pabilities for the
purpose,--his acquaintance not only with the facts, but with the terms
of science. Whether those terms were always correctly applied, we
confess ourselves not sufficiently learned to pronounce.

"How wondrous is the science of mechanism! how variegated its progeny,
how simple, yet how compound! I am propelled to the consideration of
this subject by having optically perceived that ingenious nautical
instrument, which has just now flown along like a mammoth, that monster
of the deep! You ask me how are steamboats propagated? in other words,
how is such an infinite and immovable body inveigled along its course? I
will explain it to you. It is by the power of friction: that is to say,
the two wheels, or paddles, turning diametrically, or at the same
moment, on the axioms, and repressing by the rotundity of their motion
the action of the menstruum in which the machine floats,--water being,
in a philosophical sense, a powerful non-conductor,--it is clear, that
in proportion as is the revulsion so is the progression; and as is the
centrifugal force, so is the--"

"Pooh!" cried Uncle John, impatiently; "let us have some music."

"I have an apprehension, Bagshaw," said the vice-president,--"that I
should not presume to dispute with you,--that you are wrong in your
theory of the centrifugal force of the axioms. However, we will discuss
that point at the grand-junction. But come, Frederick, the 'Dettingen Te
Deum.'"

Frederick and the young ladies having, by many rehearsals, perfected
themselves in the performance of this piece, instantly complied.
Scarcely had they reached the fourth bar, when Jack Richards, who had
not for a long time perpetrated a joke, produced a harsh, brassy-toned,
German eolina, and "blew a blast so loud and shrill," that the Dutch pug
began to bark, Carlo to howl, and the other nuisance, Master Charles, to
cry. The German eolina was of itself bad enough, but these congregated
noises were intolerable. Uncle John aimed a desperate blow with a large
apple, which he was just about to bite, at the head of Carlo, who, in
order to give his lungs fair play, was standing on all fours on the
hampers. The apple missed the dog, and went some distance beyond him
into the water. Mr. Carlo, attributing to Uncle John a kinder feeling
than that which actually prompted the proceeding, looked upon it as a
good-natured expedient to afford him an opportunity of adding his mite
to the amusements of the da