{257}

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.

POST-OFFICE LIFE-ASSURANCE AND ANNUITIES.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
MY OLD COLLEGE ROOMS.
MY FELLOW-PASSENGER.
THE MONTH: SCIENCE AND ARTS.
THE PROGRESS OF PISCICULTURE.
A PLEA FOR THE WATER-OUSEL.
BOOK GOSSIP.
OCCASIONAL NOTES.

---

No. 17.—Vol. I.

Price 1½d.

SATURDAY, APRIL 26, 1884.

The numerous aids which the government have from time to time afforded through the agency of the Post-office for the encouragement of thrift and providence amongst the poorer classes have generally been attended with so much success, that it is surprising to hear of even one exception in regard to such efforts. There is no doubt, however, as was pointed out two years ago in this Journal, that the existing scheme of Post-office Life-assurance and Annuities, which has been in operation since 1865, has sadly hung fire, and but little advantage has been taken of the system, as may be inferred from the fact, that although it has been established almost twenty years, the total number of policies for life-assurance issued during that period is not more than six thousand five hundred and twenty-four; while the number of annuity contracts granted during the same period is only twelve thousand four hundred and thirty-five. Taking the latest returns, too, we find that the life policies now existing have dwindled down to so low a number as four thousand six hundred and fifteen; while the number of annuity contracts now only reaches nine thousand three hundred and seventy-three. These figures at once show how trifling and unimportant have been the results from this branch of Post-office business; but perhaps the causes for this want of success are not far to seek, if we consider how circumscribed and restricted the present system is in its action.

It was but natural, therefore, that so energetic a reformer as Mr Fawcett should speedily turn his attention to this important subject, on taking the helm in the affairs of the great department over which he has so ably presided during the past four years. A select Committee of the House of Commons was appointed in 1882, of which the Postmaster-general was chairman; and after thoroughly inquiring into the whole subject, that Committee unanimously recommended in their Report the adoption of a scheme for the amelioration of the present system of Post-office Life-assurance and Annuities which had been put forward and explained to them by Mr James J. Cardin, the present Assistant-receiver and Accountant-general to the Post-office. An Act of Parliament was passed during the same session legalising the proposed changes; and as it is understood that the new system will be brought into operation on the first of May this year, it seems desirable, and indeed important, that the undoubted benefits and privileges that will accrue therefrom should be made known as widely as possible.

The essential feature of the new Post-office scheme for assuring lives and granting annuities is, that every person wishing to assure his or her life or to purchase an annuity through the Post-office shall become a depositor in the Post-office savings-bank—a plan that will offer to the public numerous facilities, and a large amount of convenience in respect of this kind of business, which have hitherto not existed. In the first place, the intending insurants or annuitants will in future be able for that purpose to go to any post-office savings-bank in the country—of which there are now over seven thousand. At present, life-assurance and annuity business can be transacted at only two thousand post-offices; but the intended system will at once place five thousand additional post-offices at the disposal of the public in this respect. In the next place, the cosmopolitanism of the savings-bank system will apply equally to the assurance and annuities business under its new conditions; and this it may be pointed out will prove an advantage of no mean order to the classes for whom Post-office Assurance and Annuities would appear to be chiefly designed, if it be remembered how frequently working-men move about from place to place. Under the present system, the insurant or annuitant is tied to the particular post-office at which the insurance or the contract for the annuity was originally effected, excepting by going through the formalities involved in giving notice to the chief office in London of a desire to change the place of payment{258} of the premiums, which by most persons of the classes concerned is regarded as a somewhat irksome job.

The great idea of the whole scheme seems to be to afford the public in respect of Post-office Assurance and Annuities a maximum amount of convenience with a minimum amount of trouble; and nothing could probably further this object more successfully than Mr Cardin’s scheme of working the assurance and annuities business in with that of the savings-bank; for all the advantages and benefits which the public now enjoy in regard to the latter-named branch of the Post-office will be equally shared by those who intend to assure their lives or purchase annuities through the same department. Mr Fawcett, who is a true champion of the principles of thrift, has in all his schemes to this end recognised the supreme importance of simplicity in the necessary machinery, so far as the public at all events are concerned; and it was probably the fact of such simplicity being a predominating feature of the new insurance scheme that commended it so favourably to Mr Fawcett’s mind.

Any person desiring to assure his life or to purchase an annuity through the Post-office, will first of all procure the form or forms applicable to his case, and such information as he may require from a post-office at which savings-bank business is transacted, the number of such offices in the United Kingdom being, as already stated, over seven thousand. On completion of the necessary preliminaries, which will be reduced to the smallest limits compatible with the safe conduct of the business, he will be furnished, if not already a Post-office savings-bank depositor, with a deposit book; and a deposit account will be opened in his name, and he will then be asked to authorise the transfer of the amount of all future premiums as they become due, from his savings-bank to his assurance or annuity account. He will pay into the savings-bank account thus opened such sums as he conveniently can from time to time; and these sums, together with any accumulations by way of interest, or from dividends on stock purchased under the savings-bank regulations, will form the fund from which the Post-office will take the premiums as they annually become due. So long, therefore, as the annuitant or insurant, as the case may be, takes care to have a sufficient balance in his savings-bank account when the premiums become due, he will have no further trouble in the matter. In the event of the balance being insufficient, the fact will be specially notified to him, and reasonable time allowed for making good the deficiency.

The advantage in this scheme which the classes for whom it is designed will probably best appreciate is the liberty, and consequent convenience, of paying the premiums not in one annual lump sum and on a specific date, but from time to time as may be agreeable to the insurant or annuitant, and in such sums as may at the time suit his pocket. He may indeed save a penny at a time for his annual premiums by using the savings-bank stamp slip, which has spaces on it for twelve stamps, and which when filled up may be passed into the post-office. It is astonishing what benefits can be procured by the saving of only a penny a week. For instance, a youth of sixteen, by putting a penny postage-stamp each week on one of the slips referred to, might either secure for himself at sixty, old-age pay of about three pounds a year, or insure his life for about thirteen pounds; and if the saving commenced at five years of age, the old-age pay would be about five pounds a year. Another appreciable benefit which the new system will afford as regards payment is, that by allowing the premiums to be paid in as savings-bank deposits, the higher charges necessarily made when premiums have to be collected in regular periodical instalments will be saved to the insurant or annuitant, as the case may be.

To make a providence or thrift scheme at all successful it is of course essential that the general working of such a scheme should be adapted to the character of the classes whom it is intended to reach; and it is precisely in this respect that the new scheme of Post-office Assurance and Annuities would seem to succeed. As Mr Fawcett is himself ready to admit, the purchase of an annuity or the keeping up of a policy of insurance is at present a constant source of trouble to the person concerned. Attendance at a particular post-office is necessary for the payment of a premium, a special book has to be kept, and other rules have to be observed. All this will be changed under the new system; and when once the annuity has been purchased or the assurance effected, no further action on the part of the person concerned will be necessary. The premiums will be transferred at the chief office in London from his savings-bank account to his assurance or annuity account without trouble to him. He will thus be saved the task of remembering the precise amount of premium due or the particular day on which it is to be paid; and this arrangement will also abolish the necessity for a special insurance or annuity book.

The operation of the new scheme will, so far as can be seen, lead to some collateral advantages, of which not a few persons will be ready to avail themselves. A depositor, for instance, in the Post-office savings-banks, or a holder of government stock obtained through that medium, will be able to give authority to the Postmaster-general to use the interest or the dividends as the case may be, which may accrue, for the purposes of purchasing a life policy or an annuity, or both, as might be directed. Thus, as Mr Cardin tells us, a man at the age of thirty, with one hundred pounds deposited in the Post-office savings-bank, will be able to give an order directing that half the interest thereon shall be applied to the assurance of his life for fifty-three pounds{259} thirteen shillings and fourpence, and the other moiety to the purchase of a deferred annuity of eight pounds six shillings and eightpence, commencing at the age of sixty; and if his one hundred pounds were invested in government stock, the amounts of his life-assurance and his deferred annuity would be greater, as the dividends would be of greater amount than the interest received on a mere deposit.

It may be briefly pointed out that under the Act of Parliament for legalising the changes about to be wrought in the Post-office Assurance and Annuities system, some important alterations in the limits will be made. It has been long recognised that the present limits were ill adapted to the kind of business sought. The higher limits were too low, and the lower limits too high. The former will now be raised to the useful maximum of two hundred pounds; while the present lower limit of twenty pounds has been altogether abolished, so that an assurance can be effected or an annuity purchased for any sum below two hundred pounds. There will also be some beneficial changes as to the limits of age. There can be no doubt that the first steps taken by the young to make provision for the future act as a powerful incentive to greater efforts, and that thus an annuity or life policy of considerable amount is gradually built up. Mr Fawcett and the select Committee over which he presided, recognising this fact, felt that such beginnings of thrift could not be made too soon, and consequently recommended that the present limits of age which restrict life-assurance to sixteen, and the grant of annuities to ten, should be respectively reduced to eight and five years; and these proposals have been sanctioned by the Act. It should be added, that for obvious reasons, it was considered expedient to limit the amount of the assurance to be effected upon the life of a very young child; and the Act provides, therefore, that the amount shall not exceed five pounds on the life of a child between the ages of eight and fourteen years.

