St. Nicholas, vol. 4, no. 12

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"WAIT TILL WE GET THERE, DARLING."
(See poem "Mother," page 769.)

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ST. NICHOLAS.

OCTOBER, 1877.

[Copyright, 1877, by Scribner & Co.]

MOTHER.

BY M. M. D.

EARLY one summer morning,
1 saw two children pass:
Their footsteps, slow yet lightsome,
Scarce bent the tender grass.

One, lately out of babyhood,
Looked up with eager eyes;
The other watched her wistfully,
Oppressed with smothered sighs.

"See, mother! cried the little one,
"I gathered them for you?
The sweetest flowers and lilies,
And Mabel has some too."

"Hush, Nelly whispered Mabel,
We have not reached it yet.
Wait till we get there, darling,
It is n't far, my pet."

"Get where?" asked Nelly. "Tell me."
To the church-yard," Mabel said.
No no cried little Nelly,
And shook her sunny head.

Still Mabel whispered sadly,
We must take them to the grave.
Come, darling?" and the childish voice
Tried to be clear and brave.
VOL. IV.-50.

But Nelly still kept calling
Far up into the blue;
" See, mother, see, how pretty
We gathered them for you."

And when her sister pleaded,
She cried-and would not go:-
"Angels don't live in church-yards,
My mother don't, I know "

Then Mabel bent and kissed her.
"So be it, dear," she said;
"We'll take them to the arbor
And lay them there instead.

" For mother loved it dearly,
It was the sweetest place "
And the joy that came to Nelly
Shone up in Mabel's face.

I saw them turn, and follow
A path with blossoms bright,
Until the nodding branches
Concealed them from my sight;

But still like sweetest music
The words came ringing through;
"See, mother, see, how pretty!
We gathered them for you."

VOL. IV.

No. 12.

GONE ASTRAY.

,GONE ASTRAY.
[CONCLUDED.]

BY GEORGE MACDONALD.

ELLEN was so happy, and warm, and comfort-
able when she found herself going safely on her
way in the carrier's cart, that she fell fast asleep.
When she awoke, he gave her some bread and
cheese for her breakfast, and some water out of a
brook that crossed the road, and then Ellen began
to look about her. The rain had ceased and the
sun was shining, and the country looked very pleas-
ant; but Ellen thought it a strange country. She
could see so much farther And corn was grow-
ing everywhere, and there was not a sheep to be
seen, and there were many cows feeding in the
fields.
Are we hear Edinburgh ?" she asked.
"Oh, no!" answered the carrier; "we are a
long way from Edinburgh yet."
And so they journeyed on. The day was flecked
all over with sunshine and rain; and when the
rain's turn came, Ellen would creep under a corner
of the tarpaulin till it was over. They slept part of
the night at a small town they passed through.
Ellen thought it a very long way to Edinburgh,
though the carrier was kind to her. At length she
spied, far away, a great hill, that looked like a
couching lion.
Do you see that hill?" said the carrier.
I am just looking at it," answered Ellen.
Edinburgh lies at the foot of that hill."
Oh !" said Ellen; and scarcely took her eyes
off it till it went out of sight again.
Reaching the brow of an eminence, they saw
Arthur's Seat (as the carrier said the hill was called)
once more, and below it a grand, jagged ridge of
what Ellen took to be broken rocks. But the car-
rier told her that was the Old Town of Edinburgh.
Those fierce-looking splinters on the edge of the
mass were the roofs, gables, and chimneys of the
great houses once inhabited by the nobility of
Scotland. But when you come near the houses
you find them shabby-looking; for they are full
of poor people, who cannot keep them clean and
nice.
At length the cart stopped at a public-house in
the Grassmarket-a wide, open place, with strange
old houses all round it, and a huge rock, with a
castle on its top, towering over it. There Ellen
got down.
I can't go with you till I 've unloaded my
cart," said the carrier.
I don't want you to go with me, please," said

Ellen. I think Willie would rather not. Please
give me father's letter."
So the carrier gave her the letter, and got a
little boy of the landlady's to show her the way up
the West-bow-a street of tall houses, so narrow
that you might have shaken hands across it from
window to window. But those houses are all pulled
down now, I am sorry to say, and the street Ellen
went up has vanished.
From the West-bow they went up a stair into
the High street, and thence into a narrow court,
Sand then up a winding stair, and so came to the
floor where Willie's lodging was. Then the little
boy left Ellen.
Ellen knocked two or three times before any-
body came; and when at last a woman opened the
door, what do you think the woman did the moment
she inquired after Willie? She shut the door in
her face with a fierce scolding word. For Willic
had vexed her that morning, and she thoughtlessly
took her revenge upon Ellen without even asking
her a question. Then, indeed, for a moment,
Ellen's courage gave way. All at once she felt
dreadfully tired, and sat down upon the stair and
cried. And the landlady was so angry with Willie
that she forgot all about the little girl that wanted
to see him.
So for a whole hour Ellen sat upon the stair,
moving only to let people pass. She felt dreadfully
miserable, but had not the courage to knock again,
for fear of having the door shut in her face yet
more hopelessly. At last a woman came up and
knocked at the door. Ellen rose trembling and
stood behind her. The door opened; the woman
was welcomed; she entered. The door was again
closing when Ellen cried out in an agony:
Please, ma'am, I want to see my brother
Willie !" and burst into sobs.
The landlady, her wrath having by this time
cooled, was vexed with herself and ashamed that
she had not let the child in.
Bless me !" she cried; "have you been there
all this time? Why did n't you tell me you were
that fellow's sister? Come in. You wont find him
in, though. It's not much of his company we get,
I can tell you."
I don't want to come in, then," sobbed Ellen.
Please to tell me where he is, ma'am."
"How should I know where he is? At no
good, I warrant. But you had better come in and

[OCTOBER,

377-1 GONE ASTRAY. 771

wait, for it's your only chance of seeing him before
to-morrow morning."
With a sore heart, Ellen went in and sat down
by the kitchen fire. And the landlady and her
visitor sat and talked together, every now and then
casting a look at Ellen, who kept her eyes on the
ground, waiting with all her soul till Willie should
come. Every time the landlady looked, Ellen's
sad face went deeper into her heart; so that, before
she knew what was going on in herself, she quite
loved the child ; for she was a kind-hearted woman,
though she was sometimes cross.
In a few minutes she went up to Ellen and took
her bonnet off. Ellen submitted without a word.
Then she made her a cup of tea; and.while Ellen
was taking it she asked her a great many questions.
Ellen answered them all; and the landlady stared
with amazement at the child's courage and resolu-
tion, and thought with herself:
Well, if anything can get Willie out of his bad
ways, this little darling will do it."
Then she made her go to Willie's bed, prom-
ising to let her know the moment he came home.
Ellen slept and slept till it was night. When
she woke it was dark, but a light was shining
through beneath the door. So she rose and put on
her frock and shoes and stockings, and went to the
kitchen.
You see he 's not come yet," said the land-
lady.
Where can he be?" returned Ellen, sadly.
Oh I he 'll be drinking with some of his com-
panions in the public-house, I suppose."
Where is the public-house ?"
There are hundreds of them, child."
I know the place he generally goes to," said 'a
young tradesman who sat by the fire.
He had a garret-room in the house, and knew
Willie by sight. And he told the landlady in a low
voice where it was.
Oh do tell me, please sir," cried Ellen. I
want to get him home."
"You don't think he '11 mind you, do you ?"
Yes, I do," returned Ellen, confidently.
Well, I'll show you the way, if you like; but
you'll find it a rough place, I can tell you. You '11
wish yourself out of it pretty soon, with or without
Willie."
I wont leave it without him," said Ellen, tying
on her bonnet.
Stop a bit," said the landlady. "I '11 go along."
The landlady put on her bonnet, and out they
all went into the street.
What a wonder it might have been to Ellen !
But she only knew that she was in the midst of
great lights, and carts and carriages rumbling over
the stones, and windows full of pretty things, and

crowds of people jostling along the pavements. In
all the show she wanted nothing but Willie.
The young man led them down a long, dark
close through an arch-way, and then into a court
off the close, and then up an outside stone stair to
a low-browed door, at which he knocked.
I don't much like the look of this place," said
the landlady.
"Oh there's no danger, I dare say, if you
keep quiet. They 'll never hurt the child. Besides,
her brother 'll see to that."
Presently the door was opened, and the young
man asked after Willie.
Is he in?" he said.
He may be, or he may not," answered a fat,
frouzy woman, in a dirty cotton dress. "Who
wants him ?"
This little girl."
Please, ma'am, I 'in his sister."
We want no sisters here."
And she tried to close the door. I dare say the
landlady remembered with shame that that was
just what she had done that morning.
Come come interposed the young trades-
man, putting his foot between the door and the
post; don't be foolish. Surely you wont go to
keep a child like that from speaking to her own
brother Why, the Queen herself would let her
in."
This softened the woman a little, and she hesi-
tated, with the latch in her hand.
Mother wants him," said Ellen. She's very
ill. I heard her cry about Willie. Let me in."
She took hold of the woman's hand, who drew
it away hastily, but stepped back, at the same time,
and let her enter. She then resumed her place
at the door.
Not a one of you shall come in she said,
as if justifying the child's admission by the exclu-
sion of.the others.
We don't want.to," said the young man. But
we '11 just see that no harm comes to her."
"D' ye think I'm not enough for that? said
the woman, with scorn." Let me see who dares
to touch her But you may stay where you are,
if you like. The air's free."
So saying, she closed the door, with a taunting
laugh.
The passage was dark in which Ellen found
herself; but she saw a light at the further end,
through a key-hole, and heard the sounds of loud
talk and louder laughter. Before the woman had
closed the outer door, she had reached this room;
nor did the woman follow, either to guide or pre-
vent her.
A pause came in the noise. She tapped at
the door.

77 OEATAY OTBR

Come in cried some one; and she entered.
Around a table were seated four youths, drink-
ing. Of them, one was Willie, with flushed -face
and flashing eyes. They all stared when the child
stood before them, in her odd, old-fashioned bon-
net, and her little shawl pinned at the throat. Willie
stared as much as any of them.
Willie Willie cried Ellen; and wduld have
rushed to him, but the table was between.
"What do you want here, Ellen ? Who the
deuce let you come here ? said Willie, not quite
unkindly.
"I want you, Willie. Come honie with me.
Oh I please come home with me."
I can't now, Ellen, you see," he answered.
Then, turning to his companions, How could the
child have found her way here ?". he said, looking
ashamed as he spoke.
"You're fetched. That's all," said one of
them, with a sneer. Mother's sent for you."
"Go along!" said another; and mind you
don't catch it when you get home .
Nobody will say a word to you, Willie," in-
terposed Ellen.
Be a good boy, and don't do it again said
the third, raising his glass to his lips:
Willie tried to laugh, but was evidently vexed.
What are you standing there for, Ellen ? he
said, sharply. This is no place for you."
Nor for you either, Willie," returned Ellen,
without moving.
We're all very naughty, are n't we, Ellen ?"
said the first.
Come and give me a kiss, and I '11 forgive
you," said the second.
"You sha' n't have your brother; so you may
trudge home again without him," said the third.
And then they all burst out laughing, except
Willie.
Do go away, Ellen he said, angrily.
Where am I to go to ? she asked.
Where you came from."
"That's home," said Ellen; "but I can't go
home to-night, and I dare n't go home without
you. Mother would die. She's very ill, Willie.
I heard her crying last night."
It seemed to Ellen at the moment that it was
only last night she left home.
I'11 just take the little fool to my lodgings and
come back directly," said Willie, rather stricken at
this mention of his mother.
"Oh yes! *Do as you 're bid they cried,
and burst out laughing again.
But Willie was angry now.
1 tell you what," he said, I'll go when and
where I like. -I don't need to ask your leave,-
do I?"

Two of them were silent now, because they
were afraid of Willie; for he was big and strong.
The third, however, said, with a sneer.
Go with its little sister to its little mammy "
Now, Willie could not get out, so small was
the room and so large the table, except one or
other of those next him rose to let him pass.
Neither did. Willie, therefore, jumped on the
table, kicked the tumbler of the one who had last
spoken into the breast of his shirt, jumped down
again, took Ellen by the hand, and left the house.
The rude boys said Ellen. I would never
go near them again, if I was you, Willie."
But Willie said never a word, for he was not
pleased with Ellen, or with himself, br with his
friends.
When they got into the house he said, abruptly:
What's the matter with your mother,' Ellen ?"
I don't know, Willie; but I don't think she 'll
ever get better. I 'm sure father does n't think it
either."
Willie was silent for a long time. Then he said:
How did you come here, Ellen? "
And Ellen told him the whole story.
"And now you '11 come home with me, Willie,"
she added, and we shall be so happy,- father
and mother, and all,-so happy !"
It was very foolish of you, Ellen. To think
you could bring me home if I did n't choose "
But you do choose,-don't you, Willie? "
You might as well have written," he.said.
Then Ellen remembered her. father's letter,
which the carrier had given her. And 'she took it
out of her pocket, and gave it to Willie. And
Willie took it, and sat down, with his back to
Ellen, and read it through. Then he burst out
crying, and laid his head on his arms and cried
harder yet. And Ellen got upon a bar of the
chair-for he was down on the table-and leaned
over him, and put her arms 'round his neck, and
said, crying herself all the time:
Nobody said a word to the black lamb when
Jumper brought him home, Willie. We were all
so glad to see him "
And Willie lifted, his head, and put his arms
around Ellen, and drew her face to his, and kissed
her as he used to kiss her years ago.
*
They went home with the carrier next day.
Their father did n't say much when he saw Willie.
But he held out his hand with a half smile on his
lips, and a look in his eye like the moon before
a storm.
And his mother held out her arms, and drew
him down to her bosom, and stroked his hair, and
prayed God to bless Willie, her boy.

772

GONE ASTRAY.

[OCTOBER,

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

And did she grow better ? I think I hear you noticed it,-she was so busy making much of
ask. Yes, she did; but not very soon. Willie, too.
And Ellen,-were n't they glad to see Ellen ? But when she went to bed that night, her father
They made more of Willie than they did of Ellen. kissed her and said: "The blessin' o' an auld
"And was n't Ellen sorry ? No; she never father be upo' ye, my wee bairn !

