SHORT PAPERS, OR THEMES.

[These should be written in a clear, plain, and business-like style, without any attempt at the expression of feeling or fancy.]

Ex. 1.-ABBEY.

1. A kind of religious house superior to a monastery. 2. First established in Egypt, under the title of monasteries, in the 4th century. 3. First erected in the Isle of Bardsey at the end of the 5th century. 4. First in Scotland at Iona, in 565. 5. First in Ireland, about 520. 6. 186 greater monasteries suppressed, in Henry VIII.'s time. 7. Their lands divided among five noble families. 8. Abbot, head of an abbey. 9. Sometimes a prince of the blood-royal. 10. Use of term began in 472. 11. Once twentysix abbots in England. 12. Two priors also, with seats in parliament. 13. Their croziers were carried in their right hand. 14. Bishops carried theirs in their left. 15. Different kinds of abbots. 16. Abbots ruling over branches of the same order were called cardinal-abbots. 17. On the continent there were prince-abbots, field-abbots, and abbot-counts.

Ex. 2.-ACADEMY.

1. Name derived from a grove at Athens used as a gymnastic school, whose owner was called Academus. 2. Cimon, son of Miltiades, the Peabody of his time, bought and converted it into a public park, adorned with groves, fountains, and statues. 3. Socrates is said to have taught here; then Plato, whose school was formed here about 2260 years ago (B.C. 388). 4. He presided here for nearly half a century. 5. Followers of Plato hence called Academics. 6. This school flourished under different masters, with more or less success, for nearly 600 years. 7. Our word academy derived from this term. 8. Name in the modern sense first used

in Italy. 9. Now applied to learned associations throughout Europe and America, both in science, literature, and art.

Ex. 3.-AFRICA.

1. An almost unknown land. 2. Very little explored. 3. Chief causes, badness of climate and hostility of natives. 4. Some Dieppe mariners said to have discovered the western portion of Africa in 1364. 5. Portuguese, first in modern times to obtain some definite information about Africa. 6. English, French, and Dutch follow. 7. Vasco de Gama doubles the Cape of Good Hope in 1497. 8. Slave trade from Africa begun by Spain in 1508. 9. We joined in it also, Sir John Hawkins being the first English slave dealer. 10. Many British travellers have attempted to explore Africa. 11. Mungo Park, Clapperton, and Redyard, either died or were murdered. Barth and Overweg the chief German explorers. 13. Livingstone, the chief British, and probably the most renowned of all.

Ex. 4.-AGRICULTURE.

12.

1. Tilling the ground, or agriculture, known from the earliest ages. 2. A Babylonian book on the subject still preserved. 3. Homer looks upon the pursuit as one fit for kings and princes. 4. Declined during the middle ages, war being the cause. 5. Many societies for its promotion have been established in Britain. 6. The first in Scotland, 1723. 7. Reinstated in 1784. 8. More than half a century after, one established in England. 9. In 1841 one established in Ireland. 10. More than 600 societies now in England and Ireland. 11. Professorships for the theory of agriculture in Edinburgh and Aberdeen Universities. 12. Great strides have been made of late years in analyzing soils and manures. 13. Phosphates brought from all parts of the world as fertilizers. 14. Waste moors brought into cultivation through increased attention to agriculture.

Ex. 5.-AQUEDUCTS.

1. System of water pipes unknown to the Greeks and Romans. 2. Used solely by the ancients for bringing water to supply a city. 3. Not, as with us, for navigation purposes. 4. Rome very bountifully supplied with them. 5. These conveyed water to the city, though their sources were sometimes more than 50 miles off. 6. Valleys were spanned with magnificent bridges.

7. Some had about 7000 arches. 8. Many ancient Roman aqueducts still in use. 9. Rome still more abundantly supplied with water than any city in the world by their means. 10. Solomon made an aqueduct to supply Jerusalem with water from the pools of Bethlehem. 11. Peruvian aqueducts mentioned by Humboldt. 12. Maintenon aqueduct in France, a magnificent

one.

Ex. 6.-ARMOUR.

1. Used in the most ancient times. 2. Mentioned in the Bible. 3. Armour in the aggregate called harness. 4. Homer mentions the shield of Achilles, the golden armour of Glaucus, and the breastplate of Agamemnon. 5. Iron, brass, and steel used for armour by modern nations. 6. Quilted linen by Egyptians.. 7. Shield, the only armour used by ancient Britons. 8. Anglo-Saxons used a hide tunic covered with brass rings. 9. Heavy armour found to impede the motions of Harold's soldiers in pursuing the Welsh. 10. Leathern tunics therefore employed. 11. Danes at first wore no armour but neck and leathern shin pieces. 12. Afterwards adopted a more complete suit from the Normans. 13. Chain mail discarded after 1400 A.D. 14. Not at all now used by soldiers.

Ex. 7.-ARTILLERY.

