judge whether he isn't a wonder. He can turn
a live horse into a clean-picked skeleton in five
-and-twenty minutes—Greenwich time"—the
last two words were added as clinchers settling
the wonder qualitication off-hand. "An hour
is considered pretty quick work for any one
but him; but he's such a clever workman, that
a horse is dead, and skinned, and cut up, I give
you my word, before you've done speculating
when he's going to begin. He is in the yard
outside; now I told him to keep about to-night,
as I'd got some gentlemen coming. You've only
to come into the yard to see as many horses
killed as you like." The donkey's skull and the
petrified diseases force themselves upon us
stonily as we pass from the jolly sanctum to the
office, and from the office to the yard; and the
high-stepping animals still trotting on its walls
seem to say, 'We, too, were knocked on the
head by the artistic Potler.'"

A good-looking, muscular young fellow, with
a heavy, fair moustache and "mutton-chop"
whiskers; a young man with a keen bright eye
and a brisk manner, and who, in point of attire,
looked as if he had stepped bodily out of some
tailor's fashion-book, lifted his low-crowned hat
courteously as we passed into the yard. A
huge coin, like the top of a gold shaving-pot,
dangled from his watch-chain, and precious
stones glistened upon his cravat, and wrists, and
hands. This was the expert. He stood
between a string of living horses and a large
heap of dead ones—a conqueror upon his own
battle-field. His little army of slaughterers,
in their white canvas uniforms, were busily
carving and cutting in the large slaughter-house
to the left. Gracefully directing our attention
to their doings, our new friend then proceeded
to confirm what we have already heard. He is
evidently proud of his professional achievements,
though exercising a certain gentlemanly
reserve when speaking of himself. "Twenty-five
minutes from first to last is the quickest time a
horse was ever killed and stripped in by mortal
man, and there's no one can't do that but me"
is his answer to our first question. "Stripping,"
we are reminded, means clearing every
atom of flesh from the bone, disposing of it in
boilers and elsewhere, and leaving the horse's
skeleton clean and bare. "Let the gentlemen
see you settle a few yourself, Potler,
and we'll reckon how long it takes you to do
it," is the signal for four horses to be led in.
Their halters are fastened to a beam above,
and they stand patiently side by side waiting
Mr. Potler's pleasure. That gentleman hands
his blue cloth reefing-jacket to one of his
slaughterers-in-waiting, and stands in shirt-
sleeves poising a poleaxe in front of his first
victim. The attendants have covered its eyes
and face with a piece of stiff oil-cloth, which
delves in at the top of the forehead so as to
make a bull's-eye.

After a couple of feints, apparently to show
his consummate mastery over his weapon, the
sharp end of the poleaxe descends with a
mighty blow and the horse falls—dead. There
is no intermediate suffering. The animal rolls
over upon its back simultaneously with the
crashing sound of the pointed axe through
its skull. A single quiver of the four legs as
they fall heavily into position, and the assistant-
slaughterers are peeling his hide off and cutting
him up. There is absolutely no transition
between life and death, and the entire operation
is decent, decorous, and orderly. In far less
time than it has occupied to write these words
the next horse in rotation has been blindfolded
and poleaxed in his turn—the same formal
preliminaries, the feints and poisings, having been
gone through. The four horses are killed off
in less than three minutes from their being led
into the slaughter-house; and as we turn away,
we see the first animal stretched out on his
back, his four hoofs tied to hooks from the
ceiling, and three busy figures in canvas peeling
him as methodically and naturally as if he
were an orange. The building in which this
scene takes place is perfectly clean, and Mr.
Potler returns to us without a speck apparent
upon his boots, or clothes, or hands. Stepping
easily forward, and resting on the handle of
his poleaxe as he talks, much as I've seen
cricketers after a long score, he again tells us,
with dignified modesty, that he attributes his
proud position, not so much to natural gifts,
as to long and early practice, and to having
given the whole of his mind to the subject
ever since he can remember. He leaves the
"stripping" to his subordinates to-night, and
contents himself with what we have seen.

Such was the information I gained on that
occasion. I had ascertained that London
consumes its own horse-flesh, and that packs of
hounds and country cats and dogs are fed on
horses locally killed. One of the largest coal-
owners in the country assured me that, out
of the number of horses employed at and
down his pit, an average of six or seven are
killed and wasted every week; while other
friends declare horse-eating to be useless, on
account of the limited supply existing in the
country. My friends say it is commonly eaten
now. But the subject is too delicate to broach just
now, so my evening there closes for the present.

SOUND

DR. TYNDALL'S Heat was a great as well as
an agreeable surprise. A book of science could
be interesting! The material objects brought
into play turned out very curious bodies indeed,
with strongly marked individual character, and
often appearing under singular disguises. There
was no want of sensational incidents. The story,
too, had a plot and a regular dénouement—the
stripping heat of its pretensions to rank as an
entity, and the reducing it to a mere mode of
motion—worked out as carefully as the best
constructed drama.

Sound, lately given to us by the same great
master, is even more familiar in its illustrative
details. One characteristic of Dr. Tyndall's
books is, that they set you thinking before you
have finished a couple of pages; their very