in its aimless, wandering life, guided at the whims of wave and wind, it would often go hungry but for the fact that its food, minute jelly-fishes, exists in countless profusion over the whole wide surface of the ocean. Its body contains a few drops of violet fluid, which will hold its color for many years, and is sometimes used as ink.

The little picture-mate of this interesting raftsman, somewhat resembling a butterfly in form, is one of a small group of mollusks called pteropods (wing-footed), on account of the fin-like lobes or wings that project from their fragile shells, as shown in the engraving. The pteropod uses these wings to fly through the water, just as an insect flies in the air. Pteropods are found swimming in enormous bands, sometimes filling the surface of the sea for leagues in extent; generally these great congregations occur in the deep, warm waters of the torrid zone; but one species, at least, lives northward, for it forms the chief food of the great Greenland whale. Another species, having a glassy, transparent shell, carries a little luminous globe, which emits a gleam of soft light. It is the only known species of luminous shell-fish. Our little friend, represented in this cut, has no lantern to light him on his way; he is remarkable only for his wings, and his two tails, which grow through two holes in his shell, and trail behind him. His Latin name is Hyalea tridentata. If, as his family name implies, he really were wing-footed, we might call him the Mercury of the sea.

Another curiosity found in these waters is the porcupine-fish. It is often said by old fishermen and sailors that every living object found on land has its counterpart in the ocean. They tell of sea-cucumbers and sea-corn, sea-grapes and seabeans, which, the simplehearted old sailor declares, exactly resemble the pride of the little garden patches tended by his wife ashore while he is away.

And it is true that many of the inhabitants of the ocean do bear more than an imaginary resemblance to many things found on land. The corals, sponges, and anemones often look much like flowers or ferns, while various fishes owe their names to their likeness to certain terrestrial animals. Among these is the porcupine-fish.

This prickly-looking creature is one of an order of strange fishes containing the sun-fish (not the "sun-jelly" or medusa, so common upon our coast), the globe-fish, the file-fish, and trunk-fisheach named from some peculiarity of shape, or fancied resemblance to a familiar object. Most of these fishes are covered with spines, or bony protuberances, which make them very ugly customers to handle. Some of them possess a peculiar power of inflating themselves with air, swelling up to twice

their natural size.

The globe-fish is the best illustration of this strange faculty. It swims near the bottom, next to shore, all its life, and is either so fearless or so stupid that it may be lifted up in one's hand. When so taken out of the water and gently rubbed, it will swell up to its full capacity, until you really fear it may burst. Leave the creature undisturbed, and in a short time it will allow the air to escape, and shrink into almost nothing but a bony skeleton covered with skin.

The porcupine-fish, which belongs to the same family, as I have already said, inhabits the warm waters about the Bahama Islands and the coast of Florida, where it is called among the inhabitants by a variety of titles.

The name I have chosen, however, seems to be the most appropriate, since its spiny protuberances

THE PORCUPINE-FISH.

do remind one who looks at it, and much more one who touches it, of the bristling quills of the porcupine. It is not a large fish, being less than a foot in length, and generally as broad (or round) as it is long. Its scientific name is Diodon hystrix, the second word being, as you young students may know, the Latin name of the hedgehog.

BEFORE leaving the subject of ancient sculpture, I wish to speak of some other beautiful works which are still preserved, and which the illustrations here given will help you to understand. The first is from the frieze of the temple of Minerva, or Pallas, at Egina. This word was formerly spelled Ægina, and is the name of an island in the Gulf of Egina, near the south-west coast of Greece. chief city was also called Egina, and here a beautiful Doric temple was built about 475 B. C., which was the period of the greatest prosperity and importance of the island.

Its

Many of the columns of this temple are still standing, but large parts of it have fallen down; in 1811 these ruins were examined, and some fine pieces of sculptured marble were obtained, which are the most remarkable works still existing from so early a period. Thorwaldsen, the Danish sculptor, restored these marbles, and the King of Bavaria purchased them; they are now in the Glyptothek, or Museum of Sculpture, at Munich.

The two figures given above formed a part of what is called the western pediment of the temple; this pediment contained a group of eleven figures, almost life-size, and represented in spirited action. I ought to tell you that a pediment is the triangular space which is formed by the slanting of the two sides of the roof up to the ridge-piece, at the ends of buildings, and in the Greek temples the pediment was usually much ornamented, and gave a fine opportunity for large groups.

The figures in the center were the most important actors in the scene or story represented by the sculptures, and were of full size, and usually stand

AT EGINA.

ing; then, as the space on each side became narrower, the figures were arranged in positions to suit it, and the whole composition was so fitted into the slant as to produce a regular and symmetrical outline; thus the whole effect when completed was grand and imposing, as well as very ornamental to the building.

