wires, they being held firmly in place by the sulphur. The inner ends of the wires are united by a small platinum wire. The ends of the wires are then surrounded with fulminate, and the two parts of the tube are put together, that containing the wires slipping within the other. The entire fuse is then covered with gutta-percha. The passage of an electric current through the wires heats the platinum bridge to redness, and causes an explosion of the fulminate.

The number of pounds of rack-a-rock put into drill-holes was 240,399; of dynamite, 42,331; total, 282,730 pounds. There were 11,789 drill-holes in the roof and 772 in the pillars, and their total length was 113,102 feet, or more than twenty miles. The whole amount of rock to be broken by the final blast was 270,717 cubic yards, covering an area of about nine acres. The primary charges, the office of which was by their detonation to produce the explosion of the charges in the drill-holes, were placed along the galleries at intervals of 25 feet, on timbers extending from wall to wall, and consisted of two 24-inch dynamite cartridges like those already described lashed to the timber, with one of the "mine-exploders" bound upon them. The entire mine was divided into 24 independent circuits. Within each of 21 of these circuits were 25 fuses or mine-exploders, while three circuits contained 22 fuses each. A wire from the battery on the surface of the rock at the mouth of the shaft led from one fuse to the next, until the 25 fuses were in the same electrical circuit, and thence back to the battery. So far as was practicable, adjacent charges were put on different circuits, so that if any circuit failed through fault in the connections, an explosion of its charges would still be insured through the sympathetic action of the adjoining charges. The whole number of these primary charges was 591. Some of the circuits were nearly a mile long. The battery consisted of sixty cells, all coupled in one series, each of which had an electro-motive force of 1.95 volts and an internal resistance of 0.01 ohm. The plates were 6 inches by 9 inches-four carbon and three zinc plates in each cell, separated by a quarter of an inch. The ordinary bichromate solution was used. The poles were constituted of two large mercury cups, into one of which were dipped the 24 lead wires, while the 24 return wires terminated in a third cup. Between this third cup and the remaining pole of the battery stood the apparatus for closing the circuit. It consisted of a stout iron cup containing mercury, in which sat a thin glass tumbler also partly filled with mercury. Two large strips of copper connected the mercury in the iron cup with one pole of the battery, and that in the glass with the cup containing the return wires. To close the circuit through the fuses it was only necessary to break the tumbler so as to let the mercury in it mix with that in the iron cup. To do this at the

proper moment, a quarter-inch iron rod four feet long, terminating at the top in a sinall round disk, stood with its point in the bottom of the glass. It was long enough to pass through the roof of the battery-house. A 30grain platinum fuse, connected with a small battery at Astoria, was laid on the disk and stuck on with a lump of wax. It had been previously determined by experiment that the blow struck by this fuse on exploding, and transmitted by the iron rod, would be so sharp as to pulverize the tumbler and yet not splash the mercury.

The mine was flooded by two siphons of 12 and 16 inches respectively, in fifteen honrs and a half, ending at 3.30 A. M., Oct. 10. The explosion was set for 11 A. M.. Oct. 10, but everything could not be made ready and tested in time to fire at the appointed moment. The explosion did not take place till 11.13, which caused some confusion in the seismoscopic observations. The whole area of the reef was shattered. The plan of making the excavations large enough to swallow all the débris of the reef and leave a channel deep enough, without further operations, already abandoned at Hallet's Point as more expensive than dredging up the broken rock, was never entertained at Flood Rock. Though the charges all exploded at the same instant, the time and the appearance of the effect above the water-surface varied according to the strength of the rock and the depth of the water. There was no loud report, and no dangerous shock. The breaking of some panes of glass and the shaking down of a few bricks and loose ceilings constituted all the damage that was done.

