was dark and excessively cold. A little sleet had fallen, which crumpled under my feet as I made my way toward the quay. Arrived there, not a cab was to be found at the usual stand, so I pushed on across the river, and under the archway of the palace of the Louvre, casting my eye toward that wing of the great building where I had seen, for the first time, the face which I was shortly to look on for the last time on earth. Finding no cabs in the square before the palace, I went on through the dark streets of St. Anne and Grammont, until I reached the Boulevard. A few voitures de remise were opposite the Café Foy. I appealed to the drivers of two of them in vain, and only succeeded by a bribe in inducing a third to drive me to the Place de la Roquette. It is a long way from the centre of Paris, under the shadow almost of Père la Chaise. I tried to keep some reckoning of the streets through which we passed, but I could not. Sometimes my eye fell upon what seemed a familiar corner, but in a moment all was strange again. The lamps appeared to me to burn dimly; the houses along the way grew smaller and smaller. From time to time, I saw a wine-shop still open; but not a soul was moving on the streets, with the exception of, here and there, a brace of sergents de ville. At length we seemed to have passed out of the range even of the city patrol, and I was beginning to entertain very unpleasant suspicions of the cabman, and of the quarter into which he might be taking me at that dismal hour of the night, when he drew up his horse before a little wine-shop, which I soon recognized as the one where I had left my order for the dispatch of the night's messenger. I knew now that the guillotine was near. As I alighted I could see, away to my right, the dim outline of the prison walls, looming against the night sky, with not a single light in its gratings. The broad square before the prison was sheeted over with sleet, and the leafless trees that girdled it round stood ghost-like in the snow. Through the branches, and not far from the prison gates, I could see, in the gray light (for it was now hard upon three o'clock), a knot of persons collected around a frame-work of timber, which I knew must be the guillotine. I made my way there, the sleeted ground crumpling under my steps. The workmen had just finished their arrangements. Two of the the city police were there, to preserve order, and to prevent too near an approach of the loiterers from the wine-shops; who may have been, perhaps, at this hour, a dozen in number. I could pass near enough to observe fully the construction of the machine. There was, first, a broad platform, perhaps fifteen feet square, supported by movable tressle-work, and elevated some six or seven feet from the ground. A flight of plank steps led up to this, broad enough for three to walk abreast. Immediately before the centre of these steps, upon the platform, was stretched what seemed a trough of plank; and from the farther ends of this trough rose two strong uprights of timber, perhaps ten feet in height. These were connected at the top by a slight frame-work; and immediately below this, by the light of a solitary street lamp which flickered near by, I could see the glistening of the knife. Beside the trough-like box was placed a long willow basket: its shape explained to me its purpose. At the end of the trough, and beyond the upright timbers, was placed a tub: with a shudder, I recognized its purpose also. The prison gates were only a few rods distant from the steps to the scaffold, and directly opposite them. They were still closed and dark. The execution, I learned, was to take place at six. A few loiterers, mostly in blouses, came up from time to time to join the group about the scaffold. By four o'clock there was the sound of tramping feet, one or two quick words of command, and presently a battalion of the Municipal Guard, without drum-beat, marched in at the lower extremity of the square, approached the scaffold, and, having stacked their arms, loitered with the rest. Lights now began to appear at the windows of the prison. A new corps of police came up and cleared a wider space around the guillotine. A cold gray light stole, after a time, over the eastern sky. By five o'clock the battalion of the Guards had formed a hedge of bayonets from either side of the prison doors, extending beyond and inclosing the scaffold. A squadron of mounted men had also come upon the ground, and was drawn up in line, a short distance to one side. Two officials appeared now upon the scaffold, and gave trial to the knife. They let slip the cord or chain which held it to its place, and the knife fell with a quick, sharp clang, that I thought must have reached to ears within the walls of the prison. Twice more they made their trial, and twice more I heard the clang. Meantime people were gathering. Marketwomen bound for the city lingered at sight of the