Literary Progress in Spain.-If the Revolution has done nothing else for Spain, it has given a wonderful impetus to the book trade. To judge by the increase in the number of booksellers' shops in Madrid,--to say nothing of the open-air stalls, whose well-garnished shelves would put to shame maný a similar establishment in Oxford street,every man in Madrid must spend his entire day in reading. But a few years ago, two or three booksellers sufficed for Madrid; now, you find half-adozen in every street. The books exposed in the

windows are not, indeed, of the highest order of literature, but in many cases are very interesting, as showing the comparative infancy of the nation in such matters. Elementary treatises on political economy, philosophy, and various social subjects, occupy prominent positions, and little labels asserting their novelty recommend them to the attention of the buyer. These windows are generally thronged with spectators, as much so as the print and photograph shops of Paris. Translations of every possible French work, good or bad-more usually the latter-also abound, and Florey and Maldonado are in great request; but the novelty of the day is an edition of the complete works of Plato, translated for the first time into Spanish, by Don Patricio Azcárate. A certain number of violently revolutionary and infidel publications are to be seen in most of the shops; but, by way of a counterpoise, we may add, that the Bible Society of London has no less than two large shops at Madrid, which have been established, we understand, with the most complete success.-Athe

næum.

Mr. Richard Bentley.-It is with great regret that we announce the decease of Mr. Richard Bentley, the well-known publisher. Mr. Bentley commenced business in 1829, in conjunction with the late Mr. Colburn, from whom he separated in the year 1832. The authors with whom Mr. Bentley became associated in the early portion of his career were, Morier, the author of "Hajji Baba," Horace Smith, Colley Grattan, G. P. R. James, Lord Lytton, Dr. Maginn, Father Prout, Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, and Charles Dickens. About the year 1835 Mr. Bentley began the publication of the "Standard Novels," a series which extended to 127 volumes, comprising many of the bestknown fictions of the time. In the year 1837 Mr. Bentley started that well-known magazine, Bentley's Miscellany, and commenced the famous Miscellany dinners in the Red Room in Burlington street. They were attended by Tom Moore, Dickens, Thackeray, Luttrell, Maxwell, Albert Smith, Tom Campbell, Barham ("Ingoldsby "), and Sir Edward Creasy. In the Red Room Charles Dickens drew up the prospectus of Bentley's Miscellany; and the manuscript, in Mr. Dickens's handwriting, was framed, and may be still seen at New Burlington street. In 1857 Mr. Bentley, by the decision of the House of Lords, reversing the right hitherto supposed to be possessed by American authors of copyright in this country, lost 16,000 to 17,000l. This decision was again reversed within a recent period; but the mischief the first verclict inflicted affected Mr. Bentley to the last. In the year 1859 he commenced, in conjunction with Mr. Douglas Cooke, Bentley's Quarterly Review, to which Lord Robert Cecil, now Marquis of Salisbury, lent his aid. This Review

reached, however, but four numbers; and probably it failed from the absence in its pages of any distinct political bias. The more recent publications of the house are too well known to require mention.-Athenæum.

LITERARY NOTICES.

History of the Commune of Paris. By W. M. FETTRIDGE. New York: Harper & Bros.

A GENUINE history of the Paris Commune, which would enter upon the causes and the obscure but (as the result proved) powerful social forces which underlay and brought about the tremendous explosion of last Spring, would no doubt be very acceptable to the world just now. It would also

be an invaluable contribution toward the solving of the most difficult and threatening problem which European civilization is at present called upon to confront,--the problem, namely, of the proper relations between Labor and Capital, between the upper and lower classes of society. Such a history we might perhaps expect from the writer of A History of the Commune in Paris, an article from Blackwood, which was reprinted in the September number of the ECLECTIC; or from Mr. Frederic Harrison, the ablest English champion of the Comtist Philosophy and of the Communistic principle in politics. We certainly shall not get it from Mr. Fettridge, who commences his volume with the actual revolt of the National Guards, who sees nothing in the movement apparently except its purely military aspects, and the first and most important part of whose narrative is confused, unintelligible, and in fact utterly bewildering. The reader who confines his investigations to this volume will obtain but a meagre idea of what the Commune really was, or even of what it did, for Mr. Fettridge writes of those terrible days, of the "Ruin which stalked red-handed" through the streets of Paris, with the singular mildness of a man of little imagination, writing at a distance in point of time from his theme, and for a public which has "supped full of horrors." He was in Paris "during the entire siege," and was therefore, it may be supposed, a personal witness of the catastrophe; yet there is not a page in his book which might not have been written by any tolerably industrious compiler who had never seen Paris, or a fight, or a fire.

