_Friend._ In the name of heaven, then, what do you both smoke for?
This, as one would have supposed, not an unnatural query, produced a simultaneous stare of astonishment, mingled with contempt, from both the smokers, as much as to say, “What an ass you must be!” and Dick, slowly removing his cigar once more, and spitting out, answers,
“Why, how the devil can you ask such a stupid question--what do you suppose?”
_Friend._ Suppose! why hang me if I can guess.
Here Tom took hold of his Havannah, and after spitting out on a lady who was passing--but this was only an accident--replied for himself and fellow puffer---- But let us pause a moment. Guess, reader, what it was. Do you give it up? Well, then, here it is,
This was enough for us. Our mind was enlightened by a new idea; and leaving the gentlemen to follow their gaggery, we hurried home to dinner, a wiser if not a better man.
NOT A FABLE.--A boy three years of age was asked who made him? With his little hand and foot upon the floor, he artlessly replied--“God made me a little baby, so high, and I _grew the rest_.”--_Mirror._
PUBLIC.--We have a reading, a talking, and a writing public. _When_ shall we have a _thinking_ public?
The mind is a field, in which, so sure as man sows not wheat, so sure will the devil be to sow tares.--_Bentham._
Of all the branches of study into which natural history has been divided, the most interesting, from its extensiveness, its variety, and the almost insurmountable difficulties which it presents to the student, is Ichthyology. To acquire a thorough knowledge of zoology requires much labour, study, travel, and considerable risk; in like manner with ornithology, in the prosecution of which the difficulties are greater, from the mixture of elements; but still the inhabitants of the air have thus much in common with us, that they live in the same atmospheric medium, derive their sustenance from the same earth, and although the difficulties of following their motions, and observing (unseen by them) their habits and natures, are considerable, yet still, thanks to the extension of science, they have not proved unconquerable, and the telescope, in that form called the ornithoscope, has enabled man to acquire a large store of information on this interesting subject. But with ichthyology how widely different! Here the preliminary obstacle which presents itself is an element fatal to the existence of man within it, and out of which the creatures with whose nature he would fain be acquainted cannot exist. His very powers of observation are thus rendered useless, except in a very limited degree. They are bounded by a glass vase, or a small clear pond at the utmost, and confined to a few specimens of the smaller fishes, and even then it is doubtful whether circumstances may not have altered their really natural habits. Yet above these obstacles the mind of man has risen, and by the union of analogy with laborious and constant observation, he has succeeded in classing a large amount of the tenants of the mighty deep. But before he can ascertain what proportion, or write the history of any one of them fully, he must discover some substitute for gills which will enable him to extract the necessary air for his existence from the water, and thus enable him to search the depths of ocean, and seek its inhabitants in their haunts. That such may yet be discovered by the ingenuity of man, let no one deem impossible.