unusual spectacle, and a hundred or more soldiers from a neighboring barrack had now joined the crowd of lookers-on. A few women from the near houses had brought their children; and a half-dozen boys had climbed into the trees for a better view. At intervals, from the position which I held, I could see the prison doors open for a moment, and the light of a lantern within, as some officer passed in or out. I remember that I stamped the ground petulantly it was so cold. Again and again I looked at my watch. Fifteen minutes to six! It was fairly daylight now, though the morning was dark and cloudy, and a fine, searching mist was in the air. A man in blouse placed a bag of saw-dust at the foot of the gallows. The crowd must have now numbered a thousand. An old marketwoman stood next me. She saw me look at my watch, and asked the hour. 66 'Eight minutes to six!" "Mon Dieu; huit minutes encore !" She was eager for the end. I could have counted time now by the beating of my heart. What was Emile Roque doing within those doors? praying? struggling? was the face of the castaway on him? I could not separate him now from that fearful picture; I was straining my vision to catch a glimpse-not of Emile Roque-but of the living counterpart of that terrible expression which he had wroughtwild, aimless despair! Two minutes of six! I saw a hasty rush of men to the parapet that topped the prison wall; they leaned there, looking over. THE SENSES. IV. HEARING. IN the quaint old town of Amsterdam there lived in the middle of the seventeenth century a far-famed Boniface, whose low-ceiled house on the Prince's Wharf was often so full of lovers of rich wines, that many a thirsty soul went away in anger and dismay. He was a merry companion withal, and loved to see his guests in good-humor and joyous spirits. No wine of the Rhine, no sack of France, was too rare for his friends; costly bulbs filled window and shelf with luxuriant flowers, and strange animals, the children of distant climes, were scattered over room and chamber. But the sight of all sights was, after all, Mynheer Petter himself, as wrapped up in dense, dismal clouds I saw a stir about the prison gates, and both of smoke, he sat enthroned in his roomy armwere flung wide open. There was a suppressed murmur around me -"Le voici! Le voici !" I saw him coming forward between two officers; he wore no coat or waistcoat, and his shirt was rolled far back from his throat; his arms were pinioned behind him; his bared neck was exposed to the frosty March air; his face was pale-deathly pale, yet it was calm; I recognized not the castaway, but the man-Emile Roque. There was a moment between the prison gates and the foot of the scaffold; he kissed the crucifix, which a priest handed him, and mounted with a firm step. I know not how, but in an instant he seemed to fall, his head toward the knife-under the knife. My eyes fell. I heard the old woman beside me say passionately, "Mon Dieu! il ne veut pas!" I looked toward the scaffold; at that supreme moment the brute instinct in him had rallied for a last struggle. Pinioned as he was, he had lifted up his brawny shoulders and withdrawn his neck from the fatal opening. Now, indeed, his face wore the terrible expression of the picture. Hate, fear, madness, despair, were blended in his look. But the men mastered him; they thrust him down; I could see him writhe vainly. My eyes fell again. me. I heard a clang-a thud! There was a movement in the throng around When I looked next at the scaffold, a man in blouse was sprinkling saw-dust here and there. Two others were lifting the long willow basket into a covered cart. I could see now that the guillotine was painted of a dull red color, so that no blood stains would show. I moved away with the throng, the sleet crumpling under my feet. I could eat nothing all that day. I could not sleep on the following night. The bloodshot eye and haggard look of the picture which had at the last-as I felt it would be-been made real in the man, haunted me. I never go now to the gallery of the Louvre but I shun the painting of the wrecked Médusa as I would shun a pestilence. chair, and foretold how "the Turk would invade the Holy Empire," or sang his quaint, queer ditties in Dutch. Suddenly, however, his fame increased beyond all expectation, and strangers came from far-off countries, not to enjoy his cozy comforts, not to quaff his superlative wines, but to hear him sing glasses to pieces! It was no joke and no quibble. He would place fair, costly tumblers, tall, thin-stemmed Venetian glasses, and heavy, broad-footed goblets on the bright, well-polished table, close by the square wooden tray full of fragrant tobacco. Then he would raise his voice, and ere many minutes had passed, the tall, slender glass broke with a loud shriek, and the bowl-like tumbler of the German fell, with dull, heavy sound, into pieces! As he repeated the effort, he soon