to the "taken pitch," though defended only by the youngest of the team and the pitched stumps, all tend to make true young cricketers members of good society.

Home Exercise.-1. Define cautioned, rudeness, injure, confined, demand, convince. 2. Who is referred to as the wise king? and give some of his counsels regarding words. 3. Show the good points of a game of cricket.

THE BLIND BOY.

Replied, answered.
Fragrant, having a sweet

smell.

Final, in the last place.

Disease, that which tends to death.

Widowed, having lost a husband.

Beautiful, pleasing in form.

"DEAR Mary," said the poor blind boy,
"That little bird sings very long.
Say, do you see him in his joy?

And is he pretty as his song?"

"Yes, Edward, yes," replied the maid;
"I see the bird on yonder tree."
The poor boy sigh'd, and gently said,

Sister, I wish that I could see.

"The flowers, you say, are very fair,

And bright green leaves are on the trees,
And pretty birds are singing there,-
How beautiful for one who sees!

"Yet, I the fragrant flowers can smell,
And I can feel the green leaf's shade;
And I can hear the notes that swell

From those dear birds that God has made.

"So, sister, God to me is kind,

Though sight to me He has not given;
But tell me, are there any blind
Among the children up in heaven ?”

Ere long, disease its hand had laid
On that dear boy, so meek and mild;
His widow'd mother wept, and prayed
That God would spare her sightless child.

He felt her warm tears on his face,
And said, "Oh, never weep for me;
I'm going to a bright, bright place,
Where God my Saviour I shall see.

"And you'll be there, kind Mary, too;
But mother, when you get up there,
Tell me, dear mother, that 'tis you:
You know I never saw you here."

He spoke no more, but sweetly smiled,
Until the final blow was given;
When God took up that poor blind child,
And opened first his eyes in heaven.

Home Exercises.-1. Learn the first three stanzas. 2. Parse the first two lines. 3. Put the substance of the first three verses into your own words.

O

ON HYPOTHESIS, No. 8.

Hypothesis, an opinion held as accounting for some known facts. Vacuum, empty space. Germinate, to grow from a seed.

Bucket, the part of a pump that works in the barrel.

Venture, to try to do.
Fluidity, state of a fluid.
Gravitation, drawing

power.

Exploded, forced into
pieces.
Abandoned, given up.
Withdrawn, taken away.

THESE lessons have shown how necessary it is to observe fully and accurately, and further, how, by means of experiment, we may extend our range of observation. But in scientific inquiry we do not stop here. And partly, for this reason, we often want to know, not only what is, but also what is likely to be.

And further, if every fact has to be observed in itself as such, we shall make but very slow advance. Thus, we will say that last year we sowed a bean, and there up sprang the bean plant, which bore a pod, and in it a bean seed very like the one we planted last year. We know that others have pursued a similar course with other plants and with a like result.

Now, with these known facts, no one would sow a given seed and watch the result before he would venture to predict what would follow. He would say that the seed of any plant sown under favourable circumstances would, in each case, produce a plant similar to that from which the seed was raised.

But how does he know this? Not from observation. The seed was never anything

but seed. Not from experiment, he has as yet put it to no test. It is at present, then, only a hypothesis. Seeds have been observed to germinate and grow into plants corresponding to those from which they were produced, and, on this hypothesis he sows; and, as we know, in due course he reaps; for in this case, hypothesis has passed into known law.

Let us take another case. You all know what happens when we take a jugful of water out of a pond. For the time being a hole is made in the water; but as soon as the jug is removed, the surrounding water fills up the space occupied by the jug, and presently all is level as before.

Again; we all know something about the action of a common pump. By a proper arrangement of a barrel and a movable bucket, each with a valve fitted to it, we first pump the air out of the pipe and barrel, and having done this, the water from the spring below very soon follows.

For ages, these and other similar facts were observed, and in due course men formed a hypothesis to account for them. And about three centuries ago the current hypothesis to account for such phenomena was, that "Nature abhors a vacuum;" or, in other words, they meant to say that, in the natural order of things, bodies always fill up void spaces.

Now, since that time, men have observed more carefully, and have experimented more freely; and it is found that this hypothesis is not sound. For the water flows into the

empty space by virtue of its fluidity and the law of gravitation. And in the second case, the water rises in the pump, not because Dame Nature abhors a vacuum, but because the pressure of the air having been removed from within the barrel, the pressure of air on the outside water forces it up the tube, where the corresponding pressure has been withdrawn.

We have now the case of one hypothesis that has stood the test of repeated trials, and so has become law; and of another that would not stand the test, and is therefore but an exploded or abandoned hypothesis.

Home Exercise.-1. Define advance, predict, produce, pressure, remove, barrel, and repeated. 2. Give an instance of a true and false hypothesis. 3. How does the reproduction of plants take place?

ON ANALOGIES, No. 4.

Analogy, a likeness in
parts.
Dispelled, driven asunder.
Apprehend, to take hold
of.

Diffused, spread over a
large space.

Energies, powers to act.

Religious, relating to God and duty.

Necessarily, without a

choice. Comparison, the judging of one thing by another. Physically, in relation to

matter.

We have shown you how important and yet

how difficult it is to use exactly what we mean.

words so as to express Now this arises partly