whom we have nothing whatever to communicate, but whom we embarrass for no other purpose than simply to show our friendship.

2. Jones meets his friend Smith, whom he has met in nearly the same locality but a few hours before. During that interval, it is highly probable that no event of any importance to Smith, nor, indeed, to Jones, which by a friendly construction Jones could imagine Smith to be interested in, has occurred. Yet both gentlemen stop, and shake hands earnestly.

3. "Well, how goes it?" remarks Smith, with a vague hope that something may have happened. "So, so," replies the eloquent Jones, feeling intuitively the deep vacuity of his friend answering to his own.

4. A pause ensues, in which both gentlemen regard each other with an imbecile smile and a fervent pressure of the hand. Smith draws a long breath, and looks up the street; Jones sighs heavily, and gazes down the street. Another pause, in which both gentlemen disengage their respective hands, and glance anxiously around for some conventional avenue of escape.

5. Finally Smith (with a sudden assumption of having forgotten an important engagement) ejaculates, "Well, I must be off!"—a remark instantly echoed by the voluble Jones, and these gentlemen separate only to repeat their miserable formula the next day.

6. In the above example I have compassionately shortened the usual leave-taking, which, in skillful hands may be protracted to a length which I shudder

to recall. I have sometimes, when an active participant in these atrocious transactions, lingered in the hope of saying something natural to my friend (feeling that he too was groping in the mazy labyrinths of his mind for a like expression), until I have felt that we ought to have been separated by a policeman.

7. It is astonishing how far the most wretched joke will go in these emergencies, and how it will, as it were, convulsively detach the too-cohering particles. I have laughed (albeit hysterically) at some witticism, under cover of which I escaped, that five minutes afterward I could not perceive possessed a grain of humor.

8. I would advise any person who may fall into this pitiable strait, that next to getting in the way of a passing dray, and being forcibly disconnected, a joke is the most efficacious. A foreign phrase often may be tried with success: I have sometimes known Au revoir, pronounced "O-reveer," to have the effect (as it ought) of severing friends.

LANGUAGE STUDY.

I. Write the analysis of: occur (currere); pressure (premere); respective (specere); conventional (venire); ejaculate (jacere).

II. What two adjective clauses modify "habit" (1)? What adverbial clause modifies "remarks" (3)? Supply the ellipsis in the last sentence of paragraph 4. With what is "remark" (5) in apposition?

III. What adjective (3) is used ironically? (See Definition 11.) Select what you think the most vividly descriptive words or expressions. By what metaphor does the author express the idea of thinking desperately? What fault in the expression "mazy labyrinths" (6)?

30.-Glimpses of Science.

THE THREE LIVES OF INSECTS.

a-dult', full-grown, mature.

in-çiş'ions, in-cuttings.

molt'ing, shedding, casting.

pū'pȧ (Latin, doll, puppet).

segments, sections, portions. spira-eleş, little breathing places. trans-verse', lying crosswise. tū'bu-lar, formed like a tube.

ru'di-ments, imperfect beginnings. | vo-rā ́çioùs-ly, ravenously.

1. The word insect (which, in the Latin language, whence it is derived, means "cut into" or "notched") was designed to express one of the chief characters of this group of animals, whose bodies are marked by several cross lines or incisions. The parts between these cross lines are called segments, or rings, and consist of a number of jointed pieces, more or less movable on one another.

2. Insects have a very small brain, and, instead of a spinal marrow, a kind of knotted cord, extending backward from the brain; and numerous small whitish threads, which are the nerves, spread from the brain and knots in various directions.

3. Two long air pipes, within their bodies, together with an immense number of smaller pipes, supply the want of lungs, and carry the air to every part. Insects do not breathe through their mouths, but through little holes, called spiracles, generally nine in number, along each side of the body.

4. The heart is a long tube, lying under the skin of the back, having little holes on each side for the admission of the juices of the body; which are prevented from escaping again by valves, or clappers, formed to close the holes within. Moreover, this tubular heart is divided into several chambers, by transverse partitions. In each of these partitions there is a hole, shut by a valve, which allows the blood to flow only from the back part to the fore part of the heart, and prevents it from passing in the contrary direction.

5. The blood, which is a colorless or yellow fluid, does not circulate in proper arteries and veins; but is driven from the fore part of the heart into the head, and thence escapes into the body. Here it mingles with the nutritive juices, and flows along the sides of the air pipes, receiving from the air that influence which fits it to maintain life.

6. Most insects, in the course of their lives, are subject to very great changes of form, attended by equally remarkable changes in their habits. Those changes, transformations, or metamorphoses, as they are called, might cause the same insect, at different ages, to be mistaken for as many different animals.

7. For example, a caterpillar, after feeding upon leaves till it is fully grown, retires into some place of concealment, casts off its caterpillar skin, and presents itself in an entirely different form, one wherein it has neither the power of moving about, nor of taking food: in fact, in this, its second or chrysalis state, the insect

seems to be a lifeless oblong or conical body, without a distinct head or movable limbs.

8. After resting a while, an inward struggle begins: the chrysalis skin bursts open; and from the rent issues a butterfly or a moth, whose small and flabby wings soon extend and harden, and become fitted to bear away the insect in search of the honeyed juice of flowers.

9. The little fishlike animals that swim about in stagnant water, and devour the living atoms that swarm about them, soon come to maturity, cast their skins, and take another form. In this second state they remain rolled up like a ball, and either float at the surface of the water for the purpose of breathing, or, if disturbed, suddenly uncurl their bodies, and whirl over and over.

10. In the course of a few days these little water tumblers are ready for another transformation. The skin splits on the back: the head, body, and limbs of a mosquito suddenly burst from the opening; and the slender legs rest on the empty skin till the latter fills with water, and sinks. Then the insect abandons its native element, spreads its tiny wings, and flies away, piping its war note, and thirsting for blood.

11. Caterpillars and grubs undergo a complete transformation in coming to maturity; but there are other insects, such as crickets, grasshoppers, and bugs, which, though differing a good deal in the young and adult states, are not subject to so great a change.