learned how to do it with ease to himself and all the greater marvel to his guests, until once he sang twentyfive costly goblets to pieces in a short half hour! Fortunately a German scholar of great renown came to witness the apparent wonder, explored it well, and left to posterity the enigma and its solution in a learned and spirited work on the subject. Since those days we have learned that if we but ascertain the natural note of a glass and then strike its second sufficiently loud, the glass will instantly break, with a clear clarion ring; strings of harps and violins sound, if a kindred note be heard, and the energetic and violent ringing of bells has been known to shake and to break massive vaults. The skeptic has quickly availed himself of the well-ascertained fact, and used it to explain the falling of the walls of Jericho before the trumpets of the Israelite. To the faithful believer, however, it is but a new inducement to admire the wondrous bonds of love that hold all parts of creation, the lifeless material and the living sound, in sweet friendship together, and to try to learn more of the mysterious nature of sounds, as they approach us through the organs of hearing. For the ear and its powers are still deep mysteries even to the learned and the scholar. Science has to acknowledge that she knows not the use and the special functions of each tiny part of the wondrous structure. The philoso The ear of man is the most perfect of all, but most difficult of access. The mechanism of the pher can not explain to us the nature of sound, | of lime, shaped and arranged in a peculiar mannor how mere motion in the air, when it strikes ner, to increase by resonance the force of such a delicate nerve in the head, of a sudden, and sounds. Even in birds the external parts of as if by magic, is changed into music. The the ear are still wanting, a few nocturnal birds sense is, in fact, still a great physiological riddle. | excepted, and the tympanum lies here, as with No other part of our body is so little known. reptiles and amphibia, quite near to the surface; Few men who own a watch have not at times of the inner structure, also, but a few simple opened the little machine and longed to under-bones are, as yet, in existence. The latter instand the purpose and meaning of its many tiny crease; one by one, as we ascend to the mamwheels and chains. But how few ever think malia, until we see at last the outward ear fully of examining more closely the truly wondrous developed, and within, the whole marvelous watches that tell us of the beating of time in structure complete. the great universe around us, marvels of craft and cunning, which bountiful nature has given to the poor and the rich alike, as an ever over-eye lies as clear and open before the man of flowing source of pure and unsullied enjoyment? Science itself displays this neglect in its disgusting abuses. If any body should venture to offer to the public an arcanum, a few drops of which poured into a watch would repair the broken wheel or the rusty chain, regulate its accuracy, and restore it to first perfection, would he not be received with sneers and scoffs, and reproached with a desire to insult our common sense? And yet we have seen, but of late, grave, honored physicians, who proclaimed aloud that they possessed the secret of a powder or an oil, a little tube to be put into the ear, or a magnet suspended behind it, that would cure, without doubt, all possible ills to which the ear is heir? Nothing but a melancholy indifference to the wonders of our own body, "made after His image," could produce such errors, and make us endure such announcements. We forget that "the hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both of them." science as the beautiful organ itself appears in the face of man. It is not so with the ear. Its wondrous parts are deeply hidden in the secrecy of our head, inapproachable during lifetime, and dark and unknown are therefore also, as yet, their peculiar functions. The fleeting, intangible nature of sound escapes all observation, and means of comparison, also, with other organs of hearing, are utterly wanting. We are not even admitted at once into the secrets of the organ of hearing, as we are in the other senses. We enter at first but an outer apartment, in the well known form of a shell, which stands ever ready and open to receive whatever sounds may be roving about in the free air of heaven. Its varied forms and countless angles allow not a single stray sound to escape, and gather and lead them all to a common centre. Thus they are made to enter a wide, well-oiled canal, whose tortuous windings and stiff, stout hairs exclude aught else but light, invisible air. It is nearly an inch long, and carries the sounds onward, holding the waves, as it were, well together, and increasing their strength by reflection. For its delicate walls tremble and vibrate with the