In conclusion, there can be no question that the changes which we have indicated here will prove of the greatest value, now that the importance of life-assurance and of making provision for old age is becoming more appreciated among the people. It is true, of course, that numerous benefit and friendly societies exist which offer various kinds of privileges; but from causes that are not far to seek, the poor have come to view such societies with a certain amount of distrust; and it is needful that the government should step in to render the poorer classes not only all the facilities at its command, but also that assurance as regards stability which alone a government department can impress on such classes.

We have attempted to show some of the principal advantages which will accrue from that system, and there is one more that should not be omitted. It is, that any person who may suddenly or unexpectedly become possessed of a certain sum of money may invest it in the Post-office, and by a single payment secure either an annuity in old age or a life-assurance. The advantage of being able to make a single payment is obvious; for it at once removes all further trouble and anxiety from the mind of the person so investing his money as to the future; a reflection which, to most persons, must be a source of infinite satisfaction.

CHAPTER XXV.—A WORD IN SEASON.

The suspicion which Philip now entertained regarding his uncle’s habits rendered the letters received from him the more surprising—they were so calm, kindly, and firm. He did not receive many: Mr Shield preferred that his instructions should be conveyed to him by Messrs Hawkins and Jackson. There was one waiting for him, however, on the morning on which he took possession of his chambers in Verulam Buildings, Gray’s Inn.

Wrentham had tried to persuade him to take chambers in the West End, indicating Piccadilly as the most suitable quarter for the residence of a young man of fortune who was likely to mix in society. There he would be close to the clubs, and five minutes from every place of amusement worth going to.

But Philip had notions of his own on this subject. He had no particular desire to be near the clubs: he expected his time to be fully occupied in the enterprise on which he was entering. What leisure he might have would of course be spent at Willowmere and Ringsford. The chambers in Verulam Buildings were all that a bachelor of simple tastes could desire. They were on the second floor, and the windows of the principal apartment overlooked the green square. To the left were quaint old gables and tiles, which the master-painter, Time, had transformed into a wondrous harmony of all the shades and tints of green and russet.

Sitting there, with the noisy traffic of Gray’s Inn Road shut out by double doors and double windows on the other side of the building, he could imagine himself to be miles away from the bustle and fever of the town, although he was in the midst of it. And sitting there, he read this letter from Mr Shield, which began as usual without any of the customary phrases of address:

This was signed abruptly, Austin Shield, as if the writer feared that he had already said too much.

‘How he must have suffered,’ was Philip’s thought, after the first few moments of reflection over this letter. It was the longest he had ever received from his uncle, and seemed to disclose more of the man’s inner nature than he had hitherto been permitted to see. ‘How he must have suffered! Would I bear the scar so long if—— What stuff and nonsense!’

He laughed at himself heartily, and a little scornfully for allowing the absurd question even to flit across his mind. As if any possible combination of circumstances could ever arise to take Madge away from him! The tombstone of one of them was the only barrier that could ever stand between them; and the prospect of its erection was such a long way off, that he could think of it lightly if not philosophically.

But as he continued to stare out at those quaint russet gables and the green square, a dreamy expression slowly filled his eyes, and visions of the impossible passed before him. He had thrown himself into this work which he had found to do with such earnestness, that he had already passed more than one day without going to see Madge. Her spirit was in the work, and inspired his devotion to it, and all his labour was for her. In that way she was always with him, although her form and clear eyes might not be constantly present to his mind. That was a consolatory thought for himself; but would it satisfy her? Was it sufficient to satisfy himself how he had allowed three days to pass without his appearance at Willowmere?

He was startled when he recollected that it was three days since he had been there. Three days—an age, and how it could have passed so quickly he was unable to understand. He had certainly intended every evening to go as usual. But every day had been so full of business—details of plans and estimates to study and master—that he had been glad to lie down and sleep. The task was the more laborious for him, as he had not had previous knowledge of its practical intricacies, and he was resolved to understand thoroughly everything that was done.

‘I suppose she will laugh, and say it is like me—always at extremes; either trying to do too much, or doing too little. At anyrate, she will be convinced that I have taken kindly to harness. We’ll see this afternoon.’

There was another influence which unconsciously detained him in town. He shrank somehow from the interview with his father which must take place on his return to Ringsford. He had hoped to be able to take with him some friendly message from Mr Shield which would lead to the reconciliation of the two men; and as yet he was as far as ever from being able to approach the subject with his uncle.

His reverie was interrupted by the arrival of Wrentham, spruce and buoyant, a flower in his button-hole, and looking as if he had made a safe bet on the next racing event.

‘Came to tell you about that land,’ he said.

‘I suppose you have made arrangements for the purchase?’ rejoined Philip, as he folded his uncle’s letter and replaced it in the envelope.

Wrentham followed the action with inquisitive eyes. He was asking himself, ‘Has that letter{261} anything to do with this coolness about the bargain, on which he was so hot a few days ago, or is it accident?’ Then, with a little real wonder, and some affectation of amusement at the innocence of his principal:

‘My dear Philip!’—Wrentham was one of those men who will call an acquaintance of a few hours by his Christian name, and by an abbreviation of it after an intimacy of a couple of days—‘you don’t mean to say that you imagine a question of the transfer of land in this greatest city of the world is to be settled off-hand in a forenoon?’

‘O no; I did not think that, Wrentham; but as the land is very much on the outskirts of the city, and has been for a long time in the market, I did not expect that there would be much delay in coming to terms about it.’

‘Ah! but you forget that it is within easy distance of an existing railway station, and close by the site of one which will be in working order before your houses can be built.’

‘Exactly. That is why I chose the spot.’

‘Just so; and you can have it; but the fellows know its full value, and mean to have it. Look at that.’

He handed him a paper containing the statement of the terms on which the land in question was to be sold. Philip read it carefully, frowned, and tossed it back to his agent.

‘Ridiculous!’ he exclaimed. ‘They must have thought you were acting for the government or a railway company. I believe it is considered legitimate to fleece them. Half the money is what I will give, and no more.’

When a clever man thinks he has performed a particularly clever trick, and finds that, by some instinct of self-preservation, the person to be tricked upsets all his calculations, whilst there still remains a chance of persuading him that he is making a mistake, there comes over the clever person a peculiar change. It is like a sudden lull in the wind: he shows neither surprise nor regret on his own part, but a certain respectful pity for the blindness of the other in not seeing the advantage offered him. So with Wrentham at this moment. He left the paper lying on the table, as if it had no further interest for him, and took out his cigar-case.

‘You don’t mind a cigar, I suppose?... Have one?’

‘Thank you. Here is some sherry: help yourself.’

Wrentham helped himself, lit his cigar, and sank back on an easy-chair, like a man whose day’s work is done, and who feels that he has earned the right to rest comfortably.

‘I’ve been trotting between pillar and post about that land all day,’ he said languidly, ‘because I fancied you had set your mind on it; and now I feel as tired as if I had been doing a thousand miles in a thousand hours. Glad it’s over.’

‘You do not think it is worth making the offer, then?’

‘My dear boy, they would think we were making fun of them, and be angry.’

Wrentham rolled the cigar between his fingers and smiled complacently.

‘Surely, they must be aware that the price they are asking is absurd—they cannot hope to obtain it from any one in his senses. Look at this paragraph: there is land bought by the corporation yesterday—it is almost within the city, and the price is more than a third less than these people are asking from us.’

Wrentham’s eyes twinkled over the paragraph.

‘Ah, yes; but, you see, these people were obliged to sell; ours are not. However, we need not bother about it. They require more than you will give, and there is an end of it. The question is, what are we to do now?’

‘Take land farther out, where the owners will be more reasonable, and we can reduce our rents so as to cover the railway fares.’

‘But the farther out you go, the more difficulty you will have in finding workmen.’

‘I have thought of that, and have secured an excellent foreman, who will bring us the labourers we require; and for the skilled workmen, an advertisement will find them.’

‘And who is the man you have engaged?’

‘Caleb Kersey.’

Wrentham laughed softly as he emitted a long serpentine coil of smoke.

‘On my word, you do things in a funny way. I am supposed to be your counsellor as well as friend; and you complete your arrangements before you tell me anything about them. I don’t see that my services are of any use to you.’

‘We have not had time to find that out yet. What advice could you have given me in reference to Kersey?’

