of prisms, so that each set of
+waves of coloured light coming through the slit is bent on its own road
+and makes an upright image of the slit on any screen or telescope put to
+receive it (see Fig. 21, p. 52). Now when the light we examine comes
+from a glowing solid, like white-hot iron, or a glowing liquid, or a gas
+under such enormous pressure that it behaves like a liquid, then the
+images of the slit always overlap each other, so that we see a
+continuous unbroken band of colour. However much you spread out the
+light you can never break up or separate the spectrum in any part.[1]
+But when you send the light, of a glowing gas such as hydrogen through
+the spectroscope, or of a substance melted into gas or vapour, such as
+sodium or iron vaporised by great heat, then it is a different story.
+Such gases give only a certain number of bright lines quite separate
+from each other on the dark background, and each kind of gas gives its
+own peculiar lines; so that even when several are glowing together there
+is no confusion, but when you look at them through the spectroscope you
+can detect the presence of each gas by its own lines in the spectrum.
+
+  [1] Two rare earths, Erbia and Didymium, form an exception to this,
+  but they do not concern us here.
+
+[Illustration: TABLE OF SPECTRA. Plate I.]
+
+To make quite sure of this we will close the shutters and put a pinch of
+salt in a spirit-flame. Salt is chloride of sodium, and in the flame the
+sodium glows with a bright yellow light. Look at this light through your
+small direct-vision spectroscopes[1] and you see at once the bright
+yellow double-line of sodium (No. 3, Plate I.) start into view across
+the faint continuous spectrum given by the spirit-flame. Next I will
+show you glowing hydrogen. I have here a glass tube containing hydrogen,
+so arranged that by connecting two wires fastened to it with the
+induction coil of our electric battery it will soon glow with a bright
+red colour. Look at this through your spectroscopes and you will see
+three bright lines, one red, one greenish blue, and one indigo blue,
+standing out on the dark background (No. 4, Plate I.)
+
+  [1] A direct-vision spectroscope is like a small telescope with
+  prisms arranged inside the tube. The object-glass end is covered by
+  two pieces of metal, which slide backwards and forwards by means of
+  a screw, so that a narrow or broad slit can be opened.
+
+Think for a moment what a grand power this gives you of reading as in a
+book the different gases which are glowing in the sky even billions of
+miles away. You would never mistake the lines of hydrogen for the line
+of sodium, but when looking at a nebula or any mass of glowing gas you
+could say at once "sodium is glowing there," or "that cloud must be
+composed of hydrogen."
+
+Now, opening the shutters, look at the sunlight through your
+spectroscopes. Here you have something different from either the
+continuous spectrum of solids, or the bright separate lines of gases,
+for while you have a bright-coloured band you have also some dark lines
+crossing it (No. 2, Plate I.) It is those dark lines which enable us to
+guess what is going on in the sun before the light comes to us. In 1859
+Professor Kirchhoff made an experiment which explained those dark lines,
+and we will repeat it now. Take a good look at the sunlight spectrum, to
+fix the lines in your memory, and then close the shutters again.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 48.
+
+Kirchhoff's experiment, explaining the dark lines in sunlight.
+
+A, Limelight dispersed through a prism. _s_, Slit through which the beam
+of light comes. _l_, Lens bringing it to a focus on the prism _p_. _sp_,
+Continuous spectrum thrown on the wall. B, The same light, with the
+flame _f_ containing glowing sodium placed in front of it. D, Dark
+sodium line appearing in the spectrum.]
+
+I have here our magic-lantern with its lime-light, in which the solid
+lime glows with a white heat, in consequence of the jets of oxygen and
+hydrogen burning round it. This was the light Kirchhoff used, and you
+know it will give a continuous bright band in the spectroscope. I put a
+cap with a narrow slit in it over the lantern tube, so as to get a
+narrow beam of light; in front of this I put a lens _l_, and in front of
+this again the prism _p_. The slit and the prism act exactly like your
+spectroscopes, and you can all see the continuous spectrum on the screen
+(_sp_, A, Fig. 48). Next I put a lighted lamp of very weak spirit in
+front of the slit, and find that it makes no difference, for whatever
+light it gives only strengthens the spectrum. But now notice carefully.
+I am going to put a little salt into the flame, and you would expect
+that the sodium in it, when turned to glowing vapour, causing it to look
+yellow, would strengthen the yellow part of the spectrum and give a
+bright line. This is what Kirchhoff expected, but to his intense
+surprise he saw as you do now a _dark line_ D start out where the bright
+line should have been.
+
+What can have happened? It is this. The oxyhydrogen light is very hot
+indeed, the spirit flame with the sodium is comparatively weak and cool.
+So when those special coloured waves of the oxyhydrogen light which
+agree with those of the sodium light reached the flame, they spent all
+their energy in heating up those waves to their own temperature, and
+while all the other coloured rays travelled on and reached the screen,
+these waves were stopped or _absorbed_ on the way, and consequently
+there was a blank, black space in the spectrum where they should have
+been. If I could put a hydrogen flame cooler than the original light in
+the road, then there would be three dark lines where the bright hydrogen
+lines should be, and so with every other gas. _The cool vapour in front
+of the hot light cuts off from the white ray exactly those waves which
+it gives out itself when burning._
+
+Thus each black line of the sun-spectrum (No. 2, Plate I.), tells us
+that some particular ray of sunlight has been absorbed by a cooler
+vapour _of its own kind_ somewhere between the sun and us, and it must
+be in the sun itself, for when we examine other stars we often find dark
+lines in their spectrum different from those in the sun, and this shows
+that the missing rays must have been stopped close at home, for if they
+were stopped in our atmosphere they would all be alike.
+
+There are, by the bye, some lines which we know are caused by our
+atmosphere, especially when it is full of invisible water vapour, and
+these we easily detect, because they show more distinctly when the sun
+is low and shines through a thicker layer of air than when he is high up
+and shines through less.
+
+But to return to the sun. In your small spectroscopes you see very few
+dark lines, but in larger and more perfect ones they can be counted by
+thousands, and can be compared with the bright lines of glowing gases
+burnt here on earth. In the spectrum of glowing iron vapour 460 lines
+are found to agree with dark lines in the sun-spectrum, and other gases
+have nearly as many. Still, though thousands of lines can now be
+explained, by matching them with the bright lines of known gases, the
+whole secret of sunlight is not yet solved, for the larger number of
+lines still remain a riddle to be read.
+
+We see then that the spectroscope teaches us that the round light-giving
+disc or photosphere of the sun consists of a bright and intensely hot
+light shining behind a layer of cooler though still very hot vapours,
+which form a kind of shell of luminous clouds around it, and in this
+shell, or _reversing layer_--as it is often called, because it turns
+light to darkness--we have proved that iron, lead, copper, zinc,
+aluminum, magnesium, potassium, sodium, carbon, hydrogen, and many other
+substances common to our earth, exist in a state of vapour for a depth
+of perhaps 1000 miles.
+
+You will easily understand that when the spectroscope had told so much,
+astronomers were eager to learn what it would reveal about the
+prominences or red jets seen during eclipses, and they got an answer in
+India during that same eclipse of August 1868 which is shown in our
+diagram (Fig. 47). Making use of the time during which the prominences
+were seen, they turned the telescope upon them with a spectroscope
+attached to it, and saw a number of bright lines start out, of which the
+chief were the three bright lines of hydrogen, showing that these
+curious appearances are really flames of glowing gas.
+
+In the same year Professor Jannsen and Mr. Lockyer succeeded in seeing
+the bright lines of the prominences in full sunlight. This was done in a
+very simple way, when once it was discovered to be possible, and though
+my apparatus (Fig. 49) is very primitive compared with some now made, it
+will serve to explain the method.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 49.
+
+The spectroscope attached to the telescope for the examination of the
+sun. (Lockyer.)
+
+P, Pillar of Telescope. T, Telescope. S, Finder or small telescope for
+pointing the telescope in position. _a_, _a_, _b_, Supports fastening
+the spectroscope to the telescope. _d_, Collimator or tube carrying the
+slit at the end nearest the telescope, and a lens at the other end to
+render the rays parallel. _c_, Plate on which the prisms are fixed. _e_,
+Small telescope through which the observer examines the spectrum after
+the ray has been dispersed in the prisms. _h_, Micrometer for measuring
+the relative distance of the lines.]
+
+When an astronomer wishes to examine the spectrum of any special part of
+the sun, he takes off the eye-piece of his telescope and screws the
+spectroscope upon the draw-tube. The spectroscope is made exactly like
+the large one for ordinary work. The tube _d_ (Fig. 49) carries the slit
+at the end nearest the telescope, and this slit must be so placed as to
+stand precisely at the principal focus of the lens where the sun's image
+is formed (see _i_, _i_, p. 44). This comes to exactly the same thing as
+if we could put the slit close against the face of the sun, so as to
+show only the small strip which it covers, and by moving it to one part
+or another of the image we can see any point that we wish and no other.
+The light then passes through the tube _d_ into the round of prisms
+standing on the tray _c_, and the observer looking through the small
+telescope _e_ sees the spectrum as it emerges from the last prism. In
+this way astronomers can examine the spectrum of a spot, or part of a
+spot, or of a bright streak, or any other mark on the sun's face.
+
+Now in looking at the prominences we have seen that the difficulty is
+caused by the sunlight, between us and them, overpowering the bright
+lines of the gas, nor could we overcome this if it were not for a
+difference which exists between the two kinds of light. The more you
+disperse or spread out the continuous sun-spectrum the fainter it
+becomes, but in spreading out the bright lines of the gas you only send
+them farther and farther apart; they themselves remain almost as bright
+as ever. So, when the telescope forms an image of the red flame in front
+of the slit, though the glowing gas and the sunlight both send rays into
+the spectroscope, you have only to use enough prisms and arrange them in
+such a way that the sunlight is dispersed into a very long faint
+spectrum, and then the bright lines of the flames will stand out bright
+and clear. Of course only a small part of the long spectrum can be seen
+at once, and the lines must be studied separately. On the other hand, if
+you want to compare the strong light of the sun with the bright lines of
+the prominences, you place the slit just at the edge of the sun's image
+in the telescope, so that half the slit is on the sun's face and half on
+the prominence. The prisms then disperse the sunlight between you and
+the prominences, while they only lessen the strong light of the sun
+itself, which still shows clearly. In this way the two spectra are seen
+side by side and the dark and bright lines can be compared accurately
+together (see Fig. 50).
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 50.
+
+Bright lines of prominences.
+
+Sun-spectrum with dark lines.]
+
+Wherever the telescope is turned all round the sun the lines of luminous
+gas are seen, showing that they form a complete layer outside the
+photosphere, or light-giving mass, of the sun. This layer of luminous
+gases is called the _chromosphere_, or coloured sphere. It lies between
+the photosphere and the corona, and is supposed to be at least 5000
+miles deep, while, as we have seen, the flames shoot up from it to
+fabulous heights.
+
+The quiet red flames are found to be composed of hydrogen and another
+new metal called helium; but lower down, near the sun's edge, other
+bright lines are seen, showing that sodium, magnesium, and other metals
+are there, and when violent eruptions occur these often surge up and
+mingle with the purer gas above. At other times the eruptions below
+fling the red flames aloft with marvellous force, as when Professor
+Young saw a long low-lying cloud of hydrogen, 100,000 miles long, blown
+into shreds and flung up to a height of 200,000 miles, when the
+fragments streamed away and vanished in two hours. Yet all these violent
+commotions and storms are unseen by us on earth unless we look through
+our magic glasses.
+
+You will wonder no doubt how the spectroscope can show the height and
+the shape of the flames. I will explain to you, and I hope to show them
+you one day. You must remember that the telescope makes a small real
+image of the flame at its focus, just as in one of our earlier
+experiments you saw the exact image of the candle-flame upside down on
+the paper (see p. 33). The reason why we only see a strip of the flame
+in the spectroscope is because the slit is so narrow. But when once the
+sunlight was dispersed so as no longer to interfere, Dr. Huggins found
+that it is possible to open the slit wide enough to take in the image of
+the whole flame, and then, by turning the spectroscope so as to bring
+one of the bright hydrogen lines into view, the actual shape of the
+prominence is seen, only it will look a different colour, either red,
+greenish-blue, or indigo-blue, according to the line chosen. As the
+image of the whole sun and its appendages in the telescope is so very
+small, you will understand that even a very narrow slit will really take
+in a very large prominence several thousand miles in length. Fig 51
+shows a drawing by Mr. Lockyer of a group of flames he observed very
+soon after Dr. Huggins suggested the open slit, and these shapes did not
+last long, for in another picture he drew ten minutes later their
+appearance had already changed.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 51.
+
+Red prominences, as drawn by Mr. Lockyer during the total eclipse of
+March 14, 1869.]
+
+These then are some of the facts revealed to us by our magic glasses. I
+scarcely expect you to remember all the details I have given you, but
+you will at least understand now how astronomers actually penetrate into
+the secrets of the sun by bringing its image into their observatory, as
+we brought it to-day on the card-board, and then making it tell its own
+tale through the prisms of the spectroscope; and you will retain some
+idea of the central light of the sun with its surrounding atmosphere of
+cooler gases and its layer of luminous lambent gases playing round it
+beyond.
+
+Of the corona I cannot tell you much, except that it is far more subtle
+than anything we have spoken of yet; that it is always strongest when
+the sun is most spotted; that it is partly made up of self-luminous
+gases whose bright lines we can see, especially an unknown green ray;
+while it also shines partly by reflected light from the sun, for we can
+trace in it faint dark lines; lastly it fades away into the mysterious
+zodiacal light, and so the sun ends in mystery at its outer fringe as it
+began at its centre.
+
+And now at last, having learnt something of the material of the sun, we
+can come back to the spots and ask what is known about them. As I have
+said, they are not always the same on the sun's face. On the contrary,
+they vary very much both in number and size. In some years the sun's
+face is quite free from them, at others there are so many that they form
+two wide belts on each side of the sun's equator, with a clear space of
+about six degrees between. No spots ever appear near the poles. Herr
+Schwabe, who watched the sun's face patiently for more than thirty
+years, has shown that it is most spotted about every eleven years, then
+the spots disappear very quickly and reappear slowly till the full-spot
+time comes round again.
+
+Some spots remain a very short time and then break up and disappear, but
+others last for days, weeks, and even months, and when we watch these,
+we find that a spot appears to travel slowly across the face of the sun
+from east to west and then round the western edge so that it disappears.
+It is when it reaches the edge that we can convince ourselves that the
+spot is really part of the sun, for there is no space to be seen between
+them, the edge and the spot are one, as the last trace of the dark
+blotch passes out of sight. In fact, it is not the spot which has
+crossed the sun's face, but the sun itself which has turned, like our
+earth, upon its axis, carrying the spot round with it. As some spots
+remain long enough to reappear, after about twelve or thirteen days, on
+the opposite edge, and even pass round two or three times, astronomers
+can reckon that the sun takes about twenty-five days and five hours in
+performing one revolution. You will wonder why I say only _about_
+twenty-five, but I do so because all spots do not come round in exactly
+the same time, those farthest from the equator lag rather more than a
+day behind those nearer to it, and this is explained by the layer of
+gases in which they are formed, drifting back in higher latitudes as the
+sun turns.
+
+It is by watching a spot as it travels across the sun, that we are able
+to observe that the centre partlies deeper in the sun's face than the
+outer rim. There are many ways of testing this, and you can try one
+yourselves with a telescope if you watch day after day. I will explain
+it by a simple experiment. I have here a round lump of stiff dough, in
+which I have made a small hollow and blackened the bottom with a drop of
+ink. As I turn this round, so that the hollow facing you moves from
+right to left, you will see that after it passes the middle of the face,
+the hole appears narrower and narrower till it disappears, and if you
+observe carefully you will note that the dark centre is the first thing
+you lose sight of, while the edges of the cup are still seen, till just
+before the spot disappears altogether. But now I will stick a wafer on,
+and a pea half into, the dough, marking the centre of each with ink.
+Then I turn the ball again. This time you lose sight of the foremost
+edge first, and the dark centre is seen almost to the last moment. This
+shows that if the spots were either flat marks, or hillocks, on the
+sun's face, the dark centre would remain to the last, but as a fact it
+disappears before the rim. Father Secchi has tried to measure the depth
+of a spot-cavity, and thinks they vary from 1000 to 3000 miles deep. But
+there are many difficulties in interpreting the effects of light and
+shadow at such an enormous distance, and some astronomers still doubt
+whether spots are really depressions.
+
+For many centuries now the spots have been watched forming and
+dispersing, and this is roughly speaking what is seen to happen. When
+the sun is fairly clear and there are few spots, these generally form
+quietly, several black dots appearing and disappearing with bright
+streaks or _faculae_ round their edge, till one grows bigger than the
+rest, and forms a large dark nucleus, round which, after a time, a
+half-shadow or _penumbra_ is seen and we have a sun-spot complete, with
+bright edges, dark shadow, and deep black centre (Fig. 52). This lasts
+for a certain time and then it becomes bridged over with light streaks,
+the dark spot breaks up and disappears, and last of all the half-shadow
+dies away.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 52.
+
+A quiet sun-spot. (Secchi.)]
+
+But things do not always take place so quietly. When the sun's face is
+very troubled and full of spots, the bright _faculae_, which appear with
+a spot, seem to heave and wave, and generally several dark centres form
+with whirling masses of light round them, while in some of them tongues
+of fire appear to leap up from below (Fig. 53). Such spots change
+quickly from day to day, even if they remain for a long time, until at
+last by degrees the dark centres become less distinct, the half-shadows
+disappear, leaving only the bright streaks, which gradually settle down
+into luminous points or _light granules_. These light granules are in
+fact supposed by astronomers to be the tips of glowing clouds heaving up
+everywhere, while the dark spaces between them are cooler currents
+passing downwards.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 53.
+
+A tumultuous sun-spot. (Langley.)]
+
+Below these clouds, no doubt, the great mass of the sun is in a violent
+state of heat and commotion, and when from time to time, whether
+suddenly or steadily, great upheavals and eruptions take place, bright
+flames dart up and luminous clouds gather and swell, so that long
+streaks or _faculae_ surge upon the face of the sun.
+
+Now these hot gases rising up thus on all sides would leave room below
+for cooler gases to pour down from above, and these, as we know, would
+cut off, or absorb, much of the light coming from the body of the sun,
+so that the centre, where the down current was the strongest, would
+appear black even though some light would pass through. This is the best
+explanation we have as yet of the formation of a sun-spot, and many
+facts shown in the spectroscope help to confirm it, as for example the
+thickening of the dark lines of the spectrum when the slit is placed
+over the centre of a spot, and the flashing out of bright lines when an
+uprush of streaks occurs either across the spots or round it.
