makes a greater noise in its descent than is occasioned by our most violent hail-storms, while it commits more terrible ravages on the vegetable world. These storms are fatal to both sorts of cochineal, though the wild may be in part made useful if gathered the day after the storm, and before those that were killed by it have begun to decay. It generally happens that the heavy rains and tempests cease in October, and do not re-commence before April: all this space is therefore left for the rearing of the cochineal, though there are in those countries, as well as in our own, unexpected changes in the weather, that sometimes blight the hopes of the cultivator. Sometimes when the crop of cochineals has been sown (as it is called) in the early part of October, there comes the last storm of the rainy season, and ruins everything. The only resource in such cases is to commence another sowing immediately, by which means the harvest is only delayed for three weeks or a month.

It remains to notice some of the other species of cochineal, which, before the Mexican insect was known, were employed in the business of dyeing. One of these is an inhabitant of cold countries, which it seems to prefer to more temperate climates. It is common in Poland, and is known as the Coccus tinctorius Polonicus. It is found at the root of the plant, which has been named by Ray, Polygonum cocciferum, and looks like a little red grain, adhering to the plant. It is very nearly spherical, and the largest nearly equal in bulk to a grain of pepper. Each grain is said to be lodged in a sort of cup like that of an acorn, the external part of which is rough, the internal polished. Sometimes only one or two of these grains are found on a plant, sometimes as many as forty. Observation has shown that from these little grains insects issue forth, which have two antennæ and six feet; that at the end of some days these insects grow shorter and cease to walk; and that when they have become immoveable, their body is covered with a cottony down. What distinguishes this cochineal from the other species is, that after having been round and immoveable, it again moves its feet and changes form, from round becoming oblong. This insect is gathered every two years, immediately after the summer solstice, because then it is full of juice of a purple colour. In order to detach the insect from the plant to which it has affixed itself, it is necessary to take up the latter by the roots; the insects are then scraped off, and the plant replaced in its former situation. The cochineal is separated by means of a sieve from the earth which adheres to it, and is then wetted with vinegar, or hot water, and exposed to the sun to cause it to die and dry up. It is said that this drug is bought by the Turks and Armenians, to dye silk, wool, morocco, and the tails of their horses, while the women employ it to redden the extremities of their feet and hands. Other uses are mentioned for this cochineal, such as the making, with the addition of chalk and gum arabic, a kind of lac, equal to Florence lac. But the properties of the cochineal of the polygonum are so inferior to those of the Mexican insect, that the latter is invariably used in all fine dyes. There is another species of cochineal, indigenous to Russia, from which the inhabitants extract a crimson dye. No attempt has yet been made in France, that we are aware of, to procure a dye from the insects of this genus, which are so abundant there, and so hurtful to orange and other trees, though it is very probable the attempt might be attended with considerable success. Of the species that have not been applied to any economic purpose, we may notice that which is nourished by the elm, and which, in appearance, much resembles the Mexican insect. It is principally found in the forked part of the younger branches, and may be seen, towards the middle of summer, resembling a little oval convex mass, of a brown-red colour, surrounded with a white or cottony cord. Towards the middle of July, a great number of young insects issue from the nest, and may be

seen running on the branches of the elm: they are of a yellowish-white colour, and have two antennæ and six short feet. They soon fix themselves, and remain immovable all through the winter. In the spring the female lays her eggs, and then dies, dries up, and subsequently falls from the nest. There is also another species peculiar to the branches of the alder: this is the Coccus farinarius, remarkable for the abundance of its cottony covering. De Geer stripped one of these cochineals of its covering, and a similar envelope, though less thick, made its appearance on the following day, thus showing the abundance of the provision made for this small and apparently insignificant creature.

The Coccus ficus carica is a very destructive insect in the south of Europe and the Levant. It produces the worst effect on fig-trees, drying them up by pumping out the juice, and causing the sap to flow. The presence of the insects on these trees is shown by the following marks. The trees lose their leaves sooner than others; in the new shoots the intervals of the knots become smaller every year; the number of figs diminishes; the fruit falls without ripening; the leaves and branches are covered with black spots; and when the trees have gone through these stages of decay, the winter finishes their existence. Very imperfect success has attended the various means devised for getting rid of these insects; is is only during winter that they can be attacked with any advantage, since the methods employed to reduce their numbers would at any other season prove injurious to the trees they inhabit. When a tree is greatly infested with these insects, the figs can scarcely be eaten, for they cannot be gathered without crushing some of the insects, then offensive on account of the thick red juice issuing from them. In drying figs for exportation, care is taken to stir them well upon the hurdles, that any cochineals attaching to them may be the more easily removed.

