immediately, he placed a tiny phial in the Orator’s hand, saying: ‘Pour
the contents of this into the lady’s wine-cup, and ere twelve hours
pass her love for you will exceed yours for her.’ And waving his hand
in token of dismissal, the Dwarf disappeared into his comfortless abode.
Some days elapsed after Harold’s return to Kirkwall before an
opportunity presented itself to make use of the philter. But one night
at supper, having secured Morna’s cup, he dropped the potion into
it, and filling up the cup with wine, sent it to her. His movements,
however, had not escaped her notice, and suspecting treachery, she
contrived, while affecting to drink the wine, to spill it on the floor.
Next morning, fearing some further attempt to entangle her, she treated
her would-be lover so graciously that he doubted not but what the
potion had had the desired effect.
A week later, the court removed to Earl Paul’s palace at Orphir. We can
picture the joyful meeting of the lovers; the uneasiness of Harold,
whose jealousy was again aroused; and the revengeful thoughts of
Fraukirk and Helga as they waited for the fatal web. It came at length,
borne by the Dwarf’s raven, and the two women, rejoicing in their evil
work, proceeded to cut out the vest with which they hoped to effect the
destruction of Earl Paul. The gift was to be presented on Christmas
Eve. On the morning of that day, when they were engaged in putting the
last stitches into the garment, their bower-door opened, and Harold
entered in a very ill-humour. He had lost faith in the philter; for
since her return to the society of his brother, the Lady Morna had
treated him but coldly; and he had come to his mother and aunt to rail
at his rival.
Espying the vest, resplendent in its gold and silver tissue, he asked
Fraukirk if she meant it for him. ‘Nay, my son,’ said his mother; ‘’tis
a Christmas gift for thy brother Paul.’
Then Harold fell into a mighty fury. Everything was given to Paul, he
cried; but this vest he should not have, and he tore it out of the
wretched women’s hands. Fraukirk and Helga threw themselves at his
feet, crying out that there was death in the vest, and imploring him
not to wear it. But he thrust them aside, assumed the coveted garment,
and strode from the bower. Suddenly an appalling shriek was heard,
and the inhabitants of the palace rushing simultaneously into the
great hall, found Earl Harold writhing in mortal agony, and vainly
endeavouring to tear off the vest, which only clung the more closely.
His mother and aunt approached, but he repulsed them savagely; then
turning to his brother who held him in his arms, told him to beware of
them, and even as he spoke his spirit passed away.
When Paul learned the cause of his death, he swore to be avenged on the
murderers. Fraukirk and Helga, however, warned of their danger, fled
away into Scotland, where they had great possessions. Their death was
a miserable one—they were burnt alive in their castle by a marauding
viking.
The fate of Snorro is wrapt in mystery. When Earl Paul went to seek
him, he found the Dwarfie Stone untenanted, nor was there any clue to
the hiding-place of the recluse. It was suspected, however, that he had
followed Fraukirk to Scotland, to claim that bad woman’s protection.
But the country-people had another tale to tell. They declared that the
_trollds_ had spirited the Dwarf away on account of his evil deeds. Be
that as it may, he was no more seen in Orkney, and with him disappeared
all hope of acquiring the magic carbuncle.
Balked of his vengeance, Paul returned to Orphir, and soon after
his luckless brother’s funeral, Morna and he were married. That
their happiness was lasting is testified by the saying, ‘As happy as
Earl Paul and Countess Morna,’ which was current in Orkney for many
succeeding generations.
HUMOROUS DEFINITIONS.
A witty, humorous, or satirical definition cannot be universally
acceptable, since it usually hurts somebody’s susceptibilities. No
man or woman delighting in a burst across country at the heels of the
hounds, but would think it rank heresy to hold with Pope that hunting
is nothing better than pursuing with earnestness and hazard something
not worth the catching; and the novelist who says æstheticism means,
‘none of the old conventionalities, no religion, very little faith,
hardly any charity, and nearly all sunflowers,’ has few admirers, we
may be sure, among the worshippers of bilious hues and graceless
garments. Ladies ambitious of platform popularity would indignantly
deny the truth of Whately’s ‘Woman is a creature that cannot reason,
and pokes the fire from the top;’ and how angrily your golden-haired
girl graduate would curl her pretty lips at hearing a young lady
defined as a creature that ceases to kiss gentlemen at twelve, and
begins again at twenty. Her agreeing or disagreeing regarding matrimony
being justly described as a tiresome book with a very fine preface,
would depend upon whether she had private reasons inclining her to
venture upon Heine’s ‘high sea for which no compass has yet been found.’
