Geyser. The name given to the hot springs which are so common in Iceland. Gauntlet.-From the French gant, a glove, was a large iron glove, with fingers covered with small plates, formerly worn by cavaliers, and which used to be thrown down in token of challenge. Hence to throw the gauntlet is to challenge, to take up the gauntlet, to accept the challenge, and to run the gauntlet is to force one's way through opponents closing in on both sides; and thus the phrase came to signify to run risk or hazard.

QUESTIONS:-1. What is a geyser? 2. Where are the geysers found? 3. Describe the basin of the great geyser. 4. What is the usual indication of an eruption of the geysers? 5. Describe the eruption itself. 6. To what height is the water thrown? 7. What is the probable theory of these eruptions?

LESSON XII.

The Quarrel of John Bull and His Son.

[The following extract from an American author describes, in a humourous manner, the causes which led to the independence of America in the year 1783. The notes will make all the allusions in the extract quite clear.]

a-bom-in-a'-tion, a thing to

be detested.

without

any conditions

attached.

chol'-er-ic, passionate, easily met'-tle, spirit.

enraged.

fee-simple-This expression,

in America, means an estate in which the owner has the whole property,

nod'-dle, (that which nods,

hence) the head.

tar'-nish-ed, spoiled.

tes'-ty, choleric, easily enraged.

1. JOHN BULL was a choleric old fellow, who held

a good manor in the middle of a great mill-pond

and which, by reason of its being quite surrounded by water, was generally called Bullock Island. Bull was an ingenious man, an exceedingly good blacksmith, a dexterous cutler, and a notable weaver and pot-baker besides. He also brewed capital porter, ale, and small beer, and was in fact a sort of jack-of-all-trades, and good at each. In addition to these, he was a hearty fellow, and passably honest as times go.

2. But what tarnished all these qualities was a quarrelsome, overbearing disposition, which was always getting him into some scrape or other. The truth is, he never heard of a quarrel going on among his neighbours, but his fingers itched to be in the thickest of them; so that he hardly ever was seen without a broken head, a black eye, or a bloody nose. Such was Squire Bull, as he was commonly called by the country people his neighbours-one of those odd, testy, grumbling, boasting old codgers, that never get credit for what they are, because they are always pretending to be what they are not.

3. The squire was as tight a hand to deal with in-doors as out; sometimes treating his family as if they were not the same flesh and blood, when they happened to differ with him in certain matters. One day he got into a dispute with his youngest son Jonathan, who was familiarly called Brother Jonathan, about whether churches ought to be called churches or meeting-houses; and

whether steeples were not an abomination. The squire either having the worst of the argument, or being naturally impatient of contradiction (I can't tell which), fell into a great passion, and swore he would physic such notions out of the boy's noddle. So he went to some of his doctors and got them to draw up a prescription, made up of thirty-nine different articles, many of them bitter enough to some palates. This he tried to make Jonathan swallow; and finding he made villainous wry faces, and would not do it, fell upon him and beat him like fury. After this, he made the house so disagreeable to him, that Jonathan, though as hard as a pine knot and as tough as leather, could bear it no longer. Taking his gun and his axe, he put himself in a boat and paddled over the mill-pond to some new land to which the old squire had some sort of claim, intending to settle there, and build a meetinghouse without a steeple as soon as he grew rich enough.

4. When he got over, Jonathan found that the land was quite in a state of nature, covered with wood, and was inhabited only by wild beasts. But, being a lad of mettle, he took his axe on one shoulder, and his gun on the other, marched into the thickest of the wood, and, clearing a place, built a log hut. Pursuing his labours, and handling his axe like a notable woodman, he in a few years cleared the land, which he laid out

into thirteen good farms; and building himself a fine farmhouse, about half-finished, began to be quite snug and comfortable.

5. But Squire Bull, who was getting old and stingy, and, besides, was in great want of money on account of his having lately to pay swinging damages for assaulting his neighbours and breaking their heads the squire, I say, finding Jonathan was getting well-to-do in the world, began to be very much troubled about his welfare; so he demanded that Jonathan should pay him a good rent for the land which he had cleared and made good for something; and, had it not been for the filial respect he felt for the old man, he would have refused to submit to such impositions.

6. At last, one day when the squire was more than usually heavy in his demands, which he accompanied with threats, Jonathan started up in a furious passion, and threw the tea-kettle at the old man's head. The choleric Bull was hereupon exceedingly enraged, and, after calling the poor lad an undutiful, ungrateful, rebellious rascal, seized him by the collar, and forthwith a furious scuffle ensued. This lasted a long time, for the squire, though in years, was a capital boxer. At last, however, Jonathan got him under, and before he would let him up, made him sign a paper giving up all claim to the farms, and acknowledging the fee-simple to be in Jonathan for ever.

PAULDING.

Paragraph 1 describes John Bull's position and his manufacturing skill. The "manor" is Great Britain; the "mill-pond" is the sea that surrounds it; and the last part of the paragraph gives an account of the various British manufactures.

Paragraph 2 describes John Bull's tendency to meddle with the affairs of every nation under heaven.

Paragraph 3 refers to the Puritan period when an attempt was made to secure uniformity of religion by compelling every one to accept the thirty-nine articles of the Church of England, which led to the departure of the Pilgrim Fathers to America.

Paragraph 4 refers to the establishment of the thirteen American States which existed at the time when the American War of Independence broke out.

Paragraph 5 has reference to the debt incurred by Great

Britain in the great wars at the close of last century, and to the desperate shifts to which the nation was driven to raise money to pay for these wars. Paragraph 6 describes the resolution of the Americans to resist the imposition of taxes, especially upon tea, which led to the war which resulted in the independence of the thirteen United States in the year 1783.

N.B. To give exhaustive questions on a lesson like this would occupy three or four pages. We subjoin a very few, suggestive of the kind of questions that such a lesson admits of :--(Paragraph 1) -1. What is meant by the "manor" in this paragraph? 2. What was the mill-pond? 3. What manufactures are referred to in this paragraph? 4. Where are these manufactures carried on? Paragraph 3-1. What does this paragraph refer to? 2. What doctors were sent for? 3. What is the prescription referred to? 4. How many articles entered into the prescription? 5. What articles are alluded to? 6. To what period in our history does this paragraph refer? 7. What was the boat into which Jonathan went? 8. Whom did it carry? 9. When did it sail?