+
+And now, before you go, I must tell you of one of these wonderful
+uprushes, which sent such a thrill through our own atmosphere, as to
+tell us very plainly the power which the sun has over our globe. The
+year 1859 was remarkable for sun-spots, and on September 1, when two
+astronomers many miles apart were examining them, they both saw, all at
+once, a sudden cloud of light far brighter than the general surface of
+the sun burst out in the midst of a group of spots. The outburst began
+at eight minutes past eleven in the forenoon, and in five minutes it was
+gone again, but in that time it had swept across a space of 35,000 miles
+on the sun! Now both before and after this violent outburst took place
+a magnetic storm raged all round the earth, brilliant auroras were seen
+in all parts of the world, sparks flashed from the telegraph wires, and
+the telegraphic signalmen at Washington and Philadelphia received severe
+electric shocks. Messages were interrupted, for the storm took
+possession of the wires and sent messages of its own, the magnetic
+needles darting to and fro as though seized with madness. At the
+very instant when the bright outburst was seen in the sun, the
+self-registering instruments at Kew marked how three needles jerked all
+at once wildly aside; and the following night the skies were lit up with
+wondrous lights as the storm of electric agitation played round the
+earth.
+
+We are so accustomed to the steady glow of sunshine pouring down upon us
+that we pay very little heed to daylight, though I hope none of us are
+quite so ignorant as the man who praised the moon above the sun, because
+it shone in the dark night, whereas the sun came in the daytime when
+there was light enough already! Yet probably many of us do not actually
+realise how close are the links which bind us to our brilliant star as
+he carries us along with him through space. It is only when an unusual
+outburst occurs, such as I have just described, that we feel how every
+thrill which passes through our atmosphere, through the life-current of
+every plant, and through the fibre and nerve of every animal has some
+relation to the huge source of light, heat, electricity, and magnetism
+at which we are now gazing across a space of more than 93,000,000 miles.
+Yet it is well to remember that the sudden storm and the violent
+eruption are the exceptional occurrences, and that their use to us as
+students is chiefly to lead us to understand the steady and constant
+thrill which, never ceasing, never faltering, fulfils the great purpose
+of the unseen Lawgiver in sustaining all movement and life in our little
+world.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+AN EVENING AMONG THE STARS
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"Do you love the stars?" asked the magician of his lads, as they crowded
+round him on the college green, one evening in March, to look through
+his portable telescope.
+
+"Have you ever sat at the window on a clear frosty night, or in the
+garden in summer, and looked up at those wondrous lights in the sky,
+pondering what they are, and what purpose they serve?"
+
+I will confess to you that when I lived in London I did not think much
+about the stars, for in the streets very few can be seen at a time even
+on a clear night; and during the long evenings in summer, when town
+people visit the country, you must stay up late to see a brilliant
+display of starlight. It is when driving or walking across country on a
+winter's evening week after week, and looking all round the sky, that
+the glorious suns of heaven force you to take notice of them; and Orion
+becomes a companion with his seven brilliant stars and his magnificent
+nebula, which appears as a small pale blue patch, to eyes accustomed to
+look for it, when the night is very bright and clear. It is then that
+Charles's Wain becomes quite a study in all its different positions, its
+horses now careering upwards, now plunging downwards, while the waggon,
+whether upwards or downwards, points ever true, by the two stars of its
+tail-board, to the steadfast pole-star.
+
+It is on such nights as these that, looking southward from Orion, we
+recognise the dog-star Sirius, bright long before other stars have
+conquered the twilight, and feast our eye upon his glorious white beams;
+and then, turning northwards, are startled by the soft lustrous sheen of
+Vega just appearing above the horizon.
+
+But stop, I must remember that I have not yet introduced you to these
+groups of stars; and moreover that, though we shall find them now in the
+positions I mention, yet if you look for them a few hours later
+to-night, or at the same hour later in the year, you will not find them
+in the same places in the sky. For as our earth turns daily on its axis,
+the stars _appear_ to alter their position hour by hour, and in the same
+way as we travel yearly on our journey round the sun, they _appear_ to
+move in the sky month by month. Yet with a little practice it is easy to
+recognise the principal stars, for, as it is our movement and not theirs
+which makes us see them in different parts of the sky, they always
+remain in the same position with regard to each other. In a very short
+time, with the help of such a book as Proctor's _Star Atlas_; you could
+pick out all the chief constellations and most conspicuous stars for
+yourselves.
+
+One of the best ways is to take note of the stars each night as they
+creep out one by one after sunset. If you take your place at the window
+to-morrow night as the twilight fades away, you will see them gradually
+appear, now in one part, now in another of the sky, as
+
+    "One by one each little star
+    Sits on its golden throne."
+
+The first to appear will be Sirius or the dog-star (see Fig. 54), that
+pure white star which you can observe now rather low down to the south,
+and which belongs to the constellation _Canis Major_. As Sirius is one
+of the most brilliant stars in the sky, he can be seen very soon after
+the sun is gone at this time of year. If, however, you had any doubt as
+to what star he was, you would not doubt long, for in a little while two
+beautiful stars start into view above him more to the west, and between
+them three smaller ones in a close row, forming the cross in the
+constellation of Orion, which is always very easy to recognise. Now the
+three stars of Orion's belt which make the short piece of the cross
+always point to Sirius, while Betelgeux in his right shoulder, and Rigel
+in his left foot (see Figs. 54 and 55), complete the long piece, and
+these all show very early in the twilight. You would have to wait longer
+for the other two leading stars, Bellatrix in the right shoulder and
+[Greek: k] Orionis in the right leg, for these stars are feebler and
+only seen when the light has faded quite away.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 54.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking south in March from six to
+nine o'clock.]
+
+By that time you would see that there are an immense number of stars in
+Orion visible even to the naked eye, besides the veil of misty, tiny
+stars called the "Milky Way" which passes over his arm and club. Yet the
+figure of the huntsman is very difficult to trace, and the seven bright
+stars, the five of the cross and those in the left arm and knee, are all
+you need remember.
+
+No! not altogether all, for on a bright clear night like this you can
+detect a faint greenish blue patch (N, Fig. 54) just below the belt, and
+having a bright star in the centre. This is called the "Great Nebula" or
+mist of Orion (see Frontispiece). With your telescopes it looks very
+small indeed, for only the central and brightest part is seen. Really,
+however, it is so widespread that our whole solar system is as nothing
+compared to it. But even your telescopes will show, somewhere near the
+centre, what appears to be a bright and very beautiful star (see Fig.
+55) surrounded by a darker space than the rest of the nebula, while in
+my telescope you will see many stars scattered over the mist.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 55.
+
+Chief stars of Orion, with Aldebaran. (After Proctor.)]
+
+Now first let me tell you that these last stars do not, so far as we
+know, lie _in_ the nebula, but are scattered about in the heavens
+between us and it, perhaps millions of miles nearer our earth. But with
+the bright star in the centre it is different, for the spectroscope
+tells us that the mist passes _over_ it, so that it is either behind or
+in the nebula. Moreover, this star is very interesting, for it is not
+really one star, but six arranged in a group (see Fig. 56). You can see
+four distinctly through my telescope, forming a trapezium or four-sided
+figure, and more powerful instruments show two smaller ones. So [Greek:
+th] Orionis, or the Trapezium of Orion, is a multiple star, probably
+lying in the midst of the nebula.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 56.
+
+The trapezium, [Greek: th] Orionis, in the nebula of Orion. (Herschel.)]
+
+The next question is, What is the mist itself composed of? For a long
+time telescopes could give us no answer. At last one night Lord Rosse,
+looking through his giant telescope at the densest part of the nebula,
+saw myriads of minute stars which had never been seen before. "Then,"
+you will say, "it is after all only a cluster of stars too small for our
+telescopes to distinguish." Wait a bit; it is always dangerous to draw
+hasty conclusions from single observations. What Lord Rosse said was
+true as to that particular part of the nebula, but not the whole truth
+even there, and not at all true of other parts, as the spectroscope
+tells us.
+
+For though the light of nebulae, or luminous mists, is so faint that a
+spectrum can only be got by most delicate operations, yet Dr. Huggins
+has succeeded in examining several. Among these is the nebula of Orion,
+and we now know that when the light of the mist is spread out it gives,
+not a continuous band of colour such as would be given by stars, but
+_faint coloured lines_ on a dark ground (see Fig. 57). Such lines as
+these we have already learnt are always given by gases, and the
+particular bright lines thrown by Orion's nebula answer to those given
+by nitrogen and hydrogen, and some other unknown gases. So we learn at
+last that the true mist of the nebula is formed of glowing gas, while
+parts have probably a great number of minute stars in them.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 57.
+
+Nebula-spectrum.
+
+Sun-spectrum.
+
+Spectrum of Orion's Nebula, showing bright lines, with sun-spectrum
+below for comparison.]
+
+Till within a very short time ago only those people who had access to
+very powerful telescopes could see the real appearance of Orion, for
+drawings made of it were necessarily very imperfect; but now that
+telescopes have been made expressly for carrying photographic
+appliances, even these faint mists print their own image for us. In 1880
+Professor Draper of America photographed the nebula of Orion, in March
+1881 Mr. Common got a still better effect, and last year Mr. Isaac
+Roberts succeeded in taking the most perfect and beautiful photograph[1]
+yet obtained, in which the true beauty of this wonderful mist stands out
+clearly. I have marked on the edge of our copy two points [Greek: th]
+and [Greek: th]', and if you follow out straight lines from these points
+till they meet, you will arrive at the spot where the multiple star
+lies. It cannot, however, be seen here, because the plate was exposed
+for three hours and a half, and after a time the mist prints itself so
+densely as to smother the light of the stars. Look well at this
+photograph when you go indoors and fix it on your memory, and then on
+clear nights accustom your eye to find the nebula below the three stars
+of the belt, for it tells a wonderful story.
+
+  [1] Reproduced in the Frontispiece with Mr. Roberts's kind permission.
+  The star-halo at the top of the plate is caused by diffraction of
+  light in the telescope, and comes only from an ordinary star.
+
+More than a hundred years ago the great German philosopher Kant
+suggested that our sun, our earth, and all the heavenly bodies might
+have begun as gases, and the astronomer Laplace taught this as the most
+likely history of their formation. After a few years, however, when
+powerful telescopes showed that many of the nebulae were only clusters of
+very minute stars, astronomers thought that Laplace's teaching had been
+wrong. But now the spectroscope has revealed to us glowing gas actually
+filling large spaces in the sky, and every year accurate observations
+and experiments tell us more and more about these marvellous distant
+mists. Some day, though perhaps not while you or I are here to know it,
+Orion's nebula, with its glowing gas and minute star-dust, may give some
+clue to the early history of the heavenly bodies; and for this reason I
+wish you to recognise and ponder over it, as I have often done, when it
+shines down on the rugged moor in the stillness of a clear frosty
+winter's night.
+
+But we must pass on for, while I have been talking, the whole sky has
+become bespangled with hundreds of stars. That glorious one to the west,
+which you can find by following (Fig. 54) a curved line upwards from
+Betelgeux, is the beautiful red star Aldebaran or the hindmost; so
+called by the Arabs, because he drives before him that well-known
+cluster, the Pleiades, which we reach by continuing the curve westwards
+and upwards. Stop to look at this cluster through your telescopes, for
+it will delight you; even with the naked eye you can count from six to
+ten stars in it, and an opera-glass will show about thirty, though they
+are so scattered you will have to move the glass about to find them. Yet
+though my telescope shows a great many more, you cannot even count all
+the chief ones through it, for in powerful telescopes more than 600
+stars have been seen in the single cluster! while a photograph taken by
+Mr. Roberts shows also four lovely patches of nebula.
+
+And now from the Pleiades let us pass on directly overhead to the
+beautiful star Capella, which once was red but now is blue, and drop
+down gently to the south-east, where Castor and Pollux, the two most
+prominent stars in the constellation "Gemini" or the twins, show
+brilliantly against the black sky. Pause here a moment, for I want to
+tell you something about Castor, the one nearest to Capella. If you look
+at Castor through your telescopes, some of you may possibly guess that
+it is really two stars, but you will have to look through mine to see it
+clearly. These two stars have been watched carefully for many years, and
+there is now no doubt that one of them is moving slowly round the other.
+Such stars as these are called "binary," to distinguish them from stars
+that merely _appear_ double because they stand nearly in a line one
+behind the other in the heavens, although they may be millions of miles
+apart. But "binary" stars are actually moving in one system, and revolve
+round each other as our earth moves round the sun.
+
+I wonder if it strikes you what a grand discovery this is? You will
+remember that it is gravitation which keeps the moon held to the earth
+so that it moves round in a circle, and which keeps the earth and other
+planets moving round the sun. But till these binary stars were
+discovered we had no means of guessing that this law had any force
+beyond our own solar system. Now, however, we learn that the same law
+and order which reigns in our small group of planets is in action
+billions of miles away among distant suns, so that they are held
+together and move round each other as our earth moves round our sun. I
+will repeat to you what Sir R. Ball, the Astronomer-Royal of Ireland,
+says about this, for his words have remained in my mind ever since I
+read them, and I should like them to linger in yours till you are old
+enough to feel their force and grandeur. "This discovery," he writes,
+"gave us knowledge we could have gained from no other source. From the
+binary stars came a whisper across the vast abyss of space. That whisper
+told us that the law of gravitation is not peculiar to the solar system.
+It gives us grounds for believing that it is obeyed throughout the
+length, the breadth, the depth, and the height of the entire
+universe."[1]
+
+  [1] _The Story of the Heavens._
+
+And now, leaving Castor and going round to the east, we pass through the
+constellation Leo or the Lion, and I want you particularly to notice six
+stars in the shape of a sickle, which form the front part of the lion,
+the brightest, called Regulus, being the end of the handle.[1] This
+sickle is very interesting, because it marks the part of the heavens
+from which the brilliant shower of November meteors radiates once in
+thirty-three years. This is, however, too long a story to be told
+to-night, so we will pass through Leo, and turning northwards, look high
+up in the north-east (Fig. 58), where "Charles's Wain" stretches far
+across the sky. I need not point this out to you, for every country lad
+knows and delights in it. You could not have seen it in the twilight
+when Sirius first shone out, for these stars are not so powerful as he
+is. But they come out very soon after him, and when once fairly bright,
+the four stars which form the waggon, wider at the top than at the
+bottom, can never be mistaken, and the three stars in front, the last
+bending below the others, are just in the right position for the horses.
+For this reason I prefer the country people's name of Charles's Wain or
+Waggon to that of the "Plough," which astronomers generally give to
+these seven stars. They really form part of an enormous constellation
+called the "Great Bear" (Fig. 59), but, as in the case of Orion, it is
+very difficult to make out the whole of Bruin in the sky.
+
+  [1] In Fig. 54 the sickle alone comes within the picture.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 58.
+
+Some of the constellations seen when looking north in March from six to
+nine o'clock.]
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 59.
+
+The Great Bear, showing the position of Charles's Wain, and also the
+small binary star [Greek: x] in the hind foot, whose period has been
+determined.]
+
+Now, although most people know Charles's Wain when they see it, we may
+still learn a good deal about it. Look carefully at the second star from
+the waggon and you will see another star close to it, called by country
+people "Jack by the second horse," and by astronomers "Alcor." Even in
+your small telescopes you can see that Jack or Alcor is not so close as
+he appears to the naked eye, but a long way off from the horse, while in
+my telescope you will find this second horse (called Mizar) split up
+into two stars, one a brilliant white and the other a pale emerald
+green. We do not know whether these two form a binary, for they have not
+yet been observed to move round each other.
+
+Take care in looking that you do not confuse the stars one with another,
+for you must remember that your telescope makes objects appear upside
+down, and Alcor will therefore appear in it _below_ the two stars
+forming the horse.
+
+But though we do not know whether Mizar is binary, there is a little
+star a long way below the waggon, in the left hind paw of the Great Bear
+([Greek: x], Figs. 58 and 59), which has taught us a great deal, for it
+is composed of two stars, one white and the other grey, which move right
+round each other once in sixty years, so that astronomers have observed
+more than one revolution since powerful telescopes were invented. You
+will have to look in my telescope to see the two stars divided, but you
+can make an interesting observation for yourselves by comparing the
+light of this binary star with the light of Castor, for Castor is such
+an immense distance from us that his light takes more than a hundred
+years to reach us, while the light of this smaller star comes in
+sixty-one years, yet see how incomparably brighter Castor is of the two.
+This proves that brilliant stars are not always the nearest, but that a
+near star may be small and faint and a far-off one large and bright.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 60.
+
+The seven stars of Charles's Wain, showing the directions in which they
+are travelling. (After Proctor.)]
+
+There is another very interesting fact known to us about Charles's Wain
+which I should like you to remember when you look at it. This is that
+the seven stars are travelling onwards in the sky, and not all in the
+same direction. It was already suspected centuries ago that, besides the
+_apparent_ motion of all the stars in the heavens caused by our own
+movements, they have each also a _real_ motion and are travelling in
+space, though they are so inconceivably far off that we do not notice
+it. It has now been proved, by very accurate observations with powerful
+instruments, that three of the stars forming the waggon and the two
+horses nearest to it, together with Jack, are drifting forwards (see
+Fig. 60), while the top star of the tailboard of the waggon and the
+leader of the horses are drifting the other way. Thus, thousands of
+years hence Charles's Wain will most likely have quite altered its
+shape, though so very slowly that each generation will think it is
+unchanged.
+
+One more experiment with Charles's Wain, before we leave it, will help
+you to imagine the endless millions of stars which fill the universe.
+Look up at the waggon and try to count how many stars you can see inside
+it with the naked eye. You may, if your eye is keen, be able to count
+twelve. Now take an opera-glass and the twelve become two hundred. With
+your telescopes they will increase again in number. In my telescope
+upstairs the two hundred become hundreds, while in one of the giant
+telescopes, such as Lord Rosse's in Ireland, or the great telescope at
+Washington in the United States, thousands of stars are brought into
+view within that four-sided space!
+
+Now this part of the sky is not fuller of stars than many others; yet at
+first, looking up as any one might on a clear evening, we thought only
+twelve were there. Cast your eyes all round the heavens. On a clear
+night like this you may perhaps, with the naked eye, have in view about
+3000 stars; then consider that a powerful telescope can multiply these
+by thousands upon thousands, so that we can reckon about 20,000,000
+where you see only 3000. If you add to these the stars that rise later
+at night, and those of the southern hemisphere which never rise in our
+latitude, you would have in all about 50,000,000 stars, which we are
+able to see from our tiny world through our most powerful telescopes.
+
+But we can go farther yet. When our telescopes fail, we turn to our
+other magic seer, the photographic camera, and trapping rays of light
+from stars invisible in the most powerful telescope, make them print
+their image on the photographic plate, and at once our numbers are so
+enormously increased that if we could photograph the whole of the
+heavens as visible from our earth, we should have impressions of at
+least 170,000,000 stars!
