"Yes." Grey started. " Sole executor and trustee." "Sole executor and trustee! Are you sure of that? Evans said you were one of Hie executors and trustees."

" 1 am sole executor and trustee, I assure you." What had he said to Evans about the will ? In his conscious moments he had no intention of saying anything to Evans about the will. The blows were coming too heavily and too quickly. His head— his headl

"Strange! Evans ought to be more careful. He said be was not sure whether the others were living or not; but he mentioned the fact that it would be neces sary to inquire aad ascertain if they were living or dead." The attorney looked cautiously into the sarcophagus, as though he expected the bittoin to disappear, disclosing the missing executors aud trustees.

Grey gUnced at the other man In a be wildered way. The whole of his intellect must be «omg. Not only had he gone to Evans and .irea bim important instructions about something or other, but, if he was to credit Kvanri and Barraclough, he had for gotten a feature in that will, and this very feature hatipt'ned to be enough to destroy bim inst.ntly. Could it be, good Heavens, that there was a second name in the will, and he had forgotten it, and was roaming here about Loudon instead of taking the precaution of blowing out his brains 1 He felt sick and faint. His head began to swim. What a blessed fate that of those men of Egypt who, three thousand years ago, had died, and been swathed op in ban.iages, enclosed iv huge granite coffins, and buried in the inviilable silence and security of pyramids ! H^re was he, all naked and taw from crime,, out in the rough winds, among the rough ways of un feeling men.; aud add to all that his head —his head I

" I am surprised at Evans," said Grey. C 1 He ought to have known. He ought to have known better.

"Ishould think he ought!" exclaimed the attorney warmly. "To fancy a man instructing another to move in an import ant matter of this kind, to write and ssy ths consent nf the trustees might be relied upon, and tbeu to find out there was but one trustee ! Evans mast be going mad."

" Yes:; he or—l."

" Nonsense," returned Barraclough, " There is no chance of your being wrong. Evans i« either careleES or mad."

"What do yon purpose doing?" asked Grey cautiously.

That question might safely be put in the face ot any fusts.

" I shall sell, of course. Evans tells me you agree to sol ; so that if you are sole executor and trustee, there li no need to look up auyone for consent."

What was he to hear next ? This man was telling bim he had a co-execntor and co-trustee, and that he had authorised Evans tos 11. Mons'rousl Which was his period of insanity.: when he had (it be had) sjiven Fvaus the instructions, or now ? Which was his madness : iv giving such instructions, •or in now believing his senses and the words of this man? He made a great effort, and pulled all his faculties together, knit his brows, aud put this question to himself: "Is the lead to overtake the gold—to-night?" Then h« put anothe- question to Barraclough : "AVhat did Evans say altogether ?"

" That Mrs Grey had come to hire " Arrested by the banker's manner, Barra clough paused. Grey had leaned suddenly forward, thrust a pale, shrivelled face close to Barra clough'e, placed one hand on the attorney's shoulder, and, pointing .over his ■ own right shoulder with the other hand whis pered : "This one?" " You are ill?" "No. Goon." " You really look very ill. Let me " ■' No. Qo on." " He said she wished to sell out her •annnity of two thousand a year———" "Who said that?" "Mrs Grey, your mother." " My irwtlwr ?" " Yea."

Suddenly Grey's face changed. It flushed. He drew himself clear of the attorney, and, throwing his arms aloft, uttered a loud long langh, followed by tbe words: "Before high Heaven, I thought he meant my Wife 1"

All eyes were now directed to where the tall banker stood, with his arms upraised, and a smile of joy upon his flushed face. Ere the last echo of his voice had died away among these galleries of relics from the wrecks of a hundred religions, Grey's knees shook, and, with a groan, he fell to the gronnd.

It was hours before Walter Grey regained consciousness His thoughts were sluggish and dull. The edges of his ideas were blurred, and wavering this way and that against the background. Around him all was dim. It was night. A shaded lamp was somewhere iv the room. He did not know where the lamp stood.

Where was that lamp ? What a strange thing no one came there to tell him where the lamp lay I He himself could not, of course, get up *o try and find out where the lamp was. Of course not.

Why not? Ay, why not? Wasn't it very strange there should be no one there to tell him wheio the lamp was, particularly as he could not get up I Bat why —why —why ?