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THERE'S a ship on the .sea. It is sailing to-night,
Sailing to-night !
And father's aboard, and the moon is all bright,
Shining and bright!
Dear moon he'll be sailing for many a night-
Sailing from mother and me.
Oh follow the ship with your silvery light,
As father sails over the sea !

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

BY EMILY H. LELAND.

Now, I presume there are grown-up people who
'are too stupid to understand how ailybody can
"grow smaller," but the little children who are
going to listen to this story are wise and bright
enough to know all about it, I am sure. There-
fore, let the grown-up people go away into the
parlor and talk their grand talk, while the little
folks and I cuddle down by the pleasant nursery-
fire and have our story.
Once there was a little girl. She was three

years old, and if you asked her what her name was
she always said Kittyman Tannyman." Her real
name was Kitty Taine, but she never liked that
nane-she said it was too quick," and one day,
after she had been sitting very quietly in the sun-
shine for several minutes, thinking and thinking
with all her might, she called out to her mamma
that she had "longed" her name, and made it
over into Kittyman Tannyman."
So, after this, she was called Kittyman Tannyman

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

-except when she was naughty, and then she was
called Kitty Taine, and the name sounded quicker
than ever.
However, Kittyman Tannyman was n't naughty
very often. Sometimes, to be sure, she did n't like
to wear a dingham" apron in the morning, but
wanted to put on a white one, with crimped ruffles
and pink bows on the pockets, and then run out to
make sand-cakes in.the back yard until she was n't fit
to be seen. And sometimes she wanted to go every-
where her mamma went, and would stand in the
hall and cry with her mouth open so wide you would
think she could never shut it again, and angry
tears jumping down her cheeks like rain-drops in a
thunder-storm. But, taking all the days together,
Kittyman Tannyman was more good than bad,
and no one in the house could bear the thought of
living without her. She was good and kind to all
her dollies, and never left them lying about the
floor to be stepped on by the big people, and when
she gave them baths she was sure to have the water
just right, and never put soap in their eyes. If
she spilled ink, or went to the sugar-bin, or cut off
her front hair, or picked the prettiest buds from
her mamma's plants, she always looked so sorry,
and said she "did n't fink about it," and was a
good girl for a great many hours afterward. This
was the sort of child Kittyman Tannyman was
before her big fault came.
You would never guess what that dreadful fault
was, so I will tell you. It was the fault of not going
to slee First, sIhe did n't want her afternoon
nap any more; and, after a while, she did n't
want to go to sleep when bed-time came. As
weeks went on she sat up later and later, and
her eyes grew rounder and rounder, until her big
brother told her if she did n't go to bed like other
children he would feel obliged to call her an owl.
Kittyman Tannyman, however, did not care.
Every evening she sat up a little later than the last
evening, and although her mamma put, on her
loveliest night-gown, told her every story.under the
stars, and sung her every song she ever knew, still
Kittyman Tannyman lay wide-awake in her little
bed, looking at the lamp with eyes that never so
much as winked.
Her papa would say, Don't bother with her-
she will go to sleep by and by!" and then her
mamma would go out into the sitting-room, leaving
the door open, -for she felt very sorry for any poor
child who would n't go to sleep,-and Kittyman
Tannyman would kick about with her little lily legs
and sing soft, small songs to herself, and talk to the
three dolls lying beside her until-well, nobody
ever knew when she went to sleep Certainly she
was awake when everybody else was in bed and
asleep, and the first sound in the morning was the

voice of Kittyman Tannyman singing to her three
dolls.
Papa, mamma and the big brother began to be
frightened. No matter how nice a little boy or
girl may be, they can't live and grow without
sleep, and plenty of it, too; and very soon every-
body noticed that poor Kittyman Tannynan was
beginning to grow smaller.. The doctor was called
in. He looked at the little girl's tongue, took her
chubby wrist in his fingers, talked with her, and
watched her as she ran dancing out of the room.
"Well, what do you think, Doctor?" said both
her papa and mamma together.
She does n't need any medicine," he said.
" She 's perfectly well from head to foot. It's just
a clear case of wont go to sleep. She 'll get tired
of it after a while, you may depend. But you

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only danger lies in her growing so small that she
will get stepped on, or eaten up by the cat, or
something of that sort. When she gets so small
that the situation will have become disgusting to
her, there will be a reaction. This is a very rare
disease among children, and a very interesting one.
I never knew' but three children who grew smaller.
One of them was swept up in the dust-pan by a
careless servant, and almost smothered to death;
but they are all living now, and are as big as any-

doctor picked up his shining hat and went away
without leaving even one tiny sugar-pellet, for he
was a doctor who had a soul, and he never made
was a doctor who had a soul, and he never made

774

[OCTOBER,

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER. 775

people take his medicines when he knew all the
time they had no need of them.
When Kittyman Tannyman ran into the room
again she looked all about for the "sugar meds,"
as she called them, and when her mamma said she
was not to have any, her eyes were almost ready to
cry. But her papa took a lovely, curly-headed boy
doll from his pocket, and wondered how it came
there, and whom it was for, and seemed so puzzled
about it, that Kittyman Tannyman forgot the
sugar meds, and climbed up in his lap to help him
solve the problem. As her papa placed the doll in
her hands he was grieved to see how small they
had already grown, and how loose and large her
pretty button boots had become.
"I shall have to make her clothes all over," said
her mamma. And' sure enough, she not only had
to make them smaller, but there was no end to
making them smaller. Every day an apron or a
dress, or a hat, or a broidered skirt had to be made
smaller, until mamma's fingers ached, and the
sewing-machine got out of patience and broke its
needles; and every day her papa had to buy a
smaller pair of shoes and a smaller pair of stock-
ings, until he said it was no use, he could n't spend
so much money on Kittyman Tannyman's small-
ness! So, finally, her mamma made up a lot of
cheap calico frocks,-worse than any "dingham "
aprons that ever were worn,-and, instead of having
new shoes every day, she had to wear just flannel
stockings, for these her mamma could cut and sew,
several pairs in an hour-being careful to make
each pair a little smaller than the last.
Poor Kittyman Tannyman looked very queer
in her little calico frocks and flannel stockings, and
she would sometimes roll up in a corner of the sofa
and cry softly to herself for a while, thinking of the
crimpy, crispy white aprons and bronze boots she
used to wear. But it seemed so jolly to her to be
no bigger than a big doll she would soon forget
about her clothes in running all over the house and
hiding in all sorts of cunning little places and making
ihe big people look for her long and anxiously.
At night, when it was time for everybody to be
ini bed, her mamma undressed her and put her in a
doll's cradle that had been selected for her; but no
one ever saw her asleep, and everybody was worried
except Kittyman Tannyman herself.
So she went on growing smaller. When she sat
in her high chair at table, only her curly top-knot,
her two round eyes, and the tip of her nose could
be seen. Her mamma put the big dictionary in
the chair, with a pillow on the top of it, and for a
day or two Kittyman Tannyman's whole face was
visible, but after that she was as low down as ever.
So her mamma said if she would be very nice and
quiet she might sit on the table, in a doll's chair,

close by the sugar-bowl, and use a doll's plate and
spoon, since her own had become too large for her
tiny hands. Kittyman Tannyman enjoyed this
change very much, and for a few days sat very
quietly in her place, but one night she hid behind
the sugar-bowl and played bo-peep with her big
brother until she became very wild and gay, and
before anybody could say "Kitty Taine" she
skipped across the cheese-plate, ran around the
castor, and tripping against a salt-cellar, fell head-
long into a dish of clear, bright, shaky lemon-jelly.
Of course, such conduct was not to be allowed;
but after Kittyman Tannyman was sufficiently
punished by being washed and combed and curled
for a whole hour, she was ready to promise that
she would never-never-run away on the table
again. But the promises of very little girls who
grow smaller every day are not of much value.
Every few days some shocking accident would occur
at table, and Kittyman Tannyman was sure to be
at the bottom of it. The flowers were upset into
the soup, the milk spilled over the salad, the
pickles drowned in the water-pitcher, and one day
a doll's leg was found in the gravy. Her mamma
said it was impossible to watch such a little thing
all the time, and as there were no whippings in the
house small enough to apply to her, she would be
obliged to tie her fast in her chair at meal-times.
After this the table was orderly enough, but I
could never describe the amount of mischief done
about the house. Every one knows what even one
little mouse can do if given the whole house to live
in, so it can be imagined how much mischief this
mite of a girl did, who had brains to think with
and two hands to work with. They were all talk-
ing of what could be done with Kittyman Tanny-
man, when something occurred to convince them
that something must be done.
Kittyman Tannyman had grown so very small,
she could now hide herself in the most unheard-of
places, and when she was called she would often
decline to answer, and make her poor, tired papa
and mamma have a grand hunt for her. One
night, when an elegant supper had been prepared,
and-her mamma had dressed herself in her pret-
tiest dress, and was watching from the window for
Kittyman's papa,-it being a birthday, or some-
thing of the sort,-Kittyman Tannyman got down
from the swing which her brother had made for
her under the rose-geranium, and, running softly
over the carpet, crawled into one of her papa's slip-
pers that were warming by the fire, and squeezed
and crowded herself into the toe of it completely
out of sight. Then she put her wee hand over her
wee mouth, and laughed a little laugh that nobody
could hear-thinking what a task they would have
to find her this time.

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

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KITTYMAN HAS BEGUN TO GROW SMALLER.
Presently in came her papa, and he and her
mamma both stood before the door talking a vast
amount of nonsense, it seemed to Kittyman Tan-
nyman. Then her mamma said: "Mercy-the
dinner Now where is that mouse? "
Dear me," said her papa, in a discouraged
voice, "is she hiding again?" And then he
went into the dressing-room, and Kittyman
Tannyman never dreamed that he was taking
off his damp boots. He came back in a mo-
ment, put his foot into one slipper, and stamped
it on-for he was very hungry, and knew that
the baked whitefish was cooling. He put his
foot in the other slipper, and st-- But,
before he had quite stamped it on, there came
a funny, frightened little squeak from the slip-
per. If her papa had been her mamma, he
would have screamed, and perhaps kicked the
slipper into the fire; but, being a man, he only
snatched off the slipper and looked into it.
There was poor Kittyman Tannyman away
down in the toe, gasping for breath.
Was this the last of Kittyman Tannyman?
Oh, no; she had hurt her papa much more
than he had hurt her. After she had been
carried to the open air, and had a drop of
cologne on her head and chest, she was quite
herself again. Her papa, however, could barely
taste the elegant supper-he had experienced
such a shock," he said, and added there was
very little use in living if we were never to know
what was going to happen next. The result of
this little game of hide-and-seek was that Kitty-
man Tannyman found herself next day under a
large glass goblet, with a little rbcking-chair, a
few playthings, and no way of getting out again.
"It is the only way to keep her from worrying
our lives out !" said her papa, as he sadly shoved

a cluster of white currants under the goblet and
turned away.
Instead of feeling badly about it, Kittyman Tan-
nyman was quite charmed with life under glass,
and danced gayly about her little crystal house
until she was glad to sit down in the tiny rocking-
chair to rest herself and drink the juice of a currant
or two. Then she looked about her, and said to
herself how nice it was to have a house all window,
and felt very sorry for the big people who had to
live in great, monstrous wooden rooms full of dust
and draughts.
The doctor called, and stood by the table, talk-
ing with her papa and mamma, and looking at
Kittyman Tannyman now and then. Her mamma
had just been asking him if the reaction ever
would come.
"It will be queer enough if it does n't," said the
doctor. "She's carrying it pretty far, I must con-
fess. Perhaps it would be well enough to-to-
prepare for the worst. If she continues to grow
small for another week, I fear- "
But her mamma cried out, "Oh, don't, Doc-

-
--^--~-AS^.

-

I''I11

l'l f:'-
'i i ",, --

-r
",~~~ ,,- f '

KITTYMAN AT HOME IN THE GOBLET.

tor !" and her papa turned away, biting his lips to
keep them from curling up like her mamma's.

776

[OCTOBER,

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

But still there is hope-there is hope !" said had climbed into it and was having great fun. She
the good doctor, hurrying out of the room. had never been permitted to touch this work-box,
Oh, Kittyman Tannyman !" said her mamma, but she did n't stop to think of that. She rolled
kneeling by the table, and putting her face so near the bright spools out upon the table, tangled the
the goblet that the worsteds, tossed
little girl was al- the buttons right
most afraid of her and left, put her
big eyes with such : .mamma's gold
bright tears shin- .- thimble on her
ing in them. "Oh, head, laughing to
Kittyman Tanny- ) think what a fun-
man! why wont -' ny cap it made,
you sleep? Don't 't and tumbled and
you see how small -" tangled every-
you have grown? -- thing she could
Do you want to find, until she was
grow so small that 'i weary of mischief.
we can never see Then she wished
you any more, or "- --- she could get down
kiss you, or have on the floor and
any little girlie find new worlds
again as long as to conquer. It
we live? And- "'OP! WENT THE FOOT OF THE PAPER CRADLE. seemed a great

oh, just think of your beautiful bronze boots, Kitty-
man Tannyman!"
Kittyman Tannyman thought of her bronze
boots, and looked quite serious for five seconds.
Then she shrugged her little shoulders, helped
herself to another currant, and said:
"Don't over me, mamma! Me don't feel
s'eepy "
Then her mamma and papa both went out of
the room, and both held their handkerchiefs to
their eyes.
It was, indeed, quite pleasant under the goblet,
for a day or two. Everything was so nice and
clean and quiet. The crimson table-cloth on which
the goblet sat made a fine, soft carpet for Kitty-
man Tannyman's feet; a small hole conveniently
broken out near the top of the glass supplied her
with fresh air; she had a tiny silver bell to ring
whenever she wanted anything, and her big brother
brought her specks of sugar, and now and then a
slice of strawberry. But no one likes to be shut up
for long-no matter how pretty one's prison may
be, and she was very glad when her brother
brought her lunch in a hurry one day, carelessly
left the goblet tilted up on the rockers of her little
chair, and ran off for a game of base-ball.
Now was Kittyman Tannyman's time. She did
not wait to eat her dinner, but crawled out from
under the goblet, and ran dancing and leaping
about the table as happy as a sunbeam. Her
mamma's work-box, with the lid thrown back,
showing all the delightful silks and buttons and
worsteds, was on one end of the table, and it
was n't half a minute before Kittvman Tannyman

distance, and she had to

think matters over

for three minutes. Then she remembered once
seeing her brother slide down a long way on a
rope in the barn. She climbed into the work-box
again, and finding some tape, she spent many
minutes in trying to tie one end of it around the
key of the work-box. It was a funny knot when it
was done, but it held very well, and Kittyman
Tannyman immediately proceeded to slide down
on the tape.
She found herself on the floor a little sooner
than she expected, and her hands felt tingly, but
she was soon scampering over the carpet, looking
out for whatever mischief might offer itself. Away
down in the kitchen her mamma was making cur-
rant jelly, and Kittyman Tannyman was in no
danger of interruption. She crawled under the
book-case, but came out sneezing, for she found
nothing but dust. She clambered up among the
plants, and pulled and tugged at two bright roses
until their petals came down upon her in a shower,
and they indignantly pricked her with one of their
sharp thorns. She cried a little, but only the
plants heard her, and they seemed to think it
served her right. She pressed her little nose
against the window, and wished she could run
outside, like big people. Well, why not try?"
said a little voice in her heart. I will try," said
Kittyman Tannyman out loud. She ran to the
door leading into the hall; it was open half an
inch. I can sideways fru it," she said, and sure
enough she did. The outer door was wide open,
and in a moment Kittyman Tannyman was out in
the big, big world, all by herself. "The straw-

