OBSERVING AN ECLIPSE IN THE LAND OF THE MIDNIGHT SUN and cannot sleep. By the fourth night one positively hates the sight of it: especially as the mosquitoes up there, which are large enough to appear in Barnum's circus, have adjusted themselves admirably to this midnight sun and work in three shifts of eight hours each. One thing very much surprised us up there, and that was the heat. We had thought that being in the polar regions, it might be quite cool, even in summer. Quite the contrary. At midday the thermometer rose to 100 and at night it rarely dropped below 70 or 75. On the other hand, one had merely to dig a well more than ten feet deep to find a cake of ice, for the ground is permanently frozen. Fortunately, the German astronomers had been up at Jokkmokk for three weeks before I arrived, and all the hard work had been done. All that remained was testing the accuracy of our instruments, and doing this every day was a good pastime anyway. The afternoons we spent looking over the country and paying or receiving diplomatic calls from our colleagues in the neighborhood. Near us were three Polish expeditions; but a little further north, at Gellivare, the eclipse of the sun occurs. It is simply that the moon happens to come exactly between us and the sun, and in doing so intercepts the sun's light. Now the sun is a great deal bigger than the earth (about 100 times) and the moon a great deal smaller; on the other hand, the moon is so much closer to us that it appears just about as big as the sun. Then, the moon travels around our skies (I mean among thestars) once every month, while the sun takes a whole year. The result is that the moon will quickly overtake and pass the sun, so you can imagine for yourself, why it is that an eclipse of the sun lasts such a short time. The two 103 bodies, moon we astronomers, who had seen the and sun, are of thing happen before, could not help about the same but experience an eerie feeling coming size as seen over us, as if the end of all things were from the earth, near. Five minutes before totality and as the moon every one became a little nervous, moves much especially as the sun now almost faster, it cannot completely disappeared in a thick, hide the whole black cloud. A heavy gloom settled of the sun's disk upon us mentally, as well as on the except for a environment in general. Would small instant. everything be in vain, and would we This time, in have to go back all these thousands of Sweden, the miles again without having seen the eclipse lasted eclipse? but forty seconds. If, in such a short time, one wants to be sure to get as many photographs as possible, it is necessary to have many rehearsals and many tests, in order not to lose a single one of the precious seconds. famous iron town of Sweden, there were two German expeditions, two Russian, a Polish, a Dutch, and three Swedish expeditions. In fact, the astronomers there were so thick that the natives had been placing wagers as to which would be more numerous that summer, the astronomers or the mosquitoes. Probably most of you know how an On the morning of the twenty-ninth the sun was already high in a brilliantly blue sky when we woke up. We got out our smoked glasses, and at 5:45 exactly the first dent appeared in the sun's disk: the eclipse had begun. This dent got bigger and bigger; we Then, suddenly, two minutes before totality, as if rent by the force of the oncoming shadow, the clouds broke, the rift getting rapidly wider, so that ultimately it showed us the eclipsed sun and the entire corona for the whole length of totality. Everybody was at his post. The only sound which broke the silence was the ticking of the electric clock, and the monotonous calling off of the time: three minutes, two minutes, minute, thirty seconds, twenty seconds, ten seconds. . . go! Light had diminished to less than twilight; then, suddenly, as if some one had blown out the last candle, the light went out completely. The shadow was on us. With an inconceivable speed the great shadow rushed upon us, silent as doom. Nature seemed dead, and it appeared as if doomsday were at hand. But, glancing upward, we saw the soft, silvery radiance of the corona, of such a splendor and beauty that no human pen can describe it adequately. Soft in its pearly radiance, yet intensely penetrating, sending out its streamers all over the sky, the coronal light seemed in its aloofness beyond all human conceptions of light and fire. We could but gaze at it, and admire it silently and reverently. Small wonder that in the dark ages it was taken as a sign of divine mercy! We too took a deep breath, relieved of the sun's rays would spoil the picture. And ten seconds after totality the astronomers have lost all interest in the eclipse! We all take out our plateholders, put them in a safe place, and lock them up, for we shall not develop them until sometime later. Following a craving we have all had since we arrived, we hurry back to the hotel, and thence to bed, to get a good night's sleep. The eclipse is over, the plates are in a safe place, and the local telegraph-office does not open until noon, so why worry? "THE CABBAGE PATCH" STILL GROWING Ο By ALICE HEGAN RICE