+
+These numbers are so difficult to grasp that we had better pass on to
+something easier, and our next step brings us to the one star in the
+heavens which never appears to move, as our world turns. To find it we
+have only to draw a line upwards through the two stars in the tailboard
+of the waggon and on into space. Indeed these two stars are called "the
+Pointers," because a line prolonged onwards from them will, with a very
+slight curve, bring us to the "Pole-star" (see Fig. 58). This star,
+though not one of the largest, is important, because it is very near
+that spot in the sky towards which the North Pole of our earth points.
+The consequence is, that though all the other stars appear to move in a
+circle round the heavens, and to be in different places at different
+seasons, this star remains always in the same place, only appearing to
+describe a very tiny circle in the sky round the exact spot to which our
+North Pole points.
+
+Month after month and year after year it shines exactly over that
+thatched cottage yonder, which you see now immediately below it; and
+wherever you are in the northern hemisphere, if you once note a certain
+tree, or chimney, or steeple which points upwards to the Pole-star, it
+will guide you to it at any hour on any night of the year, though the
+other constellations will be now on one side, now on the other side of
+it.
+
+The Pole-star is really the front horse of a small imitation of
+Charles's Wain, which, however, has never been called by any special
+name, but only part of the "Little Bear." Those two hind stars of the
+tiny waggon, which are so much the brightest, are called the "Guards,"
+because they appear to move in a circle round the Pole-star night after
+night and year after year like sentries.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 61.
+
+The constellation of Cassiopeia, and the heavenly bodies which can be
+found by means of it.[1]]
+
+  [1] For Almach see Fig. 58, it has been accidentally omitted from this
+  figure.
+
+Opposite to them, on the farther side of the Pole-star, is a well-marked
+constellation, a widespread W written in the sky by five large stars;
+the second V of the W has rather a longer point than the first, and as
+we see it now the letter is almost upside down (see Fig. 58).
+
+These are the five brightest stars in the constellation Cassiopeia, with
+a sixth not quite so bright in the third stroke of the W. You can never
+miss them when you have once seen them, even though they lie in the
+midst of a dense layer of the stars of the Milky Way, and if you have
+any difficulty at first, you have only to look as far on the one side of
+the Pole-star as the top hind star of Charles's Wain is on the other,
+and you must find them. I want to use them to-night chiefly as guides to
+find two remarkable objects which I hope you will look at again and
+again. The first is a small round misty patch not easy to see, but which
+you will find by following out the _second_ stroke of the first V of the
+W. Beginning at the top, and following the line to the point of the V,
+continue on across the sky, and then search with your telescope till you
+catch a glimpse of this faint mist (_c_, Fig. 58; star-cluster, Fig.
+61). You will see at once that it is sparkling all over with stars, for
+in fact you have actually before you in that tiny cluster more stars
+than you can see with the naked eye all over the heavens! Think for a
+moment what this means. One faint misty spot in the constellation
+Perseus, which we should have passed over unheeded without a telescope,
+proves to be a group of more than 3000 suns!
+
+The second object you will find more easily, for it is larger and
+brighter, and appears as a faint dull spot to the naked eye. Going back
+to Cassiopeia, follow out the _second_ V in the W from the top to the
+point of the V and onwards till your eye rests upon this misty cloud,
+which is called the Great Nebula of Andromeda, and has sometimes been
+mistaken for a comet (Figs. 58 and 61). You will, however, be
+disappointed when you look through the telescope, for it will still only
+appear a mist, and you will be able to make nothing of it, except that
+instead of being of an irregular shape like Orion, it is elliptical; and
+in a powerful telescope two dark rifts can be seen separating the
+streams of nebulous matter. These rifts are now shown in a photograph
+taken by Mr. Roberts, 1st October 1888, to be two vast dusky rings lying
+between the spiral stream of light, which winds in an ellipse till it
+ends in a small nucleus at the centre.
+
+Ah! you will say, this must be a cloud of gas like Orion's nebula, only
+winding round and round. No! the spectroscope steps in here and tells us
+that the light shows something very much like a continuous spectrum, but
+not as long as it ought to be at the red end. Now, since gases give only
+bright lines, this nebula cannot be entirely gaseous. Then it must be
+made of stars too far off to see? If so, it is very strange that though
+it is so dense and bright in some parts, and so spread out and clear in
+others, the most powerful telescopes cannot break it up into stars. In
+fact, the composition of the great nebula of Andromeda is still a
+mystery, and remains for one of you boys to study when he has become a
+great astronomer.
+
+Still one more strange star we will notice before we leave this part of
+the heavens. You will find it, or at least go very near it, by
+continuing northwards the line you drew from Cassiopeia to the Star
+Cluster (_c_, Fig. 58), and as it is a bright star, you will not miss
+it. That is to say, it is bright to-night and will remain so till
+to-morrow night, but if you come to me about nine o'clock to-morrow
+evening I will show you that it is growing dim, and if we had patience
+to watch through the night we should find, three or four hours later
+still, that it looks like one of the smaller stars. Then it will begin
+to brighten again, and in four hours more will be as bright as at first.
+It will remain so for nearly three days, or, to speak accurately, 2
+days, 20 hours, 48 minutes, and 55 seconds, and then will begin to grow
+dull again. This star is called Algol the Variable. There are several
+such stars in the heavens, and we do not know why they vary, unless
+perhaps some dark globe passes round them, cutting off part of their
+light for a time.
+
+And now, if your eyes are not weary, let us go back to the Pole-star and
+draw a line from it straight down the horizon due north. Shortly before
+we arrive there you will see a very brilliant bluish-white star a little
+to the east of this line. This is Vega, one of the brightest stars in
+the heavens except Sirius. It had not risen in the earlier part of the
+evening, but now it is well up and will appear to go on, steadily
+mounting as it circles round the Pole-star, till at four o'clock
+to-morrow morning it will be right overhead towards the south.
+
+But beautiful as Vega is, a still more interesting star lies close to it
+(see Fig. 58). This small star, called [Greek: e] Lyrae by astronomers,
+looks a little longer in one direction than in the other, and even with
+the naked eye some people can see a division in the middle dividing it
+into two stars. Your telescopes will show them easily, and a powerful
+telescope tells a wonderful story, for it reveals that each of these two
+stars is again composed of two stars, so that [Greek: e] Lyrae (Fig. 62)
+is really a double-double star. There is no doubt that each pair is a
+binary star, that is, the two stars move round each other very slowly,
+and possibly both pairs may also revolve round a common centre. There
+are at least 10,000 double stars in the heavens; though, as we have
+seen, they are not all binary. The list of binary stars, however,
+increases every year as they are carefully examined, and probably about
+one star in three over the whole sky is made up of more than one sun.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 62.
+
+[Greek: e] Lyrae. A double-binary star. Each couple revolves, and the
+couples probably also revolve round each other. (After Chambers.)]
+
+Let us turn the telescope for a short time upon a few of the double
+stars and we shall have a great treat, for one of the most interesting
+facts about them is that both stars are rarely of the same colour. It
+seems strange at first to speak of stars as coloured, but they do not by
+any means all give out the same kind of light. Our sun is yellow, and so
+are the Pole-star and Pollux; but Sirius, Vega, and Regulus are
+dazzling white or bluish-white, Arcturus is a yellowish-white,
+Aldebaran is a bright yellow-red, Betelgeux a deep orange-red, as you
+may see now in the telescope, for he is full in view; while Antares, a
+star in the constellation of the Scorpion, which at this time of year
+cannot be seen till four in the morning, is an intense ruby red.
+
+[Illustration: _Plate II._]
+
+COLOURED DOUBLE STARS.
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: g] _Andromedae_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: e] _Booetis_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: d] _Geminorum_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: a] _Herculis_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: b] _Cygni_.]
+
+[Illustration: [Greek: e] _Cassiopeiae_.]
+
+It appears to be almost a rule with double stars to be of two colours.
+Look up at Almach ([Greek: g] Andromedae), a bright star standing next to
+Algol the Variable in the sweep of four bright stars behind Cassiopeia
+(see Fig. 58). Even to the naked eye he appears to flash in a strange
+way, and in the telescope he appears as two lovely stars, one a deep
+orange and the other a pale green, while in powerful telescopes the
+green one splits again into two (Plate II.) Then again, [Greek: e]
+Cassiopeae, the sixth star lying between the two large ones in the second
+V of Cassiopeia, divides into a yellow star and a small rich purple one,
+and [Greek: d] Geminorum, a bright star not far from Pollux in the
+constellation Gemini, is composed of a large green star and a small
+purple one. Another very famous double star ([Greek: b] Cygni), which
+rises only a little later in the evening, lies below Vega a little to
+the left. It is composed of two lovely stars; one an orange yellow and
+the other blue; while [Greek: e] Booetis, just visible above the horizon,
+is composed of a large yellow star and a very small green one.[1]
+
+  [1] The plate of coloured stars has been most kindly drawn to scale
+  and coloured for me by Mr. Arthur Cottam, F.R.A.S.
+
+There are many other stars of two colours even among the few
+constellations we have picked out to-night, as, for example, the star
+at the top of the tailboard of Charles's Waggon and the second horse
+Mizar. Rigel in Orion, and the two outer stars of the belt, [Greek: a]
+Herculis, which will rise later in the evening, and the beautiful triple
+star ([Greek: z] Cancer) near the Beehive (see Fig. 54), are all
+composed of two or more stars of different colours.
+
+Why do these suns give out such beautiful coloured light? The telescope
+cannot tell us, but the spectroscope again reveals the secrets so long
+hidden from us. By a series of very delicate experiments, Dr. Huggins
+has shown that the light of all stars is sifted before it comes to us,
+just as the light of our sun is; and those rays which are least cut off
+play most strongly on our eyes, and give the colour to the star. The
+question is a difficult one but I will try to give you some idea of it,
+that you may form some picture in your mind of what happens.
+
+We learnt in our last lecture (p. 131) that the light from our sun
+passes through the great atmosphere of vapours surrounding him before it
+goes out into space, and that many rays are in this way cut off; so that
+when we spread out his light in a long spectrum there are dark lines or
+spaces where no light falls.[1] Now in sunlight these dark lines are
+scattered pretty evenly over the spectrum, so that about as much light
+is cut off in one part as in another, and no one colour is stronger than
+the rest.
+
+  [1] See No. 1 in Table of Spectra, Plate I.
+
+Dr. Huggins found, however, that in coloured stars the dark spaces are
+often crowded into particular parts of the long band of colour forming
+the spectrum; showing that many of those light-rays have been cut off
+in the atmosphere round the star, and thus their particular colours are
+dimmed, leaving the other colour or colours more vivid. In red stars,
+for example, the yellow, blue, and green parts of the spectrum are much
+lined while the red end is strong and clear. With blue stars it is just
+the opposite, and the violet end is most free from dark lines. So there
+are really brilliantly coloured suns shining in the heavens, and in many
+cases two or more of these revolve round each other.
+
+And now I have kept your attention and strained your eyes long enough,
+and you have objects to study for many a long evening before you will
+learn to see them plainly. You must not expect to find them every night,
+for the lightest cloud or the faintest moonlight will hide many of them
+from view; and, moreover, though you may learn to use the telescope
+fairly, you will often not know how to get a clear view with it. Still,
+you may learn a great deal, and before we go in I want to put a thought
+into your minds which will make astronomy still more interesting. We
+have seen that the stronger our telescopes the more stars,
+star-clusters, and nebulae we see, and we cannot doubt that there are
+still countless heavenly bodies quite unknown to us. Some years ago
+Bessel the astronomer found that Sirius, in its real motion through the
+heavens, moves irregularly, travelling sometimes a little more slowly
+than at other times, and he suggested that some unseen companion must be
+pulling at him.
+
+Twenty-eight years later, in 1862, two celebrated opticians, father and
+son, both named Alvan Clark, were trying a new telescope at Chicago
+University, when suddenly the son, who was looking at Sirius, exclaimed,
+"Why, father, the star has a companion!" And so it was. The powerful
+telescope showed what Bessel had foretold, and proved Sirius to be a
+"binary" star--that is, as we have seen, a star which has another moving
+round it.
+
+It has since been proved that this companion is twenty-eight times
+farther from Sirius than we are from our sun, and moves round him in
+about forty-nine years. It is seven times as heavy as our sun, and yet
+gives out so little light that only the keenest telescopes can bring it
+into view.
+
+Now if such a large body as this can give so very faint a light that we
+can scarcely see it, though Sirius, which is close to it, shines
+brightest of any star in the heavens, how many more bodies must there be
+which we shall never see, even among those which give out light, while
+how many there are dark like our earth, who can tell?
+
+Now that we know each of the stars to be a brilliant sun, many of them
+far, far brighter than ours, yet so like in their nature and laws, we
+can scarcely help speculating whether round these glorious suns, worlds
+of some kind may not be moving. If so, and there are people in them,
+what a strange effect those double coloured suns must produce with red
+daylight one day and blue daylight another!
+
+Surely, as we look up at the myriads of stars bespangling the sky, and
+remember that our star-sun has seven planets moving round it of which
+one at least--our own earth--is full of living beings, we must picture
+these glorious suns as the centres of unseen systems, so that those
+twinkling specks become as suggestive as the faint lights of a great
+fleet far out at sea, which tell us of mighty ships, together with
+frigates and gunboats, full of living beings, though we cannot see them,
+nor even guess what they may be like. How insignificant we feel when we
+look upon that starlit sky and remember that the whole of our solar
+system would be but a tiny speck of light if seen as far off as we see
+the stars! If our little earth and our short life upon it were all we
+could boast of we should be mites indeed.
+
+But our very study to-night lifts us above these and reminds us that
+there is a spirit within us which even now can travel beyond the narrow
+bounds of our globe, measure the vast distances between us and the
+stars, gauge their brightness, estimate their weight, and discern their
+movements. As we gaze into the depths of the starlit sky, and travel
+onwards and onwards in imagination to those distant stars which
+photography alone reveals to us, do not our hearts leap at the thought
+of a day which must surely come when, fettered and bound no longer to
+earth, this spirit shall wander forth and penetrate some of the mystery
+of those mighty suns at which we now gaze in silent awe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+LITTLE BEINGS FROM A MINIATURE OCEAN
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+In our last lecture we soared far away into boundless space, and lost
+ourselves for a time among seen and unseen suns. In this lecture we will
+come back not merely to our little world, nor even to one of the
+widespread oceans which cover so much of it, but to one single pool
+lying just above the limits of low tide, so that it is only uncovered
+for a very short time every day. This pool is to be found in a secluded
+bay within an hour's journey by train from this college, and only a few
+miles from Torquay. It has no name, so far as I know, nor do many people
+visit it, otherwise I should not have kept my little pool so long
+undisturbed. As it is, however, for many years past I have had only to
+make sure as to the time of low tide, and put myself in the train; and
+then, unless the sea was very rough and stormy, I could examine the
+little inhabitants of my miniature ocean in peace.
+
+The pool lies in a deep hollow among a group of rocks and boulders,
+close to the entrance of the cove, which can only be entered at low
+water; it does not measure more than two feet across, so that you can
+step over it, if you take care not to slip on the masses of green and
+brown seaweed growing over the rocks on its sides, as I have done many a
+time when collecting specimens for our salt-water aquarium. I find now
+the only way is to lie flat down on the rock, so that my hands and eyes
+are free to observe and handle, and then, bringing my eye down to the
+edge of the pool, to lift the seaweeds and let the sunlight enter into
+the chinks and crannies. In this way I can catch sight of many a small
+being either on the seaweed or the rocky ledges, and even creatures
+transparent as glass become visible by the thin outline gleaming in the
+sunlight. Then I pluck a piece of seaweed, or chip off a fragment of
+rock with a sharp-edged collecting knife, bringing away the specimen
+uninjured upon it, and place it carefully in its own separate bottle to
+be carried home alive and well.
+
+Now though this little pool and I are old friends, I find new treasures
+in it almost every time I go, for it is almost as full of living things
+as the heavens are of stars, and the tide as it comes and goes brings
+many a mother there to find a safe home for her little ones, and many a
+waif and stray to seek shelter from the troublous life of the open
+ocean.
+
+You will perhaps find it difficult to believe that in this rock-bound
+basin there can be millions of living creatures hidden away among the
+fine feathery weeds; yet so it is. Not that they are always the same. At
+one time it may be the home of myriads of infant crabs, not an eighth of
+an inch long, at another of baby sea-urchins only visible to the naked
+eye as minute spots in the water, at another of young jelly-fish growing
+on their tiny stalks, and splitting off one by one as transparent bells
+to float away with the rising tide. Or it may be that the whelk has
+chosen this quiet nook to deposit her leathery eggs; or young barnacles,
+periwinkles, and limpets are growing up among the green and brown
+tangles, while the far-sailing velella and the stay-at-home sea-squirts,
+together with a variety of other sea-animals, find a nursery and shelter
+in their youth in this quiet harbour of rest.
+
+And besides these casual visitors there are numberless creatures which
+have lived and multiplied there, ever since I first visited the pool.
+Tender red, olive-coloured, and green seaweeds, stony corallines, and
+acorn-barnacles lining the floor, sea-anemones clinging to the sides,
+sponges tiny and many-coloured hiding under the ledges, and limpets and
+mussels wedged in the cracks. These can be easily seen with the naked
+eye, but they are not the most numerous inhabitants; for these we must
+search with a magnifying-glass, which will reveal to us wonderful
+fairy-forms, delicate crystal vases with tiny creatures in them whose
+transparent lashes make whirlpools in the water, living crystal bells so
+tiny that whole branches of them look only like a fringe of hair, jelly
+globes rising and falling in the water, patches of living jelly
+clinging to the rocky sides of the pool, and a hundred other forms, some
+so minute that you must examine the fine sand in which they lie under a
+powerful microscope before you can even guess that they are there.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 63.
+
+Group of seaweeds (natural size).
+
+1, _Ulva Linza._ 2, _Sphacelaria filicina._ 3, _Polysiphonia urceolata._
+4, _Corallina officinalis._]
+
+So it has proved a rich hunting-ground, where summer and winter, spring
+and autumn, I find some form to put under my magic glass. There I can
+watch it for weeks growing and multiplying under my care; moved only
+from the aquarium, where I keep it supplied with healthy sea-water, to
+the tiny transparent trough in which I place it for a few hours to see
+the changes it has undergone. I could tell you endless tales of
+transformations in these tiny lives, but I want to-day to show you a
+few of my friends, most of which I brought yesterday fresh from the
+pool, and have prepared for you to examine.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 64.
+
+_Ulva lactuca_, a green seaweed, greatly magnified to show structure.
+(After Oersted.)
+
+_s_, Spores in the cells. _ss_, Spores swimming out. _h_, Holes through
+which spores have escaped.]
+
+Let us begin with seaweeds. I have said that there are three leading
+colours in my pool--green, olive, and red--and these tints mark roughly
+three kinds of weed, though they occur in an endless variety of shapes.