This much may be said for it, however, that it is more interesting and more nearly approaches completeness than any narrative of the insurrection yet written by an American. The most valuable feature of the volume are the engravings, which are twenty in number, and which give an excellent and probably trustworthy portrait of every prominent member of the Commune, besides M. Thiers, Marshal McMahon, and others. The map apbut it is of very little service in tracing the stra pended is finely engraved and useful for travellers, tegic movements of the campaign.

Art in Greece. By HENRI TAINE. Translated by JOHN DURAND. New York: Holt, Williams & Co. 1871.

THE perusal of M. Taine's other works has only fortified the opinion which we expressed in reviewing his masterly volumes on Italy, that he is the greatest art-critic living,-the clearest, the most

comprehensive, the most satisfying, the one who above all others makes us feel that criticism is no mere fortuitous concourse of vagrant and arbitrary impressions, but a science based on sound and well-defined mental laws. The cultured reader must always admire Ruskin, and he will never fail to find in his pages most valuable suggestions concerning art, as well as the loftiest inspiration; but Ruskin is dominated by his emotions, he is without method, and his theory is vague and intangible even to himself. M. Taine, on the other hand, with artistic perceptions and sensibilities not less keen, is always master of himself, always cool, clear, and precise, notwithstanding the fervid eloquence of many of his pages, and has a theory of art and a method of criticism as systematic and logical as a proposition in geometry.

Art in Greece is a good illustration of this method, and it is certainly the most satisfactory analysis of Grecian art and of the reasons which made sculpture, noblest of arts, so glorious and incomparable in that distant age that we have ever read. And it is more. It gives a clearer and better insight into Greek character, into the circumstances which shaped their destiny as a people, into their genius, customs, and points of contrast to the modern world, than can be gotten from Grote, Curtius, Mitford, and all the historians combined.

Commencing with the physical aspects of Greece, M. Taine concentrates our attention successively on the Race, the Period, and the Institutions. At the end we are surprised to find that though little has been written on Art proper, we have been brought so near to Phidias and his brother-artists, have so clear a perception of the principles and causes which underlay the aspect of Art which they illustrate, that though we could wish a few more of those brilliant glimpses at Athens and the Athenians, we have scarcely a question that remains unanswered.

It would give us much pleasure to explain what M. Taine considers the "philosophy of art," by copious citations from the text; but it is better perhaps to recommend our readers to study the little volume in its entirety. The whole series, moreover, of which it forms the concluding volume, is about as valuable an addition as a man could make to his library.

East and West Poems. By BRET HARte. New York: James R. Osgood & Co.

SEVERAL years ago Bret Harte published a volume of poems entitled "The Lost Galleon." This was before he had become famous and could command attention for anything he chooses to lay before the public, so the modest little volume made but small noise in the world of literature and its very existence had been forgotten by those who first associated the name of Bret Harte as an author with the Luck of Roaring Camp and the marvellously fine stories which followed it in the pages of the Overland Monthly. These poems, together with those which he has written since the appearance of his last book, make up the contents of East and West Poems, and are submitted once more to the judgment of the public. They are of unequal merit, most of the older ones causing only a mild surprise that they failed to make a name for their author; but there are others, such as The

Greyport Legend, The Newport Romance, His Answer to Her Letter, The Second Review of the Grand Army, and a half-dozen more, which fulfil better than anything he has yet written the promise of the unrhymed poetry of his earlier stories, and which prevent our acquiescing in the opinion of the Blackwood reviewer, that the time has been in any degree misspent that Mr. Harte has given to the cultivation of the Muse.

It is a somewhat dubious experiment for a writer who has achieved fame to challenge the public with his earlier and cruder efforts, but East and West Poems will fully maintain, even if they do not advance, Mr. Harte's reputation as a poet, and his admirers at least will be glad to have them.

Miss Columbia's Public School. By a Cosmopolitan. Illustrated by THOMAS NAST. New York: F. B. Felt & Co.

