dreds of feet deep and very beautiful, but not tempting enough to allure me into them unless I had a rope and strong hands at the other end of it to haul me out again. I think it safe to say that the nights are never warm on Mount Shasta. During the time I was there the thermometer was at 100° and a little over, in the shade, at Sisson's during the day. The highest that I had it on those days, with the thermometer in the sun and out of the wind, was 67°. By four o'clock in the afternoon ice would form in the sun, and generally by sundown the thermometer was at 25°. The coldest that I had it was 18°. When the wind blew hardest it was warmest, probably because the warm air from the valleys was blown up the sides of the mountain. It was the most comfortable when there was no wind and the thermometer stood lowest. The cirrus clouds that occasionally passed overhead seemed to be as high above me as they usually do at the level of the sea. When a fog settled on the mountain the thermometer generally went down to 32° or lower. The fog seemed to have congealed, and to be microscopic crystals that formed a delicate coating for everything they touched. If the wind blew, these particles began forming long frost crystals that stuck out straight to the windward on everything exposed.

One lives fast at a great elevation. I weighed two hundred pounds when I went up, and lost fifteen pounds in the nine days that I remained. My pulse in repose ranged from one hundred to one hundred and five per minute, and very little exertion would send it up to one hundred and twenty. My head was clear, and I had no difficulty in breathing. My appetite was fair; but, as my food was all cold, except coffee and a little toasted cheese, I soon tired of it, and craved hot bread and soup. I remained on the summit nine days and nights consecutively. Richard Hubbard, a faithful guide and true man, remained four days, was one day down (I was compelled to send him on business), and returned and stayed four days. He worked continuously while on the mountain, and stood it splendidly. His pulse was lower than mine, and his appetite first-rate. As an assistant on such an expedition I do not know of his equal. Thomas Sullivan, a fine-looking specimen of physical development, spent the first night, and was so sick that he could remain no longer. His extremities were cold, his pulse feeble, eyes bloodshot, and lips, nose, and ears purple. Mr. Thomas D. Carneal, of Oakland, came and remained with me two nights and a day. He was restless the first night, and suffered from cold hands and feet; he rallied next day and expressed a desire to remain longer, but yielded

his place to Doctor McLean, of Oakland. Doctor McLean suffered some with cold, and was a little affected in the head. He remained two nights and a day, and was glad to leave. Randolph Random, a laborer, came up in the afternoon, and we broke camp next morning. He was sick and restless, just as Sullivan had been, and was unable to do much the next morning, although he made a manly effort.

Mr. A. F. Rodgers, Assistant United States Coast Survey, speaking of his sojourn here, says:

"1875, Tuesday, October 5.-By sunset the temperature had fallen to twenty-five degrees, and it became necessary to go to bed to keep warm. I may here mention a singular circumstance connected with our sojourn on the summit - every one suffered with an intense headache, and no one could sleep; nor was any special inconvenience experienced from the want of it. Mr. Eimbeck, Assistant United States Coast Survey, who happened to visit the mountain while I was there, was constantly affected with nausea, which he called seasickness, and ascribed to the fumes of the Hot Springs.

One of the men, who temporarily essayed the duties of cooking in these springs, was affected with symptoms of fainting; and every one without exception suffered great inconvenience, no doubt from the rarefied air of the summit. Whether this effect was increased by any influence of the vapors is, I think, doubtful; personally I was not conscious of any effect, even when standing among them, although I suffered while on the summit, as every one did, from an unceasing and intolerable headache."

Friday, August 1, proved to be the day I had been waiting for. The wind had hauled to the northward during the night, and the smoke had vanished as if by magic. At sunrise, I turned my telescope in the direction of Mount Lola, and there was the heliotrope, one hundred and sixty-nine miles off, shining like a star of the first magnitude. I gave a few flashes from my own, and they were at once answered by flashes from Lola. Then turning my telescope in the direction of Mount Helena, there, too, was a heliotrope, shining as prettily as the one at Lola. My joy was very great; for the successful accomplishment of my mission was now assured. As soon as I had taken a few measures, I called Doctor McLean and Hubbard to let them see the heliotrope at Mount Helena, one hundred and ninety-two miles off, and the longest line ever observed over in the world. In the afternoon the smoke had arisen, and Helena was shut out; but on the following morning I got it again, and my mission on Mount Shasta was finished. The French have been trying for some years to measure, trigonometrically, some lines from Spain across the Mediterranean to Algiers; they have only recently succeeded, and it has been a source of

On Sunday morning, August 3d, the north wind had died out, and the smoke had again enveloped everything. I saw that nothing else would be seen for many days, and at once set about packing up. By nine o'clock everything was packed. We made a light sled, adapted for use both on the snow-fields and the rocky, mountain slopes, and with it made two trips to the edge of the great snow-field, carrying about three hundred and thirty pounds at a time. By noon we had the last of our outfit at the brink of the snow precipice, where we did them all up in packages which were securely lashed, and as nearly round as we could make them. The snow-field stretched out before us, beautifully white and even. At the top there was, first, a precipitous descent of about three hundred feet; then away it stretched for about two miles, in which distance it had a descent of about three thousand feet. The plan was to let the packages loose, to go as they would, and while Hubbard rolled the first one to the brink and let it go, I stood on a projecting point and watched it. The snow lying at the top like the crest of an immense wave, each package had a perpendicular distance of about three hundred feet to fall after leaving the brink before it touched anything. Its velocity was very great by the time it reached this point, and as soon as it hit the snow, away it bounded. Sometimes a slight inequality would incline one to the right or left,

