Carrying His Skeleton Outside

The tortoise has not aceemplisked ,he feat of taking off its flesh and sitúng in its bones, but it lias done the next thing to it. It is the flrst exam?le of a skeleton brought to the surt'ace; the back is incapable of movement and the scales, with whieh a less ambitious reptile is content, have developed into the horny shield which covers it, while the bones of the ehest have developed into a box capable of containing the creature, head and legs and all. In fact, if we belonged to a past generation, when insane plays upon words were taken for wit, we should have most probably said that the chest of the tortoise is a box to hold its trunk. The horny integument of the schild-krote, "shield toad," as our Teutonie brethren so graphically cali him, is scarcely less rich in associations than nis family name, suggesting, among a crowd of other memories, the high tortoise-shell combs, short waists, whist and pump room manners of the beauties of the Eegency. The arrangement for wearing the skeleton outside and packing the whole body away in the case formed by its convenient but not an absolute protection against foes. The lithe and wily panther, for instance, has a habit of inserting his paw into the opening left for the protrusion of the head, and thus extracting the animal. The turtle, moreover, is at a disadvantage when turned over on its back, which is a favorite method of securing those which come ashore to lay their eggs. Against ordinary dangers the thick shield is u very usef ui safeguard, but the impossibility of receiving any impression through the skin of the body must have its disadvantages, too. IIow, for instance, does a tortoise manage in those cases which a cow provides against by a rubbing post V Supposing it to be possible for him to suffer from any such inconvenience, he would be even worse off than a mediceval knight, armed cap-a-pie, beneath whose steel panoply a specimen of the dom est ie pulex had secreted itself. - The Saturday Review. A. paper by Dr. Clark ia Brain, quoted iu the Loudon Medical Meeord, gives s une ve ry intereating statisticn iu regard to epilepsy. For example, he fiuds the disease ia morecomnionly inherited from ho mother than the fether. With drunken parenfs this is reverted. Forty-í'our per cent of epileptic criraioald were born of . ents addicted to iutoxication. The conviciicn-j i'or bastardy are three times as írequeut, atuong epileptics as non-epilèptics. Epileptie crimináis differ from ordiuary epiléptica by haviDg a greater proportiouaíe nuniber oí' epileptic aud iusanerélatives. A spare bed is apt to be damp, uiiveutilated and unhealthy. It. needs airing previous to use. ín California 83,000,000 is invested in rape culture.