﻿286 PICTORIAL MISCELLANY. 



gaiters were tipped with French kid or patent leather ; and watch 

 seals and keys were to him especial objects of attraction and admi- 

 ration. With open ears he would crouch under the parlor windows 

 to listen to the conversation ; and one day, as I was reading Ten- 

 nyson's " May Queen," his round face, like a full moon, rose above 

 the window sill, and his interest in the touching story got the better 

 of his caution "I say you! couldn't the doctor cure her?" 

 After a reproof for eaves-dropping, which he bore with the most 

 perfect "sang froid" I called him in and read him the whole of 

 the beautiful poem, and never did a poet have a more honest or 

 hearty admirer. 



" Well now, aint that are pretty ? I wish you'd give me a copy 

 of them ere verses when I go home, to show to Mother ?" 



I have not time to tell you anything more about Tommy for the 

 present ; one of these days, perhaps, you shall hear more of hhru 



Little Items on Important Matters. 



THE Chinese invented gunpowder about the time of our Saviour 

 and used it in cannon. The microscope enables us to detect ani- 

 malcule the ten thousandth part of an inch in length. The Royal 

 Library at Paris contains a Chinese chart of the heavens, made about 

 six hundred years before Christ, in which one thousand four hun- 

 dred and sixty stars are correctly inserted. 



The organ was invented by a barber of Alexandria, about nineteen 

 hundred years ago. The pianoforte was invented in London by a 

 German, about seventy-five years ago. The first voyage around 

 the world was completed in fifteen hundred and twenty-two. The 

 army with which Napoleon intended to invade England was com- 

 posed of one hundred and sixty thousand soldiers, ten thousand 

 horses, seventeen thousand sailors, and a fleet of thirteen hundred 

 vessels. Napoleon was conquered and sent into exile, but he said, 

 " When I am dead, my spirit will be in the hearts of the French 

 people, like thunder in the clouds of heaven, and throb with cease- 

 less life in new revolutions." 



