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THE ATLANTIAN 15 (|f Men’s Spring Suits Of Superior Style and Quality c Knox Hats, Imperial Hats and Muse Specials. CL Boyden Shoes for Men, Muse Shoes for Men and Boys. CL Furnishings of Best Grade and Best Fashions. c A Boys’ Department, with Every thing for Boys Wear. CL A Ladies’ Shoe Department, Best Grades for Women and Misses. Geo. Muse Clothing Company STRANGE LIFE IN THE ANTARCTIC. The lands of the Antarctic region were first discovered by Capt. Cook in 1773-75. He was the first man to cir cumnavigate the southern polar conti nent. Since this time, and particular ly up to 1843, various whaling vessels ventured as far south as possible and reported the discovery and naming of new territory. Each terrestrial pole is covered by a cap of continuous ice, which remains unbroken on the land areas and which varies in size with the season and with the year. The Antarctic region has generally been represented as swarming with animal life, especially the marine form. The area is uninhabited by man. The Antarctic has been the field more par ticularly of British and German re search. The unknown Antarctic region has been estimated as being twice as large as Europe. A French exploring expedition on the Pourpuoi Pas, under Dr. Charcot, is at present in the Ant arctic. Ice-Flowers And Real Birds. Capt. Robert F. Scott, who com manded the expedition which went out from London July 31, 1901, in the British ship Discovery, and in whose party was Lieut. Shackleton, says in his diary, under date of March 30, 1902 (Easter Sunday): “Like yesterday, a fine day, with a light northerly breeze. This is a sea son of flowers, and behold! they have sprung up about us as by magic—very beautiful ice-flowers, waxen white in the shadow, but radiant with prismatic colors, where the sun rays light on their delicate petals. It was a phe nomenon to be expected in the newly frozen sea, but it is curious that they should come to their greatest perfec tion on this particular day. The ice is about five inches thick and free from snow; consequently the ice-flow ers stand up clear-cut and perfect in form. In some places they occur thickly, with broad, delicate, feathery laces; in others, again the plants as sume a spiky appearance, being form ed of innumerable small specules. “The more nearly one examines these beautiful formations, the more wonderful they appear, as it is only by close inspection that the mathe matical precision of the delicate tra cery can be observed. It is now es tablished that on the freezing of salt water much of the brine is mechanical ly excluded. Sea-ice is much less salt than the sea itself, and what salt re mains is supposed only to be entan gled in the frozen water. The amount of salt excluded seems to depend on the rate at which the ice is formed, and while some is excluded below the ice-surface, some is also pushed out above, and it is this that forms the ice-flowers. The subject is very fas cinating, and we have already started to measure the salinity of ice taken from different depths and formed un der various conditions. “The Emperor penguin stands near ly four feet high, and weighs upward j of eighty to ninety pounds. He is an i exceedingly handsome bird, with a rich black head, a bluish-gray back j and wings, a lemon-yellow breast, j with a statin-like gloss on the feath- ers, and a brilliant patch of orange on the neck and lower bill. His move ments are slow and stately, and the dignity of his appearance is much in creased by the upright carriage of his head and bill. When a group of these birds is met with in the middle of the desert ice, where all around is gray and cold and white and silent, the richness of their coloring strikes one very forcibly. Their voice is loud and trumpet-like, and rings out in the park-ice with a note of defiance that makes one feel that man is the real intruder. They have no fear, but an abundance of inquisitiveness, and a party such as I have mentioned stand in a ring all round, with an occasional remark from one to the other, discuss ing, no doubt, the nature of this new and upright neighbor. “The method employed by the Em peror penguin for carrying the eggs and chick upon his feet is shared also by the King penguin of the sub-Ant arctic area, as we saw in our visit to their rookeries in the Macquarie is lands. The King penguin we saw as he sat in mud and puddles, with his single egg upon his feet, and now we saw the Emperor penguin doing pre cisely the same thing with his single chicken to keep it off the ice; and we are agreed that the term ‘pouch,” D. A. FARRELL. Prominent Business Man and an Officer of the Builders’ Exchange. which has been used in this connec tion, is one which not only does not describe the matter, but is anatomical ly wrong and misleading. The single egg, or the chick, sits resting on the dorsum of the foot, wedged in between the legs and the lower abdomen, and over it falls a fold of heavy feathered skin, which is very loose, and can com pletely cover up and hide the egg or chick from view. When the chick is hungry or inquisitive, it pokes out from under the maternal (or paternal) lappet a piebald downy head of black and white, emitting its shrill and per sistent pipe until the mother (or the father) fills it up. The feeding is man aged as with cormorants and many other birds, the little one finding re gurgitated food when it thrusts its head inside the parent’s mouth. “I think the chickens hate their par ents, and when one watches the pro ceedings in a rookery it strikes one as not surprising. In the first place, there is about one chick to ten or twelve adults, and each adult has an overpowering desire to ‘sit’ on some thing. Both males and females want to nurse, and the result is that when a chicken finds himself alone there is a rush on the part of a dozen unem ployed to seize him. Naturally, he runs away and dodges here and there till a six-stone Emperor falls on him, and then begins a regular football ‘scrimmage,’ in which each tries to hustle the other off, and the end is too often disastrous to the chick. Sometimes he falls into a crack in the ice, and stays there to be frozen, while the parents squabble at the top; some times, rather than be nursed, I have seen him crawl under an ice-ledge and remain there, where the old ones could not reach him. I think it is not an exaggeration to say that of the 77 per cent that die, no less than half are killed by kindness.” MR. PUTOFF SHIRKS A DUTY. "My dear,” said Mr. Putoff, as he looked up from his paper, according to the Chicago News, “it is estimated that if a man were relatively as strong as a beetle he could lift 198,- 000 pounds.” "Is that so?” rejoined Mrs. Putoff, as she glanced at the cat and allowed her left eyelid to drop slowly. “I’ll look for a beetle the first thing in the morning.” “Why, dear?” queried the alleged head of the domicile. “Perhaps if I had one,’ ’replied Mrs. P., “I may be able to get the range carried into the summer kitchen. I’ve asked you at least a dozen times to do it, but it still occupies its win ter quarters.” AN ARTLESS CRITICISM OF ART. . Sig. Caruso, the great opera singer, tells of a lady’s maid’s artless criti cism of an amateur singer whose methods were of the strained order, says the Chicago Inter Ocean. The maid was brushing her mistress’ hair when she. mentioned that she had heard Miss Evans sing in the parlor the night before. “And how did you like it?” asked the mistress. “Oh, mum!” answered the maid, “it wuz beautiful! She sung just, as if she was gargling!”