‘Oh, I have nothing to say against the man, except that, as soon as you had your establishment ready to begin operations, he would have every soul in your employment out on strike for higher wages or for new terms of agreement, which will cause you heavy loss whether you knuckle down or refuse. I know the kind of man: he will be meek enough until he gets you into a corner—or thinks he has—and then he turns round and tells you that he is master of the situation, whatever you may be. That’s his sort.’

‘I think you are mistaken, Wrentham. I am sure that you are mistaken so far as Kersey is concerned. He managed that business of the harvest for my father when nobody else could, and he managed it admirably. He wants nothing more than fair-play between master and man, and he believes that my scheme is likely to bring about that condition.’

‘All right,’ said Wrentham, smiling, and helping himself to another glass of wine; ‘here’s good luck to him—and to you. We are all naturally inclined to be pleased with the people who agree with us. We’ll say that I am mistaken, and, on my honour, I hope it may be so.’

Philip flushed a little: he could not help feeling that Wrentham was treating him as if he were a child at play, and did not or could not see that he was a man making a bold experiment and very much in earnest.

‘It is not merely because Kersey agrees with me that I have engaged him,’ he said warmly. ‘I know something about the man, and I have learned a good deal from him. He has the power to convey my meaning to others better than I could do it myself. They might doubt me at{262} first; they will trust him; and he is one of those men who are willing to work.’

‘That is everything you want in the meanwhile, except the land on which to begin operations. I promised to take your answer back to these people by four o’clock. I shall have just time to drive to their office. I suppose that there is nothing to say except that we cannot touch it at the price?’

‘Nothing more.’

‘Very well. I will report progress to-morrow; but I have no expectation of bringing them down to your figure. Good-day.’

Although Wrentham bustled out as if in a hurry, he descended the stairs slowly.

‘He may have gone in for a mad scheme,’ he was thinking; ‘but he is a deal ’cuter in his way of setting about it than I bargained for.... This is confoundedly awkward for me.... Must get out of it somehow.’

(To be continued.)

No easy task would it be to analyse the medley of conflicting emotions that run riot in the heart of an old ’varsity man revisiting the haunts of his academical ‘auld langsyne.’ Even were I equal to it, I would not publish the results of my experiment. Far too sacred, too personal, at least for the pages of a magazine, were my own thoughts and memories the other day, as I stealthily stole up my old staircase in ——’s, Oxford. ‘Stealthily stole,’ I say advisedly; for I felt unpleasantly more like a burglar in my pilgrim-ascent, than a respectable country clergyman. In a university sense, generations had passed away since my college days; since I, in my generation, was wont to rollick in and out of those ancient ‘oaks’ and about those venerable banisters. One felt a kind of sad impression that one belonged to a bygone age; that one’s only rightful locus standi in the university now was a shelf in the fossil department of its museum; that one was de trop in this land of the living; that one was ‘unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown,’ a sort of college ghost that ought long since to have been laid. But now, the gray goose-quill would fain flutter on, by the page, with emotions which, as I have said, are too sacred for publication. I will confine myself to more exoteric details. At the funny old cupola-like entrance—where, on the first impulse, I found myself all but taking off my hat to the ‘silent speaking’ stones of its venerable, unsightly pile—I had met a porter, but not the porter. On the staircase I had met a scout, but not the scout. No civil salute and smile of recognition from either of those; only a curious stare—a look that seemed to ask, ‘What business have you to come back and revisit earth’—(I beg the reader’s pardon!)—‘college, disturbing us in our day and generation?’

Then, at last, well ‘winded’ by my climb, I actually stood once again in front of my own old ‘oak;’ and much I wonder if ever pious Druid stood with deeper feelings of reverence before his own! It was superscribed with a most unusual, though not foreign, name; one which to me at least was new. So far, this was a comfort; for ‘Jones’ would have made me very sad and at ‘Smith’ I feel I should have wept. As it was, I found myself already speculating with some curiosity what manner of man might own to it. Somehow, with perhaps pardonable vanity, I seemed to have expected ‘Ichabod;’ but that was not the present occupant’s name. At the inner door, which was ajar, I knocked, honestly trying not to peep; but the gentleman was not at home. Just then, a jolly young fellow, books under arm, and obviously out from lecture, came bounding up the stairs, two or three steps at a time, in the real old style. Oh, how the aged, nearly worn-out parson envied now the limbs and wind that could perform that once familiar feat! There used to be a je ne sais quoi—a sense of freedom, I suppose it was, after being ‘cribbed, cabined, and confined’ for an hour at lecture, that always made one sadly forgetful for the nonce of one’s dignity in that matter of going up-stairs. At other times, the leisurely step which betokened the importance of the (newly fledged) ‘man’ was carefully observed; and used, no doubt, to make due impression upon the freshman—that junior Verdant who always had what Carlyle would call a ‘seeing eye’ for such details of deportment. But coming from lecture, even the old hand, the third-year man, now, as of yore, involuntarily betrays a lingering trace of schoolboy days by a very natural, but most undignified, hop, skip, and jump up-stairs, to doff cap and gown and don flannels for the river.

Well, up he came, this embryo bishop, statesman, or judge—I know not which—and fixing him Ancient Mariner-wise with my eye, I told him my story; feeling rather sheepish until I had satisfactorily accounted for my being discovered hovering about the coal-bin on his landing. More than one kind of expression flitted over the youth’s features as he listened to me; but the predominating one, which his politeness in vain struggled to conceal, was characteristic of the antiquary surveying some newly dug up relic of a past epoch. ‘I am not Mr Ichabod’ (let us suppose the name), he said; ‘but I am his neighbour on this floor; and I’m sure he would wish you to go into your old rooms. I will explain it to him. He will be sorry that he was out when you came.’ With this and a mutual touch of hats, we parted; he to his rooms, and I, after an absence of some forty-five years, to mine. Suggestive enough was the very first object that caught my eye upon entering; for over the bedroom door was placed, by way of ornament, a real skull, with crossbones! There it serenely rested on a black cushion fixed to a small shelf, horribly grinning at me. I could have wished a more pleasant welcome to greet me after my long absence.

‘Eheu! fugaces, Postume, Postume’ (The years fly by, and are lost to me, lost to me), I had said to myself all the morning, as I wandered{263} about the old college haunts of my far-away youth; and if my perception of that sad fact needed quickening, that skull certainly brought it home to me with a vengeance! Clearly, my successor was a bit of a ‘mystic.’ Weird prints on the walls; curious German literature on the shelves and tables; outlandish ornaments everywhere: these and such as these spoke for their absent owner, and I felt that I could conjecture the man by his various kickshaws. I pictured him to myself reading for ‘a class’ by the midnight oil, and occasionally stimulating his flagging interest in the classics by casting a philosophic glance at the skull, to bethink him of the flight of time and man’s ‘little day’ for work. Or, again, I could see him as he refreshed himself on the sofa with a grim legend or two of the Rhine, and meditated upon the fate of some medieval fool wandering about to sell his soul, si emptorem invenerit, until he met and did fatal business with the dread merchant of the nether world. At such times, no doubt, his death’s head would have a specially attractive charm for him, and elicit some such sigh as ‘Alas! poor Yorick,’ in reference to the deluded Rhinelander. Two more clues to the character of my young friend were obvious, and right glad I was to obtain them. In the first place, he was not, as are too many of his university generation, so ‘mad,’ through much ‘learning,’ as to deny or ignore his God. Witness a well-worn Bible and Prayer-book; and even an illuminated text opposite his bed—the gift, perhaps, of a pious mother, or handiwork of a pious sister, whose holy influence he did not despise. And, again, he was not one of our unhealthy ascetics of modern society, secular ascetics, I mean—if I may coin such an expression—whose artificial merits are purely negative. Witness his rack of grotesquely shaped and well-cleaned pipes, no less than that three-handled jorum, with the shrivelled peel of the previous evening still therein!

Having taken notice of such apparent trifles on every side, and not liking to trespass longer, I prepared to leave. But if the ‘man’ who occupies my Old Rooms is brought as safely to his journey’s end as I have now well nigh been brought to mine, my last half-minute alone in that ancient ‘upper chamber’ was not spent there in vain.

IN TWO CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER II.

The next afternoon, I landed at Southampton; and having left my luggage with Raynor’s at the railway station, and exchanged my twenty-five sovereigns for their equivalent in Bank of England notes, I started off to see some relatives living a short way out of the town. After a few pleasant hours at Hambledon Hall, I drove back to Southampton, took an evening train to London, and by half-past nine was comfortably installed in my old quarters, No. 91 Savile Street, W.

In the morning arrived a telegram from Raynor: ‘Heard of a good thing in Dublin. Going there at once. May be a long business. Better countermand my rooms. Will write.’ Here without doubt was an end, at least for the present, of our partnership. Whether Paul intended me to gather that the ‘good thing’ was to involve my presence in Ireland, I knew not; but having already come to a very distinct understanding with him that the venue of any future operations must, as far as I was concerned, be laid in or near London, I was able to decide at once that even the claims of friendship did not demand my expatriation to the other side of the Irish Channel.

