his Bible and Psalm-book. The best men are usually the bravest, and of boys the same may certainly be said.

In 1838 Colonel MacGregor was appointed inspector-general of constabulary of Ireland, a post which he held for twenty years; and in 1848, in recognition of his services, he received the honour of knighthood. It was in Ireland that the youthful years of John MacGregor were spent, and there, when a lad of seventeen, he had a second narrow escape of his life, having been wrecked when alone in an iron yacht in the Irish Channel.

The oldest of four sons-each of whom excelled in manly exercises-he early showed a love of adventure. His brother, Lieutenant Douglas MacGregor, served in the Crimean War, and was the attached friend of the well-known Christian soldier Hedley Vicars. A letter, written by Lieutenant MacGregor to Lady MacGregor on the death of Vicars, who fell in a Russian sortie, breathes the genuine sorrow of a true and brother-like attachment. Douglas MacGregor, animated by the same pious spirit, took up and continued the labours of his deceased friend, visiting the hospitals and reading and praying with the sick soldiers. Adjutant to his regiment at an unusually early age, and with every promise of distinction, it was only six months after Vicars fell that he too was slain. He penetrated twice into the Redan, the second time to come out no more. The lifeless body of the young and gallant officer was found far advanced into the interior of the Redan.

In 1845, at the age of twenty, Mr. MacGregor began to write and sketch for "Punch," and has done so at intervals for many years, giving the proceeds to the policeoffice poor-boxes. In 1847 he entered at the Inner Temple, and took the degree of M.A. of Cambridge. It was also in 1847 that he joined the Ragged School Union, and from that time he has taken an active and

prominent part in various efforts to improve the temporal and spiritual condition of the lowest and most neglected of our London juvenile population. Many a hundred of our ragged-school boys know his face well, and know it to love it, for there is something about its genial smile and bronzed vigour that lads take to at once. But we must proceed with our story. Mr. MacGregor visited Paris during the Revolution of 1848, and in 1849-50 made a long tour in Europe and the Levant, ending with Palestine and Egypt. Soon after this he published "Three Days in the East," a little book designed to illustrate the terms and allusions of Scripture. The profits the author devoted to ragged schools. In March, 1851, aided by two other barristers, he founded the original Shoeblack Society, and, with a committee, has directed its operations until the present time. It is an interesting fact that the various Shoeblack Societies of London, managed by separate committees, but on similar systems, numbering 400 boys, earn £10,000 yearly. The boys meanwhile get a fair education, with the best influence on their characters, and are prepared for permanent situations at home and abroad. No wonder the founder of the system should be a boy's favourite.

served, and ran through many editions. In making long excursions with a small boat with double paddle and sails, he had the merit of originality. The "Water Lily," some years before, had floated on the Rhine and the Danube, but it was rowed by four men; and the "Water Witch," also, in like manner had laboured up French rivers, and on a hundred tedious locks on the Bale Canal.

The covered canoe and the paddle were new as a means of foreign travel, and their advantages over the row-boat are thus stated by the captain of the "Rob Roy" himself:

"The voyager looks forward, not backward. As he sits in his little bark, he sees all his course and the scenery besides. With one powerful sweep of his paddle he can instantly turn the canoe. He can steer within an inch in a narrow place, or press through reeds and weeds, branches and grass; can hoist and lower his sail without changing his seat; can shove with his paddle when aground, or jump out in good time to prevent a smash. He can wade and haul the light craft over shallows or on dry ground, through fields and hedges, over dykes, barriers, and walls; can carry it by hand up ladders and stairs, and can transport his boat over high mountains and broad plains

in a cart drawn by a horse, a bullock, or a cow."