NCE into the pages of THE CENTURY MAGAZINE wandered a funny little group of children. There was Billy Wiggs leading an old horse named "Cuby"; there were three towheaded little girls, all with "jography names," Asia, Australia, and Europena; there was a one-legged boy named Chris Hazy; and after them trooped a lot of shabby, ragged, but merry youngsters. Shall I wonder if you know where they came from? Why, from the Cabbage Patch, of course! And the strange part about it is that they are all there still: not with the same names, to be sure, but with the same ragged clothes, and under-fed bodies, the same eager desire for fun, and happiness, and their share of the good things of life. I tell you a story about them? Years and years ago, after "Mrs. Wiggs" had made many friends for the Cabbage Patch, half a dozen young women in Louisville, Kentucky, decided to build a little house where these children could come whenever they liked, and not only romp and play games, but read good books and learn to cook, and sew, and do all sorts of useful and interesting things. You see, half the world has lots more of everything than it needs, and the other half hasn't nearly enough, so the Cabbage Patch Settlement came to be a place where you could send anything you did not want, and where you could get many things which you did want. One year a farmer had such a huge crop of pumpkins that he did not know what to do with them. Then a happy idea came to him. He loaded a big wagon I wonder how many of you boys One of the most friendly havens in the new "Cabbage Patch" will be the model reading-room. Just shut your eyes for a moment, and visualize it. Pretend that you are a tired, lonely boy, who after a hard day's work, is tramping the streets looking for anything that will make you forget that you are cold and hungry and discouraged. You spy a lighted window in a big building, and peering in, you see a long, cheerful room, lined with rows and rows of books. There are bright rugs on the floor, and gay "But it is yours to take home," I curtains at the windows; there are explained. A little boy I once knew got his first Christmas present when he was nine years old the very first one he had ever had in his life! It was a book, and he was so thrilled over it that he would not let it out of his hands until the time came for him to go home from the Christmas party. Then he brought it to me and asked me to keep it for him. "I ain't got no place to keep nothin'," he said wistfully. "Me Maw said I could have the top of the wardrobe, but I can't reach it." comfortable chairs drawn up to the tables on which are softly shaded lamps, and magazines, and games, and big bowls of gleaming white pop-corn, and red and yellow apples. Think of not having a bureau Whether this room remains a dream, drawer, nor a closet, nor even a shelf or whether it becomes a reality, you could call your own! depends upon the generosity of our Do you wonder that when the friends far and near. I Christmas in the Lublin District of Poland By ERIC PHILBROOK KELLY T had been snowing for many days in the Lublin district, but on the day before Christmas the sun leaped through the clouds and shone upon a world of glittering white. It shone upon the market-place of Lublin where there was a very fairyland of color and happiness, of rows upon rows of Christmas booths hung with every imaginable delight: dolls and horns, beads, gold and silver glass, books with huge pictured covers, candied statues of St. Mikolai, the children's friend, sausages in strings, games, real leather shoes, stockings and frocks of the most fascinating colors, lanterns, candles, chocolates, wooden clocks, canes, and a million other things that drew the people from their snow-bound homes and caused them, young and old, to shriek with pleasure. It shone upon the beggars in the church doors who asked for a bit of bread "for the love of the good Christ." It shone upon solemn rows of priests marching to the churches to pray for the souls of men, and upon the poor children living in cellars, who held up their hands to the narrow gratings above their heads and rejoiced in the warmth. It shone upon rich churches, upon poor chapels, and upon soldiers marching in the streets, whose thoughts were of home and families far away; it shone upon the living, man, woman, and child, and upon the crosses above the graves of those who had gone to join Him, for whose re-birth all the world was waiting. Out at the edge of the Lublin forest, not twenty versts from town, it shone upon a humble peasant's cottage. The walls were only rough pine boards nailed lengthwise, and the roof which overhung at the edges, was thick thatch. Inside the cottage with its one living-room, a veritable turmoil existed, for five children in rough peasant dress had thrown themselves upon a man of middle age, apparently their father, and were engaged in pummeling him about (though strangely enough he seemed to be enjoying it) and shouting. "Heigh-ho! Give over!" he was shouting. "Janek, your fingers from my throat. Stas, off my feet, you rascal, or I'll lift you out the door. Stefan, let go!" He threw them off gently, laughing, and surveyed them from a