There is reason to fear that many Welsh may be attracted by this new religious craze as they have been in years gone by by Mormonism, one of the foolishest of creeds. The only way to oppose these aberrations is to cultivate common sense and reason.

In an article in the August number of the "Dysgedydd," is presented a program of church work during the twentieth century; then follow several articles on subjects pertaining to religion and the interests of the denomination, viz., the Union Meetings at Porthmadoc; A Medley; A Page from Dr. Edward Williams' Diary; Sunday School Corner; Notes on the Union Meetings at Porthmadoc; Events of the Month; Reviews, Reports, Poems, Obituaries, etc.

-Among the items forming a program of church activity during the Twentieth Century, are the following: The preaching of the pure truth of the gospel; the propagation of Protestant principles for the subversion of the spirit of popery that is so active in the world now-a-days; an organized attack on the powers of evil; advocacy of the principles of good will and peace; the routing of the enemies of the Sabbath and the destruction of the gin power and gambling institutions of all kinds.

In the Events of the Month the Editor betrays a petty spirit during his short review of the trouble in China. We can not see how the British Government could do otherwise than act in concert with the powers of Europe; but, contrarily, it appears to be the Editor's view that the British power should undertake to go around, championing everybody's cause singlehanded. The fact that it acts harmoniously and in unity with such powers as Russia and Germany does not signify that it is a tyrannical power. The United States does the same, necessarily. Governments cannot afford to be at loggerheads from mere whim or caprice. What

a good number of the stop-the-war party desires is to have it fought in their way and to gain their ends.

The contents of the "Cronicl" for August are the following: "Religious Notes," by Eynon; Variety Department -Peter and Maria Jones; "Diwygwyr Cymru;" "The Growth of Popery and Nonconformity;" "Jesus the Carpenter of Nazareth; "Should Women Vote;" "Story of the Month," by. the Editor; The Sunday School lesson, Notes, Reviews, Obituaries, etc., etc.

-In "Religious Notes" Eynon anent the Christian Endeavor Convention in London, states that he has not yet come across a good Welsh rendering of the title "Christian Endeavor," which shows the movement has not taken a strong hold of the Welsh spirit. He upbraids the Church of England for its refusal of St. Paul's and Westminster to the Endeavorers. Every eccentricity in the Church of England must be attributed to its being an "establishment;" it tolerates the ritualists for the same reason that it excludes the Endeavorers. In the last paragraph, Eynon adverts with delight to the new Welsh book, "Diwygwyr Cymru." "Efrydydd Hanes" in his review of Mr. Evans' book relates briefly how it originated, a volume which he calls "beautiful and striking." It certainly does strike hard at one of the leading denominations in Wales. "Efrydydd Hanes" believes it to be the most popular book in the Welsh language, excepting the Biblealone.

Professor Rhys is engaged upon a book dealing with Welsh and Manx fork-lore, and the Oxford University Press will publish it. The "Daily Chronicle" says that "the book will be awaited with interest, having regard to the author's eminence as an authority on whatever refers to Celtic literature."

The exodus of the tree destroying caterpillar may be confidently predicted within a short time, probably about five years, according to City Forester John C. Lewis. This prediction is based upon their gradual decrease in size and vitality noticed from year to year. Several seasons ago few specimens could be found under two and a half or three inches in length, most of them being as thick as the little finger, while at the present time the largest ones do not exceed an inch and a half in length, nor are they thicker than a lead pencil.

A successiul operation has just been performed in St. Luke's Hospital, New York City. A tumor was removed from the inside of the sheath of the spinal cord. It was necessary to cut into six vertebrae, and the patient was kept under anesthetics for more than three hours. He was operated upon after a number of German specialists had pronounced that his ailment was rheumatism.

A train on the Ulster and Delaware Railway was stopped recently on account of the caterpillars which collected on the tracks in sufficient numbers to stop the train by the lubrication of the rails, which resulted from the crushing of their bodies under the wheels. According to The Railway Review, it is necessary for men to sit upon the cowcatcher and sweep away the obstructions by holding brooms on the rails.

A new record for high kite flying was established at Blue Hill, Boston, July 19, when a height of 15,900 feet was reached with a line of six kites in tandem. Five were an improved box pattern, and one was a rib kite. The greatest height was reached with four and three-quarter miles of steel piano wire

used as a flying line. The temperature registered by the automatic instrument was 30 degrees; at the sea level it was 80 degrees. The velocity of the wind was 26 miles an hour, and the atmosphere was very dry. It was difficult to see the highest kite from the Observatory without the aid of a telescope.

