Mungo Malagrowther enjoyed a sinecure. But James's other pedagogue, Master Patrick Young, went more ceremoniously to work, and appalled the very soul of the youthful king by the floggings which he bestowed on the whipping-boy when the royal task was not suitably performed. And be it told to Sir Mungo's praise that there were points about him in the highest respect suited to his official situation. He had, even in youth, a naturally irregular and grotesque set of features, which, when distorted by fear, pain, and anger, looked like one of the whimsical faces which present themselves in Gothic architecture. His voice was also high-pitched and querulous, so that, when smarting under Master Peter Young's unsparing inflictions, the expression of his grotesque physiognomy, and the superhuman yells which he uttered, were well suited to produce all the effects on the monarch who deserved the lash that could possibly be produced by seeing another and an innocent individual suffering for his delict."

There were exceptions, however, to this rule, for Mr. Prince states in his "Parallel History" (1842, iii. 262), that when Dr. Markham inquired of George III "how his majesty would wish to have the princes treated," he replied, "Like the sons of any private English gentleman. If they deserve it, let them be flogged. Do as you used to do at Westminster." It seems very clear, also, that Henry VI was chastised personally.

In an old play entitled, "When You See Me You Know Me," the custom is thus noticed :"Prince (Edward vi)-Why, how now, Browne? what's the matter?

Browne. Your grace loiters, and will not ply your book, and your tutors have whipped me for it.

Prince. Alas, poor Ned! I am sorry for it; I'll take the more pains, and entreat my tutors for thee. Yet, in troth, the lectures they read me last night out of Virgil and Ovid I am perfect in, only I confess I am behind in my Greek authors.

Will (Summers).-And for that speech they have declined it upon his breech."

We can easily imagine that such a custom would afford our old dramatists abundant opportunity for enlivening their audience by the witty introduction of it, especially as they generally contrived to gain popularity for their performances by upholding or ridiculing any foolish usages of the

time.

He

It seems probable that this custom was not confined to our own country, and was perhaps practised in Spain, for the improvement of Philip III. Le Sage, it may be remembered, has introduced such a mode of correction in his "Gil Blas," relating the following amusing anecdote. tells us how Don Raphael was at the early age of twelve selected by the Marquis de Leganez to be the companion of his son of the same age, who hardly knew a letter of his alphabet. In spite of the patient endeavour of his masters to induce him to apply himself to his studies, he persisted in frittering away his time, till at last the head-master resolved to give le fouet to young Raphael when

ever the little Leganez deserved it. This, however, he did so unsparingly, that the boy Raphael made up his mind to run away from the roof of the Marquis de Leganez; and to revenge for all the cruel and unjust treatment which he had received, he took with him one hundred and fifty ducats of the master.

Once more, a few years ago, the "Pall Mall Gazette," in an article on the "Pekin Gazette" for 1876, called attention to the appointment of, among other instructors to the young emperor, a Hahachutcz, or "whipping-boy," who by reason of his office suffers in his person for all the sins and shortcomings of his imperial fellow-student.

M.

T. F. THISELton Dyer.

THE CHANNEL TUNNEL:

IN CONNEXION WITH THE INVASION OF
ENGLAND.

DE LESSEPS has lately said that "if the Channel tunnel is not now completed, the glory of the work will belong to the next century, along with the right to wonder at our hesitations and perhaps at our prejudices."

All questions as to the possibility of the work have been set at rest, nor is there much controversy as to the social and commercial as well as political and international advantages of thus uniting our island with the Continent. If peace could be for ever guaranteed, we suppose all opposition to the scheme would cease. But the danger of the tunnel in case of war is still an open question. Some high authorities speak with confidence of the absurdity of alarm from a route so easily closed; but authorities equally high have dwelt on the perils to which our sea-girt isle would be exposed. The British Government takes the cautious view, and refuses to sanction the continuance or completion of the works.