In this kind of travelling Mr. MacGregor is an enthusiast. He speaks exultingly of the feeling attendant on the rapid motion of his boat, of the sense of freedom, of the joy of diffi culties overcome, and of the grand panorama of river beauties unrolled for days and days together. The pleasures of canoeing he ranks far above those of all other modes of locomotion; and his opinion is of value because it is that of an experienced traveller. Before he had "paddled his own canoe " he had visited many lands, had climbed glaciers and volcanoes, dived into caves and catacombs, trotted in the Norway carriole, and galloped on the Russian steppes. He had known the charms of a Nile boat and a sail in the Egean; he had ridden a mule in Spain, swung on a camel in the East, and glided

on a sleigh in northern regions. So exceedingly pleasant and successful had been the 1,000 miles' cruise, that Mr. MacGregor determined on another expedition for the following year. A new canoe was built, shorter, narrower, shallower, lighter, and stronger than the old "Rob Roy," and with every other improvement suggested by experience.

The little volume describing the first cruise created something like a canoe furor. Canoes were speedily built, and the Canoe Club was organised, the commodore of which is, or lately was, H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. The professed objects of the Club are to improve canoes, promote canoeing, and unite canoeists. Mr. MacGregor was the founder of the Canoe Club, and takes rank as its captain.

The new Rob Roy," in length fourteen feet, and, with all its apparatus complete, weighing not more than 71lb., was turned northwards; and a cruise through Sweden, Denmark, Schleswig-Holstein, the Black Sea, and the Baltic was chronicled in a second volume, "The Rob Roy on the Baltic." Referring to Mr. MacGregor's trip among the Scandinavians, a writer has remarked:-" He was just the man to go among a merry-hearted and religious people. His gaiety was akin to their hearty mirth, and they respected the jolly navigator who came among them with the heaviest part of the frieght in tracts, and with no article so thoroughly used on board as his pocket Testament."

The profits from the first edition of "The Voyage alone in the Yawl Rob Roy," were devoted towards founding prizes for boys on board training-ships. And here we may advert to the warm interest felt by Mr. MacGregor in the work accomplished by the various reformatory training-ships stationed in different localities. This he has in part shown by establishing these Rob Roy prizes. They consist of a sovereign and a medal, given annually to each of twenty of the most deserving boys on leaving the ships for sea. It must be remembered that the boys received into these ships are rescued from a career of actual or probable crime, and are trained, reformed, and fitted for a seafaring life. Of these training-ships, the Chichester is moored at Greenhithe, on the Thames, and is managed by a committee in connection with the St. Giles's Refuge for Boys, in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields. An appeal, made in a

"Give the boy his hobby, and he'll ride it quietly enough," I heard my father say when I was a little chap about the height of a shilling's worth of ha'pence; and to do him justice, he let me have my fling without much grumbling. Well, birds were always my hobby; in fact, anything that could fly was my delight; but the worst of it was that my birds were always dying. Deeply and truly can I sympathise with the poet, who sings,

"I never loved a bullfinch well,

Nor taught him two sweet notes to pipe,
But he to croup a victim fell,

Or perished in grimalkin's gripe." And as it was with my finches, so was it with my larks, starlings, blackbirds, jackdaws, and pigeons.

Some time since, it must be rather a good long while now, I should fancy, my imagination was quite set on fire by the wonderful accounts of the foreign "homing-birds," and the distances they traversed. Jack Townley's father had sent him to Cheltenham, which is good part of a day's journey from our place; and I was feeling very lonely without him, so it struck me that it would be grand if he and I could keep flying-pigeons, and send them backwards and forwards with messages. You must know that at that time I had never seen a bird bring back a message; and although I had often read of it, I'm not quite sure if I really believed that they ever did.

I was always talking to my father about these pigeons; but pigeons are not at all in his line. You see, the fact is, he hardly knows a "blue dragon" from a "yellow tumbler," which comes hard upon me, as I've had to find out everything for myself. However, you know what sort of a man father is; he doesn't say much at the time, but he "thinks the more,' so one day he remarked to me,

66

'Alic, I was talking yesterday to my friend, Mr. Renton, about your fancy for pigeons, and he seemed quite pleased. He says he has been very successful in training them himself, but he is getting too old to attend to them now, and so he is giving them up. "I'm just sending them all away, ," he said; "but if your son likes to have a pair, send him over to-morrow and he shall have them." You may be sure I did not want driving out that afternoon. Fortunately for me it was Wednesday our eleven was playing on the common, but what was that to me when I had a pair of real "Antwerps" in view?

