The science of acoustics is a very interesting study, and one which well repaid the magicians of ancient times for the attention which they bestowed upon it; for their superior knowledge in this direction gave them an immense power over the ignorant and superstitious people. In the Egyptian labyrinth, which comprised twelve palaces and 1500 underground apartments, it was claimed that the gods spoke in thunder tones; and according to Pliny, who wrote at this time, the palaces were so artfully constructed that if a door was opened the peals of thunder would be heard echo

STATUES OF MEMNON, EGYPT.

ing through the interior. The king Darius Hystaspes was accustomed to convince his subjects of his divinity by means of mysterious and awful bursts of thunder and flashes of lightning, which would be seen and heard while they were at their devotions. It is thought, in this connection, that in the vaulted and subterranean apartments of the labyrinth of Egypt, the reverberations that would arise simply from the opening and shutting of the doors alone might have been a near enough approach to the rolling of thunder to be imposed upon the credulity of the devotees. Sir David Brewster has given it as his opinion that the ancients were familiar with the method of imitating thunder in practice in our modern theatres. This is done by shaking a piece of sheet-iron horizontally, so as to agitate the corner in a direction at right angles to the surface of the sheet; in

this manner the deep growling of distant thunder, as well as the sharp rattle of the explosive bursts which crash over our heads, may be produced. This effect may also be attained by using sheets of tinplate and thin plates of mica; but in this case the sound is shorter and sharper. The vivid flashes of lightning may be imitated by throwing powdered rosin or lycopodium seeds through a flame, and the rattling of rain is mimicked by a shower of peas in a kind of drum.

Certain kinds of stones possess remarkable properties of sound, and of these tho

ancients made great use. A wonderful stone is mentioned by Pausanias, which was placed as a sentinel at the entrance of a treasury, and he says that robbers were frightened away by the trumpet tones which it gave out. A number of stones have this singular power, and it is reasonable to suppose that one of this class was so placed that it would be struck by a piece of metal when the outside door of the treasury was opened. Safes and strong boxes have been known to give forth sounds to alarm the owners when forced open by burglars. M. Salverto declares that Louis XV. had one of these boxes, and that one was offered to Napoleon I. at Vienna in 1809; there have also been similarly contrived boxes, which, if opened by a false key, throw out a battery of cannon and shoot the intruder.

The sonorous qualities of the clink stone are indicated by its name. The red granite of the Thebaid in Egypt has like properties; and so musical are the granite rocks on the banks of the Orinoco, that the natives attribute the to them mysterious sounds, to witchcraft. Travellers in Brazil tell of large blocks of basalt which emitted clear sounds when struck, and this stone is used by the Chinese in the construction of musical instruments.

But of all these acoustic wonders the most celebrated is the "Jabel Nakous, or, Mountain of the Bell," a low sandy hill in the peninsula of Mount Sinai, in Arabia. Petræa, which emits sounds varying in

power from that of a humming-top to thunder, while the sand, either from natural or artificial causes, slides down its sloping sides.

A similar phenomenon was noticed by Hugh Miller when he was in the island of Eigg, in the Hebrides. While walking over the dry white sand of the beach, he became aware that a musical sound attended his footsteps. At each step the sand was scattered, and the sound was simultaneous with the act, the cause being either the concussion between the particles of sand, or the vibrations of the atmosphere when struck by it. Of course, if a musketball passing through the air causes a whistling noise, each minute particle of sand must contribute its small faint quota to Awell the chorus of sound, and many such notes, which would be unnoticed by the ear taken singly, would of necessity produce sound varying in power with the number of particles. This theory satisfactorily accounts for the musical note of "The Mountain of the Bell," as well as the fainter sounds of the trodden sea beach at Eigg.

The engraving on page 210 shows the colossal statues of Memnon on the plain west of the Nile, one of which is famous the world over for its so-called vocal powers. Sir A. Smith distinctly heard sounds apparently issuing from this celebrated statue, and these sounds have been attributed by some to the peculiar resonant properties of the granite. M. Salverte, however, believes them to be wholly the result of artifice on the part of the Egyptian priesthood, and contrived an apparatus by which he believed that the sun's rays produced the remarkable sounds.