whole ear, and communicate the disturbance to the inner parts of the structure. Hence if foreign bodies, or long accumulated ear-wax, obstruct the free passage, our hearing is seriously impaired. Through it the sounds reach without delay the first gate, that closes the inner chambers against all dangers from without. This is a delicate and elastic curtain, well fastened to the surrounding bones like the skin of a drum, and hence its technical name. As the sticks of the drummer Like other organs of sense, the ear also may be watched from its earliest infancy—a mere bubble of air-through all the slow changes of form, up to its highest perfection in man. All animals, it is true, are believed to possess some means of perceiving sounds, but in the lowest they surely are so closely united with others, that we at least can not distinguish where touch ceases and hearing commences. The primitive form of the ear-but lately discovered by the aid of the microscope-is a simple cell or bladder, barely visible to the naked eye. Even in the lowest of animals, however, this remarkable organ exhibits already its two most distinctive features; it lies ever deep in the very centre of the body, often in the midst of the nervous sys-strike his drum and thus produce sounds within tem, and it contains already, in its microscopic stage, those tiny crystals which are found nowhere else in all nature. The miniature globe of transparent texture is always filled with a clear liquid, and in it swim one or more little bodies, kept by tiny, restless hairs (cilia) in ever active, swinging motion. As we approach the higher classes of animals, the structure becomes more and more complicated; the parts increase in number, the arrangement grows in beauty. Fishes, receiving all sounds not through air but through water, with which their whole body is ever in contact, need therefore no outward ear; but they have, close by, large compact masses the body of the instrument, so the faint waves of the air also strike against the tympanum ; the little membrane yields and presses upon a cavity within the so-called drum. Its delicacy is exquisite. A glass plate, covered with finest sand and set swinging by the touch of a bow, causes, we know, the tiny atoms to range themselves in curious, beauteous figures. So the light, little membrane, also, when vibrating under the influence of certain grave or deep tones, will make the seed of earth-moss, or like delicate substances that have been strewn upon it, assume the far-famed figures of Chladni. We enter next a round, well-stored chamber, The hammer rests upon the anvil, and the latter again, by a minute little bone, the smallest in the whole body of man, on the stirrup, whose broad lower part, where the foot would stand in a stirrup, closes up a tiny window in the last and innermost chamber of the ear. Thus the wondrous three bones, suspended in the air-filled apartment, and moving slightly where they are joined together, form a myste filled with ever-renewed air, and deeply, snugly | As the wonderful "opening into the soul of ensconced in the interior of the bones that form man" grows wider and narrower with the mass our temples. Safely protected without, it has a | and the brightness of light that falls upon it, so door within, and a tubular passage that leads the tiny skin, stretched out here so oddly, adapts right into the mouth, through which a current itself, without our aid and our will, to the of air is ever passing into the curious little strength, height, and depth of various sounds. apartment. Thus the tympanum always re- A dazzling light causes the pupil visibly to conmains well stretched, whatever pressure may be tract, and a deafening sound induces the tymbrought to bear upon it by the impatient waves panum to grow smaller by being strained; to of air that constantly beat against it from with- receive more waves of a feebler light the pupil out, as the stormy breakers of the sea roll up to stretches wide open, and, in like manner, the the cliffs of an iron-bound shore. Through this tympanum also is loosened and enlarged to repassage alone access can be had to the middle ceive a larger number of waves of sound. chamber of the ear, and the surgeon, by inserting his delicate instrument through the nose, can blow and squirt water or air into the drum, as the occasion requires. But the tube serves, besides, as a sounding-board, adding new strength and greater distinctness to the sounds that enter the inner chamber. Nor is it without importance that thus an escape is afforded to an overwhelming volume of sound that may at times be gathered in the cavity of the ear. Artillerious bridge from the outer curtain to the everrists, therefore, open the mouth at the firing of cannon to escape deafness, and even when hearing less violent noises, we find instant relief from painful sounds by allowing them egress through this remarkable channel. When