Various

“ In this country the air is so damp that in general the discharge of the electricity of the clouds takes place quietly and silently; but in summer, and in dry climates, it produces the vivid flashings and injurious effects of the lightning, and the re-echoed rattle of the thunder-clap.
When water is cooled, it diminishes in bulk like other bodies; but at a particular temperature it deviates from the general law of contraction, and by doing so, becomes, perhaps, the most striking example of providential design that is to be met with in inorganic nature. ”

“ The motion of the sap in the one, that of the blood in the other class of living beings, becomes slower, and, dropping its leaves and fruit, the tree retains but its firm trunk, within which its energies are preserved for the ensuing season; whilst the hedgehog, the viper, the frog, and other animals, retire to their hiding-places, and in a state of almost lifeless stupor remain until the warmth of the succeeding spring calls them to renewed existence. ”

“ It is the renewed vigour it implants in all around that affects us—man, animals, birds, plants, vegetation, flowers. Refreshed and soothed with sleep, man opens his heart; he is alive to Nature, and Nature’s God, and his mind is more intelligent, because more fresh. ”

“ The nutrition of vegetables furnishes a beautiful and simple example of the use of water in nature. The body of the vegetable, the proper wood, may be considered as being composed of water and of charcoal; and hence, when we heat a piece of wood until we decompose it, the water is expelled, and carbon or charcoal remains behind. In order to grow, a plant must therefore get water and charcoal in a form fit for its use, that is, in such a form as it can make food of, and digest them. ”

“ From its value as the great agent of nutrition to the vegetable world, and the necessity of a supply of it to animals; from its power in modifying the appearance and structure of a country, changing land into sea, and elevating banks where deep water had been before, the philosophers of old looked upon water as the origin of all earthly things, as being above all others the element of nature. It is not so: water is not an element. ”

“ The fight thickened, volunteers joining either rank every moment, in the laudable endeavour to keep up the balance of power. Biddy had quitted her grip of the doctor, and was now, to the surprise of those who had time to look about them (and they were few) , engaged in the endeavour to wrench a stick out of the hands of a huge hulk of an Englishman, who, having merely gone to see the fun at Donnybrook, without the most remote idea of joining in a fight, could not be persuaded of the necessity of giving his stick, as he did not intend to use it himself, to one who did, and that one “a female!” ”

“ As to dining out with friends at this period of care and labour, he rarely ventures to indulge in such a recreation; or if he does on some very particular occasion, such is the discipline of his mind, such the strength of his self-denying habits, that he can rise from the table at a prescribed moment, and with a cool lawyer-like head apply to his nocturnal labours as if there had been no interruption of an exciting nature. ”

“ In the thin extremities, as in the leaves, such is the effect of the frost of a single night; but as the fluids, yielding but gradually up their latent heat, solidify very slowly, the injury does not extend so far as to be beyond the remedial powers of the plant itself. In another way, however, the peculiar latent heat of water is of still more importance. If there was no large collection of water on the globe, the change of seasons would be amazingly more rapid and more remarkable than they at present are. ”

“ If in spring or summer, when vegetable life is in activity, when the development of leaves, of flowers, and fruit, is at its greatest energy, end all the vessels of the plant are distended with its nutritious juices, were it suddenly exposed to cold, the sap would be frozen, and by the expansion of the ice the vegetable tissues torn to pieces, and the plant killed. ”

“ For the formation of substances which are peculiar to certain plants, other substances are required as food, thus, most plants require nitrogen, which is accordingly furnished abundantly in atmospheric air; others must have access to sulphur, in order to flourish; but this depends, as it were, upon particular branches of manufacture in which the plant is engaged; for its own support, for making wood, and the tissue of its leaves and vessels, it uses only water and carbonic acid.
The conversion of water into steam or invisible vapour by boiling, is one of the best known facts in science ”