The annual consumption of true cochineal in Great Britain is about 750 bags, or 150,000 lbs. weight, value 275,000l. The fine unadulterated cochineal will have a gray colour, bordering on purple: the gray is owing to the powder which naturally covers the insect, and of which a little adheres, and also to a waxy fat: the purple shade arises from the colour having been partially extracted by the water in which they were killed. The insect is wrinkled with parallel furrows across its back, which are intersected by a longitudinal one; hence they are easily distinguished by a quick eye from the smooth, glistening, black grains, of no value, called East India cochineal, with which it is often shamefully adulterated.

A system of adulterating cochineal has lately been. detected, which has been practised for many years on a prodigious scale, by a mercantile house in London. "I have analysed," says Dr. Ure, "about a hundred samples of such cochineal, from which it appears that the genuine article is moistened with gum-water, agitated in a box or leather bag, first with sulphate of baryta in fine powder, afterwards with bone or ivory black, to give it the appearance of negra cochineal, and then dried. By this means about twelve per cent. of the worthless heavy spar is sold at the price of cochineal, to the enrichment of the sophisticators, and the disgrace of British trade and manufactures."

The colouring matter of the cochineal is very soluble in water, and is called carminium, from its being the basis of a carmine. The value attached to cochineal in our manufactures may be gathered from the quantity imported, and the value annexed to it. The high price of this article has long induced dyers to look out for cheaper substitutes in dyeing red, and both madder and lac have been made to supersede cochineal to a considerable extent. This circumstance, together with improved methods of cultivating the cochineal, has led to a reduc tion in the price of the latter.

REMARKABLE PROPERTY OF THE

FRAXINELLA.

AMONG the physical phenomena exhibited during the life of vegetables, and which may engage us in studies of a curious and interesting nature, one of the most remarkable is that which is generally attributed to the plant called Fraxinella. This plant is said to be surrounded, at particular parts of the day, during the heat of summer, with an inflammable atmosphere, which may be set fire to by bringing a taper near it, and this without causing any injury to the plant itself. In order to account for this remarkable phenomenon, it has been imagined that the plant is continually emitting a vapour, which, not being so readily transmitted by the surrounding air, remains around it in a condensed form, or that it is retained from further expansion by its own vital

energy.

This singular fact has not been noticed by botanists except in a very general manner. They do not appear to have studied it attentively for themselves, the only precise details we meet with on the subject being given by Bosc, in the Dictionary of Natural History. He says that the extremity of the stalks, and the petals of the flowers, in the fraxinella, are covered with numerous small vessels filled with essential oil. In very hot weather these vessels emit a vapour of a powerful odour, which is inflammable, and so abundant, that if, towards evening when the cooler air has somewhat condensed it, you bring a lighted taper near to the plant there appears all at once a bright light, which spreads around the fraxinella without doing it any injury.

M. Biot was induced by accidentally witnessing this phenomenon to give it his attention and study, and we have translated the results of his observations for the benefit of our readers.

Supposing at first sight, with all others who had studied the subject, that an ethereal emanation really surrounded the plant, he made several experiments, but all of them failed of success: he then examined the cortical vessels from whence the supposed inflammable atmosphere was said to proceed. Those vessels, as seen through the microscope, present the appearance of small glands terminated by a sort of conical gullet, drawn out to a point at its extremity. They have been accurately represented by Mirbel, in his Elémens d'Anatomie et de Physiologie Végétale. These glands are distributed more or less abundantly on all parts of the stalk, and especially on the peduncles or flowerstalks, where, at the part where the flower is inserted, they are very numerous. We may also trace them on the edges of the leaflets, and on the edges and veins of the petals, on the stamens, styles, and even on the seeds and ovaries. Among these vessels, some are sessile, others placed on a footstalk, the latter being frequent on the more vigorous parts of the plant. Though at first very small, they increase in proportion to the growth of the plant, and their surface, examined with the microscope under a strong light, presents a beautiful mottled appearance of red and green. This is the case only with the variety bearing red flowers; in the white fraxinella it is entirely green. The interior is filled with a colourless liquid, through which the light is refracted in foci. At the extremity of this point, M. Biot frequently observed a small limpid drop, as if a part of the internal liquid dilated by the elevation of the temperature, or secreted by the vital energy, had escaped without. These observations made him think that the developement of the flame around the plant might be perfectly produced by simultaneous ignition, or almost instantaneously propagated by these numberless vessels filled with essential oil. On this supposition the heat of summer was no longer necessary for the actual production of the phenomenon, but simply for the maturation of the inflammable liquid contained in