I found the old gentleman walking up and down his garden, looking rather sad, I fancied. However, he brightened up at once, and took me down to the pigeon-house, which was a neat little place, very clean and pretty, but not at all grand. I was glad of that, because I thought that one like it might, with a little assistance from my respected father, come within my own strictly limited

means.

"What a jolly little house, sir!" I could not help exclaiming.

"Built it myself," responded Mr. Renton, with a smile that showed he was pleased with my appreciation of his handiwork. "Always do my own carpentering. Yes, it's a nice little house; and I'll tell you what it is, if you don't give your birds a comfortable home, you can't expect them to stay with you. Courier pigeons go out and about so much that their tastes get cultivatedthey're quite fastidious in their way, I can assure you. If you are really going in for making your birds comfortable-"

"My birds always die," I could not help saying, although I suppose it was hardly polite of me to interrupt him.

"Ah!" said he, thoughtfully, and then paused before he added, "Humph!"

The interjections were expressive; they came home to me with great force. I felt very much ashamed of myself.

"Well," said he, "I had kept back my last pair for you, but I should be very sorry to think I was sending them to certain death; for I need hardly tell you, Alic, that I am very fond of my birds. In fact, I think I must hear from you what sort of place you are going to put them in before I let you have them. I should like to come over and see for myself, but I don't feel quite equal to the walk."

suppose I satisfied Mr. Renton, for after a good deal of talk I left his house the happy possessor of a pair of "Antwerps "-"Red Chequers" he called them-one of whom had several times flown from Dover to London.

Never in all my life do I remember feeling so thoroughly elated as during my tramp home on that Wednesday evening. It was a stiffish walk, but it seemed to take me next to no time, so occupied was my mind with devising how I was to get my birds trained to do the journey between London and Cheltenham.

"You won't let them out, of course," Mr. Renton had said on parting. This was a warning that pressed at first rather heavily on my mind; but after I had thought over it awhile, I construed it into meaning,

"Keep them in for a month ;" and for a month I kept them in.

At the end of the month I let out my birds. It was a very fine day, and I thought they would have no difficulty in finding their way back to their new home-which, I'm sure, although I write it myself, was all that a reasonable pigeon could desire-and the food good and unlimited. They did find their way back, but, unfortunately, it wasn't to me; for no sooner had I let them out than they flew right above the highest of our elms, and without looking round at all, they went right away-simply bolted. Of course I thought they would wheel round and round, and presently come back; but they never so much as turned once. It was striking three; dismayed as I was, I yet had sufficient presence of mind to notice that. The next half-holiday I went over to Mr. Renton again, and

But that's a story too long for this sheet of paper; I did it, though, at last.

Carrier Pigeons.

OUT WITH A JACK-KNIFE. BY THE REV. J. G. WOOD, M.A., F.L.S., Author of "Illustrated Natural History," etc. PART II.

finding it riddled with little burrows tenanted by small wood-lice, mostly white in colour, and running about aimlessly when brought to the light. They are, however, nothing but intruders, having taken possession of the holes bored by insects which needed them no longer.

The pill wood-louse is so called from its habit of rolling itself into a ball. When thus rolled it is quite a pretty object, the edges of the segments giving it a sort of "engine-turned" appearance. Children frequently find them and play with them, thinking them to be beads, and very much astonished they are to find their toys running away. Within my own recollection they were actually used as pills, and I have seen large quantities of them in old apothecaries' drawers.