He lost the sense of sight, and felt his eyes pressed against illimitable void dark ness. His ears,too,were dead, plugged with thick silence that was not clear, but con fused silence, as in the cars of one deep in water. Then the darkness and the silence shuddered with {horror, and he ceased to be aware.

It was daylight, and his tongue was very thick—thicker than ever he had felt it. It wa*. so thick and stiff he could not move it. This was strange. The light, too, was peculiar. It looked as though the dawn or daylight lay far from the win dow. Of course the dawn was far away from the windows always, but it seemed immeasurably far off this morning. But then tho ringing of all those bslls made up for the increased distance of the dawn. How dull he had been not to see that at first 1 of course tha bells more than com pensated the distance of the dawn. How he hated Latin ! He'd never even tiy to learn it—never, They might flog him as much as ever they chose, but Latinhe'd never learn, Notforalltbemastersin England. No, not for his father. He would not even pretend to learn it, only for his mother. But for his mother he'd shy a slate at the head-master, and hit the Latin man with the heavy, very heavy knob of the big school-room poker on the bald part, right in the middle of the bald part of his head. They were ringing a thousand bells more now. How the sonnd did thin out the dawn !It thinned it out until all was worn away. Well, he had better go to sleep. Ho had a hard day's work before him. He had promised Bee (this very day six weeks they had been married) to thke her on the river, their own rrver, aud show her what he could do with the sculls. He was to pull her down to Seacliff. And yet, with that run on the Bank, how was he to sleep ? Bee, too, was worrying him a good deal. Why did they not stop those bells ?

They had changed the measure of the bolls. They had been ringing peals of joy ; they now rang ten thousand times more bells, but they were all ringing death-bells. Ah, yes; how stupid he had been ! Of course, they were burying the universe iv tbe Great Darkness, and these were the great bells swung in the peaked hollows of space, ringing for the burial in chaos of the dead stars. Now he must

go. It was afternoon before he again op ened his eyes. He felt something had happened : what he did not know. "I have had a bad fail, or an accident of another kind ; my head feels queer and I am weak. What has happened? Where am I?"

He lay still awhile to recover strength. Then be asked feebly: " Is there anyone here ?'

A nurse showed herself. She wonld not allow him to speak much, but she told him the history of his present poiition briefly :

While speaking to Mr Barraclough in the British Museum, he had had an attack, of what kind the doctor did not say. Prom the British Museum Mr Barraclough had him conveyed to this place, the attorney's house, whero he had been in sensible tor some hours.

Had he raved ? No ; not a word.

Had any message be _ sent home?

Yes. Mr Barraclough had telegraphed to Mr Grey's chief man at Daneford, and the gentleman was now waiting below. G-ey a»ked that Mr Aldridge might be sent to him. The nurse agreed to admit the manager on an uuderstaading the In terview was to occupy no more than a quarter of an hour.

In a few minutes Aldridge eutered the room, and having expressed his regrets and hopes, and received suitable replies, Grey's first qnestion was :

*' Have you told anyone of the contents of that telegram ?" '" No." ■' You are cure ?" " Quite sure." "Tell no one on the face of the earth."

" I promise not."

" Aldridge.l have known you some time, and I have every reason to believe and trust you. lam under many obligations to you, Keep this matter entirely to yourself, and you will double all my gratitude." " Kely on me,"

"It may leak out through the telegraph office or through Barraclough. I want you to go back to Daneford at once, see Evans, and tell bim not to say anything of my fllness. This is most important. .Mow go. Barraclough may have told Evans. Go at once."

"Any further orders?" "No." " I have paid Sir William Midharst's cheque for twenty thousand."

" All right. Don't lose a moment. Don't miss the first train."

Grey fell b«ck exhausted. Though his head ached, it felt clearer than for many weeks.

" It would never do," he thought, "to have all Daneford gossiping over the Infir. mitles of a man who must one of these days be a candidate bridegroom. The least ►aid about me the better. I have neither the humour nor the strength for criticism or sympathy at present." It was several days before he was well enough to go home. He went back straight to Daneford.

The evening of his arrival he strolled through the city, and took no heed of the direction in which he had wandered until ho was attracted by something un usual in a house over the way. The front of the house was all dark. It was his mother's house. The piars of the gates were covered with auction bills announcing in a few days the sale of the lease and furniture.