“ Johnny Halfacre is a little farmer, whom I occasionally see, and who, being in no way connected with me, nor even conscious that I am particularly observing him, goes on in his own way, without any hint or encouragement from me, or indeed from any one else, as far as I can perceive. ”

“ There issues continually from the ocean at the equator, as the earth revolves, a current of water considerably warmer than that which bathes our shores. This current becoming sensible first in the Gulf of Mexico, is called the Gulf Stream; it passes obliquely across the Atlantic, floating on the colder water of the ocean, which tends in a direction nearly opposite to replace it, and thus diffuses over the coasts of North America and Europe the heat which it had absorbed within the torrid zone. ”

“ On the approach of spring, the warmer air, and the rays of the more elevated sun, act directly on the surface of the ice, and each portion of water formed by melting, becoming heavier, sinks, so as to expose the ice itself to the source of heat. Thus the ice is rapidly dissolved, and after a few days the lake throws off its wintry aspect altogether. ”

“ But, further, Johnny Halfacre’s garden, in which he seldom ceased from doing something in the summer evenings as long as daylight lasted, greatly aided in supporting his pig at that time when food is so dear and scarce for swine. The tops of blossoming bean-stalks (by the plucking off of which the crop is improved) and other vegetable waste, besides vetches and rye—the latter both in the green and ripe state—gave him sufficient food to keep the pig in fair order, with a little help from other sources ”

“ In fact, when on the cessation of summer the first cold winds tend to bring on the winter, and to bind up our lakes in frost, the first portion of water frozen becomes, by giving up its latent heat, a source of warmth which tempers the chilly air, and retards its action on the remainder. The water freezes thus very slowly. The vegetables, and certain classes of animals, feeling the cold of winter thus gradually coming on, prepare to meet it without injury. ”

“ Time is proportionably valuable to the meanest peasant who possesses a cabbage garden, and if properly estimated and applied, will add to his comforts in a degree of which, he who is habitually uncalculating and unthrifty in this respect can have but little notion. ”

“ The action of the cold wind continuing, the water at the surface is still further cooled; but now, in place of contracting, it expands—instead of becoming heavier, it becomes lighter, and remains floating upon the surface. It is then still further cooled, and finally its temperature being reduced to 32 degrees, it freezes, and a layer of ice is formed on the surface of the lake. ”

“ The northerly winds, which would bring down a sudden winter on us, are therefore tempered by passing over the warmer surface of the ocean; whilst the hot winds from the south, which on the approach of spring might make too premature a change, expend, in passing over the great expanse of sea, a portion of their heat ”

“ Water is a portion of the food of all living beings. In the case of animals, the bodies from whence they derive nutriment are so varied and so complex, that to illustrate the peculiar part which water plays in each, would occupy too much space. ”

“ There is thus no particular reason why there should be three times as much water at present as land, but it is easy to show that water on the great, as well as on the small scale, is of paramount importance in nature. ”

“ The indignant bystanders interfered to prevent the outrage, when—will it, can it be believed? our pen trembles, and a cold thrill runs through us as we write it!—the worse than Indian war-whoop, the yell of the collegians, was raised, and their numbers would in all human probability have succeeded, but for the timely interference of the police, to whose humanity, promptitude, and forbearance, upon the trying occasion, too much praise cannot be given. ”

“ Paddy and Biddy, with an alacrity and agility truly astonishing, sprang from the lofty vehicle, plunged into the crowd (where there were plenty of willing hands to free them from the handcuffs) , and escaped. Nor were the worthy doctors slow in following their example, the only prisoner that remained being the bewildered Englishman, who suffered “only” a three months’ incarceration in his majesty’s jail of Newgate for going to see Donnybrook, and the fun at it, his sentence having been mercifully mitigated, in consideration of its being his first offence! ”

“ All the water which is absorbed by plants is not assimilated, or digested; a great part is again thrown out by the surface of the leaves; for, precisely as the air which an animal expires from the lungs in breathing is loaded with vapour, so is there a process of perspiration from the surface of the leaves, which are the lungs of plants. ”