the vessels, which, once formed and matured, no longer depended upon heat or cold, nor upon the time of the day. Ignition could only thus take place on contact with the inflamed body, or, at least, on a very near approach to contact, in order to burst the vessels. Thus it must take place according to the law of suction and of propagation belonging to small globules in juxtaposition, filled with liquid, and not with the instantaneous effect of a volume of gas. It was in this manner of regarding the phenomenon that M. Biot conducted his succeeding experiments, of which he has given us an account of a few.

On the 26th of April, 1830, he endeavoured to produce ignition on the peduncle of a flowering bunch of the red variety of fraxinella, which appeared to be full of vessels well filled with the inflammable liquid. He could not obtain a continued flame, but merely a few local explosions, such as we can produce by spirting the essential oil from the rind of an orange on the flame of a candle. The rest of the plant being less thickly covered with the secreting glands, did not present any appearance of ignition. This experiment was repeated at the same period of the following year, with precisely the same result. In those parts where the plant had previously been ignited, the glands seemed blackened and obliterated. On the 15th of May, 1830, many flower stalks had acquired their full developement, the glands being considerably swelled, and furrowed upon their surface. The weather throughout the day was cold and dry, as it was in the evening when he tried his experiment. The trial succeeded when the flame was held under the flower stalks of some completely or partially developed blossoms, especially near the insertion of the flowers, where the glands were most abundant. The ignition, though evident, was not sufficient to rise spontaneously from the base of one flower to that of another; it was necessary to apply the taper successively to each point, but so slightly as not to injure the stalks. Among those which presented the phenomenon were some which had been attempted in vain, the month before; and even the others, where the the glands had been actually destroyed by a previous ignition, were capable of yielding it anew, after the lapse of a week, other glands doubtless becoming matu rated after the former trial. In the third trial, which took place on the 22nd of May, the developement of the plant being more advanced, the combustion went on with vivacity on all the stalks. The repetition of the phenomenon was observed many times by M. Biot, who marked its appearance on the same stalk at different times and under different circumstances. duced it, on the same stalk, seven or eight times during one season, by choosing successively the different parts on which to operate; nor did he find it necessary that the experiment should be made particularly in the evening, any more than at another part of the day. Lastly he observed, that the flame is easily propagated in an upward direction, especially in the flowering clusters, but that it is much less easy to promote it in a downward direction; it may also take place on the central peduncle of a cluster, without being developed on all the lateral ones, though the latter may be in a proper state to experiment upon, if the taper is applied separately to each.

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This power to separate and isolate the effects produced is quite intelligible under the system of globules, sepa rately distributed over all parts of the plant, but it is not consistent with the theory of the existence of a volume of inflammable air, such as is generally supposed to envelope the plant in question.

The phenomenon which we have been describing may be observed on both varieties of fraxinella, that with red and that with white flowers, but less easily and less frequently on the latter, where the glands are somewhat smaller, and are also less thickly disposed on the

EASY LESSONS IN CHESS.

V.

THE information contained in the four previous lessons constitutes as it were the Grammar and Vocabulary of Chess. You have now to become acquainted with the Laws of the Game. The following is the Code of Laws adopted by the London Chess Club, established in 1807, and recently revised by the Committee of that Society. We submit these laws to your notice without attempting to explain or illustrate them. Chess-players in general object to any commentary on their laws: they consider them adequate to explain their own meaning, and should any doubtful case arise as to the intention of a particular law, reference to some disinterested party is far more satisfactory than to the remarks of a Commentator. But before you read these laws we would impress upon you the advice of Mr. Lewis, the eminent player, and anthor of several valuable works on the game:

Always play strictly according to the laws of the game; even if your adversary take back moves, or do not play a piece he has touched, never do so yourself; I have met with many who entirely object to take odds, but who nevertheless are willing enough to take back moves, as if that were not taking odds, and great odds too.