Now, be it remembered, that the wood-lice are not insects, though they are popularly classed among them, as are spiders and even worms. They are relatives of the crab, the lobster, and the shrimp, and their empty shells may often be found in crevices, bleached as white as if of ivory, hard and very brittle.

Spiders, too, have their representatives in this concourse of underground life, having apparently crept into one of the holes which lead from the subterranean dwellings to the open air.

What a spider can possibly want in a worm-hole I cannot imagine, nor how it sustains life when it is there.

No insects are likely to fall into its net. At first I was disposed to think that these spiders had come into the holes for the purpose of escaping danger, and had lost their way. But when uncovered they seem quite as anxious to regain the holes as the wood-lice or the worms themselves.

No spider thus discovered will be large enough to do any harm to human beings, but some of the large garden-spiders can use their poison fangs with sufficient vigour to pierce a delicate skin.

Now for some more examples of hidden animal life. The disclosed ground was absolutely swarming with winged and unwinged ants. The former crawled slowly about as if not

'ants' eggs," and carrying them out of sight through the many holes which led to the nest below.

So

hard did they work, that in a very short time not an ant, winged or otherwise, was to be seen. It really seems surprising that so many creatures should pass an underground existence, and above all that they should be miserable in the presence of light and hasten back to their loved

Chambers of Ants' Nest.

darkness. Many, such as the earth-worms, live almost wholly underground; but there are others, such as these ants, which are absolute marvels of varied capacity for light or darkness. Taking, for example, the perfect males and females, we find them able to thread the complicated and absolutely dark passages of their subterranean homes, and, though possessed of eyes, being annoyed by light when the nest is opened, and hastening to conceal themselves in the dark.

They have not only eyes, but four ample wings, which they can use to good purpose in the open air. They never retain the wings for any length of time, but shake them off when they descend to earth after their flight, and are then ready to resume their life of darkness.

The common wood-ant is very remarkable in this respect. It will wander for wonderful distances from its nest in search of food or material. In course of years, the ants will make regular paths, traceable for hundreds of yards. They ascend and search among trees in the neighbourhood, and if you climb a lofty elm you will find the ants above you.

Yet they never miss their way, never lose anything, retrace their steps with their burdens, and when they have reached the nest, plunge at once into its labyrinthine passages, which are never penetrated by a ray of light. How, coming out of the sunshine, they can find their

Yellow Ants' Nest.

way to the young which they have to feed, or how they can keep the interior of the nest in such perfect order, is one of the yet unexplained mysteries of animal life.

As to the wings, they are not bitten off, as many people think, but are snapped off in a very curious manner, each pair being brought forward as far as possible, and the tips pressed against the ground. They then break off close to the body, the two wings of each side generally adhering to each other by means of a tiny apparatus wonderfully resembling the hooks-and-eyes of human invention.

The four wings are not shed at once, but the pair of one side is broken off some little time before the other.

During this time the queen ant remains nearly in the same spot. Occasionally a worker ant comes up to her, touches her antenna with its own, and runs away.

Should the nest he a large one, the surround

Gnat (with Caterpillar and Chrysalis). suck our blood, and so can one or two of the gad-flies-not to mention the flea-though they cannot sting and inject poison.

There is something almost amusing in the quick alertness of the little insect, which, by the way, can run backwards as well as forwards -and, indeed, always does so when trying to hide itself in a crevice. It backs into the crevice just as the toad does, and when it has wriggled itself in as far as possible, it lays its long antennæ over its back, tucks in its legs, and remains motionless, thereby concealing from all but sharp eyes the fact that it is a beetle, and not a lump of decaying fungus.

Of course, this habit is mere instinct, though at first sight it has the appearance of being due to reason. The insect cannot draw a mental paral lel between itself and the object which it imitates, any more than the pill-beetle, which remains motionless in a dusty road, knows its resemblance to a pebble, or a "loopen" caterpillar its similitude to a twig Not that bipeds are, as insects, incapable of reason. They can reason well enough within limits, and often do so, yet no reason is employed in this act of concealment.

