are either animals or vegetables, according to the definition adopted. They move like animals, but breathe and otherwise conduct themselves as vegetables, and are now classified accordingly. They are generally to be found wherever putrefaction is going on; fevers have been attributed to their presence in the blood, and they are made answerable for a great deal besides. Fungus germs and old-fashioned ferments have been rather snubbed of late by their intrusion.

Liebig attributed the formation of vinegar to the simple chemical combination of oxygen with alcohol; but Pasteur, a great authority on all that relates to fermentation, regards the change as a physiological result of the vegetation of a special bacterium, the Mycoderma aceti. Herr Wurm, in order to settle the controversy, has tried whether it is possible to produce vinegar by "sowing" pure bacteria in a tepid mixture of water, vinegar, and alcohol, to which some phosphates have been added. He succeeded so completely that it is now proposed to manufacture vinegar commercially by this method, which is stated to be more rapid and economical than the usual one of fermenting saccharine solutions.

On my own part, I do not see that these facts refute Liebig's chemical theory at all. The oxidation to which he attributes the formation of vinegar may be promoted by bacteria, or a "vinegar plant," or microscopic fungi, or any other vegetation that acts in accordance with the usual chemistry of vegetation, by dissociating water and carbonic acid, appropriating their carbon and hydrogen, and evolving the separated oxygen in that nascent condition most favourable for its ready combination with the liquid in the midst of which the vegetation is proceeding.

THE

SUNSHINE AND RAILWAY Accidents.

HE railway accident scason has set in rather severely this year by the running away of the Flying Scotchman, near Berwick, and the similar and still more disastrous derailment of the Midland train at Wennington. As we have such accidents annually at the summer holiday-time, the popular explanation is naturally suggested, viz. that it is all owing to the excursion trains.

I have another theory of my own which I hereby publish as what certain candidates for "endowment of research" delight to call “a working hypothesis ;" i.e. a theory for which I shall claim full credit, and a "grant," if it turns up correct, but will otherwise drop. It is this: The metals of a railway expand and contract with variations

of temperature, and wherever rails are laid, in cold, in cool, or average weather, a space should be left between each to allow for the expansion that must occur when the sun-glare of summer falls upon their dark heat-absorbing surfaces. Unless fully sufficient allowance is made for this expansion, the sunshine will cause the rails to push against each other at their ends, and force themselves into curves or zig-zags, in spite of the fish-plates, cradles, and bolts; or, worse still, a positive rupture of these and an over-lap or side-lap may occur somewhere. Such irregularities are likely to throw a rapidly running train off the metals, as both the trains above named were thrown off. The worst of these accidents occurred where the rails had been newly laid. I ask, Who laid these rails? Were they inspected by an officer with sufficient scientific education to know the temperature of rails when laid in early hours of a dewy August morning; what additional temperature these same rails would acquire under such sun rays as fell upon them between midday and 2 P.M. on August 11, when the Midland accident occurred; and whether he was able to calculate, from the known co-efficient of expansion of Bessemer steel, the elongation to which every mile of rail thus laid and exposed would be liable under the extreme conditions of possible variations of temperature?

The fact that both these accidents were totally unconnected with excursion traffic or collision, but were mysterious runnings away from the rails, renders the above a very serious question. If the laying of rails is in any case left to ordinary workmen-who, like all good artisans, delight in making a "good fit"-they would of course bring the rails well up together, and mischief must result.

Both the accidents occurred on exceptionally hot and sunny days, and inspection of the line when the rails are cooler may not reveal the disturbance due to their maximum temperature.

W. MATTIEU WILLIAMS.

IT

TABLE TALK.

T is not generally known in England that the Jesuits, now once more driven from France, were, previous to their expulsion in 1762, accustomed to employ as educational agents, in the schools under their charge, performances not only of tragedy and of comedy, but also of ballet! So elaborate was the scale on which these ballets were presented, that the pupils had to study at the opera with dancers from the opera, and dancers from the opera were in course of time introduced together with the pupils in the performances. That this strange and uncomfortable alliance should draw down upon the Jesuits the stern condemnation of their Jansenist rivals was to be expected. Very good specimens of the odium theologicum are some of the attacks which are published in the organs of the last-named body. A history of the theatre of the Jesuits has just been published in France, and constitutes instructive and fairly amusing reading. Among those who were trained by the Jesuits were Molière and Dancourt, both actors and both dramatists. No record of any special capacity for acting being displayed by either of these pupils exists, nor does the name of either appear in the lists of those who took part in the representations. A nickname applied to the Jesuits by Dancourt was well chosen, and has since stuck to them. Being rebuked by one of the fathers, in whose class he had formerly been, for the degrading vocation he had assumed, Dancourt is reported to have said, "I do not see, my father, that you are justified in condemning thus the employment I have taken up. I am one of the comedians of the King, you are one of the comedians of the Pope. There is no great difference between us." Quite considerable are the contributions to dramatic literature of the Jesuit fathers. Père Brumoy, author of the voluminous "Théâtre des Grecs," was one of the body, and Père Porée and Père Legay are prolific authors. Most of the plays written for performance by the pupils were in Latin, and have accordingly had but little interest for following generations. Of the comedies written in French, however, numerous editions have appeared. Père Porée, who is the most brilliant product of the Jesuits, has obtained the high praise of Saint Marc-Girardin.