short distance while he put his clothes in order, and they, whispering eagerly, made plans for a new attack. "Order now, for I am off for town after we have eaten soup. I have a great fat pig to go in the sleigh, and he must be in the market before sundown or there'll be no Christmas to-morrow." groped toward him lovingly. He had her up in his arms in a flash and his lips to her cheek. "Anetka, my dove, what shall I get you at the Bazaar? Shall it be a doll or ribbons or sweets? Shall it be a saint on a blue box or a star all covered with paper lace? Speak and tell me what it shall be, for what you name, that I will bring." "Boots," shouted Stas and Stefan, simultaneously. They were fat little twins, just bursting into their 'teens, dressed alike in yellow-gray blouses, with rough trousers thrust into the tops of shoes much too large for their feet. Their blue eyes twinkled out from behind masses of hay-colored hair. "A book," added Janek, the little man of the family who at fifteen had One, a girl of perhaps seven years, finished his studies in the parish school. "Ribbons," from Marya, a year younger. She had a sweet face and dark eyes, like the mother who was dead, and her homespun clothes took nothing away from her comeliness. "SHE FELL UPON HER KNEES WITH ARMS OUTSTRETCHED, CRYING, LIGHT-LIGHT-LIGHT!" Anetka, the youngest, born seven years ago in the days of war, said nothing aloud. Instead she whispered in her father's ear. "A lamp!" he exclaimed in surprise. "Why what do you,- -" and then he stopped as tears sprang into his eyes. "Yes," he went on as he smothered some powerful feeling, "yes, by the lightning you shall have a lamp, no matter if the twins miss their boots and Jan his book." His face was close against hers, but he drew away in order that she should not feel the moisture on his cheeks. For Anetka, the pet and pride of Pan Kovalski, was blind. Lightning-blind the neighbors called it since it came with the great storm that swept the Lublin forest when the child was three years old. In the midst of the thunder and the roar of hail and rain, a bolt had fallen upon the oak tree that sheltered the cottage, and a ball of fire rolling down the chimney had struck down the mother and blinded the child. When they took Anetka up they thought that nothing had happened to her, save perhaps fright and shock, but when she tried to run to her father and only fell headlong upon the floor, they knew that she could not see. The village doctor did his best for her, and in the season when crops were good, Pan Kovalski took her to the great doctor in Lublin, but his efforts were unavailing and her blindness was not dispelled. The Lublin doctor however held out some hope. "It is a curious case," he said, "and while I cannot find that any part of the eyes has been destroyed or injured, yet there is some paralysis that prevents sight. This lightning bolt came as a shock. It is only possible that some shock, something unusual, may restore sight, -however the case is such a delicate one that I cannot treat it. I might harm her eyes, which in themselves seem good, and thus prevent that restoration of sight which may come at some time. And when it does come, if come it should, I think that it will be suddenly." At this Pan Kovalski rejoiced greatly, but as the years went by and the child did not regain her sight, his hopes sank. There were times however when his heart was swelled with great emotion, moments in which the child would suddenly show evidences of vision, particularly in the presence of strong lights, but these evidences did not continue, and he had almost resigned himself to her blindness. One of these occasions when her sense of vision seemed keenest, came at a festival when all the neighborhood went to the parish church. The church had been in total darkness when the people entered,-Pan Kovalski and Anetka were among the foremost and were sitting close to the altar rail when suddenly a verger entered with a large lamp which he put upon a shelf above the lectern or reader's desk; some rays from this lamp, so different from the ordinary candles which were burned in the peasants' cottages, fell upon Anetka's eyes. She felt the gleam in some mysterious way, and though but a little child, fell upon her knees with arms outstretched crying softly, "Light-light-light!" It seemed to the father that a miracle had been wrought, and later when Anetka appeared to feel the same emotion as she gazed toward the reddened west at sunset time, he thought that deliverance was at hand. That sense of light was however, the nearest she had ever come to vision, and hope at length died again. It was no easy. resolution that he took now in promising his child the lamp. Money was very scarce since the war, and taxes, high. Candles cost enough, even when purchased from the stores on saints' days or on the mother's name-day when they were lighted at the shrine of St. Elizabeth. A lamp meant as well the purchase of oil and wicks, dear enough in themselves, but Anetka was his heart's favorite, and seldom asked favors. Therefore he determined to afford her this indulgence, though the other children must forego gifts on the day of the birth of our