8. As the great Geyser explodes only once in forty hours or more, it was, of course, necessary that we should wait his pleasure; in fact, our movements entirely depended on his. For the next two or three days, therefore, like pilgrims round an ancient shrine, we patiently kept watch; but he scarcely deigned to favor us with the slightest manifestation of his latent energies. Two or three times the cannonading we had heard immediately after our arrival recommenced; and once, an eruption to the height of about ten feet occurred. But so brief was its duration, that by the time we were on the spot, although the tent was not eighty yards distant, all was over.

9. At length, after three days' watching in languid expectation of the eruption, our desire was gratified. A cry from the guides made us start to our feet and rush towards the basin. The usual underground thunders had already commenced, a violent agitation was disturbing the centre of the pool.

10. Suddenly a dome of water lifted itself to the height of eight or ten feet, then burst and fell; immediately after which a shining liquid column, or rather a sheaf of columns, wreathed in robes of vapor, sprang about seventy feet into the air; and, in a succession of jerking leaps, each higher than the last, flung their silvery crests against the sky. For a few minutes the fountain held its own; then all at once appeared to lose its ascending energy. The unstable waters faltered, drooped, fell, “like a broken purpose," back upon themselves, and were immediately sucked down into the recesses from which they had sprung.

11. The spectacle was certainly magnificent; but no description can give any idea of its most striking features. The enormous wealth of water, its vitality, its hidden power, the immeasurable breadth of sun-lit vapor, rolling in exhaustless abundance, all combined to make one feel the stupendous energy of nature's slightest movements.

Dufferin.

XCI. THE SELF-TAUGHT MATHEMATICIAN.

ed'-u-cate, to teach; to instruct; lehren; erziehen.

pre-fix', to put before; vorseßen.

con-tem ́-po-ra-ry, one who lives at the same time with another; Zeitgenosse.

chev-a-lier', a knight; a gallant man; Ritter; Kavalier.

duke, a prince next in rank below a king; a title of nobility of the highest order; Herzog.

ge-om-e-try, the measurement of lines, surfaces, and bodies; Raumlehre; Geometrie.

ac'-cu-ra-cy, exactness; Genauigkeit.

can'-dor, frankness; Offenheit.

ar'-chi-tect, one who plans buildings; Baumeister.

com'-pass-es, an instrument for describing circles, measuring lines, etc.; Zirkel.

pat'-ron-age, favor or assistance; Schuß; Begünstigung. trea'-tise, a written composition; Abhandlung.

pri'-vate, not public; individual; persönlich.

1. Edmund Stone affords us an instance of a self-educated mathematician. Neither the place nor the time of his birth is exactly known; but he was probably a native of Argyleshire, Scotland, and born a few years before the close of the seventeenth century. He is spoken of as having reached an advanced age in 1760, and he died in 1768. The only account we have of his early life is contained in a letter, which is to be found prefixed to a French translation of one of his works, from his contemporary, the Chevalier Ramsay, who knew him.

2. His father, Ramsay tells us, was gardener to the Duke of Argyle, who, walking one day in his garden, observed a Latin copy of Newton's "Principia" lying on the grass, and thinking it had been brought from his own library, called some one to carry it back to its place. Upon this, Stone, who was then in his eighteenth year, claimed the book as his own. "Yours?" replied the Duke. "Do you under

stand Geometry, Latin, and Newton?" "I know a little of them," replied the young man,

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3. The Duke was surprised; and, having a taste for the sciences, he entered into conversation with the young mathematician. He asked him several questions, and was astonished at the force, the accuracy, and the candor of his answers. "But how," said the Duke, came you by the knowledge of all these things?" Stone replied, "A servant taught me, ten years since, to read. Does one need to know any thing more than the twenty-four letters, in order to learn every thing else that one wishes?" The Duke's curiosity redoubled: he sat down on a bank, and requested a detail of the whole process by which he had become so learned.

4. "I first learned to read," said Stone; "the masons were then at work upon your house. I approached them one day, and observed that the architect used a rule and compasses, and that he made calculations. I inquired what might be the meaning and use of these things, and I was informed that there was a science called arithmetic. I purchased a book of arithmetic, and I learned it.

5. "I was told there was another science called geom-. etry; I bought the necessary books, and I learned geometry. By reading, I found that there were good books in these two sciences in Latin; I bought a dictionary, and I learned Latin. I understood, also, that there were good books of the same kind in French; I bought a dictionary, and I learned French. And this, my Lord, is what I have done; it seems to me that we may learn every thing when we know the twenty-four letters of the alphabet."

6. Under the patronage of the Duke of Argyle, Stone, some years after this, made his appearance in London, where, in 1723, he published his first work--a Treatise on Mathematical Instruments, principally translated from the French. In 1725, he was chosen a Fellow of the Royal

Society. Next year appeared his Mathematical Dictionary; which was followed by other occasional productions down to the year of his death. Of his private history, however, after he took up his residence in the metropolis, little or nothing is known.

XCII. THE BURYING BEETLE.

bar, to cross with stripes or lines; streifen.
oc'-cu-py, to take up; to fill; einnehmen.
trans-ac ́-tion, that which is done; Unternehmung.
va'-ry, to change; verschieden sein.

Selected.

on the av'-er-age, in a mean proportion; durchschnittlich.
en'-trails, the bowels; Eingeweide.
es'-ti-mate, to calculate; abschäßen.
in-ter', to bury; beerdigen.

1. There are several species of Burying or Carrion Beetles; but, as their habits are very similar, they need not be separately described. Any one who wishes to see them at work may do so by taking a dead mouse, bird, or piece of meat, and laying it on a soft spot of ground.

2. Sometimes, but very rarely, a pair of the beetles will come to it by daylight, their wide wings bearing them along with great speed; but in general they prefer night as the time to begin their work. If the bird be visited in the early morning, it will be no longer upon the surface of the ground, but will be half sunken below it, as though the earth had given way, just as a piece of dark cloth sinks into snow. If, however, the bird be removed, the cause of its gradual disappearance will be seen in the form of one or two beetles, sometimes black, and sometimes beautifully barred with orange.

3. During the day the beetles will mostly remain quiet; but in the evening they begin to be active. To dig a hole, and then to drag the bird into it, would be a task far beyond their powers, and they therefore employ another plan. They entirely burrow beneath the bird, emerging every now and then to scrape out the loose soil, walk round the bird, mount it as if to see how the work is proceeding, and then disappear afresh and renew their labors. Sometimes they dig rather too much on one side, and then they appear sadly puzzled, running round and round the bird, getting on it as if to press it down with their weight, pulling it this way and that way; and at last they do what they ought to have done at first, namely, disappear under the bird and scrape away the earth until the hole is large enough to allow the bird to sink into the required position.

4. The time occupied in the transaction necessarily varies according to the size of the buried object and the condition of the beetle; but on the average an ordinary finch, or a mouse, can be buried in the course of a day. When the task is completed, a number of eggs are laid upon the buried animal, and then the beetles emerge, cover it with earth, and fly away. In some cases they will bury a whole series of corpses; once four beetles buried, in a small piece of earth, four frogs, three birds, two fishes, one mole, two grasshoppers, the entrails of a fish, and two pieces of meat. And so strong and persevering are these insects, that a single beetle succeeded in burying a mole in two days. Now the mole is at least forty times as large as the beetle, so that we can estimate the strength and perseverance of the beetle by calculating the labor which would be necessary for a man to inter, in two days, an animal forty times as large as himself.

Wood.