We may add that unless this advice be strictly attended to, you will soon contract a careless and slovenly style of play, and most of the beneficial influence of this noble game will be lost upon you.

THE LAWS OF CHESS.

I. The Chess-board must be so placed that each player has a white corner square nearest his right hand. If the board have been improperly placed, it must be adjusted, provided four moves on each side have not been played, but not afterwards.

II. If a piece or pawn be misplaced at the beginning of the game, either player may insist upon the mistake being rectified, if he discover it before playing his fourth move, but not afterwards.

III. Should a player at the commencement of the game, omit to place all his men on the board, he may correct the mission before playing his fourth move, but not afterwards.

IV. If a player, undertaking to give the odds of a or pawn, neglect to remove it from the board, his piece sary, after four moves have been played on each side, has the choice of proceeding with, or recommencing the game. V. When no odds are given, the players must take the first move of each game alternately, drawing lots to determine who shall begin the first game. If a game be drawn, the player who began it has the first move of the following

one.

VI. The player who gives odds, has the right of moving first in each game, unless otherwise agreed. Whenever a pawn is given, it is understood to be always the King's Bishop's Pawn.

VII. A piece or pawn touched must be played, unless, at the moment of touching it, the player say "J'adoube," or words to that effect; but if a piece or pawn be displaced or overturned by accident, it may be restored to its place. VIII. While a player holds the piece or pawn he has touched, he may play it to any other than the square he took it from, but having quitted it, he cannot recall the move. IX. Should a player touch one of his adversary's pieces or ns, without saying "J'adoube," or words to that effect, Es adversary may compel him to take it; but if it cannot legally taken, he may oblige him to move the King: Should his King, however, be so posted that he cannot be legally moved, no penalty can be inflicted.

X. Should a player move one of his adversary's men, his

of his own that cannot take it without making a false move, XI. If a player take one of his adversary's men with one his antagonist has the option of compelling him to take it with a piece or pawn that can legally take it, or to move his own piece or pawn which he touched.

XII. Should a player take one of his own men with another, his adversary has the option of obliging him to move either.

XIII. If a player make a false move, i. e., play a piece or pawn to any square to which it cannot legally be moved, his adversary has the choice of three penalties; viz., 1st, or compelling him to let the piece or pawn remain on the square to which he played it; 2nd, to move it correctly to his King. square; 3rd, to replace the piece or pawn and move

another

XIV. Should a player move out of his turn, his adversary may choose whether both moves shall remain, or the second be retracted.

XV. When a pawn is first moved in a game, it may be played one or two squares; but in the latter case the opponent has the privilege of taking it en passant with any pawn which could have taken it had it been played one square only. A pawn cannot be taken en passant by a piece. XVI. A player cannot castle in the following cases:1. If the King or Rook have been moved. 2. If the King be in check.

3. If there be any piece between the King and Rook. 4. If the King pass over any space attacked by one of the adversary's pieces or pawns.

Should a player castle in any of the above cases, his adversary has the choice of three penalties, viz. :—1st, of insisting that the move remain; 2nd, of compelling him to move the King; 3rd, of compelling him to move the Rook. moved without leaving the King in check, he must XVII. If a player touch a piece or pawn that cannot be replace the piece or pawn and move his King; but if the King cannot be moved, no penalty can be inflicted.

XVIII. If a player attack the adverse King without saying "Check," his adversary is not obliged to attend to it; but, if the former, in playing his next move, were to say Check," each player must retract his last move, and he that is under check must obviate it.

66

XIX. If the King has been in check for several moves, and it cannot be ascertained how it occurred, the player whose King is in check must retract his last move, and free his King from the check; but if the moves made subsequent to the check be known, they must be retracted.

XX. Should a player say "Check" without giving it, and his adversary in consequence move his King, or touch a piece or pawn to interpose, he may retract such move, provided his adversary have not completed his next move.