The figures in this western pediment of the temple at Egina illustrated an episode in the story of the Trojan War; it was the struggle of Ajax, Ulysses, and other Greeks, with the Trojan warriors, over the dead body of Achilles. The Greeks ardently desired to possess themselves of the body of their brave leader, in order to give it a fitting burial, and they succeeded in bearing it off to their own camp.

The myth relates that the god Apollo guided the arrow of Paris which killed Achilles, who could only be wounded in his ankles, because when his mother, the goddess Thetis, dipped him in the river Styx to make him invulnerable, or safe from being hurt by weapons, she held him by the ankles, and as they were the only parts of his body not wetted, it was only in them that he could be wounded.

It is believed that the warrior in this picture who is about to send his arrow, is Paris; he wears the curved Phrygian helmet and a close-fitting suit of mail; in the whole group there is but one other clothed warrior, all the rest are nude. The highest part of this pediment has the figure of the goddess Minerva, or Pallas, standing beside the fallen body of Achilles, which she attempts to cover with her shield, while a Trojan warrior tries to draw the

body away from the Greek who opposes him. The two figures in our plate are placed at one side, where the space in the triangle is growing narrow. You can imagine what spirit there must be in the whole group, when there is so much in these two comparatively small figures; how sure we are that the arrow will shoot out with deadly power, and how the second warrior is bracing himself on his feet and knee, and leaning forward, in order to thrust his lance with all possible force!

These Eginetan statues have traces of color and of metal ornaments about them. The hair, eyes, and lips were colored, and all the weapons, helmets, shields, and quivers were red or blue, and some portions of the garments of the goddess show that the statue must have had bronze ornaments. We know nothing of the artists who made these sculptures, but critics and scholars think that the works resemble the written descriptions of the statues made by Callon, who was a famous sculptor of Egina, and lived probably about the time in which the temple was built.

The next four illustrations are from the sculptures of the Parthenon, the beautiful temple at Athens, which was mentioned in the first paper of these stories. This temple was completed in 437 B. C., a little later than that at Egina. The Parthenon passed through many changes before it was reduced to its present condition of ruin. Probably about the sixth century of our era, it was dedicated to the Virgin Mary and used as a Christian church until, in 1456 A. D., the Turks transformed it into a Mohammedan mosque. In 1687 the Venetians besieged Athens; the Turks had stored gunpowder in the eastern chamber of the Parthenon, and a bomb thrown by the Venetians fell through the roof, and set fire to the powder, which exploded, and completely destroyed the center of the temple. Then Morosini, the commander of the Venetians, attempted to carry off some of the finest sculptures of the western pediment, but in lowering them to the ground they were allowed to fall by the unskillful Venetians, and thus were broken in pieces.

Early in the present century, Lord Elgin carried many of the Parthenon marbles to England, and in 1816 they all were bought by the British Museum. Finally, in 1827, during the rebellion of the Greeks against the Turks, Athens was again bombarded and the Parthenon still further destroyed, so that those who now visit it can only

"Go forth and wander through the cold remains

Of fallen statues and of tottering fanes,
Seek the loved haunts of poet and of sage,
The gay palæstra and the gaudy stage!
What signs are there? A solitary stone,
A shattered capital, with grass o'ergrown,
A mouldering frieze, half hid in ancient dust,
A thistle springing o'er a nameless bust;

Yet this was Athens! Still a holy spell
Breathes in the dome, and wanders in the dell,
And vanished times and wondrous forms appear,
And sudden echoes charm the waking ear;
Decay itself is drest in glory's gloom,
For every hillock is a hero's tomb,

And every breeze to Fancy's slumber brings
The mighty rushing of a spirit's wings."

The British Museum now contains very nearly all that are left of the sculptures of the two pediments of this magnificent temple. The torso which is pictured below is believed to be that of a statue of Theseus.

Torso is a term used in sculpture to denote a mutilated figure. This figure made a part of the group of the front or eastern pediment of the temple, in which the story of the birth of Minerva was represented. This goddess is said to have sprung forth, all armed, from the head of Zeus, or Jupiter, and it is fitting that Theseus should be represented as present on the occasion, since he was the greatest hero, and the king, of Athens, of which city Minerva was the protecting goddess. All the sculptures of the Parthenon, as you will remember, are attributed to the great sculptor Phidias, and his school, and are very beautiful.

Next come three illustrations from the frieze of the Parthenon. Perhaps you know that a frieze is a band extending below a cornice, which runs around the outside of a building, or the inside of an apartment. The cornice is placed high up where the roof joins the sides of a building, or where the ceiling joins the walls of a room; the frieze is just below, and may be very narrow or broad, as the proportions of the object it ornaments require. The sculptured frieze of the Parthenon