THE chief attractions of this amusing little brochure are of course the seventy-two illustrations by Nast. The letter-press itself is very well done -altogether better to our mind than the Dame Europa's School on which it is founded. It deals in a pointed and spirited way with the general outlines of American history, tells of the various difficulties which "Miss Columbia" has had, first with Johnny Bull, and then with slavery and civil war in her own dominions,-devoting special attention to the new "irrepressible conflict" which the Irish element in our population and the aggressive policy of the Roman Catholic sect is slowly forcing upon the country. Many good hits are made, and the whole is unusually free from the exaggeration and vulgar raillery into which such satire is too likely to betray its author; but, as we have said, the liveliest part of the book are the caricatures by Nast. These are crude in execution, but excellent in design, and are made to do good service in the present fight with Tammany corruptionists. Tweed, Hall, Sweeny, and Connolly figure conspicuously in all the pictures which illustrate the "Irish difficulty;" and the artist proves here, as he has already proved in Harper's Weekly, that "custom cannot stale their infinite variety.” There is something like Fate in the cool, relentless way in which Nast follows up these fellows, -dragging them before a tribunal which is more terrible to them doubtless than the dubious menace of the local courts. Mr. Nast wields a tre

mendous power, -a power which is unique in America, and it is fortunate for the country that he wields it always in the interest of public virtue.

SCIENCE.

The Arctic Regions.—North-polar voyaging assumes a new aspect this summer, for not only are there more than a dozen expeditions, greater and smaller, besieging the icy fastnesses of the arctic region at almost every point in the circle of its unknown area, but the whole of these, with two exceptions, are independent of any public aid, and have been undertaken at individual risk, in the hope of direct mercantile as well as scientific gain.

Two very important expeditions are under German leadership (Petermann's Mittheilungen, ix.). The Rosenthal expedition of this year sailed on the 25th of June from Bremerhafen, and is directed by the veteran traveller von Heuglin. One of

the two vessels belonging to it is the Germania, the steamer in which the second German voyage to East Greenland was made. The ships are prepared for a fifteen months' cruise of discovery in the Siberian seas, and the route which it is intended to follow passes through the strait of Novaia Zemlia, and across the Kara Sea; thence an attempt will be made to double the North Cape of Asia and to reach the islands of New Siberia. A few determinations of longitude, alone, in this region, would be of the greatest service to geography. Payer and Weyprecht's expedition, which left Tronisö also in June, is directed to the region east of Spitzbergen, where the land named after King Karl of Würtemberg has been dimly seen, and is now to be the special object of exploration. A Swedish expedition in two war vessels provided by government, led by Professor Nordenskjöld, left Carlscrona on the 11th of May, for the more complete examination of the sea between Greenland and Spitzbergen. Several Norwegian vessels, under well-tried arctic commanders, and thoroughly equipped with scientific instruments lent by the government, have sailed for the seas between Spitzbergen and Novaia Zemlia.

From Scotland Mr. Lamont has gone with his steam-yacht to revisit the scene of last year's German expedition on the East Greenland coast in high latitudes; and an enterprising Englishman, Mr. Leigh Smith, has bought and manned a vessel at Tromsö to sail for the Spitzbergen seas.

The well-considered American expedition of Captain Hall in the Polaris steamer left New York in the end of June. Supplies of coal await the vessel at Disco, in West Greenland, and it is intended to purchase a supply of sledge-dogs at Upernavik, the northernmost settlement on that coast; thence the Polaris will cross Melville Bay, and Captain Hall has chosen to follow Jones Sound as the most promising entrance to the circumpolar region.

In

France is also represented this year in the person of a gentleman named Octave Pavy, formerly a resident in North America, who has prepared an expedition at his own cost, to carry out, in its main features, the plan proposed by his own countryman, Lambert, a few years ago. He proposes to cross the Pacific from San Francisco to Japan, and there to charter a ship for Kamtchatka. Petropaulovsk he will purchase 200 reindeer and 50 dogs, and will travel thence in deer-sledges by Anadyrsk to Cape Jakan. There, one-half of the number of reindeer will provide a supply of fresh provision for the further part of the journey, and the remainder will be left in charge of the native Chukchees. Should solid ice be found extending northward from the cape to the unvisited Wrangell Land, the dog-sledges will be put in action; if there is open water a "modified monitor raft,' constructed specially for this use, will be fitted up and launched on the polar waters.— The Academy.