+Here is a piece of the beautiful pale green seaweed, called the Laver or
+Sea-lettuce, _Ulva Linza_ (1, Fig. 63), which grows in long ribbons in a
+sunny nook in the water. I have placed under the first microscope a
+piece of this weed which is just sending out young seaweeds in the shape
+of tiny cells, with lashes very like those we saw coming from the
+moss-flower, and I have pressed them in the position in which they would
+naturally leave the plant (_ss_, Fig. 64.).[1] You will also see on this
+slide several cells in which these tiny spores _s_ are forming, ready to
+burst out and swim; for this green weed is merely a collection of cells,
+like the single-celled plants on land. Each cell can work as a separate
+plant; it feeds, grows, and can send out its own young spores.
+
+  [1] The slice given in Fig. 64 is from a broader-leaved form,
+  _U. lactuca_, because this species, being composed of only one
+  layer of cells, is better seen. _Ulva linza_ is composed of two
+  layers of cells.
+
+This deep olive-green feathery weed (2, Fig. 63), of which a piece is
+magnified under the next microscope (2, Fig. 65), is very different. It
+is a higher plant, and works harder for its living, using the darker
+rays of sunlight which penetrate into shady parts of the pool. So it
+comes to pass that its cells divide the work. Those of the feathery
+threads make the food, while others, growing on short stalks on the
+shafts of the feather make and send out the young spores.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 65.
+
+Three seaweeds of Fig. 63 much magnified to show fruits. (Harvey.)
+
+2, _Sphacelaria filicina._ 3, _Polysiphonia urceolata._ 4, _Corallina
+officinalis._]
+
+Lastly, the lovely red threadlike weeds, such as this _Polysiphonia
+urceolata_ (3, Fig. 63), carry actual urns on their stems like those of
+mosses. In fact, the history of these urns (see No. 3, Fig. 65) is much
+the same in the two classes of plants, only that instead of the urn
+being pushed up on a thin stalk as in the moss, it remains on the
+seaweed close down to the stem, when it grows out of the plant-egg, and
+the tiny plant is shut in till the spores are ready to swim out.
+
+The stony corallines (4, Figs. 63 and 65), which build so much carbonate
+of lime into their stems, are near relations of the red seaweeds. There
+are plenty of them in my pool. Some of them, of a deep purple colour,
+grow upright in stiff groups about three or four inches high; and
+others, which form crusts over the stones and weeds, are a pale rose
+colour; but both kinds, when the plant dies, leaving the stony skeleton
+(1, Fig. 66), are a pure white, and used to be mistaken for corals. They
+belong to the same order of plants as the red weeds, which all live in
+shady nooks in the pools, and are the highest of their race.
+
+My pool is full of different forms of these four weeds. The green
+ribbons float on the surface rooted to the sides of the pool and, as the
+sun shines upon it, the glittering bubbles rising from them show that
+they are working up food out of the air in the water, and giving off
+oxygen. The brown weeds lie chiefly under the shelves of rocks, for they
+can manage with less sunlight, and use the darker rays which pass by the
+green weeds; and last of all, the red weeds and corallines, small and
+delicate in form, line the bottom of the pool in its darkest nooks.
+
+And now if I hand round two specimens--one a coralline, and the other
+something you do not yet know--I am sure you will say at first sight
+that they belong to the same family, and, in fact, if you buy at the
+seaside a group of seaweeds gummed on paper, you will most likely get
+both these among them. Yet the truth is, that while the coralline (1,
+Fig. 66) is a plant, the other specimen (2) which is called _Sertularia
+filicula_, is an animal.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 66.
+
+Coralline and Sertularia, to show likeness between the animal Sertularia
+and the plant Coralline.
+
+1, _Corallina officinalis._ 2, _Sertularia filicula._]
+
+This special sertularian grows upright in my pool on stones or often on
+seaweeds, but I have here (Fig. 67) another and much smaller one which
+lives literally in millions hanging its cups downwards. I find it not
+only under the narrow ledges of the pool sheltered by the seaweed, but
+forming a fringe along all the rocks on each side of the cove near to
+low-water mark, and for a long time I passed it by thinking it was of no
+interest. But I have long since given up thinking this of anything,
+especially in my pool, for my magic glass has taught me that there is
+not even a living speck which does not open out into something
+marvellous and beautiful. So I chipped off a small piece of rock and
+brought the fringe home, and found, when I hung it up in clear sea water
+as I have done over this glass trough (Fig. 67) and looked at it through
+the lens, that each thread of the dense fringe, in itself not a quarter
+of an inch deep, turns out to be a tiny sertularian with at least twenty
+mouths. You can see this with your pocket lens even as it hangs here,
+and when you have examined it you can by and by take off one thread and
+put it carefully in the trough. I promise you a sight of the most
+beautiful little beings which exist in nature.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 67.
+
+_Sertularia tenella_, hanging from a splint of rock over a water trough.
+Also piece enlarged to show the animal protruding.]
+
+Come and look at it after the lecture. It is a horny branched stem with
+a double row of tiny cups all along each side (see Fig. 67). Out of
+these cups there appear from time to time sixteen minute transparent
+tentacles as fine as spun glass, which wave about in the water. If you
+shake the glass a little, in an instant each crystal star vanishes into
+its cup, to come out again a few minutes later; so that now here, now
+there, the delicate animal-flowers spread out on each side of the stem,
+and the tree is covered with moving beings. These tentacles are feelers,
+which lash food into a mouth and stomach in each cup, where it is
+digested and passed, through a hole in the bottom, along a jelly thread
+which runs down the stem and joins all the mouths together. In this way
+the food is distributed all over the tree, which is, in fact, one animal
+with many feeding-cups. Some day I will show you one of these cups with
+the tentacles stretched out and mounted on a slide, so that you can
+examine a tentacle with a very strong magnifying power. You will then
+see that it is dotted over with cells, in which are coiled fine
+threads. The animal uses these threads to paralyse the creatures on
+which it feeds, for at the base of each thread there is a poison gland.
+
+In the larger Sertularia (2, Fig. 66) the whole branched tree is
+connected by jelly threads running through the stem, and all the
+thousands of mouths are spread out in the water. One large form called
+the sea-fir _Sertularia cupressina_ grows sometimes three feet high, and
+bears as many as a hundred thousand cups, with living mouths, on its
+branches.
+
+The next of my minute friends I can only show to the class in a diagram,
+but you will see it under the fourth microscope by and by. I had great
+trouble in finding it yesterday, though I knew its haunts upon the green
+weed, for it is so minute and transparent that even when the weed is in
+a trough a magnifying-glass will scarcely detect it. And I must warn you
+that if you want to know any of the minute creatures we are studying,
+you must visit one place constantly. You may in a casual way find many
+of them on seaweed, or in the damp ooze and mud, but it will be by
+chance only; to look for them with any certainty you must take trouble
+in making their acquaintance.
+
+Turning then to the diagram (Fig. 68) I will describe it as I hope you
+will see it under the microscope--a curious tiny, perfectly transparent
+open-mouthed vase standing upright on the weed, and having an equally
+transparent being rising up in it and waving its tiny lashes in the
+water. This is really all one animal, the vase _hc_ being the horny
+covering or carapace of the body, which last stands up like a tube in
+the centre. If you watch carefully, you may even see the minute atoms of
+food twisting round inside the tube until they are digested, after they
+have been swept in at the wide open mouth by the whirling lashes. You
+will see this more clearly if you put a little rice-flour, very minutely
+powdered and coloured by carmine, into the water; for you can trace
+these red atoms into some round spaces called _vacuoles_ which are
+dotted over the body of the animal, and are really globules of watery
+fluid in which the food is probably partly digested.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 68.
+
+_Thuricolla folliculata_ and _Chilomonas amygdalum_. (Saville Kent.)
+
+1, Thuricolla erect; 2, retracted; 3, dividing. 4, _Chilomonas
+amygdalum_. _hc_, Horny carapace. _cv_, Contractile vesicle. _v_,
+Closing valves.]
+
+You will notice, however, one round clear space (_cv_) into which they
+do not go, and after a time you will be able to observe that this round
+spot closes up or contracts very quickly, and then expands again very
+slowly. As it expands it fills with a clear fluid, and naturalists have
+not yet decided exactly what work it does. It may serve the animal
+either for breathing, or as a very simple heart, making the fluids
+circulate in the tube. The next interesting point about this little
+being is the way it retreats into its sheltering vase. Even while you
+are watching, it is quite likely it may all at once draw itself down to
+the bottom as in No. 2, and folding down the valves _v_, _v_ of horny
+teeth which grow on each side, shut itself in from some fancied danger.
+Another very curious point is that, besides sending forth young ones,
+these creatures multiply by dividing in two (see No. 3, Fig. 68), each
+one closing its own part of the vase into a new home.
+
+There are hundreds of these _Infusoria_, as they are called, in my pond,
+some with vases, some without, some fixed to weeds and stones, others
+swimming about freely. Even in the water-trough in which this Thuricolla
+stands, I saw several smaller forms, and the next microscope has a
+trough filled with the minutest form of all, called a Monad (No. 4, Fig.
+68). These are so small that 2000 of them would lie side by side in an
+inch; that is, if you could make them lie at all, for they are the most
+restless little beings, darting hither and thither, scarcely even
+halting except to turn back. And yet though there are so many of them,
+and as far as we know they have no organs of sight, they never run up
+against each other, but glide past more cleverly than any clear-sighted
+fish. These creatures are mostly to be found among decaying seaweed, and
+though they are so tiny, you can still see distinctly the clear space
+(_cv_) contracting and expanding within them.
+
+But if there are so many thousands of mouths to feed, on the tree-like
+_Sertulariae_ as well as in all these _Infusoria_, where does the food
+come from?
+
+Partly from the numerous atoms of decaying life all around, and the
+minute eggs of animals and spores of plants; but besides these, the pool
+is full of minute living plants--small jelly masses with solid coats of
+flint which are moulded into most lovely shapes. Plants formed of jelly
+and flint! You will think I am joking, but I am not. These plants,
+called _Diatoms_, which live both in salt and fresh water, are single
+cells feeding and growing just like those we took from the water-butt
+(Fig. 29, p. 78), only that instead of a soft covering they build up a
+flinty skeleton. They are so small, that many of them must be magnified
+to fifty times their real size before you can even see them distinctly.
+Yet the skeletons of these almost invisible plants are carved and
+chiselled in the most delicate patterns. I showed you a group of these
+in our lecture on magic glasses (p. 39), and now I have brought a few
+living ones that we may learn to know them. The diagram (Fig. 69) shows
+the chief forms you will see on the different slides.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 69.
+
+Living diatoms.
+
+_a_, _Cocconema lanceolatum_. _b_, _Bacillaria paradoxa_.
+_c_, _Gomphonema marinum_. _d_, _Diatoma hyalina_.]
+
+The first one, _Bacillaria paradoxa_ (_b_, Fig. 69), looks like a number
+of rods clinging one to another in a string, but each one of these is a
+single-celled plant with a jelly cell surrounding the flinty skeleton.
+You will see that they move to and fro over each other in the water.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 70.
+
+A diatom (_Diatoma vulgare_) growing.
+
+_a_, _b_, Flint skeleton inside the jelly-cell. _a_, _c_ and _d_, _b_,
+Two flint skeletons formed by new valves, _c_ and _d_, forming within
+the first skeleton.]
+
+The next two forms, _a_ and _c_, look much more like plants, for the
+cells arrange themselves on a jelly stem, which by and by disappears,
+leaving only the separate flint skeletons such as you see in Fig. 16.
+The last form, _d_, is something midway between the other forms, the
+separate cells hang on to each other and also on to a straight jelly
+stem.
+
+Another species of Diatoma (Fig. 70) called _Diatoma vulgare_, is a very
+simple and common form, and will help to explain how these plants grow.
+The two flinty valves _a_, _b_ inside the cell are not quite the same
+size; the older one _a_ is larger than the younger one _b_ and fits over
+it like the cover of a pill-box. As the plant grows, the cell enlarges
+and forms two more valves, one _c_ fitting into the cover _a_, so as to
+make a complete box _ac_, and a second, _d_, back to back with _c_,
+fitting into the valve _b_, and making another complete box _bd_. This
+goes on very rapidly, and in this plant each new cell separates as it is
+formed, and the free diatoms move about quite actively in the water.
+
+If you consider for a moment, you will see that, as the new valves
+always fit into the old ones, each must be smaller than the last, and so
+there comes a time when the valves have become too small to go on
+increasing. Then the plant must begin afresh. So the two halves of the
+last cell open, and throwing out their flinty skeletons, cover
+themselves with a thin jelly layer, and form a new cell which grows
+larger than any of the old ones. These, which are spore-cells, then form
+flinty valves inside, and the whole thing begins again.
+
+Now though the plants themselves die, or become the food of minute
+animals, the flinty skeletons are not destroyed, but go on accumulating
+in the waters of ponds, lakes, rivers, and seas, all over the world.
+Untold millions have no doubt crumbled to dust and gone back into the
+waters, but untold millions also have survived. The towns of Berlin in
+Europe and of Richmond in the United States are actually built upon
+ground called "infusorial earth," composed almost entirely of valves of
+these minute diatoms which have accumulated to a thickness of more than
+eighty feet! Those under Berlin are fresh-water forms, and must have
+lived in a lake, while those of Richmond belong to salt-water forms.
+Every inch of the ground under those cities represents thousands and
+thousands of living plants which flourished in ages long gone by, and
+were no larger than those you will see presently under the microscope.
+
+These are a very few of the microscopic inhabitants of my pond, but, as
+you will confuse them if I show you too many, we will conclude with two
+rather larger specimens, and examine them carefully. The first, called
+the Cydippe, is a lovely, transparent living ball, which I want to
+explain to you because it is so wondrously beautiful. The second, the
+Sea-mat or Flustra, looks like a crumpled drab-coloured seaweed, but is
+really composed of many thousands of grottos, the homes of tiny
+sea-animals.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 71.
+
+_Cydippe Pileus._
+
+1, Animal with tentacles _t_, bearing small tendrils _t'_. 2, Body of
+animal enlarged. _m_, Mouth. _c_, Digestive cavity. _s_, Sac into which
+the tentacles are withdrawn. _p_, Bands with comb-like plates. 3,
+Portion of a band enlarged to show the moving plates _p_.]
+
+Let us take the Cydippe first (1, Fig. 71). I have six here, each in a
+separate tumbler, and could have brought many more, for when I dipped my
+net in the pool yesterday such numbers were caught in it that I believe
+the retreating tide must just have left a shoal behind. Put a tumbler on
+the desk in front of you, and if the light falls well upon it you will
+see a transparent ball about the size of a large pea marked with eight
+bright bands, which begin at the lower end of the ball and reach nearly
+to the top, dividing the outside into sections like the ribs of a melon.
+The creature is so perfectly transparent that you can count all the
+eight bands.
+
+At the top of the ball is a slight bulge which is the mouth (_m_ 2, Fig.
+71), and from it, inside the ball, hangs a long bag or stomach, which
+opens below into a cavity c, from which two canals branch out, one on
+each side, and these divide again into four canals which go one into
+each of the tubes running down the bands. From this cavity the food,
+which is digested in the stomach, is carried by the canals all over the
+body. The smaller tubes which branch out of these canals cannot be seen
+clearly without a very strong lens, and the only other parts you can
+discern in this transparent ball are two long sacs on each side of the
+lower end. These are the tentacle sacs, in which are coiled up the
+tentacles, which we shall describe presently. Lastly, you can notice
+that the bands outside the globe are broader in the middle than at the
+ends, and are striped across by a number of ridges.
+
+In moving the tumblers the water has naturally been shaken, and the
+creature being alarmed will probably at first remain motionless. But
+very soon it will begin to play in the water, rising and falling, and
+swimming gracefully from side to side. Now you will notice a curious
+effect, for the bands will glitter and become tinged with prismatic
+colours, till, as it moves more and more rapidly these colours,
+reflected in the jelly, seem to tinge the whole ball with colours like
+those on a soap-bubble, while from the two sacs below come forth two
+long transparent threads like spun glass. At first these appear to be
+simple threads, but as they gradually open out to about four or five
+inches, smaller threads uncoil on each side of the line till there are
+about fifty on each line. These short _tendrils_ are never still for
+long; as the main threads wave to and fro, some of the shorter ones coil
+up and hang like tiny beads, then these uncoil and others roll up, so
+that these graceful floating lines are never two seconds alike.
+
+We do not really know their use. Sometimes the creature anchors itself
+by them, rising and falling as they stretch out or coil up; but more
+often they float idly behind it in the water. At first you would perhaps
+think that they served to drive the ball through the water, but this is
+done by a special apparatus. The cross ridges which we noticed on the
+bands are really flat comb-like plates (_p_, Fig. 71), of which there
+are about twenty or thirty on each band; and these vibrate very rapidly,
+so that two hundred or more paddles drive the tiny ball through the
+water. This is the cause of the prismatic colours; for iridescent tints
+are produced by the play of light upon the glittering plates, as they
+incessantly change their angle. Sometimes they move all at once,
+sometimes only a few at a time, and it is evident the creature controls
+them at will.
+
+This lovely fairy-like globe, with its long floating tentacles and
+rainbow tints, was for a long time classed with the jelly-fish; but it
+really is most nearly related to sea-anemones, as it has a true central
+cavity which acts as a stomach, and many other points in common with the
+_Actinozoa_. We cannot help wondering, as the little being glides hither
+and thither, whether it can see where it is going. It has nerves of a
+low kind which start from a little dark spot (_ng_), exactly at the
+south pole of the ball, and at that point a sense-organ of some kind
+exists, but what impression the creature gains from it of the world
+outside we cannot tell.
+
+I am afraid you may think it dull to turn from such a beautiful being as
+this, to the grey leaf which looks only like a dead dry seaweed; yet you
+will be wrong, for a more wonderful history attaches to this crumpled
+dead-looking leaf than to the lovely jelly-globe.
+
+First of all I will pass round pieces of the dry leaf (_r_, Fig. 72),
+and while you are getting them I will tell you where I found the living
+ones. Great masses of the Flustra, as it is called, line the bottom and
+sides of my pool. They grow in tufts, standing upright on the rock, and
+looking exactly like hard grey seaweeds, while there is nothing to lead
+you to suspect that they are anything else. Yesterday I chipped off very
+carefully a piece of rock with a tuft upon it, and have kept it since in
+a glass globe by itself with sea-water, for the little creatures living
+in this marine city require a very good supply of healthy water and air.
+I have called it a "marine city," and now I will tell you why. Take the
+piece in your hand and run your finger gently up and down it; you will
+glide quite comfortably from the lower to the higher part of the leaf,
+but when you come back you will feel your finger catch slightly on a
+rough surface. Your pocket lens will show why this is, for if you look
+through it at the surface of the leaf you will see it is not smooth, but
+composed of hundreds of tiny alcoves with arched tops; and on each side
+of these tops stand two short blunt spines (see 2, Fig. 72), making four
+in all, pointing upwards, so as partly to cover the alcove above. As
+your finger went up it glided over the spines, but on coming back it met
+their points. This is all you can see in the dead specimen; I must show
+you the rest by diagrams, and by and by under the microscope.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 72.
