“ A bright day helps us to meet sorrow bravely; a dull, dark day makes sorrow our master: we bow our heads and groan because nature seems to have entered into a conspiracy against us. The strong will may fling aside this atmospherical depression, but the effort is needed: whereas when the sun shines, even the weak can lift their heads and say without faltering: ‘Let me know the worst.’
Madge held in her hand a letter—the same which Wrentham had seen on Beecham’s desk, and of which he made due report to Mr Hadleigh. ”

“ She wets continually the livid and senseless little lips, and sighs as if her heart would burst, as she watches, in her own words, ‘the sair, sair liftin’ o’ the wee breist, an’ the cauld, cauld dew on the little face!’ The struggle will not last long now, and the mother’s pent-up feelings will ere long get relief. ”

“ Turning away from the venerable time-keeper, my eye falls on an old-fashioned low-set chest of drawers, with dingy folding brass handles, and little bits of the veneer chipped off here and there, and the ivory awanting in some of the keyholes. Where are now, I ask myself, the ashes of those bright household fires, which have winked in the shining depths of their mahogany in the darkening gloaming, before the blinds were drawn and the candles lit? What secrets and treasures have not these same drawers been the repositories of! ”

“ Perhaps some of those same youngsters, to whose inquiring and wondering minds the pictures were an every-day exercise, are settled down, old men and women now, in one of these distant quarters of the globe, say America, and are sitting at this very moment in their log-hut in the backwoods, their minds’ eyes reverting to the familiar face of that old clock tick-ticking away in their childhood’s home. ”

“ If there be no widow, the children take all, the collateral relatives having no claim. If any of the testator’s children have died before him, leaving issue, such issue take in equal shares the portion which their parent would have taken if living.
In England, the heir-at-law who takes his father’s freehold estates is not thereby deprived of his share, or any portion of his share, of the personalty. But in Scotland, the heir must bring into account or collate the value of what he has received in that capacity, before he can claim any part of the movables. ”

“ Since compulsory education became law, he must use reasonable means to get them educated. If a child should prove incorrigible, the parent may apply to the justices of the peace to send him or her to an Industrial School; which they have power to do on being satisfied by evidence upon oath that the child is altogether beyond the power of its parent to manage or control; and an order may be made upon the parent to pay the expense of the child’s maintenance and education in such school, if his means are sufficient to enable him to do so. ”

“ But a mother can apply to the court for an order that she may have the exclusive care of her children while they are respectively under seven years of age; and after that age, for leave of access to them at reasonable times, in cases where husband and wife do not live together. In case of the divorce of the parents, the court will give directions as to the custody of the children of the marriage, taking into consideration the offence against morality of the guilty parent, but also what is best for the children’s education and upbringing and prospects in life. ”

“ Over and over again, persons listening into telephones for the purpose of hearing what a friend is saying, have heard the strains of this music—aside, communicated by induction from some neighbouring line to theirs. Not long ago, a telegraph clerk in Chicago was listening in a telephone early one morning, and to his surprise heard the croaking of frogs and the whistling of birds. The explanation of the phenomenon is, that a loose joint in the telephone wire where it passed through a wood, acted as a microphone, and transmitted the woodland chorus to his ears. ”

“ Sitting there, the candle flickering in the strange draughts which came from nowhere, the gloom outside growing quite black, and the shadows in the little room growing huge and threatening, Madge was trying to read the riddle of her very awkward position.
A sharp knock at the door, one of those knocks which impudent and inconsiderate females give when they have no particular message to convey, and resent the necessity of carrying it.
‘A man in the oak parlour wants to see you, if you ben’t too busy.’
Madge passed her fingers over the aching head. ”

“ A parent is bound to maintain and educate his children according to his station; and if the father should neglect his duty in this respect, the mother—if living with her husband—may, as his agent, order what is necessary, and he would be responsible for the expense thus incurred, which must be strictly limited to what is reasonably necessary. If a child should become chargeable upon the poor-rates, both father and grandfather are responsible for repayment of the cost incurred ”

“ But in Scotland, the power of a father to dispose of his property by will is much more restricted, being confined to what is called the ‘dead man’s’ part—namely, so much as remains after setting aside one-third of the personal property or movable goods for the widow; and one-third for the children of the testator. Or if there be no widow, then the share of the children is one-half, which is divisible among them equally. The rights of either widow or child may be renounced by an antenuptial marriage contract, or for some equivalent provision given in such a contract, or by will ”

“ If he were dead, the mother would take a share of the personal estate with the surviving brothers and sisters, and the eldest brother would inherit the real estate as heir-at-law. If the mother were living, but no brothers or sisters, nephews or nieces, she would have the personal estate, but could not inherit the real estate so long as any heir could be found on the paternal side. The children of deceased brothers and sisters take equally amongst them the share of personal estate which their deceased parent would have taken if living. ”

“ A child while under the age of twenty-one years cannot enter into a binding contract, even with the consent and concurrence of its parent, except for special purposes. One of these purposes is the acquisition of knowledge which will enable the child to earn its livelihood when it arrives at maturity. Thus apprentices and articled clerks may be bound in such a manner as to render it compulsory for them to serve until they respectively attain the age of twenty-one years ”