“ Now, the vapour which passes off is electrified also; and while in this state of electricity, it, on arriving at the colder regions of the air, cannot condense, to form liquid water. The minute particles of the water repel each other too violently, in virtue of their electricities, to form drops, but they constitute the great loose collections of clouds which diversify so much the appearance of our sky. The clouds being thus highly electrical, and being very light, are attracted by the tops of mountains and high lands, or by elevated buildings ”

“ The lawyer of high practice, during the term season, steadily pursuing his laborious studies, and determined to overcome every difficulty in his pursuit of professional rank and wealth, rises early, and borrows from the night so many of those hours which are spent in rest and sleep by men of less mental activity, that he leaves himself but a very contracted measure of time for those essential purposes. ”

“ As far as I can judge, he does not permit his worldly to supersede his eternal interests; and as he knows the value of the present TIME, so does he estimate aright the infinitely superior importance of that which is future. ”

“ In all our drinks, even in ardent spirits, there is a very large quantity of water, and our solid food very seldom contains less than nine-tenths of its weight of water. The living body is even less solid. ”

“ The physician—I do not mean him who is regularly called out of church, or from the social party, by his servant, under the pretence of a pressing call, but the real and laborious practitioner, to whom minutes are money and fame—will not idle away an hour; neither will the sober steady shopkeeper, until he has realized an independence, absent himself from his counter as long as there is a reasonable chance of a customer dropping in ”

“ The Baily lighthouse is a spot of no less antiquarian than picturesque interest. Its name, which is cognate with the Latin ballium, is derived from an ancient circular stone fortress which encircled the apex of the rock, and of which considerable remains existed previous to the erection of the present buildings. This great keep was fortified by three earthen walls, with deep intervening ditches placed at the entrance to the narrow peninsula, and by extending from one side of it to the other, cut it off completely from the promontory. ”

“ He had worked in the large garden of a gentleman who kept an English gardener, who had taught Johnny the use of a sprong in preference to a spade for turning up the earth, especially when too hard for the latter implement; and though the handle was short, and, according to my own notion, fatiguing to the back, the fact was, that Johnny soon preferred it for dispatch and correctness of operation to the long-handled spade which all my other neighbours use. ”

“ These pigs are now ten months old, and have never been outside their yard, nor do they seem to be (compared with pigs of the same age which have had the run of the common) injured by confinement. Being always highly littered in the yard, having the sleeping chamber kept perfectly clean, and being abundantly fed, they sport about the straw, and seem quite contented. But without such care and comfort young swine will certainly not thrive in imprisonment.
Johnny will fatten up these pigs in October for sale in November, with barley-meal, pollards, toppings, and potatoes ”

“ If our time were to bring us in such profits as the counsellor and the doctor make, we would be busy too, and no one would see us standing idle, sitting on a ditch side, or smoking and coshering by the fireside, or talking to the neighbours, of a wet day, in a forge. If we could be coining guineas as easily as the likes of them makes the money, sitting in their soft chairs, and never doing a hand’s turn of work that would tire their limbs, we would ”

“ He does not expect to realize any ready money by rearing and fattening them; when sold, his stock will merely pay for their keep—he considers the large quantity of valuable manure a sufficient return.
He has hired a labourer to work with him, and will incur but little expense for horse-labour, as he and his assistant together are able to dig an acre very deeply in ten days; and he considers one such digging equal to three light ploughings; and from his experience of the last year, he is of opinion that spade-husbandry is far cheaper than that which is effected by the plough. ”

“ A man weighing 150 lbs. would, if perfectly dried, weigh not more than 10 lbs., the other 140 lbs. being water. It is to the existence of this quantity of water that we owe the elasticity, the softness, and pliability of the different portions of our frame, the animal tissues being, when dry, hard and brittle as dry glue. ”