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

berry-patch?" said the little voice in her heart.
"All right !" said Kittyman Tannyman.
Now, when she was a nice, large child, wearing
bronze boots and crimped aprons, she could easily
reach the strawberry-patch; but to-day it seemed a
long way off, and twice she came near getting lost
outright in the winding garden-path, overhung as
it was by forests of mignonette and candy-tuft. A
great, scratchy grasshopper nearly knocked her
down as he jumped across the path, and a burly
bumble-bee touched her with one of his loud, buzz-
ing wings, as he was hurrying home with his bags
of honey. All sorts of queer bugs peeped out of
the candy-tuft forests at her, and she was glad to
hurry on and reach the shelter of the broad straw-
berry-leaves. As she sat there with a beautiful red
ripe strawberry in her lap, and had just taken the
second bite from it, she heard a sound that is not
pleasant to hear when one is out strawberrying,
and that sound was-thunder! Kittyman Tan-
nyman remembered that thunder was generally
mixed up with rain, and she knew that the rain
was very wet. She wished it was not such a long
way back to the house. Such a pity-when she
had only taken two bites! So she took another
and another, and the next thunder that came
seemed just around the corner, and down came a
drop of rain on her head and ran down her back
in a very unpleasant way.
"Oh my! me must have 'a yumbella!" said
Kittyman Tannyman, looking about her; but
there was nothing to be seen but the great broad
strawberry-leaves bending and nodding under
other drops of rain.
Kittyman pulled with all her strength, and suc-
ceeded in breaking off a fine large leaf, which she
held over her head, but the drops fell thicker and
faster, and very often one would strike the poor
child so hard that it would almost make her cry.
The red round strawberries bent toward her try-
ing, I am sure, to tell her not to be afraid, but
Kittyman Tannyman was afraid, and very uncom-
fortable, too. It was dark and wet out in the big
world, the thunder was uncommonly loud, and
Kittyman Tannyman wished-yes, she actually
wished-that she had never grown smaller, but was
her mamma's fine large girl again, helping dust
chairs and gather bouquets, and wearing her dear,
dear bronze boots and sky-blue sash. And then
Kittyman Tannyman put both her little hands to
her eyes and cried and cried.
And while she was crying under the strawberry-
leaves everybody in the house was hunting for Kit-
tyman Tannyman. They knew she had not been
eaten by the cat, for the cat had been sent away
when the little girl first began to grow small. They
knew she had not been swept up in the dust-pan,

for her mamma was too careful for that. They
looked in the water-pitcher; they poked-very
softly-under the book-case; they even looked in
their other pockets, and in all the boots and shoes
and rubbers in the hall-closet, but not a sign of
Kittyman Tannyman. Night was coming on. The
thunder had stopped, but the rain still came down
-not in big swift drops as at first, but mildly and
reluctantly, as if afraid of hurting something.
If she went out-of-doors where do you think
she would be likely to go ? asked her father.
She is very fond of strawberries," suggested
her mamma.
The big brother had returned from his base-ball
game, and feeling as if he would like to drown him-
self for having been so careless with his little sister's
goblet house, was hunting for her everywhere; and
while he lighted a candle and proceeded to the
garret, her papa took the lantern and started for
the garden.
Be very careful where you step-both of you!"
said her mamma, and if you keep calling to her
that we are going to have cream-toast for supper,
may be she will answer-if she is alive," and her
mamma wiped the tears from her eyes and con-
tinued her search in the china-closet.
Kittyman Tannyman's papa went very slowly
down the garden path, holding the lantern near the
ground and looking sharply among the wet flowers
and grasses on either side while he called, and in a
soft voice:
Kittyman Tannyman."
Presently he reached the strawberry-patch. It
was a large patch, and he had walked all about it,
taking care not to step on anything that looked
like a calico frock with flannel stockings sticking
out of it, and he was just going to give up looking
any longer-for he did think that with all her non-
sense his bright little girl had intelligence enough
to go into the house in case of a rain-storm-when
he fancied he heard a faint little cry, not much
louder than the cry of a five-cent doll, just before
him among the strawberries.
Kittyman Tannyman !" he calJed, are you
here ? Don't you want some beautiful cream-toast,
Kittyman Tannyman ? "
And up came the little wee crying voide :
"Me wants ma--mma--- "
Her papa set the lantern down very quickly and
began putting the wet leaves aside with hands that
trembled for joy. There, close beside a big straw-
berry with only four bites taken out of it, was Kit-
tyman Tannyman, sopping wet and cold as a snail,
her beautiful little curls all dripping, her face and
hands so stained with tears and strawberry juice
that no one but her own papa would have known
her, and oh, so small! Her papa took her up ten-

[OCTOBER,

THE LITTLE GIRL WHO GREW SMALLER.

derly in one hand, covering her with the other-
just as some kind boy would pick up a young bird
that had fallen from its nest-and carried her to
the house.
She 's here,-and alive he said, hurrying into
the dining-room, where her mamma was just be-
ginning to search the last shelf. "Bring some
warm water and dry flannels, please, and just
half a drop of blackberry wine,-she's about
chilled through! "
Her mamma first peeped into her papa's hand,
and sure enough there was Kittyman Tannyman
all huddled up in a ball. She kissed the little wet
head, and hurried away for the things. In a few
minutes Kittyman was bathed and rubbed dry,
and, dressed in a soft flannel wrapper, she drank
the half drop of wine, and, lying back in her
papa's hand, stretched her tiny feet toward the fire
that had been kindled on purpose for her, and
breathed a long, deep breath. Papa saw her lips
moving, and he bent his head to listen.
Me 's perfectly tompfortble," she said.
Then her papa covered her with his other hand,
and rocked gently back and forth, while he sung a
low, gentle song about the "Wind of the Western
Sea."
About this time, her mamma happened to think
of the poor big brother still hunting about in the
garret, and she went up to tell him that it
would n't be necessary to search any longer. She
was gone some minutes,-for she wanted to help
the big brother put in order the barrels and boxes
he had overturned,-and when they came down
again into the sitting-room You can never
guess the surprise that awaited them there:
Kittyman Tannyman
was sound asleep !
Yes, there she lay in ._
her papa's hand, her
hair all back into curls :
again, her small fists
cuddled up under her
chin just as they used
to be when she slept,
and breathing soft, ''
comfortable, regular
little breaths. With .
one impulse, papa,
mamma, and the big. .
brother drew out their ,
handkerchiefs, and,. / -
waving them in the
air, gave three silent
cheers. Then, going ."

about on tiptoe, and hardly daring to breathe, her
mamma prepared a little cradle of white card-board,
made a soft mattress of cotton batting, with a
white silk handkerchief for sheets, and then her
papa gently laid Kittyman down in it, and they
covered her with the prettiest doll-quilt, and set
the cradle away in a quiet, shadowy corner.
They took off their shoes, they tied.up the
door-bell, and the evening paper remained un-
touched upon the table, for fear its rustling might
awaken Kittyman Tannyman.
Such care was quite needless, however. Kitty-
man Tannyman not only slept all the evening and
all night, but slept all the next forenoon; and as
her papa and mamma stood watching her, every
moment convincing them it was time to send for
the doctor,-this prolonged sleep was so alarm-
ing,-Kittyman Tannyman sighed, yawned, and
stretched herself out, until pop went the foot of her
paper cradle!
Kittyman Tannyman had begun to grow bigger!
The reaction had come !
The news was all over the neighborhood in
twenty minutes. Everybody was talking of it.
Everybody called with congratulations. The doc-
tor came and went away again, smiling and rub-
bing his hands. Her papa walked up town as
if he owned a bank. Her mamma warbled over
her work as if it were all play. Her big brother
whistled louder than ever.
And Kittyman Tannyman-you can imagine how
quickly she kicked out one cradle-foot after another,
and how she outgrew her calico frocks so fast that
they had to be changed twice a day, until her mamma
declared, with tears of gratitude in her eyes, that by
the time grapes were
3. ripe her dear little girl
_i would be big enough
to wear her pretty
4' white aprons and but-
"' ~ton-boots again. For
every day after lunch,
Kittyman took a fine
growing nap on the
'sitting-room lounge,
and at night her
mamma could barely
finish one story be-
fore Kittyman Tanny-
man was sound asleep,
.-. growing on, like a
." sweet, healthy child,
'i ''I toward the glad, beau-
tiful morning.

779

780

IN the midst of those bloody times in Paris which
were described in a past volume of ST. NICHOLAS,*
there was living in that city a gentleman just passed
the age of fifty, who only a very short time before
published a story-book for young people which,
within a period of twelve months, passed through
fifty editions, and was, within a few years there-
after, translated into almost all the languages of
Europe.
The name of the story was Paul and Virginia,"
and the name of the author was Bernardin de St.
Pierre. He was born at
Havre, a sea-port town at
the mouth of the Seine,
and went to school there
until he was twelve; but
while he was at school he
fell in with a translation
of Robinson Crusoe,"
and he loved the book so
much that he came to
love adventure more than
books, and begged for per-
mission to go over seas 7
with an uncle who was
bound for Martinique.
And he went there, and
saw first in that island
(which you will find on
your atlas among the West
Indies) the bananas, and
palms, and orange-trees,
and all that rich tropical
growth which afterward
he scattered up and down
upon the pages of his story
of Paul and Virginia." BERNARDIN E
But the boy Bernardin did not stay in Marti-
nique; he grew homesick, and went back to France,
and studied engineering in Paris, and before he
was twenty had gone away again to Malta, which
is a strongly fortified little island in the Mediterra-
nean, lying southward of Italy. He did not stay,
however, in Malta, for he fought a duel there,
which made it an unsafe place for him.
Not long after this he obtained a position under
the famous Empress Catharine of Russia, and had
strange adventures in Poland, where it is said a
beautiful Polish princess would have married the
young French engineer, but her friends took good

care she should not commit what was counted so
great an indiscretion.
Then he went to his old home at Havre again,
but his family was scattered and the home broken.
He next gained an appointment as engineer to
the Isle of France, which was another tropical
island near to Madagascar, in the Indian Ocean.
After five or six years here among the bananas
and the palm-trees, he went back to Paris-with-
out business, without money, almost without
friends. This was his own fault, however, for he
was reckless, and petulant,
and proud.
He began now to think
of printing books, though
he was past thirty-four.
His first venture was a
S'"'story of his voyage to the
S... b Isle of France; then he
S passed many years work-
Sing at what he called
-c Studies of Nature." He
could hardly find a pub-
Slisher for this; at last, how-
Sever, he bargained with
Monsieur Didot to print
-.-s it,-and Didot was the
most celebrated printer in
France. Not only did he
print the book of the ad-
venturous Bernardin, but
he gave him his daughter
for a wife.
I suppose that this author
gave a great deal more.of
study and of care to his
E ST. PIERRE. book on nature than he
did to the little story of Paul and Virginia." Yet
it was this last-which was published some two
years or more before the capture of the Bastille-
which gave him his great fame.
Where there was one reader for his other books,
there were twenty readers for Paul and Virginia."
In those fierce days, when the Revolution was
ripening and a gigantic system of lordly privileges
was breaking up and consuming away,-like straw
in fire,-this little tender, simple story, with its
gushes of sentiment and its warm, tropical atmos-
phere, was being thumbed in porter's lodges, and
was read in wine-shops, and hidden under chil-

* See Vol. III., p. 33.

[OCTOBER,

TWO FRENCH STORY-TELLERS.

TWO FRENCH STORY-TELLERS.

BY DONALD G. MITCHELL.

TWO FRENCH STORY-TELLERS.

dren's pillows, and was sought after by noble
women,-and women who were not noble,-and
by priests, who slipped it into their pockets
with their books of prayer. Even the hard, flinty-
faced young officer of artillery, Napoleon Bona-
parte, had read it with delight, and in after years
greeted the author with the imperial demand-
" When, M. St. Pierre, will you give us another
Paul and Virginia ?' "
It is only a simple tale tenderly told. A boy
and girl love each other purely and deeply; they
have grown up together; they are poor and un-
taught; but the flowers and fruits are rich around
them, and the sweetest odors of
the tropics are spent upon the
story. Virginia, loving the boy,
sails away from the island home -i'
to win education in the old world
of France. The boy grieves, and
studies that he may match in him- l
self the accomplishments which
Virginia is gaining in Europe.
At last the ship is heralded
which speeds her back. In a
frenzy of delight, Paul sees the
great ship sweep down toward
the shore.
But clouds threaten; a wild,
swift storm bursts over the beauti-
ful island ; there is gloom and
wreck; and a fair, lifeless form is .
stranded on the sands. '
Poor Virginia! Poor Paul!
Then-two graves, with the
name of the story over them. -,1
And the birds sing, and the trop-
ical flowers bloom as before.
This is all there is of it. Do
you not wonder that so slender a
tale could take any hold upon a
people who were engulfed in the terrors of that
mad revolution ? Why was it ?
Partly, I think, because the dainty and tender
tone of the story-teller offered such strange con-
trast to the fierce wrangle of daily talk; partly also
because, in the breaking down of all the old society
laws and habits of living in France, it was a relief
to catch the sweet glimpse of the progress of an
innocent life and innocent love-albeit of children
-under purely natural influences.
It is worth your reading, were it only that you
may see what tender and exaggerated sentiment
was relished by this strange people at a time when
they were cutting off heads in the public square by
hundreds.
It is specially worth reading in its French dress
for its choice, and simple, and limpid language.