"A curious discovery is said to have been made in Germany, that land of never-ending research,” says "The Western Electrician." "It is that the lens of the human eye is diamagnetic, or possessed of the apparent property of being repelled by the poles of a powerful magnet. It is suggested as a possibility that this characteristic might be utilized in a magnetic treatment to flatten the lens and thus improve or perhaps cure near sightedness."

Tolstoi seems to me an absolute spirexcels in it, fond of extremes, who spoiling a just idea by exaggerations. In this respect, as in many others, he is like Rousseau, from which he took belief in man's native goodness, his hatred for philosophy and civilization, his fondness for a patriarchal country life, his desire to rehabilitate manual labor, his plan to bring man back, as nearly as possible, to that famous nature-life so dear to past century authors of "Robinsonades"-only he is a Russian Rousseau with the evident stamp of his native country.-G. Renard.

Lamarck teaches us that our organs are developed by exercise and atrophied by inactivity, and that the results of this development of atrophy are transmitted by heredity. Animals that live in a state of nature are alive because they have resisted all destructive agencies, and they do this by means of special organs that are continually being

exercised. Now the man of a prosperous race has succeeded in sheltering himself from these destructive agencies without having to struggle against them; he therefore loses progressively the use of all the organs that give him power to fight directly against the ele

ments.

Commenting on the opening of underground electric roads in London and Paris, both with largely equipped American apparatus, "The Electrical World" says: "There is an old saying that the shoemaker's wife goes illshod, and it has a pertinency to the situation which discloses the two leading capitals of the old world equipped with American underground electric railways, while not a city in this country has anything of the kind, unless we count in the Boston subway, which is simply a sunken track for trolley cars. ever, in a few years we shall be able to try underground roads

How

here without

going to Europe for the experience, while it is not improbable that many useful points in practice will have been developed in Europe that will be worthy of study or imitation."

The Jews appear to be making rapid strides to the front in all countries, not only in commerce, but in scholarship, science, and the arts. In no country, perhaps, is this more evident than in America. The New York "Sun" recently contained this item: "Of the 640 girls who passed successfully the examination for admission to the Normal College this month (June), the great majority are Jews. More than five sixths of the whole number came from the public schools, of which for many years past the best scholars have been of that race chiefly. * **Of about 800 graduates from the public schools admitted to the free city college for boys, the vast majority also are of the Jewish race, the proportionate number of other

races being even smaller than among the girls admitted to the Normal College."

A curious and unexpected development has arisen in connection with the cutting off suddenly, at Assouan, on the Upper Nile. The large volumes of water which were liberated had been stagnant for many months, and, therefore, possessed no free oxygen; consequently the fish in the river at Assonan have been destroyed by the hundreds of thousands. The chief of the engineering staff reports that there are over 1,000,000 dead fish ranging from two or three inches to six or seven feet in length, lying exposed to the sun within one hundred yards of his office. odor exhaled by the decompos.tion of these fish by the torrid sun is nauseating in the highest degree. To accelerate the gravity of this situation there is no other drinking water available. Fortunately, however, no virulent epidemic has yet broken out among the inhabitants as a result of drinking such polluted water.

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THE AMERICAN INDIAN.

The

His

"He is the most religious of beings, only it is his own natural religion, not borrowed nor learned from books. instincts guide him. He has no formalities of written law nor stated times for his worshipping. Divinity surrounds him, is ever present, ever manifest. With all his faults his life is one con

tinuous prayer. This will be gainsaid; but go live his life, share his joys and sorrows, dear critic, ere you brush aside this statement-a continuous prayer. Even in his gaiety he sings of God the god (Ti-ra-wa-hut), the Father above. It is not all solemnity-and there is no hypocrisy in savage worship. In all the Indian's adversity, and in all the pressure of an aggressive civilization that has surrounded him for gen

erations-forcing its evils upon him more gratuitously than its good examples-notwithstanding our progressive Christianity that engulfs him, he clings to his simple faith, stands by his convictions, and proclaims to the world that he wants no better God than the Father of his people the beloved, 'Ti-rawa-hut,' whom his forefathers trusted, and who he believes to be still in power."-H. E. Burgess.

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A RESULT OF PRINTING.

