Sibley had it. While the master wavered and deliberated, and drifted to and fro, the man was gone.

CHAPTER XVIII.

MAUDE SIBLEY.

MR. SIBLEY had once lived in lodgings, and had days of adversity. Fortune had been at odds with him; but that was some time ago. He had feathered his nest well by now. He had a comfortable house and a comfortable income. The income, people hinted, was made rather than earned. But people are apt to be ill-natured when a neighbour climbs up the ladder while they remain at the bottom. Sibley was pretty nearly up the ladder in these days. He could ride his hunter when he liked; he had a nice little balance at his banker's, and, on the whole, things were going very smoothly with him. But he was not a happy man, nor was he likely to be while Mordecai sat at the gate.

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He wanted her to be handsome and brilliant and accomplished. He wanted to push her forward into society, so as to gain a more advanced footing for himself.

He would not have cared what he spent on her dress, or how worldly and frivolous she might be. Instead of which she would sing hymns-he had heard the servants say so. And he knew the book which was her constant companion in her hours of solitude-her Bible. He could not make her the partner of his schemes either, and Sibley was always scheming. There was some influence which unconsciously restrained him. So that the father and the daughter held on each a separate course; like parallel lines, they never met.

Yet she struggled hard to be some kind of a companion to him; she would be at the head of the table if possible. Many times it was not possible, and she would lie stretched on her bed of suffering, where he never visited her, or attempted to soothe or comfort

"It is not in my way, and Maude is used to it," he would mutter to himself.

She was sitting by the fire reading when he came in from his interview with Sir Frederic. She put aside her book directly.

You are late, dear papa."

The drawing-room was very handsomely furnished, and as large and commodious as that at the Tower.

Sibley liked luxury. He was by nature of a soft, effeminate habit, and he had crept on from one luxury to another.

He was a widower. His wife had died years ago, when Maude Sibley was an infant.

It was rather a painful heritage which the mother had bequeathed to the child, incessant ill-health.

None knew what Maude suffered. She might be said never to have been young. All her childhood, all her early youth, were spent in battling with some disease which medical skill could not lay hold upon. It was like a blight, which made her life apparently dreary and joyless, that is, as far as externals went. She was young still, but there was no beauty in the pallid, sickly face, and the dwarfed stunted figure.. If, indeed, we except the look of patient resignation which shone from her eyes; the quietude of her spirit, the piety and trustfulness of her nature. These were hidden ornaments, pearls of great price.

Her father did not see them. He never had. It was one of his sorest trials that the girl should have grown up so different to other girls.

Let us go

"It is as likely as not we shall have to wait for it. There was not a sign of breakfast when I came down this morning."

"When shall you be home, papa ?"

"I can't tell; in a day or two, I suppose."

He took it up carelessly. Perhaps he was glad to change the topic. He turned to the blank leaf at

Maude had stood looking at him. There was an evident struggle going on in her mind. At length she advanced a step.

"Papa," said she, softly.

"Yes, child."

She laid her hand on his arm, and her tearful eyes were raised to him.

"Dear papa, kiss me before you go."

He gave her a cold, hasty kiss.

Papa," said she, still detaining him, and speaking as though the words were forced from her, "I should not have asked, but for one thing, I feel my life hangs on a thread, the doctors tell me it does. I get weaker and weaker every day. I might die, papa, without having the opportunity of seeing you, or bidding you farewell."

He looked at her with more feeling than he had shown yet. He saw how ill she was-how fast fading; and, perhaps, some touch of remorse strove within him.

"I daresay I shall be home to-morrow night," he said; "and now have your dinner, and amuse your

He read in a loud, angry voice, his face colouring with surprise, "Kate Ormond!"

"What business has this book here, Maude?" he asked, in displeasure.

"Kate lent it me, papa, a long time ago. We were schoolfellows, if you remember."

"Then I won't have it-I won't have the name of Ormond turning up under one's very eyes. I shall throw the book in the fire." And, with a passionate gesture, he flung it into the midst of the blaze. "I will teach you how to borrow books of one's worst enemy!" he cried, turning fiercely upon her, every trace of tenderness gone.

series of phenomena. The historian, too, will find it necessary to observe that astronomers of our time, with the utmost enthusiasm and labour, have availed themselves of the prodigality with which Nature has assisted them, and have endeavoured to extract from each event as it occurred all the information which they could make it yield.

This grand series of celestial wonders was nobly ushered in by the unexpected apparition of the great comet of 1858, which riveted the attention of millions of observers during the time it was visible. Magnificent comets, though many have been recorded, are still rarely seen, and our generation is fortunate in having witnessed one of the most remarkable that has ever appeared. It cannot be said that this comet, splendid as it was, contributed so much to our knowledge as some of the other events in the quarter of a century referred to. Scientific means of observation were not at that time sufficiently advanced to gain all the knowledge from the comet which we now (eleven years later) know it was undoubtedly capable of yielding.

The next event in the series was the splendid meteoric shower of November, 1866. It was foretold that this display would take place, and from the observations made on the meteors, and the interest excited by them, a magnificent discovery was made, which revealed the movements of these bodies.

Next in order comes the great eclipse of the sun, of August, 1868. This, in certain countries, was a total eclipse, and obscured the sun for a longer period than has been the case in any eclipse which has happened for very many centuries. By means of the observations which were made upon it, much valuable information was obtained, and the impulse which this event gave to certain methods of inquiry is still leading to further accessions to our knowledge.