The speaking heads of ancient times were fashioned to represent the gods, and to utter oracular responses. The speaking head of Orpheus at Lesbos is one of the most celebrated, and was invested with the credit of having predicted, in the usual equivocal language of the heathen oracles, the bloody death that ended the expedition of Cyrus the Great into Scythia. Odin imported into Scandinavia the magic arts of the East, and owned a speaking head, reported to be that of the sage Minos, which articulated replies. The famous mechanic

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Gerbert, who was pope under the title of Sylvester II., A.D. 1000, constructed a talking head of brass, and Albertus Magnus, in the thirteenth century, is said to have invented a head which would both move and speak. This head was made of earthen ware, and so terrified Thomas Aquinas that he broke it in pieces, to the dismay of the architect, who exclaimed, There goes the labor of thirty years!' It is probable that in these cases the sound was conveyed by pipes from a person in an adjoining room to the mouth of the figure. Indeed, we are plainly told by Lucian that the impostor Alexander made his statue of Esculapius speak by the transmission of a voice from behind, through the gullet of a crane, to the mouth of a figure; and this means of deception was probably in general use, for we are informed that when Bishop Theophilus broke to pieces the statues at Alexandria, in the twelfth century, he found that some of them were hollow, and these were so placed against the wall that a priest could conceal himself behind them, and address the ignorant and deluded people through their mouths, this being only one of the many remarkable delusions of superstition.

The speaking machines of modern times have been modelled upon this principle, the machine consisting of a head placed upon a hollow pedestal, which, to aid the deception, contains a pair of bellows, a sounding-board, a cylinder and pipes, supposed to represent the organs of speech. In other instances such accessories are rejected, and a mere wooden bead utters its sounds by means of a speaking trumpet. This deception was skillfully practised at the court of Charles II., by an Englishman, until one of the pages discovered a Catholic priest in an adjoining room. The question had been proposed to the wooden figure by whispering it in its ear, and the answers were correctly given by speaking through a pipe in the same language in which they were given.

Did our limits permit, we might give many other illustrations of the use of this principle, but it is unnecessary, as writers on acoustics have furnished abundant examples of its use and adaptation to purposes of deception.

The engraving on this page gives a very good idea of the appearance of the wonderful rafflesia of Sumatra, the largest and most magnificent flower in the world, which first attracts attention by its remarkalle size. It is composed of five roundish leaves or petals, each measuring a foot across, of a brick-red color, but covered with numerous irregular yellowish white swellings. The petals surround a large cup nearly a foot wide, the margin of which bears the stamens; and this cup is filled with a fleshy disc, the upper surface

of which is everywhere covered with curved projections, like cows' horns. The cup, when freed from its contents, would hold about twelve pints of water. The flower itself weighs fifteen pounds. It is very thick; the petals being from one to three-quarters of an inch in thickness.

The discovery of the rafflesia by Dr. Arnold occurred in this way: One day, as he and his companions were exploring the wilds of Sumatra, a Malay attendant suddenly exclaimed, "Come with me, sir; come! A flower, very large, beautiful,

There it lay,

wonderful!" thus drawing the attention of Dr. Arnold to a flower the like of which he had never seen before. among the bushes of the jungle, seemingly springing from the ground itself, without stem or leaves, and seeming to the astonished party the very queen of tropical vegetation-the most wonderful of flowers.

It might reasonably be supposed by the uninitiated that a blossom of such enormous dimensions and weight would be a treasure to the perfumer; but instead of the sweetness the travellers expected to inhale, they had to endure an odor exactly like that of tainted beef. So strong was this odor that Dr. Arnold believed that even the flies that swarmed over the flower were deceived by its smell, and were depositing their eggs in the thick disc, with the idea that it was a piece of carrion.

as

We have mentioned the fact that the flower appeared at first glance to be leafless, and a further inspection revealed the singular truth that no leaves of any kind were connected with it. It sprang from a small, leafless, creeping stem, about as thick as two fingers. It has been truly said that a plant without leaves is like an animal without a stomach, since the leaves perform for the plant the same office does the stomach for the animal; they separate from the air the food needed for the growth of the plant. Deprive the vegeta, ble world of leaves, and we should have no wood, no flowers, no fruit and no seed. For this reason plants are furnished with leaves, some consisting of merely a leafy expansion, and even the single cells of minute and microscopical plants are nothing less than leaves reduced to their most simple structure. But notwithstanding the almost absolute necessity of leaves, there do exist remarkable plants which are indisputably leafless, and which make up for this deficiency in themselves by using the leaves of others. As is well known, such specimens are called parasites, because they draw life and strength from the nutritive juices of others. Thrusting their roots into the living tissues of other plants instead of into the earth, they appropriate to themselves the prepared food of these plants, and at once apply it to their own purposes for the production of stem, flower or fruit. Perhaps the most familiar example of such a parasite is the dodder, one kind of which infests cultivated flax, while others are found on clover, etc.

