"Oh, you're home," she remarked dully. "Are you arly?"

"Arly? No; 'tis past six o'clock. When are we goin' to hev tea?"

"Dear me!" she exclaimed, starting up hurriedly, "I'd forgotten all about tea. I shorn't be long a-gettin' it ready."

With her usual capable precision she set to work, replying only in monosyllables to her husband's remarks, keeping back the dreadful information with her accustomed self-command, till, as she said to herself, "James had made a good tea."

She ate nothing herself, and to her husband's inquiries murmured indistinctly of headache. But when the meal was finished and James sat stroking the cat between the intervals of feeding it with some choice morsel, his wife remarked:

"I've heered some bad news to-day, James."

“Oh," he said quietly, "what is it?" Perhaps the firm self-control that each possessed was the greatest bond of likeness between this couple who were outwardly so unlike. As she told her story, which, commonplace as it might be to the outside world, was to these old people the tragic uprooting of all they held dearest, he went on mechanically smoothing the cat's fur, though his withered hand trembled slightly, and the red had faded for a moment from his wrinkled cheeks.

"Well, well," he said patiently, with a touch of bitterness, "the land is theirs to do what they like wi' it. We shell jest hev to do as we're bid, like other poor folks."

"We shall likely hev six months' notice, the man said this afternune; time to look about for another house," answered his wife, anxious to make the best of it to her husband.

"Empty housen are allus scarce round about here, as scarce as piebald sparrers; and if all the Lane folks are

wantin' housen too! Hows'ever, we must do the best we can, but 'twill be a bad day's work for us when we hev to go."

The six months' notice came at Michaelmas, to be carried into effect the following Lady-day. Seven other families had notice to quit at the same time, and, as James Lake had foretold, every empty house in that and the neighboring parish of Tofton could have been let twice over. In common with many others, they had been obliged to arrange for a temporary refuge with relatives while they waited for their turn as the cottages became vacant.

It was a sad autumn and winter. Each crop they garnered reminded them sorrowfully that it was the last they would ever gather there; with grief they burnt the bee-hives, because no one in that desolated spot could be induced to take them, and Sarah Lake looked on with grim face and an aching heart as the dealer in second-hand furniture from Campsey carried away the horsehair sofa that after many years of married life had been proudly added to the furniture of their roomy kitchen. That, and many other cherished household goods, had to go because they would have to lodge with Mrs. Nelson for a while-months, or even years it might be, before they could secure a cottage-and her small rooms and shed could only store a portion of the Lakes' belongings.

It was a bitter day at the end of March when James and Sarah Lake said a final good-bye to their old home. A cutting east wind had brought with it a black, bone-searching frost, and Mike, the gray donkey, flicked his long ears and stamped with his fore-hoofs as he waited with the stolid patience of his kind at the little front gate while numerous odd parcels were packed in the cart.

"Where's Tony?" asked Mrs. Lake of her husband. "P'raps he'd like a drink o' milk afore I put him in the basket."

"Don't you bother about Tony, I'll see a'ter him," answered her husband, who, in his round felt hat and Sunday velveteen coat, felt rather over-dressed to be doing much in the way of assisting.

"Werry well, I'll jest leave him to you; only mind you don't forget him." "I shorn't do that, you may be werry sure," was his quiet reply.

The next half-hour was a busy one with Mrs. Lake, who, with precise method, went round to every part of the house and sheds to see that nothing was left behind. When she had satisfied herself that the smallest of their possessions had been removed, she put on her bonnet, wrapped her gray duffel shawl methodically around her gaunt figure, and locked the door behind her.

"James! James!" she called. "Are you ready?"

There was no answer. "Drat the man, wherever is he got to? I s'pose he's lookin' after Tony." She walked down to the big five-barred cart-gate and looked up the lane.

"Why, if that ain't James comin' from the road! I wonder where he's bin trapeesin' off to jest as we wanted to get away," she said to herself; and as he came nearer she asked sharply, "Wherever have you bin, James? Everything is in the cart, an' I shouldn't wonder if the dickey worn't half perished, standin' so long i' the cold."

James looked up wearily for an instant without speaking, and then followed her into the garden.

"Is it Tony you've bin after?" she asked, her voice still sharp with the annoyance that the grief of parting and the irritating cold were producing between them.

The Gentleman's Magazine.

"Yes, I've bin after Tony," he answered slowly in a dreary monotone. "Well, where is he? Can't you find him?"

"No, Sairy," said the old man, "we shan't never find him no more. I took him through Bate's Cranely to the river and-" (his voice broke a little)"I-I put him out o' the way."

"What do you mean?" she asked in alarm. "You don't mean to tell me you've drownded him."

"Yes, missus," he answered with a sad decision, "that's what I ha' done. I drownded him."

"Drownded Tony!" exclaimed Sarah. "However could you? Whatever wor you a thinkin' of?"

"Well, I don't want to hurt your feelin's, but I shouldn't ha' liked him to live under the same roof as your sister Mary. She's sour as a crab, that's what she is, as sour as a crab. She couldn't ha' bin kind to him, 'taint in her natur; an' suner 'an see him ill-treated wi' sly kicks an' the like, I thought 'twould come easier for me to get rid of him myself. But there, Sairy bor, I never done sech a hard day's work i' my life. I cried like a child when the pore dumb thing looked up at me an' mewed, an' tried to get away; from me that wouldn't ha' harmed him for the world . . . only he didn't know an' I felt jest like a murderer.

Large tears were coursing down Sarah's tanned cheeks as she said brokenly.

"He was a butiful cat; sech a good faithful crittur. But there, James bor, 'tis no use frettin'; p'raps when we get to a house of our own agin we might happen on another one like him."

