a
means of acquiring much knowledge touching medicine which, up to this
time, is ignored." He then refers to his meditated Treatise on Animals
as only an entrance upon that knowledge. But whatever secrets Descartes
may have thought to discover, they are not made known to the public
according to his promise. And in a letter to M. Chanut, written in 1646
(four years before he died), he says ingenuously: "I will tell you in
confidence that the notion, such as it is, which I have endeavoured to
acquire in physical philosophy, had greatly assisted me to establish
certain foundations for moral philosophy; and that I am more easily
satisfied upon this point than I am on many others touching medicine, to
which I have, nevertheless, devoted much more time. So that"--(adds the
grand thinker, with a pathetic nobleness )--"so that, instead of finding
the means to preserve life, I have found another good, more easy and
more sure, which is--not to fear death."

(3) Chrysococyx lucidus,--namely, the bird popularly called the shining
or bronzed cuckoo. "Its note is an exceedingly melancholy whistle, heard
at night, when it is very annoying to any sick or nervous person who
may be inclined to sleep. I have known many instances where the bird
has been perched on a tree in the vicinity of the room of an invalid,
uttering its mournful notes, and it was only with the greatest
difficulty that it could be dislodged from its position."--Dr. Bennett:
Gatherings of a Naturalist in Australasia.

CHAPTER LXXVI.

I strayed through the forest till noon, in debate with myself, and
strove to shape my wild doubts into purpose, before I could nerve and
compose myself again to face Margrave alone.

I re-entered the hut. To my surprise, Margrave was not in the room in
which I had left him, nor in that which adjoined it. I ascended the
stairs to the kind of loft in which I had been accustomed to pursue my
studies, but in which I had not set foot since my alarm for Lilian had
suspended my labours. There I saw Margrave quietly seated before the
manuscript of my Ambitious Work, which lay open on the rude table, just
as I had left it, in the midst of its concluding summary.

"I have taken the license of former days, you see," said Margrave,
smiling, "and have hit by chance on a passage I can understand without
effort. But why such a waste of argument to prove a fact so simple? In
man, as in brute, life once lost is lost forever; and that is why lif