250 LIGHT SCIENCE FOR LEISURE HOURS. 



Bents to our contemplation. "We may say of tlie snow- 

 crystals what Tennyson said of the small sea-shell. 

 Each snow-star is 



"Frail, but a work divine, 

 Made so fairily well, 

 So exquisitely minute, 

 A miracle of design." 



Yet massed together with all the prodigality of Na- 

 ture's unsparing hand they crown the everlasting 

 hills ; or, falling in avalanche and glacier, overwhelm 

 the stoutest works of man ; or, in vast islands of float- 

 ing ice, show themselves to be 



"Offeree to withstand, year upon year, the shock 

 Of cataract seas that snap the three-decker's oaken spine." 



(From the Daily News, March 11, 18G9.) 



LONG SHOTS. 



OUK artillerists have paid more attention of late 

 years to the destructive properties of various forms of 

 cannon than to the question of range. It was different 

 when first the rifling of cannon was under discussion. 

 Then the subject which was most attentively con- 

 sidered (after accuracy of fire) was the range which 

 might possibly be obtained by various improvements in 

 the structure of rifled cannon. Many of our readers 

 will remember how, soon after the construction of 