The gentlemen who instruct the British public respecting the merits
and demerits of authors, artists, and actors, cannot be expected to
own Lord Beaconsfield right in saying, ‘Critics are the men who have
failed in literature and art.’ The newspaper writer who pronounced
a journalist to be a man who spent the best years of his life in
conferring reputations upon others, and getting none himself, would
probably demur at that by which he lives being described as ‘groundless
reports of things at a distance;’ and if an American, he would loudly
exclaim against the _Autocrat of the Breakfast-table_ defining
‘interviewers’ as ‘creatures who invade every public man’s privacy,
listen at every keyhole, tamper with every guardian of secrets;
purveyors to the insatiable appetite of a public which must have a
slain reputation to devour with its breakfast, as the monster of
antiquity called regularly for his tribute of a spotless virgin.’
The witness who enlightened judge and jury by explaining that a bear
was a person who sold what he had not got; and a bull, a man who bought
what he could not pay for, thought he said a smart thing; but he had
been partly anticipated by Bailey, who in his Dictionary tells us that
to ‘sell a bear’ means among stock-jobbers to sell what one hath not.
The worthy lexicographer lays it down that a definition is ‘a short and
plain description of the meaning of a word, or the essential attributes
of a thing,’ but does not always contrive to attain to his own ideal.
For example, we do not learn much about the essential attributes of
things when told that bread is the staff of life; a bench, a seat to
sit upon; a cart, a cart to carry anything in; that thunder is a noise
well known to persons not deaf; dreaming, an act well known; that
elves are scarecrows to frighten children; and birch, ‘well known to
schoolmasters.’ He defines a wheelbarrow as a barrow with one wheel,
and informs us that a barrow is a wheelbarrow. Some of his definitions
are instructive enough, as showing how words have departed from their
original signification. Thus we find that in his time a balloon meant
a football; defalcation, merely a deduction or abating in accounts;
factory, a place beyond seas where the factors of merchants resided
for the conveniency of trade; farrago, a mixture of several sorts of
grain; novelist, a newsmonger; saucer, a little dish to hold sauce;
politician, a statesman; and ‘the people,’ the whole body of persons
who live in a country, instead of just that part of them happening to
be of one mind with the individual using that noun of multitude.
Philosophers are rarely masters of the art of definition, their
efforts that way, as often as not, tending to bewilder rather than
enlighten. What a clear notion of ‘common-sense’ does one of these
afford us by describing it as ‘the immediate or instinctive response
that is given in psychological language, by the automatic action of
the mind; or in other words, by the reflex action of the brain, to any
question which can be answered by such a direct appeal to self-evident
truth.’ Still better or worse is the definition of the mysterious
process called ‘evolution’ as a change from an indefinite incoherent
homogeneity to a definite coherent heterogeneity, through continuous
differentiations and integrations; which an eminent mathematician has
thus rendered for the benefit of English-speaking folk: ‘Evolution is a
change from a no-howish untalkaboutable all-likeness to a some-howish
and in-general talkaboutable not-at-all likeness, by continuous
somethingelseifications and sticktogetherations.’ Putting this and that
together, he who does not comprehend exactly what evolution is must be
as obtuse as the playgoer who sitting out a play does not know he is
witnessing ‘a congeries of delineations and scenes co-ordinary into a
vivid and harmonious picture of the genuine features of life.’
Impromptu definitions have often the merit of being amusing, whatever
may be said as to their correctness. ‘What on earth can that mean?’
asked Hicks of Thackeray, pointing to the inscription over a doorway,
‘Mutual Loan Office.’ ‘I don’t know,’ answered the novelist, ‘unless it
means that two men who have nothing, agree to lend it to one another.’