He had, until now, forgotten what Barra clough had told him. All rushed in upon his mind.

" She is goiog to seU her annuity, her lease, her furniture, poor old woman ; and I, the only trustee living, cannot prevent her, cannot approach her. Poor^jld woman ! Wat Grey, I never pitied you until this moment."

[To be Contimied.)

How to Collect a Dividend.

In tbe early days of limited liability paper mills in America, a six-foot stranger with a bad look in his eye, one day entered the city office of the company, pulled out ten shares of stock in the company, and inquired of tbe secietary if there were any dividends on the stock.

" NeVer heard of any," was the reply. " Diifc't anybody ever try to collect divL dends ? "

" It they did. they didn't get anything." " This stock ought to pay ten per cent,," continued the strSnger. "Here's a thou, sand dollars. Ten per cent, a year would be 100 dollars. I've held these shares three months, which would be 25 dollars. Pardner, I want my divy !" "But I've nothing to do with it. You must go to the mill at ."

"Too fur away! I'm going to collect here, and save time. Pilgrim, count out my divy I"

_ The above peroration was followed by the sight of a six-shcoter, and an expression which meant business, and the secretary didn't consume three minutes counting out the money, which the stranger took and walked out, with the remark that he never invested in stock paying less than ten per cent, and didn't believe in cumulative dividends. This was the only dividend paid by that limited paper mill for four years, and the secretary, oo a salary of 40 dollars a month, had to stand that.

The formation of Waterspouts.

A papbr was read at a recent meeting of the Meteorological Society by Mr George Attwood, F.G.S. This contains an account of several waterspouts observed in the Pacific Ocean, and also one seen in the Atlantic Ocean. The author believes that the waterspouts in the Pacific Ocean were caused by a cloud heavily charged with cooled moisture drifting from the high mountains of Costa Rica coming into con tact with air-currents and clouds travelling in a different direction, and of a warmer temperature, by which contact the cloud heavily charged with moisture was given a rotatory motion, causing it to discharge part of its moisture and make it assume a cylindrical figure and fall down by its own gravity.

Joining the Army.

A medical man was once examining a number of youths about to join the atmy on foreign service. Each one as he en tered the room was told to undress him self. One had just resumed his clothes, and while the doctor was writing certifi cates was desired to leave the room, and send in the next person. Someone else at once entered. " Take all your clothes oft," said the doctor, without lifting his eyes from his desk, " and then 1 shall be able to attend to you." "Sir!" said a sweet but indignant voice. The doctor, looked up. " Holloa l" said he, astonished beyond measure at the lovely vision, " you are surely not going in for this service?" "No, sir," said the blushing maid; "I called to ask for an appointment as nurse in the hospital."

THE THOUGHT READING SWINDLE

ELenry Jbaboucherc versus Irving

liis/iop

Scene at St. James's Mall.

(BY OUR LONDON" COERW3PONDENT.)

