thousands of years ago! Some have called it 'od'--an 'imponderable
fluid'--as you know; you and others wish to call it 'electricity.' I
prefer to call it 'the spirit of life,'--a name simple, dignified, and
expressive!"

"It has the disadvantage of being poetic," said Dr Rippon, with grave
irony; "and doctors don't like poetry mixed up with their science."

"It _is_ poetic," admitted Julius, regarding the old doctor with
interest, "and therefore it is intelligible. The spirit of life is
electric and elective, and it is 'imponderable:' it can neither be
weighed nor measured! It flows and thrills in the nerves of men and
women, animals and plants, throughout the whole of Nature! It connects
the whole round of the Cosmos by one glowing, teasing, agonising
principle of being, and makes us and beasts and trees and flowers all
kindred!"

"That is all very beautiful and fresh," said Lefevre, "but--"

"But," interrupted Julius, "it is not a new truth: the poet divined it
ages ago! Buddha, thousands of years ago, perceived it, and taught that
'all life is linked and kin;' so did the Egyptians and the Greeks, when
they worshipped the principle of life everywhere; and so did our own
barbaric ancestors, when the woods--the wonderful, mystic woods!--were
their temples. Life--the spirit of life!--is always beautiful; always to
be desired and worshipped!"

"Yes," said old Dr Rippon, who had listened to this astonishing rhapsody
with evident interest, with sympathetic and intelligent eye; "but a time
will come even to you, when death will appear more beautiful and