bad thing to accept a more modest part, and to rest content with observing. Observation is all the thought that most of us can attain to. But we may decline to accept "thinkers" at their own curious and self-satisfied valuation.

How first it dawned upon me that the solution of the information difficulty might be found in the remark of Sir John Vesey - lineal descendant of old Solomon "All humbug; humbug, upon my soul!" was in this wise. When a youngster, fresh from college, admiring knowledge and reverent of facts, but better acquainted with tennis and racquets than with less exact sciences, I dined at my father's table with the late Mr. Strap. The party was small, but he was great. There were "ourselves," and with us my keen college friend, Jack Hardhed, of Bluenose, who even then knew more facts than any man else had ever known, and came on purpose to meet the Historian of Civilization. Open-mouthed we sat, and listened to the oracle, my father included, who in his quiet way had, I think, more true knowledge than greater men; but was wont to hold his tongue and listen, with a quaint and courteous smile, which puzzled people till they knew him, and when they did, made them rather uncomfortable. It gave them an uneasy notion that he was finding them out. The oracle had not then so far advanced with him. In the course of a conversation in which Strap laid down the law about everything,

coming, he goes to his rival in the local | ten up, many and many an Impey, I take practice to ask if he is threatened with it, will find that, like Lord Dundreary, he typhus, and being assured that he is not only "thank he thunk," after all. It is no (by the authority which on any other case he rightly considers valueless), goes home and takes no medicine, but waits till the cold is gone-what is it to him, I say, when he issues a pamphlet on cerebral disease for the benefit of the public, that only his initiated can translate him when he says that the "effusion of hæmatin and hæmatosin into the lymphatic sheaths, capillary dilatations, atheroma, and infatctions" (Oh! what can an infarction be?) are the signs of that disease? What sets, what cliques, we all are, and all live in When we are young, we look on "wellinformed" people with awe and envy. As we grow older, we ask ourselves what on earth we mean by it?—whether to be well-informed is not, in our eyes, to know the things that we know, another version of the "orthodoxy which is my doxy," and if the constant reader of the Thespis or the Pegasus, who can tell you all that is going on, one in every provincial theatre, and the other in every racing-stable in England, has not as much right (and in his heart uses it, too) to look down on Impey, of St. Nil's, for knowing nothing on earth about these things, as Impey has to regard him, as he does, as an altogether inferior being, the nearer to our common ancestor the catarrhine ape in proportion to his ignorance of molecules. If, in grave and thoughtful earnest, some of us come to believe that there is no higher provable purpose in this world than to live straight, and to do our neighbor no harm, while aiding him in the struggle to the best of our little power, which has the better right to laugh at the other, Impey or the constant reader? It is well to have an interest in life; and as the first has his, so too has the second. But Impey's speculations, on what he admits he cannot know, shake the faith and repose of many a yearning soul, and therein, be he tenfold right in his melancholy creed, they work clear harm in the one world he believes in. If there really prove some day to be another, where the first shall be last and the last first, which will stand best, I wonder, the constant reader, or Impey, of St. Nil's? It is a very curse of the time that half the world must needs "think," which is not so easy as it sounds. When the inevitable "Finis" comes to be writ

- my father smiling, and passing the wine, Hardhed, respectful and reverent at first, scratching his head at last and fidgeting on his chair, as if anxious to "cut in," the rest of us awestruck and admiring, somebody mentioned a new dictionary with approval. "It is a good book," said the oracle. "It is one of the few dictionaries which I have read through with pleasure." The pause which followed this remark was terrible. The idea at once conjured up by the mind, of a student who was in the habit of reading dictionaries from A to O, all other learning apart, and had liked a few of them, was, to speak with simplicity, tremendous. I have never forgotten the moral they conveyed, and have looked ever since, on all men of information, with a jaundiced eye.

TOM BALBus.

From Golden Hours.
ON SHAKING HANDS.