The annexed illustration is the fac-simile of an old engraving preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris, entitled "Divers projets sur la descente la Angleterre." The date of publication is (13 Prairial de l'an XI) June 1803, the time of the threatened invasion of England by Napoleon, then First Consul. In the camp at Boulogne all possible methods of crossing the Channel were canvassed, and it appears that the project of a tunnel was mooted even at the beginning of this century. Probably the caricaturist held the idea of submarine invasion as chimerical as that of crossing by help of kites and balloons, and the French have now reproduced the picture in order to show the folly of a great nation like England being moved by childish panic, in opposing what would conduce to the progress of international commerce and the consequent strengthening of peaceful rela

tions.

EARLY ten thousand living species of birds

NEA

are now known to naturalists. These are all comprised in two great divisions-that of the Carinata, the keel-breasted flying and swimming birds, and the raft-like flat-breasts or Ratita, the ostriches and their allies. Many very remarkable forms have become extinct even within the limits of the historic period, and the life records of the rocks tell us plainly that the group was represented in long past ages of geological history. The bones of birds, it is true, are far less frequently preserved than those of other animals, but their feathers and footprints give no uncertain evidence of their former existence. In those Tertiary deposits furnishing the gypsum or Paris plaster of commerce, for instance, the footprints of several species occur associated with the bones of numbers of flesheating and grass-eating animals. While in the famous limestones of Monte Bolca in Sicily, which are quarried for the sake of the numerous and beautiful fossil fishes they contain, feathers are also abundantly preserved; and, so far as we yet know, only birds were clothed in plumage. But their bones sometimes afford proof that different climatal conditions prevailed in Europe, as in the case of those of the parrots, trogons, currassows, and marabout storks of the Miocene deposits of

[From the lithographic slates of Solenhofen, Bavaria; original in the Berlin Museum.

France and the Rhineland-all species which now live in warmer regions. We have also plenty of evidence that birds inhabited the air and the ocean during some periods of the Secondary era.

In the year 1861 the existence of birds in the Jurassic period was first revealed by the discovery of a single feather, which was found imbedded and beautifully preserved in the fine-grained "Solenhofen slates" at Pappenheim, in Bavaria. This deposit supplies the stones for lithographic purposes, and was formed of successive layers of tidal mud so fine in texture as to preserve winged insects, and that most fragile of all animals, a jelly-fish, a specimen of which may be seen in the Royal Geological Museum at Dresden. feather in question was minutely described as that of Archaeopteryx lithographica by Hermann Von Meyer, and is now exhibited in the museum of the University of Berlin. A year later the osseous remains of a remarkable animal, partly covered with similar feathers, were found by Dr. Häberlein in the the same horizon and locality. This

The

was described by Professor Richard Owen, under the name of Archæopteryx macrura, or "ancient long-tailed bird," and thus introduced by him in 1863 to the notice of the members of the Royal Society.

The upper and under slabs of slate containing the specimen furnished proof, in the hands of their describer, that the hind limbs of the organism resembled those of existing perching-birds in anatomical structure. In all adult modern birds, the fore limb or wing terminates in a free pollex or thumb and two digits or fingers, which coalesce; the pollex, and often the second digit, supports a claw. In this ancient bird, however, two of the wing fingers were free and armed with claws, and the bones are separate throughout. Thus the wing resembles the osseous framework of the fore limb of the reptile, and retains throughout life what is now but a transitory feature visible only in the embryonic stages of some unhatched fledgelings. But the chief distinguishing peculiarity of the archaeopteryx was the long lizard-like tail which was composed of twenty narrow and gradually attenuating vertebræ, and thus resembled that of a reptile, although each joint supported a pair of long and slender quill feathers. Frontispiece.) Now the tail of all living species is very short, and consists at most of nine joints or vertebræ, the terminal ones being welded together into a peculiar "ploughshare "-shaped bone, the os coccygis, which supports the steering feathers of the tail. In the embryonic stages these terminal bones are for a while also separate and distinct. Therefore the tail of the "ancient bird exhibits a further retention throughout life of that which is now merely a brief and passing phase of avian development. A comparison of the two types of vertebral column shows at once their marked divergent features which suggested to Professor Owen the title of Saururæ, or "lizardtailed," as that most appropriate to the new subclass of birds then represented by this interesting fossil, which long remained unique, and was secured for the national collection.