+
+The Sea-mat or Flustra (_Flustra foliacea._)
+
+1, Natural size. 2, Much magnified. _s_, Slit caused by drawing in of
+the animal _a_.]
+
+First, then, in the living specimen which I have here, those alcoves are
+not open as in the dead piece, but covered over with a transparent skin,
+in which, near the top of the alcove just where the curve begins, is a
+slit (_s_ 2, Fig. 72). Unfortunately the membrane covering this alcove
+is too dense for you to distinguish the parts within. Presently,
+however, if you are watching a piece of this living leaf in a flat
+water-cell under the microscope, you will see the slit slowly open, and
+begin to turn as it were inside out, exactly like the finger of a
+glove, which has been pushed in at the tip, gradually rises up when you
+put your finger inside it. As this goes on, a bundle of threads appears,
+at first closed like a bud, but gradually opening out into a crown of
+tentacles (_a_, Fig. 72), each one clothed with hairs. Then you will see
+that the slit was not exactly a slit after all, but the round edge where
+the sac was pushed in. Ah! you will say, you are now showing me a polyp
+like those on the sertularian tree. Not so fast, my friend; you have not
+yet studied what is still under the covering skin and hidden in the
+living animal. I have, however, prepared a slide with this membrane
+removed (see Fig. 73), and there you can observe the different parts,
+and learn that each one of these alcoves contains a complete animal, and
+not merely one among many mouths, like the polyp on the Sertularia.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 73.
+
+Diagram of the animal in the Flustra or Sea-mat.
+
+1, Animal protruding. 2, Animal retracted in the sheath. _sh_, Covering
+sheath. _s_, Slit. _t_, Tentacles. _m_, Mouth. _th_, Throat. _st_,
+Stomach. _i_, Intestine. _r_, Retractor muscle. _e_, Egg-forming parts.
+_g_, Nerve-ganglion.]
+
+Each of these little beings (_a_, Fig 72) living in its alcove has a
+mouth, throat, stomach, intestine, muscles, and nerves starting from the
+ganglion of nervous matter, besides all that is necessary for producing
+eggs and sending forth young ones. You can trace all these under the
+microscope (see 2, Fig. 73) as the creature lies curiously doubled up in
+its bed, with its body bent in a loop; the intestine _i_, out of which
+the refuse food passes, coming back close up to the slit. When it is at
+rest, the top of the sac in which it lies is pulled in by the retractor
+muscle _r_, and looks, as I have said, like the finger of a glove with
+the top pushed in. When it wishes to feed, this top is drawn out by
+muscles running round the sac, and the tentacles open and wave in the
+water (1, Fig. 73).
+
+Look now at the alcoves, the homes of these animals; see how tiny they
+are and how closely they fit together. Mr. Gosse, the naturalist, has
+reckoned that there are 6720 alcoves in a square inch; then if you turn
+the leaf over you will see that there is another set, fixed back to back
+with these, on the other side, making in all 13,440 alcoves. Now a
+moderate-sized leaf of flustra measures about three square inches,
+taking all the rounded lobes into account, so you will see we get 40,320
+as a rough estimate of the number of beings on this one leaf. But if you
+look at this tuft I have brought, you will find it is composed of twelve
+such leaves, and this after all is a very small part of the mass growing
+round my pool. Was I wrong, then, when I said that my miniature ocean
+contains as many millions of beings as there are stars in the heavens?
+
+You will want to know how these leaves grew, and it is in this way.
+First a little free swimming animal, a mere living sac provided with
+lashes, settles down and grows into one little horny alcove, with its
+live creature inside, which in time sends off from it three to five
+buds, forming alcoves all round the top and sides of the first one,
+growing on to it. These again bud out, and you can thus easily
+understand that, in this way, in time a good-sized leaf is formed.
+Meanwhile the creatures also send forth new swimming cells, which settle
+down near to begin new leaves, and thus a tuft is formed; and long after
+the beings in earlier parts of the leaf have died and left their alcoves
+empty, those round the margin are still alive and spreading.
+
+With this history we must stop for to-day, and I expect it will be many
+weeks before you have thoroughly examined the specimens of each kind
+which I have put in the aquarium. If you can trace the spore-cells and
+urns in the seaweeds, observe the polyps in the Sertularia, and count
+the number of mouths on a branch of my animal fringe (_Sertularia
+tenella_); if you make acquaintance with the Thuricolla in its vase, and
+are fortunate enough to see one divide in two; if you learn to know some
+of the beautiful forms of diatoms, and can picture to yourselves the
+life of the tiny inhabitants of the Flustra; then you will have used
+your microscope with some effect, and be prepared for an expedition to
+my pool, where we will go together some day to seek new treasures.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE DARTMOOR PONIES,
+
+OR
+
+THE WANDERINGS OF THE HORSE TRIBE
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Put away the telescopes and microscopes to-day, boys, the holidays are
+close at hand, and we will take a rest from peeping and peering till we
+come back in the autumn laden with specimens for the microscope, while
+the rapidly darkening evenings will tempt us again on to the lawn
+star-gazing. On this our last lecture-day I want you to take a journey
+with me which I took in imagination a few days ago, as I lay on my back
+on the sunny moor and watched the Dartmoor ponies.
+
+It was a calm misty morning one day last week, giving promise of a
+bright and sunny day, when I started off for a long walk across the moor
+to visit the famous stone-circles, many of which are to be found not
+far off the track, called Abbot's Way, leading from Buckfast Abbey, on
+the Dart, to the Abbey of Tavistock, on the Tavy.
+
+My mind was full of the olden times as I pictured to myself how, seven
+hundred years or more ago, some Benedictine monk from Tavistock Abbey,
+in his black robe and cowl, paced this narrow path on his way to his
+Cistercian brethren at Buckfast, meeting some of them on his road as
+they wandered over the desolate moor in their white robes and black
+scapularies in search of stray sheep. For the Cistercians were shepherds
+and wool-weavers, while the Benedictines devoted themselves to learning,
+and the track of about twenty-five miles from one abbey to the other,
+which still remains, was worn by the members of the two communities and
+their dependents, the only variety in whose lives consisted probably in
+these occasional visits one to the other.
+
+Yet even these monks belonged to modern times compared to the ancient
+Britons who raised the stone-circles, and buried their dead in the
+barrows scattered here and there over the moor; and my mind drifted back
+to the days when, long before that pathway was worn, men clad in the
+skins of beasts hunted wild animals over the ground on which I was
+treading, and lived in caves and holes of the ground.
+
+I wondered, as I thought of them, whether the cultured monks and the
+uncivilised Britons delighted as much in the rugged scenery of the moor
+as I did that morning. For many miles in front of me the moor stretched
+out wild and treeless; the sun was shining brightly upon the mass of
+yellow furze and deep-red heather, drawing up the moisture from the
+ground, and causing a kind of watery haze to shimmer over the landscape;
+while the early mist was rising off the _tors_, or hill-tops, in the
+distance, curling in fanciful wreaths around the rugged and stony
+summits, as it dispersed gradually in the increasing heat of the day.
+
+The cattle which were scattered in groups here and there feeding on the
+dewy grass were enjoying the happiest time of the year. The moor, which
+in winter affords them scarcely a bare subsistence, is now richly
+covered with fresh young grass, and the sturdy oxen fed solemnly and
+deliberately, while the wild Dartmoor ponies and their colts scampered
+joyously along, shaking their manes and long flowing tails, and neighing
+to each other as they went; or clustered together on some verdant spot,
+where the colts teased and bit each other for fun, as they gambolled
+round their mothers.
+
+It was a pleasure, there on the open moor, with the lark soaring
+overhead, and the butterflies and bees hovering among the sweet-smelling
+furze blossoms, to see horses free and joyous, with no thought of bit or
+bridle, harness or saddle, whose hoofs had never been handled by the
+shoeing-smith, nor their coats touched with the singeing iron. Those
+little colts, with their thick heads, shaggy coats, and flowing tails,
+will have at least two years more freedom before they know what it is to
+be driven or beaten. Only once a year are they gathered together,
+claimed by their owners and branded with an initial, and then left
+again to wander where they will. True, it is a freedom which sometimes
+has its drawbacks, for if the winter is severe the only food they can
+get will be the furze-tops, off which they scrape the snow with their
+feet; yet it is very precious in itself, for they can gallop when and
+where they choose, with head erect, sniffing at the wind and crying to
+each other for the very joy of life.
+
+Now as I strolled across the moor and watched their gambols, thinking
+how like free wild animals they seemed, my thoughts roamed far away, and
+I saw in imagination scenes where other untamed animals of the horse
+tribe are living unfettered all their lives long.
+
+First there rose before my mind the level grass-covered pampas of South
+America, where wild horses share the boundless plains with troops of the
+rhea, or American ostrich, and wander, each horse with as many mares as
+he can collect, in companies of hundreds or even thousands in a troop.
+These horses are now truly wild, and live freely from youth to age,
+unless they are unfortunate enough to be caught in the more inhabited
+regions by the lasso of the hunter. In the broad pampas, the home of
+herds of wild cattle, they dread nothing. There, as they roam with one
+bold stallion as their leader, even beasts of prey hesitate to approach
+them, for, when they form into a dense mass with the mothers and young
+in their centre, their heels deal blows which even the fierce jaguar
+does not care to encounter, and they trample their enemy to death in a
+very short time. Yet these are not the original wild horses we are
+seeking, they are the descendants of tame animals, brought from Europe
+by the Spaniards to Buenos Ayres in 1535, whose descendants have
+regained their freedom on the boundless pampas and prairies.
+
+As I was picturing them careering over the plains, another scene
+presented itself and took their place. Now I no longer saw around me
+tall pampas-grass with the long necks of the rheas appearing above it,
+for I was on the edge of a dreary scantily covered plain between the
+Aral Sea and the Balkash Lake in Tartary. To the south lies a barren
+sandy desert, to the north the fertile plains of the Kirghiz steppes,
+where the Tartar feeds his flocks, and herds of antelopes gallop over
+the fresh green pasture; and between these is a kind of no-man's land,
+where low scanty shrubs and stunted grass seemed to promise but a poor
+feeding-ground.
+
+Yet here the small long-legged but powerful "Tarpans," the wild horses
+of the treeless plains of Russia and Tartary, were picking their morning
+meal. Sturdy wicked little fellows they are, with their shaggy
+light-brown coats, short wiry manes, erect ears, and fiery watchful
+eyes. They might well be supposed to be true wild horses, whose
+ancestors had never been tamed by man; and yet it is more probable that
+even they escaped in early times from the Tartars, and have held their
+own ever since, over the grassy steppes of Russia and on the confines of
+the plains of Tartary. Sometimes they live almost alone, especially on
+the barren wastes where they have been seen in winter, scraping the snow
+off the herbage as our ponies do on Dartmoor. At other times, as in the
+south of Russia, where they wander between the Dnieper and the Don, they
+gather in vast herds and live a free life, not fearing even the wolves,
+which they beat to the ground with their hoofs. From one green oasis to
+another they travel over miles of ground.
+
+    "A thousand horse--and none to ride!
+    With flowing tail, and flying mane,
+    Wide nostrils--never stretch'd by pain,
+    Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,
+    And feet that iron never shod,
+    And flanks unscarr'd by spur or rod.
+    A thousand horse, the wild, the free,
+    Like waves that follow o'er the sea."[1]
+
+  [1] Byron's _Mazeppa_.
+
+As I followed them in their course I fancied I saw troops of yet another
+animal of the horse tribe, the "Kulan," or _Equus hemionus_, which is a
+kind of half horse, half ass (Fig. 74), living on the Kirghiz steppes of
+Tartary and spreading far beyond the range of the Tarpan into Tibet.
+Here at last we have a truly wild animal, never probably brought into
+subjection by man. The number of names he possesses shows how widely he
+has spread. The Tartars call him "Kulan," the Tibetans "Kiang," while
+the Mongolians give him the unpronounceable name of "Dschiggetai." He
+will not submit to any of them, but if caught and confined soon breaks
+away again to his old life, a "free and fetterless creature."
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 74.
+
+_Equus hemionus_, "Kiang" or "Kulan," the Horse-ass of Tartary and
+Tibet. (Brehm.)]
+
+No one has ever yet settled the question whether he is a horse or an
+ass, probably because he represents an animal truly between the two.
+His head is graceful, his body light, his legs slender and fleet, yet
+his ears are long and ass-like; he has narrow hoofs, and a tail with a
+tuft at the end like all the ass tribe; his colour is a yellow brown,
+and he has a short dark mane and a long dark stripe down his back as a
+donkey has, though this last character you may also see in many of our
+Devonshire ponies. Living often on the high plateaux, sometimes as much
+as 1500 feet above the sea, this "child of the steppes" travels in large
+companies even as far as the rich meadows of Central Asia; in summer
+wandering in green pastures, and in winter seeking the hunger-steppes
+where sturdy plants grow. And when autumn comes the young steeds go off
+alone to the mountain heights to survey the country around and call
+wildly for mates, whom, when found, they will keep close to them through
+all the next year, even though they mingle with thousands of others.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 75.
+
+Przevalsky's Wild Horse, the "Kertag" or "Statur."]
+
+Till about ten years ago the _Equus hemionus_ was the only truly wild
+horse known, but in the winter of 1879-80 the Russian traveller
+Przevalsky brought back from Central Asia a much more horse-like animal,
+called by the Tartars "Kertag" and by the Mongols "Statur." It is a
+clumsy, thick-set, whitish-gray creature with strong legs and a large,
+heavy, reddish-coloured head; its legs have a red tint down to the
+knees, beyond which they are blackish down to the hoofs. But the ears
+are small, and it has the broad hoofs of the true horse, and warts on
+his hind legs, which no animal of the ass tribe has. This horse, like
+the Kiang, travels in small troops of from five to fifteen, led through
+the wildest parts of the Dsungarian desert, between the Altai and
+Tianschan Mountains, by an old stallion. They are extremely shy, and
+see, hear, and smell very quickly, so that they are off like lightning
+whenever anything approaches them.
+
+So having travelled over America, Europe, and Asia, was my quest ended?
+No; for from the dreary Asiatic deserts my thoughts wandered to a far
+warmer and more fertile land, where between the Blue Nile and the Red
+Sea rise the lofty highlands of Abyssinia, among which the African wild
+ass (_Asinus taeniopus_), the probable ancestor of our donkeys, feeds in
+troops on the rich grasses of the slopes, and then onwards to the bank
+of a river in Central Africa where on the edge of a forest, with rich
+pastures beyond, elephants and rhinoceroses, antelopes and buffaloes,
+lions and hyaenas, creep down in the cool of the evening to slake their
+thirst in the flowing stream. There I saw the herds of Zebras in all
+their striped beauty coming down from the mountain regions to the north,
+and mingling with the darker-coloured but graceful quaggas from the
+southern plains, and I half-grieved at the thought how these untamed and
+free rovers are being slowly but surely surrounded by man closing in
+upon them on every side.
+
+I might now have travelled still farther in search of the Onager, or
+wild ass of the Asiatic and Indian deserts, but at this point a more
+interesting and far wider question presented itself, as I flung myself
+down on the moor to ponder over the early history of all these tribes.
+
+Where have they all come from? Where shall we look for the first
+ancestors of these wild and graceful animals? For the answer to this
+question I had to travel back to America, to those Western United States
+where Professor Marsh has made such grand discoveries in horse history.
+For there, in the very country where horses were supposed never to have
+been before the Spaniards brought them a few centuries ago, we have now
+found the true birthplace of the equine race.
+
+Come back with me to a time so remote that we cannot measure it even by
+hundreds of thousands of years, and let us visit the territories of Utah
+and Wyoming. Those highlands were very different then from what they are
+now. Just risen out of the seas of the Cretaceous Period, they were then
+clothed with dense forests of palms, tree-ferns, and screw-pines,
+magnolias and laurels, interspersed with wide-spreading lakes, on the
+margins of which strange and curious animals fed and flourished. There
+were large beasts with teeth like the tapir and the bear, and feet like
+the elephant; and others far more dangerous, half bear, half hyaena,
+prowling around to attack the clumsy paleotherium or the anoplotherium,
+something between a rhinoceros and a horse, which grazed by the
+waterside, while graceful antelopes fed on the rich grass. And among
+these were some little animals no bigger than foxes, with four toes and
+a splint for the fifth, on their front feet, and three toes on the hind
+ones.
+
+These clumsy little animals, whose bones have been found in the rocks of
+Utah and Wyoming, have been called _Eohippus_, or horses of the dawn,
+by naturalists. They were animals with real toes, yet their bones and
+teeth show that they belonged to the horse tribe, and already the fifth
+toe common to most other toed animals was beginning to disappear.
+
+This was in the Eocene period, and before it passed away with its
+screw-pines and tree-ferns, another rather larger animal, called the
+_Orohippus_, had taken the place of the small one, and he had only four
+toes on his front feet. The splint had disappeared, and as time went on
+still other animals followed, always with fewer toes, while they gained
+slender fleet legs, together with an increase in size and in
+gracefulness. First one as large as a sheep (_Mesohippus_) had only
+three toes and a splint. Then the splint again disappeared, and one
+large and two dwindling toes only remained, till finally these two
+became mere splints, leaving one large toe or hoof with almost
+imperceptible splints, which may be seen on the fetlock of a horse's
+skeleton.
+
+The diagram (Fig 76) shows these splints in the horse's or ass's foot of
+to-day. For you must notice that a horse's foot really begins at the
+point _w_ which we call his knee in the front legs, and at his hock _h_
+in the hind legs. His true knee _k_ and elbow _e_ are close up to the
+body. What we call his foot or hoof is really the end of the strong,
+broad, middle toe _t_ covered with a hoof, and farther up his foot at
+_s_ and _s_ we can feel two small splints, which are remains of two
+other toes.
+
+Meanwhile during these long succeeding ages while the foot was
+lengthening out into a slender limb the animals became larger, more
+powerful, and more swift, the neck and head became longer and more
+graceful, the brain-case larger in front and the teeth decreased in
+number, so that there is now a large gap between the biting teeth _i_
+and the grinding teeth _g_ of a horse. Their slender limbs too became
+more flexible and fit for running and galloping, till we find the whole
+skeleton the same in shape, though not in size, as in our own horses and
+asses now.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 76.
+
+Skeleton of Horse or Ass.
+
+_i_, Incisor teeth. _g_, Grinding teeth, with the gap between the two as
+in all grass-feeders. _k_, Knee. _h_, Hock or heel. _f_, Foot. _s_,
+Splints or remains of the two lost toes. _e_, Elbow. _w_, Wrist. _ha_,
+Hand-bone. _t_, middle toe of three joints, 1, 2, 3 forming the hoof.]