"The human race is like a child with a new toy; it values the toy in and for itself. The mere facts that we can print as fast as lightning, that we can talk with distant cities, that we can bottle up human speech, have, perhaps, proved a little too much for us, and we have neglected what we have to say and how we should say it. On the whole it can hardly be doubted that the art of utterance has declined since the invention of printing; we have no longer that simple, direct expression, that 'large utterance of the early gods.' This is the price we have had to pay for seizing Prometheus-like, on mere power, on mere knowledge. It is the story of the Garden of Eden perpetually reproduced in human history. We do not doubt that mankind has gained, but the intellectual producer has too often lost because with the gain of his power over natural agencies has gone a loss of the ancient spontaneity, leisured art, sense of beauty, original intellectual force, which marked the genius of the anique world. Can we recover the old spirit and temper while using the new knowledge? That is one of the vital questions for mankind."-Spectator.

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A MUSICAL BICYCLE.

At this time when so many improvements are being made on bicycles, in the way of attachable motors, etc., the

machine illustrated herewith will doubtless interest our readers. It is the invention of Mr. Samuel Goss, of Chicago, and was designed for the purpose of furnishing music for the rider of the wheel and his companions, in order to break the monotony and give divertisement during long and tedious runs.

The mechanism, which is quite simple, is mounted on an iron frame made to fit into that of the machine. On this frame are stretched piano wires, while on the cross-piece, are some small hammers operated by pins on the cylinder, and made to strike the wires. is The cylinder rotated by worm gears placed at its lefthand end and driven from the crank shaft by a cord and pulley.

The inventor has foreseen the case when the riders should tire of the mulever sic, by providing a small for throwing out the gears and thus stopping the cylinder. The tune may be varied by putting in new cylinders, and the time of any air may be quickened by increasing the speed of the wheel.

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EDUCATION IN CHINA.

Education of a certain type is very general, but still there are vast numbers of countrymen in China who can neither read nor write. There is a special literary class who alone know the literature of their country, to the study of which they devote their lives. There are boarding schools, day schools, and colleges. Examinations mainly confined to moral philosophy and literature are held in the prefectorial cities of each province twice in three years for the lower degree necessary as a passport to the public service, and of the six or seven thousand candidates who have come forward, not more than sixty can be admitted to the degree of Literary Chancellor. For the higher degrees, other examinations are necessary. There is a "College of Foreign

The benefit to be derived from seabathing is due, first of all, to the low temperature of the water, the temperature of sea water seldom being above 70 or 75 degrees. Water at that temperature very rapidly extract's heat from the body, so that if a person remains in water at that temperature a very great length of time, he loses considerable heat. * * Fresh water is usually warmer than salt water; and in soft water, reaction occurs more quickly than in salt water, so that one may remain in it a little longer.

"In connection with sea-bathing there is a reaction from cold-the reaction which follows the extraction of heat,then another reaction, in which there is an elevation of temperature, the bodily forces receiving an extra amount of heat. It is from this reaction that we derive the great benefit of sea-bathing, and not from the salt in the air or in the water, as some people think. The benefit comes from nothing else but the cold water. * * *

"Cold has the marvelous property of increasing vital work of all kinds. When cold water is applied to the skin, impulses are set inward that awaken every organ of the body. Let us see what takes place: When a person dashes into cold water, the first thing he does is to draw a deep breath; the lungs swell out, a deep inspiration is taken, and the heart begins to pound

away with wonderfully increased vigor and strength. * * *

"This deep breathing increases lung activity, thus bringing in more oxygen; it increases heart activity, so that the blood is circulated with greater force; hence we have more blood and purer blood carried into every tissues of the body. The result is a stirring up of the bodily forces and a distribution throughout the system of a larger amount of highly vitalized and oxygenated blood.-"Good Health."

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THE DIVINING ROD.

At last the divining rod is to be scientifically investigated. A commission has been appointed in France to study all apparatus and methods employed by sorcerers, water seers, and wizards, who use the divining rod, mineral rod, exploring pendulums, hydroscopic compasses, and the other instruments which go by a host of other fanciful names. The French engineer, M. Brothier de Rolliere, is the president of the commission. He will procure divining rods of all kinds, including books, reviews, journals, reports of experiments, together with the names and addresses of the inventors of the alleged devices. All the facts and documents may be sent to M. de Rolliere, care of Cosmos, 8 Rue Francois Premier, Paris, France. It is to be hoped, that the findings of this commission will, once for all, settle the question of the divining rod, not only for the discovery of water, but also minerals. In England, particularly, the water diviner plies his lucrative profession without legal interference, and, strange to say, his dupes are often town authorities. The whole business is akin to that of fortune teller, the spiritualist, or any other charlatan, and it is strange that the exponents of such systems are allowed to openly pursue their avocations undisturbed by fear of prosecution. At present the victims are the only ones punished.