of poems, containing my old favorites, ‘Modern Greece,’ and the ‘Ode to a Deserted Churn.’  These I read aloud several times to the miners, and their longing to return sooner to a world where they could get the rest of the volume became so strong, that, as I was about to begin my fifth reading, they consented to an expedient of escape which I had already proposed once or twice in vain.  This was to blow us out by means of the fire-damp.  The result of the experiment I cannot yet fully report, as some confusion ensued.  Jones has disappeared, having been, as I hope and believe, discharged upward, and I have found the remains of only one miner, so that it seems to have been a tolerable success, though I myself was blown inward, owing to the premature explosion of the train.  In one respect the result was highly satisfactory to me personally.  Jones had all along insisted that the vapor was antiphlogistic.  Whichever way he went, I think (fair-minded as he is) he must be by this time convinced of his error, and I shall accordingly enter him in my Report as discharged cured.  I may add, as an interesting scientific fact, that his ascent was accompanied by such a sudden and violent fall of the barometer (which he had in his lap) that the instrument was broken.  This would seem to prove a considerable decrease in the weight of the atmosphere at the moment of explosion.  The darkness was oppressive at first; but a happy thought occurred to me.  You know Jones’s poodle, and how obese he is?  Well, he was shot into my lap, where he lay to all appearance dead.  I had some matches in my pocket and at once kindled the end of his tail, which makes a very good candle, quite as good as average dips, tales, quales.  By the light of this I proceed to note down my first series of comments as a tail-piece to your meteorological article in the July ‘Atlantic,’ of which we received a copy in due course, as the magazine has a large circulation among our friars miner down here.

“METEOROLOGY ‘MADE EASY.’

“In glancing at the article on ‘Meteorology’ in the July number of the ‘Atlantic Monthly,’ I was so struck by the dashing style in which the writer presents what he calls the ‘leading principles’ of the science, that, in spite of portentous errors, I was tempted to follow his diversified flight to its very close.  Reading pencil in hand, I gathered up a long list of mistakes in fact and in philosophy, of which the following specimens, although but the first fruits of a not very critical examination, may serve to illustrate the carelessness—­shall I not say ignorance?—­of the writer on the topics in regard to which he proposes to enlighten the general reader.

“1.  According to our essayist, the weight of the atmosphere is about 43/1000ths that of the globe,—­in other words, 1/23d part.  Now a simple calculation, or a reference to one of the standard works on Physics, should have taught him that the weight of the entire air is less than one-millionth part of that of the earth,—­that is, fifty thousand times less than he states it to be.”