+
+They did not, however, during all this time remain confined to America,
+for, from the time when they arrived at an animal called _Miohippus_, or
+lesser horse, which came after the Mesohippus and had only three toes
+on each foot, we find their remains in Europe, where they lived in
+company with the giraffes, opossums, and monkeys which roamed over these
+parts in those ancient times. Then a little later we find them in Africa
+and India; so that the horse tribe, represented by creatures about as
+large as donkeys, had spread far and wide over the world.
+
+And now, curiously enough, they began to forsake, or to die out in, the
+land of their birth. Why they did so we do not know; but while in the
+old world as asses, quaggas, and zebras, and probably horses, they
+flourished in Asia, Europe, and Africa, they certainly died out in
+America, so that ages afterwards, when that land was discovered, no
+animal of the horse tribe was found in it.
+
+And the true horse, where did he arise? Born and bred probably in
+Central Asia from some animal like the "Kulan," or the "Kertag," he
+proved too useful to savage tribes to be allowed his freedom, and it is
+doubtful whether in any part of the world he escaped subjection. In our
+own country he probably roamed as a wild animal till the savages, who
+fed upon him, learned in time to put him to work; and when the Romans
+came they found the Britons with fine and well-trained horses.
+
+Yet though tamed and made to know his master he has, as we have seen,
+broken loose again in almost all parts of the world--in America on the
+prairies and pampas, in Europe and Asia on the steppes, and in Australia
+in the bush. And even in Great Britain, where so few patches of
+uncultivated land still remain, the young colts of Dartmoor, Exmoor,
+and Shetland, though born of domesticated mothers, seem to assert their
+descent from wild and free ancestors as they throw out their heels and
+toss up their heads with a shrill neigh, and fly against the wind with
+streaming manes and outstretched tails as the Kulan, the Tarpan, and the
+Zebra do in the wild desert or grassy plain.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE MAGICIAN'S DREAM OF ANCIENT DAYS.
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The magician sat in his armchair in the one little room in the house
+which was his, and his only, besides the observatory. And a strange room
+it was. The walls were hung with skulls and bones of men and animals,
+with swords, daggers, and shields, coats of mail, and bronze
+spear-heads. The drawers, many of which stood open, contained
+flint-stones chipped and worn, arrowheads of stone, jade hatchets
+beautifully polished, bronze buckles and iron armlets; while scattered
+among these were pieces of broken pottery, some rough and only
+half-baked, others beautifully finished, as the Romans knew how to
+finish them. Rough needles made of bone lay beside bronze knives with
+richly-ornamented handles and, most precious of all, on the table by the
+magician's side lay a reindeer antler, on which was roughly carved the
+figure of the reindeer itself.
+
+He had been enjoying a six weeks' holiday, and he had employed it in
+visiting some of the bone caves of Europe to learn about the men who
+lived in them long, long ago. He had been to the south of France to see
+the famous caves of the Dordogne, to Belgium to the caves of Engis and
+Engihoul, to the Hartz Mountains and to Hungary. Then hastening home he
+had visited the chief English caves in Yorkshire, Wales, and Devonshire.
+
+Now that he had returned to his college, his mind was so full of facts,
+that he felt perplexed how to lay before his class the wonderful story
+of the life of man before history began. And as the day was hot, and the
+very breeze which played around him made him feel languid and sleepy, he
+fell into a reverie--a waking dream.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+First the room faded from his sight, then the trim villages disappeared;
+the homesteads, the corn-fields, the grazing cattle, all were gone, and
+he saw the whole of England covered with thick forests and rough
+uncultivated land. From the mountains in the north, glaciers were to be
+seen creeping down the valleys between dense masses of fir and oak, pine
+and birch; while the wild horse, the bison, and the Irish elk were
+feeding on the plains. As he looked southward and eastward he saw that
+the sea no longer washed the shores, for the English and Irish Channels
+were not yet scooped out. The British Isles were still part of the
+continent of Europe, so that animals could migrate overland from the
+far south, up to what is now England, Scotland, and Ireland. Many of
+these animals, too, were very different from any now living in the
+country, for in the large rivers of England he saw the hippopotamus
+playing with her calf, while elephants and rhinoceroses were drinking at
+the water's edge. Yet these strange creatures did not have all the
+country to themselves--wolves, bears, and foxes prowled in the woods,
+large beavers built their dams across the streams, and here and there
+over the country human beings were living in caves and holes of the
+earth.
+
+It was these men chiefly who attracted the magician's attention, and
+being curious to know how they lived, he turned towards a cave, at the
+mouth of which was a group of naked children who were knocking pieces of
+flint together, trying to strike off splinters and make rough flint
+tools, such as they saw their fathers use. Not far off from them a woman
+with a wild beast's skin round her waist was gathering firewood, another
+was grubbing up roots, and another, venturing a little way into the
+forest, was searching for honey in the hollows of the tree trunks.
+
+All at once in the dusk of the evening a low growl and a frightened cry
+were heard, and the women rushed towards the cave as they saw near the
+edge of the forest a huge tiger with sabre-shaped teeth struggling with
+a powerful stag. In vain the deer tried to stamp on his savage foe or to
+wound him with his antlers; the strong teeth of the tiger had penetrated
+his throat, and they fell struggling together as the stag uttered his
+death-cry. Just at that moment loud shouts were heard in the forest, and
+the frightened women knew that help was near.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 77.
+
+Palaeolithic times.]
+
+One after another, several men, clothed in skins hung over one shoulder
+and secured round the waist, rushed out of the thicket, their hair
+streaming in the wind, and ran towards the tiger. They held in their
+hands strange weapons made of rough pointed flints fastened into handles
+by thongs of skin, and as the tiger turned upon them with a cry of rage
+they met him with a rapid shower of blows. The fight raged fiercely,
+for the beast was strong and the weapons of the men were rude, but the
+tiger lay dead at last by the side of his victim. His skin and teeth
+were the reward of the hunters, and the stag he had killed became their
+prey.
+
+How skilfully they hacked it to pieces with their stone axes, and then
+loading it upon their shoulders set off up the hill towards the cave,
+where they were welcomed with shouts of joy by the women and children!
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 78.
+
+Palaeolithic relics.
+
+1, Bone needle, from a cave at La Madeleine, 1/2 size. 2, Tooth of
+Machairodus or sabre-toothed tiger, from Kent's Cavern, 1/2 size. 3,
+Rough stone implement, from Kent's Cavern, 1/4 size.]
+
+Then began the feast. First fires were kindled slowly and with
+difficulty by rubbing a sharp-pointed stick in a groove of softer wood
+till the wood-dust burst into flame; then a huge pile was lighted at the
+mouth of the cave to cook the food and keep off wild beasts. How the
+food was cooked the magician could not see, but he guessed that the
+flesh was cut off the bones and thrust in the glowing embers, and he
+watched the men afterwards splitting open the uncooked bones to suck out
+the raw marrow which savages love.
+
+After the feast was over he noticed how they left these split bones
+scattered upon the floor of the cave mingling with the sabre-shaped
+teeth of the tiger, and this reminded him of the bones of the stag and
+the tiger's tooth which he had found in Kent's Cavern in Devonshire only
+a few days before.
+
+By this time the men had lain down to sleep, and in the darkness strange
+cries were heard from the forest. The roar of the lion, mingled with the
+howling of the wolves and the shrill laugh of the hyaenas, told that they
+had come down to feed on the remains of the tiger. But none of these
+animals ventured near the glowing fire at the mouth of the cavern,
+behind which the men slept in security till the sun was high in the
+heavens. Then all was astir again, for weapons had been broken in the
+fight, and some of the men sitting on the ground outside the cave placed
+one flint between their knees, and striking another sharply against it
+drove off splinters, leaving a pointed end and cutting edge. They
+spoiled many before they made one to their liking, and the entrance to
+the cave was strewn with splintered fragments and spoilt flints, but at
+last several useful stones were ready. Meanwhile another man, taking his
+rude stone axe, set to work to hew branches from the trees to form
+handles, while another, choosing a piece remaining of the body of the
+stag, tore a sinew from the thigh, and threading it through the large
+eye of the bone needle, stitched the tiger's skin roughly together into
+a garment.
+
+"_This, then_," said the magician to himself, "_is how ancient man lived
+in the summer-time, but how would he fare when winter came?_" As he
+mused the scene gradually changed. The glaciers crept far lower down
+the valleys, and the hills, and even the lower ground, lay thick in
+snow. The hippopotamus had wandered away southward to warmer climes, as
+animals now migrate over the continent of America in winter, and with
+him had gone the lion, the southern elephant, and other summer visitors.
+In their place large herds of reindeer and shaggy oxen had come down
+from the north and were spread over the plains, scraping away the snow
+with their feet to feed on the grass beneath. The mammoth, too, or hairy
+elephant, of the same extinct species as those which have been found
+frozen in solid ice under a sandbank in Siberia, had come down to feed,
+accompanied by the woolly rhinoceros; and scattered over the hills were
+the curious horned musk-sheep, which have long ago disappeared off the
+face of the earth. Still, bitterly cold as it was, the hunter clad in
+his wild-beast skin came out from time to time to chase the mammoth, the
+reindeer, and the oxen for food, and cut wood in the forest to feed the
+cavern fires.
+
+This time the magician's thoughts wandered down to the south-west of
+France, where, on the banks of a river in that part now called the
+Dordogne, a number of caves not far from each other formed the home of
+savage man. Here he saw many new things, for the men used arrows of
+deer-horn and of wood pointed with flint, and with these they shot the
+birds, which were hovering near in hopes of finding food during the
+bitter weather. By the side of the river a man was throwing a small dart
+of deer-horn fastened to a cord of sinews, with which from time to time
+he speared a large fish and drew it to the bank.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 79.
+
+Mammoth engraved on ivory by Palaeolithic man.]
+
+But the most curious sight of all, among such a rude people, was a man
+sitting by the glowing fire at the mouth of one of the caves scratching
+a piece of reindeer horn with a pointed flint, while the children
+gathered round him to watch his work. What was he doing? See! gradually
+the rude scratches began to take shape, and two reindeer fighting
+together could be recognised upon the horn handle. This he laid
+carefully aside, and taking a piece of ivory, part of the tusk of a
+mammoth, he worked away slowly and carefully till the children grew
+tired of watching and went off to play behind the fire. Then the
+magician, glancing over his shoulder, saw a true figure of the mammoth
+scratched upon the ivory, his hairy skin, long mane, and up-curved tusks
+distinguishing him from all elephants living now. "_Ah_," exclaimed the
+magician aloud, "_that is the drawing on ivory found in the cave of La
+Madeleine in Dordogne, proving that man existed ages ago, and even knew
+how to draw figures, at a time when the mammoth, or hairy elephant, long
+since extinct, was still living on the earth!_"
+
+With these words he started from his reverie, and knew that he had been
+dreaming of Palaeolithic man who, with his tools of rough flints, had
+lived in Europe so long ago that his date cannot be fixed by years, or
+centuries, or even thousands of years. Only this is known, that, since
+he lived, the mammoth, the sabre-toothed tiger, the cave-bear, the
+woolly rhinoceros, the cave-hyaena, the musk-sheep, and many other
+animals have died out from off the face of the earth; the hippopotamus
+and the lion have left Europe and retired to Africa, and the sea has
+flowed in where land once was, cutting off Great Britain and Ireland
+from the continent.
+
+How long all these changes were in taking place no one knows. When the
+magician drifted back again into his dream the land had long been
+desolate, and the hyaenas, which had always taken possession of the caves
+whenever the men deserted them for awhile, had now been undisturbed for
+a long time, and had left on the floor of the cave gnawed skulls and
+bones, and jaws of animals, more or less scored with the marks of their
+teeth, and these had become buried in a thick layer of earth. The
+magician knew that these teeth marks had been made by hyaenas, both
+because living hyaenas leave exactly such marks on bones in the present
+day, and because the hyaena bones alone were not gnawed, showing that no
+animals preyed upon their flesh. He knew too that the hyaenas had been
+there long after man had ceased to use the caves, because no flint
+tools were found among the bones. But now the age of hyaenas, too, was
+past and gone, and the caves had been left so long undisturbed that in
+many of them the water dripping from the roof had left film after film
+of carbonate of lime upon the floor, which as the centuries went by
+became a layer of stalagmite many feet thick, sealing down the secrets
+of the past.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The face of the country was now entirely changed. The glaciers were
+gone, and so, too, were all the strange animals. True, the reindeer, the
+wild ox, and even here and there the Irish elk, were still feeding in
+the valleys; wolves and bears still made the country dangerous, and
+beavers built their dams across the streams, which were now much smaller
+than formerly, and flowed in deeper channels, carved out by water during
+the interval; but the elephants, rhinoceroses, lions, and tigers were
+gone never to return, and near the caves in which some of the people
+lived, and the rude underground huts which formed the homes of others,
+tame sheep and goats were lying with dogs to watch them. Also, though
+the land was still covered with dense forests, yet here and there small
+clearings had been made, where patches of corn and flax were growing.
+Naked children still played about as before, but now they were moulding
+cups of clay like those in which food was being cooked on the fire
+outside the caves or huts. Some of the women, dressed partly in skins of
+beasts, partly in rough woven linen, were spinning flax into thread,
+using as a spinning-whorl a small round stone with a hole in the middle
+tied to the end of the flax, as a weight to enable them to twirl it.
+Others were grinding corn in the hollow of a large stone by rubbing
+another stone within it.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 80.
+
+Neolithic implements.
+
+1, Stone hatchet mounted in wood. 2, Jade celt, a polished stone weapon,
+from Livermore in Suffolk, 1/4 size. 3, Spindle whorl, 1/2 size.]
+
+The men, while they still spent much time in hunting, had now other
+duties in tending the sheep and goats, or looking after the hogs as they
+turned up the ground in the forest for roots, or sowing and reaping
+their crops. Yet still all the tools were made of stone, no longer rough
+and merely chipped like the old stone weapons, but neatly cut and
+polished. Stone axes with handles of deer-horn, stone spears and
+javelins, stone arrowheads beautifully finished, sling-stones and
+scrapers, were among their weapons and tools, and with them they made
+many delicate implements of bone. On the broad lakes which here and
+there broke the monotony of the forests, canoes, made of the trunks of
+trees hollowed out by fire, were being paddled by one man, while
+another threw out his fishing line armed with delicate bone-hooks; and
+on the banks of the lakes, nets weighted with drilled stones tied on to
+the meshes were dragged up full of fish.
+
+For these Neolithic men, or men of the New Stone Period, who used
+polished stone weapons, were farmers and shepherds and fishermen. They
+knew how to make rude pottery, and kept domestic animals. Moreover, they
+either came from the east or exchanged goods by barter with tribes
+living more to the eastward, now that canoes enabled them to cross the
+sea; for many of their weapons were made of greenstone or jade, and of
+other kinds of stone not to be found in Europe, and their sheep and
+goats were animals of eastern origin. They understood how to unite to
+protect their homes, for they made underground huts by digging down
+several feet into the ground and roofing the hole over with wood coated
+with clay; and often long passages underground united these huts, while
+in many places on the hills, camps, made of ramparts of earth surrounded
+by ditches, served as strongholds for the women and children and the
+flocks and herds, when some neighbouring tribe attacked their
+homesteads.
+
+Still, however, where caves were ready to hand they used them for
+houses, and the same shelter which had been the home of the ancient
+hunters, now resounded with the voices of the shepherds, who, treading
+on the sealed floor, little dreamt that under their feet lay the remains
+of a bygone age.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 81.
+
+A burial in Neolithic times.]
+
+And now, as our dreamer watched this new race of men fashioning their
+weapons, feeding their oxen, and hunting the wild stag, his attention
+was arrested by a long train of people crossing a neighbouring plain,
+weeping and wailing as they went. At the head of this procession, lying
+on a stretcher made of tree-boughs, lay a dead chieftain, and as the
+line moved on, men threw down their tools, and women their spinning, and
+joined the throng. On they went to where two upright slabs of stone with
+another laid across them formed the opening to a long mound or chamber.
+Into this the bearers passed with lighted torches, and in a niche ready
+prepared placed the dead chieftain in a sitting posture with the knees
+drawn up, placing by his side his flint spear and polished axe, his
+necklace of shells, and the bowl from which he had fed. Then followed
+the funeral feast, when, with shouts and wailing, fires were lighted,
+and animals slaughtered and cooked, while the chieftain was not
+forgotten, but portions were left for his use, and then the earth was
+piled up again around the mouth of the chamber, till it should be opened
+at some future time to place another member of his family by his side,
+or till in after ages the antiquary should rifle his resting-place to
+study the mode of burial in the Neolithic or Polished Stone Age.
+
+Time passed on in the magician's dream, and little by little the caves
+were entirely deserted as men learnt to build huts of wood and stone.
+And as they advanced in knowledge they began to melt metals and pour
+them into moulds, making bronze knives and hatchets, swords and spears;
+and they fashioned brooches and bracelets of bronze and gold, though
+they still also used their necklaces of shells and their polished stone
+weapons. They began, too, to keep ducks and fowls, cows and horses; they
+knew how to weave in looms, and to make cloaks and tunics; and when they
+buried their dead it was no longer in a crouching position. They laid
+them decently to rest, as if in sleep, in the barrows where they are
+found to this day with bronze weapons by their side.
+
+Then as time went on they learnt to melt even hard iron, and to beat it
+into swords and plough-shares, and they lived in well-built huts with
+stone foundations. Their custom of burial, too, was again changed, and
+they burnt their dead, placing the ashes in a funeral urn.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 82.
+
+British relics.
+
+1, A coin of the age of Constantine. 2, Bronze weapon from a Suffolk
+barrow. 3, Bronze bracelet from Liss in Hampshire.]
+
+By this time the Britons, as they were now called, had begun to gather
+together in villages and towns, and the Romans ruled over them. Now when
+men passed through the wild country they were often finely dressed in
+cloth tunics, wearing arm rings of gold, some even driving in
+war-chariots, carrying shields made of wickerwork covered with leather.
+Still many of the country people who laboured in the field kept their
+old clothing of beast skins; they grew their corn and stored it in
+cavities of the rocks; they made basket-work boats covered with skin, in
+which they ventured out to sea. So things went on for a long period till
+at last a troubled time came, and the quiet valleys were disturbed by
+wandering people who fled from the towns and took refuge in the
+forests; for the Romans after three hundred and fifty years of rule had
+gone back home to Italy, and a new and barbarous people called the
+Jutes, Angles, and Saxons, came over the sea from Jutland and drove the
+Britons from their homes.
+
+[Illustration: Fig. 83.
+
+Britons taking refuge in the Cave.]