ing hill, they were lost to sight. As soon as the last package had gone out of sight, we strapped the instruments to our backs and began the descent. We had about forty pounds each, and had to pack it about a mile along the ridge before we came to a place where the snow was not too steep to slide on. When we found such a place, each put a gunny-sack on the snow and sat down on it. The alpenstock was next placed under one arm, so as to project to the rear and form a brake. Then a slight motion with the feet, and we were off like a shot. I have had many pleasant rides, but for rapidity and ease of motion this beat them all. I had perfect control of myself by means of my alpenstock. Every foot of descent was bringing me into a denser atmosphere, and the effect of the whole was that of a very delightful stimulant.

This delightful ride terminated just where the packages stopped rolling. Looking back, I could follow with my eye the track I had made in the snow, and away up toward the place where I had started I saw my gunny-sack. In the keen enjoyment of my ride I had not missed it, but a preliminary examination satisfied me that I had lost not only the gunny-sack, but the seat of my trousers, and I congratulated myself in having escaped so easily. The packages had all stopped near each other, and we soon hauled them to a place from which we could pack them on horses. It was four o'clock when this was finished, and leaving Hubbard to spend the night with some hunters that we found on the mountain, I completed my day's work and the expedition to Shasta by walking to Sisson's, a distance of about twelve miles, | and arrived there before dark, successful in my undertaking, pleased with my trip, and glad that it was over. B. A. COLONNA.

Oneiros was divine.

Ireland seems to be ever in a state of disorder or trouble. No matter what legislative measures have been passed for her relief, she is still always complaining, and never feels well or in a state of convalescence. The national disease, whatever it be, seems to be chronic, and beyond the power of all political doctors to cure. From the earliest history we have of that island—when it enjoyed "Home Rule" under its national kings, down to the time of its being given over to the tender nursing of England by the Vicar of Christ, and on from that day to the present--we read of nothing but civil wars and confusion, confiscation and contention, massacres, murders, and famines. What can be the occasion of this sad state of things, or to what social or political cause must we assign it? Her people are intelligent, industrious, and active, and her soil and climate capable of producing in abundance all the necessaries of life. Thousands of sheep and cattle find luxuriant pasture on her evergreen plains, and if the climate of her western counties is too humid for the maturing of wheat, the climate of the eastern will ripen it perfectly, while there is no part of the entire country, except the mountainous districts, where oats and barley, flax, turnips and potatoes-in fact, everything that comes under the denomination of green crops -will not grow to perfection. There is no traveler that has ever visited the country, and beheld the fertile plains of Tipperary and Limerick, and the rich lands of Roscommon, Meath, Dublin, and Lowth, and a dozen of other counties we could name, that is not struck with the fertility of the island, and ready to exclaim: "How can the people of this magnificent country be in such a wretched condition, or ever suffer from hunger?" The answer to this question, however, is not so simple as may be imagined, for the national disease, like many of our bodily disorders, is complicated, arising from a variety of causes, the effects of which have been inherited and handed down for many generations.

Let us look back and take a comprehensive glance at the past history and condition of the island. Before its conquest by England, very little is known to us; and before the fifth century, when St. Patrick is said to have evangelized the country, we may say that we know absolutely nothing. Several tribes inhabited

the island in the time of Ptolemy. But the assertion of its having a nine hundred years' history before the Christian era of its being colonized by the Phoenicians, and being in those ancient times the seat of civilization and learning, having schools of philosophy, astronomy, poetry, and medicine-is, we fear, only a national myth invented by the bards, who, like those of other countries, were never remarkable for speaking the truth. The Phoenicians were, indeed, a colonizing as well as a commercial people, and may have visited the island when trading with Britain. But it is very unlikely they would settle in a country so exceedingly wet and remote, when the sunny shores of the Mediterranean, upon which they had already planted some colonies, were far more inviting and much nearer home. Ptolemy and the ancient geographers, who derived most of their information from these same Phoenicians, do not mention the fact. We are not, however, left in uncertainty, for the analogy of history may assure us that the first inhabitants of the island, like those of Scotland, Britain, and Gaul, came from ancient Scythia, being a portion of the great Celtic family who moved westward across the continent of Europe, according as they were forced on by the successive waves of Asiatic emigration, till they were finally stopped by the waves of the Atlantic. Here the eastern and southern shores of Britain would be the first to receive them, where, finding a level and fertile country, they would naturally settle down on it, until forced again by the next wave of emigration to move further to the west.

This we know was the case upon the Saxon invasion of Britain, when the Celtic population, or native inhabitants of that island, were obliged to move west into Cornwall and Wales. From thence it is likely that many of them, from time to time, crossed the channel into Ireland, where they would find others, who, for similar reasons, had previously passed over from Scotland, and with whom they would naturally amalgamate, as their languages were only different dialects of the same Gaelic original. In confirmation of this theory of Scythian origin, I may observe that Orosus informs us that in the fifth century a number of Scythians, whom Constantine had driven out of the north of Spain, landed in Ireland, and there met a kindred people, having the same origin and language with themselves.