bing noses, etc., being common. Some Pacific islanders who now shake hands used to show their joy at meeting by AMONGST the Romans a hand was the sniffing at their friends after the fashion emblem of good faith, and the almost uni- of amiable dogs. The Fuegians pat and versal adoption of the clasped hands in slap each other. The Polynesian takes marriage, and other solemn ceremonies, his friend's hand or foot, and strokes his prove this to have been a custom instinc- own face with it. Amongst the Todas of tively considered as emblematic of union the Nilgherry hills respect is shown by and fidelity; unfortunately, just as the raising the right hand to the face, and kiss, at any rate between women and rela- placing the thumb on the bridge of the tions, has ceased to be a token of the tru- nose. The people of Iddah greet you by est and strongest affection, so has the shaking their fist in your face. The cerehand-shake also fallen somewhat from its mony of rubbing or pressing noses is high estate, and become a mere idle cere- common to many countries; Linnæus mony not necessarily conveying an im- found it practised in the Lapland alps, pression of any special interest or regard. while Darwin describes the aborigines of In the ancient usage of striking hands as Australia as invariably pressing the tips a pledge of fidelity in confirming a bar of their noses together on meeting, congain, is no doubt to be found the origin of tinuing the process for a space of time shaking hands. "Who is he that will somewhat longer than would be required strike hands with me?" asks Job, when for a cordial shake of the hand, and accomplaining of the unmerited contempt companying it with sundry short grunts of and mistrust to which he was subjected. extreme satisfaction. Some of the tribes We also learn that in ancient Rome the in central Africa take one another's hands hand-shake was utilized in a manner not on meeting, but, considering this insuffiunfamiliar to the would-be legislators of cient, at the same time testify their regard modern times; that, in fact, it was one of for a friend by gently rubbing his arm the condescensions practised by those with the other hand. Anything but flatwho aspired to a seat in the Senate, to win tering to one's self-love is the hand-shake the goodwill and adherence of their low- perfunctory, in which the performer, first born constituents; for it is said of Scipio raising your hand, gives it a short, sharp, Nasica, the enemy of Tiberius Gracchus, quick, impressive movement downwards, that in canvassing for votes he exclaimed, and then drops it abruptly, as though he on taking the rough hand of a laborer, would say, There! I have done my "What! Do you walk on your hands?" duty for this time, so far as you are con It is natural that savages in their love of cerned." Then we have also the handimitation should conform by degrees to shake perpendicular, in which the whole the usages of more civilized nations, and arm is moved energetically up and down in nothing is this more marked than in with precisely the action of a pump-hantheir adoption of kissing and shaking dle; and the hand-shake horizontal, in hands as expressive of love and friend- which the arm is moved with equal vigor ship. A certain facetious ethnologist from side to side; representatives of the declares that the existence of savage last two types produce on meeting an adtribes who do not kiss their women is a mirable illustration of the mechanical conclusive proof of primeval barbarism, combination of forces, the result of their since, he says, had they once known the hand-shaking being a curious rotatory practice, they could not possibly have motion so embarrassing to the chief acforgotten it. The Red Indians have cer- tors, so comical to the spectator, that no tainly learned the habit of shaking hands one who has once witnessed the same is in wishing one another good-morrow from ever likely to forget it. One man at least the Europeans, but for many centuries we know who has the curious habit of previously they seem to have clasped embracing his friend's left elbow with his hands as a token of fidelity, in ratifying a disengaged hand while the right is em bond. Some nations have very eccentric, ployed in the customary greeting, a trick not to say unpleasant, modes of saying, which bears a close relationship to the "How do you do?" And the further we arm-rubbing of certain tribes in central descend in the scale of race-development, Africa. The muscular hand-shaker is the more we find the civilities exchanged generally a very good fellow, but the viceby human beings assimilating to those of like pressure of his fist, though it comes the lower animals, such endearments as from the heart, and may be in that sense patting, stroking, sniffing, blowing, rub-pleasing, yet causes his victims nearly as

The aged man, who found in sixty years
Scant cause for laughter, laughed before he

died

not!

And died still smiling: Athens vexed him
Not he, but your Athenians, he would say,
Were banished in his exile!

When the dawn

First glimmers white o'er Lesser Asia,
And little birds are twittering in the grass,
And all the sea lies hollow and grey with mist,
And in the streets the ancient watchmen doze,
The master woke with cold. His feet were

chill

knew

And reft of sense; and we who watched him
The fever had not wholly left his brain,
For he was wandering, seeking nests of birds-
An urchin from the green Ionian town
Where he was born. We chafed his clay-cold

limbs ;

much physical discomfort as would the | And risked your own to save him, - Pericles, — embrace of a tame bear. A true, warm- I now unfold the manner of his end. hearted friend is a valuable possession, but one would prefer being convinced of his affection in some other way than by having one's joints dislocated. "B. is an excellent fellow," said some one, in speak. ing of a muscular philanthropist of this type, "but I shook hands with him once, and ever since that, whenever I see him, I put my hands in my pocket, and keep them there." It would be impossible to enumerate all the different modes of shaking hands with which one has grown familiar, but it is a subject, the consideration of which, besides affording some amusement for an idle hour, may really be of use to the student of human nature, since, though not an unerring index to a man's character, it gives a clue to it at least as trustworthy as phrenology and physiognomy; for instance, the man of an honest, open nature, is not likely to use habitually the hand-shake secretive, nor will he of modest, kindly disposition, only vouchsafe two fingers to his friends. The languid hand-shake will generally be found peculiar to persons of cold, lymphatic temperament, while the hand-shake retentive shows what may be, in many respects, a fine character marred by a certain self-sufficiency, and want of consideration for the feelings of others. The hand-shake muscular generally accompanies warmth and intensity of affection, combined with great strength of will, and a nature good, if somewhat coarse of fibre; and the unpleasantness of this development of our subject being a question not so much of manner as degree, it can easily be modified by culture into the handshake unexceptionable, such as of course distinguishes every reader of this article.