London was hot, airless, and uninviting this 21st of July. Two days had elapsed, during which I had heard nothing more from Raynor; and as I loitered down to my club, there came into my mind the recollection of Keymer, a breezy little homestead among the Sussex downs, where lived a middle-aged bachelor cousin of mine, and of his cordial invitation to repeat a visit I had paid him the previous summer. Half an hour later I had posted my letter to Henry Rodd, whose reply by return post was all I could wish: On and after the 24th, he would be delighted to see me for as long as I cared to stay.

On the morning of the 26th, the day upon which I was to leave for Keymer, my landlady presented herself in my sitting-room, and with an expression as of one who has intelligence to convey, opened upon me with: ‘Oh, I beg your pardon, sir, but there was a gentleman called yesterday, askin’ whether we had any one lodgin’ here as was jest back from furrin parts, because he’d got a friend who he thought was goin’ to some lodgin’s in this street, and he couldn’t find him out—not the gentleman, couldn’t, that is, sir. I’m sure he knew you, sir, because he said, when I called you Mr Rodd, “Ah! is that Mr P. Rodd?” says he. “Yes,” says I to the gent; “it’s Mr Peter Rodd.” “O yes,” says he, careless-like, “I know Mr Peter Rodd by name.” Then he give me five shillin’s, sir, and told me be sure and not trouble you about his ’avin’ been, seein’ as ’ow you wouldn’t know who he was—he didn’t give no name, sir—but I thought I’d best tell you, sir, because it didn’t seem right-like his givin’ me five shillin’s to say nothin’ about it. Excuse me for mentionin’ it, sir; but it’s what I call ’ush-money, and it’s burnin’ ’oles in my pocket ever since.’

Here the worthy woman paused for breath; and wondering much who this lavish unknown might be, and how he came to know so obscure an individual as myself by name, I, perhaps indiscreetly, asked for a description of his appearance, being then unaware of the curious fact, that people in good Mrs Morton’s station of life are wholly incapable of conveying to a third person the faintest impression of a stranger’s exterior. Thus she could not say whether he was dark or fair, tall or short, young or old, stout or thin. Upon one point only did her memory serve her: ‘His necktie was a speckly, twisted up in a sailorses’ knot.’ Having triumphantly furnished me with this useful clue to the visitor’s identity, Mrs Morton took herself down-stairs.

A sudden thought struck me, and I ran to the window. No; there was not a soul to be seen in the quiet little street save a very ordinary looking person in a gray dustcoat, sunning himself against the pillar-box at the corner some fifty yards away; evidently a groom waiting for orders, I thought. An hour later, I went out to make some purchases, lunched at Blanchard’s, and drove{264} back to Savile Street to prepare for my journey to Sussex. There, in friendly converse with a policeman at the same corner, was Citizen Gray-coat. I looked sharply at him as my cab passed. His tie was not ‘speckly,’ nor had he any outward pretensions to the title of ‘gentleman.’

I reached Keymer without adventure late in the afternoon, my cousin himself driving over in his trap to meet me. Turning round on the platform, after our first hand-shaking, to look for my travelling-bag, I saw stooping in the act of reading the card attached to the handle—the man in the gray dustcoat.

It could not be a chance! No; look at it which way I would, there scowled at me the unpleasant but undeniable fact that I was being ‘watched.’ For what purpose, it was of course impossible to tell, though I had no difficulty in connecting the visitor of the day before with the apparition in gray at the little Sussex junction. I waited till the evening to mention the matter to my cousin Henry, who, after a ringing laugh and many small jokes at my expense, suddenly became serious, and remarked: ‘But I say, Peter, it is an excessively disagreeable thing to be followed about in that sort of way. Can’t you account for the mistake in any way, so as to be able to get rid of the fellow to-morrow?’

At that moment the suspicion against which I had fought so hard was borne in with irresistible force upon my mind, and almost dizzy with the physical effort to conceal its effect, I muttered my concurrence with Rodd, that for his sake no less than my own, steps should at once be taken to come to an understanding with the man and relieve him of his duty. Looking forward with interest to learning the nature of the mistake next day, we parted for the night.

That circumstances were so shaping themselves as to do away with the necessity of any action from our side, did not, and could not enter into my calculations, as, bitterly wondering when and how this miserable suspicion would become a sickening certainty, I fell into a dream-haunted and unquiet sleep.

We had breakfasted, and were leaving the house towards eleven o’clock the next morning, intending, if we could sight him, to interview the gray-coated sentry, when a station fly drove up to the door and deposited a well-built and gentlemanly looking person, who, slightly raising his hat, said: ‘May I ask if either of you gentlemen is Mr Peter Rodd?’

Casually noticing that the speaker wore a speckled tie, I replied: ‘That is my name.’

‘Then it is my duty to inform you, sir, that I have a warrant for your arrest on a criminal charge, and at the same time to caution you against saying anything which may hereafter be used in your disfavour.’

‘What is the charge?’ I asked, ‘with the air,’ as Henry afterwards observed, ‘of a man who is in the habit of being arrested every morning after breakfast.’

‘Suspicion of having stolen on or about the 23d June a sum of one thousand five hundred and fifty pounds in gold from the Alliance Bank, Cape Town, in which you were an employee under the name of Percival Royston.’

‘And what evidence have you that this gentleman is the person for whose arrest you have a warrant?’ interposed my cousin.

‘Strictly speaking, I have told you all I am permitted to do,’ was the courteous answer. ‘But it will not be a very grave breach of duty if I say that my prisoner is known to have reached England in the Balbriggan Castle, to have exchanged gold for notes at Southampton, and to be in possession of a quantity of luggage marked P. R., some of which has been found upon examination to contain clothes, books, and letters bearing the name Percival Royston, Alliance Bank, Cape Town; while in other boxes were found similar articles with the name Peter Rodd, showing the adoption of the alias.’

‘Would it be within your province to release your prisoner upon undoubted proof that he is not the person wanted?’

The officer thought for a moment, and replied: ‘If such proof could be confirmed by a magistrate—and after communicating with headquarters—yes.’

‘Then,’ said my cousin, ‘will you be good enough to bring your prisoner to the manor-house, and ask the squire—who is a magistrate—three simple questions?—The name of your prisoner—How long it is since they last met—What is to his knowledge the total duration of the prisoner’s recent absence from England?’

This my captor readily consented to do; and after the three questions had been answered by the squire—at whose house I had dined just a year before—telegraphed to Scotland Yard, asking whether it was known how long Royston had been continuously in the service of the bank. The answer came speedily: ‘Five or six years;’ followed half an hour later by a second message: ‘A mistake has occurred. Do not arrest Rodd. If already done, express regret, and return at once.’ There was just time for him to catch an up-train; and after carrying out his last instructions with great politeness, the detective drove off, stopping, as I observed, at the end of the drive to pick up a man who was leaning against the gate-post, his hands buried deep in the pockets of a gray dustcoat.

The next post from London brought a very ample explanation and apology for ‘the painful position in which I had been placed through an exceedingly regrettable mistake. This had arisen through the imperfect information furnished to the authorities in the first instance as to the movements of the real culprit, who, they had unfortunately no room whatever to doubt, was the passenger going under the name of Paul Raynor. This person, it was now ascertained, had taken passage on board a sailing-ship for South America. The similarity of initials, with other facts of which I was aware, had combined to mislead those engaged in the case; while the discovery of Royston’s luggage in my possession had of course confirmed their suspicions.

‘They were directed to add that the alias under which I knew him had of course been assumed only after the Balbriggan Castle had actually sailed, as the message brought by the next homeward-bound steamer to Madeira, and thence telegraphed to England, did not contain this important item of information.’

Opening the newspaper two or three days later, I read at the head of a column, in conspicuous{265} type: ‘Arrival of the Cape Mail. Audacious Robbery from a Cape Town Bank’—then in smaller print: ‘A considerable sensation has been caused at Cape Town by the discovery of a robbery planned and carried out with an audacity which it is not too much to describe as unique in the annals of crime. The circumstances are briefly these. On the morning of Wednesday the 16th June, the mail-steamer Turcoman arrived in Table Bay from England, having on board some five thousand pounds in gold for the Alliance Bank, to whose care it was duly delivered on the same day. A portion of this amount, namely, fifteen hundred pounds, was destined for the use of the bank’s Diamond Fields branch at De Vriespan, where it was required with all expedition. The overland service between Cape Town and the Diamond Fields is a bi-weekly one, leaving the former place at six A.M. on Monday and Thursday, and covering the whole distance of seven hundred miles in about five days nine hours. In order, therefore, to insure the despatch of the case containing the specie by the mail-cart on the following day, Mr Percival Royston, the assistant-cashier, was requested to undertake, in conjunction with the senior clerk, Mr Albertus Jager, the duty of counting and repacking the gold, after the completion of their ordinary work at six or seven o’clock. According to the latter gentleman’s statement, the task was not commenced till after dinner at about eight o’clock. They had made some considerable progress when Royston remarked how pale and tired his companion was looking. Upon Mr Jager’s admitting that he was feeling far from well, the other asked him if he would not give up the work and go home to bed, saying that he (Royston) would finish the counting himself and have everything ready in plenty of time for to-morrow. Knowing how thoroughly the assistant-cashier was trusted by the bank, Mr Jager allowed himself to be persuaded, and left at once for his own quarters. The case was duly despatched in the morning, in charge of a clerk proceeding to the De Vriespan office on promotion, the fact being reported by Royston to the head-cashier.