We come now to talk of the other book of which
I spoke. It is by Madame Cottin, and is called,
" Elizabeth; or, The Exiles of Siberia."
Siberia, you know, is a country of great wastes,
where snows lie fearfully deep in winter, and winds
howl across the bleak, vast levels, and wolves
abound. It is under the dominion of Russia, and
to this pitiless country the emperor of Russia was
wont to send prisoners of state in close exile-where
their names were unknown, and all communica-
tion would be cut off, and where they would live
as if dead.
Well, Elizabeth was the daughter of such a

0

HE LITTLE PAUL AND VIRGINIA IN THE WOOD.

prisoner, who, with his wife, lived in a lonely habi-
tation in the midst of this dreary region. She
grows up in this desolate solitude, knowing only
those tender parents and their gnawing grief. She
knows nothing of their crime or exile, or judge, or
real name. But as she ripens into girlhood, the
parents cannot withhold their confidence, and she
comes to know of their old and cherished and luxu-
rious home on the Polish plains, which is every day
in their thoughts.
From this time forth the loving daughter has but
one controlling thought, and that is, how she may
restore these sorrowful parents to their home and
to the world.
It is a child's purpose, and opposed to it is the
purpose of the Autocrat of all the Russias But
then, courage and persistence are noble things, and

TWO FRENCH STORY-TELLERS.

/1/

I /

S't-

ADAME AN OLD T .]

MADAME COTTIN. [FROM AN OLD ETCHING .]

She had not the courage to tell of this resolution
to her parents, but kept it ever uppermost in her
thoughts as months and years rolled on and she
gained strength; while the dear lives she most
cherished wasted with grief and toil in the wintry
solitudes.
One friend she made her confidant: it was the
son of the governor of Tobolsk, who, in his hunt-
ing expeditions had come unawares upon the retired
cabin of her father, and thereafter repeated twice
or thrice his visit. He was charmed by her beauty
and tenderness, and would have spoken of love,
but she had no place in her heart for that. Always
uppermost in her thought was the weary walk to
be accomplished, and the pardon to be sought.
The young hunter could not aid her, for inter-
course with the exiled family was forbidden, and he
had already been summoned away and ordered to
regions unknown.
At last, after years of waiting, Elizabeth being
now eighteen, an old priest came that way who was
journeying to the west. It seemed her golden
opportunity. She declared now, for the first time,
her purpose to her parents. They expostulated
and reasoned with her. The long way was a drear
one; monarchs were remorseless; they had grown
old in exile and could bear it to the end.

they win more triumphs than you could believe. But the tender girl was more unshaken and
They will win them over school-lessons, and bad steadfast than they. She bade them a tearful
habits, and bad temper, just as surely as they win adieu, and with the old priest at her side, turned
them in the battles of the world.
So upon the desolate plains of IP1 't
Siberia the fair young girl plots [ i
and plots. How should this fair,
frail creature set about the un- .
doing of an imperial edict, and the -
restoration of father and mother
to life and happiness once more ? !
Over and over she pondered in -
the solemn quietude of those
wintry Siberian nights, upon all
the ways which might avail her to

rents. At last came the resolve-- -
and a very bold one it was-to EDt T
make the journey on foot from
their place of exile to the Russian
capital, never doubting, in the
fullness of her faith, that if she
could once gain a hearing from _-
the emperor, she could win his
favor, and put an end to her I
father's exile.
Ah,what could she know of the ELIZABETH WEARILY PRESSED ON THROUGH THE SIBERIAN FOREST.
depth of state crimes, or of the
bitterness of royal hate, or of that weary march of her steps toward the Russian capital. Very toil-
over 2,000 miles across all the breadth of Russia ? some it was, and day followed day and week week,

[OCTOBER,

WHICH HAD IT?

with wearisome walking; and before the journey
was half done the old priest sickened and died, she
nursing him and closing his eyes for his last sleep
in a cabin by the way.
But still she had no thought of turning back, but
wearily and painfully pressed on. Week followed
week, and still long roads lay before her. It will
make your hearts ache to read the story of her toil,
of her bleeding feet, of her encounters with rude
plunderers, her struggles with storm, and snow,
and cliff. There were great stretches of silent
forest; there were broad rivers to cross; there were
gloomy ravines to pass through, and her strength
was failing; and she had been robbed of her money
and the winter was coming on; and there was no
messenger or mail to tell her of the dear ones she
had left in the little cabin of the exile. But through
all, her courage never once failed, and at last it
rejoiced her heart to see in the blazing sunlight, on
the edge of the Muscovite plains, the great shining
domes of the palace of Moscow.
Here she was a stranger in a great city, and the
wilderness of the streets was full of more terrors and
more dangers for her than the wilderness of the
vast forests she had crossed in safety. Her very
frailty, however, with her earnestness and her
appealing look, won upon passers-by, and well-
wishers befriended her and heard her story with
amazement. And the story spread, and made
other well-wishers aid, until at last she came to the
feet of the emperor.
They knew, all of them, the tale she had to tell,
and the eyes of all pleaded with her so strongly,
that her request was granted and the father set free.

Of course the story glides on very pleasantly
after this: she has a government coach to carry
her back over that long stretch of foot-travel; she
finds her parents yet alive; she somehow has en-
countered again that stray son of the governor of
Tobolsk, and I believe they were married, and all
lived happily ever after.
It is not much of a love story, however, except of
parental love, which, after all, is one of the purest
kinds of love.
Madame Cottin, who wrote the story, lived, as I
said, in the days of the French revolution, and was
married in the year 1790, when she was only seven-
teen years old. Her husband was very much older,
and a rich banker. I doubt if she loved him greatly:
there are some things in other books of hers (for
she published a great many) which make me think
so very strongly. Still, I believe she was an honest
woman, and struggled to do her duty. I do not
think Madame Cottin's other works are to be com-
mended, or that any one reads them very much
nowadays. "Elizabeth"-the book of which I
have given you the story-was printed in the time
of the First Napoleon (I806), and had an im-
mense success. There is hardly a language of
Europe in which it is not to be found printed now.
It is a good story. What devotion !-so rare-
so true-so tender !
Read it for this, if nothing else, and cherish the
memory ever in your young hearts.
It is as good a sermon on the fifth command-
ment as you will ever hear, and remember that it
was preached by a Frenchwoman who lived in
Paris through the reign of blood.

WHICH HAD IT?

BY SARAH WINTER KELLOGG.

CHAD and Seth were great cronies, though Chad's ing more definite than that they were always up to
father was a lawyer, and Seth's was a blacksmith, some mischief.
But, then, the one was a very good blacksmith, The truth of the matter was that Chad and Seth
and the other a very poor lawyer, and this lessened were two young democrats, full to the brim of life
the social gap. and spirit, who liked fun better than anything else.
There was an opinion floating about the village, Indeed, they considered fun the chief end of boys.
that Chad and Seth were bad boys. But the evi- They sometimes pursued it thoughtlessly, perhaps
dence for this was very intangible. People were recklessly, and often violated the proprieties in its
ready enough to pronounce them "a pair of pre- pursuit. But there was nothing mean about these
cious young rascals," but when a man was asked for two boys. To use Chad's favorite word, they were
an instance of their rascality, he could assert noth- not sneaks. They were fair on the play-ground,

WHICH HAD IT?

often generous, and, Seth especially, had a soft
spot under his sooty jacket. He was tender with
all the weak. Little boys and "them girls" knew
very well their knight.
Chad and Seth were near the same age-just
turned thirteen.
The worst thing I knew about Seth was that he
did n't keep his hands and face clean. As for
Chad, the greatest fault I found with him was that
he persisted in his companionship with Seth, when
he knew that his mother would have preferred him
to look higher for a friend.
His mother had raised no serious objection to the
association, but Chad knew her preferences, and
should have respected them. But Seth had a great
fascination for Chad. He was a more important
factor in Chad's enjoyment than all the other boys
in the village combined.
But his father 's a blacksmith," Chad's mother
said one day.
How can Seth help what his father is? Chad
asked warmly. "If we boys had the bossing of
our fathers, Seth might have had his a lawyer, and
I'd had mine a blacksmith. I'd rather be a black-
smith any day than a lawyer. A lawyer don't do
anything that I know of except to read old papers,
and then go to the court-room and speak his piece.
I hate to read writing, and I don't like to speak
pieces, any way, if there are girls. But a black-
smith's work's jolly-blowing his big bellows till
the forge is red and splendid. I love to see the
red-hot irons, and to hear the hammer ring on the
anvil, and to see the sparks fly, and the strong iron
bend just the way it's wanted to. It's better 'n
fire-crackers and rockets; makes a fellow feel like
giving three cheers and a tiger. And a blacksmith
works with horses. My sakes I just wish I could
be a blacksmith. Say, may I go, mother? "
Chad was teasing to go and play with Seth.
Why, Chad, I should think you 'd feel morti-
fied to be seen with Seth. His clothes are dirty
and sometimes ragged," the mother said.
I aint goin' back on Seth for that," said Chad,
stoutly. "He can't help it. His mother's the
one to haul over the coals for that. Any way, I 'd
like to wear dirty clothes myself sometimes, 'stead
of being kept all the time starched and ironed. I
could play lots better in old clothes. You ought
to see Seth play; he just pitches in,-rumblety-
tumblety. He can turn the jolliest somersaults
that ever I saw. I've seen him turn'em, one after
another, all the way from the top to the bottom of
that big red sand-hill--don't you know ?-by Squire
Bowers's. Tell me, mother, if I may go."
I'm afraid Seth's a bad boy; people say he is."
He aint bad," said Chad, warmly. He aint
any sneak. Folks think if a fellow don't stay in the

house and read all the time, he 's bad. Seth aint
any of your sickly kind. He's the jolliest boy in
this town, and I can't have any fun without Seth.
That's all there is about it. There is n't another
boy to play with. Now! "
There 's Frank Finley," the mother suggested.
Frank Finley exclaimed Chad, with a tone
of contempt. Why, mother, he's the spooniest,
the dumbest, the finnikiest, the chickenest milk-
sop that ever I saw. He parts his hair in the mid-
dle, and wears curls stringing down his back. All
the fellows call him Fanny,- all except "-and
Chad's cheeks flushed and his eyes brightened with
the triumphant vindication of his friend,-" all
except Seth, mother; Seth never calls him names;
he always stands up for Frank. He takes Frank
in his lap on the sled, just like a baby, to keep him
from tumbling off. And Seth's the best skater on
the pond; but he often loses the race, when we
boys race, because he 's got Frank Finley, tugging
him along. And Seth always chooses Frank on
his side in toss-up, 'cause the other fellow wont
have him. I tell you, Seth's a high old trump.
May n't I go, mother ?"
"Yes, I suppose so; but I don't see why boys
have to catch all the slang that's floating around,"
said the mother.
But Chad did not hear the remark. With the
first word of his mother's reply, he had rushed for
the street, slamming and banging the doors after
him.
I 'm going to tell you of a little incident which
occurred in the village where Chad and Seth lived,
and then you may answer the question with which
this story started : Which Had It ?
It was the last night of the year, and there was a
watch-meeting in the little Methodist church of the
little village. Many country people had come in their
sleighs to help the village folks watch the old year
out and the new year in. Chad and Seth were at
the meeting, and it was a foregone conclusion with
some folks that they were bent on mischief.
The congregation had been, for some moments,
sitting in profound silence, reviewing, doubtless,
the failures of the year so soon to end, and making
resolutions for the year so soon to begin. The
silence was very solemnizing, as we sat there in the
dimly lighted church, with not a sound to be heard
except the loud ticking of the clock under the
gallery, marking off the few last moments of the
fleeting year. But five minutes of the old year
remained, when the minister, a venerable, white-
haired man, rose, and spoke a few solemn words,
which made the people feel yet more solemn.
"A few more vibrations of that pendulum," he
said, pointing to the clock, which put in a solemn
tick-tack, as he paused for breath, and we shall

[OCTOBER,

WHICI HAD IT?

all be swung into a new year. Then it will be my
privilege and pleasure to wish you all a happy new-
year; so, I shall have the best of the congregation.
It seems fitting, dear friends, that we should spend
the last few moments of the old year in prayer."
The people all knelt. Then came an earnest
petition, that the dear Lord would meet his people
on the threshold of the new year, and abide with
them to the end. When the prayer was ended,

sat down in his chair without a word, and gazed in
a bewildered way at the congregation. Everybody
turned and stared at everybody else. Seth gig-
gled aloud. Chad, sitting next pew from him,
looked scared. Seth tucked his head between his
knees and snickered painfully. He wanted to stop,
but to save his life, he could n't. He pressed his
hand over his mouth, but the laugh would burst
out. He tried to smother it in his woolen com-

A COMMOTION IN THE CHURCH.
while the clock was buzzing with preparation for its
last announcement for the year, while the amen
was hovering about the pastor's lips, ready to
alight, before the people had fairly risen from their
knees, somebody, determined to get the better of
the minister, shouted out, so that every ear heard:
I wish you a happy new-year I "
Who in the world was it ? The minister was so
surprised at this stealing of his thunder, that he
VOL. IV.-51

S .-. i r,, ..,,, r .i ,i, I,'r I,-. :,l ,o th -
..1 ._ i ,.., and
II I .i I, ,I : '. I--1 .i.i n o