Hold the beetle, gently, and you will see how it does not appear to be frightened, but only angry, twisting itself about, and biting with goodwill at the fingers which hold it.

It is sup

In common with most of its kin, it discharges from the mouth a quantity of reddish-brown fluid, having a very offensive odour. posed to be used as a means of defence, but I cannot believe that such a provision was made for the sake of offending human nostrils, though it certainly has that effect. It is well known to naturalists that many creatures have the instinctive habit of rejecting the contents of their

stomachs when alarmed, and such I believe to be the case with these beetles.

If you wish to examine the under surface of the insect, nothing is easier. Lay it on its back on a piece of glass or a clean plate, and it cannot recover itself. At first it will kick vigorously, and spin round and round on its back, as its sharp claws can find no hold. But it soon ceases to make any effort, and will be quiet, unless it be touched, when it will again begin to kick, hoping to regain its footing.

Now, having sufficiently examined the beetle, let it go its way and fulfil the task for which it

was made.

Another beetle, which frequents similar localities, is the great black cocktail, notable for its habit of turning up its tail in a menacing way, just as the earwig does. It has no pincers like those of the earwig, but at the very tip of the tail are two largish white spots, from which issues a singularly evil-smelling substance, the odour of which clings to the fingers most perseveringly.

It is an insect which, although if it can find a mode of escape it will avail itself of it, has no hesitation in accepting the alternative of fighting, for which it possesses very efficient weapons in the shape of large, pointed, sickle-shaped jaws.

When irritated-and it has a very short temper-it stands high on its legs, curls its tail over its back, flings its head well up, opens its jaws to their fullest extent, and altogether has such a savage look, that most persons are afraid to touch it. The beetle often gets into cellars, and I have known gentlemen afraid to enter their own cellars on account of the cocktail beetles.

However formidable they may appear, they can do no real harm. They can give a sharp nip with the jaws, and leave a very unpleasant odour on the hand, but that's all. And they are really useful insects, being most accomplished scavengers, and feeding on decaying substances which, but for them and their allies, might breed a pestilence.

They have very large and beautiful wings, which are packed into such very tiny wing cases, that when they are spread they look as if nothing but a conjuring trick could put them back again.

Some time ago an ingenious foreigner exhibited a box of no great dimensions, in which he had contrived to pack a whole bedroom suite large enough for a married couple. There was an ample bedstead, couch, wash-stand, tables, chairs, etc, and all came out of the box. No one but the inventor could take them out, and no one but himself could pack them up again.

Now, though an experienced entomologist can draw cocktails' wings from under the covers, open out their many folds, and display them to their fullest extent, he can rarely replace them, an act which is performed by the insect in a few seconds; but it is seldom witnessed, the cocktail being a night-flier.

As to the species of cocktails, or Staphylinidæ, as they are called, they are of various sizes and colours, and are almost beyond counting in point of numbers. They may be found under banks, under the earth, in hollow trees, etc., and, oddest of all, there are some which always live in ants' nests, where they are as eagerly tended by the ants as if they belonged to the same species.

We will still proceed with the old fog by the help of the jack-knife.

In close proximity to the cocktails are the omnipresent earwigs, which are sure to be found in any crevice. Even if linen be hung up to dry and left out during the night, earwigs are sure to get into every fold.

They generally cause much alarm on account of the pincers on the tail, which, though intended primarily for folding the large and beautiful wings under their cases, can be used as weapons, and give a tolerably sharp pinch.

Unlike the generality of insects, which just lay their eggs, leave them, and die, the earwig sits on its eggs until they are hatched, and afterwards takes charge of the young until they can shift for themselves. There are not many eggs, and the insect always arranges them in a conical heap, and sits with her six legs over them,

JACK AND JOHN:

Their Friends and their Fortunes.