Said Lord Wellesley to Plunket: ‘One of my aides-de-camp has written
a personal narrative of his travels; pray, what is your definition of
“personal?”’ ‘Well, my lord,’ was Plunket’s reply, ‘we lawyers always
consider personal as opposed to real;’ an explanation as suggestive
as that of the London magistrate who interpreted a ‘housekeeper’ as
meaning ‘a sort of a wife.’ ‘Pray, my lord,’ queried a gentleman of a
judge, ‘what is the difference between common law and equity?’ ‘Very
little in the end,’ responded his lordship: ‘at common law you are
done for at once; in equity, you are not so easily disposed of. The
former is a bullet which is instantaneously and charmingly effective;
the latter, an angler’s hook, which plays with the victim before
it kills him. Common law is prussic acid; equity is laudanum.’ An
American contemplating setting a lawsuit going, his solicitor said he
would undertake the matter for a contingent fee. Meeting Mr Burleigh
soon afterwards, the would-be litigant asked that gentleman what a
contingent fee might be. ‘A contingent fee,’ quoth Mr Burleigh, ‘is
this—if the lawyer loses the case, _he_ gets nothing; if he wins it,
_you_ get nothing.’ ‘Then I don’t get anything, win or lose?’ said his
questioner. ‘Well,’ was the consolatory rejoinder, ‘that’s about the
size of a contingent fee.’ So Brough was not very much out in defining
a lawyer as a learned gentleman who rescues your estate from your
enemies and keeps it himself.
‘What is a nobleman’s chaplain?’ inquired a legal luminary, perhaps
over-fond of professing ignorance, ‘A nobleman’s chaplain, my lord,’
said Dr Phillimore, ‘is a spiritual luxury.’ It is astonishing how
innocent gentlemen learned in the law are, by their own account.
Addressing a matronly witness in a breach of promise case, counsel for
the defence said: ‘I am an old bachelor, and do not understand such
things. What _is_ courtship?’ ‘Looking at each other, taking hold of
one another’s hands, and all that kind of thing,’ was the comprehensive
answer.
An Ohio school-committee must have been puzzled to decide which of two
candidates for a school-marmship was the better fitted for the post,
the young woman who averred that ‘respiration’ was the perspiring
of the body, or her rival, who believed ‘emphasis’ was the putting
more distress on one word than another; definitions worthy of a place
beside those achieved by the English medical student responsible for:
‘Hypothesis, something that happens to a man after death;’ and ‘Irony,
a substance found in mineral wells, which is carefully preserved in
bottles, and sold by chemists as tincture of iron.’ All abroad, too,
was the intelligent New York ‘health-officer,’ who, having testified
that his district was afflicted with highjinnicks, being pressed as to
what he understood ‘hygienics’ to mean, answered: ‘A bad smell arising
from dirty water.’
At one of Sheridan’s dinner-parties, the conversation turned upon
the difficulty of satisfactorily defining ‘wit.’ Forgetting that he
was expected to hear, see, but say nothing, Master Tom informed the
company: ‘Wit is that which sparkles and cuts.’ ‘Very good, Tom,’ said
his father. ‘Then, as you have sparkled, you can cut!’ and poor Tom
had to leave his dinner unfinished. Probably a worse fate awaited the
Brooklyn boy, who, called upon to explain the meaning of ‘Quaker,’
wrote: ‘A Quaker is one of a sect who never quarrel, never get into a
fight, never claw each other, and never jaw back. Pa’s a Quaker; but ma
isn’t!’ The youngsters sometimes hit upon very quaint definitions, such
as: Ice, water that stayed out in the cold and went to sleep; dust,
mud with the juice squeezed out; fan, a thing to brush warm off with;
sob, when a fellow doesn’t want to cry and it bursts out of itself;
wakefulness, eyes all the time coming unbuttoned; chaos, a great pile
of nothing and no place to put it in.