Pending the awarding of a contract for dredging, the work of removing the rock was begun with a scow belonging to the Government, as soon after the explosion as possible. From 15 to 30 tons of rock were hoisted out daily, after being slung by divers on chains. A contract has been let for the removal of 30,000 tons of the rock at $3.19 a ton, the contractor to do his own surface-blasting. This is less than the price for which rock was removed on similar terms at Hallet's Point. The contractor has two grapples at work, and is removing an average of about 120 tons a day. As a whole, the cost of mining a cubic yard of rock has been reduced 34 per cent. from the cost of doing the same work at Hallet's Point. The total cost of the work done on Flood Rock, including the final blast, amounts to $2.99 a cubic yard of the whole amount of rock broken, or $5.66 less than the cost of breaking Hallet's Point. A considerable part of this gain will be expended on the proportionately larger amount of dredging to be done. The net result, however, will show an improvement of not less than 30 per cent. The total cost of the final blast at Hallet's Point was $81,092.24; at Flood Rock it was only $106,509.93, though the blast was 56 times as large. The progress with the dredging gives promise that an 18

was also appointed, by virtue of a vote bearing date March 5, to investigate the alleged frauds on the public exchequer, of which ex-President Marco Aurelio Soto is accused.

Railroads. Mr. Hungerford, Engineer-inChief of the Central Railroad of Honduras, has surveyed the line to connect Trujillo with Juiticalpa, a distance of two hundred miles. The concession to build this line was given to a New York syndicate. Work has been proceeding on the line of the Northern Honduras Railway, which is to connect Trujillo with Puerto Cortés, or any point on the frontier of Guatemala, for which the concession was obtained in 1884, and which is expected to be in operation in September, 1887. Liberal inducements are also held out by the Government to bona fide settlers from abroad in this section of the country, which even now is very important as a fruit-growing region, whence an active export is going on to New Orleans and New York of bananas and cocoanuts, especially from the island of Bonaca, where there are extensive cocoanut-walks, and from which point bananas are also shipped in great quantities to American ports.

Transportation.-In October the Government made a contract with Don Eduardo Busquet for the establishment of a coasting-line of steamers on the northern Atlantic coast.

The Government also took vigorously in hand in 1885 river improvements and the digging of canals to connect rivers in the republic. Thus a contract was made with George W. Shears to deepen the Ulua and Blanco rivers, so that they may be navigable to a point called La Imprenta. A similar contract was made with Waldemar Allstrom and Don Miguel Luís Aguilera, for the deepening of the Aguan river all the way to a locality called La Lima, ten miles from the city of Yoro.

The

Tobacco. The Government has made efforts to facilitate the cultivation of tobacco. Tobacco-seed is allowed, by decree of October, 1885, to enter the country duty free. tobacco-tax, which planters have to pay, is $3 for every hundred pounds produced, and the tax on cigars, which manufacturers have to pay, is $1 a thousand.

Mines. Gold and silver mining enterprises in Honduras, in which American companies are engaged, are becoming more profitable. There are five New York companies.

The October report of the Yuscarán Mining Company stated that the company had already expended a large amount of money, and that a shaft had been sunk about 140 feet. It is proposed to sink this shaft 400 feet before driving, to connect with the main Guayabillas vein. The report of the Paraíso Reduction Company, of Dec. 1, mentions the purchase and erection of a large roasting-furnace. The company also purchased the "Ultimo" and "Coco" ingenios, both necessary to control the water of the Quebrada Grande River and for milling facilities; furthermore, the ingenio of Daniel

Fortín, the largest and best-equipped native reduction-works in that district. Engineers were engaged in a complete survey of the whole water system of the district. By securing the immense water-power, thousands of tons of ore could be made available daily for treatment at a profit.

The development of the Santa Elena mines uncovered such a mass of gold-bearing quartz that it was considered best to introduce stamping machinery at the Paraíso reduction-works, and treat it as a free milling of ore by plate amalgamation. Machinery for a forty-stamp mill complete was shipped in August from Cincinnati, to be in place on March 1, 1886, increasing the capacity of the Paraíso reductionplant about 100 tons a day. There were made at the Santa Elena mine three very rich discoveries in the month of September-veins with the usual good average of silver and gold, and rich threads in the center of the veins.