‘Nothing further appears to have transpired until Tuesday the 21st June, when the head-cashier addressing Royston, asked: “By the way, when is that gold due at De Vriespan? To-day?”

“Yes, sir,” was the answer; “we ought to get the telegram announcing its arrival in half an hour or so.”

‘It is the custom of the bank to send a junior clerk to the home-going mail-steamer with late letters for England, which may be posted on board upon payment of an extra fee. This duty Royston asked to be allowed to perform on the present occasion, stating that he would be glad of the opportunity of seeing some friends off who were leaving by the steamer that day. He left the bank at three forty-five, was seen to go on board with a travelling-bag ten minutes later, and has not since been heard of. His other luggage, consisting of two portmanteaus, had been removed from his lodgings before daybreak, Royston having somehow obtained the services of a coolie, who states that, following his instructions, he first carried the luggage to an inn near the docks, subsequently transferring it thence by hand-truck to the ship as soon as the dock gates were opened. It should be remarked that Royston occupied rooms on the ground-floor, the landlord and his wife and the other lodgers sleeping on the first and second floors. But for this fact, it would probably have been impossible to effect the removal of the luggage without disturbing the other occupants of the house.

‘At five o’clock a telegram was received at the Alliance Bank: “De Vriespan, four thirty. Case just arrived. On being opened, found to contain nothing but lead-sheeting to exact weight of gold expected. Clerk in charge denies all knowledge. Wire any instructions.” A cab dashed furiously to the docks, its occupant the head-cashier, who, as he turned the corner towards the quay, was just able to descry the smoke of the vanishing steamer now four or five miles on her way. “Too late!” shouted the Steam Company’s agent as he passed on foot. “Ship sailed sharp at four thirty!”

‘The above incident will most probably give a sharp impetus to the movement, already initiated in Cape commercial circles, for the establishment of ocean cable communication with Great Britain direct, the importance of which, from an imperial as well as a colonial point of view, has long been recognised.’

A keen east wind was blowing in my teeth as I hurried along the Strand towards Temple Bar one morning in March, and as I bent my head to meet a more than usually piercing gust, I came against a passer-by, who answered my apology with a smile of recognition. ‘Mr Rodd, I think?’

It was no other than the polite detective, more polite than ever, because of the whirling dust and biting wind, against which the best of good-humour is so rarely proof.

‘Ah, sir,’ he went on, as we drew into a low archway for a moment’s talk, ‘you would be astonished to hear the story of the wildgoose chase we had after Mr Percival Royston last summer and autumn. If you would care to call in at my quarters any day after four o’clock, I should be very pleased to tell you about it.’

‘Thank you,’ I replied; ‘I will see. Meanwhile, how did it end?’

‘All wrong for us, I am sorry to say. He got clean away from us; and I don’t suppose we shall ever hear of him again.’

The sun shone out for a moment, and the wind seemed to have lost something of its bitter chill as I wished Detective Elms good-morning and passed on my way eastward.

The abnormally mild winter—if winter it can be called—which has been experienced this year, has once more raised hopes in the minds of farmers that brighter times are in store for them. The extreme mildness of the season has not only been favourable for all field operations, but it has been most beneficial for stock. Lambs have never been so numerous as they are this year in many of the southern counties, for not only have they had the climate in their favour during the most critical time of their lives, but there has been a wonderful number of twins. Indeed,{266} the proportion of these latter to single births has on some farms been as high as sixteen out of twenty.

A silver lining to the dark cloud which has so long overshadowed the British farmer may also perhaps be discerned in certain operations which are now being pushed forward at Lavenham, in Suffolk. A private Company has been formed to recommence, under the more favourable conditions which the progress of scientific agriculture has rendered possible, the making of beet-sugar in this country. Between the years 1869 and 1873, Mr James Duncan tried a similar experiment, and the present Company has acquired his works at Lavenham, to take up once more the industry which he tried to establish. The recently devised methods of extracting sugar from the beet are much easier and simpler, and far less costly, than the processes employed by Mr Duncan; and the promoters of the enterprise are sanguine of success, if they can only induce the farmers to grow sufficient beetroot for them to operate upon. The Company has arranged favourable terms of transport with the railway authorities; for instance, a truck-load of roots can be brought to Lavenham from Bury—a distance of eleven miles—for eighteenpence a ton. For the same distance, Mr Duncan formerly paid four shillings and twopence a ton. The experiment will be watched with extreme interest by all agriculturists.

Mr Wood’s lecture to the Institute of Agriculture on the subject of Ensilage gave some valuable particulars of experiments he had made with the object of ascertaining which are the crops that can be most profitably cultivated for that method of preservation. He first of all took the value of ensilage at twenty-six shillings and eightpence, or about one-third the value of hay. An acre of heavy meadow-grass produced twelve tons of compressed food; and the same quantity dried into hay weighed only two tons seven hundredweight. After allowing for the cost of producing each, the lecturer showed a balance in favour of the ensilage over hay of nearly five pounds sterling an acre. Buckwheat cultivated for treatment as ensilage, against the same valued as a seed-crop, showed a gain in favour of the silo of two pounds eight shillings and threepence per acre. Oats compared in like manner show a balance of five pounds per acre; and here there is a further gain, for oats cut in the green state have not had the time to exhaust the soil as if they had been left to mature. There is still a further gain in favour of ensilage, when it is remembered that the ground is cleared before the usual time, and is therefore ready very early for new crops. The lecturer concluded by throwing out a useful hint that dairymen and cowkeepers in towns could be with great advantage supplied with the new form of fodder in casks, a sixty-gallon cask holding about thirty-one stone-weight of the compressed material.

Mr W. F. Petrie, whose recently published book upon the Pyramids of Gezeh we noticed two months ago, has just undertaken some excavations in another part of Egypt, which are likely to bear fruitful results. Amidst a desolation of mud and marsh, there lies, in the north-eastern delta of the Nile, a place far from the track of tourists, and which is therefore seldom visited. This now remote spot, Sàn-el-Hagar (that is, Sàn of the Stones), was once a splendid city, in the midst of the cornlands and pasturage which formed part of the biblical ‘field of Zoan.’ Excavations were begun here in 1861 by Mariette Pasha, and he unearthed the site of the principal temple; but lack of funds and want of support generally, caused him to give up the work, though not before several treasures had found their way from his diggings to the Boulak Museum at Cairo, and to the Louvre. Mr Petrie, under the auspices of the newly formed Egypt Exploration Fund, commences the work anew in this promising field of research; and before long we may possibly have very important finds to chronicle.

At the recent meeting of the Scottish Meteorological Society, held in Edinburgh, an interesting account was given of the daily work which has been carried on in the Ben Nevis Observatory since its first occupation in November last, and which is telegraphed daily from the summit of the mountain. Several new instruments have been added since that date, and improvements in the buildings costing a thousand pounds will shortly be commenced. Referring to the new marine station at Granton, near Edinburgh, Mr Murray of the Challenger expedition gave an interesting account of the work going on there. The laboratory is now in working order, and there is accommodation for five or six naturalists. It is intended to offer this accommodation free of expense to any British or foreign naturalist having a definite object of study in view.

The French Academy of Sciences has just received an interesting account of a meteorite which fell not long ago near Odessa. A bright serpentine trail of fire was seen one morning to pass over that town; and the editor of one of the papers, surmising that a meteoric mass might have fallen from the sky, offered a reward to any one who would bring it to him. A peasant, who had been terribly frightened by the stone falling close to him as he worked in the fields, and burying itself in the ground, answered this appeal. He had dug the stone out of the soil, and preserved it, keeping the matter quite secret from his neighbours, as he feared ridicule. This stone was found to be a shapeless mass weighing nearly eighteen pounds. The fall of another meteorite, which in its descent near the same town wounded a man, was also reported; but it had been broken into fragments and distributed among the peasants, who preserved them as talismans.

The visitors to Cliff House, San Francisco, had recently the rare opportunity of viewing a marvellous mirage, during which the headland of North Farallon, which is under ordinary circumstances quite out of sight, indeed absolutely below the horizon, not only came into view, but appeared to be only a few miles from the shore. The strange sight fascinated the onlookers for many hours, and marine glasses and telescopes were brought to bear upon these veritable castles in the air.

