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197. Holly Cottage, con.

to take her place for the time, which request The
Asso. was glad to grant.

Eliz. C. Davis had a school-boys’ short history
of “Elijah, the boys and the bears”, - “He did, the boys did
and the bears did.”

Eliza T. Moore read of the wonderful collection
of the illuminating devices used by man, (from
the earliest dawn of history to the present), and
is now being prepared for exhibition in The Nat’l.
Museum at Wash. The fire-brand which transferred
the flame from tribe to tribe, the first attempt
at a lamp, made of an animals skull,
the greased stick, forerunner of a candle, belonged
to the camp-fire period. Some Edison of these
dark ages, first used a st__ petrel as a lamp
by placing fibre in the mouth of a fat bird
and lighting the primitive wick.

During the stone age flat pieces were
hollowed out and encircled with dry moss, which
burned readily around a well of grease. All parts
of Europe and Asia have sent to Wash. pottery
lamps of ancient and crude design. The next
evolution, in light, was an iron lamp, then came
also copper, brass and bronze. After many yrs.
Argand discovered the method of putting oil
in a reservoir, forcing it up in a wick
and using a glass chimney, - this was the first
real lamp and was supposed to be the last
analysis of that luxury. Kerosene and gas
followed and finally electricity has been harnessed
successfully, for heating and lighting
purposes almost all over the civilized world.

Elma Chandlee gave first, a funny story
of a boy at Sunday School who, on being told that
Methuselah lived for 900 yrs., said he would like
to know where all his birthday gifts were buried!
Elma also favored us with such a good parody
on a familiar song, - “My Rosary”

“Five mournful bushes in a bed,
Only one bud in each I see,
Although I count them eagerly, each day,
My Rosary.

I wait but still no blossoms come,