The south-western. [volume] (Shreveport, La.) 1852-1870, 1859-02-16
ooh, yes. l am safe indeed now" said

ooh, yes, l am safe indeed now," said
Margaret's heart.
In that hour all was made clear between
them With new resolves for the future, with
deeper love for each other, and a prayer for
strength, another page of life was turned for
them.
Years afterwards Margaret, proud and
happy wife, wrote: 81 cannot tell you all he
has been to me-my guide when | was igno-
rant, my strength when | faltered my best
earthly friend always What do not owe you
for revealing the mistake that had almost
wrecked the happiness Of both
The wind is from the northeast, an ashen
gray sand sweeps close overheard, the general
exclamation is, ''it feels like snow" Soon the
flakes begin to descend; at first eisurely and
few; then swifter; and finally faster, faster.
Before an hour, the earth is covered with
white mantle, composed of millions on millions
of little crystals, each as perfect of its kind as
q diamond, and each in itself, If you will only
look at it, as beautiful. Take up one. ltmelts
in your hand; it is gone See that other, on
the very top of the snow drift, glistening, gem
like, in the sunshine. A while ago, it was
vapor floating in the sky; before that, it was
drop of sea water; tomorrow, it will be fluid
again, and mingling with the ocean. Examine
its shape. Its like Tiny star, cut in Carrara
marble. Yet no sculptor, not even lapidist,
could ever rival it. No marble is fne enough
to fabrcate it. What subtle power in nature
has made this snowflake so different in ap-
pearauce from the rain drop, yet substantially
the same? The very boys in a telegraph Office
will tell YOU that it was magnetism. Yes tits
this, as yet almost unknown agent, the motive
power by which we send s'lightning" messages
to our friends. which helps to crystalize alike
the diamond at the bottom of the mine and the
snow flake high up in heaven
The whole subject Of crystals is beautiful
beyond imagination. 1t is crystalizatlon, and
crystalizalion alone, which draws the line be
tween the diamond that flashes on lady's
finger and the charcoal that smuts kitchen
maid Sandstone and granite, limestone and
marble, have their essential differences in crys-
talization One has been formed in the labo-
ratory of nature, by the slow deposit of matter
/ held in solution in primeYal seas, the other by
particle on particle, also held in solution, ar
ranging itself in the precision of soldiers at a
review. No architect ever built more regularly
/ than nature, when constructing even the small
est crystal Plants and animals grow by ex-
cessive developments; increased BY assimilation
/ through chemical changes; but crystals are
equally perfect in their earliest stages, and en-
large onIy by accretion. Yet crystals, like all
other created things,die in time. Mines abound
with skeletons of crystals Crystals differ in
shape--as the microscope reveals-almost as
much as plants themselves. Yet the same
substances always crystalize in the same forms,
at least under the same conditions, so that we
may say there are tribes and races of crystals,
with typical shapes, exactly as of men.
Fair reader, can you apply the picture? Sup
pose you make an effort.