(See

Dr. John Evans, F.R.S., the well-known archæologist, became greatly interested in the slabs containing these remarkable remains, now exhibited at the National Natural History Museum at South Kensington. After minute investigation he came to the conclusion that a small detached object lying in one corner of the slab was a fragment of the skull of the bird, and showed the cast of the two hemispheres of the brain. In a portion of bone in the centre of the slab, retaining the impressions of five teeth, which were subsequently found imbedded in the counterpart, he recognised a fragment of the toothed jaw of archæopteryx. Dr. Evans communicated the existence of these additional objects to Dr. Hermann Von Meyer, who acknowledged their discovery to be very important, and expressed his belief that the jaw did not belong to any of the numerous known genera of Solenhofen fishes, but probably was that of archæopteryx. "An arming of the jaw with teeth," he added, "would contradict the view of the archæopteryx being a bird, or even an embryonic form of bird. But after all I do not believe that

the great God formed His creatures after the systems devised by our philosophical wisdom. In the work of Creation, nothing is known of the classes of birds and reptiles, as we now define them, and just as little of a prototype or of a constant embryonic condition of a bird which might be recognised as archæopteryx. The archæopteryx is of its kind just as perfect a creature as other creatures, and if we are not able to include this fossil animal in our system our shortsightedness is alone to blame."

In 1865 Dr. Evans published these views with his own in the "Natural History Review," but it was long before any further evidence could be adduced to support them.

Eighteen years after the discovery of the first archæopteryx palæontologists were gratified by the announcement that a second and far more perfectly preserved example had been disinterred by Dr. Häberlein's son in the same locality. This specimen was patriotically secured by Dr. Werner Siemens, of Berlin, for 20,000 marks (1,000), with a view of its retention in the "Fatherland," and was subsequently repurchased by the Prussian Government for 18,000 marks. It was then in the possession of the authorities connected with the Geological Museum of Berlin University, where, through the kindness of Professor Beyrich, it was examined by the writer. This example is somewhat smaller than the first, and the skull, vertebral column, and fore limbs are so well preserved as to supply anatomists with all the characters that were unrevealed or but imperfectly shown in the comparatively disjointed and fragmentary original specimen.

No very complete description, however, of the Berlin fossil now in the Royal Mineralogical Museum of the Prussian capital has yet been issued by those possessing the best facilities for studying it. But the specimen has naturally attracted considerable attention, and palæontological anatomists of divers nations have more or less cursorarily examined it. As no six persons would draw similar inferences from a given series of facts in mundane matters, it is not surprising that scientists should express somewhat divergent opinions with regard to the structure of such an anomalous organism, and even its systematic position in the animal kingdom. All, however, agree that Dr. John Evans's views respecting the armature of the jaw were singularly correct, and recognise the presence of minute teeth in situ in the upper jaw. According to the recent examination of Mr. W. Dames the dentition extended to the maxillary. Ten teeth, believed to be in distinct sockets, are preserved, with indications of two others. The nasal aperture and osseous characters of the jaw are purely avian.

Professor Carl Vogt, of Geneva ("Revue Scientifique," September, 1879), revived Wagner's theory, and considered the animal as partaking more of the reptile than the bird. 'Bird in its integument and feet, archeopteryx is reptile in all the rest of its organism-the head, neck, thorax, ribs, tail, and whole fore limb are plainly constructed as in reptiles. Reptilian affinities, therefore," he Geol. Mag., Dec., 1882, English Trans. By H. G. Seeley.

sums up, "predominate in the skeleton above all others."

An English writer, Professor H. G. Seeley, F.R.S. ("Geological Magazine," July, 1881), refutes this view, and describes archeopteryx as a bird, "less modified in structure in the direction which existing avian osteology has taken, and therefore more easily comparable with reptiles, but not necessarily more reptilian, or of inferior organic grade, to the newer bird type." In his opinion the Berlin specimen differs so considerably from that in the British Museum that it represents a distinct species of the genus.