It seems strange that Samuel Pepys, whose famous Diary is known to all English readers, should have been left without a monument in the old London church where his remains repose, until one hundred and eighty years after his{267} death. This may be partly explained by the circumstance that Pepys’ Diary was not published until the year 1825. It was originally written in cipher, and the key to it, strange to say, was not made use of until that time. Although Pepys was a well-known man in his day, and occupied a good official position as ‘Clerk of the Acts’ and Secretary to the Admiralty, his fame is due to his unique Diary. At last, however, Pepys has a monument to his honour, which was unveiled the other day in the ancient city church of St Olave’s, near the Tower of London. The question has been raised whether Pepys, in using a cipher alphabet, did not intend his Diary as a private document. But still he left the key behind him, which he might have easily destroyed. However this may be, the book has delighted thousands of readers, giving as it does in a very quaint style a picture, and a true picture too, of London life two hundred years ago.

A curious record of the year 1478 is quoted in the Builder, which points to an early case of water being laid on to a town-house. The ingenious individual who thus tapped the conduit or watercourse running along the street, seems to have paid more dearly for the privilege than even a London water-consumer has to pay to the Companies in the present day. The man was a tradesman in Fleet Street, and is thus referred to: ‘A wex-chandler in Flete-strete had by crafte perced a pipe of the condit withynne the ground, and so conveied the water into his selar; wherefore he was judged to ride through the citie with a condit uppon his hedde.’ This poor man was nevertheless only adapting to his own purposes a system of water-conveyance that had been known and practised in many countries ages before his time.

It is expected that nearly one thousand members and associates of the British Association will cross the Atlantic in August next to take part in the meeting which is to be held this year at Montreal. All visitors to the Dominion know well that the Canadians understand the meaning of the word hospitality in its broadest sense, and they are, according to all reports, taking measures which will cause their British cousins to long remember the welcome which they will receive. The Association is taking good care that the members shall be seen at their best, and no new members will be allowed to join the party except under stringent conditions. This will very rightly prevent an influx of people who will take a sudden interest in scientific research for the sake of getting a cheap trip to Canada. The names of the representative men under whose care the various sections are placed, are sufficient guarantee that plenty of good work will be done. We may mention that special attention will be paid in section D, under Professor Ray Lankester, to the vexed question of the supposed connection between sun-spot periods and terrestrial phenomena. This question has long been a bone of contention among scientific men, one side bringing forward figures giving remarkable points of agreement, the other side disclaiming them with the assertion that statistics can be made to prove anything. Perhaps this meeting of the Association may guide us to a right solution of the problems involved.

‘The Mineral Wealth of Queensland,’ the title of a paper recently read before the Royal Colonial Institute by Mr C. S. Dicken, was full of matter which should be interesting to those who are seeking an outlay for their capital. Queensland is five and a half times larger in area than the United Kingdom. Its gold-fields are estimated to cover a space of seven thousand square miles, and it produces large quantities of silver, copper, and tin. According to the official Reports of geologists, coal crops out on the surface over some twenty-four thousand square miles. Hitherto, these vast resources have been comparatively untouched. Men and capital are required for their development; and as the climate is a healthy one, and the laws administered by capable and impartial men, there is every incentive to Europeans to turn their attention to the country.

A Bill now before the House of Commons is of extreme interest and importance to students of natural history, to artists, and many others. We allude to Mr Bryce’s ‘Access to Mountains (Scotland) Bill.’ In the preamble to this proposed measure, it is set forth that many large tracts of uncultivated mountain and moorland, which have in past times been covered with sheep and cattle, are now stocked with deer, and in many cases the rights which have hitherto been enjoyed by artists and others of visiting such lands, have been stopped by the owners. It is now proposed that it should be henceforward illegal for owners of such property to exclude any one who wishes to go there ‘for the purposes of recreation, or scientific or artistic study.’ At the same time the Bill clearly provides that any one committing any kind of poaching or damage is to be regarded as a trespasser, and dealt with accordingly. Parks and pleasure-grounds attached to a dwelling-house are of course excepted from the operation of the Act.

Mr Johnston’s book upon The River Congo is full of interesting particulars of his wanderings through that part of Africa and his meeting with Stanley. He certainly throws some new light upon the climate of the country; for whereas previous travellers have described it as fever-breeding, and full of terrors to the white man, Mr Johnston tells us that the climate of the interior table-land is as healthy as possible, and that any European taking ordinary precautions as to temperate eating and drinking, need never have a day’s illness there. This is perhaps a matter of personal constitution and physique. Because one man has had such a pleasant experience of African climate, it is no reason why every one else should expect the same exemption from illness. Still, we trust that Mr Johnston’s deductions may prove correct.

We are all of us now and then astonished by the report of some sale in which a fancy price, as it is called, has been paid for something of no intrinsic value, and very often of no artistic value either. Hundreds of pounds have been paid within recent years for a single teacup, provided that the happy purchaser can be sure that it is unique. Even thousands have been paid for a vase a few inches high simply because it was rare. The mania for collecting curiosities which prompts people to pay these large sums, is by no means confined to articles of virtu. Natural history claims a large army of such collectors. A single{268} orchid was sold only the other day for a small fortune. At the time of the Cochin-China fowl mania, which John Leech helped to caricature out of existence, a single rooster fetched five hundred pounds. Only last month, in London, some enormous prices were obtained under the hammer for a collection of Lepidoptera, vulgarly known as moths and butterflies. Single specimens fetched three and four pounds apiece, and even more; whilst a common white butterfly, apparently having a particular value because it was caught in the Hebrides, was actually knocked down for the sum of thirteen guineas. It would be extremely interesting to ascertain the exact nature of the pleasurable sensations with which the owner of this butterfly doubtless regards his purchase. The export of a few white butterflies to the Hebrides might prove a profitable venture, if not overdone.

It may be that the age of big prices for little teacups and vases is on the eve of passing away, for it would seem that the secret processes by which the old workers could endow the china with a depth of colour and richness of tone impossible to achieve by more modern hands, have been rediscovered. It is reported that M. Lauth, the Director of the Sèvres state porcelain manufactory, has attained this result. Moreover, his discovery does not, like too many others, resolve itself into a mere laboratory experiment, but represents a manufacturing success. The results, too, can be looked for with certainty, whereas there is little doubt that the old workers had many a failure as well as successes.

The recent opinion of Mr Justice Stephen that cremation, if properly conducted, is not illegal, has again opened up a subject, which, although of a somewhat delicate, and to some people actually repulsive nature, is bound sooner or later to force its importance upon public attention. There is every reason to believe that public opinion is fast undergoing a very great change, as the subject becomes better understood. A like alteration of public feeling is also observable in other European countries. Sir Spencer Wells has lately published an account of the public cemetery in Rome, where, in the four months previous to his visit, no fewer than forty bodies had been submitted to the new form of sepulture. Dr Cameron’s Bill for the regulation of the practice of cremation will possibly come before the House of Commons before these lines appear in print, and we shall then have an opportunity of gauging the feeling for and against a practice which, after all, is not new, but very old indeed.

Lovers of nature will be glad to hear that otters are yet extant in the Thames; but unless possessed of that unfortunate instinct which causes the average Briton to kill and slay anything alive which is not actually a domestic animal, they will be disgusted to learn that these interesting creatures are no sooner discovered than they are shot and stuffed. In January 1880, an otter weighing twenty-six pounds was shot at Hampton Court; another shared the same fate at Thames-Ditton in January last; and one more has recently been slaughtered at Cookham.

We have recently had an opportunity of visiting the steep-grade tramway which is being laid, and is now on the point of being finished, on that same quiet Highgate Hill where tradition tells us Dick Whittington heard the bells prophesying his future good-fortune. This tramway is the first of its kind in this country, and will probably prove the pioneer line of many others in situations where the hilly nature of the ground forbids horse-traction. Briefly described, it consists of an endless cable, a steel rope kept constantly moving at the rate of six miles an hour by means of a stationary engine. This cable moves in a pipe buried in the ground midway between the rails; but the pipe has an opening above. Through this opening—a narrow slit about an inch wide—passes from the car a kind of grip-bar, which by the turn of a handle in the car is made to take hold of the travelling-rope below, or to release its hold, as required. This system has been in successful operation in San Francisco for many years, and there is no reason why it should not succeed in this country. The only question seems to be whether the traffic up and down Highgate Hill is sufficient to make the enterprise pay.

The profits of the International Fisheries Exhibition amount to fifteen thousand pounds. Two-thirds of this sum will be devoted to the benefit of the widows and orphans of fishermen, presumably through the instrumentality of some Society or Insurance Association to be formed for the purpose; three thousand pounds will go to form a Royal Fisheries Society for scientific work in connection with the harvest of the sea; whilst the balance remains in hand, at present unappropriated.