.. :.,. i .. .. ... .- : H e
S, ...i I -1 ,, i. -I i i ,'- :[ I : I was
Squire Woodruff.
"I 've got ten dollars here," he said, opening
his purse and displaying the bill. It belongs to
the man, woman or child that will give the name
of the person who interrupted our meeting." He
reached forward and handed the money to the
minister, who laid it on the big Bible on the desk.
"And here's another ten a-top of that," said
Mr. Alexander, making his deposit.
Then everybody looked all around to see some-
body start up, tell who the offender was, and claim

WIIICH I-HAD IT?

the twenty dollars. Doubtless nobody knew who
it was, for nobody spoke.
Then Mr. Lemuel Dyer said:
I'11 make that twenty dollars thirty."
"I go you five better," added Mr. Arthur
Matthews. Mr. Matthews was a class-leader, and
would have been properly shocked if he had
known that he was using an expression of the
card-player, and that in church.
Still, nobody claimed the money. By this time
the people were excited and curious. Somebody
added another five dollars, making forty now
offered for information as to the offender. Seth
had stopped laughing for the moment, and looked
a little frightened when he saw how in earnest the
people were to bring the offender to light.
Mrs. Mason, who had been sitting near Seth and
Chad, now went over, and spoke to Seth's father.
"That was Seth who called out," she said; I
know it was. I saw his lips move."
Seth was scared when he saw his father coming
over to him. The father looked angry as he
charged the offense upon Seth.
Mrs. Mason says she saw your lips move."
It's a lie," cried the boy, : -..'.l indignantly.
Then he burst out laughing, as the funny part of
the affair came over him again.
Seth, you know it was you," said Mrs. Mason.
Of course it was," added Miss Palatkin. ": I
know it by the way he keeps laughing."
It was n't; I did n't do it," Seth declared.
"It's just like him; he's always up to some
mischief," said somebody else. I know he did it."
I know I did n't," said Seth.
Do you know who it was?" asked his father.
By this time a third of the congregation had
gathered around Seth.
Yes, I know," Seth answered.
Who was it ?" asked a half dozen voices.
"I aint going to tell."
Then it looked so funny to Seth to see all that
crowd of people around him, that he laughed in
their faces. When Seth wanted to laugh he
could n't help laughing, any more than Vesuvius
could help belching. He was n't one of the kind
who can laugh in their sleeves.
There are forty dollars you can have, if you 'll
tell," one said.
"He ought to be punished, whoever it was,"
another argued. Everybody'II think it's you
unless you tell."
It was n't me, and it 'll be mean to blame it on
to me." Then Seth giggled again.
Then tell who it was," said his father. You
're foolish not to, when you can make forty dollars
by telling. Think what lots of things you can buy
with it. Come, Seth, tell," he continued, coax-

ingly, "and I '11 give you another ten. Then
you '11 have fifty dollars-a half-hundred-about as
much as I can make in a month. And you can
make it by just speaking a name."
"Come, let us have it," urged Mr. Arthur
Matthews. "Who was it?"
Seth just looked at Mr. Matthews, and seemed
ready to burst into another laugh.
-"Why, how contrary ye be!" said Mother
Ketchum, eying Seth over the tops of her spec-
tacles. Why don't ye tell and be done with it,
so the folks can go home?"
But Seth repeated: I aint goin' to tell."
"If ye was my boy, I'll be bound he'd tell
purty quick." Mother Ketchum addressed part of
this remark to Seth and part to Mrs. Leonard,
standing on the right. Finally the minister spoke:
We are determined, if possible, to discover the
reckless individual who has had the temerity to in-
terrupt our solemn service, and to bring him to
punishment. This is the second time our service
has been interrupted. We brought the other
offender to light, and we shall discover this one.
Be sure of that, my guilty friend. That which is
hidden shall be revealed. We offer for information
of the offender a standing reward of fifty dollars."
Here Seth's father pulled at the minister's
sleeve, to say that his offer of ten dollars was only
to Seth, and the pastor's proclamation was amend-
ed accordingly. Then the people went to their
homes, discussing the matter as they went.
Of course it was Seth," said Chad's father, who
prided himself on his lawyer-like ability of seeing
1i, 1.h people.
"You'll be willing to give up Seth now, I sup-
pose?" said the mother to Chad.
I don't believe it was Seth." This was all the
answer Chad made.
When Seth had got home, his father scolded
him for not speaking and claiming the money.
You 've got to tell," insisted the father. I'll
flog you if you do not."
I'll take the whipping," Seth answered, with
his voice trembling; ".but I wont tell."
When Seth had gone to bed, his mother came
and sat down beside him. She wanted him to
have the money; and no wonder, with seven little
mouths in her nest to be fed.
"Just think," she said, "'what you could do
with all that money. You could get you a new
suit of clothes, and new cap, and some boots."
Poor Seth thought of Chad's handsome new
winter suit, and of his own shabby jacket, and a
great lump came up in his throat.
I would n't get any good of the money," the
boy said. "You and father would take it all; I
know you would."

(OCTOBSI,

WHICH HAD IT?

The mother thought he was yielding, and has-
tened to assure him that he should have every
penny to spend for himself. But Seth had no
thought of telling when he made the remark; he
just wanted to re-enforce himself-to have a better
excuse for refusing to tell.
Then you can look as well as Chad," the mother
added. He wont be ashamed of you then."
"Chad aint 'shamed of me now," said Seth,
with a quiver in his voice. He likes me better
than any the other fellers. He would n't like me
if I was to tell; he hates a tell-tale."
So the mother soon found there was no hope of
getting the secret from Seth.
The next day, as he was going for the milk for
breakfast, he was joined by Chad.
My goodness, Seth, you're a bully boy you're
a perfect stunner!" Chad said, in an enthusiastic
whisper. Did you know all the time who it was ?"
Of course I knew," said Seth. I heard you
and saw you."
"And are n't you ever going to tell?"
Not any," said Seth.
Forty dollars continued Chad. Did n't it
make you feel shaky ? "
"It did make my mouth water; but it didn't
make me feel like telling on you, Chad."
You're a brick, Seth; you're a chief corner-
stone. But, Seth, you've got to tell-you've got
to have that forty dollars. I don't mind if they do
know; they wont do anything much about it.
Anyway, I did n't do anything wicked; it was n't
anything mean. I just did it for fun, and I don't
see the use of their making a great hullaballoo
about it. I don't care if they do know it was me.
They dare n't hang me, and they dare n't put me
in jail. I 'd a notion to get up and tell on myself;
I felt like a sneak not to. But I wanted you to get
the fifty dollars, you sec. Good gracious you've
got to have it, Seth. You must tell."
I wont ever tell anything on you, Chad," said
Seth. You would n't like me any more if I did."
Yes, I would," Chad declared, eagerly.
I would n't like myself," said Seth.
But, you see, the boy who did that ought to be
punished."
Chad forgot, for the moment, who "the boy"
was, in his eagerness that Seth should have the
money. But in vain he argued. Seth declared he
never would tattle on Chad. So Chad made up his
mind that he'd tell on himself. "I wont be a
sneak." That's what he said to himself. It was
a favorite expression with Chad.
The episode at the watch-meeting was the gen-
eral theme of talk for the next few days. It was a
trifling matter to engage a whole village; but
curiosity was excited. They wondered who the

offender could be. Was it or was it not Seth?
These people had been interrupted once before in
their religious services. They felt that somebody was
interfering with their 1; 1.1 ---i.. they were being
abused. And the more they talked about it the
more outraged they felt. And the more outraged
they felt the harder it grew for Chad to confess
himself the offender at the meeting.
But one morning he found himself fairly started
for the minister's house. He did n't go cross lots,"
which he might have done, and saved half the dis-
tance. He went roundabout. When he reached
the gate, he faced about, and walked away from it
as fast as he could for a half block. Then he
walked back to it, and went slowly up the terraced
steps. Perhaps he would then have gone straight
forward up the walk to the house, but for those
two sheltering fir-trees on the edge of the terrace.
He hid behind one of these till he could gather
courage. When he got on the porch, I think he
would again have hid behind something if there
had been anything to hide behind; or he would
have run away if he had n't seen Mrs. Hemingway,
the minister's wife, looking at him from the window.
He tried to think of something to say, so as to put
away the real errand as far as possible. But: sud-
denly the door opened, and there stood the minis-
ter. "'Good-morning, my boy," he said, kindly.
' Come in to the fire."
Chad walked in, looking like a little sheep. He
sat down with his cap hanging on his fist. The
other hand grasped his leg for a moment, then it
was stuck into the pocket of his trousers. The
minister waited for Chad to state his errand. But
Chad sat there as if he never meant to let any-
body know what he'd come for.
Is it very cold out?" asked the minister.
"Yes, sir," answered Chad, taking his hand
from his pocket, and hiding it with the other
under his cap. Then he crossed his legs, and
looked as though he was getting ready to say
something. So the minister waited to hear him
announce the occasion of the call. But Chad just
uncrossed his legs.
Is your father well ?" asked the minister.
"Yes, sir," Chad answered, hooking back his
right foot to the chair leg.
Another period of silence ensued.
Is your mother's health good this winter? said
the minister at length, wondering what ailed this
boy, usually so much at his ease.
Chad answered Yes, sir," as before. and hooked
back his other foot. i i. .. as lie realized his awk-
ward position, he brought both feet forward and
placed them quite precisely in order, with the toes
turned out at dancing-school angle. But he soon
fidgeted them ouc of place, while trying as hard as

WHICH HAD IT?

he could to think of some easy, pleasant way of
telling all about it.
"Do you go to Sunday-school?" was the next
question Chad heard. He wound one leg around
the other and said he did. Then he unwound his
legs, and stood his feet close up to the stove to
warm, like flat-irons on end.
What did Santa Claus bring you?"
Chad jammed his hat between his knees and
answered, "A microscope."
"Were you at the watch-meeting?"
Here was Chad's chance. He screwed himself
sideways in his seat, and hugged the back of his
chair with both arms, as if to hold himself to his
object. His cheek was burning, his eyes down-
cast, his voice dry and crackling, as he answered:
"Yes, sir; and I know who it was-who it was
that got the best of you-that wished the folks a
happy new-year, you know."
"You do? Who wasit?"
Will I get the money if I tell?"
"Certainly you will," the minister answered.
"No hoaxing?" asked Chad, growing bolder;
" I 'll be sure to get it? "
To be sure you '11 get it."
"It was me," said Chad, "but I did n't mean
any harm by it."
The minister looked at Chad in a vague way for

a moment, and then he broke into a hearty laugh.
"You 've got the best of me again," he said.
" Well, I '11 see that you get the money, but doubt-
less you '11 be fined to that amount, and will have
to pay it back. So you wont make anything."
Chad looked a little blank. "Anyway, I feel
better for owning up," he said at length, and I've
found out, too, that Seth wont tell on a feller."
When the matter came up before the church it was
argued by some that Chad deserved more credit for
bringing the offender to light than any other in-
formant would have merited. These advised that
he be freely forgiven, and that the money be paid
over to him.
I was not in favor of such action, and I happened
to be a prominent member of the church society.
My heart was yearning toward Chad, but I wanted
to make him feel to the bottom of his boots that
because a thing is done in fun it is not necessarily
blameless. It seemed to me that I would thus
straighten the chief crook in his ideas. So I asked
that he be fined. He was fined the forty dollars.
Which had the best of it? Chad had to hear
this question very often for the next few months.
In view of the fact that he learned from this experi-
ence to pursue his fun with due regard to the rights
of others, the question, Which had it-which had
the best of it ?-may be promptly answered.

=2.
'*IB

II

i

"WOW IT'S YOUR TULN."

788

[OCTOBER,

yrr~

HARE AND HOUNDS.

HARE AND HOUNDS.

BY KATE BROWNLEE HORTON.

WOULD you like to hear something, young foxes" day after day in the hunting season, return-
friends, about a famous out-door game that boys ing at night jubilant and enthusiastic, and some-
in England play There, as in your own country, times waving high in triumph the brush" (the

--
:

I'v

A'

ON THE SCENT OF THE HARE.

each season has its own especial sports, and as
soon as the warm, sunny May-days come, when
the fields and roads are dry and firm, Hare and
hounds !" is the cry from boyish lips, and young
hearts beat high for joy in the sunshine, and boyish
feet almost spurn the earth as they prance along
the highways, and over the hedges, getting in
"training" for their much-loved sport.
It is confined principally to school-boys between
the ages of ten and sixteen, though often boys who
do not belong to the school are members of the
"hunt," and very often, too, the little fellows are
the best runners in the party.
You must know that England is a great hunting
place, and each papa who can afford it keeps his
horse and "follows the hounds who follow the

fox's tail, that is) which the huntsman who catches
and kills the fox always has as a trophy.
So boys grow up to love and exult in this sport,
and to long for the days when they, too, can have
a horse for their very own, and go galloping "over
hill and dale, through bush and through brake," as
the proverbial sly old fox may lead.
Till that happy time comes, however, "hare
and hounds is the joy of their hearts,-as it was
of their papas when they, too, were boys,-and this
is how it is played.
The boys divide themselves into two parties,
each having its champion runner," and lots are
drawn as to which of these runners shall be the
" hare in the first hunt of the season, afterward
they go by turn.

,I

HARE AND HOUNDS.