THOSE of your readers who see " Truth " re gularly will, I feel confident, have overlooked the many references in recent issues to the so-called " thought-reader," Irving Bishop. This worthy pretends that by feeling a man ho can divine his thoughts. Mr Labouchere, the editor of "Truth," disbelieved In the phe nomena, went to see the performance, and pronounced it a " do." His telling sarcasms hit Bishop very hard, and the latter angrily challenged his detractor to put him to the te»t publicly. " Labby," nothing loth, offered to hot" Mr Bishop £1,000 to £100 thit he c iuld not read the number of a bank note which he would seal up in an envelope, and Bisbop pretending to accept the terms, the result was a scene in St. James's Hall, described by the special of the " Daily Telegraph" as follows :-A "seance ex traordinaire " was given last evening in St. Jame-'s Great Hall for the purpose of judg ing Mr W. Irving Bishop's "new illustra tions of his extraordinary power of reading unuttered thoughts " Few who were pre sent can have failed to make themselves acquainted with tne position of tha case as it stood at the opeoing of this curious func tion. Mr Henry Labouchere, M. P., had offered Mr Bishop a Bank of England note for £1,000, conditionally on the latter telling the number of the note without looking at it, aod on his consenting to forfeit £100 in the event of failure. The challenge was accepted, subject to a slight amendment ot the conditions. Declining "to be bound by any one man selected by Labouchere," Mr Bishop proposed that some gentleman chosen from a committee of the spec*ators should be confidentially told the number of the note. Ia answer to this, Mr Labouchere refused to recognise the committee or the audience. He declared his belief thst Mr Bishop could not read the thoughts of any one unless those thoughts wete conveyed to him naturally; said that, under ordinary circumstances, the test should have been for Mr Bishop to tell the number of the note to him alone; but that in view of certain pos sible difficulties—as.that Mr Bishop might complain that Mr L tbouchere was not think ing of the number—be had offered to con fide it to Mr firth, member of the borough in which the charity is located. As no one questions Mr Firth's intelligence or bis independence, Mr Labouchere felt himself justified in considering that gen tleman's aid sufficient to re render the test a serious oue. Kut Mr Bi-hop stood fast to his objection, and intimated that, as it his "intention to shortly discontinue" his public life, this may be the last opportunity Mr Labouchere will bave of proving the courage of his convictions. As Mr Labouchere hsd publicly stated his intention, supposing his conditions were not accepted, of leaving Mr Bishop "to dis cuss tbe matter with his audience at St, James's Hall," the challenger's absence last evening was not on the whole surprising. But thete were many who took Mr Bishop's part inrega ttlug tbis refusal to appear as an act which virtually allowed judgment to go by default A committee, most of the mem bers ot which are known in some way or other, and a few who have been frequent attendants at Mr Bishop's entertainments, was formed at first without a chairman, bnt afterwards, when elements ot disorder began to ba ominously manifest, with Mr Waddy, Q.G., M. P., in the chair. Perhaps the moHt noteworthy members were Dr. Wllberfjrce (Bishop Designate of .New castle), the Rev. Mr Haweis, and Mr Lane Fox, the electrician, who was induced by loud calls from the audience to go upon the platform. There still remained two vacont chairs ; and Mr B shop for mally called, first on " Henry Labouchere, M.P.," to occupy one of them, and then on Mr Firth, the member for Chelsea, to take the other. JSo answer b.ing forthcoming, Mr Bishop proposed to go on without them ; but firit he read a letter which, on the pre vious evening, he had sect to Mr Firth, soliciting his presence as "holder of the stakes." There was applause mingled with laughter when the text of this letter was made knowD ; but when Mr Bishop inti mated that he would deferreadingMrFirth's reply till a later period of tbe evening, deri sive Founds were heatd, together with the cry from many parts ot ihe well-filled hall, " Why not now ." Disregarding these im patient pro'ests, and handling an iron ring, Mr Bfshop began to explain his position to wards Spiritualism, wh'ch seemed a little vague. He blindfo'ded Mr Waddy, and was beginning a well-known experiment with the iron ring, when some malcontents in the gallery colled out "This is not ' tnough'-reacfcng.'" Still Mr Bishoo went on with his demonstrations, blindfolding Mr Haweis and experimentalising wit" him as to the distance and position of certain sounds. Then the lecturer told a story about some pretended Spiritualists in America, who attempted to convince him that a piece of paper prepared with phos phoras and carbon burst into flame through supernatural ugency. Mr Bishop, leaving tbe platfo-m for a few seconds, returned with a copy of " Truth," aud jocularly pre tended to test its inherent susceptibility to spontaneous, combustion. After many wit ticisms, received witti mingled favour and protest by his auoience, Mr Bishop exchanged the paper for another, which ignited by being waved to aud lio. Next, he allowed himself to be manacled with a pair of newly-invented ratchet-hand cuffs from Scotland-yard, and then entered a curtained cabinet, in which he remained concealed for a short time, when tho familiar beU-ringing and tambourine-beating weut on. One hand was presently shown through an opening in the top of the drapery, and afterwards both hands, far apart; and Mr B shop next came forth disencumbered from his hand-cuff's, in one of which, still locKed, was suspended the large iron ring. From time to time the audience, or a part of it, was very restless, demanding a cessa tion of the conjuring ; but still it went on, ond was so amusing as almost to reconcile the clamourers for " thought-reading " to the postponement of what they had come to see and hear.