is slowly burning away and melting into gases; as these cool down there will be winter in the sun, and our globe will supply the missing heat. Commencing at the equator, an increasing fire will diffuse itself over the whole earth, scorching up life and vegetation, and melting the earth's crust into a gasosphere. Throughout this period the moon, which is now an ice-bound planet, will bask in vivifying rays, and enjoy the genial warmth which at present belongs to us. Gradually our globe will once more cool down, but unless a larger faculty of accommodation to altered circumstances shall have taken place, animal life will be represented solely by a race of salamanders. Mr. Ellis bids us use our eyes and observe how at the present time Mercury is burning and Mars is passing from the red into the white stage of incandescence; the sun is in flames, which can be seen at every eclipse, and the earth is becoming sensibly warmer every year. Men of science may, if they choose, admit the theory of planetary cremation; but the notion that the seasons are becoming warmer is not likely to be popular this autumn.-Pall Mall Gazette.

"mo

What is Coal?-This question is answered in a very able paper by Professor Dawson, LL.D., in the "Monthly Microscopical Journal" for August. He says that-1. The mineral charcoal or ther coal" is obviously woody tissue and fibres of bark; the structure of the varieties of which and the plants to which it probably belongs, he has discussed in another paper. 2. The coarser layers of coal show under the microscope a confused mass of fragments of vegetable matter belonging to various descriptions of plants, and including, but not usually largely, sporangites. 3. The more brilliant layers of the coal are seen, when separated by thin lamine of clay, to have on their surfaces the markings of Sigillaria and other trees, of which they evidently represent flattened specimens, or rather the bark of such specimens. Under the microscope, when their structures are preserved, these layers show cortical tissues more abundantly others. any 4. Some thin layers of coal consist mainly of flattened layers of leaves of Cordaites or Pychnophyllum. 5. The Stigmaria underclays and the stumps of Sigillaria in the coal roofs equally testify to the accumulation of coal by the growth of successive forests, more especially of Sigillariæ. There is, on the other hand, no necessary connection of sporangite beds with Stigmarian soils. Such beds are more likely to be accumulated in water, and consequently to constitute bituminous shales and cannels. 6. Lepidodendron and its allies, to which the spore-cases in question appear to belong, are evidently much less important to coal accumulation than Sigillaria, which cannot be affirmed to have produced spore-cases similar to those in question, even though the observation of Goldenberg as to their fruit can be relied on; the accuracy of which, however, he is inclined to doubt.

than

A Grand Dredging Exploration.-Professor Agassiz has accepted an invitation extended to him by the American Coast Survey Bureau to take passage on the iron coast-survey steamer, which has recently been built at Wilmington, Delaware, and which was to sail for the Pacific coast in September. The expedition will take deep-sea soundings all the way, and extensive collections of spe

Discovery of Another Asteroid.-Another asteroid, the 15th, has been discovered by Mr. Watson, of Ann Arbor, Mich., who bids fair to rival the most successful asteroid-seekers.

The Manufacture of Steel.-Mr. David Forbes' usual quarterly report on the mining and metallurgical resources of the several States of Europe gives us most valuable information. In fact, it gives in a condensed and thoroughly comprehensive form, everything that has been done for the quar

ter.

We find it stated that M. Aristide Berard has recently introduced into practical operation, at Givors, in France, a process for the direct conversion of pig-iron into steel, for which, among other advantages, he claims that it effects a partial purification of the iron, by eliminating the sulphur, phosphorus, arsenic, etc.; at least, to such an extent, that commoner brands of pig-iron, which by no process at present known could be used, may be employed for making steel suitable for the manufacture of rails, tires, etc.; and that, by the combined action of air and gas, alternate oxidizing or reducing effects may be obtained at pleasure, so that the decarbonization or recarbonization, and consequent uniform nature of the product may be regulated, whilst at the same time the waste is reduced to a minimum. The main features of the process are the conversion of the fuel employed into a gaseous state, the use of a jet of superheated, steam in so doing, and the employment of a peculiarly-shaped converting furnace, in which from three to five tons of cast-iron is treated at a time, the charge being run into the movable bed of the furnace, in the molten state, direct from the blast furnace or cupola. Spiegeleisen is added in the operation, and the waste is stated to be not more than from seven to eight per cent., whilst the operation is said to require only from one hour to one hour and a half.