The rest of the boys are the hounds," and the
other champion is the huntsman who marshals
them to the "meet" (which is usually the school
play-grounds), gives the signal for the starts, calls
them off by a shrill whistle when they get on the
wrong scent, and, in fact, is "master of the
hounds," par excellence.
The "hare" is provided with a small, open
satchel or pouch, slung across his shoulder, and
filled with bits of white paper about an inch square-
heavy paper that the wind will not carry away. It
is the privilege of the small boys who are too little
to take part in the hunt to prepare these bits of
paper, and for a day or two before a "run" they
have great fun in preparing ''scent," as they call it.
The hare is also allowed five minutes head
start," and is allowed to choose his own course, but
is obliged to scatter the bits of white paper at short
intervals all along the way he goes, as they are his
tracks for the hounds to follow. The five minutes
given him he usually spends in seeking for some
obscure place at which he leaves a little package of
yellow or blue paper to denote the starting-point.
This may be some blocks away, or up a side
street, or just around the corner; he has his
choice, and a free opportunity to seek it, as the
" hounds" go within doors till the five minutes are
up. Then the huntsman cries whoop i halloo !"
and away they all bound hither and thither, seeking
till they find the package of colored paper (which
they are obliged to do before they can start); the
finder must cry "hark! forward!" then off they
go, on the scent.
Sometimes so long a time is taken up in finding
the staiting-point that the hare makes famous
headway, and can "double" on his followers-that
is, retrace his way for a block or two on the other
side of the street (leaving the bits of paper all along,
of course), go round a block, or, if they are in the
country, he probably makes for the woods, goes in
some distance, then turns back, perhaps, till he
finds some leafy tree, up which he climbs and hides
himself till the "hounds" have gone by: anything
to put them off the track.
When the hare has gone far enough, and wishes
to return, especial care must be taken, as, if he is
seen, the hounds can rush after him, "cross lots,"
and woe betide him if he is caught! He is no
longer champion, but has to give up his badge to
the fortunate "catcher," and cannot even be one
of the hounds till he has paid a certain forfeit
demanded by rule-usually something good to eat.
If the hare gets successfully home to the play-
ground, the opposite party has to stand treat; "
so you may imagine how hard each side strives to
win. It is a capital game when really played
according to rules, and English boys think the

rules half the sport. It has been played for
several generations,-an old game,-not only in
England, but wherever English boys have gone, or
English games are known. At Vevay, in Switzer-
land, where there is a large pension (school) for
boys, it is the regular summer amusement; but it
is hard running there, for the roads are so "up and
down hilly" (as the boys say), and the hare can
never find a good hiding-place.
One bright little English lad said "'no wonder
'Swissies' are 'buffers;' no boy can learn to run
in a country that is all set up on edge !"
I should not wonder if some of the boy readers
of ST. NICHOLAS already know about this game,
since so many of their English cousins come to this
country. If so, this account must be for those who
have not heard of it.
But it is not only boys who play "hare and
hounds." A gentleman who has just returned
from China told me that at Shanghai and Ningpo
the English residents-merchants, officers and
others-have quite recently introduced the game,
with this difference, they play it on horseback, and
make a whole day's sport of it.
Early in the morning they send out some one
who knows the country well (sometimes a China-
man, and that makes the fun all the better), give
him a good fair start, perhaps half an hour, then
gallop after him as hard as the horses can go, as if
they were indeed back in "merrie England,"
hunting a fox or hare. They need sharp eyes to
discover the paper "scent" when they fly over
the ground so quickly, but that only makes them
the keener hunters.
In Scotland I think boys enjoy the game fully as
much as in England, keep closer to the rules, and
welcome each hunting-day as eagerly as the first
one of the season. Wednesday and Saturday
afternoons are usually chosen for hunts; though
sometimes an indulgent teacher, if diligently im-
portuned, will give the whole school an extra half-
holiday, and go himself to see the start.
Does it seem strange to think of having only a
half of Saturday for play ? It is almost a universal
custom, at least in Scotch country places, to have
school on Wednesday and Saturday mornings till
noon, giving the rest of those days for a holiday,
and boys there seem to like it so. I suppose that is
because they have never known any other way.
But they get a great deal of enjoyment out of
their "halfies" (as they call those holidays), and
after school-hours as well, though school does not
usually close till four o'clock. That is late, is n't
it ? But Scotch summer-days hardly seem to have
any end. All through June, July and August (on
the west coast principally), it is as light at ten
o'clock in the evening as it is in our country at

[OCTOBER,

HARE AND HOUNDS.

seven, so games go on all through the "gloamin',"
till tired feet turn gladly homeward, where wearied
heads seek downy pillows, and bright eyes close in
the sound, healthful sleep that comes so quickly to
happy childhood after a long, joyous day spent in
the pure, fresh summer air.
I once saw a splendid game played in the Scotch
town of Ayr, which so interested me that I actually
"followed the hounds" myself, though at a very
modest pace, and not over the hedges.

The hare was getting rather the worst of it, and,
having nowhere else to hide, rushed into a near-by
railway station where a train was waiting, gave the
guard a knowing wink, and sprang into one of the
carriages, and the train moved slowly off just as the
panting "hounds" came in sight. He threw a
handful of papers from the window, but kept him-
self well out of view.
A little cousin of mine, who was huntsman that
day, saw the papers fluttering in the breeze, and
being as quick as a wink" to catch an idea, knew
in a minute what the wily hare" had done-so,
fleet of foot as he was quick of thought, he flew

across the fields to the next station (which, fortu-
nately, was not far distant, but to reach which the
train had to go around a long curve), and breath-
less, but triumphant, caught the unsuspecting hare
just as he stepped from the railway carriage, chuck-
ling to himself at the thought of having outwitted
all his pursuers.
Was n't he fairly caught, think you ? and did
not he have to pay up for his trick? The "hounds,"
who soon appeared on the scene, carried him off

JGHT!
to the nearest sweetie shop" (as Scotch laddies
call candy stores), and made him spend every
"bawbie" (a copper half-penny, worth one cent
of our money) he had, for toffyy" and other
sweeties."
Now, boys, you who know all about hare and
hounds," as well as you who do not, try it-with
the rules-and see if you do not find it a jolly
good game, that will give you that lightness and
fleetness of foot so much to be desired by every
boy, and will help you to spend many a happy
holiday with fun-loving comrades, when old games
are "played out" and you long for something new.

CAUGHT BY THE SNOW.

HAROUN AL RASCHID.

BY HENRY W. LONGFELLOW.

ONE day, Haroun Al Raschid read
A book wherein the poet said:

" Where are the kings, and where the rest
Of men who once the world possessed?

" They 're gone with all their pomp and show,
They're gone the way that thou shalt go.

" O thou who choosest for thy share
The world, and what the world calls fair,

" Take all that it can give or lend,
But know that death is at the end !"

Haroun Al Raschid bowed his head;
Tears fell upon the page he read.

CAUGHT BY THE SNOW.

BY WILLIAM H. RIDEING.

ONE day last October, while a party of govern-
ment surveyors in charge of Lieutenant George M.
Wheeler, of the United States Engineers, were
encamped on the banks of Lake Tahoe, in the
Sierra Nevada, a brown old ranchman came out
of his cabin and told us, in a cold-blooded way,
that we should have snow before morning. The
wind had changed suddenly from south-west to
north, and masses of great white clouds drove
over the darkening blue of the sky. We had
barometers, thermometers, and all the instruments
used by Old Probabilities in foretelling the weather,
but we knew from experience that it was unneces-
sary to consult them, and that we might as well
take the ranchman's word for law. Squirrels, spi-
ders, and old ranchmen are the wisest of the
weather-wise, and no signs of a storm are so sure
as theirs,-the spider ceasing to weave his gossa-
mer across the roads and trails, the squirrels laying
in an extra store of provisions, and the ranchman
sniffing the air with the keen scent of a pointer.
The sun-burnt old man who spoke to us was as

innocent of scientific knowledge as a chipmunk is,
but long life in the open air, and the observation
of nature, had developed an instinct in him which,
as in the animals, was more sensitive to the approach
of a change than the most delicate instruments ever
made by human hand.
We had been in snow already,-the snow which
never melts, but shines all summer, and drops into
icicles along the tops of the rough mountains,
whose clasp holds the lake within its bounds. We
had played at snow-ball early in September; but
we had so far escaped severe storms, such as the
one now prophesied for us was likely to be.
There are more comfortable and complete shel-
ters from bad weather than small canvas tents, and
less rheumatic beds than a blanket spread upon
the frozen earth; there is more substantial food
than a soldier's rations; but the tents, the blankets,
and the rations represented our frugal outfit, and
all that we had to depend upon.
A few flakes of white fell, and vanished in the
pine-fire that we built at night, and then a heavy

792

[OCTOBER,

1877.] CAUGHT BY THE SNOW.

rain set in, and continued to patter on our tents
until morning, when we removed our camp from
Lake Tahoe to Squaw Valley, which is a deep bay
in the mountains, with an outlet i : .I.h- into one
of the high-walled ravines called cations. We were
anxious to occupy a certain peak, and Squaw Val-
ley seemed to offer the best way of reaching it.

of a fir-tree, might have pitied us as we crowded
nearer the fire, endeavoring to get warmth, and
only getting smoke. For supper we had a slice
of bacon and bread, which the rain had reduced to
an unsavory pulp, and we crept into our damp
beds with longing thoughts of home.
Next morning, as I stretched out my arms against

AT THE DOOR OF THE HUT.

The rain fell without abatement for thirty-six
hours, and our tents swayed to and fro in the
wind, threatening to collapse each moment, despite
the strong ropes that guyed them to the pines under
which they were pitched. We were so wet and
cold that the saucy-looking chipmunk, which occa-
sionally peeped and winked at us from the hollow

the tent, I felt that it was heavy, and heard
it crackle, and when I looked outside, the whole
country was transformed; the surrounding mount-
ains and the valley-that had been blue, purple,
and green-were covered with white; the great
pines and firs resembled solid cones of snow; our
pack-mules, with tails turned to the wind and

CAUGHT BY THE SNOW.

drooping heads, were the picture of misery, and
there we were-snowed-in. The storm might
continue for days-even for weeks. When once
the snow begins in the sierras of California and
Nevada, there is no telling when it will stop; it
piles itself up in the valleys to a height of forty
feet, and it seals the country,-not with wax, of
course, but with something that we cannot help ad-
miring for its velvety beauty, and dreading for its
treacherous softness. The farmers who have stock
on the slopes of these mountains keep two barns,
-one in the Sacramento valley, where the cli-
mate is deliciously mild, and their cattle can graze
all winter, and the other in one of the mountain
valleys, which, when the snow melts in the spring,
are clothed with a growth of very nutritious grass.
We had seen household after household turning
westward during the previous weeks, in anticipa-
tion of the winter, and now, when it had come,
there was not a human habitation, to our knowl-
edge, within many miles of camp, though earlier
in the season the country had been overrun with
cattle, and overcast with the smoke of many
ranches.
How the white flakes fell, and how they chilled
our finger-tips and toes! It was as though the
clouds were coming down, as a little southern girl
said to me when she first saw the fleecy strays of
winter drifting out of a sad northern sky. Great
phantoms seemed to roll and wreathe themselves in
the air, and to fling out mysterious rings and fes-
toons. The highest peaks disappeared, and the
lower hills, seen through the gauzy veil of the
snow, were like the figures in a lace, and as im-
palpable to look at as puffs of steam. Ah, how we
longed and longed for home !
The surveyors, who, under Lieutenant Wheeler,
are making the most out-of-the-way parts of the far
West as familiar as a New England county, have
some pleasant experiences, to be sure, and they
deserve them; for it takes a great many pleasant
ones to counterbalance the wretchedness of two or
three days of storm. The men stood about the
camp-fire disconsolately and silently, finding no
relief in smoking or in conversation. In the morn-
ing our black cook called Breakfast! and in the
evening he called Supper! We would have
been happier had we been able to sit down to a
respectable meal. Bacon and bread were the
daintiest things, however, that our mess afforded.
Smarting and coughing from the pine-fire smoke,
we tried to forget our sorrows in bed; tossing and
shivering in our wet blankets, we slept a little, and
awoke again to the miseries of the situation.
When, on the next morning, we turned out, and
found no promise of a clearing, our hopes fell to
the zero of despair; and we decided that it was

high time for us to make a change of base.
Not more than fifteen miles from our camp was
the famous Donner Lake, where an emigrant party
had been snowed-in many years ago, twenty-eight
persons dying from cold and hunger; and while
we did not anticipate any real danger of this kind
to ourselves, escape from Squaw Valley being pos-
sible at almost any time, we knew that to remain
at our present camp would cause us much vexation
and delay in our work.
So our bedding, food, instruments and tents
were packed on the mules, and we went forth
toward the Truckee Cafion. A strange and for-
lorn procession we made From the lieutenant
in charge, who was an officer in an artillery regi-
ment, down to the black cook, not a man in the
party had any fancy article in his dress. Buck-
skins, flannels, felt hats and heavy riding-boots-
things for warmth and wear, and not for show-
made up our costumes, which would have sadly
misled any one not aware of our true character
and occupation. Soldiers and scientific men work-
ing on the western plains and mountains are not
the elegantly uniformed creatures that the illus-
trated weeklies sometimes picture them as being.
A dandy in camp is laughable and intolerable, and
there was not a laughable or intolerable member
in our party. Perhaps one figure in the rear of the
pack-train might have raised a smile among stran-
gers. It was Sergeant Ford, an intelligent young
officer detailed from Camp Independence to serve
with our party. The mule which he rode dragged a
mysterious-looking one-wheeled carriage after it,
and as the mule stumbled in the drifts, the wheel
was lifted forward and swung from side to side in
the most extraordinary fashion, and Ford was occa-
sionally shot from his seat into a soft bed of snow.
But clumsy as this carriage appeared, it was one
of the most important things of the survey; attached
to the wheel was a small dial called an odometer,
which recorded each revolution; and as a certain
number of revolutions were equal to a mile, we
were thus enabled to tell the distances traveled
from day to day, and to obtain measurements of
the roads and trails in the country that we were
surveying.
As we crept along through the smiling storm
with a shadowy chain ofwhited mountains encircling
us, and a roof of gray over us, the wind that swept
from the summits pierced us with its cold, and shook
the pines and firs of their snow, which ascended in
the air like a cloud of vapor. Our progress was
slow; the mules floundered and slipped at every
step, and before we had gone far, the dark day
began to edge on to the darker night, though we
were still houseless and hungry. We could see
only a little way ahead through the dense flakes

[OCTOBER,

1877.1 CAUGHT BY

which dashed upon us in a fury and seemed deter-
mined to encompass us in their icy grip. Now
and then a darker spot was visible in the gray, and
our hopes rose as our imaginations traced the out-
lines of a house in it; but it turned out to be a
clump of trees, or a massive detached rock, and
we were again faced with the gloomy possibility of
no shelter for the night.
This happened so often, that we gave no more
attention to what was before us, and plodded on
with downcast eyes; and it was thus that I had
almost reached its front and only door before I
discovered an isolated little cabin, before which the
leaders of the pack-train had stopped. The doors
and windows and every opening had been securely
nailed up, and the heavy cattle-tracks leading to the
outlet of the valley showed that the ranchman had
hastily retreated at the beginning of the storm. He
had gone away, not dreaming that any one would
appear in the neighborhood until the spring should
bring greenness to the country again.
A nice point of law now presented itself to us.
It is not probable that felonious intent, or any-
thing that a lawyer could interpret as felonious
intent, ever entered the minds of our party before ;
but there we were,-chilled to the bone, hungry,
and completely unhappy; and there was the house,
offering both shelter and a dry place on which we
might make our beds. We hesitated a few mo-
ments,-for burglary is a serious offense,--and then
we shook the snow from our shoulders and forced
an entrance, knowing that the generosity which
grows as largely in the Californian heart as Bartlett
pears grow in the wonderful Californian soil, would
have made us warmly welcome, had it been present
in the person of the owner.
Some of the more curious members of the party
immediately made an investigation of the contents
of the house, which confirmed the evidence of the
cattle-tracks outside, that the occupants had left
suddenly; and as each man made a discovery, he
shouted it to the others. From the different cor-
ners and shelves, I heard the announcements of
"half a bottle of pickles," "basket of potatoes,"
"bottle of pain-killer," piece of soap," a dish-
cloth," corn-flour," and other things which the
ranchman had not thought worth taking away.