BY MRS. EILOART,

Something alive in the Easket.

would be enough to keep house upon with what he had of his own, and John and he could go on together in the old place still. John seemed to like this idea himself, and as he seemed to have no relations, and no

"Archie Blake," etc.

father fell seriously ill, and was ill for a long time. Enoch nursed him night and day, and would not allow even Mrs. Carstone to assist, though he had been a little more gracious to her since the death of her husband. He suffered her to send beeftea, jelly, and anything else that was good for the invalid, but the nursing he seemed to consider his own especial privilege. The doctor from Northcombe came once and sometimes twice a day, but neither Enoch nor the doctor was of much use, though they both did their best, and after some weary weeks of suffering Mr. Moreton was called away from his son and his

servant.

John felt this very much; he had loved his father very dearly in his own grave quiet fashion. Mrs. Carstone would have liked him to come and live with Jack and her at once, and said in her warm-hearted way that there was plenty of room in the chimney corner for Enoch as well. That was really kind of her, for it is certain she would never have liked her kitchen one half so well again if Enoch had been in it. Enoch thanked her and declined her goodness for himself, and said that John would be better in a house of his own than with friends; and they could manage still; there was enough left, with care, though part of his late master's income had died

with him.

So it proved; there was a small sum coming yearly to John, which Enoch said

him, matters went on in accordance with Enoch's wishes till another trouble came which that individual had not foreseen.

He caught cold. Mrs. Carstone said it was because he never would change his stockings when he got his feet wet, which she was always telling him he ought to do, to which admonition Enoch always replied that he was neither sugar nor salt for a drop of water to melt him. This cold brought on rheumatism, and the rheumatism settled in his limbs, so that Enoch became partly crippled. He could work about the house, do the cooking, and keep the place tidy, but he had to give up the gardening and the going to market for whatever was wanted for the table, and he had to sit by the fire as if he were nothing better than an old woman, as he told Jenny Flint, a dame of his own age, and something of his own temper, who replied that there were worse things in the world than old women-old men, for instance.

Then John's responsibilities came upon him. He had to take care not only of himself, but of Enoch. He continued to go to school with Jack just as he had always done, but he had to do the marketing for the house between school hours, and he hired a man to come half a day a week to the garden on the rock, and, when he could spare time himself from his lessons or Jack's claims on his leisure, would work there himself. And to hear John give this man his directions as to the crops he should sow, or any other matter connected with the garden, was really good. "He's too clever to live, that boy o' yourn," said Jenny Flint to Enoch Green; to which Enoch tartly replied, "May be so;

fools do live an uncommon long time, to bo sure. You're over threescore, I take it, yourself, Mrs. Flint."

All the neighbours on No Man's Land had a great respect for John. Before long they began to call him Mr. Moreton, just as they had done his father before him. They had always looked up to Mr. Moreton as a gentleman, and had had a great reverence for his learning and his many travels, though how they knew much about either was a puzzle, since neither Mr. Moreton nor Enoch ever talked to them on such subjects, and indeed little enough upon any other. If they could have helped John in any way they would have done so, but John seemed to want no one's help, not even Mrs. Carstone's; and if Enoch would have allowed them, not a woman in the place but would have gladly taken her turn at cleaning up the cottage and washing John's dirty linen and ties. But, like John, Enoch would have no help. Crippled as he was, he could still continue to do as much as this; and when he had nothing else to employ him, he sat by the fire or near the open door in the sunshine, mending John's clothes and his own with a skill and a patience that not a matron in the place could have equalled.

As to the children of No Mans Land. the reverence, indeed I may say the awe, with which they looked up to John wa something quite out of the common course. The sauciest urchins were still if John desired them to be quiet; even the girls stopped their chatter if John told them it annoyed him. The little ones, even before they could speak, left off crying and stood with their eyes as wide open as their mouths if John came near; so that altogether John felt he had a character to sustain, and was an important personage from whom a great deal was expected, and therefore it is not to be wondered at if his gravity increased, and that there