the great Humboldt drew fishes, that live only at a great depth of the ocean, with extreme suddenness up from their dark home, their swimmingbladder contained naturally an air much denser than that of the atmosphere above the ocean's surface. It had no outlet, and as all gases have a tendency to equalize their density, the air within was so forcibly expanded, that it drove the intestines of the poor creatures out of their bodies. A similar calamity might befall us through the expansion of the air in the inner chamber of the ear, when we reach a high elevation, the top of a lofty mountain, where the air around is essentially thinner. But such a misfortune is avoided by the aid of this tubecalled the Eustachian, after a great anatomist of the sixteenth century—which allows the air of the drum to escape through the mouth. The distinguished physiologist, Carus, affirms that he felt the actual working of this remedy in every instance when he reached a height of 4500 feet; a tiny bubble of air, he says, passed each time from the ear through the Eustachian trumpet. The furniture of the little chamber consists of three mysterious bones of oddest shape and unknown purpose. Anatomists even, who love to deal in monstrous Latin names, have not been able to resist the striking resemblance of these tiny instruments to actual things, the work of man, and call them hammer, anvil, and stirrup. The hammer is closely fastened to the tympanum, and serves, besides other purposes, to stretch and to relax it according to the nature of the sounds it receives. A powerful muscle, beyond the control of all but a few favored men, draws it back and releases it again; thus varying the power of reverberation. It acts, in this respect, exactly like the pupil of our eyes. closed door of the holiest of holies, and over this bridge pass all sounds that are to fill us with joy or with sorrow. Their precise, individual use is not yet well known, nor are men of science quite agreed why Nature should have given them just such a peculiar form and no other. So much only is certain, that the beauty and symmetry of these insignificant bones determine, at least to a high degree, our power to enjoy the sweet charms of music. At last we are admitted to the secret chamber, where the outer world, in the shape of sounding waves, knocks at the very gates of the mysterious temple in which our mind is enthroned. It is a wonderful room, deep in the very heart of our head, set in the still solitude of hard, rock-like bone, which no ordinary knife can cut. Here our good mother Nature has hid her marvelous child, in order to protect its tender limbs against rude contact with the world without, to give a clear, ringing sound to the tones that enter, and perhaps to teach us, by example, that we also can enjoy the true blessings of music only in the quiet of a placid, peaceful mind. Who can imagine the joyful astonishment, and the wondering admiration of our Maker's supreme wisdom, when the anatomists, two hundred years ago, discovered, one by one, the tiny bones we have mentioned; and then, of a sudden, in the very heart of this bone, hard as stone, found a whole new system of delicate, beautiful organs? Well might they exclaim, as is reported of one of them: "I will praise Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made!" This holiest is a tiny room, filled with pure, limpid water, and branches off, on one side, through double openings, into three wonderful archways; and, on the other, into the cochlea, which closely resembles the tortuous walks of a snail's peculiar house. This is, no doubt, the highest organ that serves the sense of hearing, for it is wanting in all lower animals, and does not appear except in the more perfect classes. A small, safely-closed window connects it with | it passes from the nerves to the mind, is changed the vestibule, as through the oval opening, closed from a silent, lifeless undulation of air into a by the stirrup, it communicates with the middle living, sounding impression. chamber. Here, in the third and innermost part of the ear, sounds meet, in the liquid, the tender tips of the nerves that enter from within the mysterious labyrinth. Nature has here, as in all her merely mechanical contrivances, obtained the greatest end by the smallest means. In an incredibly limited space, by the aid of the long windings of the cochlea, she multiplies the points of contact, where sounds touch nerves, and these convey to the mind the impressions received. And all these marvels, that have so far baffled the ingenuity of the wisest of all nations, are hid behind a modest and unpretending ear, often still farther concealed by long locks of hair and broad tresses. The ear is an organ of secrecy, destined to bring to the mind the softest and gentlest motions of the outer world; hence it is so much less apparent, so insignificant even among other organs of sense. The outward