When the French Academicians were busy with their famous Dictionary,
the members of the committee were at odds as to defining _de suite_
and _tout de suite_. Bois-Robert suggested that they should adjourn to
a restaurant and discuss some oysters and the question together. On
arriving there, Bois-Robert asked the attendant to open _de suite_ six
dozen oysters, and Courart chimed in with: ‘And serve them to us _tout
de suite_.’ ‘But, gentlemen,’ said the woman, ‘how can I open your
oysters _de suite_ and serve them _tout de suite_?’ ‘Easily enough,’
answered one of the party; ‘open six dozen oysters _de suite_—that is,
one after another—and serve them _tout de suite_, that is, as soon as
you have opened them.’ His definition of the two phrases was adopted
by acclamation. There is nothing like practical illustration to bring
home the meaning of things. Puzzled by hearing a deal of talk about
contracting and expanding the currency, an American lass asked her
sweetheart: ‘What is the difference, John, between contraction and
expansion, and how do circumstances affect them?’ John was quite equal
to the occasion. ‘Well, dear,’ said he, ‘when we are alone we both sit
on one chair, don’t we?’ ‘Yes.’—‘That’s contraction. But when we hear
your pa or ma coming, we get on two chairs, don’t we?’ ‘I should say we
did.’—‘Well, my love, that’s expansion, and you see it’s according to
circumstances.’—‘John,’ said the satisfied maiden, ‘we’re contracting
now, ain’t we?’—‘You’re right!’ said John; and then was performed an
operation which a great mathematician defined as consisting ‘in the
approach of two curves which have the same bend as far as the points of
contact.’
A NEW FUEL.
An experiment as carried on by the contractors for the Forth Bridge
at their works near South Queensferry, to determine whether crude
shale oil can be advantageously employed as a substitute for coal in
feeding boiler furnaces, possesses no slight interest; for should the
new material fulfil the expectations of its introducers, the method
cannot fail to be extensively adopted in the numberless manufacturing
arts, where a heating agent combining efficiency and economy with
cleanliness, is a desideratum. The general principles of the method
adopted and the apparatus employed will be readily understood, when it
is borne in mind that the process depends on the perfect combustion
of crude shale oil, vapourised in connection with superheated steam
and atmospheric air. The apparatus consists mainly of a cylindrical
cast-iron retort, around which two pipes are coiled spirally, one
externally, the other internally, meeting each other in a burner
beneath the retort. Through the external pipe oil is forced by
hydraulic pressure; through the internal pipe water is similarly driven.
To start the apparatus, the retort must first be heated, which may be
readily effected by a small coal fire. The water valve is then slightly
opened, and the water, after traversing the pipe coiled internally
around the retort, issues at the burner beneath—a powerful jet of
superheated steam. The oil is then similarly admitted through its pipe,
namely, that coiled externally around the retort, and vapourised, or
nearly so, by the heat, reaches the burner below. Here it is caught
by the superheated steam, and hurled against the convex bottom of the
retort, the force of the impact breaking up into finely divided vapour
any portion of the oil which the heat may not have already converted
into gas. In a short time the retort and tubes become red hot, chemical
action is set up, and perfect combustion of the steam, the carbon from
the oil, and atmospheric air, drawn in by the partial vacuum formed,
ensues. The perfect combustion and intense heat generated consumes all
the products, and leaves little or no residue requiring removal. The
absence of ashes or other refuse necessitating constant attendance
and cleaning; and the almost entire exemption from smoke, due to the
completeness of combustion, are amongst the advantages claimed by the
inventors of the apparatus.
With reference to the economy of the process, it may be added that
crude shale oil is almost a waste substance, for that used during the
recent experiments was the residue left in the process of obtaining
the oil of commerce by distillation from the shale. In appearance the
crude shale oil resembles butter, and so viscid is it, that a match,
cinder, or even a red-hot poker fails to ignite it. Even in those
localities where the cheapness of coal would equalise the cost of the
two substances, it is yet claimed for the shale oil, that economy
results from the comparatively little labour required in connection
with its employment; an immense gain is moreover made in space for
storing purposes; whilst a saving is effected by the decreased amount
of work expended in keeping the furnace and machinery clean, heat with
cleanliness being a marked characteristic of this method.
Other advantages may be briefly enumerated: Reduced bulk and weight
as compared with coal, by which a saving correspondingly great is
effected in carriage, often a considerable factor in the cost of the
latter material. Economy resulting from the instantaneous extinction
of the fire, whenever the day’s work is completed; whilst the facility
with which the fire can be started, and the readiness with which the
apparatus can be attached to furnaces at present consuming coal, are
powerful arguments in favour of this new fuel.