+
+And so once more the caves became the abode of man, for the harassed
+Britons brought what few things they could carry away from their houses
+and hid themselves there from their enemies. How little they thought, as
+they lay down to sleep on the cavern floor, that beneath them lay the
+remains of two ages of men! They knew nothing of the woman who had
+dropped her stone spindle-whorl into the fire, on which the food of
+Neolithic man had been cooking in rough pots of clay; they never dug
+down to the layer of gnawed bones, nor did they even in their dreams
+picture the hyaena haunting his ancient den, for a hyaena was an animal
+they had never seen. Still less would they have believed that at one
+time, countless ages before, their island had been part of the
+continent, and that men, living in the cave where they now lay, had cut
+down trees with rough flints, and fought with such unknown animals as
+the mammoth and the sabre-toothed tiger.
+
+But the magician saw it all passing before him, even as he also saw
+these Britons carrying into the cave their brooches, bracelets, and
+finger rings, their iron spears and bronze daggers, and all their little
+household treasures which they had saved in their flight. And among
+these, mingling in the heap, he recognised Roman coins bearing the
+inscription of the Emperor Constantine, and he knew that it was by these
+coins that he had, a few days before in Yorkshire, been able to fix the
+date of the British occupation of a cave.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+And with this his dream ended, and he found himself clutching firmly the
+horn on which Palaeolithic man had engraved the figure of the reindeer.
+He rose, and stretching himself crossed the sunny grass plot of the
+quadrangle and entered his classroom. The boys wondered as he began his
+lecture at the far-away look in his eyes. They did not know how he had
+passed through a vision of countless ages; but that afternoon, for the
+first time, they realised, as he unfolded scene after scene, the history
+of "The Men of Ancient Days."
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+    Abbot's Way across Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Absorption of rays of sunlight, 129
+
+    Abyssinia, wild ass of, 203
+
+    _Actinozoa_, Cydippe allied to the, 190
+
+    Ages, lapse of between old and new stone age, 217
+
+    Alcor, or Jack, 158
+
+    Aldebaran, 149;
+      called so by the Arabs, 153;
+      colour of, 167
+
+    Algol the Variable, 162, 165
+
+    Almach, [Greek: g] Andromedae, 156;
+      a coloured double star, 167
+
+    America, extinction of original horse in, 207
+
+    Andromeda, the great nebula of, 162, 164;
+      double coloured star in, 167
+
+    Animal of the Sea-mat, 191;
+      number in one leaf, 193
+
+    Animal-trees and stony plants, 178
+
+    Animals, extinct, living with man, 211
+
+    Antares, a ruby-red star, 167
+
+    Antherozoids of mosses, 89
+
+    Apothecia of lichens, 83
+
+    Apennines, Lunar, figured, 19
+
+    Archimedes, a lunar crater, 10;
+      smooth centre of, 19
+
+    Arctic lands, lichens in, 82
+
+    Arcturus, colour of, 166
+
+    Aristarchus, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      streaks around, 17
+
+    Aristotle, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Arrows, old stone, 215
+
+    Asia, horse of Central, 201
+
+    _Asinus taeniopus_, 203
+
+    _Aspergillus glaucus_, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Ass tribe, forms allied to the, 201
+
+    Ass, wild of Africa, 203
+
+    Atmosphere, absence of in the moon, 21
+
+    Australia, wild horses of, 207
+
+
+    _Bacillaria Paradoxa_, a diatom, 185
+
+    Bacteria growing on wounds, 66
+
+    Baiae, hill thrown up on Bay of, 103
+
+    Ball, Sir R., on binary stars, 154
+
+    Beehive, triple star near the, 168
+
+    Beer, fermentation of, 65
+
+    Bellatrix, a star in Orion, 148
+
+    Berlin, ground beneath, formed of diatoms, 186
+
+    Bessel, on movements of Sirius, 169
+
+    Betelgeux, a star in Orion, 148
+
+    Binary star in Great Bear, 157, 158
+
+    Binary stars, 154, 166, 170
+
+    Bog-moss or Sphagnum, 93
+
+    Bog-mosses, distribution of, 94
+
+    Bombs, volcanic, 105
+
+    Booetis [Greek: e], a coloured double star, 167
+
+    Britons inhabiting caves, 224;
+      ornaments and customs of, 223
+
+    Britons of Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Bronze weapon and bracelet, 223
+
+    Bryum or thread moss, 77
+
+    Buckfast Abbey, monks of, 196
+
+    Bunt, a fungus, 64
+
+    Burial in Neolithic times, 221
+
+    Cassiopeia, the constellation, 162;
+      coloured double star in, 167
+
+    Castor, a binary star, 154
+
+    Camera, photographic, 47;
+      attached to the telescope, 121
+
+    Cancer [Greek: z], a triple coloured star, 168
+
+    Candle-flame, image of, formed by lens, 33
+
+    Canis Major, constellation of, 148
+
+    Capella, colour of the star, 153
+
+    Castor, light of compared with a near star, 158
+
+    Caterpillars destroyed by fungus, 66
+
+    Caucasus Mountains on the Moon, 18
+
+    Cave, the three periods of a, 225
+
+    Caves, Palaeolithic and Neolithic, 210;
+      Palaeolithic life in, 211;
+      hyaenas roamed in, 217;
+      Neolithic life in, 218;
+      Britons took refuge in, 224
+
+    Cells, fertile of mushroom, 69;
+      of moss-plant, 89
+
+    Celt, jade, from Suffolk, 219
+
+    Chambers, Mr., his drawing of [Greek: e] Lyrae, 166
+
+    Charles's Wain, 155;
+      part of Great Bear, 157;
+      stars of drifting, 159;
+      stars visible in waggon of, 160;
+      double coloured star in, 158, 167
+
+    _Chilomonas amygdalum_, a monad, 182
+
+    Ciliary muscle, action of the, 34
+
+    Clark, Alvan, on companion of Sirius, 169
+
+    Clockwork of telescope, 2
+
+    _Cocconema lanceolatum_, a diatom, 184
+
+    Coin of age of Constantine, 223
+
+    _Confervae_, growth of, 79
+
+    Commons, Mr., photographed Orion's nebula, 152
+
+    Constantine, coin of age of, 223
+
+    Constellations, maps of, 148, 156
+
+    Copernicus, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      figured, 17;
+      bright streaks around, 18
+
+    Copper-sulphate in lava, 108
+
+    _Corallina_, a stony seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177;
+      appearance like _Sertularia_, 179
+
+    Cornea of the eye, 31
+
+    Corona, nature of the sun's, 123, 137
+
+    Cottam, Mr. A., his plate of coloured stars, 167
+
+    Crater, lava flowing from a, 98;
+      interior of Vesuvius, 100
+
+    Crater-plains, 19-21
+
+    Craters on the moon, 10, 13, 17, 19, 20;
+      of earth and moon compared, 16
+
+    Crystallites in volcanic glass, 109
+
+    Crystallisation, two periods of, in lava, 115
+
+    Crystals forming in artificial lavas, 114;
+      precious, 116
+
+    _Cydippe pileus_, a living jelly-ball, 187;
+      structure of, 188-190
+
+    Cygni [Greek: b], a coloured double star, 167
+
+
+    Dartmoor, fairy rings on, 57, 58;
+      the Sundew on, 56;
+      granite figured, 112;
+      ponies, 195
+
+    De la Rue, his photograph of moon, 13
+
+    Devonshire ponies, black stripe on, 201
+
+    Diatom, a growing, 185
+
+    _Diatoma hyalina_, 184
+
+    Diatoms, magnified fossil, 39;
+      living marine, 184
+
+    Didymium, giving a broken spectrum, 126
+
+    Dordogne, caves of the, 210, 215
+
+    Draper, Prof., photographed Orion's nebula, 152
+
+    _Drosera rotundifolia_ on Dartmoor, 56
+
+    Dschiggetai, horse-ass of Tibet, 200
+
+    Dsungarian desert, wild horse of the, 203
+
+    Dykes, nature of volcanic, 111
+
+
+    Earth, path of the moon round the, 8;
+      magnetic storm on, caused by sun, 14;
+      reservoirs of melted matter in the, 101
+
+    Earthquakes accompanying volcanic outbursts, 102
+
+    Eclipse of sun, red jets and corona seen during, 125
+
+    Eclipse, total, of the moon, 23;
+      lurid light during, 25
+
+    Eclipses, how caused, 7
+
+    Elephant, hairy, engraved on ivory, 216
+
+    _Empusa muscae_, 66
+
+    Engis and Engihoul caves, 210
+
+    England, ancient caves in, 210;
+      in Palaeolithic times, 211
+
+    Eocene, toed horses of the, 205
+
+    _Eohippus_, or horse of the dawn, 205
+
+    _Equus hemionus_, the horse-ass, 202
+
+    Eratosthenes, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Erbia, giving a broken spectrum, 126
+
+    Ergot, a fungus, 61
+
+    Eruptions of Vesuvius, 97, 100, 104
+
+    Eudoxus, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Experiments, necessity for accurate, 54
+
+    Eye, structure of the, 29-32;
+      mode of seeing with the, 32;
+      short-sighted, 29, 35;
+      distances spanned by the naked, 40
+
+
+    Faculae on the sun's face, 122, 140
+
+    Fairy rings, 55;
+      mentioned in _Merry Wives of Windsor_, 57;
+      growth of, 71-73
+
+    Ferments caused by fungi, 60, 64
+
+    Fishing in ancient times, 215, 220
+
+    _Fistulina hepatica_, a fungus, 71
+
+    Flint skeletons of plants, 185
+
+    Flustra or sea-mat, 187;
+      structure of, 191-193
+
+    Fly, fungus killing a, 66
+
+    Focal images, 33;
+      distances, 44
+
+    Fouque, M., artificial lava made by, 112
+
+    Fructification of mushrooms, 69;
+      of lichens, 83;
+      of mosses, 91;
+      of seaweeds, 177
+
+    _Funaria hygrometrica_, urn of the, 89, 91;
+      has no urn lid, 92
+
+    Fungi, nature of, 59;
+      different kinds of, 60;
+      attacking insects, 66;
+      growing on wounds, 66;
+      the use of, 74
+
+    Fungus and green cells in lichen, 81
+
+
+    Gardener, advice of the old, 118
+
+    Gas, spectrum of a, 126
+
+    Gases revealed by spectroscope, 52
+
+    Gemini, the constellation, 154
+
+    Geminorum, [Greek: d], a double coloured star, 167
+
+    Gills of mushroom, 69
+
+    _Gomphonema marinum_, 184
+
+    Gooseberry, fermentation in a, 64
+
+    Gory dew, _Palmella cruenta_, 79
+
+    Graham's island thrown up, 102
+
+    Granular appearance of sun's face, 123
+
+    Grape fungus, 65
+
+    Great Bear, the constellation, 157;
+      binary star in, 158;
+      coloured double star in, 158, 168
+
+    Greenstone, Neolithic weapons of, 220
+
+    Guards, the, in the Little Bear, 162
+
+
+    Hartz Mountains, caves of the, 210
+
+    Hatchet, a Neolithic stone, 219
+
+    Hebrides, volcanic islands of, 111
+
+    Henri, MM., photograph of moon's face by, 19
+
+    Herculaneum, buried, 98, 104
+
+    Herculis [Greek: a], a coloured double star, 168
+
+    Hermitage, lava stream flowing behind the, 97, 99
+
+    Herschel's drawing of Copernicus, 17
+
+    Huggins, Dr., on shape of prominences, 135;
+      on spectra of nebulae, 151;
+      on cause of colour in stars, 168
+
+    Himalayas, single-celled plants in the, 79
+
+    Horse, wild, of the Pampas, 198;
+      of Tartary, 199;
+      of Kirghiz steppes, 200;
+      Przevalsky's, 202;
+      early history of toed, 204;
+      structure of foot and hoof of, 205;
+      skeleton of, 206;
+      origin and migration of early, 207
+
+    Hungary, ancient caves of, 210
+
+    Huyghens, the highest peak in Lunar Apennines, 19
+
+
+    Image formed at focus of lens, 33;
+      of sky in telescope, 49
+
+    Implements, old stone, 213;
+      new stone, 219
+
+    Imps of plant-life, 59
+
+    India, low plants in springs of, 79;
+      solar eclipse seen in, 124;
+      wild ass of, 203
+
+    Infusorial earth, 186
+
+    Infusorians in a seaside pool, 183
+
+    Inhabitants of a seaside pool, 172-174
+
+    Iris of the eye, 30
+
+    Iron pyrites in lava, 108
+
+    Iron slag, lava compared to, 105
+
+    Islands, volcanic thrown up, 102
+
+
+    Jack by the second horse, 157
+
+    Jade, Neolithic weapons of, 220
+
+    Jannsen, Prof., on sun prominences, 131
+
+    Judd, Mr., on volcano of Mull, 111
+
+    Jutes and Angles invading Britain, 224
+
+
+    Kant on nebular hypothesis, 152
+
+    Kent's Cavern, rough stone implement from, 213
+
+    Kepler, a lunar crater, 10;
+      streaks around, 17
+
+    Kertag, or wild horse, 202
+
+    Kew, sun-storm registered at, 143
+
+    Kiang or Kulan, 200
+
+    Kirchhoff, Prof., on sunlight, 128
+
+    Kulan or Kiang, 200
+
+
+    Labrador felspar artificially made, 113
+
+    Langley, Prof., sun-spot drawn by, 141
+
+    Laplace, nebular hypothesis of, 152
+
+    Lava, aspect of flowing, 99;
+      reservoirs of molten, 101;
+      nature of, 107;
+      artificially made, 113;
+      two periods of crystallisation in, 115
+
+    Lava-stream, history of a, 100;
+      section of a, 108;
+      rapid cooling of surface, 108
+
+    Laver or sea-lettuce, structure of, 176
+
+    Leo, the constellation, 155
+
+    Leucotephrite artificially made, 113
+
+    Lens, natural, of the eye, 31;
+      simple magnifying, 35
+
+    Levy, M., artificial lava made by, 112
+
+    Lichens, specimens of from life, 77;
+      the life-history of, 80-84;
+      sections of, 81;
+      distribution of 82, 95;
+      fructification of, 83;
+      causes of success of, 94
+
+    Lick telescope, magnifying power of, 46
+
+    Light, lurid, on moon during eclipse, 24;
+      sifted by spectroscope, 126
+
+    Light-granules on sun's face, 123;
+      supposed explanation of, 141
+
+    Lime-tree, fungi on the, 64
+
+    Liss, bronze bracelet from, 223
+
+    Little Bear, pole-star and guards in the, 162
+
+    Lockyer, Mr., on sun-prominences, 131, 136
+
+    Lunar Apennines figured, 19
+
+    Lyrae [Greek: epsilon], a double-binary star, 166
+
+
+    Machairodus, tooth of, 213
+
+    Madeleine, La, carvings from cave of, 216
+
+    Magic glasses and how to use them, 27;
+      what can be done by, 28, 53
+
+    Magician's chamber, 1;
+      his pupils, 4;
+      spells, 28;
+      his dream of ancient days, 209
+
+    Magnetic connection of sun and earth, 142
+
+    Magnifying-glass, action of a, 35
+
+    Mammoth engraved on ivory, 216
+
+    Maps of constellations, 148, 156
+
+    _Marasmius oreastes_, fairy-ring mushroom, 55, 72
+
+    _Mazeppa_, quotation from Byron's, 201
+
+    Men of older stone age, 212;
+      of Neolithic age, 218
+
+    _Mesohippus_, a toed horse, 205
+
+    Microliths in volcanic glass, 109, 110, 113, 115;
+      formed in artificial lava, 113
+
+    Microscope, 3;
+      action of the, 36-38
+
+    Mildews are fungi, 60
+
+    Milky Way, 149;
+      Cassiopeia in the, 163
+
+    Minerals crystallising in lava, 108
+
+    Mines, increase of temperature in, 101
+
+    Miohippus, or lesser toed horse, 206
+
+    Mizar, a double-coloured star in the Great Bear, 158, 168
+
+    Monads, size and activity of, 183
+
+    Monks, ancient, of Dartmoor, 196
+
+    Monte Nuovo thrown up in 1538, 103
+
+    Moon, phases of the, 6;
+      course in the heavens, 8;
+      map of the, 10;
+      craters of the, 10, 13, 17, 19, 20;
+      face of full, 11;
+      a worn-out planet, 21;
+      no atmosphere in the, 21;
+      diagram of eclipse of, 23;
+      lurid light on during eclipse, 24
+
+    Moss-leaf magnified, 87
+
+    Moss, life-history of a, 84, 92;
+      a stem of feathery, 85;
+      protonema of a, 86;
+      modes of new growth of a, 88;
+      fructification of a, 89;
+      urns of a, 89, 91
+
+    Mosses, different kinds of, 77;
+      advantages and distribution of, 94
+
+    Moulds are fungi, 60;
+      how they grow, 63
+
+    Mountains of the moon, 19;
+      formation of, 21
+
+    _Mucor Mucedo_, figured, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Mull, volcanic dykes in the island of, 111
+
+    Mushroom, early stages and spawn of, 67;
+      mycelium of, 67;
+      later stages of, 68;
+      section of gills of, 69;
+      spores of, 70;
+      fairy or Scotch bonnet, 72
+
+    Mycelium of mould, 63;
+      of mushroom, 67;
+      of fairy rings, 72
+
+
+    Naples, volcanic eruption seen at, 96;
+      Monte Nuovo thrown up near, 103
+
+    Nasmyth on bright lunar streaks, 16
+
+    Nebula of Orion, 149;
+      spectrum of, 151;
+      photographs of, 152;
+      of Pleiades, 153;
+      of Andromeda, 163-164
+
+    Needle, bone, from a cave, 212
+
+    Neolithic implements, 219;
+      industries and habits, 218-220;
+      burials, 221
+
+    Neptune, invisible to naked eye, 35
+
+    Neison, Mr., his drawing of Plato, 20
+
+    _Nostoc_, growing on stones, 79
+
+
+    Oak, fungi on the, 64
+
+    Observatory, the Magician's, 2;
+      astronomical on Vesuvius, 97;
+      cascade of lava behind the, 99
+
+    Obsidian, or volcanic glass, 109
+
+    Occultation of a star, 22, 25
+
+    Onager, or wild ass of Asia, 203
+
+    Optic nerve of eye, 34
+
+    Orion, constellation of, 147, 149;
+      great nebula of, 149;
+      photographs of Nebula of, 152;
+      coloured double stars in, 168
+
+    Orionis [Greek: th], or Trapezium, 150
+
+    Ornaments of ancient Britons, 222
+
+    Orohippus, a toed horse, 205
+
+    _Oscillariae_, growth of, 79
+
+
+    Palaeolithic man, 212;
+      relics, 213;
+      life, 214, 216
+
+    Pampas, wild horses of the, 198
+
+    _Penicillium glaucum_, figured, 61;
+      growth of, 63
+
+    Penumbra of an eclipse, 23;
+      of sun-spots, 140
+
+    Perithecia of lichens, 84
+
+    Petavius, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Photographic camera, 3, 47;
+      attached to telescope, 121
+
+    Photographs of the moon, 13, 19;
+      of galloping horse, 48;
+      of the stars, 49, 161;
+      of the sun, 121
+
+    Photosphere of the sun, 123
+
+    Philadelphia, electric shocks at during sun-storm, 143
+
+    Pixies of plant life, 59
+
+    Plains of the moon, 10;
+      nature of the, 12
+