THE SNOW.

795

The most enterprising explorer in this direction
was Mr. Frank Carpenter, our topographer, who,
when I found him, was eating some moldy blanc-
lmage out of a rusty can with a chip of wood.
We were not long in putting up the stove and
lighting a glorious fire, and spreading our blank-
ets on the floor. We were not long, either, in
putting the cook in the kitchen, or slow in urging
him in his preparations for supper; and though
we had already eaten a whole basketful of pota-
toes, sliced with a pen-knife and roasted on the
stove, it was astonishing how quickly a fine joint
of beef, which was among our other discoveries,
vanished when supper was ready.
A little way from the house was a large barn,
in which we stabled our mules and fed them with
hay. A mule is a weather-hardy creature, that is
supposed to be capable of enduring the severest
exposures, and is not often treated to lodgings in a
stable; and it was a treat, therefore, to see our
animals comfortably quartered for once, and to
hear them munching their abundant feed.
The storm continued throughout the next day,
and in the evening, as we sat around the camp-
fire, Sergeant Ford, who had been out-of-doors,
rushed into our midst, looking for a shot-gun. In
answer to our questions, he said, breathlessly,
"Turkey!" and disappeared again. We were
within three weeks of Thanksgiving, and the pros-
pect of turkey was almost too much for us. We
started for the door, but before we could reach it Ford
had fired, and as we put our heads into the snow,
we saw him standing with the smoking gun in his
hand, and watching a large white owl as it flew
away into the night. "'Turkey ? we inquired,

sympathetically. Ford simply shook his head, and
scon went to bed.
The next day was clear, and we moved camp to
Truckee, leaving the little house exactly as we
found it, and carefully boarding up the doors and
windows, to keep out the future storms. More
than this, as soon as we learned the name and
address of the ranchman, a check on the United
States Treasury for a sum equivalent to the value
of the food and hay that we had used was sent to
him. So it is likely that our party will escape
punishment.

AUTUMN POETRY.

AlIi L JM POETRY.

BY LUCY LARCOM.

Is there more
-. poetry in spring
than in autumn?
Yes, more that
finds expression,
for in spring every-
,r-c- thing has a voice
or a look that
1!'reveals its glad-
ness; nature then
S t is one grand choral
Sof praise.
'' { The pleasure of
"'.,. 't simply being alive
is the song that re-
i' !' sounds everywhere.
It is the careless
7 delight of a little
S child who knows
nothing of life,-
S who feels nothing,
,except that the sun-
shine is bright, the
Sair sweet, and that
Small faces and forms
S\\around him are full
SI of love.
In autumn the
S world is still beauti-
ful, but its beauty
is that of change,
and of the mem-
Sory of change. A
warm, dreamy mid-
i summer haze lies
between us and the
'fresh fields and deli-
cate wild flowers
1 of spring, and we
look at the gor-
geous leaves and
blossoms of the sea-
l son against a dim
background tinted
I with the faded
treasures of the
past. And, because
it has a past as well
as a present, the poetry of autumn is deeper than
that of the earlier seasons. It is richer, too, if we
keep within us the bloom and the fragrance which

we have enjoyed, and so blend the blossoms of
spring and summer with those of the declining
year.
You know-or will learn, by and by-that we
never need lose anything which has really made
our life blessed, except by our own fault. If we
have taken the loveliness around us into heart and
soul, and not merely glanced at it idly, it has
become an immortal possession for all true beauty
is poured into our lives out of the heart of Him
who is the Infinitely Beautiful, and every gift He
bestows is perfect and indestructible.
Have you ever thought about the shading-off of
one season into another,-how gradual and delicate
it is, and what a charm it adds to the year? You
cannot tell exactly when midsummer has passed
into autumn, any more than you can draw a sharp
line between the red and the orange in the rain-
bow. Nature shades her colors more exquisitely
than any artist, and it is in this magical blending
that half her poetry is found. The four seasons
make a visible harmony, like four voices so per-
fectly accordant that you hear them as one in a
song; for there is an eye-music as well as that
which enters the ear.
Late in August, you come in your rambles upon
some hidden pool of the woodlands, and find, to
your surprise, the water-lilies still awake here and
there; and on the margin of the pond, the most
magnificent blossom of midsummer, the cardinal-
flower. What a contrast they make-that pure
whiteness, crystal-born, and that inimitable red,
which seems a burst of the intenscst warmth hid
in the bosom of earth The white clematis, or
virgin's-bower, hangs its graceful streamers along
the wood-paths, veiling the departing footsteps of
Summer, whom Autumn has already come to meet,
scattering golden-rod about, as an admittance-fee
into the grounds of the dethroned queen.
Beautiful poems have been written about the
passing of summer into autumn. Mrs. Hemans
sings her regret in one beginning-

Thou art bearing hence thy roses,
Glad Summer, fare thee well!
Thou art singing thy last melodies
In every wood and dell."

And this little song, Summer's Done," plainly
betrays its New England origin:
Along the way-side and up the hills
The golden-rod flames in the sun;

[OcTOBnR,

AUTUMN POETRY.

The blue-eyed gentian nods good-bye
To the sad little brooks that run,-
And so .' Summer's done,' said I,
'Summer's done!'
In yellowing woods the chestnut drops;
The squirrel gets galore,
Though bright-eyed lads and little maids
Rob him of half his store,-
And so 'Summer's o'er,' said I,
SSummer 's o'er!'
"The maple in the swamp begins
To flaunt in gold and red,
And in the elm the fire-bird's nest
Swings empty, overhead,-
And so 'Summer's dead,' said I,
'Summer's dead!'

The barberry hangs her jewels out,
And guards them with a thorn;
The merry farmer-boys cut down
The poor old dried-up corn,-
And so 'Summer's gone,' said I,
'Summer's gone!'

The swallows and the bobolinks
Are gone this many a day,
But in the mornings still you hear
Tie scolding, swaggering jay,-
And so 'Summer's away,' said I,
'Summer's away!'
A wonderful glory fills the air,
And big and bright is the sun;
A loving hand for the whole brown earth
A garment of beauty has spun,-
But, for all that, 'Summer's done,' said I,
'Summer's done!'"

"A Still Day in Autumn," by Mrs. Sarah Helen
Whitman, takes you into the dreamy atmosphere
of the beautiful September days. Here are two or
three stanzas of it:
I love to wander through the woodlands hoary,
In the soft light of an autumnal day,
When Summer gathers up her robes of glory,
And like a dream of beauty glides away.

How through each loved, familiar path she lingers,
Serenely smiling through the golden mist,
Tinting the wild grape with her dewy fingers
Till the cool emerald turns to amethyst!

Warm lights are on the sleepy uplands waning
Beneath soft clouds along the horizon rolled,
Till the slant sunbeams through their fringes raining
Bathe all the hills in melancholy gold."

In one of Alice Carey's songs of the autumn
days, she writes that

Summer from her golden collar slips,
And strays through stubble-fields, and moans aloud,-
Save when by fits the warmer air deceives,

And the red pennons of the cardinal-flower
Hang motionless upon their upright staves."

Into his Last Walk in Autumn he has brought
several of his friends
S well known to Amer-
ii ican readers; and all
I' through his poems
you catch glimpses
I: :- i 1 and flashes of aut-
J umnal color.
I. It is to the poetry
.ii of our own country
that you must look
-.'" for the best songs of
I i! autumn, and that for
a very good reason.
"' '. Our autumn is a far
\ I i I' j more cheerful season
.-- than that of most
Other countries. The
'! brilliant colors of the
S i 1' forest-trees, and the
'.I ii days of bright sun-
'' I .'."- shine and soft air,
:'i"- I that sometimes lin-
''.e ', ger far into Novem-
bi er, are a wonder
to foreigners. Many
'.'' persons find it hard
to decide whether
S June or October is
our most delightful
month.
Longfellow sings,

With what a glory comes
and goes the year!"

and he writes of

i" The solemn woods of ash
I deep-crimsoned,
And silver beech, and maple
I A i yellow-leaved,
S Where Autumn, like a faint

SBy the way-side a-weary."
'old man, sits down

I And again, in that
sweetest of idyls-
j Evangeline ":

And, stealing hopeful to some sheltered bower, Such was the advent of autumn. Then followed that beautiful
She lies on pillows of the yellow leaves, season
And tries the old tunes over for an hour." Called by the pious Acadian peasants the Summer of All-Saints.
Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light, and the landscape
And Whittier paints in glowing words the flowers Lay as if new-created in all the freshness of childhood."
that blossom between summer and fall:

" Along the road-side, like the flowers of gold
That tawny Incas for their gardens wrought,
Heavy with sunshine, droops the golden-rod;

And, again, lie addresses autumn as coming

"With banners, by great gales incessant fanned,
Brighter than brightest silks of Samarcand !

AUTUMN POETRY.

AN OCTOBER DAY.

Thou standest, like imperial Charlemagne,
Upon thy bridge of gold; thy royal hand
Outstretched with benedictions o'er the land!"

Lowell's Indian Summer Reverie" is full of
splendid description :
The birch, most shy and lady-like of trees,
Her poverty, as best she may, retrieves,
And hints at her foregone gentilities
With some saved relics of her wealth of leaves;

The swamp-oak, with his royal purple on,
Glares red as blood across the setting sun,
As one who proudlier to a fallen fortune cleaves:
He looks a sachem, in red blanket wrapt."

"The maple-swamps glow like a sunset sea,
Each leaf a ripple with its separate flush."

"The woodbine up the elm's straight stem aspires,
Coiling it, harmless, with autumnal fires."

798

[OCTOBER,

~ ~

AUTUMN POETRY.

In modern English poets we get, now and then, Here is "A Little Girl's Song of Autumn," by
a glimpse of glowing color. Tennyson writes of an unknown writer:

"Autumn laying here and there
A fiery finger on the leaves;"

and tells us how one who watches may see
The maple burn itself away."

And Allingham must have seen something like
our autumn colors before writing this stanza:
Bright yellow, red, and orange,
The leaves come down in hosts;
The trees are Indian princes,-
But soon they'll turn to ghosts."

George Cooper has a pretty little song about
" The Leaves and the Wind ":
"'Come, little leaves,' said the wind one day-
'Come o'er the meadows with me, and play;
Put on your dresses of red and gold,-
Summer is gone, and the days grow cold.'

" Soon as the leaves heard the wind's loud call,
Down they came fluttering, one and all;
Over the brown fields they danced and flew,
Singing the soft little songs that they knew:

"'Cricket, good-by, we've been friends so long!
Little brook, sing us your farewell song,-
Say you are sorry to see us go;
Ah you will miss us, right well we know.

"'Dear little lambs, in your fleecy fold,
Mother will keep you from harm and cold;
Fondly we've watched you in vale and glade;
Say, will you dream of our loving shade?'

"Dancing and whirling the little leaves went;
Winter had called them, and they were content.
Soon fast asleep in their earthy beds,
The snow laid a coverlet over their heads."

- .

" The autumn has filled me with wonder to-day,
The wind seems so sad, while the trees look so gay;
The sky is so b'ue, while the fields are so brown,
While bright leaves and brown leaves drift all through the town.
I wish I could tell why the world changes so;
But I am a little girl-I cannot know!

" The sun rises late, and then goes down so soon,
I think it is evening befOre it is noon !
Of the birds and the lowers hardly one can be found,
Though the little brown sparrows stay all the year round.
I wish I could tell you where all the birds go;
But I am a little girl-I cannot know!

"0 Autumn! why banish such bright things as they?
Pray turn the world gently 1 don't scare them away !
And now they are gone, will you bring them again?
If they come in the spring, I may not be here then.
Why go they so suifily-then come back so slow?
Oh, I'm but a little girl!-I cannot know!"

015 I

-- I..
.5~~A 1~. C

.. 1EL '

I-

'It

Gazing upon the splendors of the autumn woods,
we do not wonder that a poet exclaims,
Sorrow and the scarlet leaf
Agree not well together!"
And of the very latest autumn Bryant writes:

" The melancholy days have come, the saddest of the year,-
Ofwailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sere."

Even after this period of dimness, the atmosphere
grows warm and spicy and hazy, and there is a soft
flush over the fields and woods, like the after-glow
of a gorgeous sunset. If ever there is poetry in
the air we breathe, it is during the Indian summer.
We all know those days

" When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees
are still,
And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill."

Do we not love Bryant's "Death of the Flowers"
and "Fringed Gentian," as we do these last flowers
of the year, and the beautiful season in which they
bloom,-and as we do the poet himself, who was
almost the first to open American eyes to the loveli-
ness of our wild flowers, and the peculiar beauty of
our autumnal scenery ?

