To such a girl we may commend the advice of Matthew Arnold, quoted in our last paper, to make a space for reading, and keep to it, in spite of all interruptions. But to the larger class who crave for self-culture and have only a little leisure, we would say with deep sympathy—make the most of what you have. On your way to and from your daily work, in odd moments of freedom, you will find it a delightful rest and refreshment to turn to some favourite volume. It is a truism, but is by no means thoroughly understood even yet, that a startling amount can be accomplished in odds and ends of time. One of the best read men we know is a busy lawyer. From morning to night he is at his office; in the evening he is often engaged in philanthropic work; but he always carries a small volume about with him and has learnt to make the most of odd moments. That is the way to become a great reader. The wish to read is the one necessary element in the matter; then the habit grows with exercise. People generally do manage to obtain that on which they set their heart of hearts. The writer has observed that, however poor her young friends may profess themselves to be, they never seem debarred by straitness of cash from acquiring a bicycle; however poor and abject a man may be, he never seems too poor to become tipsy, if he is so inclined; and few people who wish to read will be too poor in time or cash to indulge the taste. The biographies of great men are full of what can be accomplished by treasuring spare moments. Dr. Mason Good, a doctor in full practice, translated Lucretius while driving in his carriage through the streets of London. Dr. Erasmus Darwin composed all his works in the same way in the country, writing down his thoughts on little scraps of paper. Kirke White learned Greek while walking to and from a lawyer’s office. Elihu Burritt, who was a well-known character in his day and lived as United States Consul for twenty-two years in Birmingham, was only a blacksmith to begin with. While working at his forge he mastered some eighteen ancient and modern languages and twenty-two European dialects. Afterwards he made translations from the Icelandic, Arabic and Hebrew. “All that I have accomplished, or expect, or hope to accomplish,” he said, “has been, and will be, by that plodding, patient, persevering process of accretion which builds the ant-heap—particle by particle, thought by thought, fact by fact. And if ever I was actuated by ambition, its highest and warmest aspiration reached no further than the hope to set before the young men of my country an example in employing those invaluable fragments of time called ‘odd moments.’”