"Eh? and can't some of your clever chemists crystallize a little bit of carbon, and make a Koh-i-noor?" "Ah, uncle, perhaps we shall, some day. In the mean time, I suppose, we must be content with making carbon so brilliant as it is in the flame of a candle. Well; now you see that a candle-flame is vapor burning, and the vapor, in burning, turns into water and carbonic acid gas. The oxygen of both the carbonic acid gas and the water comes from the air, and the hydrogen and carbon together are the vapor. They are distilled out of the melted wax by the heat. But, you know, carbon alone can't be distilled by any heat. It can be distilled, though, when it is joined with hydrogen, as it is in the wax, and then the mixed hydrogen and carbon rise in gas of the same kind as the gas in the streets, and that also is distilled by heat from coal. So a candle is a little gas manufactory in itself, that burns the gas as fast as it makes it." "Haven't you pretty nearly come to your candle's end?" said Mr. Wilkinson. "Nearly. I only want to tell uncle, that the burning of a candle is almost exactly like our breathing. Breathing is consuming oxygen, only not so fast as burning. In breathing we throw out water in vapor and carbonic acid from our lungs, and take oxygen in. Oxygen is as necessary to support the life of the body, as it is to keep up the flame of a candle." "So," said Mr. Bagges, "man is a candle, eh? and Shakspeare knew that, I suppose (as he did most things), when he wrote "'Out, out, brief candle!' "Well, well; we old ones are moulds, and you young squires are dips and rushlights, eh? Any more to tell us about the candle?" "I could tell you a great deal more about oxygen, and hydrogen, and carbon, and water, and breathing, that Professor Faraday said, if I had time; but you should go and hear him yourself, uncle." "Eh? well! I think I will. Some of us seniors may learn something from a juvenile lecture, at any rate, if given by a Faraday. And now, my boy, I will tell you what," added Mr. Bagges, "I am very glad to find you so fond of study and science: and you deserve to be encouraged: and so I'll give you a what-d'ye-call-it? a Galvanic Battery on your next birth-day; and so much for your teaching your old uncle the chemistry of a candle." THE MYSTERIOUS COMPACT. A FREE TRANSLATION FROM THE GERMAN. IN TWO PARTS.--PART I.