After another cpbinet-trick, in which Mr Bishop was bonnd with surgical bandages instead of rope, the time came for the psychological experiments. These were preceded by th,; reading of Mr Firth's letter, as follows : —

Sir, —1 have received your letter sucgest ing that I should sit on your platform at St. James's Hall and hold £100 while you guess the number of a note known only " to the subject of the experiment." If I under stand the offer of Mr Labouchere aright, I was to be asked in the interests of a Chelsea charity to be men. " subject." But you do not make to mc any such request, and as the service which you seek at my hands could be equally well rendered by the chair in which you invite me to sit, I trust you will excuse my attending your performance.—Yours obediently, J. F. B. Firth.

A mixed reception was accorded this epistle ; nor was it quite clear whether the laughter aud hisses were on one side or the other. A troublesome interruptor, who

I attempted to speak from the body ot the hall, and was induced to mount the plat form, where he was as little under control as down below, flourished an envelope, de claring that it contained "a fiver," which Mr Bishop might bave if he could tell its number. The first experiment of thought reading w«s the secreting a pin, Dy one of the committee, who seemed to. enjoy the special confidence of the assembly, loud calls being raised for him, when it appeared likely that somebody else would be chosen by the chairman. Mr Lane Fox, in fact, was the gentleman elected by acclamation from the body of the hail. Inasmuch as Mr Biehop, blindfold, succeeded iv leading him to ihe spot, and in finding the pin, the audience had every reason to accept this proof of a wonderful power. The burst of applause was the heartiest that had so far been heard. Now came the announcement front the chairman that Mr Charles Bussell held in hand a banknote for £5. the number of which was only known to Professor Kay Lnnkester, who sat by him. Would Mr Bishop attempt to tell the number ? Then ensued the dreariest, and, as afterwards appeared, the most unnecessary fencing that ever taxed the patience of hearer*. Mr Bishop said be remembered experim»nting with the Professor, and localisii g the seat of an imaginary pain. Afterwards Professor Lankester told the audience that Mr Bishop had succeeded once with him, acdhad failed several times. After listening to a long and rambling speech from Mr Bishop, the audience com plained that they had been kept more than two hours, and begged hnu to say whether he would accept or decline the challenge. But this was precisely what he would not do in the few words that the wearied audience wanted to hear. At last tbe chair man said Mr Bishop would accept the challenge, and had, in fact, staked a £100 note on his ability to read the number; but he still »i-hed that a member of the com mittee should be the subject of his experi ment. Meanwhile, the members had be gun to drop away ; and when Mr Charles .Kussell was called for, somebody called out, "He has left tbe hall in disgust." He had, however, depssited the note frith Professor Kay Lankester, who declined to accede to the condition of importing a committee man into his confidence, Then somebody handed up a note in an envelope, from Colonel Trench, who expressed his willingness to accept Mr Bishop's terms. Mr Lane Fox was-pgain called on, but he vigorously shook his head, and tne chair man fixed on Colonel Statham as the mem ber of the committee to read the figures on the note, and to have his thoughts read in turn by Mr Bishop. The loudest dissent from this arrangement was expressed, in rather uncomplimentary language, till the chairman pacified the dissentients by assur ing them that Colonel Trench was a friend of a Cabinet Minister ;in the last Go vernment. Mr Bishop marked with chalk on a black board five compart ments, and said, if he succeeded in placing the five figures correctly in those spaces he should ask the audience to sup port him in demanding from Mr Labou chere the payment of £1,000. There was some laughter at this; but having been again made blindfold, Mr Bishop again took the band of Colonel Statham, and cast himself into that tremulous and half-fren 2ied condition in which he generally works out his tasks. In fine, he dashed off with spasmodic energy the figures 66,894 in speedy succession, and they were declaree to be right. This done, Mr Bishop was loudly applauded, and he repeated im pressively his dsire that the audience would support his claim against his challenge.

Thought Heading Explained.— Some Interesting Experiments.

