book my husband wished to see, and he was ably seconded by his assistants. They first brought us some exquisite Persian MSS, beautifully illuminated and bound; and when we made them understand that my husband would like to see any books in the library from India, they eagerly produced all they had, but they proved to be chiefly modern works on music. After they had brought us some fine MSS. of the Koran with glosses and commentaries, they asked us to walk about and examine the general contents of the building. The bookcases were of the best construction, with movable shelves, and at one end we found a very good collection of English, French, and German classics. The centre of the room was occupied by glass cases, filled with gorgeously bound, illustrated works, chiefly gifts to the Sultan. While my husband, with the aid of Sadik Bey, was talking to the old librarian, the assistants showed my son and me some fine photographs of places in the Sultan's dominions and of public buildings in Stamboul.

Nothing could exceed their courtesy and attention and evident wish to make our visit pleasant to us. The Sultan had sent word that we were coming, and we heard from the librarian that H.I.M. takes deep interest in all the arrangements of the library, and visits it almost every day, and that he had already ordered that my husband's books, which he had begged leave to present to the Sultan, should occupy a prominent place when they arrived. We left most unwillingly, accompanied to the door by the venerable librarian and all his staff, who took leave of us with the usual graceful Eastern salutation of the deep bow, with the right hand laid first on the heart, then on the head-a sign of devotion which we felt they had fully carried out in their courteous attention during the two hours of our visit.

it can easily be arranged." Before we left Pera for Therapia, we had for some days constantly passed rams being led about the streets; some of them magnificent animals, with thick white fleeces, others looking poor and thin. These were the victims to be sold for the Qurban Bairam, or Feast of Sacrifices, which is a day of rejoicing throughout the whole Mussulman world, and is celebrated on the tenth day of the twelfth lunar month. This fell, when we were in Turkey, on June 24. Every householder must provide one or more rams, according to the size of his household, which he must kill himself directly after the morning prayer. It is afterward eaten, part being given to the poor. The feast is thought to be in memory of the sacrifice of Isaac.

As the reception is very early in the morning, we had to sleep in Pera. At 8.30 P.M. or sundown, a great gun proclaimed the opening of the feast, and from that moment the noise of bells and guns, shouts and singing, never ceased. We went to bed early, but not to sleep; the guns, and bells, and fireworks went on all night, and the dogs, disturbed from their usual scavengering expeditions, kept up one wild yell. About 2 A.M. the various regiments which were to line the road down which the Sultan passes from Yildiz to Dolmabaghcheh, began to march past our hotel, each regiment with its band playing, and, as the streets are not lighted, accompanied by hundreds of men carrying lanterns, looking like glow-worms as they came up the hill past my windows. After breakfast the carriage came, at 5.30, and we drove rapidly along the Grande Rue and down the hill by the German Embassy, reaching the palace just at its foot soon after 6. It was a glorious morning, already hot, and we found our faithful friend, Sadik Bey, in his grandest uniform and covered with orders, awaiting us. He took us at once to the diplomatic waiting-room, which was rapidly filling, we being the only people present not belonging to an embassy or legation; and we heard afterward our good fortune had excited the envy of other English visitors to Pera. It was past seven when the second Mas

ter of Ceremonies appeared to summon us, and then began a hurried rush across the garden and up the countless stairs to a long gallery on one side of what is the largest audience hall in the world. We found on crossing the garden that the Sultan had already arrived, and we had not seen what is the most beautiful sight of the Bairam reception earlier in the year, his riding into the palace on a white horse covered with jewelled trappings, surrounded by all his court officials, superbly mounted. As the Sultan slays his ram directly he dismounts on this occasion, no infidel eye may witness the arrival. The ram, a huge animal of the Angora breed, with snow-white fleece, lay dead as we passed at the foot of the steps by which the Sultan reaches his own apartments. On arriving at our gallery we found that we were so high above the floor, and the hall of audience so vast, that we could scarcely distinguish the features of those below us. But for a few attend ants hurrying about, the hall was empty, except that the throne, a large armchair and footstool in cloth of gold, already stood in its place at the upper end of the hall facing the grand entrance doors. Over these doors was a smaller gallery, where the band was placed, which played beautifully till the ceremony began. Our gallery, though not much more than half the length of the hall, was large enough for a good ball-room. The ladies sat in front, looking over the balustrade, the gentlemen stood behind, and at the back, beneath the lofty windows, was a buffet, with gold plate laden with every delicacy. Gradually the hall began to fill, and as every one of the rank of a colonel upward throughout the whole Empire has a right to attend the Bairam receptions, the crowd of magnificent uniforms was very great. They stood in ranks, one behind the other, forming three sides of a square, leaving the centre of the hall facing the throne free. The Imperial Household, headed by the Chief Eunuch, stood across the hall behind the throne in order of precedence, all in magnificent uniforms, and most of them with orders. The second eunuch-a very tall, thin fellow-stood about the thir

teenth, and above two of the Sultan's sons-in-law. It would be difficult to imagine a more gorgeous scene than the hall presented when all had entered and were awaiting the Sultan's entry. Every variety of uniform, sheiks from the desert in burnous and turban, priests, ulemahs, ministers all alike blazing with orders. I asked Sadik Bey why there was so long a delay, as it was nearly eight o'clock. He told me that the Sultan, tired with the early prayers, had gone to sleep, and no one can venture to disturb H.1. M. At length the band ceased, and the small, stately man appeared through a door near the throne, followed by Osman Ghazi only. The Sultan wore a plain military frock-coat, a fez, like all the rest of the brilliant throng, with a curved gold-hilted sword-no decoration of any sort. As he entered every one in the hall bowed to the very ground, and remained so till he had taken his seat. Osman Ghazi stood at the right of the Sultan's throne, with a gold-embroidered scarf over his right. arm, which was kissed by the less angust members of the assembly, who had no right to touch the Sultan.