XXI. Every Pawn which has reached the eight or last square of the chess-board, must be immediately exchanged for a Queen or any other piece the player may think fit, even though all the pieces remain on the board. It follows therefore that he may have two or more Queens, three or more Rooks, Bishops, or Knights.

XXII. If a player remain at the end of the game, with a Rook and Bishop against a Rook; with both Bishops only; with Knight and Bishop only, &c., he must check-mate his adversary in fifty moves on each side at most, or the game will be considered as drawn; the fifty moves commence from the time the adversary gives notice that he will count them. This law holds good for all other check-mates of pieces only, such as Queen or Rook only, Queen against a Rook, &c., &c.

XXIII. If a player agree to check-mate with a particular piece or pawn, or on a particular square, or engage to force his adversary to stale-mate or check-mate him, he is not restricted to any number of moves.

XXIV. A stale-mate is a drawn game.

XXV. If a player make a false move, castle improperly, &c., &c., the adversary must take notice of such irregularity before he touches a piece or pawn, or he will not be allowed to inflict any penalty.

XXVI. Should any question arise, respecting which there is no law, or in case of a dispute respecting any law, the players must refer the point to the most skilful and disinterested bystanders, and their decision must be considered as conclusive.

HERM AND JETHOU.

HERM AND JETHOU!! Ninety-nine persons out of a hundred will say, "I never heard of them: what are they? places, or people, or what?" Let it be my task to tell what they are. If the Right Honourable Secretary for the Home Department were asked to name "the Channel Islands," he would certainly say, "Jersey, Guernsey, and Alderney;" possibly he might add "Sark," for Sark is named in the Orders of Council affecting the Channel Islands: but Herm and Jethou he certainly would not name. The reader will therefore have gathered by this time, that Herm and Jethou are the two smallest of the Channel Islands. Let us spend a summer's day together at Herm and Jethou.

Standing on the pier of Peter's Port, Guernsey, one sees Herm and Jethou opposite, and distant about three miles. I had missed the packet to Jersey, having run down from the hotel, in Guernsey, just in time to see her stern disappear round the rocky islet on which stands Castle Cornet; and finding myself thrown adrift for the day, cast a longing eye at the little isles across the calm morning sea, spotted with fishing-boats, and reflecting in its depths the twenty or thirty French chasse-marées which lay at anchor in the roads.

Boats and boatmen are not difficult to be found at Guernsey, and in five minutes I was pushing off from the pier, and making for Herm and Jethou.

Guernsey is seen to greatest advantage from the sea; for the shore being precipitous, and the town of Peter's Port being built on the slope, the effect is striking; backed too and flanked as it is by the towers of Elizabeth College, and by the handsome country seats of the Guernsey aristocracy. An hour's agreeable rowing brought me close to Jethou, the appearance of which is more and more picturesque the nearer it is approached, and, desiring the boatmen to wait, I contrived to leap upon the little pier of rough stones, and commenced the circuit of Jethou. There is one gentleman's house on Jethou, and towards this I made in the first place; but he was from home; he was out among the rocks a-shrimping, a very favourite amusement with the inhabitants of all these Islands; and therefore I was forced to ramble without a cicerone.

J

I found Jethou one large rabbit warren. Their numbers almost equalled what we read of the penguins, on some of the South Sea Islands. Never saw I such a multitude of wild things before; I could have knocked them on the head by dozens, and unless "the preventive check" be applied, or colonization be resorted to, I know not what is to become of these legions. Nearly on the summit of the island, I found myself in a small orchard, which, as I was afterwards told, produces most excellent cider. On descending to the beach, I met Mr L- returning from his sport; they were prawns he had filled his basket with, not shrimps-half a stone weight I should imagine. I asked him what he meant to do with them. "Make a pie," said he; but he did not invite me to stay and take a bit. Mr. L―― never leaves the island, unless to paddle himself across to Herm, and is, as may easily be credited, not fond of company.

I found my boatman shrimping also, in the neighbourhood of his boat, and in ten minutes we had crossed the narrow deep channel that separates Jethou from Herm, and

landed.