Apropos of the foregoing, " Truth " oi June 6 {.i.e. before the seance at St James's Hall) contained a long article on " thought reading," from which I extract the foßow ing :-

A gentleman sends me the following ex pianation of Mr Bishop's thought-read fng :—

" The Rev. , of this town (Brad ford), a short time ago, at the Technical School Hall, explained that all Mr Bishop's inatances of so-called "thought-reading" were such as any ordinary person might perform after half-an-hour's practice. He said that Mr Bishop's performances were not the result of reading the thoughts of the person made the subject of the illustration, but that he was able to carry out his per formances by a knowledge of what he, Mr , called '' ideal mortor." He said that the mind acts-^inconsciously upon the muscles of the body, and that if a person fix his mind upon a particular object, and you take hold of his left wrist with your ri^ht hand, and put the tips of your left hand fingers to his left hand fingers, then if you follow the line of the least resistence, you will arrive at the object on which the per son has fixed his thought. He illustrated this iv various ways, but one of his illus trations was very remarkable. One gentle man, who was rather sceptical, but of whose bona fides there was no doubt, hid two pins in different parts of the hall, and told only one other gentleman which pin he had fixed hia mind upon. Mr , who had been out of the hall, was then brought in blind folded, took the hand of the gentleman who had hid the pin, and taking him with him, within a minute found the piu he was think ing of.

•'Mr then explained how to tell nunber ot a banknote where the number was only Known to, I think, two, or else one other person. The Town Clerk pro duced a note, which he showed to another gentleman. Mr was then brought into the room (blindfolded I think, but I am not sure of this). He set out on a table ten cards, containing the JVos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, S, 9, 0. He took bold of the Town Clerk's hand in the way I have named, and passedi: slowly over tbe numbers, telling him to fix his thoughts on the first figure on the note. He found by this means the first figure, and so on to the last figure of the number on the note. To find the number of a note, he also showed us, might be done in another way. A gentleman who knew the number of a note in the Town Clerk's pocket was taken by Mr before a black-board, and a piece of chalk was placed in his left hand. He was told to think of the shape of the first figure, Mr — held his hand, and in about a minute the first figure was written on the|blackboard, and so on all the others. Mr explained that, unconsciously, the gentleman resisted the moving of his hand in any direction but that of the figure to be written.

"Mr has shown similar illustrations at friends' houses, where he has been spend ing the evening, and has assured them that there is no necromancy in the matter, that all is done by following the line of the least rcsistaucc, and that the left hand is chosen because it is less under control of the will than the right hand. He says the gen tleman whoso hands he holds pleads him, although unconsciously, and not he the gen tleman. Mr took the Jsubject up to expose the absurdity of Mr Bishop's pre tension that he could read people's thoughts." This explanation is interesting, because it shows that any one, with a little practice, can do precisely what Mr Bishop professes to do, without trespassing upon the credulity of the world to believe that one person can read the thoughts of another. In confirmation of this, a friend of mine tells

me that one ot bis daughters saw a person hide an object in a room, whilst another person was out of the room. The second person was tben brought in bliudfolded.the first person put a hand on each of her sides, and she at once walked to the place where tee object had been hidden. To prove to his daughters what a very simple feat this was, my friend said that he would himself do it with any one of them placing her hands on his sides, And he did it, because he followed the line of the least resistance ; that is to say, he allowed himself to be con ducted. In vain his daughters insisted that they did not guide him. He met this by renewing the experiment again, and again invariably with the same success.

That Mr Bishop himself would have his audiences be'ieve that, Instead of his " thought-reading" being a mere trick, he is enabled to know what is passing through another person's mind, without that know ledge being conveyed by any material agency, ia evident, for in one of his pro grammes 1 find the following statement :—

'' a murder had been committed in Aus tralia by a convict upon a settler who bad disappeared. An officer of police was sent to try and discover the perpetrator. He, for this purpose, went to watch the house of the convict, and whilst doing so the convict came to the window and looked very hard at the officer, who then fancied he saw the murdered man dragged from a post near the house, and thrown in a pit of water close by. Th sim pression was so strong upon tbe officer t mt he fetched a native tracker, who came to the post, aud said, ' Blood, man's blood,' and immediately seemed to follow the trail to the pit of water. This was searched, and the body of the murdered man was found. The convict was arrested, tried, and condemned. Before execution hn confessed tbat he had killed the man at thn }post with a blow of an axe, and had the drsgged him to ihe pit of water and throwe him in. he also said that when the police man looked at him through the window, the whole scene of the murder was vividly presented to his mind." Here, then, we have a claim, not to read a per.-on's thoughts through muscular action, voluntary or involuntary, but through a thought vividly presented to one mind being mirrored upon another, mind. If tiis power does exist, why is it not put to better use than merely guessing words and numbers, for it might render the detection of all crime, not only at the an tipodes, but here in England ? The reason is, I apprehend, that such thought-reading, a» is explained in the Australian incident, and by means of which Mr Bishop would have his audiences believe that he guesses words and figures, does not exist. Anent the scientists whose names Mr lii-hop presses into his programmes, a gen tleman sends me a letter tbat he received from Professor Huxley. Jt Is as follows :— '• I do not know in what way Mr Irving Bishop may be üßiog my name, but he has no authority from me to use it pt all. All that I know about him is that I was once present at one of his performances. The statement that Mr Bishop has a recommendation from me (on the slip which you enclose and which I return) is devoid of foundation "

