88 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Dis 



nest has been robbed several times, builds up her last in a 

 very slovenly manner. And we act much as that bird does if, 

 after repeated failures, we again attempt our disappointing task 

 at all. A. 



Excusable Disappointment. 



There is plenty of disappointment which is not excusable. 

 People do things which their own common sense, if they would 

 use it, could tell them must end only in one way. Yet, when 

 the inevitable misfortune comes, they call it disappointment. On 

 the other hand, there is an excusable disappointment, as when 

 one trusts to a fixed law of Nature and finds it has suddenly 

 varied. Take, for instance, the case of people who, having 

 always found rain-water to be clear and clean, are disappointed 

 to find a shower of a wholly different character. This experi- 

 ence happened in South America to the inhabitants of one of 

 the Argentine provinces the city of San Juan. They once 

 had black rain ! For many hours during a day and a night this 

 black disappointment poured down upon them. Clothes 'left 

 out to dry were saturated with black water ; and all the vessels 

 which should have gathered pure water were filled instead with 

 black water. No one could have been prepared for this. No 

 one could have guarded against it. People expect rain-water to 

 be clear, just as they expect a good bank to pay its depositors. 



i. o. 



The Discontented Character. 



There are people who are constitutionally discontented. No- 

 thing gives them satisfaction. They are like the hermit-crabs, 

 and may well be designated " crabbed." We see that the animal 

 and the shell are mostly well suited to each other ; but it is a 

 remarkable fact that, however well the shell and the crab may 

 seem to be suited to each other, the crab always thinks that a shell 

 belonging to another crab would make a better house. Conse- 

 quently they will wage direful battles over a few empty shells, 

 although neither of the shells would make so commodious a 

 habitation as that which was already occupied. F. 