Of late years, no feature of fishery economy has excited more attention than the progress we have been making in what is called ‘Pisciculture.’ Fish-eggs are now a common article of commerce—the sales of which, and the prices at which they can be purchased, being as regularly advertised as any other kind of goods. This is a fact which, a century ago, might have been looked upon by our forefathers as something more than wonderful. Such commerce in all probability would have been stigmatised as impious, as a something ‘flying in the face of Providence.’

But in another country there was buying and selling of fish-eggs more than a thousand years ago. The ingenious Chinese people had discovered the philosophy which underlies fish-culture, as well as the best modes of increasing their supplies of fish, long before any European nation had dreamt of taking action in the matter. A few years ago, a party of fisher-folks from the Celestial Empire, on a visit to Europe, were exceedingly astonished at the prices they had to pay for the fish they were so fond of eating. They explained that in China any person might purchase for a very small sum as much as might serve a family for a week’s food. They also mentioned that some fishes which we reject, such as the octopus, were much esteemed by the Chinese, who cooked them carefully, and partook of them with great relish. The capture of the octopus, indeed, forms one of the chief fishing industries of China, these sea-monsters being taken in enormous{269} numbers at some of the Chinese fishing stations, notably at Swatow. They are preserved by being dried in the sun; and then, after being packed in tubs, they are distributed to the consuming centres of the country. In the inland districts of China there are also to be found numerous fishponds, where supplies of the more popular sorts of fish are kept, and fed for the market. These are grown from ova generally bought from dealers, who procure supplies of eggs from some of the large rivers of the country. The infant fish, it may be mentioned, are as carefully tended and fed as if they were a flock of turkeys in the yard of a Norfolk farmer. In the opinion of the Chinese fishermen, who were interviewed by the industrious Frank Buckland, hundreds of thousands of fish annually die of starvation; and if means could be adopted for the feeding of tender fry, fish of all kinds would become more plentiful than at present, and we would obtain them at a cheaper rate. In China, the yolks of hens’ eggs are thrown into the rivers and ponds, that kind of food being greedily devoured by the young fish.

It has long been known to those interested in the economy of our fisheries, that only a very small percentage of the ova of our chief food-fishes comes to maturity, while of the fish actually hatched, a very small percentage reaches our tables for food-uses; hence the desire which has arisen to augment the supplies by means of pisciculture. In the case of a fish like the salmon, every individual of that species (Salmo salar) which can be brought to market is certain, even when prices are low, of a ready sale at something like a shilling per pound-weight; and it is not, therefore, to be wondered at that the proprietor of a stretch of salmon-water should be zealous about the increase of his stock of fish. A quarter of a century since, the salmon-fishery owners of the river Tay in Scotland, impressed with the possibilities of pisciculture, had a suite of salmon-nurseries constructed at Stormontfield, where they have annually hatched a very large number of eggs, and where they feed and protect the young fish till they are ready to migrate to the sea, able to fight their own battle of life. This may be said to be the earliest and longest sustained piscicultural effort of a commercial kind made in Great Britain, an example which was followed on other rivers. The chief salmon-fisheries of Scotland being held as private property, are, of course, more favourably situated, in regard to fish-culture, than salmon-fisheries which are open to the public, and which, in a sense, are the property of no person in particular. These latter must be left in the hands of mother Nature. The salmon, however, being an animal of great commercial value, is so coveted at all seasons of the year, both by persons who have a legal right to such property, and by persons who have no right, that such fisheries have a tendency to become barren of breeding-stock; for although each female yields on the average as many as twenty thousand eggs, extremely few of these ever reach maturity; hence, it has come about that many proprietors are resorting to the piscicultural process of increasing their supplies.

But the chief feature of the pisciculture of the period is that ‘fisheries’ are now being worked quite independently of any particular river. There is, for example, the Howietoun fishery, near Stirling, which has been ‘invented,’ as we may say, by that piscatorial giant, Sir James Gibson-Maitland. From this establishment, the eggs of fish, particularly trout, and more especially Loch Leven trout, are annually distributed in hundreds of thousands. From Howietoun, and from some other places as well, gentlemen can stock their ponds or other ornamental water with fecundated ova in a certain state of forwardness; or they can procure, for a definite sum of money, fish of all ages from tiny fry to active yearlings, or well grown two-year olds! Sporting-waters which have been overfished can be easily replenished by procuring a few thousand eggs or yearlings; while angling clubs which rent a loch or important stream can, at a very small cost, keep up the supplies, whether of trout or salmon. In the course of the last three summers, several Scottish lakes have had their fish-stores replenished by means of drafts on the piscicultural bank, which is always open at the Howietoun ‘fishery.’ The distance to which ova or tender young fish require to be transported offers no obstacle to this new development of fish-commerce; thousands of infantile fish were brought from Russia to Edinburgh with perfect safety on the occasion of the Fishery Exhibition held in that city. The loss in transit was not more, we believe, than two per cent.

It may prove interesting to state the prices which are charged usually for ova and young fish. A sample lot of eyed ova of the American brook trout, to the extent of one thousand, may be obtained for thirty shillings; and for ten shillings less, a thousand eggs of the Loch Leven trout, or the common trout of the country, may be purchased. For stock supplies, a box containing fifteen thousand partially eyed ova of S. fontinalis (American) may be had for ten pounds. The other varieties mentioned are cheaper by fifty shillings for the same number. Fry of the same, in lots of not fewer than five thousand, range from seven pounds ten shillings to five pounds. Yearlings are of course dearer, and cost from fifteen and ten pounds respectively per thousand. Ten millions of trout ova are now hatched every year at the Howietoun fishery.

The fecundity of all kinds of fish is enormous. A very small trout will be found to contain one thousand eggs; a female salmon will yield on the average eight hundred ova for each pound of her weight; and if even a fifth part of the eggs of our food-fishes were destined to arrive at maturity, there would be no necessity for resorting to pisciculture in order to augment our fish commissariat. But even in America, where most kinds of fish were at one period almost over-abundant, artificial breeding is now necessary in order to keep up the supplies. In the United States, fish-culture has been resorted to on a gigantic scale, not only as regards the{270} salmon, but also in connection with various sea-fishes, many hundred millions of eggs of which are annually collected and hatched; the young fry being forwarded to waters which require to be restocked. Apparatus of a proper description for the hatching of sea-fish has been constructed, and is found to work admirably. Some of these inventions were shown last year in the American department of the International Fishery Exhibition, where they were much admired by persons who feel interested in the proper development of our fishery resources. In the United States, the art of pisciculture has been studied with rare patience and industry, the fish-breeders thinking it no out-of-the-way feat to transplant three or four millions of young salmon in the course of a season. In dealing with the shad, the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries have been able to distribute the young of that fish by tens of millions per annum; the loss in the hatching of eggs and in the transmission of the animal being very small.

Some writers and lecturers on the natural and economic history of our food-fishes have asserted that no possible demand can lead to their extermination or to any permanent falling-off in the supplies; but the economy of the American fisheries tends to disprove that theory. In the seas which surround the United States, certain fishes would soon become very scarce, were the supplies not augmented each season by the aid of the pisciculturists. The fruitfulness of the cod is really wonderful, individuals of that family having been taken with from five to nine millions of eggs in their ovaries. The fecundity of the common herring, too, has often proved a theme of wonder. That an animal only weighing a few ounces should be able to perpetuate its kind at the rate of thirty thousand, is indeed remarkable. But fruitful in reproductive power as these and other fishes undoubtedly are, it has been prophesied by cautious writers, that by over-fishing, the supplies may in time become so exhausted as to require the aid of the pisciculturist. If so, we believe the mode of action which has been found to work so well in the American seas will be the best to follow. No plan of inclosed sea-ponds, however large they might be, will meet the case; the fish-eggs will require to be hatched in floating cylinders specially constructed for the purpose, so as to admit of the eggs being always under the influence of the sea-water, and at the same time exposed to the eye of skilled watchers. It is believed by persons well qualified to judge, that the eggs of our more valuable sea-fishes may in the way indicated be dealt with in almost incredible numbers. We have only to remember that twenty females of the cod family will yield at least one hundred millions of eggs, to see that the possibilities of pisciculture might extend far beyond anything indicated in the foregoing remarks.

In resuscitating their exhausted oyster-beds, the French people have during the last twenty years worked wonders; they have been able to reproduce that favourite shell-fish year after year in quantities that would appear fabulous if they could be enumerated in figures. Pisciculture was understood in France long before it was thought of as a means of aiding natural production in America; but our children of the States—to use a favourite phrase of their own—now ‘lick all creation’ in the ways and means of replenishing river and sea with their finny denizens.

In a paper which appeared in this Journal, in June 1883, on the Salmon, a few words were said in defence of the water-ousel against a fama which had found vent in newspaper correspondence, accusing that most interesting bird of destroying salmon spawn. An English gentleman, after reading those remarks, has written to us, giving a sad illustration of misdirected zeal, which had arisen from the reading of such newspaper letters.