Professor O.C. Marsh, of Yale College, Connecticut, U.S.A., in a paper entitled "Jurassic Birds and their Allies," read before Section D at the British Association at York, September 1881, has contributed materially to our knowledge of both specimens of the archeopteryx. From this we learn that, in addition to the long and lizard-like tail, the animal-as he had surmised-was found to possess vertebræ of a most unbird-like nature, for they were bi-concave, or hollowed, out at both ends, as in most fishes and some reptiles. Only five vertebræ were amalgamated with the haunch bones to form the pelvis. On removing the matrix obscuring the pelvic region in the British Museum example, the three pelvic elements-so firmly united in adult existing birds-were found to be separate and distinct. All these and other minor characters approximating to the structure of some of the many contemporary forms of lizard-like reptiles. The brain-cast was small but bird-like in shape, and the wing terminated in three separate fingers, each of which was armed with a claw. But the form and position of these free "metacarpals " are just what may be seen in some young birds of to-day. The bones of the reptile are indeed there," concludes the professor, "but they have already received the stamp of the bird."

66

In a word, the complex skeleton of archæopteryx, though savouring much of the reptile, may be regarded as that of a bird in an arrested stage of development, while the external covering of down and feathers are unmistakably avian, for the wing and tail, "flight feathers," are as welldeveloped and characteristic as those of any of the modern representatives of the race. The absence of plumage on the neck, head, and body of the Berlin fossil does not prove that the extremities only were feather-clad. In fact, the smaller and softer body-feathers have only slight attachments, and would readily float away from the carcass, and thus release the underlying down before its final entombment in the tidal mud of those Oolitic shores.

In regard to the plumage, we may notice that Dr. Evans scores another point in calling attention to the fact that along the outer margin of the tibia of the right leg "there is a series of eight, or possibly nine, feathers of much the same character as those along the tail, and nearly, though not quite, of the same length. They appear to lie evenly one over the other, like the feathers of the tail and wings, though at a more acute angle

to the bone with which they are associated. . . The feathers of the wings and tail remain in position, and the fact that the feathers along the leg appear to be arranged in a similar manner, and are also preserved in their proper place, may well raise a suspicion that all three sets of feathers come under the same category, and all have in some manner served for the purposes of flight. The imbrication of the leg feathers one over the other, and their external position on the tibia, are also suggestive of their having thus served." In fact, Dr. Evans suspects that the archæopteryx supplemented the feeble powers of flight, indicated by the rounded shape of the wings, by the action of the long quill feathers attached to its legs.

Until recently the two specimens of archæopteryx were the only known land-birds of the Jurassic period. But Professor Marsh has lately described the skull of a bird resembling in shape that of the flat-breasted ratite type from the Upper Jurassic beds of Wyoming Territory, U.S.A. A single tooth was found associated in the matrix. Aquatic birds with teeth were far from uncommon in the succeeding Cretaceous period, for among the twenty species discovered by this knight-errant paleontological in the course of his numerous and adventurous exploring expeditions to the Rocky Mountain region of the fastreceding "West," .three genera, represented by ten species, possessed well-developed teeth. The fragile remains of these unique and remarkable forms were disinterred from the chalk of Texas and Kansas, and now enrich the Peabody Museum of New Haven, Connecticut. The history of these odontornithes, or birds with teeth, fills a magnificently illustrated folio, the first volume of the Memoirs of the Peabody Museum of Yale College.

These birds with teeth were of two distinct types: one, a keel-breasted, short-tailed aquatic bird with large wings, small feet, fish-like, bi-concave vertebræ, and teeth in distinct sockets (Ichthyornis); the other Western bird (Hesperornis) had rudimentary wings, flat breast, robust legs, and a powerful paddle-like tail. This was a diving-bird, incapable of flight. It possessed teeth set in a grooved jaw, and true "saddlebacked" vertebræ of the modern avian type. All were carnivorous, and fed on the fishes that inhabited the chalk ocean then covering most of what is now the Rocky Mountain area.

In 1873 Professor Owen described the skull of a bird (Odontopteryx) from the London clay of the Isle of Sheppey, which exhibited the rudimentsof teeth, structures which are now quite obsolete or merely embryonic in the bird class.

None of these extinct forms were probably so graceful and beautiful as the majority of existing species, yet their structure is full of interest and significance. The discovery of so many widelydiffering types within the last few years is one of the most striking illustrations of the fact that the so-called gaps in the geological record are surely, if not rapidly, becoming filled up.

AGNES CRANE