Herm is much larger than Jethou; it is about four miles in circumference, and contains nearly twelve hundred acres of cultivated land; much more is susceptible of improvement, and might easily be redeemed from the empire of furze and wild mint which grows everywhere in the greatest abundance. There are excellent sheep-walks too, but, most unaccountably, no sheep. There are about a score of persons resident in Herm; the lessee, and his agricultural labourers, one of whom keeps a little inn, for the benefit of the shrimpers who come over from Guernsey.

But Herm possesses one peculiar distinction,-an attraction which, during the summer, is the frequent cause of picnic parties from Guernsey,-its shell beach. I have been told by competent judges that the little island of Herm is richer in shells than all the shores of all the rest of the British Islands; and that the shells found there may be considered miniatures of the shells found in most other parts of the world. The divisions of the order testacea in this little island extend to upwards of forty genera, embracing upwards of two hundred varieties; and in sponges, corals, and corallines, Herm is as rich as in shell.

The shell beach of Herm, which extends from half a mile to three quarters of a mile, is one mass of shells, unintermixed with either pebbles or sand. Dig with your arm deep as

you may, there is still nothing but shells,-minute perfect shells, and fragments of larger shells. The minute shells are extremely pretty, and may be gathered in millions; and although I am myself no conchologist, and might probably commit so great a heresy as to estimate the value of shells by their beauty, I spent a long summer's noon much to my mind in Herm, wandering on the shell beach; lying upon it; digging my hands an arm's length down, and sifting, and examining, and pocketing.

As I returned along the rocks, I observed that several boats with shrimpers had arrived from Guernsey. This amusement is in fact a passion, and is indulged by persons of all ranks; and so various are tastes, in the matter of recreation, that I have seen individuals, who found quite as much pleasure in wading knee-deep for half a day among the rocks to make capture of some handfuls of shrimps, as has ever been afforded to others in the pursuit of the deer or the fox.

It was almost sunset when I had finished my rasher and egg in the little inn; and dusk was beginning to settle over the sea when I entered the harbour of Guernsey.- .?

AFFECTIONS OF MAN BEFORE THE FALL.

FOR the lightsome passion of Joy: it was not that which now often usurps this name; that trivial, vanishing, superficial thing, that only gilds the apprehension, and plays upon the surface of the soul. It was not the mere crackling of thorns, a sudden blaze of the spirits, the exultation of a tickled fancy, or a pleased appetite. Joy was then a masculine and severe thing; the recreation of the judgment, the jubilee of reason. It was the result of a real good suitably applied. It commenced upon the solidities of truth, and the substance of fruition. It did not run out in voice, or indecent eruptions, but filled the soul, as God does the universe, silently and without noise. It was refreshing but composed; like the pleasantness of youth tempered with the gravity of age; or the mirth of a festival managed with the silence of contemplation. And on the other side, for Sorrow. Had any loss or disaster made but room for grief, it would have moved according to the severe allowances of prudence, and the proportions of the provocation. It would not have sallied out into complaint or loudness, nor spread itself upon the face, and writ sad stories upon the forehead. No wringing of the hands, knocking of the breast, or wishing ourself unborn; all which are but the ceremonies of sorrow, the pomp and ostentation of an effeminate grief; which speak not so much the greatness of the misery as the smallness of the mind. Tears may spoil the eyes, but not wash away the affliction. Sighs may exhaust the man, but not eject the burthen. Sorrow then would have been as silent as thought, as severe as philosophy.-SOUTH.

THE meaning which any generation puts upon the phrases upon the received philosophy of the time. of Scripture depends, more than is at first sight supposed, Hence, while are in fact contending for their own interpretation of reve men imagine that they are contending for revelation, they lation unconsciously adapted to what they believe to be rationally probable. And the new interpretation which the school to be a fatal violence done to the authority of religion, new philosophy requires, and which appears to the older is accepted by their successors without any of the dangerous results which were apprehended. When the language of Scripture invested with its new meaning has become familiar to men, it is found that the ideas which it calls up are quite as reconcilable as the former ones were with the soundest religious views. And the world then looks back with surprise at the error of those who thought that the essence of religion was involved in their own arbitrary version of some

collateral circumstance.-WHewell.

As there is a foolish wisdom, so there is a wise ignorance, in not prying into God's ark, not inquiring into things not revealed. I would know all that I need and all that I may: I leave God's secrets to HIMSELF. It is happy for me, that God makes me of his court, though not of his council. -BISHOP HALL.

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