"No," answered her husband, with a world of regret in his voice, "we shall never find pore Tony's like aginan-an' we shall never keep another cat!"

Jaye Garry.

Science, "the great measurer," is for ever busy with scales, weights, and measuring-tape. Directly it was settled that the world is round, we find the Alexandrian astronomers attempting to measure its circumference. Hardly had Newton formed his theory of gravitation before his mind was full of schemes for "weighing the earth." From the moment when the modern atomic hypothesis was accepted, and indeed even before, Dalton and his colleagues were as busy as bees trying to weigh invisible, nay, hypothetical, atoms and molecules. And the very discovery of the "electrons" or "corpuscles" in Sir William Crookes's vacuum tubes may almost be said to have consisted in attempts to compare their masses with those of the lightest particles previously known-atoms of hydrogen. Nothing seems too difficult. The weight of the earth, the weight of an atom, the velocity of light-nay, the speed of thought itself, or, at least, the speed with which thought can be translated into action-all these and a thousand other quantities have been brought by science within the compass of her measuring instruments, their values ascertained, stated in familiar terms, and placed, gratis, at the service of man.

Perhaps some of the readers of the "Cornhill" may feel disposed to take a peep into the machinery employed to accomplish the tremendous task of weighing a world? If so, I must ask them, first, to consider this question:

What do we mean by "the weight of the earth"?

When we speak of the weight of such an object as a lump of coal, we mean, of course, the pull of the earth upon that piece of coal; and the quantity of coal we call a pound is that quantity

which is pulled to the earth with a force just equal to the force that pulls a particular piece of platinum, marked "P.S. 1844 1 lb.," and called the "Imperial Avoirdupois Pound," which is kept at the Standards Office in Westminster.

Now it is clear that the earth, as a whole, cannot pull itself to itself. Every particle of it in every direction must pull every other particle, with the result that there is a state of equilibrium and no pull; and thus, in the everyday sense of the term, the earth has no weight at all.

But we all know that though when we weigh bodies we may seem merely to measure the pull of the earth upon them, we not only learn the strength of this pull, but also measure what Newton called "the quantity of matter in them," or, as we say to-day, "their masses." For it has been shown by Newton that at any given point on its surface the earth's pull on an object is proportional to the mass of the object, and quite independent of all such qualities or considerations as its shape or position, whether it is a solid, a liquid, or a gas, and also, as Lavoisier has taught us, independent of its chemical constitution; this being, of course, only a particular case of Newton's law of gravitation, which tells us that every particle of matter in the universe attracts every other particle with a force which depends on their masses and on the distances which separate them; the attraction being proportionately greater between large masses than between small masses, increasing when the masses are brought closer to one another, and decreasing as they recede, in such a manner that if the distances between the centres of two spheres be doubled, then the attraction between

them is reduced to one-quarter of its original strength.

Returning now to our question, we see that the process familiarly termed "weighing the earth" consists really in measuring the quantity of matter the earth is made of, or, in modern terms, in determining its mass.

Although we cannot even imagine ourselves balancing the earth on a pair of scales against a set of weights, some other way of attacking the problem which is not altogether beyond the range of the imagination may occur to the reader, and help him to grasp its nature and difficulty.

We know, for example, that the diameter of the earth is about 8,000 miles, and we know how to calculate the approximate volume of a sphere when we have measured its diameter. Why, then, should we not calculate the volume of the earth in cubic feet, find the mass of a cubic foot of it in pounds by weighing samples, finally multiply these two quantities, and so determine its mass in pounds? It would not be very difficult to perform these simple operations, but, unfortunately, even if we neglect the irregularity of the earth's surface, there are still some fatal objections. The masses of equal volumes of rock taken from different parts of the earth's crust vary considerably; and, further, even if this were not so, we have no means of getting samples of the material of which the earth is made except by scratching its outer skin, and it would by no means be safe to assume that the average weight of each cubic foot of the rocks which exist below, out of our reach, is the same as the average weight of each cubic foot of the rocks which are familiar to us on its surface. Still, the general idea of the problem presented in the form of this faulty proposal is not unhelpful. It simplifies the matter considerably. We know the volume of the earth more or less

closely, therefore all we have to do is to find its "mean density"-to find, that is, what proportion the mass of the earth bears to the mass of a globe of water of equal size. When this is done, since every cubic foot of water weighs about 621⁄2 lbs., we can easily calculate the weight of the earth in the ordinary sense of the term, and state it in pounds or tons, in grams or kilograms, as we may desire.

The process of "weighing the earth," then, may be said to consist in finding its mean density, water, which is said to have the density 1, being taken as the standard substance. Thus stated, the problem seems easy enough, but the solution of this simple problem has occupied the thoughts of many master minds, and taxed to their utmost the powers of many great experimenters from the days of Newton.

It is true that, by taking the earth as their standard, astronomers have been able to draw up a table of densities for the heavenly bodies, from which we learn that the mean density of the sun is about one-fourth as great as that of our globe, that of Venus and Mars about nine-tenths as great, that of Mercury one and a quarter times greater, and so on. But this, though sufficient for many purposes, fails to give us such a clear idea of the matter as we get when we can think of our quantities in familiar terrestrial standards such as the gram or the pound; and so it is necessary to connect the celestial scale of densities, in which the earth is made the standard, with one of the more familiar terrestrial scales. The first attempt to do this was made by Newton. This attempt was a mere estimate-in fact, a guess. I give it in full in his own words, as translated by Motte:

But that our globe of earth is of greater density than it would be if the whole consisted of water only, I thus make out. If the whole consisted of