lows of trees and in old walls. They are very active and very intelligent, but their intelligence and activity seem to work always to the harm of the farmers and housekeepers. A merchant observed a venerable old mongoose in his warehouse, and set a trap for it. He put a hen's egg in a position to be well seen as bait, and under it concealed a spring trap, right in the animal's road. The mongoose burrowed under the trap, threw it out of gear, and managed so that the egg rolled down to him. Yet some mongooses are taken in traps, but not one in twenty of them are females. The females are too busy taking care of their families to be running round; and it is supposed that the males in their depredations, besides satisfying their own wants, provide for those of their mates at home.
The Sympsychograph.—The Revue Scientifique concludes a summary of Prof. Jordan's remarkable account of the sympsychograph in the September number of the Monthly with the remarks: "All this is very ingeniously constructed—text and photograph—and falls in no way short in logic and reasoning of the habitual lucubrations of the spirits: it is quite as plausible as a hundred stories that have been told to us in all seriousness. The only difference is that Mr. Jordan has been amusing himself, and his whole account is pure invention. The ‘astral cat’ exists only in his imagination, as the ‘astral body’ of the spirits is also undoubtedly imaginary; but Mr. Jordan knows this, while the spiritualists do not recognize it. As a satire the story is very amusing; but it is certain that some persons will take it seriously, and this will be not the least amusing thing about it."
The Fascination of Cycling.—In the effort to account for the absorbing and enduring pleasure of bicycling, which induces men and women to spin for hours every day over the same roads, with no apparent diminution of their enjoyment, M. Ph. Tissier adduces associations of ideas corresponding with the frequent and quick changes of attitude to which the wheelman is subject. There is a limit, however, to these changes of position, and it is not so far off but that they will become tiresome long before the bicyclist becomes in fact tired of wheeling. M. Ch. du Pasquier, in the Revue Scientifique, looks for the origin of the bicyclist's delight in the pleasure of motion, augmented by the rider's sense of control and mastery of the instrument and of himself. The experiments of Feré have proved that motion introduces very real effects into our organisms. It gives a kind of new force, and increases the effect of an excitant, in proportions bearing an approximate relation to its rapidity. This force-giving action explains many other things not otherwise accounted for—such as the pleasure of riding rapidly in a carriage, of getting up into a high place, and the delight we take in games of strength and skill, in agile exercises, wrestling, racing, combats, etc. The activity begotten of the exercise operates as a further stimulant; and so the rider goes on, with the breezes fanning his cheeks, his whole organization, as Gratiolet observes, "singing in various tones a hymn of satisfaction and joy," till he is in danger of exhaustion before he realizes that he is becoming tired. In this last condition lies the great danger of excessive cycling, which can not be too carefully guarded against. M. du Pasquier finds a serious defect in cycling in its monotonous character. It is far excelled, in his opinion, in variety of motions and tensions by horseback riding, tennis, and fencing, which, besides bringing all the muscles of the body into play, enforce the participation of the mind—of attention, judgment, and decision. The movement in cycling is stupidly regulated by the mechanism, which permits no further extension or flexion of the limbs or the body; the motions are all alike in infinite repetitions, at least so long as the "spin" endures. It follows that the mental action can not be very elastic and the mental images will not be lively or varied. The impressions the cyclist receives are correspondingly monotonous. Those thoughts can not produce anything of value which are occupied with the road that has been passed over, with the miles that are yet to be covered, and the time when the rider will get to his destination; which are intent on keeping the record he has made, or upon creating a new one. Feré's remark bears upon this point that "the effect of systematized excitation on a small number of ideas is always bad," and that it is not healthy for the mind to be inactive in
