little tube; the water thus compelled to flow downwards would rise in

the reservoir, represented by the flower-pot, until it reached the
same level at either end."

"That is quite clear," cried Raphael.
"But there is this difference," the other went on. "Suppose that the

thin column of water poured into the little vertical tube there exerts
a force equal, say, to a pound weight, for instance, its action will

be punctually communicated to the great body of the liquid, and will
be transmitted to every part of the surface represented by the water

in the flower-pot so that at the surface there will be a thousand
columns of water, every one pressing upwards as if they were impelled

by a force equal to that which compels the liquid to descend in the
vertical tube; and of necessity they reproduce here," said Planchette,

indicating to Raphael the top of the flower-pot, "the force introduced
over there, a thousand-fold," and the man of science pointed out to

the marquis the uprightwooden pipe set in the clay.
"That is quite simple," said Raphael.

Planchette smiled again.
"In other words," he went on, with the mathematician's natural

stubborn propensity for logic, "in order to resist the force of the
incoming water, it would be necessary to exert, upon every part of the

large surface, a force equal to that brought into action in the
verticalcolumn, but with this difference--if the column of liquid is

a foot in height, the thousand little columns of the wide surface will
only have a very slight elevating power.

"Now," said Planchette, as he gave a fillip to his bits of stick, "let
us replace this funny little apparatus by steel tubes of suitable

strength and dimensions; and if you cover the liquid surface of the
reservoir with a strong sliding plate of metal, and if to this metal

plate you oppose another, solid enough and strong enough to resist any
test; if, furthermore, you give me the power of continually adding

water to the volume of liquidcontents by means of the little vertical
tube, the object fixed between the two solid metal plates must of

necessity yield to the tremendous crushing force which indefinitely
compresses it. The method of continually pouring in water through a

little tube, like the manner of communicating force through the volume
of the liquid to a small metal plate, is an absurdly primitive

mechanicaldevice. A brace of pistons and a few valves would do it
all. Do you perceive, my dear sir," he said taking Valentin by the

arm, "there is scarcely a substance in existence that would not be
compelled to dilate when fixed in between these two indefinitely

resisting surfaces?"
"What! the author of the Lettres provinciales invented it?" Raphael

exclaimed.
"He and no other, sir. The science of mechanics knows no simpler nor

more beautiful contrivance. The opposite principle, the capacity of
expansion possessed by water, has brought the steam-engine into being.

But water will only expand up to a certain point, while its
incompressibility, being a force in a manner negative, is, of

necessity, infinite."
"If this skin is expanded," said Raphael, "I promise you to erect a

colossal statue to Blaise Pascal; to found a prize of a hundred
thousand francs to be offered every ten years for the solution of the

grandest problem of mechanical science effected during the interval;
to find dowries for all your cousins and second cousins, and finally

to build an asylum on purpose for impoverished or insane
mathematicians."

"That would be exceedingly useful," Planchette replied. "We will go to
Spieghalter to-morrow, sir," he continued, with the serenity of a man

living on a plane whollyintellectual. "That distinguished mechanic
has just completed, after my own designs, an improved mechanical

arrangement by which a child could get a thousand trusses of hay
inside his cap."

"Then good-bye till to-morrow."
"Till to-morrow, sir."

"Talk of mechanics!" cried Raphael; "isn't it the greatest of the
sciences? The other fellow with his onagers, classifications, ducks,

and species, and his phials full of bottled monstrosities, is at best
only fit for a billiard-marker in a saloon."

The next morning Raphael went off in great spirits to find Planchette,
and together they set out for the Rue de la Sante--auspicious

appellation! Arrived at Spieghalter's, the young man found himself in
a vast foundry; his eyes lighted upon a multitude of glowing and

roaring furnaces. There was a storm of sparks, a deluge of nails, an
ocean of pistons, vices, levers, valves, girders, files, and nuts; a

sea of melted metal, baulks of timber and bar-steel. Iron filings
filled your throat. There was iron in the atmosphere; the men were

covered with it; everything reeked of iron. The iron seemed to be a
living organism; it became a fluid, moved, and seemed to shape itself

intelligently after every fashion, to obey the worker's every caprice.
Through the uproar made by the bellows, the crescendo of the falling

hammers, and the shrill sounds of the lathes that drew groans from the
steel, Raphael passed into a large, clean, and airy place where he was

able to inspect at his leisure the great press that Planchette had
told him about. He admired the cast-iron beams, as one might call

them, and the twin bars of steel coupled together with indestructible
bolts.

"If you were to give seven rapid turns to that crank," said
Spieghalter, pointing out a beam of polished steel, "you would make a

steel bar spurt out in thousands of jets, that would get into your
legs like needles."

"The deuce!" exclaimed Raphael.
Planchette himself slipped the piece of skin between the metal plates

of the all-powerful press; and, brimful of the certainty of a
scientificconviction, he worked the crank energetically.

"Lie flat, all of you; we are dead men!" thundered Spieghalter, as he
himself fell prone on the floor.

A hideous shrieking sound rang through the workshops. The water in the
machine had broken the chamber, and now spouted out in a jet of

incalculable force; luckily it went in the direction of an old
furnace, which was overthrown, enveloped and carried away by a

waterspout.
"Ha!" remarked Planchette serenely, "the piece of skin is as safe and

sound as my eye. There was a flaw in your reservoir somewhere, or a
crevice in the large tube----"

"No, no; I know my reservoir. The devil is in your contrivance, sir;
you can take it away," and the German pounced upon a smith's hammer,

flung the skin down on an anvil, and, with all the strength that rage
gives, dealt the talisman the most formidable blow that had ever

resounded through his workshops.
"There is not so much as a mark on it!" said Planchette, stroking the

perverse bit of skin.
The workmenhurried in. The foreman took the skin and buried it in the

glowing coal of a forge, while, in a semi-circle round the fire, they
all awaited the action of a huge pair of bellows. Raphael,

Spieghalter, and Professor Planchette stood in the midst of the grimy
expectant crowd. Raphael, looking round on faces dusted over with iron

filings, white eyes, greasy blackened clothing, and hairy chests,
could have fancied himself transported into the wild nocturnal world

of German balladpoetry. After the skin had been in the fire for ten
minutes, the foreman pulled it out with a pair of pincers.

"Hand it over to me," said Raphael.
The foreman held it out by way of a joke. The Marquis readily handled

it; it was cool and flexible between his fingers. An exclamation of
alarm went up; the workmen fled in terror. Valentin was left alone

with Planchette in the empty workshop.
"There is certainly something infernal in the thing!" cried Raphael,

in desperation. "Is no human power able to give me one more day of
existence?"

"I made a mistake, sir," said the mathematician, with a penitent
expression; "we ought to have subjected that peculiar skin to the

action of a rolling machine. Where could my eyes have been when I
suggested compression!"

"It was I that asked for it," Raphael answered.
The mathematician heaved a sigh of relief, like a culprit acquitted by

a dozen jurors. Still, the strange problem afforded by the skin
interested him; he meditated a moment, and then remarked:

"This unknown material ought to be treated chemically by re-agents.