ds.

That was a very dead language, indeed, my dears; so dead that it is no
wonder it made the old green parrot blue to speak it now and then.
However, by this time it is past all power to worry anybody else, let us
hope.

A PLANT THAT WALKS UPSIDE DOWN.

Shrubs, trees, Jack-in-the-Pulpits, and all such plants, grow with their
roots down in the ground; but I've lately heard that a man called a
philosopher, once wrote of a plant that grows and walks with the roots
upward!

Lord Francis Bacon is the man's name, and the plant he meant is Man.
Only he wrote in Latin, I believe, and so, instead of calling Man "a
plant upside down," he called him "planta inversa." He explained these
words by saying that the brain in man, whence the nerves start, to
spread like a net-work all through the body, corresponds to the roots in
a plant.

If this is so, my dears, you are a kind of walking plants, only you are
obliged to walk top-side down. This seems curious, but it is pleasant to
think you are not so very different from a Jack-in-the-Pulpit after all.

THE SMALLEST INSECT KNOWN.

The Red Schoolhouse.

MY DEAR JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT: No doubt, you have heard of the
"leaf-cutter" bees, who line their nests with small round pieces of
leaves, which they themselves cut and then fit together so exactly,
without gum, that they hold their stores of honey and do not leak a
bit. Well, a sharp-eyed observer has found, on one of these bees, an
insect whose body is no longer than the width of the dot of this "i"
(1-90th of an inch), and which is believed to be the smallest insect
known. It is called _Pteratomus_, a word which means "winged atom,"
and it lives entirely upon the body of the bee. It has beautiful
hairy wings, and long feelers, and its legs are rather like those of
a mosquito, though, of course, very much smaller. Its feet are so
small that they can only just be seen when magnified to four hundred
times their natural size! Now, for a full-grown insect, as it is, I
think the _Pteratomus_ is very small.--Sincerely yours,

THE LITTLE SCHOOLMA'AM.

[Illustration: A WATER-SPOUT.]

A WATER-SPOUT.

Did any of you ever hear of water-spouts at sea? I don't know much about
them myself, but the St. Nicholas artist will draw a picture of one for
you, and the editors will kindly put it in. According to travelers, the
water seems to come down from the clouds, or go