the immense
advantage of being agreeable to the Americans.

M. Polain, keeper of the Archives at Liege, has recently discovered that
the famous French historian, Froissart, whose Chronicles are universally
known, copied the first fifty chapters of his work from Jehan le Bel, an
author of his own time, whose manuscripts have been recently discovered
in the Belgian libraries. This is a discovery of considerable interest
to antiquarians. An edition of one hundred and twenty-five copies of
Jehan le Bel's book has been printed for the use of a select number of
historical _savans_.

A whimsical discovery is announced by M. Jules Allix, in the
_feuilleton_ of the Paris _Presse_. It seems too absurd to merit
repetition, but it is reproduced in some of the London literary papers,
and is there treated as if there might be something real in it. It is
stated that a method has been discovered of communicating instantly
between any two places on the earth, without regard to distance or
continuous lines, and through the agency of magnetized _snails_! The
inventors of this novel telegraph are said to be M. Benoit, of France,
and M. Biat, of America; and they are further said to have been engaged
for several successive years in experimenting upon the subject. They
claim to have ascertained that certain descriptions of snails possess
peculiar properties or sympathies, which cause them to feel the same
sensation, no matter at what distance they may be, when acted on in a
particular way by galvanic and magnetic influences. A snail placed in a
box, suitably provided with the requisite apparatus, in France, thus
responds to the motions of a snail, placed in a similar box, in America;
and by providing a snail for each letter, a conversation may thus be
carried on. The correspondent of the London Literary Gazette, says that
he saw experiments on the subject in Paris, which were attended with
complete success. The whole thing is probably an ingenious hoax. A
skeptical correspondent of the Literary Gazette proposes an easy method
of testing the new telegraph. He says, "If the _Presse_ newspaper will
every day for a few weeks give a short abstract of contemporary American
news, or indeed mention any points of prominent interest which occur on
the other side of the Atlantic; thus anticipating by some weeks the
ordinary mails; and if, when these arrive, the news given by the snail
telegraph is confirmed, doubts will vanish, and snails will be at