As soon as the Sultan was seated the court ulemah stepped up on his left and uttered a low prayer, the whole assembly standing in the prayer attitude, with the hands raised and the palms turned toward the face, as if forming a book. Directly the priest stepped back, the reception began at once in perfect silence; the Pashas passing upon the Sultan's right, prostrating themselves and kissing the scarf, and then backing away on his left in a crouching attitude, and saluting as they backed by touching the ground, their heart, and their forehead with the right hand. Those who were well accustomed to court life executed this movement with perfect grace, but most of the provincial Pashas were exquisitely awkward, and, instead of pausing between each salutation, continued the movement incessantly, and long after they were hidden from the Sultan by those following them.

The Pashas who were personal friends of the Sultan were not allowed to fall at his feet; a very slight movement of the Imperial hand showed that

they were only to bow low; and old Raoulf Pasha, who had lost a leg at Plevna, was not expected to back across the room, but was permitted to pass away at once behind the throne. No one else left the hall. Two incidents excited great attention. The Bulgarian Envoy had been treated a few days before with considerable hauteur by the Russian Ambassador, on which the Sultan had said he should not run the chance of any indignity in the diplomatic gallery at the reception, but should stand below with the Royal household; and there he was in plain evening dress, most conspicuous among all the uniforms. The other notable incident was the reception of the exKhedive, Ismael Pasha, who was known to be in great disgrace owing to some marriage intrigue in which he had been engaged. As the old man approached no sign of recognition was visible on the Sultan's countenance, and Ismael was allowed to grovel at the Sultan's feet, and back away at the side, without one kind look. At length all had passed by, and taken their places again in ranks round the

raised his hands in blessing and uttered a prayer, all the Pashas reassuming the attitude of prayer. He then stood aside and the Sultan resumed his place, and all the other ulemahs present came forward up the centre and made their obeisance. Their dresses were most brilliant-black, green, purple, and blue satin robes mixed with white-and many of them wore orders.

As soon as the last ulemah nad passed, the Sultan rose, without any sort of salutation to any one, and while all present bowed again to the very ground, passed out of the hall, with only Osman Ghazi in attendance. The hall quickly emptied itself, and we were glad to turn to the inviting buffets, for though it was only nine o'clock, most of us had breakfasted soon after five. On our way from the palace to the landing-place, where the various embassy steam launches were waiting, we passed innumerable cafés full of Pashas and officers in full uniform sipping coffee and smoking after the fatigues of the reception. Sadik Bey bade us farewell at the hall, having to attend the audience granted to all the household officials.

"When will that be?" I asked. "It is impossible to say," he replied. "His Majesty is going to sleep; we cannot say when he will wake."

We were glad to accept the offer of places in the Austrian launch, and, though it was but little past ten o'clock when we reached Therapia, we felt as if we had already had a long and exciting day.--Longman's Magazine.

THE startling announcement that the gigantic sum of £3,000,000 was to be paid for the Pneumatic Tire Company, and that a new company was to be floated with a capitalization of £5,000,000, in the place of the original company with its comparatively modest capital of £250,000, has created something like a revolution in the financial world. Many a speculator

for a rise, who has hitherto confined his attention to South African and Westralian mines, and has made a study of assays and monthly crushings, will be prone henceforth to turn his attention to this new field for gambling, and to watch with more attention than heretofore the determination of our home-population to be up to date in fashions and recreations. The Chan

cellor of the Exchequer has already made his acknowledgments for no mean portion of his surplus of £6,000,000 to the mining markets: the signs of the times seem to point to the possibility that a boom in bicycling industries may provide him with a substantial contribution toward the hoped-for surplus in 1897. Whether in view of the abnormal increase in the number of bicycles either the present or some future Chancellor may conceive the audacious design of taxing a machine which is after all a luxury to one, if a necessity to another, moiety of riders; or whether either county or district councils, which seem to be respecters of persons to a less acute degree than Governments almost of necessity are, may find in a moderate impost on bicycles a way of tempering the wind to that shorn lamb the pedestrian ratepayer, who is condemned to pay the piper for the repair of roads on which his personal safety is endangered and his nerves violently shaken by the vagaries of wheelmen,-these are questions beyond the scope of this paper.

