gather round a person that was blowing a French horn, and seeming to testify an awkward kind of satisfaction. Dogs are well known to be very sensible of different tones in music; and I have sometimes heard them sustain a very ridiculous part in

a concert.

The great old lion which was some years since kept at the infirmary in Edinburgh, while he was roaring with the utmost fierceness, no sooner heard a bag-pipe than all his fierceness ceased. He laid his ear close to the front of the den, nibbled his nose and teeth against the end of his pipe, and then rolled upon his back for very glee. I have seen a German flute have the same effect on an old lion and a young tyger in the tower of London.

There is found in America a kind of spider more mischievous than even the tarantula, chiefly in the vallies of Neyba, and others within the jurisdiction of Popayan. It is called a cova. It is much less than a bug, and is of a fiery red colour. It is found in the corners of walls and among the herbage. On squeezing it, if any moisture from it falls on the skin of either man or beast, it immediately penetrates the flesh, and causes large tumours, which are soon followed by death.

The only remedy is, on the first appearance of a swelling, to singe the person all over with a flame of straw, or of the long grass growing on those plains. This the Indians perform with great dexterity, some holding him by the feet, others by the hands.

Travellers here are warned by their Indian guides, if they feel any thing crawl on their neck or face, not even to lift their hand, the coya being so delicate a texture, that it would immediately burst. But let them tell the Indian what they feel, and he comes and blows it away.

The beasts which feed there, are taught by instinct, before they touch the herbage with their lips, to blow on it with all their force, in order to clear it of these pernicious vermin. And when their smell informs them, that a coya's nest is near, they immediately leap and run to some other part. Yet sometimes a mule, after all his care, has taken in a coya with his pasture. In this case after swelling to a frightful degree, it expires upon the spot.

An account of the fossil Asbestos, from which a kind of cloth is manufactured invulnerable to fire.

THE most extraordinary of all fossils is the ASBESTOS. It seems to be a species of alabaster, and may be drawn into fine

silky threads of a greyish or silvery colour. It is indissoluble in water, and remains unconsumed even in the flame of a furnace.

A large burning-glass, indeed, will reduce it to glass globules; but common fire only whitens it. Its threads are from one to ten inches long, which may be wrought into a kind of cloth This the ancients esteemed as precious as pearls. They used it chiefly in making shrouds for emperors or kings, to preserve their ashes distinct from that of the funeral pile. And the princes of Tartary at this day apply it to the same use. The wicks for their perpetual lamps were likewise made of it. A handkerchief of this was long since presented to the royal society. It was twice thrown into a strong fire, before several gentlemen. But in the two experiments it lost not above two drachms of its weight. And what was very remarkable, when it was red hot, it did not burn a piece of white paper on which it was laid.

But there is a kind of asbestos wholly different from that known to the ancients. It is found so far as we yet know, only in the county of Aberdeen, in Scotland. In the neighbourhood of Achintore, on the side of a hill, in a somewhat boggy soil, about the edges of a small brook, there is a space ten or twelve yards square, in which pieces of fossile wood petrified lie very thick. Near this place, if the ground be dug into with a knife, there is found a sort of fibrous matter, lying a little below the surface of the ground, among the roots of the grass. This the knife will not cut and on examination it proves to be a true asbestos. It lies in loose threads, very soft and flexible, and is not injured by the fire.

Yet it is sometimes collected into parcels, and seems to form a compact body. When this, however, is more nearly examined, it appears not to be a real lump, but a congeries resembling a pledget of pressed lint, and being put into water, it separates into its natural loose threads.

A stranger discovery still has been lately made. The proprietor of a forge, upon taking down his furnaces to repair them, found at the bottom, a great quantity of a substance, which upon repeated trial, effectually answered all the uses of the asbestos. It was equally well manufactured either into linen or paper, and equally well endured the fire. Upon prosecuting the inquiry, it appeared to him, that both the native asbestos (at least one species of it) and this obtained from the forge, were nothing more, than what he terms calcined iron, deprived, whether by nature or by art, of its inflammable part: and that by uniting the inflammable part, either with this, or the fossile asbestos, it may at any time be restored to its primitive state of iron.

But it is certain, there is asbestos which has no relation to

An account of the Polypus, a wonderful production of the sea; it is a kind of animal which possesses life in every part, and is capable, if cut into many pieces, of forming itself into a distinct animal of its kind again—and shows, though ruined and dismembered, that it can assume its former power, and repopu late and live.

Look into this rivulet, whose bottom is covered with broken pieces of plants: what do you perceive upon them? Spots of mouldiness. Do not mistake: this mouldiness is not what it appears to be; and you already begin to suspect so; you think that you greatly ennoble them by advancing them to the rank of vegetables; you conjecture they are plants in miniature, that have their flowers and seeds, and plume yourself on being able to judge of these mouldinesses in a different manner from the vulgar. Take a magnifying glass: what do you discover? Some very pretty nosegay, all the flowers of which are in bells. Each bell is supported by a small stalk, which is implanted in a common one; you now no longer doubt of the truth of your conjecture, and cannot be persuaded to quit this microscopic parterre. You have not however sufficiently observed it. Look stedfastly on the aperture of one of these bells: you will there perceive a very rapid motion, which you cannot be weary of contemplating, and which you compare to that of a mill. This motion excites little currents in the water, that corvey towards the bell a multitude of corpuscles, which it swallows up. You begin to doubt whether these bells are real flowers; and the motions of the stalks which appear to be spontaneous, increase your suspicions. Continue your observations: .ature herself will teach you what you ought to think of this singular production, and will furnish you with fresh motives for admiring the fecundity of her ways. That is a bell which detaches itself from the cluster, and that floats along in order to fix itself to some support. Follow it. A short pedicle issues from its extremity and the bell fastens itself by the end of this pedicle. It lengthens and becomes a little stalk. It is no longer a nosegay you are beholding, it is a single flower. Redouble your attention; you are just arrived at the most interesting moment of inspection. The flower is closed, has lost its form of a bell, and assumed that of a bud. You perhaps suspect that this bud is some fruit, or a seed that has succeeded to the flower: for you are loth to give up your first conjecture. Do not lose sight of this bud; it is now divided by degrees according to its length, and the stalk is at present supplied with two buds, less than the first. Examine what passes