as it alternately increases and diminishes,
indicates that the Sun's distance is at the same
time diminishing or increasing. The extremes
of the Sun's apparent distances occur about the
1st of January and the 1st of July. The
extreme distances bear to each other the
proportions of one hundred and seventeen to one
hundred and twenty-one. When, therefore, it is
said that the distance of the Earth from the Sun
serves as a unity of measure, the mean value
of that distance (half the sum of the greatest
and the smallest distances) will be understood
to be thereby meant.

But while we are thus looking out for Venus,
I wonder what the Venusians think of us. For
they persist, in spite of the late Dr. Whewell,
in maintaining the habitability of their globe.
They are, moreover, thoroughbred Highlanders:
our grandest landscapes are tame compared
with theirs. Not only is their country
mountainous, but they have mountains five times as
high as our very highest, to which they retreat
during the summer heats. Under the shadow
of rocks taller than Chimborazo, they preserve
their complexions from tanning by the sun.
Themselves (according to Kircher's account)
are universally handsome and young; how they
dispose of the old and ugly he does not say.
They are dressed in iridescent garments (shot
silks?) and transparent gauzes, which reflect
different hues with every play of light.

Better authorities tell us that Venus must be
very much what Cook found Otaheite, with
what Otaheite has not—glaciers fringed with
tropical vegetation. There are brilliant seas,
luxurious islands, rushing waterfalls, and
refreshing winds—with a great probability of
hurricanes, cyclones, and tornadoes upsetting
everything. Although Venus has no moon of
her own, Mercury, by his brightness and close
vicinity, and Terra, by her magnitude, render
the service of a couple of moons, and supply
her scene-painters with charming effects. Still,
the Earth's surface, nearly covered with seas
and veiled in a cottony, cloudy winding-sheet,
would be but a bad reflector of light, and
offer but a dingy spectacle. Our moon would
be a curiosity, certainly singular, but by no
means brilliant. All things considered, there
can be little doubt that the Venusians look
down upon us with an eye of pity.

             MY FIRST TIGER.

No soldier who has made one of a well-
organised shooting-party in India is likely to
forget the feelings of pleasure and of real liberty
with which he enjoyed his week or month's
absence from duty. Talk of a hard-worked
lawyer's annual holiday to Baden or Switzerland,
it is not to be compared with the enjoyment
of a month's shooting in India. In these
days there is not a nook or corner of Europe—no,
nor of many parts of Asia either—where you can
get completely away from the worry and bother
of every-day life. I know a large shareholder
in Overend, Gurney's unfortunate bank who
heard of his ruin when he was on the banks of
the Jordan, and another friend of mine got the
news that his daughter had run away with a
fellow not worth a shilling, whilst he, the
honoured parent, was travelling in Bulgaria.
In London we are always running a race against
time, and constantly losing it. Not so in
India. In that country, one day is so like
another, there is so very little to do and so
much time to do it in, that any change from
cantonment life is accounted a godsend. Even
the preparation for a month's campaign is no
light matter, and the occupation it affords, for a
fortnight or so before leaving the station, is not
the least pleasing part of the undertaking.
Tents have to be bought or hired; camels or
carts to carry luggage must be provided;
provisions for the party, and for the servants of the
party, are laid in; guns and ammunition put in
order; and a thousand things must be thought
of which a "griffin," or new hand in the country,
would never dream were necessary. In the
present instance our party consisted of Captain
Ring and myself, of my own regiment; Mr.
Hogan and Mr. Anger, of the Civil Service; with
Major Aster, of the staff, and Dr. Hoxon, an
assistant-surgeon of horse artillery. After the
custom and fashion of Bengal, the native servants
of these gentlemen numbered more than a
hundred and fifty souls, and this without including
such temporary followers as might join our camp
from any of the villages we passed near. Those
who have never been in the East may wonder
at such an immense following; but when I
enumerate the servants which each saib logue
(gentleman) is obliged to keep in that country,
their surprise will cease. For instance, I had
to look after me—or rather for me to look
after—a "kitmagar," or table- servant, a
Moslem, whose sole duty it was to wait upon
me at breakfast, luncheon, and dinner. Next was
a "bearer," a Hindoo, who looked after my
clothes, and acted as bed-maker. The third
servant in social position was a masaulchie, or
lamp-trimmer; the fourth, a dhobie, or washer-
man (no dhobie would dream of washing for two
masters); the fifth, a sweeper; and though last,
not least, each of my three horses had a syce, or
groom, and a grasscutter—six servants
connected with my stables, and five for myself, or
eleven in all. Suppose each of the party to
have had the same, this would have made sixty-
six servants. But having fewer horses than
the others, I had also fewer servants, so that
the personal following of the party may be safely
set down as eighty individuals. To these must
be added a cook, with two assistants, a butcher,
and six tent-pitchers that were in the general
pay of the party, and the wives of more than
half the servants, who accompanied their lords
to the jungle, many of them having two and
three children. Besides there were the camel-
drivers; the gharry, or cart-drivers; the
mahouts, or men in charge of the half-dozen
elephants lent us by the Commissariat Department,
each elephant having two men to cut forage for