grown more confident, adduced the example of the Newtonian reflector, in which the refrangibility was arrested by the second speculum and the angle of incidence restored by the third" (a bewilderingly ridiculous statement). "'And,' continued he, 'why cannot the illuminated microscope, say the hydro-oxygen, be applied to render distinct, and if necessary even to magnify, the focal object?' Sir David sprang from his chair in an ecstasy of conviction, and leaping half-way to the ceiling" (from which we may infer that he was somewhat more than _tête montée_), "exclaimed, 'Thou art the man!'" The method devised in each case being once accepted as sound, the rest of course readily follows. In the case of the Lunar Hoax a number of discoveries are made which need not here be described[72] (though I shall take occasion presently to quote some passages relating to them which closely resemble in style certain passages in the Australian narrative). In the later hoax, the illustrative experiments are forthwith introduced. Signor Rotura, having so far persuaded Mr. Grant of the validity of the plan as to induce him to allow a favourite dog to be experimented upon, "injected two drops of his liquid, mixed with a little glycerine, into a small puncture made in the dog's ear. In three or four minutes the animal was perfectly rigid, the four legs stretched backward, eyes wide open, pupils very much dilated, and exhibiting symptoms very similar to those caused by strychnine, except that there had been no previous struggle or pain. Begging his owner to have no apprehension for the life of his favourite animal, Signor Rotura lifted the dog carefully and placed him on a shelf in a cupboard, where he begged he might be left till the following day, when he promised to call at ten o'clock and revive the apparently dead brute. Mr. Grant continually during that day and night visited the cupboard, and so perfectly was life suspended in his favourite--no motion of the pulse or heart giving any indication of the possibility of revival--that he confesses he felt all the sharpest reproaches of remorse at having sacrificed a faithful friend to a doubtful and dangerous experiment. The temperature of the body, too, in the first four hours gradually lowered to 25 degrees Fahrenheit below ordinary blood temperature, which increased his fears as to the result; and by morning the body was as cold as in natural death. At ten o'clock next morning, according to promise, Signor Rotura presented himself, and laughing at Mr. Grant's fears, requested a tub of warm water to be brought. He tested this with the thermometer at 32 degrees Fahrenheit" (which, being the temperature of freezing water, can hardly be called warm), "and in this laid the dog, head under." In reply to Mr. Grant's objections Signor Rotura assured him that, as animation must remain entirely suspended until the administration of the antidote, no water could be drawn into the lungs,