"It is conceivable that the physical discomforts and mental weariness which ill-health brings may be almost, if not quite, compensated by the pleasurable emotions caused by unflagging attentions and sympathetic companionship. If this ever happens, it happened in his case. All who have known the household during these years of nursing are aware of the unmeasured kindness he has received without ceasing. I happen to have had special evidence of this devotion on the one side and gratitude on the other, which I do not think I am called upon to keep to myself, but rather to do the contrary. In a letter I received from him some half-dozen years ago, referring, among other things, to Mrs. Tyndall's self-sacrificing care of him, occurred this sentence: 'She has raised my ideal of the possibilities of human nature.'" [Illustration: ALFRED RUSSEL WALLACE] ALFRED R. WALLACE "Amok" is an innovation which I do not recommend. It consists in letting go when things get too bad, and doing damage with tongue, hands and feet. It is the tantrum carried to its logical conclusion. I saw one instance where a henpecked husband "ran amok" and killed or wounded seventeen people before he himself was killed. It is the national and therefore the honorable mode of committing suicide among the natives of Celebes, and is the fashionable way of escaping from their difficulties. A man can not pay, he is taken for a slave, or has gambled away his wife or child into slavery, he sees no way of recovering what he has lost, and becomes desperate. He will not put up with such cruel wrongs, but will be revenged on mankind and die like a hero. He grasps his knife, and the next moment draws out the weapon and stabs a man to the heart. He runs on with bloody kris in his hand, stabbing every one he meets. "Amok! Amok!" then resounds through the streets. Spears, krises, knives, guns and clubs are brought out against him. He rushes madly forward, kills all he can--men, women and children--and dies, overwhelmed by numbers, amid all the excitement of a battle. --_Alfred Russel Wallace, in "The Malay Archipelago"_ ALFRED R. WALLACE The question of how this world and all the things in it were made, has, so far as we know, always been asked. And volunteers have at no time been slow about coming forward and answering. For this service the volunteer has usually asked for honors and also exemption from toil more or less unpleasant. He has also demanded the joy of riding in a coach, being carried in a palanquin, and sitting on a throne clothed in purple vestments, trimmed with gold lace or costly furs. Very often the volunteer has also insisted on living in a house larger than he needed, having more food than his system required, and drinking decoctions that are costly, spicy and peculiar. All of which luxury has been paid for by the people, who are told that which they wish to hear.