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The climate of the island of Sumatra, the home of the rafflesia, is warm and moist, and rain falls almost incessantly, particularly in the south. In the neighborhood of the marshes it is very unhealthy, but in the more elevated districts, and upon the southwest coast, it is said to be more favorable to long life. The soil is remarkable for its fertility, but a great part of the island remains imperfectly explored. Much of the east coast is covered with mangrove bushes, while further inland are found palms, and trees of gigantic growth, few of them being less than one hundred feet in height. On the western shore, beside the myrtle and several varieties of fig, all the fruit trees common to the Indian Archipelago abound, and most of the mountains are covered to their summits with jungle. Among the productions of the island are rice, the cocoanut, betelnut, sago tree, capsicum, pepper, turmeric, ginger, coriander, etc., while in the forests in the north camphor and benzoin are found, and the India rubber tree abounds. Through the tropical forests large numbers of elephants roam, and tigers of great size and ferocity are common. The buffalo exists both wild and domesticated. The terrible boa constrictor grows sometimes to a great size.

Sumatra is supposed to be the cradle of the Malay race, and its inhabitants at this day belong to that people. They are divided into several tribes, who speak languages that are regarded as dialects of one common tongue, Beside those of Malay origin, there are two nations who live in the woods in a savage state and have little intercourse with the others. They are called the Orang Kubu and the Orang Gugu, and their history is involved in obscurity. The Malays around the coast appear to be collected from different parts of the Indian Archipelago, and many Chinese have settled in Sumatra. The houses are raised on posts or pillars from four to eight feet from the ground, and in some parts of the country they are erected in trees. Those of the poorer classes are made of bamboo and thatched with grass, but the houses of the more wealthy are generally framed of wood, and the sides enclosed by large sheets of bark. The kreese or dagger blades made in Sumatra are highly esteemed, and the gold and silver filigree work done there is much admired.

CHAPTER III.

As they had feared from the commencement of the search, the body could not bo recovered. That portion of the lake had a soft miry bottom, and it refused to yield up to the sorrowing household even that sad satisfaction-the lifeless stiffened body. There was little disagreement in the general opinion concerning the fatal plunge. Captain Alick was still a strong athletic man, and a matchless swimmer; it could only have happened from some sudden physical ailment; in all probability the sudden chill of the water had brought the cramp to paralyze his limbs, and after that faint halloo for help, he had sunk to the bottom.

In the pocket of the coat brought back by poor Tim were found the keys to his safe and private drawers. They were given over at once to the lawyer's charge. The will, with that hasty postscript which his dismal premonitions had prompted Captain Alick to write, was found just as he had laid it away. The instrument bore date five years back, but the postscript in that bold hand-writing was dated that last evening, and contained these lines:

"A strange unaccountable foreboding has come upon me. If anything should occur to take me away before the morning breaks, this is to give my dear cousin, Richard Merton, a solemn charge. As he is well aware, the will gives to him all my property saving the moderate annuities left to my faithful servants. It is impossible for me to make a legal change now, but I leave to him this as my solemn dying legacy, the care and cause of Genevieve, the daughter of Miriam Grey. He must not disregard it.”

The solicitor of the deceased read this aloud, in a low impressive tone, in the presence of Mr. Merton, Genevieve, the housekeeper, Tim and a few others. The desolate girl looked over wistfully into Richard Merton's face, and trembled at its hard cold expression, even while he rose, and coming to her side, said, calmly:

ness to comply in every possible way with the desire of my esteemed relative, Miss Genevieve. Henceforth I shall look npon you as under my protection. You will accompany me to my home when I return.”

Genevieve's violet eyes were misty, and her voice trembled so that she could hardly articulate her thanks. He had just touched the tips of his cold fingers to her trembling hand. She thought of the caressing clasp that she was never to know again. She recalled the two hands laid upon her head in blessing that sorrowful hour of parting, whose good-night had proved such a long farewell, and her head drooped, and her heart beat suffocatingly. Why was it this new protector chilled her so? What filled her mind with such vague disquieting forebodings? She reproached herself for the unaccustomed sensation, yet could not overcome it.

The will had provided for the undisturbed possession of the cottage for six months, by Mr. Bourne and such servants as chose to remain there, that the sudden decease of the testator might not throw them adrift without giving time for providing new homes. Every one who had served or loved him was carefully remembered, even to Old Moll, whose bequest was two hundred pounds. But, as has been before stated, the principal estate, with the large amount of prize money lying untouched in the bank, was given to Richard Merton and his heirs.

The fortunate legatee rose from his seat as soon as the formal proceedings were over, and hurried out into the open air, feeling as if he should stifle if compelled to remain longer wearing that mask of decorous grief while his heart was swelling so exultantly. He walked rapidly to and fro, with his hands locked closely together.

What a fortunate escape he had had! What inexpressible relief to know that his management of his ward's affairs was not to be brought out into the broad light for the world, whose good opinion was his law and gospel, to examine and comment upon. Alick Thurston had always been a determined obstinate fellow, if he once set his