During the previous winter, he was one of a party that spent a few days on the banks of a favourite salmon river in Wales. The party were all enthusiastic anglers; and, fired by the recent outcry against the ousel, they made a raid upon these birds, killing thirty in one day. Like the ‘Jeddart justices’ of old, the party then proceeded to convict the slain; when, lo! on examination by one of their number—a well-known English analyst—not a grain of salmon roe could be found in all the thirty crops examined, though it was then the height of the salmon spawning season. Like Llewelyn, after slaying Gelert, they had time to repent, ‘For now the truth was clear.’ They had slain the innocent, which feed upon insects that prey on salmon ova. They had therefore killed one of the salmon’s best protectors.

No better instance could be adduced of the caution with which popular theories in natural history should be received. But besides branding the innocent little ousel as a salmon-destroyer, some writers went so far as to assert that the bird had no song, and was not worth listening to. The best observers fortunately have defended the bird against the charge of being songless; and in respect to its alleged crime of eating salmon-roe, the evidence above given is surely conclusive in favour of its innocence.

The water-ousel is one of our most unique birds. It is a wader and a diver, and though not web-footed, by using its wings it can propel itself under water. Its habits are always a delightful study to the observer. The domed nest, with its snow-white eggs, is a wonderful structure; and there is a fascination in watching the bird tripping in and out of the water in pursuit of its food, popping overhead ever and again, and reappearing for a moment, only to dive and reappear elsewhere. When rivers are largely frozen over, it is interesting to see how boldly the little bird dives from the edge of an ice-sheet into a stream two feet or more in depth, how long it can remain under water, and how often it rises to breathe and dive again without leaving the stream. The singing of the water-ousel is low, but remarkably sweet, and long-continued in the winter-time of the year, when no other bird but the redbreast is heard; and when trilled out, as the notes frequently are in the clear frosty air, as the bird sits perched on a rocky projection,{271} or takes its rapid flight up or down the stream, they sound clear and melodious.

THE WATER-OUSEL’S SONG.

We have on more than one occasion drawn attention in these pages to the good work which Miss Ormerod is accomplishing by the dissemination of knowledge on the subject of insect life as it affects agriculture. She has now published a Guide to Methods of Insect Life, and Prevention and Remedy of Insect Ravage (London: Simpkin, Marshall, & Co.), which cannot fail greatly to advance the object she has in view. The Guide was written at the request of the Institute of Agriculture, and its chief purpose is to give some information on the habits, and means of prevention, of crop insects. The book is written in a style which will render it useful to agriculturists, gardeners, and others, even although they happen to have no scientific knowledge whatever of entomology. The various insects, their eggs and larvæ, are described in terms as free from scientific terminology as is possible; and such scientific terms as must occasionally be used are explained in a glossary at the end of the book. The illustrations are numerous; and between these and the verbal descriptions given, no difficulty should at any time be felt in identifying any particular insect pest, and applying to it the treatment which the author suggests. The methods of prevention are mainly taken from the reports which Miss Ormerod has been in the habit of receiving annually from a large number of agriculturists, so that the reader has here, in one little book, the united experience and observations of a large body of practical men.

⁂

Last year we had the pleasure of publishing in this Journal two papers on the subject of Shetland and its Industries, by Sheriff Rampini, of Lerwick. Since then, the same gentleman has delivered two lectures before the Philosophical Institution, Edinburgh, which lectures are now published in a neat little volume, under the title of Shetland and the Shetlanders (Kirkwall: William Peace and Son). In the papers which appeared in our pages, the author confined himself to the industries of the island, its agriculture and fisheries; in these lectures, however, he gives himself greater scope, and treats of the history, traditions, and language of the people, introducing many anecdotes characteristic of them and of their habits.

AMERICAN LITERARY PIRACY.

In the London Figaro, the editor thus writes: Those literary men who are agitating for a copyright convention with the United States have doubtless suffered in the following way, which seems to me particularly hard on some of the authors of this country. I am, let it be assumed, then, the writer of a number of short stories, which, at anyrate, for the purposes of my statement, I will conclude to have been good enough to earn sufficient popularity to bring them within the purview of the American book pirates. Very well—my stories are taken as quickly as they appear and published in the States, not only in a book-form, but in all the principal newspapers which devote some of their columns to fiction.

For this honour I, of course, receive never a cent, and that is a distinct hardship, I take it. But that is not all. My stories having appeared in the States, slightly altered to suit American tastes, and without my name attached, are read and admired by the editors of English provincial journals, who straightway proceed to cut out the fictions in question, and alter them back again, to suit the idiosyncrasies of their British readers. Thus my handiwork appears a second time in this country; and in not one, but possibly a dozen or a score of provincial newspapers.

The result is this. When I go, a month or two after, and offer a collection of my short stories to a London publisher, he reads them, and replies in effect: ‘Yes, I like your stories very well; but what is the use of my publishing them, when they have appeared in half the country papers in the{272} kingdom?’ It is in vain I explain. The injury has been done; and an apology from the country editors is but a slight and unsatisfactory atonement for an act which has kept me out of scores or hundreds of pounds.

Besides this, there are other publishers who, seeing that my fiction appears in the Little Pedlington Mirror or the Mudborough Gazette, mentally determine that my calibre as a writer cannot be very great if I am reduced to dispose of my copy to such papers as these. And therefore, through no fault of my own, but, as a matter of fact, in actual consequence of my success, my reputation as a writer is positively injured in quarters in which it is most important to me it should be sustained. I have been describing incidents which have really occurred, I may add; and I think that the grievance is one that needs serious attention, with a view to its redress.

SOWING AND HARVESTING.

Farmers, besides being subject to the risks incurred by all engaged in commercial enterprises, are in addition peculiarly dependent on the very variable weather of our climate. In 1877, Professor Tanner was deputed by the Science and Art Department to make an inquiry into the conditions regulating the growth of barley, wheat, and oats. He found that on a certain farm the portion of the barley-crop which was harvested in fine harvest-weather yielded per acre forty bushels, each of which weighed fifty-six pounds; while on the same farm the part harvested after some rain had fallen—in bad harvest-weather—also yielded forty bushels per acre; but in this case each bushel weighed only forty pounds—thus showing that there was a loss of six hundred and forty pounds of food on each acre. Barley is also peculiarly sensitive to the condition of its seed-bed. Two parts of the same field were sown with similar seed; but in one case the seed was got down in good spring-weather, and in the other, after heavy rain; and the result was that the former grew freely, and yielded per acre forty bushels, weighing fifty-eight and a half pounds each; while in the latter case the seed never grew freely, and yielded per acre only twenty-four bushels, weighing fifty-four pounds per bushel—thus showing a loss of one thousand and forty-four pounds of grain per acre.

In the case of wheat, and particularly of the finer varieties, the losses arising from bad harvest-weather tell very materially on the prices. Of the same crop of fine white wheat grown in 1877 under similar conditions, the part harvested in good weather yielded per acre forty bushels, each weighing sixty-six pounds; while the part which could not be harvested before being damaged by rain yielded an equal number of bushels; but the weight of each bushel was decreased by five pounds, and this latter was sold at two-and-sixpence per bushel lower than the former. Besides this, if ungenial weather should prevent the farmer sowing his wheat in good time, the yield is still further lessened, if indeed he does not deem it expedient to sow barley instead.

One would think that oats—the hardiest of our cereals—would suffer little from the effects of bad weather; but in a case in which two portions of oats grown under similar conditions were examined, it was found that the portion harvested in good weather produced thirty-three bushels, each weighing forty-one and a half pounds; while that stacked after some rain had fallen was found to give thirty-two bushels, weighing thirty-nine and a half pounds each.

RUSSIAN LONGEVITY.

From a correspondent, who has passed some years in Russia, we learn that in the village of Velkotti, in the St Petersburg government, an old woman is living who has just attained her one hundred and thirtieth birthday! The old lady is in the enjoyment of good health, but complains of her deafness (and no wonder). Her hair is still long and plentiful, considering her age. She spent her youth in great poverty, but is now pretty well off. She has outlived three husbands; and has had a family of nineteen children, all of whom have been married, and are now dead, the last one to die being a daughter of ninety-three. She lives with one of her great-grandchildren, a man of fifty.

Our correspondent also informs us that a few months ago an unusually curious wedding took place in Ekaterinoslav, in Russia. The bridegroom was sixty-five years old, the bride sixty-seven. By former marriages, each of them have children and grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren, living in the same town. The bridegroom’s father, now in his one hundred and third year, and the bride’s mother, in her ninety-sixth year, are still alive, and were at the wedding.

The Conductor of Chambers’s Journal begs to direct the attention of Contributors to the following notice:

If the above rules are complied with, the Editor will do his best to insure the safe return of ineligible papers.

Printed and Published by W. & R. Chambers, 47 Paternoster Row, London, and 339 High Street, Edinburgh.

All Rights Reserved.