warmth as possible over our whole apparatus, that all dampness might be kept away. “At length the important night arrived, and, notwithstanding all our precautions, we went to the lecture-room in great trepidation. The clock struck seven, and the electrical machine, which had been kept near a large fire in the apparatus-room till the last moment, was carried in and attached to the table. The lecture began, and the machine was set in motion, while we stood in breathless anxiety to watch the result. To our inexpressible relief we soon saw that it was in full power; and experiment succeeded experiment without the slightest failure. All had proceeded well till about the middle of the lecture, when suddenly the rod of the winch, which, with superfluous caution, had been made of glass, snapped in two, and the machine was brought to a stand. Though enough had been done to establish the success of our attempt, my father, naturally anxious to complete his lecture, and remembering that he was in the midst of a manufacturing town, inquired earnestly whether any one present could furnish a substitute of any description, however rude. One or two gentlemen immediately disappeared, and, meantime, my own machine, which had been brought as a provision against mishap, was used for some minor experiments, for which its power well sufficed. While this was going on my brother Edwin had carried the broken winch into a small workshop on the premises, and, sawing off the leg of a stool, had shaped this at the ends, fitted it to the winch handle, and, returning to the room, attached it to the socket on the axle of the machine, which again began to revolve, so that when our kind friends returned with their substitutes the necessity for them had passed away, and the lecture went on swimmingly to the end; my Great Bear, which was, so far as I know, a novelty, attracting particular attention, and eliciting, contrary to the rule and usage of the society, a round of applause. “One of the loudest foreboders of evil consoled himself for his error by remarking on the number of assistants ‘Hill’ had had, adding that he had better have brought his wife and all his family to help him. So trifling a circumstance would not have been noticed here had it not touched the key-note of our success. In our course through life, from the beginning to the present hour, each one of us has been always ready to help the others to the best of his power; and no one has failed to call for such assistance again and again. Each one, I am sure, recognises in this fact a main cause of such success as he has attained; and I cannot too emphatically declare that to mine it has been essential.