It is estimated that if given quantities of crude shale oil and coal
be taken, equal to each other as regards heat-giving efficiency, the
former will occupy less than one-fifth the bulk of the latter. So
great a reduction in space set aside for fuel, would, in our large
ocean-going steamers, whose coal forms upwards of one-third of their
tonnage, mean an enormous addition to cargo room, and consequently
to earning power. ‘Of seventy stokers to handle two hundred tons per
day, and put out the ashes, sixty may be left at home. Instead of
two thousand tons of dead-weight in coal, the steamer may carry four
hundred. In carrying and consuming large quantities of coal, the matter
of ballast is a serious consideration. A hydrocarbon liquid, carried in
several tanks, would be expelled therefrom to the furnaces by pumping
water into the tanks, the ballast remaining nearly the same.’ There
can be no question that such fuel is eminently suited to fast-sailing
cruisers, which may be required to remain at sea for lengthened
periods, without touching at port.
In conclusion, it will readily be perceived from the foregoing brief
description of the method of employing crude shale oil as a fuel, how
considerable are the advantages therefrom accruing; how important is
the attempt—the first it is stated that has been made in Scotland—to
utilise a substance hitherto regarded as little beyond a waste product.
DO SNAKES EVER COMMIT SUICIDE?
A correspondence as to whether snakes, when irritated or tormented to
exasperation, will strike themselves with their own fangs and so commit
suicide, has been going on for some weeks in _Nature_. The following
striking story is given by an Indian correspondent, as an incident
which he once witnessed:
‘I was quite small,’ he writes, ‘but my memory of the strange
occurrence is very clear and distinct. It was in the state of Illinois,
when at that early day a short, thick variety of rattlesnake was very
numerous, so much so, that the state acquired an unenviable reputation
in the older parts of the Union. Farmers in “breaking prairie,” as
the first ploughing of the prairie sod was called, would kill them
by dozens in the course of a single summer. They were very venomous;
but, owing to their sluggish nature and their rattle, which was always
sounded before an attack, few persons were bitten by them. Moreover,
there was little danger of death if proper remedies were applied at
once.
‘I was one day following one of the large breaking-ploughs common at
that time. It was drawn by five or six yoke of oxen, and there were
two men to manage the plough and the team. As we were going along,
one of the men discovered a rattlesnake, as I remember about twelve
or fourteen inches in length. They rarely exceeded eighteen or twenty
inches, so that this one was probably about two-thirds grown. The man
who first saw it was about to kill it, when the other proposed to see
if it could be made to bite itself, which it was commonly reported
the rattlesnake would do if angered and prevented from escaping.
Accordingly, they poked the snake over into the ploughed ground, and
then began teasing it with their long whips. Escape was impossible, and
the snake soon became frantic at its ineffectual attempts either to
injure its assailants or to get away from them. At last it turned upon
itself and struck its fangs into its own body, about the middle. The
poison seemed to take effect instantly. The fangs were not withdrawn
at all; and if not perfectly dead within less than five minutes, it
at least showed no signs of life. That it should die so quickly will
not seem strange if it is borne in mind that the same bite would have
killed a full-grown man in a few hours’ time. The men watched it long
enough to be sure that it would not be likely to move away, and then
went on with their work. I trudged around with them for an hour or
more, and every time we came where the snake was, I stopped and looked
at it; but it never moved again. In this case, I do not remember that
the snake had been injured at all. I have often heard of rattlesnakes
biting themselves under such circumstances; but this was the only case
that ever came under my observation.—W. R. MANLEY.’
A STORY THAT NEVER GROWS OLD.
A youth and a maiden low-talking,
He eager; she, shrinking and shy;
A blush on her face as she listens,
And yet a soft tear in her eye.
Oh! sweet bloomed the red damask roses,
And sweet sang the thrush on the spray,
And bright was the glamour of sunshine
That made the world fair on that day.
But oh! not so sweet the red roses,
So sweet the bird’s song from above,
So bright the gold glamour of sunshine,
As was the sweet glamour of love
That fell on that pair in the garden,
As ’mid the fair flowers they strolled;
And there, as ’twas first told in Eden,
Again was Love’s tender tale told.
* * * * *
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and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.
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_All Rights Reserved._