had its effect, and the pious old lady proceeded to search the Scriptures again, and finally selected the name of Matthew, saying that, in her opinion, he was about the best of all the apostles, although he had once been a publican, for he was the first one of them who had ever thought of writing a gospel. So the boy was named Matthew Themistocles, after an evangelist and a heathen; as if he were destined to combine in his character the opposite qualities of a saint and a sinner. "It is believed that even in the cradle this robust and remarkable baby gave evidence of superior intelligence; and it is much to be regretted that he had no admiring Boswell at that early period of his existence to describe his extraordinary doings. But no historian ever makes a record of the wisdom which proceeds from the mouths of babes and sucklings; and when we behold the learned and illustrious man swaying mighty masses by his eloquence, or dignifying and adorning the bench, imagination finds it difficult to travel back and discover him in the cradle, so puny and insignificant that the portly old crier of the court could have enveloped him in his handkerchief, like a bit of bread or cheese, and stowed him in the capacious pocket of his overcoat. "When the moon stood still in the valley of Ajalon, the people on the other side of the hills knew not that a great luminary was in their immediate neighborhood. But when she got in motion and slowly arose, until her silvery edges were seen above the surfaces of the surrounding eminences, the crowds began to collect and watch with absorbing interest the increasing proportions of the magnificent phenomenon. And when, in full effulgence, she was over the tops of the trees, all admired her splendor, and many began to dispute about her apparent size: some saying that she seemed to them as big as an ordinary platter; others, that she was equal in dimensions to a fine large cheese; while a few affirmed that her circumference was as great as that of the wheel of the war-chariot of Joshua, the son of Nun. Thus has it been with each intellectual light which has shone on the world; at one time hid in the vale of obscurity,--in the valley of Ajalon,--then surmounting the intervening obstacles, the first rays of the rising luminary are seen, and people begin to talk and admire, until finally it becomes visible in full-orbed splendor, when a variety of opinions are heard in reference to its actual magnitude. We once heard an old lawyer, who was _laudator temporis acti_, assert with savage emphasis that a certain occupant of the bench was 'a picayune judge,' thus intimating that this splendid luminary of the law did not seem to him bigger than an insignificant five-penny bit. But the eyes of old men are weak and watery, and not to be trusted. Some of the junior members of the legal fraternity said that he was as large as a dinner plate; others were of opinion that he had attained the size of an ordinary cheese; while many of the