THE HOLIDAYS.
The summer holidays will soon be on us now and the school will be closed and left in silence for seven weeks. All our boys will each spend their holidays in different ways such as our purses will permit. It is to be hoped that we have fine weather for the holidays so that we may spend all our time out in the country or by the seaside.
All the boys have worked well this term and, I think, we all deserve a good holiday. We all wish Mr. Piper and Mr. Wallace and Miss Stubbs a real good time.
J. A. MASKELL.
VOLCANOES.
A volcano is sometimes termed a burning mountain, but it is really nothing of the kind. It is really a giant mound of earth and rock, full of molten rock, called lava, which sometimes overflows the crater in which it is contained.
The world's largest volcano is Aconcagua, which is over 23,000 feet high. Very often, just before or just after an earthquake there is an eruption of a volcano.
Of the European volcanoes the most famous four are Etna, 10,780 feet, Vesuvius 4,000 feet, Stromboli 2,000 feet and Heckla in Iceland 5,000 feet.
Long ages ago, probably about 72 million years, the earth was well covered with volcanoes, which were discharging fire and lava. On the surface of the moon there are extinct volcanoes with craters that would stretch from London to Brighton.
In the year 79 A.D., an eruption of Vesuvius destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum covering these two cities with a layer of lava and ash over 1,000 feet in depth. Some of this has been removed and remains of streets, shops, houses, and people have been unearthed just as they were 1,852 years
E. SHAW.
FLIGHT.
On 17tb December, 1903, Wilbur Wright mounted his flimsy biplane and flew-the first person to fly with wings. Bleriot, six years later, electrified the world when he piloted his small monoplane across the channel.
In the short time that has elapsed since then, the aeroplane has developed into a vehicle of transport
Aeroplanes have crossed the Atlantic in squadrons, a girl has flown to Australia, the Poles have been flown over; and from many air ports, swift planes take their cargoes over half the world. Many types of 'plane are made by mass production, as the D.H. Moth, the most popular light aeroplane.
G. BURGESS.
CAUSES OF FAILURE.
The causes of a person's failure may be any one of this dozen of little things that after all are not little things.
1. He may forget that his worth is manifest by what he produces.
2. He finds excuses for not doing, instead of finding ways to do what should be done.
3. The world goes ahead in almost every direction, and he keeps on the humdrum turnpike, where somebody will have to pay the tolls.
4. He is not observant, accurate, or thoughtful.
5. He is sailing- by the broken compass of chance.
6. He flatters himself by viewing himself in his own mirror, instead of measuring himself with others that have passed him in the race.
7. He thinks nobody notices that he has fallen behind.
8. He does not love his work as he expected when he began; and therefore his enthusiasm has been lost.
9. He puts off too many things until to-morrow.
10. He is unconscious of being idle much of his time, and lets the day go by, lacking the results he could have attained.
11. His lack of thoroughness blocks leadership.
12. However honourable, he fails to realize that his example affects others.
SOUND.
Like light and heat, sound is the result of wave motion. One difference between light and heat vibrations, and sound vibrations is that the former are transverse (crosswise), while the latter are longitudal (lengthwise). Sound is a laggard compared with light. It travels 1,089 feet a second in air at 32 degrees F., the speed increasing about one foot a second for every degree rise in temperature, while light travels at 186,000 feet a second.
Because sound is produced by waves, it can be refracted, focused, and reflected, like light.
In the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, London, and other similar buildings, sound is so focussed that a whisper at one end can be distinctly heard at the other.
R. BODIAM.