Proposal for a Series of Surveys of the Star Depths. Mr. Proctor, in a communication to the Royal Astronomical Society, indicates the necessity of a series of systematic surveys of the heavens, on a principle quite different from that on which the Herschels gauged the star depths. A series of telescopes of gradually increasing aperture should be employed to gauge every portion of the celestial sphere, the series of gauges for the several apertures being then charted isographically. His opinion of the value of such surveys is founded on the interesting results which are established by the isographic charting of all Argelander's series of 40 full-sheet charts, showing the places of 324,198 stars. It would not be necessary, however, to mark in every star separately, with careful reference to position and size, as in the isographic copy of Argelander's charts; all that would be necessary would be to mark in the observed number of stars (as determined by the gauges) in the corresponding spaces in the chart. The gauge fields should not

be circular, but square (except close by the poles), so as to leave no ungauged spaces, and to avoid overlaps. By taking apertures of 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 12, and 18 inches, or even to 2 ft. and 4 ft., a progressive series of charts would be obtained, which would throw great light on the laws of stellar distribution.

Darwin's Theory Applied to Plants.—An excellent paper on this subject has been reproduced from the German in the "American Naturalist " for July. It is a very lengthy paper, and is abundantly supplied with notes. It is translated by Mr. Packard, Jr., whose name is so well known in America and England. The original authors are Dr. E. Müller and Professor F. Delpino. It is the most important botanical contribution which has appeared for years.

A Terrible Disease.-A disease in which the whole of the human body becomes infested with minute worms has long been known in Germany, where the habit of eating raw ham and half-cooked sausage widely prevails. This flesh-worm disease has made its appearance in England, as is said, for the first time. At a farmhouse in Cumberland, the mistress, her daughter, and a man-servant were taken ill, and suffered acute pains, described as worse than rheumatic pains, in their limbs. Dr. Cobbold, in a lecture delivered at the Society of Arts, states that the pains were occasioned by thousands, perhaps millions, of trichina burrowing and eating their way from one part of the body to another. The man was the most afflicted of the three, probably because he had eaten most of the "old sow" from which the disease was "caught." In this case the meat had been grown on the farm ; every one knows that home-fed bacon is regarded as wholesome; and the question arises :-Is the disease spreading, and What is the remedy? To the latter query the answer is:-Cook the meat thoroughly; let it be as well done inside as outside, and the trichina will be all killed. As to the spread of the disease, further evidence is wanting. In some quarters, a disposition prevails to trace the origin of the worm-disease in animals to sewage irrigation. But, as our readers will remember, a scientific committee have reported that the crops on a sewage-irrigated farm show no signs of parasites.

The Theory of Ocean Currents.-The dredging expeditions to the deep sea within the past three years have given rise to a grand theory of oceanic currents, in which are included the various phenomena of temperature, density, and animal life brought to light by those expeditions. Animals native to the arctic seas have been found in southerly latitudes, and to account for their presence in these regions, the existence has been assumed of a cold current far below the surface, in which the animals were drifted down. Under-currents and up-and-down currents are supposed to be the means by which the equilibrium of the ocean is maintained; but Captain Spratt of the royal navy, who has had much experience in marine surveying, contends that the theory recently put forth has no foundation in fact, and that no currents prevail in the deep parts of the sea. He shows that the conclusions arrived at are based on a mistaken interpretation of surface-current phenomena, and that the mistake originated in faulty methods of

observation. Captain Spratt's views and arguments are printed at length in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, and may therefore be discussed by all interested in the question; and will doubtless be duly weighed by Dr. Carpenter, who is about to make another exploration in the Mediter.

ranean.

About Petroleum.-Where does petroleum come from? is a question which has excited much discussion among geologists in America. Dr. Sterry Hunt, F.R.S., of Montreal, answers, that while certain limestones throughout the United States are so largely oleiferous as at present, it seems unphilosophical to search elsewhere for the origin of the oil, or to imagine it to be derived by some unexplained process from rocks which are destitute of the substance. In the neighborhood of Chicago there are enormous deposits of this oilbearing limestone; some of the houses in the city are built of it, and after a while present a smeary appearance from exudation of the oil. The least thickness of the mass is thirty-five feet, and it has been estimated from experiment that each square mile of it contains seven and three-quarter million barrels, each of forty gallons, of petroleum. As a means of comparison, we mention that the total produce of the great Pennsylvania oil-region from 1860 to 1870 was twenty-eight million gallons. Four square miles of the Chicago limestone contain a greater quantity.