“ A melancholy interest is lent just now to the name of St Marguerite by the fact that the last public act of the lamented Duke of Albany was to sign a petition protesting against the sale of that island. The thrilling tale of ‘the man with the iron mask,’ which used to be a favourite in school-books, has since our childish days enveloped the little island for us in a halo of mystery and awe. St Marguerite and its companion island of St Honorât lie, like twin gems of ocean, in the Golfe de Frejus, and form a romantic point in the seaward view from Cannes ”

“ In comfortable contrast with this lonesomeness, sitting among the deepening shadows on a dark clump of moorland, or bent, on the left-hand corner of the picture, is the dreamiest little hut, with the rarest blue smoke rising out of its crazy chimney, and floating like a spirit among the dark grays and purples sleeping on the hillsides. ”

“ In order to clear the ground, we will first dispose of the illegitimate class; and throughout this paper it must be understood that the words parent and child, when used without any qualifying terms, refer to those between whom that mutual relationship lawfully subsists.
An illegitimate child, or bastard, is one who is born without its parents having been lawfully married; and in England, a bastard born is illegitimate to the end of his or her life ”

“ A legitimate child—with the exception noted above—is the offspring of parents who were lawfully married before the time of its birth. A posthumous child, if born in due time after the husband’s death, is legitimate.
The father has primâ facie a right to the custody of his children while under the age of sixteen years; after that age, if they are able to maintain themselves, they may be emancipated from his control. ”

“ The tide is far out, and has left long zigzag shallow pools of water lying in the uneven places on the sands, into which the swift vanishing day, through a break in the dark saffron clouds, is casting wistful looks. ”

“ This is founded upon the well-known principle, that a minor can only be compelled to perform contracts entered into on his behalf during his minority; and that when he attains the age of twenty-one years, he is free to enter into contracts on his own behalf, which stand upon an entirely different footing, and are entirely inconsistent with the former contract. It may also be mentioned here that a minor, when he becomes of age, is free to elect whether he will perform any other contracts which he may have entered into during his minority. ”

“ A parent may lawfully maintain an action on behalf of his child, whether such child be an infant or of full age, without being liable to be prosecuted for the offence of maintenance or champerty. In like manner, a child if of full age may maintain an action on behalf of his parent, even though he may have no personal interest in the subject-matter of the action. ”

“ But with a sufficient weight attached, the patient may go to sleep confident of comparative ease; for the weight is too much for the spasmodic action of the muscles to overcome, and the bony surfaces therefore remain separated. And not only does the surgeon’s rack thus save the patient from a terrible amount of pain, but, by allowing him to get good rest of a night, it must increase enormously the probability of ultimate recovery. ”

“ The contraction about which we have spoken as taking place in scars formed after burns of the gullet, and which is so dangerous there, also occurs in burns on the surface of the body, and often leads to a good deal of deformity. Burns, indeed, are a great source of trouble to the surgeon in many ways. For instance, if a burn is very extensive, there may be great difficulty in getting a cicatrice to form over the whole of it. Cicatrisation only begins in the immediate neighbourhood of living epidermis, and therefore a burn or ulcer must heal from the circumference to the centre. ”

“ Meanwhile the clocks are striking the small-hours. But Silas Monk does not come home. The candle on the table beside Rachel burns low. The girl grows alarmed, and listens for the footsteps of her old grandfather. She goes out and looks about into the dark night. No one is to be seen, no one is to be heard. ”

“ The object of this arrangement of pulley and weight is, by making traction on the foot and leg, to keep the lower of the bones, which go to form the diseased joint, away from the upper, and so avoid the excruciating pain caused by the carious or ulcerated surfaces touching one another.
The benefit in such cases of having a weight drawing on the leg is most marked at night, when the patient wishes to get to sleep. With a good heavy weight, many a patient may sleep comfortably, who would otherwise be in a most pitiable condition through the long watches of the night. ”

“ The law of Scotland is not so favourable to the father and mother of intestates. The father does not succeed to real or heritable estate if there be a brother or sister, and in the same event his right is limited to that of one-half the movable estate. ”

“ The microphone re-transmits it as before, the telephone utters it, and so the process of repetition goes on ad infinitum.
Since the microphone can, as it were, magnify small sounds, and in this respect has some resemblance to the microscope, which magnifies minute objects, it might be thought that it would prove useful for deaf persons. But though the microphone enables a person with good ears to hear mechanical vibrations which otherwise would be inaudible, the sounds that are heard are not in themselves very loud, and hence a dull aural nerve might fail to appreciate them. ”

“ The Blake transmitter, the Ader, and many others by which music and speech are now conveyed so many miles, are all varieties of the carbon microphone. In some churches, microphone transmitters are now applied to the pulpit, so that the sermon can be transmitted by telephone to invalid members who cannot leave home. At the Electrical Exhibitions of Paris, Vienna, and the Crystal Palace, the music of an entire opera was transmitted from the stage by wire to other buildings where great numbers of persons sat and listened to it. ”

“ A bastard cannot inherit either real or personal estate from either of its parents, nor from any other person; neither can any person inherit from{378} a bachelor or spinster who is illegitimate. If, however, such a person marries, the husband or wife and children have the same legal rights as if the stain of illegitimacy had not existed. ”