Lord. For who could know what the word "lamp" meant to the blind child of seven years? Who could measure the ecstasy that burst in that soul when a realization of light leaped into her darkened eyes? Of a self-effacing disposition and little inclined to ask much for herself, the impulse must have been indeed a mighty one that prompted her to demand this costly thing. For young as she was, she knew as all peasants knew, the value of money and the difficulty of procuring it. It is light that cheers us when we are downhearted, it is light that brings us solace out of suffering, it is light that beams upon us when we discover some new hidden truth of the universe, it is light that first greets us when we emerge into this world. To Anetka, "lamp" meant just this. And in her blindness, light was the essence of her spirit's craving. The beet soup (barsch) was soon consumed, and the horse was hitched to the sleigh. A squealing pig, well covered with blankets, was hoisted into the space beneath the driver's seat, and Pan Kovalski cracked his whip in farewell. The next moment he was off, the children running for a distance beside the horse, over the thick white crust that had formed on the fallen snow, and then waved good-by as the squeaking runners disappeared down the slope among the pines and turned into the main highway at the foot of the hill. "A goodly family. Would that the mother had lived to see it!" thought Pan Kovalski as he let the horse travel swiftly along the road. Road was scarcely the term for it, although it was the main thoroughfare between Lublin and Warsaw, for the snow had fallen so deeply that the boundaries of the road were almost lost. In light snow it was easy to travel because of the tree stumps which lined the way. This was the common method of marking highways in the country districts where posts and railings were expensive. The tree stumps were piled along the sides, with their jagged roots sticking in the air, and interlocked by the same protuberances. At Lublin he found himself late in the afternoon in the midst of great excitement. Everywhere on the square in front of the church were forests of Christmas trees brought in for sale. Booths that sold toys, candies, and foods were surrounded by crowds of men, women, and children, and the store windows were heaped high with dazzling wares that would tempt even a saint. Over all the din of the purchasers, the blowing of horns and the ringing of bells, could be heard the cries of the booth-keepers with their "What do you need?" "What do you need?" Crowds of boys and carollers were making ready to set out at the appearance of the first star with their little theaters "Szopkas" in which they manipulated puppets which depicted scenes enacting the dramatic events of more than nineteen hundred years ago when Christ was born. The leaders carried stars set on poles, and behind them came the singers with a dozen carols ready for the performance, and at the last, the boy carrying the little theater with the puppet-dolls. Many a heart they were to gladden that night and many a feast they were to be invited to, for every good Christian leaves a vacant place at his table during the feasting of Christmas eve in case that the Christ Child should come along hungry. Any one who knocked at the door was to be taken in and fed, for was it not said, "Inasmuch as ye have done it to the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto Me." The pig was sold at dusk, and at a good price too, for folk are generous on Christmas eve. Pan Kovalski then went to a little inn where travelers found warmth and comfort, to have a bite of food and something hot to drink. The man who let him in at the door said "Merry Christmas," and the man who served him his food said "Merry Christmas," and a party of strangers who entered, all said "Merry Christmas." There was that in their eyes that betokened deep sincerity too, for men become, in this, children again upon the eve of Christ's birth, and remember all those things that are dearest to the heart of the world. Pan Kovalski rejoiced as he ate. By his side lay some bundles, hurriedly "Have you seen the comet?" asked angels of mine from their beds and one of them. we will see this thing." "No," answered the other. "The nights till now have been cloudy." "There is one however," went on the first. "I have been reading of it here. The sky will be clear this night and we can see it. To the east it lies, not far from the center of heaven." "A comet," thought Pan Kovalski. "Then I will see it too, on my way home. The man speaks the truth; it has been cloudy weather with a vengeance. And when I reach home early in the morning I will wake those He finished and went out to buy Anetka's lamp. He had saved this purchase until last, because he wished to buy it at one of the stores and not at one of the booths where the goods were of cheaper make. The high price that he had got for the pig had enabled him to buy all the other presents that the children had wanted, after the necessary supplies were paid for, and yet leave him enough for a lamp, so he thought. He still had four zloties in his wallet (about eighty cents) and believed that this princely |