N

SNOW CRYSTALS.

ATURE is a wonderful artist. She is endowed

by the Creator with the most marvellous powers not only of producing the useful but also the sublime and beautiful. We who live in a land cold enough for ice to form and snow to fall, must have often gazed with admiration at the beautiful tracery1 drawn by the icy hand of frost on the window-panes of our houses and conservatories. The structure of ice and snow is not less surprisingly beautiful, though less open to observation.

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"To many persons," says Professor Tyndall, with his wonted eloquence, "a block of ice may seem of no more interest and beauty than a block of glass; but in reality it bears the same relation to glass that an oratorio of Handel does to the cries of a market-place. The ice is music, the glass is noise; the ice is order, the glass is confusion." The constituents of glass have not combined under the influence of any force producing order and symmetry in every particle; whereas ice is symmetrically built up by a force working in every part according to the same laws, and seemingly with beauty and order not only as the result, but the direct purpose, just as much as a certain pattern is formed in the loom according to a set design.

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On watching the formation of artificial ice in a freezing machine, you may see six-rayed stars, or sixpetalled flowers of thin ice, forming and rising to the surface of the liquid. A similar arrangement of particles goes on at the surface of a freezing lake, and large masses of ice are doubtless built up under this star-like arrangement. The process by which the particles of ice assume regular forms is termed crystal

lization, and these symmetrically formed particles are called crystals.

Not only is ice thus formed, but under favourable conditions snow is also similarly constructed. Snow crystals are of infinite variety and beauty. Captain Scoresby, the Arctic traveller, who was the first to observe them, gave ninety-six illustrations of their graceful forms. One striking feature in the snow crystals is this, that though differing so widely in character, they are nearly all hexagonal in shape.

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On this interesting phenomenon? Professor Tyndall has written in language worthy of a poet. "Snow, perfectly formed, is not an irregular aggregate of iceparticles in a calm atmosphere, the atoms arrange themselves, so as to form the most exquisite figures. You may have seen those six-petalled flowers which show themselves within a block of ice when a beam of heat is sent through it. The snow crystals formed in a calm atmosphere are built upon the same type: the

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molecules arrange themselves to form hexagonal stars. From a central nucleus shoot six spiculæ,10 every two of which are separated by an angle of 60°. From these central ribs small spiculæ shoot right and left, with unerring fidelity to the angle of 60°, and from these again smaller ones diverge at the same angle. The six-leaved blossoms assume the most wonderful variety of form; their tracery is of the finest frozen gauze; and round about their corners other rosettes of smaller dimensions often cling. Beauty is superposed upon beauty, as if Nature, once committed to her task, took delight in showing even within the narrowest limits the wealth of her resources."

1 Tracery, ornamental work, generally in stone.

2 Handel, a great musician (d. 1759), wrote the Messiah and other oratorios.

3 Constituents of glass, the materials of which glass is made.

4 Symmetry, regular shape.

5 Six-petalled. The petals of a flower are the flower leaves.

6 Hexagonal, six-sided.

six; gonia, a corner.)

(Gr. hex,

7 Phenomenon, any remarkable fact in nature.

Aggregate, a collection. (Lat. ag, ad, to; grex, a flock.)

9 Molecule, a very minute particle. (Lat. moles, a mass.) Observe the postfixes cle, cule, ule signify

"little."

10 Spiculæ, little spikes.

11 Angle of 60°, angle of sixty degrees; that is, two-thirds of a right angle.

DEATH-SCENE OF EDWARD II.

BERKELEY CASTLE.-The King and Lightborn, a murderer. Edward. Who's there? What light is that?

com'st thou ?

Wherefore

Lightborn. To comfort you, and bring you joyful news. Edw. Small comfort finds poor Edward in thy looks! Villain, I know thou com'st to murder me.

Light. To murder you, my most gracious lord!

Far is it from my heart to do you harm.

The queen I has sent me to see how you were used,
For she relents at this your misery:

And what eyes can refrain from shedding tears,
To see a king in this most piteous state?

Edw. Weepest thou already? list awhile to me,
And then thy heart, were it as Gurney's is,
Or as Matrevis',2 hewn from the Caucasus,
Yet will it melt ere I have done my tale.
This dungeon where they keep me is a sink
Wherein the filth of all the castle falls.
Light. O villains!

Edw. And there, in mire and puddle, have I stood
This ten days' space; and lest that I should sleep,
One plays continually upon a drum.

They give me bread and water, being a king;
So that, for want of sleep and sustenance,
My mind's distemper'd, and my body's numb'd,
And whether I have limbs or no I know not.
O would my blood drop out from every vein,
As doth this water from my tatter'd robes!
Tell Isabel, the queen, I look'd not thus,
When for her sake I ran at tilt 3 in France,
And there unhorsed the Duke of Cleremont.

Light. O speak no more, my lord! this breaks my heart. Lie on this bed, and rest yourself a while.

Edw. These looks of thine can harbour nought but death: I see my tragedy written in thy brows.

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Yet stay a while; forbear thy bloody hand,
And let me see the stroke before it comes,
That even then when I shall lose my life,
My mind may be more steadfast on my God.

Light. What means your highness to mistrust me thus ?
Edw. What mean'st thou to dissemble with me thus ?
Light. These hands were never stain'd with innocent
blood,

Nor shall they now be tainted with a king's.

Edw. Forgive my thought, for having such a thought. One jewel I have left, receive thou this.

Still fear I, and I know not what's the cause,

But every joint shakes as I give it thee.

Oh, if thou harbour'st murder in thy heart,

[Gives jewel.

Let the gift change thy mind, and save thy soul.

Know that I am a king: oh, at that name
I feel a hell of grief. Where is my crown?
Gone, gone; and do I still remain alive?

Light. You're overwatched," my lord; lie down and rest. Edw. But that grief keeps me waking, I should sleep; For not these ten days have these eyelids closed.

Now as I speak they fall, and yet with fear
Open again. O wherefore sitt'st thou here?

Light. If thou mistrust me, I'll be gone, my lord.
Edw. No no; for if thou mean'st to murder me,
Thou wilt return again; and therefore stay.

Light. He sleeps.

[Sleeps.

Edw. (awaking.) Oh, let me not die; yet stay, oh, stay

awhile.

Light. How now, my lord?

Edw. Something still buzzeth in my ears,
And tells me, if I sleep, I never wake;

This fear is that which makes me tremble thus.
And therefore tell me, wherefore art thou come?
Light. To rid thee of thy life.-Matrevis, come!
Edw. I am too weak and feeble to resist :
Assist me, sweet God, and receive my soul.

The queen, Isabella, wife of Ed

ward II. She had driven her husband from the throne and cast him into prison, and was now about to have him murdered.

2 Gurney and Matrevis, the king's gaolers.

3 Ran at tilt, took part in a tourna

ment: a mock encounter in which knights fought on horseback with blunt spears.

4 My tragedy, my bloody fate. A "tragedy" is a play with a mournful ending.

5 Overwatched, worn out by excessive "watching" or lying awake.

THE

ON RISING IN THE WORLD."

HE pages of history abound with the names of men who have risen to distinction from the lowest ranks of society. In all such cases nature has no doubt done much, but untiring industry and indomitable 1 perseverance have accomplished still more. This is true even