eight of 200 pounds. Jimmy is a young one.--Your devoted reader,

FRANCIS H. ALLEN.

Baltimore, Md

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: Perhaps the other readers of your magazine have heard
of "Tyrian purple," a dye which once sold in the shops of ancient Rome
for its own weight in silver. Well, after a while, the way to make this
dye was forgotten,--probably because those who had the secret died
without telling it to others. And now I want to let you know what I have
learned lately, in reading, about how the secret was found again, after
hundreds of years.

A French naturalist, named Lacazo Duthiers, was on board a ship, when,
one day, he saw a sailor marking his clothes and the sails of the ship
with a sharp-pointed stick, which, every now and then, he dipped into a
little shell held in his other hand. At first, the lines were only a
faint yellow in color; but, after being a few minutes in the sun, they
became greenish, then violet, and last of all, a bright, beautiful
purple, the exact shade called by the ancients "Tyrian purple"--a color
that never fades by washing, or exposure to heat or damp, but ever grows
brighter and clearer! The naturalist was rejoiced, and after trial found
that he really had discovered again the long-lost secret. He felt well
repaid for keeping his eyes open. The little shell was the "wide-mouthed
purpura," as some call it, some three inches long, found in the
Mediterranean Sea, and on the coasts of France, Ireland and Great
Britain. My book says that the difficulty of obtaining and preserving
these shells must always render "Tyrian purple" a rare and expensive
color.

I remember, too, that the Babylonians thought "Tyrian purple" too sacred
for the use of mortals, so they used it only in the dress of their
idols. Romulus, king of Rome, adopted it as the regal color, and the
Roman emperors forbade any besides themselves to wear it, on penalty of
death.--Yours truly, F. R. F.

The boys and girls who solved the poetical charade printed on page 639
of the July number, must have noticed that it is an unusually good one,
and we are sure that all our readers will admire the charade, after
comparing it with its solution, which we publish upon page 704 of this
number.

Alexandria, Ohio.

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I should like to know who would succeed to the throne
in case of Queen Victoria's and her eldest son's deaths. My brother and
I sold hickory-nuts and onions to get the St. Nicholas last fall.