1889.] MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 163 



Our Artist. — We beg to introduce the young man who has made 

 the drawings from which the frontispiece in the present number, as well 

 as that in the April number, was photo-engraved — Mr. Robert W. 

 Smiley — the son of the publisher. Mr. Robert, who is quite recently 

 from school, takes much interest in our illustrations, and promises some 

 good work hereafter. He has owned and used one of Crouch's Histo- 

 logical Microscopes since he was 15 years old, and to those who fear 

 to put a valuable instrument into a boy's hand we may say that it is 

 still uninjured and practically as good as new. 



o 



Our Correspondence. — We are constantly getting letters that con- 

 tain items of more than passing interest. The writers do not prepare 

 the letters with the view to their being published, but we trust that they 

 will in no case object to our inviting the microscopical world to a par- 

 ticipation in their good thoughts. The extracts to be found in this num- 

 ber are a fair sample, and have been called to present the most matter 

 in the smallest space. In future those who do not want theirletters so 

 treated can protect them by the heading " Confidential." On the other 

 hand, if something in your letter which is as good as what we do print 

 gets overlooked, do not feel slighted, because space is lacking 'at times 

 and opportunity at others. 



To those who do not always get their replies to business letters by 

 return mail, or each number on time, we ought to explain that this 

 periodical has to be managed in such spare moments as we can snatch 

 from our regular and other occupations by which latter we earn our 

 daily bread. In other words, the Journal does not pay such profits 

 as to permit one to devote his life to it. When we go out of town its 

 correspondence has to await our return, and we sometimes get an accu- 

 mulation ahead that requires time to clear away, and we are going out 

 of town in August, if possible. Patience then, friends, or a doubling 

 of the subscription price for clerk-hire, whichever you prefer ! The 

 more the business grows the more are we taxed to keep up with it, and 

 yet the happier are we. 



o 



Unreasonable Requests. — We are continually passing by requests 

 of this sort with such replies as time will permit us to make. A dealer 

 in microscopical goods, whose patience had become almost exhausted, 

 recently showed us a letter which ran as follows : 



" You say the instrument magnifies 100 diameters. You will send 

 me a magnified representation of some very small object ; for instance, 

 a small drop of blood, showing plainly the corpuscles, or a very fine 

 hair. I send you one from my head, which I consider about as fine as 

 Mother Nature makes." 



The curious thing is that people who ask such favors cannot possibly 

 be convinced that their requests are in any degree improper. 



o 



The Army Medical Museum, at Washington, D. C, contains 141 

 microscopes, 10,416 microscopical specimens illustrating almost every 

 field of microscopical work. Many were made 20 years ago. Dr. 

 Gray is in charge of this section. There are also many cultures of 

 bacteria. 