Sir John Lubbock writes to the same gentleman :— "I chanced to meet Mr Bishop at Canon Wilberforce's some evenings ago, but had no idea tbat I was going to do so. It is true that he gave four numbers ot a Bank of England note correctly out oi five._ I suppose that I must have given some indica tion, but was certainly not conscious of having done so."

Courageous Rodents.

The hot weather of the past month seems to have increased to a notable extent the courage and pugnacity ot certain animals belonging to the genus of rodents. The " Field " mentions two samples of unusua valour on the part of these creatures. The fiist is that of a common rat, which had fastened its teeth in the hind leg of a rabbit, and was being dragged about by the victim as it rushed round and round, screaming with the pain, among some bushes on a heath. The correspondent who observed this proceeding, being a lover of fair play, did his best not to interrupt the combatants, but it seems that the aggres-'-i rat was not inclined to trust to this policy of friendly neutrality, and on the appearance of so foimidable a bystander, thought prudence the better part of valour, and made off, leaving the wounded rabbit also to escape without farther hurt. This coney is de scribed as not being one of those infants which are habitually attacked and eaten by rats, but as " about three parts grown," and, therefore, at least more than four times as large as its adversary. The hero of tbe other lals is cur old friend the hedgehog, as to whose alleged guilt as a poacher there is a debate between na turalists and game-preservers whichexcceds the length of Belt v. Lawes. The teller of the anecdote relates how a shepherd captured one of these animals in a hedge, and on walking a little further, found a partridge's nest, with eggs, and a number of feathers, showing that the parent bird had be-n destroyed. The captive was slain in cod blood, and d^eeted, when the evi dences of his murderous act were found within him, The tragic story seems to show, first, that partridges sitting on their nests, like Homer, sometimes nod ; secondly, that the hedgehog is as subtle as many bensts ot the field ; and, thirdly, that as a matter of Epicurean taste, he i refers the flesh of the old partridge, even when flavoured with feathers, to her eggs. Unless, indeed, he had tasted one of the latter, and found it advanced a little too far beyoad its prime condition.

Mow an Irishman Kept a Secret too well.

A Lady and gentlemen recently married In tbe neighbourhood of Boston, left home in their own carriage for a bridal tour among the mountains. In order t > avoid the curioe• ity attracted by persons in the honeymoon, the geatleman gave his servant the strictest charge not to tell any one on the road that they were newly-married, and threatened to di-miss him if he did.

Dan promised implicit o vedicnce ; but on leaving the first inu on the road next morn ins?, the happy couple were much a'tonished and annoyed to find tho servants all as sembled, and pointing to the gentleman, mysteriously exclaiming, "That's him; that's the man." " I should think they'd both be ashamed of themselves," &c. Oa reaching the next stage the indignant master told Dan he mnst immediately dis charge bim, as he had divulged what he had impressed upon him as n secret. " Tlazs yer honor," 8 .id Dan, " what is it you complain of ?" "You 1" exclaimed the angry master, '■ you told the servants at the inn last night that wo were a newly-mairied couple."

"Och, then be this aud be that," says l.'au, brightening up in anticipated triumph, "There's not a word of truth in it, yer honor. Sure I told the whole kit of them, servants aud all, that you mould not be married for a fortnight yet !" Tha lady fainted, but the husband par doned Dan, and concluded that in future ha. had better tell the truth, ~\

STAK SATURDAY SUPPLEMENT, JULY 28, 1883

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