1. Term first applied to engines used for casting heavy missiles.. 2. Earliest military engines perhaps mentioned in the book of Chronicles, about 1000 years B.d. 3. Romans used them under different names. 4. The most powerful did not make so much impression against a wall or fortification as an 18-lb. ball discharged from a modern cannon. 5. Stones of 300 lbs. weight thrown by one of these engines at the siege of Stirling Castle in 1303. 6. In 1312 Arabians use cannon. 7. John of Gaunt employs 140 cannon in an attack upon St. Malo in 1378. 8. Red-hot balls fired by the English at the siege of Cherbourg in 1418. 9. In 1521 brass cannon first cast in England. 10. Iron guns 26 years after. 11. Largest cast gun in existence, 14 ft. 1 in. long,-Indian make. 12. Throws a ball 1600 lbs. weight.

Ex. 8.-ATLANTIC TELEGRAPHY.

1. Said to have been first mooted in New York. 2. Soundings made across the Atlantic by the British and United States Governments. 3.

Company formed to lay down a cable between the Old and New Worlds. 4. Cable snapped August 11th, after 380 miles had been payed out. 5. Joined again. 6. Finally completed, 7th August, 1858. 7. First message sent ten days afterwards-from the Queen to President Buchanan. 8. Cable ceased to act on the 3rd of September. 9. New one determined on. 10. Great Eastern employed for the purpose of laying it. 11. Three faults found. 12. Cable parts. 13. Ship now only 606 miles from her journey's end. 14. Four attempts made to fish up the cable in water several miles deep. 15. Unsuccessful. 16. Great Eastern returns 17th August, 1865. 17. Re-lays it afterwards successfully in 1866. 18. Messages now constantly passing to and fro. 19. Others projected.

Ex. 9.-BALLOONS.

1. Notion of flying or sailing through the air a very ancient one. 2. In the beginning of the 14th century a Dominican monk first forms a correct idea of the principle. 3. Brothers Montgolfier first secure a practical result. 4. First ascent from Paris in 1783. 5. Successful, though the balloon caught fire; the two adventurers, however, put it out. 6. In next flight aëronauts ascended about two miles into the air. 7. Lunardi makes the first ascent in England, in 1784. 8. In the following year a balloon caught fire. 9. The passengers in it were dashed to the ground. 10. A fall of 3000 feet. 11. Elevation attained by Gay Lussac, four miles. 12. Two Neapolitan scientific men attempt a higher elevation. 13. Highly rarefied air. 14. Balloon bursts in consequence. 15. Fall of nearly five, miles. 16. Remains of balloon break their fall. 17. They save their lives. 18. Glaisher made discoveries with the balloon. 19. Extensively used in the siege of Paris in 1870-71.

Ex. 10.--BANK OF ENGLAND.

1. Projected by John Paterson, a Dumfriesshire man, in 1694. 2. He also founded the Bank of Scotland in Edinburgh a year afterwards. 3. Building stands upon three acres of ground. 4. Looks like a huge tomb where gold is buried, at least for a time. 5. There are nine open courts. 6. No windows to the street. 7. Structure of one floor only. 8. Rooms lit by skylights chiefly. 9. A guard room. 10. Committee rooms. 11. Rotunda; library. 12. Armoury. 13. Immense cellarage below. 14. Eighteen millions of pounds sterling in bullion said to be kept here

15. The gold in ingots. 16. The silver in bars or ingots. 17. A printing office, chiefly for bank notes. 18. A detachment of Foot Guards on duty every night. 19. More than a thousand persons employed in it.

Ex. 11.-BUCCANEER.

1. Name derived from the Carib word boucan, sun-dried meat; because the first buccaneers were solely and entirely employed in hunting, capturing, and slaying wild boars and buffaloes for their flesh. 2. This article was used as food in many parts of the West Indies and South America. 3. The cruelty of the Spaniards, who in 1524 held the chief sway in the New World, forced them to abandon this peaceful occupation. 4. Bands of bold European adventurers united to attack the Spanish settlements. 5. Perhaps the most daring actions the world ever saw now done. 6. A handful of men in an open boat think nothing of attacking and boarding a heavily armed Spanish galleon with a numerous crew. 7. Great atrocities committed on both sides. 8. Morgan, the chief English buccaneer ; Peter of Dieppe, the chief French; and Van Horn, the chief Dutch. 9. Brethren of the Coast, as they called themselves, suppressed in 1697.

Ex. 12.-CANALS.

1. Used in China at a very early period. 2. In Egypt about 3220 years ago. 3. One, the river of Joseph, constructed under one of the Pharaohs. 4. First in Europe supposed to have been made by Xerxes across the low isthmus of Athos. 5. Two canals dug by the Romans in Lincolnshire, 6. Several in Italy and also in Flanders. 7. Egyptians said to have been the first to use locks on their canals. 8. Ten years after the battle of Culloden canals introduced into Britain. 9. Sankey Brook the first. 10. James Brindley the greatest canal engineer this country has produced. 11. Considerably more than 3000 miles of canals in England and Ireland. 12. Canal said to have been dug in 521 B.C., connected Red Sea and Mediterraanean. 13. So remained for thousands of years. 14. Silted up at last. 15. Re-digging begun in 1859-Lesseps, engineer. 16. Ships now pass through daily. 17. Grand canal in China. 18. Eight hundred miles long.

Ex. 13.-CANNON.

1. Word derived from Latin canna, a reed, because round, hollow, and