the mole--and it is always hazardous gravely to doubt or contradict the deliberately expressed opinion of such a man on a matter strictly within his proper province. All the same we still venture to question the assertion that the mole ever voluntarily enters water deep enough to swim in, or ever dims the velvety sheen of its glossy pile even by such a luxury as a voluntary bath in the shallows, till we have some stronger proof for it than has yet been adduced. CHAPTER XLVII. Autumnal Night--Meteors--The Spanish Mackerel--Professor Blackie's Translations from the Gaelic--The "Translations" of the Gaelic Society of Inverness. "On the Rialto, every night at twelve, I take my evening's walk of meditation." So says the love-sick knight in Venice Preserved. We have never, much as we should like it, had an opportunity of enjoying a Rialto midnight meditation ramble. There is poetry and romance in the very thought of it; but we know something more poetical and in every way better still, namely, a midnight meditative stroll along our own beautiful silvery sanded beach, what time the sea is so calm that its breathings are low and soft as the respirations of a child whose sleep is undisturbed save by angel-whispered dreams; the cloudless sky above, with its waning moon and thousands of sparkling stars, each star a living intelligence; its sparkling speech, and no sound to disturb the solemn silence, except now and again the wakeful sea-bird's eerie scream, and the voice of many waters, as the mountain torrents leap adown their channels to the sea, a voice so mellowed by the distance that it becomes solemn and musical as the fast-falling concluding notes of a grand organ hymn--the Pentecostal "Veni, Creator Spiritus, for example. During the fine weather of this exceptionally fine season [August 1875] we have rarely gone to bed before midnight, more frequently, indeed, long after, and our last thing at night has been a sea-shore stroll, a half or quarter hour so thoroughly enjoyable that we have come to miss it sadly, if by adverse weather, absence from home, or any other cause, we are obliged to forego it. In addition to all the other attractions of a midnight sea-side stroll in such weather as the tropics themselves might be proud of, the reader must remember that August is one of our meteor months--the second week particularly being remarkable for the number and brilliancy of the Perseides, so called from their seeming mainly to radiate from the direction of the constellation Perseus. Never was there a finer season to observe them than this; and although they have, perhaps, been less numerous than usual, the brilliancy of many of them was so remarkable, and their paths throughout so easily followed, that their very infrequency only added to the eagerness and interest with which one watched and waited for them. The finest display of the season was from midnight on to nearly two A.M. on the night of the 11th and 12th,