risks than any he had yet incurred. The
party of Iroquois got tired of seeing him
caper; their veneration for the tin case
subsided, and they left Lebeau to the care of one
of their number, who had so little respect for
the parchment certificate, that he made more
than one attempt to kill its owner. He was
saved from anthropophagy by an Indian girl
of the tribe of the Abenkanises, named Marie,
whose parents, addicted also to cannibalism,
were equally desirous of feasting upon the
parliamentary advocate. It was only by
tapping their brandy-cask when they were
asleep, that Marie succeeded in dispelling
from their sober thoughts that a lawyer was
good to eat. But having done so much for
Lebeau, the young lady manifested a desire
to appropriate him to herself, not as an
eatable, but as a husband, and one morning
she informed him that she had dreamt a
Jesuit had united them. As the dreams of the
Indians were supposed to be inspirations of
the Manitou, or Great Spirit, this vision was
not to be disregarded, and Lebeau was only
saved from an immediate sacrifice at the
altar by dreaming, in his turn, that the Jesuit
who was to marry them was one who did
duty on the other side of the Canadian frontier.
By this stratagem he reached the
English settlements, and we need scarcely
say that the fair Abenkanise added another to
the long list of young ladies who have put
their trust in perfidious man.

M. Lebeau's volume contains, besides many
other romantic incidents of personal adventure,
much that was considered highly
curious at the time he wrote concerning the
habits of the Canadian Indians, but which
subsequent travellers have made the world
better acquainted with.

A BUNDLE OF CROTCHETS.

IT is interesting to look back at the
projects of former—years projects which excited
astonishment in their day, and which have had
a variable result in success or failure.*

* Vol. vii., page 367.

The number of uncompleted, half-developed
inventions is not to be estimated, which are always
holding the inventors in suspense between
fortune or ruin. Taking one subject alone
—the means of travelling—it would be
found that, notwithstanding the wonders
already done, there are numerous plans,
clever or absurd, as the case may be,
always ready to effect something still
more wonderful. Some of these, according
to the present length, and breadth,
and depth of our knowledge, we are
disposed to laugh at, under a conviction that
they will never be otherwise than laughing-
stocks; others we regard as possible though
bold, desirable though costly, probable though
uncertain; while a third group we at once
acknowledge to be possible, reasonable, and
in every way advantageous; rather delayed
by the oddities of prejudice, than by any
difficulties inherent in themselves.

Distance-measurers are waiting to be used,
as soon as society shall see fit to use them.
We do not mean pedometers for pedestrians,
or odometers for road-makers, but index-
hands, whereby to judge how far a cab has
travelled. Cab reform, as we all know, has
been a very noisy and a very small reform;
something useful has been done, but
something more is wanted. Whether the measurers
or meters will ever render this desirable service
time must show; but inventors have not
been backward. There are many curious
contrivances, patented or otherwise, bearing on
this matter. In most of them, every
complete revolution of the cab wheels causes a
particular toothed wheel to revolve through
the space of one tooth; one revolution of
this toothed wheel causes a second toothed
wheel to revolve through the distance of one
tooth; this occurs a third and perhaps even
a fourth time; and an index hand on a dial
plate finally shows how many miles and yards
the cab has run since the apparatus began to
work. Where the fact to be determined is,
not how far the vehicle has run, but how
many persons have entered it, there have
been devised springs on the door-step, governing
an index hand and a wheel or two. But
the distance measurers for cabs, and the
number indicators for omnibuses, are alike
waiting to be called for.

Why it is that we reject all improvements
in our London omnibuses, surpasses
comprehension. Perhaps there is some kind
of vested right, by which we claim especial
ownership in the lowest, narrowest, dirtiest,
and most comfortless of such vehicles, allowing
Liverpool, and Manchester, and Glasgow
to go far ahead of us. Yet look what a
benevolent inventor has done for us. He
gives us, in his triumphant new omnibus, a
separate compartment for each passenger,
upwards of twenty-six inches wide, which
obviates the possibility of robbery, or
infection, or annoyance of any kind, whilst,
should it be desired, communication is easily
maintainable. He provides an outside
gallery, with a separate door to each
compartment, which does away with the nuisance
formerly experienced, especially by ladies, of
entering at the end of the omnibus. And
there is also furnished for our use a method
of reaching the roof by steps placed at the
end, intended as a great improvement upon
the present clumsy, and dangerous and
inconvenient mode by which we become outsiders.
Those accustomed to the leading London
thoroughfares know something of this stranger
—it tried to struggle itself into existence, as
omnibuses in general did some thirty years
ago, when Shillibeer fought his battle against
stage-coaches; the omnibuses triumphed over
the coaches; but this new particular omnibus
did not succeed in maintaining its position