The fourth and fifth of these great events of this quarter century are still in the future, and it is to them that these articles will be devoted.

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nomers, but could not be entered upon here. Some, then, of the present generation will witness a phenomenon twice repeated, which has not now been seen for a century, and will not again be seen for more than a century to come

These transits of Venus differ much from the other astronomical events to which we have referred as happening within the quarter century. A comet, an eclipse, or a shower of falling stars, are splendid objects to those who witness them, and are of universal interest. A transit of Venus, on the other hand, is inconspicuous; it will be seen by those who look properly for it as a little black spot moving over the sun. It is a spectacle of no beauty, and would be thought of little interest by one who did not know the importance which attaches to it. To the astronomer, on the other hand, the phenomenon is of the utmost significance; he is capable of eliciting information from it which, in the present state of knowledge, is greatly needed, and which cannot be gained so accurately from any other source.

The question which the transit of Venus can be made to answer is, How far from the earth is the sun? We shall first explain what is meant by the transit of Venus, and how it happens; we shall then endeavour to show, as simply as possible, the kind of observations which are made; and we shall finally point out what are the circumstances which render a determination of the sun's distance of peculiar importance at present, and the arrangements which it is proposed to make for observing the expected transits in different parts of the world.

The word transit means "passing over." Venus is a heavenly body called a planet, the phrase "transit of Venus" is merely an abbreviation of the expression "transit of Venus over the sun;" it means the passing of the planet Venus between us and the sun, so that we see Venus, by looking at the sun, as a dark spot upon the brilliant background. Why Venus appears dark under these circumstances, though when seen as the evening star she is so beautifully brilliant, will be presently explained.

The circumstances under which a transit of Venus can take place will be sufficiently explained by one of the accompanying diagrams (Fig. 1). Let the body s in the centre represent the sun. Now we must remember that our earth and Venus are both planets; that all planets move round the sun; and that Venus is nearer to the sun than the earth is to the sun. Let the point marked v represent the position of Venus, and the innermost of the two circles in the figure be the path in which Venus moves. It goes completely round in 225 days. The earth being further from the sun, suppose at E, the outermost of the two circles is drawn to represent its path. It moves around the sun in 365 days

Now supposing the earth to be in the position marked E, when Venus is in the position marked v, then, looking from the earth towards the sun, that is, supposing an eye placed at E looks towards s, Venus at v would be seen in a different direction from the sun; but, supposing when the earth has moved round in the direction indicated by the arrow to A, and Venus, which always moves more quickly than the earth, reaches in the same time the position marked B between A and s, then, to an eye looking towards s from A, Venus at B would be seen in the same direction, and would appear immediately in front of the sun; and since Venus mores more quickly than the earth, it would appear to move across the sun. This phenomenon is called the transit of Venus.

that Venus appears as a dark spot on the sun, so unlike the planet in its more familiar appearance as the beautiful evening star. Venus has, like our earth, the pleasing alternations of day and night; her side turned towards the sun is brilliantly illuminated, the opposite side is in pitchy darkness. She has not even a moon such as that with which our earth is furnished to mitigate oc

A comparison of a transit of Venus with an eclipse of the sun will prove instructive. When an eclipse of the sun occurs, it is caused by the moon coming between us and the sun, and thus shutting off part of the light. In this case so much of the sun is sometimes obscured, that a considerable shade is thrown over the landscape, or sometimes even complete darkness has been produced; but Venus, though a body very much larger than the moon, yet when it interposes itself between us and the sun, no perceptible diminution in the daylight is noticed. How is this? The answer is a simple one. An object when very distant appears smaller than it does when near at hand. Venus is very much more distant from us than the moon, and consequently looks very much smaller than it really is, so much so indeed, as to appear to us to be less than the moon. Hence when Venus lies between us and the sun, it hides much less of the sun behind it, than does the moon when in a similar position. In fact, Venus when in transit, only appears as a small round black spot, and though it undoubtedly does stop a little of the light from the sun, which was on its way to the earth; yet the amount is so small as not to be missed in the brightness of daylight.

casionally her nights. When we see Venus in the evening, we see more or less of her side which is turned towards the sun, and it is brilliant; but when the planet mores to between us and the sun, of course her illuminated side is turned towards the sun, and we only see the side over which the shades of night have spread themselves, then by contrast the planet is seen as a black spot, with

the splendid surface of the sun in the background. The phenomenon of the transit having been thus, to a certain extent, explained, it will be easy to understand the principle, at all events, of the observations which have to be made upon it. Suppose the large circle in the adjoining figure (Fig. 2) to represent the sun as seen from any place on the earth on the day on which the transit is to occur. The planet advances along the line marked A B, but we need not expect to see it till it comes in front of the sun, for, in the first place, its illuminated side is nearly completely turned from us as it faces the sun; and even were this not so, the brilliancy of the sun would completely overpower the beams of any small luminary in his vicinity. But immediately after the edge of the planet passes over the sun's edge, a

A little attention will easily explain why it is

small notch is seen in his brilliant outline. This gradually advances, until the planet is completely on the sun, as marked at P. Venus, which then appears as the black spot already mentioned, moves slowly across, until she reaches the other side at the point marked Q, then she moves off the sun. She again ceases to be visible, and the phenomenon is at an end. The time of passage occupies about four hours.

(To be concluded.)