From The Contemporary Review.
THE DEATH OF ANAXAGORAS.
"Lampsacum postea profectus, illic diem suum obiit;
ubi rogantibus eum principibus civitatis, Numquid
fieri mandaret, jussisse ferunt ut pueri quotannis
quo mense defecisset ludere permitterentur, ser-
varique et hodie consuetudinem." -DIOG. LAErt.,
De Vita Philosoph. : Anaxagoras.

CLEON of Lampsacus to Pericles :-
Of him she banished now let Athens boast;
Let now th' Athenians raise to him they stoned
A statue; Anaxagoras is dead!

To you who mourn the master, called him
friend,

Beat back th' Athenian wolves who fanged his throat,

And so he dozed, nor dreamed, until the sun
Laughed out-broad day—and flushed the
garden gods

Who bless our fruits and vines in Lampsacus.
Feeble, but sane and cheerful, he awoke
And where the ilex spreads a gracious shade
And took our hands and asked to feel the sun;
We placed him, wrapped and pillowed; and

he heard

The charm of birds, the social whisper of
vines,

The ripple of the blue Propontic sea.
Placid and pleased he lay; but we were sad
To see the snowy hair and silver beard
Like withering mosses on a fallen oak,
And feel that he, whose vast philosophy
Where Athens pastures her dull sheep, lay

Had cast such sacred branches o'er the fields

fallen

And never more should know the spring!

Confess,

You too had grieved to see it, Pericles !

But Anaxagoras owned no sense of wrong;
And when we called the plagues of all your
gods

On your ungrateful city, he but smiled:
"Be patient, children! Where would be the
gain

Of wisdom and divine astronomy,
Could we not school our fretful minds to bear
The ills all life inherits! I can smile
To think of Athens !
blame?

Were they much to

But earth and stones, with caverns, hills and | And now the reverend fathers of our town

He paused; and blowing softly from the sea,
The fresh wind stirred the ilex, shaking down
Through chinks of sunny leaves blue gems of
sky;

And lying in the shadow, all his mind
O'ershadowed by our grief, once more he
spoke :

"Let not your hearts be troubled! All my
days

Hath all my care been fixed on this vast blue
So still above us; now my days are done,
Let it have care of me! Be patient; meek;
Not puffed with doctrine! Nothing can be

known;

Nought grasped for certain; sense is circumscribed;

The intellect is weak; and life is short!"

IIe ceased and mused a little, while we wept.
"And yet be nowise downcast; seek, pursue;
The lover's rapture and the sage's gain
Less in attainment lie than in approach.
Look forward to the time which is to come!
All things are mutable; and change alone
Unchangeable. But knowledge grows! The
gods

Are drifting from the earth like morning mist;
The days are surely at the doors when men
Shall see but human actions in the world!
Yea, even these hills of Lampsacus shall be
The isles of some new sea, if time not fail!”

Had heard the master's end was very near,
And come to do him homage at the close,
And ask what wish of his they might fulfil.
But he, divining that they thought his heart
Might yearn to Athens for a resting-place,
Said gently: "Nay, from everywhere the way
To that dark land you wot of is the same.
I feel no care; I have no wish. The Greeks
Will never quite forget my Pericles,
And when they think of him will say of me,
'Twas Anaxagoras taught him!"
Loath to go,

No kindly office done, yet once again
The reverend fathers pressed him for a wish.
Then laughed the master: "Nay, if still you
urge,

And since 'twere churlish to reject goodwill,
I pray you, every year when time brings back
The day on which I left you, let the boys-
All boys and girls in this your happy town
Be free of task and school for that one day."

CHINESE ARTILLERYMEN. A good story comes from the north which, if true, forcibly illustrates the rottenness of the official system which in China plays into the hands of Russia, or any other power that meditates hostilities with the Middle Kingdom. The expensive guns which were procured from Europe (Krupp and others) were very soon robbed of their brass sights by certain peculating petty mandarins, and the weapons were of course of no use whatever for actual service. Great was the consternation, therefore, when the 'cute viceroy, Li Hung Chang, gave orders that a review should be held, and that these deadly pieces of artillery should be fired off in his presence. The astute official thieves, how ever, were equal to the occasion; they speedily improvised pieces of bamboo in shape very nearly resembling the real sights, and gilded

over the more thoroughly to hide the deception, placing them in position and firing by rule of thumb as if the finest calculations and sighting had been elaborated. One of the precious guns burst, it may be remembered at this same review, by overcharging or doubleshotting; but the greatest triumph of the military rogues on that day was the sighting of Krupp's guns with pieces of gilt bamboo. Such are the men who would lead the Chinese braves to victory against disciplined Western troops. We fancy that Tso Tung-tung keeps a better run of his artillery than was done on this memorable occasion. It is not, we believe, an uncommon thing to find the most vital part of a machine stolen (if loose) after having been passed into the hands of the Chinese.

Overland China Mail.

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