+    Plants, colourless, single-celled, 65;
+      single-celled green, 78;
+      two kinds of in lichens, 80;
+      with flint skeletons, 185
+
+    Plato, a lunar crater, 10, 24;
+      figured, 20
+
+    Pleiades, the, 153;
+      nebulae in, 153
+
+    _Pleurococcus_, a single-celled plant, 78
+
+    Plough, the, or Charles's Wain, 157
+
+    Pointers, in Charles's Wain, 161
+
+    Pole-star, the, 161;
+      a yellow sun, 166
+
+    Pollux, a yellow sun, 166
+
+    _Polysiphonia_, a red seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177
+
+    _Polytrichum commune_, a hair moss, 88;
+      its urns protected by a lid, 91
+
+    Pool, inhabitants of a seaside, 172-74
+
+    Precious stones, formation of, 116
+
+    Proctor, his star atlas, 146;
+      on drifting of Charles's Wain, 159
+
+    Prominence-spectrum and sun-spectrum compared, 134
+
+    Prominences, red, of the sun, 125;
+      seen in full daylight, 131-133;
+      shape of, 135
+
+    _Protococcus nivalis_, 79
+
+    Protonema of a moss, 86
+
+    Przevalsky's wild horse, 202
+
+    Ptolemy, a lunar crater, 10
+
+    Puffballs, 67, 70;
+      use of in nature, 73
+
+    Pupil of the eye, 30
+
+    Puzzuoli, eruption near, 1538, 103
+
+
+    Quaggas, herds of, 203
+
+
+    Rain-band in the solar spectrum, 130
+
+    Rain-shower during volcanic eruption, 107
+
+    Readings in the sky, 53, 127, 151, 168
+
+    Red snow, a single-celled plant, 79
+
+    Regulus, the star, 155, 166
+
+    Reindeer, carving on horn of, 216
+
+    Reservoirs of molten rock underground, 101
+
+    Resina, ascent of Vesuvius from, 98
+
+    Retina of the eye, 31;
+      image of object on the, 33
+
+    Richmond, Virginia, infusorial earth of, 186
+
+    Rigel, a star in Orion, 149;
+      a coloured double star, 168
+
+    Rings, growth of fairy, 73
+
+    Roberts, Mr. I., his photograph of Orion's nebula, 152;
+      and of nebula of the Pleiades, 153;
+      and of nebula of Andromeda, 164
+
+    Rosse, Lord, his telescope, 46;
+      on Orion's nebula, 150;
+      stars visible in his telescope, 160
+
+    Rue, De la, his photograph of the moon, 13
+
+    Rust on plants, 61
+
+
+    Sabrina island formed, 102
+
+    Saturn, distance of, 40
+
+    Saxons, invasion of the, 224
+
+    Schwabe, Herr, on sun-spots cycle, 137
+
+    Scoriae of volcanoes, 108
+
+    "Scotch bonnet" mushroom, 72
+
+    Sea-mat, _see_ Flustra
+
+    "Seas" lunar, so-called, 10
+
+    Seaweeds, a group of, 175;
+      fruits of, 177
+
+    Secchi, Father, on depth of a sun-spot, 139
+
+    Selwyn, Mr., photograph of sun by, 122
+
+    Senses alone tell us of outer world, 29
+
+    _Sertularia tenella_, structure of, 180;
+      _cupressina_, 181
+
+    Sertularian and coralline, resemblance of, 179
+
+    Shakespeare on fairy rings, 57
+
+    Shipley, Mr., saw volcanic island formed, 103
+
+    Sight, far and near, 35
+
+    Silkworm destroyed by fungi, 66
+
+    Sirius, 146;
+      a bluish white sun, 166;
+      irregularities of caused by a companion, 169
+
+    Skeleton of the horse, 206
+
+    Skin diseases caused by fungi, 61, 66
+
+    Sky, light readings in the, 53, 127, 151, 168
+
+    Smut, a fungus, 61
+
+    Sodium lime in the spectrum, 128
+
+    Somma, part of ancient Vesuvius, 97, 104
+
+    Spawn of mushroom, 67
+
+    Spectra, plate of coloured, 127
+
+    Spectroscope, 3;
+      Kirchhoff's, 51;
+      gases revealed by the, 52;
+      direct vision, 127;
+      sifting light, 126;
+      attached to telescope, 132
+
+    Spectrum of sunlight, 127, 130
+
+    Sphacelaria, a brown-green seaweed, 175;
+      fruit of, 177
+
+    Sphagnum or bog moss, 77, 93;
+      structure of leaves of, 93
+
+    Spindle-whorl from Neolithic caves, 219
+
+    Spore-cases of mosses, 89, 91, 93
+
+    Spores of moulds, 63;
+      of mushroom, 70;
+      of lichens, 83;
+      of mosses, 91
+
+    Star, occultation of, by the moon, 24;
+      a double-binary, 166;
+      a dark, travelling round Sirius, 169
+
+    Star-cluster in Perseus, 162
+
+    Star-depths, 160, 171
+
+    Stars, light from the, 40, 42;
+      visible in the country, 145;
+      apparent motion of the, 146;
+      maps of, 148, 156;
+      of milky way, 149;
+      binary, 154;
+      real motion of, 159;
+      drifting, 159;
+      number of known and estimated, 161;
+      colours of, 166;
+      double coloured, 167;
+      cause of colour in, 168;
+      are they centres of solar systems? 170
+
+    Statur or wild horse, 202
+
+    Streaks, bright, on the moon, 14-17
+
+    Suffolk, bronze weapon from barrow in, 223
+
+    Sun, path of the moon round the, 8;
+      one of the stars, 119;
+      how to look at the, 119;
+      face of, thrown on a screen, 120;
+      photograph of the, 122;
+      prominences, corona, and faculae of, 122-125;
+      mottling of face of, 123;
+      total eclipse of, 124;
+      zodiacal line round, 125;
+      dark lines in spectrum of, 128;
+      reversing layer of, 131;
+      metals in the, 131;
+      sudden outburst in the, 142;
+      magnetic connection with the earth, 143;
+      a yellow star, 166
+
+    Sun's rays touching moon during eclipse, 24
+
+    Sun-spots, cycle of, 137;
+      proving sun's rotation, 138;
+      nature of, 139;
+      quiet and unquiet, 140;
+      formation of, 142
+
+    Sundew on Dartmoor, 56
+
+
+    Tarpan, a wild horse, 199
+
+    Tartary, wild horses of, 199
+
+    Tavistock Abbey, monks of, 196
+
+    Telescope, clock-work, adjusting a, 2;
+      an astronomical, 41;
+      magnifying power of the, 43-46;
+      giant, 46;
+      terrestrial, 47;
+      what can be seen in a small, 46;
+      how the sun is photographed in the, 122;
+      how the spectroscope is worked with the, 132
+
+    Teneriffe, peak of compared to lunar craters, 15
+
+    Tennant, Major, drawing of eclipsed sun by, 123
+
+    Temperature, underground, 101
+
+    _Thuricolla follicula_, a transparent infusorian, 182
+
+    Tiger, sabre-toothed, 211, 213
+
+    _Tilletia caria_ or bunt, 64
+
+    Toadstools, 67, 70;
+      use of in nature, 73
+
+    Tools, of ancient stone period, 214, 215
+
+    Tooth of machairodus, 213
+
+    Torquay, the Magician's pool near, 172
+
+    Tors of Dartmoor, 197
+
+    Trapezium of Orion, 150
+
+    _Tremella mesenterica_ fungus, 71
+
+    Tripoli formed of diatoms, 35
+
+    Tundras, lichens and mosses of the, 82, 95
+
+    Tycho, a lunar crater, 10;
+      description of, 13;
+      bright streaks of, 14
+
+
+    _Ulva_, a green seaweed, 175;
+      a section magnified, 176
+
+    Umbra of an eclipse, 23
+
+    Urns of mosses, 89, 91
+
+    _Ustilago carbo_, or smut, 64
+
+    Variable stars, 165
+
+    Vega, a bluish-white sun, 166;
+      double-binary star near, 165
+
+    Veil of mushroom, 68
+
+    Vesuvian lavas imitated, 113
+
+    Vesuvius, eruption of 1868 described, 97, 99, 104;
+      dormant, 103;
+      eruption of in A.D. 79, 104
+
+    Volcanic craters of earth and moon compared, 16;
+      eruptions in the moon, 21;
+      glass under the microscope, 109, 110, 115
+
+    Volcano, diagram of an active, 105
+
+    Volcanoes, the cause of discussed, 101, 102;
+      ancient, laid bare, 111
+
+
+    Washington, electric shocks at during sun-storm, 143
+
+    Winter in Palaeolithic times, 215
+
+    Wood, winter growth in a, 76
+
+    "World without End," 115
+
+
+    Yeast, growth of, 65
+
+    Yorkshire, Roman coins in caves of, 225
+
+
+    Zebra, herds of, 203
+
+    Zodiacal light, 125
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS.
+
+
+  _THE FAIRYLAND OF SCIENCE._ By ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY. With 74
+     Illustrations. Cloth, gilt, $1.50.
+
+"Deserves to take a permanent place in the literature of
+youth."--_London Times._
+
+"So interesting that, having once opened the book, we do not know how to
+leave off reading."--_Saturday Review._
+
+
+  _LIFE AND HER CHILDREN: Glimpses of Animal Life from the Amoeba
+     to the Insects._ By ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY. With over 100
+     Illustrations. Cloth, gilt, $1.50.
+
+"The work forms a charming introduction to the study of zoology--the
+science of living things--which, we trust, will find its way into many
+hands."--_Nature._
+
+
+  _WINNERS IN LIFE'S RACE; or, the Great Backboned Family._ By
+     ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY. With numerous Illustrations. Cloth, gilt,
+     $1.50.
+
+"We can conceive no better gift-book than this volume. Miss Buckley has
+spared no pains to incorporate in her book the latest results of
+scientific research. The illustrations in the book deserve the highest
+praise--they are numerous, accurate, and striking."--_Spectator._
+
+
+  _A SHORT HISTORY OF NATURAL SCIENCE; and of the Progress of
+     Discovery from the Time of the Greeks to the Present Time._ By
+     ARABELLA B. BUCKLEY. New edition, revised and rearranged. With
+     77 Illustrations. Cloth, $2.00.
+
+"The work, though mainly intended for children and young persons, may be
+most advantageously read by many persons of riper age, and may serve to
+implant in their minds a fuller and clearer conception of 'the promises,
+the achievements, and claims of science.'"--_Journal of Science._
+
+
+  _A WORLD OF WONDERS; or, Marvels in Animate and Inanimate
+     Nature._ A Book for Young Readers. With 322 Illustrations on
+     Wood. Large 12mo. Cloth, illuminated, $2.00.
+
+_CONTENTS._--Wonders of Marine Life; Curiosities of Vegetable Life;
+Curiosities of the Insect and Reptile World; Marvels of Bird and Beast
+Life; Phenomenal Forces of Nature.
+
+
+  _AROUND AND ABOUT SOUTH AMERICA: Twenty Months of Quest and
+     Query._ By FRANK VINCENT, author of "The Land of the White
+     Elephant," etc. With Maps, Plans, and 54 full-page
+     Illustrations. 8vo, xxiv-473 pages. Ornamental cloth, $5.00.
+
+No former traveler has made so comprehensive and thorough a tour of
+Spanish and Portuguese America as did Mr. Vincent. He visited every
+capital, chief city, and important seaport, made several expeditions
+into the interior of Brazil and the Argentine Republic, and ascended the
+Parana, Paraguay, Amazon, Orinoco, and Magdalena Rivers; he visited the
+crater of Pichinchas, 16,000 feet above the sea-level; he explored falls
+in the center of the continent, which, though meriting the title of
+"Niagara of South America," are all but unknown to the outside world; he
+spent months in the picturesque capital of Rio Janeiro; he visited the
+coffee districts, studied the slaves, descended the gold-mines, viewed
+the greatest rapids of the globe, entered the isolated Guianas, and so
+on.
+
+
+  _BRAZIL: Its Condition and Prospects._ By C. C. ANDREWS,
+     ex-Consul-General to Brazil. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
+"I hope I may be able to present some facts in respect to the present
+situation of Brazil which will be both instructive and entertaining to
+general readers. My means of acquaintance with that empire are
+principally derived from a residence of three years at Rio de Janeiro,
+its capital, while employed in the service of the United States
+Government, during which period I made a few journeys into the
+interior."--_From the Preface._
+
+
+  _FIVE THOUSAND MILES IN A SLEDGE: A Mid-Winter Journey across
+     Siberia._ By LIONEL F. GOWING. With Map and 30 Illustrations in
+     Text. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
+"The book is most certainly one to be read, and will be welcomed as an
+addition to the scant literature on a singularly interesting
+country."--_Courier._
+
+
+  _CHINA: Travels and Investigations in the "Middle Kingdom."_ A
+     Study of its Civilization and Possibilities. With a Glance at
+     Japan. By JAMES HARRISON WILSON, late Major-General United
+     States Volunteers and Brevet Major-General United States Army.
+     12mo. Cloth, $1.75.
+
+"The book presents China and Japan in all these aspects; the manners and
+customs of the people; the institutions, tendencies, and social ideas;
+the government and leading men."--_Boston Traveller._
+
+
+  _THE GARDEN'S STORY; or, Pleasures and Trials of an Amateur
+     Gardener._ By GEORGE H. ELLWANGER. With Head and Tail Pieces by
+     Rhead. 12mo. Cloth extra, $1.50.
+
+"Mr. Ellwanger's instinct rarely errs in matters of taste. He writes out
+of the fullness of experimental knowledge, but his knowledge differs
+from that of many a trained cultivator in that his skill in garden
+practice is guided by a refined aesthetic sensibility, and his
+appreciation of what is beautiful in nature is healthy, hearty, and
+catholic. His record of the garden year, as we have said, begins with
+the earliest violet, and it follows the season through until the
+witch-hazel is blossoming on the border of the wintry woods.... This
+little book can not fail to give pleasure to all who take a genuine
+interest in rural life. They will sympathize with most of the author's
+robust and positive judgments, and with his strong aversions as well as
+his tender attachments."--_The Tribune_, New York.
+
+
+  _THE FOLK-LORE OF PLANTS._ By T. F. THISELTON DYER, M.A. 12mo.
+     Cloth, $1.50.
+
+"The Folk-Lore of Plants" traces the superstitions and fancies connected
+with plants in fairy-lore, in witchcraft and demonology, in religion, in
+charms, in medicine, in plant language, etc. The author is an eminent
+English botanist, and superintendent of the gardens at Kew.
+
+"A handsome and deeply interesting volume.... In all respects the book
+is excellent. Its arrangement is simple and intelligible, its style
+bright and alluring; authorities are cited at the foot of the page, and
+a full index is appended.... To all who seek an introduction to one of
+the most attractive branches of folk-lore, this delightful volume may be
+warmly commended."--_Notes and Queries._
+
+
+  _FLOWERS AND THEIR PEDIGREES._ By GRANT ALLEN, author of
+     "Vignettes of Nature," etc. Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50.
+
+No writer treats scientific subjects with so much ease and charm of
+style as Mr. Grant Allen. His sketches in the magazines have well been
+called fascinating, and the present volume, being a collection of
+various papers, will fully sustain his reputation as an eminently
+entertaining and suggestive writer.
+
+"'Flowers and their Pedigrees,' by Grant Allen, with many illustrations,
+is not merely a description of British wild flowers, but a discussion of
+why they are, what they are, and how they come to be so; in other words,
+a scientific study of the migration and transformation of plants,
+illustrated by the daisy, the strawberry, the cleavers, wheat, the
+mountain tulip, the cuckoo-pint, and a few others. The study is a
+delightful one, and the book is fascinating to any one who has either
+love for flowers or curiosity about them."--_Hartford Courant._
+
+
+  _THE HISTORY OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATION._ A Hand-book based upon
+     M. Gustave Ducoudray's "Histoire Sommaire de la Civilisation."
+     Edited by the Rev. J. VERSCHOYLE, M.A. With numerous
+     Illustrations. Large 12mo. Cloth, $1.75.
+
+"With M. Ducoudray's work as a basis, many additions having been made,
+derived from special writers, Mr. Verschoyle has produced an excellent
+work, which gives a comprehensive view of early civilization.... As to
+the world of the past, the volume under notice treats of Egypt, Assyria,
+the Far East, of Greece and Rome in the most comprehensive manner. It is
+not the arts alone which are fully illustrated, but the literature,
+laws, manners, and customs, the beliefs of all these countries are
+contrasted. If the book gave alone the history of the monuments of the
+past it would be valuable, but it is its all-around character which
+renders it so useful. A great many volumes have been produced treating
+of a past civilization, but we have seen none which in the same space
+gives such varied information."--_The New York Times._
+
+
+  _GREAT LEADERS: Historic Portraits from the Great Historians._
+     Selected, with Notes and Brief Biographical Sketches, by G. T.
+     FERRIS. With sixteen engraved Portraits. 12mo. Cloth, $1.75.
+
+The Historic Portraits of this work are eighty in number, drawn from the
+writings of PLUTARCH, GROTE, GIBBON, CURTIUS, MOMMSEN, FROUDE, HUME,
+MACAULAY, LECKY, GREEN, THIERS, TAINE, PRESCOTT, MOTLEY, and other
+historians. The subjects extend from Themistocles to Wellington.
+
+"Every one perusing the pages of the historians must have been impressed
+with the graphic and singularly penetrative character of many of the
+sketches of the distinguished persons whose doings form the staple of
+history. These pen-portraits often stand out from the narrative with
+luminous and vivid effect, the writers seeming to have concentrated upon
+them all their powers of penetration and all their skill in graphic
+delineation. Few things in literature are marked by analysis so close,
+discernment so keen, or effects so brilliant and dramatic."--_From the
+Preface._
+
+
+  _LIFE OF THE GREEKS AND ROMANS_, described from Ancient Monuments.
+     By E. GUHL and W. KONER. Translated from the third German
+     edition by F. HUEFFER. With 543 Illustrations. 8vo. Cloth, $2.50.
+
+"The result of careful and unwearied research in every nook and cranny
+of ancient learning. Nowhere else can the student find so many facts in
+illustration of Greek and Roman methods and manners."--_Dr. C. K.
+Adams's Manual of Historical Literature._
+
+
+New York: D. APPLETON & CO., 1, 3, & 5 Bond Street.
+
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