Less sudden than what I have spoken of as a revolution in the financial world, but quite as marked, has been the entire change of popular feeling on the subject of bicycles; and by popular feeling I do not mean the feeling only of those thousands who have lately become converts --slow unwilling converts like myself many of them-to the art of cycling, but the feeling also of those sections of society who, though for various reasons unable to ride themselves, now tacitly approve of and encourage what a few years ago they condemned and abominated.

"De Bruce! I rose with purpose dread To speak my curse upon thy head;

But then, as I thought of my own feelings a few years back toward cycles. and cyclists, I began to wonder whether the old clergyman was at all in the position of the abbot in the "Lord of the Isles," and had been mastered not. exactly by high behest but by the God or Goddess of Fashion, who so often coerces humanity into following its dictates. For as I head my paper with the title "My Friends who Cycle," I cannot help recalling the fact that less than ten years ago I not only did not consciously own a friend who bicycled, but rather had the feeling that, if any friend of mine did take to such a pursuit, our paths must for the future lie apart. For in very sooth there was a time when I had almost learnt to loathe the sight and sound of a bicycle. There was little elegance methought in the art; the exponents thereof were for the most part beyond words objectionable. As they came tearing past me down the Bath road on Sundays, I felt that their personal appearance was unlovely, and their manners unnecessarily aggressive. They rode at top-speed, crouching down over their machines, and the majority of them seemed to take an anholy pleasure in startling, closely shaving, and, to speak generally, exasperating foot-passengers.

But time rolled on, and a change came over the scene. The bike became the fashion, and as a more respectable class of riders took to the road, and the manners of the cyclist improved, the feeling of loathing gave place to toleration, and I no longer felt wholly out of charity with my fellow-being simply because he chose to bestride a bicycle. It came to me, however, as a new and surprising sensation when a passing cyclist suddenly jumped off his machine, and as he shook me warmly by the hand, I recognized in him a quondam cricketing ally.

"But why have you come down to this?" I presently inquired.

These certainly seemed strong arguments in favor of the machine, and as one by one my friends fell victims to the fascinations of the bike, I found myself, not only in the smoking-room at night but even at the afternoon teatable, inundated by bicycle conversation, and presently grew large-hearted enough to own that it was infinitely more intelligible and more amusing than golf shop. In fact, if all the stories I heard were true, I gleaned some interesting information about the habits and customs of the bicycle. It would appear on the evidence I heard and I may add that I have later on partially verified sundry conclusions originally based on the Argument from Authority by personal observation as well as by painful experiment-that many commonly accepted opinions on the subject are quite erroneous. To all, then, whom it may concern, be it known that a bicycle is not merely an inanimate and insensate piece of machinery. On the contrary, it possesses not only all the instincts, but also not a few of the vices, of quadruped animals, is quick to distinguish between rough and kindly handling, and capable of recognizing the presence of an intelligent and skilful ri er quite as readily as the horse. The same machine which, under good management, is perfectly tractable and docile, will be found under opposite conditions to combine the obstinacy of a mule with the kicking powers of a jackass. I have heard one man complaining that his bicycle always lashed out and barked his shin as he was mounting; another that his invariably fell upon him heavily as he dismounted; while a hireling which had behaved quite respectably for a whole week, after standing in the stable on Sunday, was so fresh on Monday morning that, after trying to run away, it jibbed so suddenly that the rider was thrown violently forward on to his face and received some severe contusions. Walter Raleigh's well-known verse

"Fain would I climb but that I fear to fall"

must have found a ready echo in the heart of many a beginner who has hopped for fifty yards along a road with one foot on the step of his ma

chine, hesitating to make the final attempt to climb up from one side owing to a conviction grounded upon past experience that it would only be a prelude to tumbling off on the other. A lady, not overmuch troubled by nerves, described to me what a shock it was to her wifely feelings, when, having persuaded her husband, who had been sedulously practising in the garden, to make his first public trial on the highroad, on turning a corner round which he had of course after the manner of husbands preceded her, she saw nothing but his heels sticking up into the air out of a very deep ditch. There were fortunately no bones broken, and it is needless to say that it was entirely the fault of the machine, which had first shied across the road at the corner, then deliberately buck jumped and kicked, and finally, having thrown the rider over its head into the ditch, had proceeded to sit down on the top of him. Indeed, if the gentleman's account is to be credited, that particular bicycle either had, for some days at all events, only one side to its mouth, or having at some period of its existence been ridden to the hounds, resented hammering along the hard highroad, and not only attempted to jump the hedge and ditch into the adjoining field on every possible opportunity, but, being a high-couraged animal, invariably selected for the attempt that side of the road where the ditch was deepest and muddiest, and the hedge. thickest and most prickly. Times there were, again, when that self-willed machine would resolutely ignore all rules of the road, and as if suddenly acquiescing in the rider's desire to avoid hugging the hedge, would persist in occupying the middle of the road, and either decline to give way to any passing vehicle or attempt to force a passage on the wrong side. Had it not been for the stronger mind of the lady-rider, who was a perfect mistress of her machine, the gentleman would. have given up the struggle at a very early period of his cycling career. For, after narrowly shaving the wheels of the first vehicle he attempted to pass, he dismounted, and, pale in the face and trembling in every limb, announced his determination of going home.