The Mouth of the Mississippi.-The coastsurveyors are kept in continual anxious work by the never-ceasing deposits of mud at the outlets of the Mississippi. The bar advances seawards about three hundred and thirty-eight feet every year, and this movement and the growth of mud-lumps heighten the difficulty of keeping the channels open. With all concerned in the navigation of the river, a strong desire now prevails that the mouths should advance so far into the deep water of the gulf as to put a stop to the formation of bars. The mouth known as the South-west Pass appears to be the most advanced towards the desired condition; and if the other outlets could be closed, the mouth of the Mississippi would become within the present generation similar to that of the Amazon or Orinoco.

Land Drainage.-Mr. Lawes and Dr. Gilbert, whose names are known to agriculturists everywhere, have made a long series of experiments to determine how much of the nitrogen supplied to a field is lost. There was reason to believe that some of the nitrogen passed away with the drainage-water, that some remained shut up in the soil, while another portion was lost by evolution from the leaves of the growing plants. The experiments above referred to showed that a considerable

portion of the nitrogen did remain in the soil, not having contributed to increase of crop; but still there was a large amount unaccounted for, and this, on further investigation, was proved to have been lost in drainage. Ont his, Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert remark that, it being established beyond all question that land-drainage may carry off as nitrites and nitrates large quantities of the nitrogen supplied as manure, it becomes a matter of great practical importance to consider the power of different descriptions of soil to retain the nitrogen supplied to them, to estimate approximately the

probable average proportion of the rainfall which may pass from them as drainage-water, and to determine, accordingly, the best modes, and the best periods of the year, for the application of nitrogenous manures. From this it will be understood that farmers will more and more find their advantage in scientific knowledge; and in the acquisition of this knowledge, their daily life will become more and more interesting.

ART.

Statues of Statesmen at Westminster.—It has been proposed to erect at Westminster, by means Peel, Viscount Palmerston, and the Earl of Derby, of funds subscribed, statues of the late Sir Robert and the Treasury requested Mr. Barry and Mr. Weekes, together with Mr. Fergusson, to report upon the subject. These gentlemen state that the two gardens opposite the gateways of New Palace Yard are the only open-air spaces at present available for the statues of statesmen in the neighborhood of the Houses of Parliament; and that if the central avenue between these gardens were widened to twenty-eight feet, ten statues could be accommodated, five on each side of it, so as to form a pleasing and appropriate approach to the Houses of Parliament. While some of the pedestals would be unoccupied, they might be temporarily surmounted by vases to contain flowers. The four truncated angles of the square would afford suitable positions for eight more statues, and suggestions are made to prevent any incongruity or unpleasing effect while the number may be incomplete. The three gentlemen consulted are of opinion that the statues should, as a general rule, be one-half larger than life-size, inclusive of the plinth of about five inches, and that they should not all be of an uniform height, but that the same variety of height as exists in life should be, approximately at least, retained. The pedestals should be uniform in dimensions and in design, and in accordance with the architecture of the surrounding buildings. It is considered that eight feet will be the best height for the pedestals. After the eighteen statues have been erected, which can be placed in Parliament Square Gardens, other sites may be available, after the clearances in Old Palace Yard and Abingdon street.-Leisure Hour.

Engraving by Electricity.-The efforts which have been made from time to time, with but poor encouragement, to engrave on metals by means of electricity, seem at last to have resulted in the attainment of practical results. An ingenious French mechanic has produced an invention by which a metal plate, upon which a design is drawn with a chemical ink of some kind, is slowly rotated with its face vertical, and several other similar plates, graded in size, are also slowly rotated by appropriate mechanism. The object of the invention is to engrave on the smaller plates the design traced upon the largest, on different scales of magnitude, which is accomplished by applying a cutting point to the face of each plate, and which is pressed against it by means of an electric current whenever a blunt point, applied to the large plate, encounters the ink in which the design is traced,-the cutting points being at other times withdrawn. The point presented to the first plate is merely a “feeler,” which determines by electrical agency whether the