in his more dangerous moments, and who
sometimes, when this caution has been administered
in vain, will rescue those who have suffered by
his duplicity at the last moment, and will help
to patch, up the wretched resources with which
they have escaped from the clutches of our
sportive acquaintance. In the course of those
sixteen years, no fewer than 4,184,739
persons did business with him—in the bathing
line only—not counting skaters. Out of this
number 262 got into such difficulties that the
services of the Society, whose place of business
has been before referred to as looking
over our friend's property, were required to
extricate them; that 111 were so mauled and
impaired in their means that the Society aforesaid
had to take them seriously in hand, and afford
them professional assistance of a very
important kind before they were in a condition
to resume business; and that in 32 cases
the resources of the association in question
were unavailing, and the unhappy victims were
lost.

We subjoin the tabular statement from which
we get these facts, merely premising that two
additional deaths have occurred since it was drawn
up: making the entire number 32, as given
above.

We have purposely omitted to take into calculation
the deaths by suicide, because it may be
said that any one bent on suicide would, if the
Serpentine were rendered unavailable for that
purpose, find some other means of its
accomplishment. Omitting these, then, we yet get
an average of two deaths in the Serpentine in
the twelvemonth, for the last sixteen years.
We might then have begun by pleading for
more than a single life, but we prefer confining
ourselves to the thought of that ONE MAN, friend
perhaps of yours or ours, who will be drowned
by this time next year, unless the dangerous
bed of the Serpentine is at once set right.
We are that man's advocate. Let us implore
his judges, by that black list of deaths
which has been given above, to consider how
surely a life is hanging on their decision. Let
us inform them, by the memory of that last
death which is fresh in all our memories, and
which might have been avoided, to save our
client from a similar fate. We will not dwell
upon the other advantages which may be
conferred on other persons; we will keep to the
point with which we started, and—by the wife
whom this man may leave a widow, by the
children whom he may leave without a father,
by some who depend on him, or at least by some
who love him—by all these things, and many
more—we implore the jury on whom his very
existence depends, that they will grant us a
verdict, and give us this man's life.

NATURE'S PLANTING.

THE means employed by Nature, the great
planter, to effect the dispersion of seeds, and
by which the young plants are separated and
sent out into the world from their seed-cup
homes, are as various and curious as the forms
of the seed-cups themselves.

So soon as the seed is ripe, Grew quaintly
remarks, Nature taketh several methods for its
being duly sown. For, first, the seeds of many
plants which affect a peculiar soil or seat, as of
arum, poppy, &c., are heavy and small enough,
without further care, to fall directly down into
the ground. But, if they are so large and light
as to be exposed to the wind, they are often
furnished with one or more hooks to stay them
from straying too far from their proper place.
So the seeds of avens have one single hook,
those of agrimony and goosegrass many; both
the former loving a warm bank, the latter a
hedge, for its support. On the contrary, many
seeds are furnished with wings or feathers;
partly with the help of the wind to carry them
when ripe from off the plant, as of the ash,
sycamore, maple, mahogany, and trumpet flower,
and partly to enable them to make good their
flight more or less abroad, so that they may
not, by falling together, come up too thick,
and that if one should miss a good soil or
bed another may hit. So the kernels of pine
have wings, yet short, whereby they fly not into
the air, but only flutter upon, the ground. But