I

AM scarcely rash in assigning to Dr. Horace Howard Furness, the amiable and accomplished editor of the American "Variorum Shakespeare "—a work of stupendous labour and erudition-the authorship of a letter in the Times protesting against the vandalism displayed in our treatment of the Tower of London. In common with most Americans who visit the Tower, Dr. Furness, who has recently been in London, feels what a desecration of the place is involved in using as armouries the chambers most splendid in poetic memories and historic associations. Along the walls upon which the most eminent characters in English history have written their names or recorded their sorrows, are now muskets and other weapons arranged in stars and various patterns. Upon these the conductor expatiates, to the all but entire exclusion of references to history. So long as guides are taken from the class which now supplies them, it is perhaps as well that the historical associations of the Tower should be allowed to rest. As one who has visited not a few places of historical interest at home and abroad, I may say that the views of history one would obtain from trusting the statements of guides and ciceroni would be not a little confusing. American visitors of intelligence bring with them their own knowledge of history. None the less, they are anxious to vivify it by connecting it with the exact scenes of familiar events, and it would scarcely be superfluous to place the guides in a position to state who were among the more illustrious occupants of each chamber.

Some of the explorations of our American visitors perplex not a little the modern occupants of buildings associated with memories of departed greatness. After informing us of pious pilgrimages he had made to spots with which a Londoner is so familiar, they inspire little interest, and awaken scarcely a memory, of going, for instance, to listen, like Shallow, to the chimes at midnight from St. Clement's Church. The distinguished editor I have mentioned told, also, how he called at one of the houses in which Johnson is known to have resided, and asked to be shown the room in which he is supposed to have lived and worked. "This is the room, sir," said the little Abigail who conducted him. "Leastways, I am told as it is, for the genelman wasn't here in my time." How long will it be, I wonder, before School Boards put an end to this state of affairs? The answer of the little "domestic" might have been taken out of the pages of Dickens. It is worthy of the Marchioness.

A

MONG recent meetings, the place of honour belongs to that of the Index Society. Without fully accepting the implication

of the American Minister, who was in the chair, that indexes constitute a royal road to learning, I will admit that they are among the greatest boons to scholarship that literature has supplied. That we have gone back in respect of index-making since the days of our ancestors will be obvious to any one who compares new books with old. The "table" to Philemon Holland's translation of Pliny's "Natural History" occupies between 120 and 130 folio pages with double columns; and such books as Florio's "Montaigne," the French edition of Monstrelet's "Chronicles," and the like, are abundantly supplied. To one modern book, at least, I have been obliged, with a view to utilising its contents, to supply an "index" in MS.; and the effort to use others has, in consequence of the want of an index, had to be abandoned. Among comparatively modern books that have come under my ken, the most amply indexed is Wade's "British History Chronologically Arranged," which has sixtyfour pages of double-column index to a thousand and odd pages of text. Thirty-one pages of index, meanwhile, are held sufficient for the eight volumes of Landor's Collected Works, and thirty-six are all that are supplied to the "Histoire des Républiques Italiennes" of Sismondi a book to which, owing to the variety of subjects with which it deals, an ample index is indispensable. Not a few of the books most useful to the student are nothing more than indexes. Almost worse than the absence of an index, unpardonable as this is in the case of works of a certain description, is the presence of an index which is stupidly arranged or misleading. To that amusing and very readable periodical Notes and Queries I would commend, as an entertaining subject, a collection of Curiosities of Index-making.

N the presence of a large assembly, the statue of François Rabelais has been erected at Chinon, in Touraine. Whether this spot be the birthplace of the great teacher of Pantagruelism is still debated. Its claims are, however, the best that any French town has put forth. Considering the fitness of the site, there cannot be two opinions. Standing close to the market-place in which are sold those ripe golden and luscious fruits the unequalled profusion of which has gained for the district the name of the Garden of France, it commands a full sweep of the Loire, with the busy and picturesque bridge and the vine-clad hills of Touraine. Behind it stands the old castle, one of the largest and most picturesque of those feudal edifices of France. Almost at the feet of the statue are placed those gifts of nature of which Rabelais counselled the enjoyment. For the proof of his intellectual influence, trace back almost to Paris or forward to