the dull-grey, leaden sky will melt before his, as the hedge gave
way before the prince in the fairy tale, and when the sunbeam
gently kisses the frozen water it will be set free. Then the
brook will flow rippling on again; the frost-drops will be shaken
down from the trees, the icicles fall from the roof, the moisture
trickle down the window-pane, and in the bright, warm sunshine
all will be alive again.

Is not this a fairy tale of nature? and such as these it is
which science tells.

Again, who has not heard of Catskin, who came out of a hollow
tree, bringing a walnut containing three beautiful dresses - the
first glowing as the sun, the second pale and beautiful as the
moon, the third spangled like the star-lit sky, and each so fine
and delicate that all three could be packed into a walnut shell;
and each one of these tiny structures is not the mere dress but
the home of a living animal. It is a tiny, tiny shell-palace
made of the most delicate lacework, each pattern being more
beautiful than the last; and what is more, the minute creature
that lives in it has built it out of the foam of the sea, though
he himself is nothing more than a drop of jelly.

Lastly, anyone who has read the 'Wonderful Travellers' must
recollect the man whose sight was so keen that he could hit the
eye of a fly sitting on a tree two miles away. But tell me, can
you see gas before it is lighted, even when it is coming out of
the gas-jet close to your eyes? Yet, if you learn to use that
wonderful instrument the spectroscope, it will enable you to tell
one kind of gas from another, even when they are both ninety-one