ONLY A PEBBLE. 17 



But a sadder fate still awaits him. The roaring fury 

 of a swollen torrent seizes him and carries him off in 

 wild haste. After a fierce chase down the steep sides 

 of a mountain, he finds himself of a sudden in a new 

 world. He wonders and marvels. He lies in a smiling 

 meadow, glowing in the golden light of the sun and 

 decked with gorgeous flowers. But alas! he cannot live 

 in a world of light and air. A thousand new foes, small, 

 unseen, and unnoticed, but all the more powerful, surround 

 him. Sweet, prattling rivulets play with the new guest, 

 and too late he finds that there is poison in their smile 

 and a dagger in each embrace. The very air, this mere 

 dream that the eye does not see, and the hand does not 

 feel, attacks him with fatal energy. It pierces into his 

 veins; it slips into the tiniest cleft; it loosens the sinews 

 of his structure, and gnaws, with insatiable eagerness, at 

 the very core of his life. The fiercest of all his enemies, 

 called oxygen, sows discord among the imprisoned gases 

 that hol'd the beautiful structure of the stone together. 

 Subtle and cunning, it lures, first one and then another, 

 from its ancient alliance ; treacherously it draws them to 

 the surface, and decks the unresisting victim with brilliant 

 colors which conceal the certain destruction that is going 

 on beneath the bright surface. The lifeless mass, no 

 longer strong in union, begins to crumble into its ele- 

 ments. New forces are called to aid: electric fluids 

 consume his last force, and galvanic currents tear and 

 rend what has withstood all other influences. Utterly 

 helpless and friendless, the poor pebble thus lies but a 

 little while amidst the grasses that feed upon his very 



