not the sign, of La Fosse aux Lions (The
Lions' Den). La Coiffier's wines were first-rate,
and her cookery superb; her house was
always filled with people of quality, but none
went there more frequently than the fat poet
Saint Amand—a tun of a man, like Falstaff.
Taverns were the delight of his existence.
One called La Perle (The Pearl) attracted
him for a very especial reason—the clock
never went right; it was either too slow or
had stopped altogether. When others abused
the clock, Saint Amand took up its defence,
and finally wrote the following couplet, which
the master of the cabaret caused to be placed
beneath it:—

"Que j'aille bien, ou mal, il ne t'importe pas,
Puisque céans toute heure est l'heure des repas."

Which may be literally, if not elegantly,
translated thus:—

"What matter whether fast or slow I'm jogging,
Since every hour is here the hour for progging."

Saint Amand's death was characteristic.
He gave up the ghost at a cabaret called Le
Petit Mauve (The Little Sea-mew), which is
still in existence at the corner of the Rue de
la Marais and the Rue de Seine. He died, it
is said, with a bottle and glass before him.

AN IMMEASURABLE WONDER.

A HUNDRED years ago, the industrious and
intelligent author of a Topographical History
of Cornwall, Mr. Borlase, described, for the
first time in a book, a seaside annelide, which
the Cornish fishermen called the sea
long-worm. With a view to encourage men to
take pains and trouble in searching out
unknown and undescribed plants and animals,
the custom has prevailed of connecting the
name of the discoverer with the name of the
plant or animal. The practice had something
sound and good in it, although it has been
abominably abused; Cuvier only gave honour
where it was justly due when he called
the sea long-worm the Borlasia. There is, it
may be remarked, however, only a bookish
reminiscence in the Cuvierian name, while in
the name of the Cornish fishermen there is a
rude description, a rough word-picture of the
animal.

Mr. Borlase says: "The long-worm found
upon Careg-killas, in Mount's Bay, which,
though it might properly enough come in
among the anguilliform fishes, which are to
succeed in their order, yet I choose to place
here among the less perfect kind of
sea-animals. It is brown, and slender as a
wheaten reed; it measured five feet in
length (and perhaps not at its full stretch),
but so tender, slimy, and soluble, that out of
the water it will not bear being moved without
breaking; it had the contractile power
to such a degree that it would shrink itself
to half its length, and then extend itself again
as before."

Colonel Montagu, an excellent observer,
seems to question the accuracy of the accounts
he had received from the Devonshire fishermen
of the length of the Borlasia. He says:

"This species of Gardius is not uncommon
on several parts of the south coast of Devonshire,
where it is by some of the fishermen
known by the very applicable name given to
it in the History of Cornwall. It is indeed
of so prodigious a length that it is impossible
to fix any bounds; some of the fishermen
say thirty yards—but perhaps as many feet
is the utmost; those specimens which have
come under our inspection did not appear to
exceed twenty feet, and more commonly from
eight to fourteen or fifteen."

The skin is perfectly smooth and covered
with a strong tenacious slime; the head or
anterior end is usually more depressed and
broader than any other part, but all parts are
equally alterable, and in continual change
from round to flat, rising into large swellings
or protuberances in various parts, especially
when touched.

The expansion and contraction are so
unlimited that it is scarcely possible to ascertain
the utmost length of this worm. One
which was estimated to be about eight feet
long was put alive into spirits, and instantly
contracted to about one foot, at the same
time increasing double the bulk, which originally
was about the diameter of a crow's
quill. In the vast exertion of the muscles
the animal is generally divided at those parts
which had been twined into knots.

The French fishermen agree with the
English in giving the Borlasia the length of
a hundred feet. After such a concurrence of
testimony, it would be presumptuous to
contradict observations with reasonings. There
may, however, be error without wilful
exaggeration. Every child knows the illusion of
a circle of fire produced by whirling a stick
red-hot at one end, rapidly in the dark. The
long worm is, I believe, a nocturnal animal,
resting tranquil during the day and moving
chiefly at night. When the fishermen observe
it of a shiny night, stretching suddenly, as it
appears, fifty, sixty, seventy, or a hundred
feet, there may be something of visual illusion
in the startled and truthful, although incomplete
and inaccurate, observations.

Some of the savans have given the sea
long-worm another name, and have called it
the Nemertes Borlasii. The dictionaries of
natural history say this is a mythological name.
What a worm of the Channel has to do with
mythology they do not explain. From the
etymology of this Greek word, however, I fancy
the man who used it had a meaning, and knew
something of the animal. The Nemertes
signifies the Never-misser—the animal who never
misses his prey. As there is something of
the form painted by the name of the fishermen,
there is something of the character of
the animal hit off when he is called the
Ne'er-misser. Boastful books abound,
describing the feats of rod and line fishermen,