The general report made by Don Adolfo Zuriga, Attorney-General of Honduras, in September, dated from Tegucigalpa, says, "Within the next six months there will be very considerable quantities of gold and silver shipped to New York from here, and within two years Yuscarán will be such a mining center as will equal any mining district in America."

Commerce.-The following table shows the imports from Central America :

and his mother was a royalist in her sympathies, and had shared in the dangers of the Vendean insurrection; so that he spoke of himself as born with both royalist and imperial aspirations. He alluded frequently to the antiquity of his race, but his paternal grandfather was a master builder at Nancy, and made no pretensions to nobility. He was a feeble child, and when about six weeks old he was carried to Elba, where his father's regiment was stationed, and there and in Corsica he remained three years. The two succeeding years his mother passed at Paris with her children. She then went with them to Italy, where her husband, at that time Col. Hugo, was governor of the province of Avellino in the kingdom of Naples. The future poet, according to his biographers, played about the foot of Vesuvius, and shuddered at the stories of the celebrated bandit known as Fra Diavolo, whose band his father broke up. In 1809 Madame Hugo returned to Paris with her family and lived in an old house with a highwalled garden, where Victor played and studied with his brothers, who afterward achieved distinction in literature, and with the girl who became his wife. He was taught by an old married priest, and by Gen. La Horie, who had been compromised with Moreau, was for several years under the surveillance of the imperial police, and took refuge in the Hugo household, where he was accustomed to sit with the boy upon his knee and read with him Polybius and Tacitus. The hiding-place of La Horie was discovered and he was arrested and impris oned, escaping only to take part in an insurrection, in which he perished; and this incident is supposed to have aided the mother's influence in giving the poet's mind its first royalistic tendency. In the spring of 1811 Madame Hugo went to Spain, whither her husband, then general and maréchal of the palace, had accompanied King Joseph Bonaparte in 1809. The journey was not made without peril, among deserted villages and desperate bands of guerrillas. The family took up its residence at Madrid in the Macerano Palace, and the boys were placed in the College of Nobles, where they remained a year, and it was intended that Victor should become one of the pages of the King; but the prospects of the new monarchy continued to be so stormy that Madame Hugo returned to Paris with her younger sons, Eugene and Victor, taking up her former residence, and committing the education of the boys to their former teacher. There was little religion mingled with their instruction, for their mother was less religious than loyal. Gen. Hugo returned from Spain after the overthrow of the Bonaparte kingdom a poor man, as he had purchased an estate there which was confiscated. He afterward conducted the famous

defense of Thionville in the invasion of 1814. Madame Hugo, who used to wear green shoes in order to keep the imperial color under her feet, received marks of favor from the returning Bourbons; and during the Hundred Days her husband separated from her and took charge of the education of his sons. He sent them to a boarding-school, where they remained until 1818, attending a course of philosophy, physics, and mathematics at the College of Louis le Grand. Victor showed great aptitude for mathematics, but he preferred poetry to all else, and devoted his leisure time to it. He began to write verse at ten years of age, and at thirteen

VICTOR HUGO.

rhymed about Roland and his chivalry. During the four following years he composed multitudinous verses in the classic style, his more important efforts being the tragedy of "Irtamène," celebrating under an Egyptian disguise the restoration of the Bourbons; the drama of "Inès de Castro," and three acts of an unfinished tragedy, "Athélie, ou les Scandinaviens." A poem, "Sur les avantages de l'étude," submit. ted in competition for a prize offered by the Academy in 1817, was mentioned with honor, and would, it is said, have been crowned if the author had not spoken of himself in the closing lines as fifteen years of age, which aroused the suspicions of the judges, who feared a mystification.

Gen. Hugo had intended his son Victor for the profession of arms, but in 1818 he yielded this point and allowed the young poet to give up the project of entering the Ecole Polytech