boards and straw, and the whole covered with
earth, on which seeds are sown to hide the
buried treasure. The trench is opened in the
middle of the following February—in the evening
—with the same precaution against every
avoidable stir and noise. It is said that in hives
thus treated, the bees consume three-fifths less
honey than when they are not buried; there is
almost no mortality, and the queen begins to
lay three weeks sooner than usual.

Honey can be made of wood, linen, cotton, or
starch, by boiling them for ten or twenty hours
in water acidulated with sulphuric acid, and
replacing the water as it evaporates. If the acid
liquid be then saturated with chalk, filtered and
evaporated, the result is artificial honey,
composed, like honey itself, of grape sugar mixed
with a little liquid sugar. So says the chemist,
but no busy bee among our prudent housekeepers
has yet tried to gather honey from her
linen and cotton rags.

Manna is got from the sap of the ash-tree by
the puncture of an insect of the cochineal family,
and it is produced also from other trees. A
sweet substance, like manna, exudes from the
leaves of an Australian tree—the Eucalyptus
sesinifera—dries in the sun, and, when the
trees are shaken by the wind, falls like a shower
of snow. The manna of Mount Sinai is drawn
from the tamarisk by puncture of the coccus.
It exudes as a thick syrup during the heat of
the day, falls in drops, congeals during the night,
and is gathered in the cool of the morning.

Then we have a little friend in sickness, to
whom we are not always grateful while he is
serving us, in the cantharides, or Spanish fly.
He is rare in England, but is found now and
then in the southern counties on the lilac, privet,
and some other shrubs. In Spain he is common,
and in Italy, and other southern lands. In some
parts of France, especially Poitou, ash-trees are
never planted, because the quantity of cantharides
that breed on them become a nuisance to the
inhabitants of the district. Other beetles, as
the oil beetle, and the golden beetle, have
inflammatory power, and it is said to be by virtue
of this that a live ladybird imprisoned in a
hollow aching tooth will cure the most violent
toothache.

In Africa they eat ants stewed in butter. In
Sweden they distil them with rye to give a
peculiar flavour to brandy. Pressed ant-eggs
yield a mixture resembling chocolate with milk,
of which the chemical composition really
resembles that of ordinary milk. The large
termites, or white ants, which are so destructive
to houses and furniture, are roasted by the
Africans in iron pots, and eaten by handfuls as
sugar-plums. They are said to be very nourishing,
and to taste like sugared cream or sweet
almond paste. As for locusts, "the Africans,"
says Dr. Phipson, "far from dreading their
invasions, look upon a dense cloud of locusts as
we should so much bread-and-butter in the air.
They smoke them, or boil them, or salt them,
or stew them, or grind them down as corn, and
get fat upon them." An inch-long spider is
roasted over the fire and relished as a tit-bit by
the natives of New Caledonia. The eggs of a
sort of boat-fly are found strewed by thousands
on the reeds on the banks of the great fresh-
water lakes Texcoco and Chalco. The Mexicans
shake them into a cloth, set them to dry, then
grind them like flour, and sell the flour in sacks
for making a peculiar kind of cake called haulté.
The unground eggs are used also for feeding
chickens.

THE CALL IN VAIN.

I.

CALL back the dew
That on the rose at morn was lying:
When the day is dying,
Bid the sunbeam stay:

Call back the wave
E'en while the ebbing tide's receding—
Oh, all unheeding
Of thy voice are they.

As vain the call
Distraction makes on love departed,
When the broken-hearted
Bitter tears let fall:

Dew and sunshine, wave and flow'r
Renew'd, return at destin'd hour,
But never yet was known the pow'r
Could vanish'd love recal.

II.

Call back the brave
Beneath the distant billow lying;
Bid those who love them, sighing,
For them cease to sigh.

Call back the bird
That, seeking warmer climes for pleasure
(Spent is our summer treasure),
Spreads his wing to fly.

Call back the dream
That in the night our fancy chaining,
With our slumber waning,
Melts at dawn away:—

Ah! no call like this succeeding.
Cease with dying love thy pleading,
Know, too late, with bosom bleeding,
Love is more lost than they!

HAPPY IDIOTS.

THE dream of the monks and hospitallers of
old has been realised—alms-giving has become
an art, indeed, it may be said, a fine art. Among
all the institutions of the country there are none
so well organised, so liberally conducted, or so
carefully and thoughtfully adapted to their
purpose, as those which are designed to relieve the
sufferings and mitigate the misfortunes of
humanity. Here in England there is scarcely a
disease either of the mind or body, scarcely
even a deformity, for whose alleviation some
hospital has not been provided by the inexhaustible
charity of the people. And our hospitals