is not even, as has been long believed, indispensable for the purpose of hearing; its absence tends only to diminish the accuracy of our perceptions. Animals hear very well without any visible ear; and the mole, that is utterly earless, surpasses many others in the sharpness and power of this sense. The large number of earless men we meet in the East hear as well as did the unhappy victims of a barbarous custom that inflicted, even in England, the disgraceful punishment of such mutilation upon men like the friends of the noble Hampden; for sounds do not reach the mind alone by the funnel-shaped entrance of the ear, as rays of light can enter the depth of the eye by the pupil only. A large number of airy waves are even thrown back again by the outer ear, and few only reach the narrow channel, and thus enter into the organ itself. The muscles, by which all animals and a few men can control the outward ear, probably aid in presenting its elastic walls to all sides from which sounds may approach it. The whole structure of the head, however, serves in the The precise purpose of both these inner parts of the ear is not fully known: the semicircular passages serve, it is said, to increase and to lengthen the effect of sounds that enter from without in all directions, while the snail-shell gives us the pitch of a note, and gathers all other sounds that may seek admittance, not through the open portals of the ear, but through the friendly aid of the bones of the skull; for the organ of hearing is so wonderfully set in the innermost recesses of the head, that even the gentlest vibrations-mere wayward waves of intangible air that no other sense can perceive will at once set it in tremulous motion, and give us an almost unbounded world of enjoyment. The nerves, however, are not here, as elsewhere, grown into the organ of this great sense, but spread over its secret chambers in a manner found in no other part of the body. They touch a fine white sand or dust, consisting of tiny, incredibly hard, and beautiful grains of crystal. This is the very wonder of wonders-the char-process of hearing; the skull and its bones form, acteristic feature of the sense of hearing; for its essential parts are not the outward ear nor the middle chamber, not the mysterious chain of miniature hammers and anvils, not even the marvelously beautiful labyrinth, deep in the dark night of the skull. What makes it alone the organ of hearing, as distinct from the organs of all other senses, is this matchless connection of delicate nerves with hard, crystalline bodies, which are themselves again suspended in a clear, ever-pure liquid. The process of hearing is, then, simply this: A concussion without moves the atmosphere, which rises and falls, like the waters of the ocean, in waves that spread to all sides until they meet with resistance. They enter the outward ear, pass through the outward channel, and strike against the first door, the drum. This delicate curtain moves under the pressure, and sets the three tiny bones into motion. The hammer pushes the anvil, the anvil pushes the stirrup, and the stirrup, pressing with its lower end upon the closed door of the innermost chamber, communicates thus the commotion to the water that fills the labyrinth. The liquid rising in miniature waves, which still correspond, it is said, with amazing accuracy to the airy waves without, touches, as it rises and falls, the delicate ends of the nerves, and this simple mechanical contact, spiritualized at the instant in which VOL. XII.-No. 71.-S s both in texture and form, excellent aids in conducting sounds from without to the inner nerves. They are ever and every where active in leading them up to the brain. Hence the familiar fact, that a stick held to hard parts of the head and to an instrument increases the sound, as in Sweden deaf men and women may be seen sitting in church with long wooden sticks in their mouths which touch the pulpit, and thus enable them to hear the Word of God and the minister's sermon.. Hence also the equally wellknown experience, that persons inaccessible to all sounds through the ear may still be acutely sensible to vibrations. Mrs. Tonna (Charlotte Elizabeth), who lost her hearing in carly life, could thus derive great pleasure from the vibrations of an organ or from the sounding-board of a piano, and by merely touching the latter with her hand perceive, though not hear, a tune accurately enough to write it down on the instant! Not even the loss of the tympanum is necessarily followed by deafness-a sad privation, indeed, which is either laid upon us by our Maker at the moment of birth, or results from an essential injury to the inner parts of the organ of hearing. Innate deafness is, in fact, more severely felt than the want of any other sense, not on account of its own melancholy consequences-the perfect isolation in the midst of our brethren-but because of the unavoidable |