Of one thing we may be certain,-that He who
turns the world upon its axis so as to cause the
changes of the seasons, meant us to receive some
new happiness from every one of them. He hath
made everything beautiful in its time," and if we were
but as grateful as He is good, how would the seasons,
one and all, ring with hymns of 1 -,i,; ,: ; !
It would do us all good to get by heart Thom-
son's Hymn of the Seasons." You know how it
begins:
"These, as they change, Almighty Father, these
Are but the varied God. The rolling year
Is full of Thee Forth in the pleasing spring
Thy beauty walks, Thy tenderness and love.
Wide flush the fie'ds; the softening air is balm;
Echo the mountains round; the forest smiles;
And every sense, and every heart, is joy.
Then comes Thy g'ory in the summer months,
With light and heat refulgent. Then Thy sun
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year;
And oft Thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks;
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and ,roves, in hollow-whi peering gales.
Thy bounty shines in autumn unconfined,
And spreads a common feast for all that lives.
In winter awful Thou!"

The poetry of earth is never dead," and never

9-
.~a:-...

J?

AUTUMN POETRY.

r:.: I .'1 .J ut of
SI. : ,i We
.. .1 lt i:, bear
-.. I r the
I ,,.. ., t -in
r i,, I,, : .: ,: ,.a tion .
1- I ,- ,, ,:e s :

'... I seasons

tled, lis-
: lark,
i I .. herlap

S. gorgeous

', P ~~-- ,...... .ll ..... dreamy,

'.is white
SI.... II ... him."

... I of the
u,, ,,,-n than
.. ,.: ,,1: I,. ... Y ou

.o,-,_ .. selves,
I I .... A..:, g told
'.. ,r~ m ay
.f I 7 11 ; and
B.- t, IrII n ,- ,h11 Mary
Si.. .... .- about
"GOL EN-ROD. Lorn-fields," well worth com-
mitting to memory.
There are those who think of autumn only as a
gloomy season,-

The Autumn is old;
The sere leaves are flying;
He hath gathered up gold,
And now he is dying;
Old age, begin sighing!"

But to children, and to the child-hearted, the
whole year is happy with hope. The fall of the
leaf is but a promise of the bright days of winter
which are coming, all sparkle and merriment
and health; and of the glad spring, over whose

needed sleep the winds of autumn and winter
sing lullabies-the fresh, faithful Spring, which
has never failed of re-awakening, since the first
birthday of man. Yes,

Sure as earth lives under snows,
And joy lives under pain,
'T is good to sing with everything,
'When green leaves come again.'

Still, among faded garden-flowers, and under
fallen forest-leaves, we cannot but be more thought-
ful than when all things are bursting into gladsome
life. This, too, has been sung of by one of our
poets:
The berries of the brier-rose
Have lost their rounded pride;
The bitter-sweet chrysanthemums
Are drooping, heavy-eyed.
'T is time to light the evening Fre;
To read good books, to sing
The low and lovely songs that breathe
Of the eternal spring."

In some hearts there is an ever-blooming spring-
time of cheerfulness, which makes all around them
forget the fight of seasons and of years. Such
hearts never grow old, and they spread far and
wide the sunshine of immortal youth. Every man,
woman and child of us might be such a fountain
of gladness, if we would. Love is the only eternal
spring-time-in whatever world we live.
Yet there is mirth for children in what some-
times makes older people sad.

We stand among the fallen leaves,
Young children at our play,
And laugh to see the yellow things
Go rustling on their way."

What child's heart does not bound to the music
of Marian Douglas's call to the woods in the brilliant
autumn days ?

Fire i fire upon the maple-bough
The red flames of the frost!
Fire! fire! by burning woodbine, see,
The cottage-roof is crossed !
The hills are hid by smoky haze
Look! how the road-side sumachs blaze!
And on the withered grass below
The fallen leaves like bonfires glow i

Come, let us hasten to the woods,
Before the sight is lost!
For few and brief the days when burn
The red fires of the frost.
When loud and rude the north wind blows,
The ruddy splendor quickly goes.
But now-hurrah those days are here,
The best and loveliest of the year."

Nobody has a better opportunity to know what
the poetry of autumn is-the real poetry, unrhymed
and unprinted-than a country child whose home
is in the Northern United States. Just think of it

800

[OCTOBER,

AUTUMN POETRY.

-the season of the golden-rod, the aster, and the
fringed gentian,-of crimson and scarlet maple-
forests, and of oak-groves almost as brilliant,-of
beech-woods whose aisles seem covered with a
golden roof, as you pass through them,-of pine-
forests hung with the twisted streamers and orange-
colored berries of the bitter-sweet, and bordered
with the red pennons of the sumach, and with
coral-hung barberry-bushes,-of ripe nuts on the
hill-sides, as well as of yellow grain-fields, and
loaded orchards. What season can boast more
beauty, or half so great wealth ?
In the autumn flowers there is one thing to be

and does n't it give us
a glimpse of His won-
derful thoughts who has '
made the flowers grow
for us, that when the '.
days are shortening, --
and we get less of the \ -
sun's light, the earth around 1
us blossoms out into litth- '
stars and suns? It is as '
the dull clod, warmed thn...h -
and through by months of '- .-- .
shine, tried to leave the ima_-. ..- "

8oi

particularly noticed-that so many of them are star- its benefactor's face impr i, ',- 4
shaped and sun-shaped. The wild aster, which everywhere, teaching us tc. .
makes our road-sides so beautiful with its varied press our gratitude to the God
tints,-white, lilac, amethyst, and royal purple,- who has planted our souls in His
takes its name, "Aster, a star," from its world, by letting our lives blos-
form. "Frost-flowers they are some- som into beauty like His. Or,
l times called, and stars of the frosty we might say, it is as if He
S days they are. The large rudbeckia, who made the sun were showing
with bronze disk, and rays of gold or us that if we need more light
purple,-the compass- than there is in the darkening
C flower of the prairies, skies, He can kindle sunshine
i the Wild sunflower and for us out of the coldest and
the coreopsis,-and the the dryest sod beneath our feet.
golden-rod, every stem Even in the leafless and flower-
of which is a constel- less November, the heart of the poet, which is
lation of little suns, all also the heart of a little child, can see something
N 1i i -. 1ie same shape, beautiful. Let that wintry month, if it seems
|'4' ,r'I r.. ly all of them gloomy to you, be remembered in Alice Cary's
I.... h the sun's own wise, sweet words:
S\ j .., The other late
I.:- ; the gentians The leaves are fading and falling,
..' t g n The winds are rough and wild,
.. 4f1& rlte azure of the The birds have ceased their calling,
; ", -'ihe world puts But let me tell you, my chil-l
n'-.. g e T.u. I. ..'. and gold, be-
fore it clothes Though day by day, as it clc
\Doth darker and colder gro
itself for its The roots of the bright red rc
*-. " .'. ,_ long sleep in Will keep alive in the snow .t.-
Sthe whiteness
f the snow. And when the winter is over,
Th--r---i" -t newlev .l

-' oo oo the sVow
'- ^ ; 1 1-i !l' [ l -". "L" "n ..- ,.... ,...: .. i ro the clc ..

IV, -

Vo1. IV-52.

A CENTURY AGO.

" The robin will wear on his bosom
A vest that is bright and new,
And the loveliest way-side blossom
Will shine with the sun and dew.

" The leaves to-day are whirling,
The brooks are all dry and dumb;
But let me tell you, my darling,
The spring will be sure to come.

" There must be rough, cold weather,
And winds and rains so wild;
Not all good things together
Come to us here, my child !
" So, when some dear joy loses
Its beauteous summer glow,
Think how the roots of the roses
Are kept alive in the snow!"

A CENTURY, AGO.

BY NOAH BROOKS.

CHAPTER I.

1777.
"THE British have landed at the Back Cove "
shouted Peletiah Wardwell, one fine May morning
in 1777, as he burst into the keeping-room of Cap-
tain Joe Perkins' house. Dame Perkins dropped
her knitting-work, and, looking steadily over her
spectacles at the lad, said :
Peletiah, you have forgotten something."
Peletiah, with a blush mantling his honest and
already flushed face, pulled off his sealskin cap and
made an awkward bow. Boys were brought up in
that way, one hundred years ago.
Then he added, excitedly, but with less boister-
ousness: "Yes, the British have landed at the
Back Cove. Captain Blodgett has called for volun-
teers."
"And Mr. Perkins has gone off to the Neck,"
said the dame, rising and going to the window,
from which she could look up toward Windmill
Hill. No horseman was in sight. There was no
sign of her husband's return. Then, with a flash
of indignation in her eyes, she turned to the boy
and asked:
"Why stand you there ? Go! alarm the town !"
The boy was off like a shot.
"What's that? What's that, mother?" cried
Oliver, a boy of sixteen, who rushed in from the

back garden, where he had been spading up the
beet-beds. His mother had taken down Captain
Perkins' gun from the wooden mantel where it
hung, and was looking at the old flint-lock.
The red-coats have landed at the Back Cove,
my son, and we must defend the town."
"You mother ? cried the boy, with something
like a laugh in his eye, but with his face glowing.
"You mother?"
The time has come at last, my boy. Father
said that there was danger that the British would
come over from the Penobscot shore and take the
town in the rear. They have landed at the Back
Cove. There is no force in the little battery be-
tween them and the fort. And Captain Blodgett
has only thirty militia-men with him in the fort.
Everybody must do his share to save the town.
I can run bullets for somebody to use with your
father's gun."
"Give me the gun, mother I'll go!"-and
the lad's eyes sparkled as he spoke.
Said like a man, my boy! said like a man!
There are the horns and just then the sound of
fish-horns braying on the village-green showed that
the alarm had spread.
The preparations were few and hurried. Oliver
hung his father's powder-horn about his neck, put
into his pouch what few bullets he could find,
picked the flint of the gun-lock, so that it should

802

[OCTOBER,

l i _I;
~ i

-~~I~E~l~;sriP~~a.45iJ~~
'- "-
-; --

A CENTURY AGO.

not miss fire; and was then ready to run to the could descry a fleet of boats on the shore of the

green to report himself for duty.
I shall run some more bullets and send to you
anon," said the mother. The skillet is on the
coals and Dorcas will help me."
The lad lingered an instant in the open door-
way, and the sun streaming brightly on him gilded
his yellow hair and shed a sort of glory over his
fair young face. So full of life, so alert and ardent,
he seemed for the moment transfigured in the eyes
of his mother. She went swiftly toward him; kissed
him, and without a quiver in her voice said:
"I cannot give you to your country, Nolly. God
gave you when he gave you a country. You will
do your duty.
That I will, mother," and the boy, throwing
his father's gun over his shoulder, ran down the
village street to the green.
As he fled, two stalwart fellows hurried by, not
forgetting to salute Dame Perkins as they passed.
Shading her eyes from the sun, she called after
them :
Seth and Jotham Buker My little Nolly has
gone to the defense. Will you have an eye on his
welfare in the fight ? "
"Aye I aye answered the men cheerily as
they ran.
Then Dame Perkins softly closed the door, threw
her apron over her head and sat down on the stairs,
crying to herself, "My son my son "
Dorcas, the little handmaid of the house, brought
a bag of bullets, all hot from the molds, to Oliver
as he stood with the other volunteers on the green.
And I thought, Nolly, that mebbe you 'd like
your fishing' tackle," and she produced the boy's
tom-cod lines as she spoke.
The young men standing around laughed at the
sight, and Oliver blushed with mortification. It
seemed to him that he had grown to manhood
since he had used that line off the wharf the day
before. -Curbing his impatience a little, he said:
Much obliged, Dorcas," and put the reel into
his pocket.
Forward march shouted Corporal Hib-
bard, and the little company stepped out manfully
to the tap of the drum, every beat of which seemed
to say to the lad: You will do your duty you
will do your duty over and over again.
Through the fields they went straight to the
crown of the peninsula on which Castine is built.
There, on the rounded ridge, overlooking the
town on the one side, and the pastures on the other,
was a rude earth-work, about six feet high, sur-
rounded by a ditch, and commanding a view of the
harbor in front of the town, as well as of the Back
Cove which bordered the rocky and sloping pastures
behind it. This was The Fort." Thence they

cove, about a mile and a half away. Half a mile
off was a small battery of earth, shaped like a
half-moon, behind which a few men might lie con-
cealed and worry an advancing enemy.
Tell off twenty men for the battery shouted
Captain Blodgett.
And Corporal Hibbard went down the line and
counted out every other man until he had his twenty
men. These stepped out to the front. They were
old, middle-aged, and young. Each was afire
with zeal; each was more than ready to fight for
his country. The oldest was the gray-haired
grandsire of Seth and Jotham Buker. The young-
est was Oliver Perkins. And as they marched
cheerily, yet sedately, down the hill, Oliver's heart
beat high with pride, and he seemed to hear a soft
voice repeating: '" You will do your duty You
will do your duty 1 "
Seems to me they might have kep' that little
chap at home," muttered old man Buiker to his
grandson, Seth, discontentedly, though even his
aged limbs almost tottered as he spoke. This is
no fit work for children."
He 's grit," said Seth, sententiously, and I 've
promised the dame to keep an eye on him."
No talking in the ranks thundered Corpo-
ral Hibbard.
The red coats of the British were already gleam-
ing through the firs and cedars as the little squad
filed behind the battery and lay down with their
guns in position.
Wait till I give the word," said the corporal,
in a hoarse whisper,-" then fire "
Oliver's breath came fast, and his eyes sparkled
with strange light, as the red-coats came steadily
on. On they came, first slowly, then, lowering
their guns, with gleaming bayonets fixed, they
broke into a run, and charged directly upon the
battery.
Fire shouted Corporal Hibbard, as he saw
the whites of the eyes of the British regulars.
At the word, a rattling crash tore out from the
line behind the battery. The enemy's line wavered
and broke here and there. Then came a word of
command, and the red-coats dashed up the slope,
swarmed over the battery, and, in the midst of
firing, smoke, and cheers, struggled to gain the
position.
It was a brief fight. A few of the patriots man-
aged to escape into the fir thickets to the right and
left of the battery, and so fled back to the fort with
the ill news.
The British troops re-formed their line and
marched on up the hill. How gallantly the patriots
defended this last line behind the town, how well
they fought, I cannot stay to tell. It was all in vain.

A CENTURY AGO.

When night fell, the red cross of St. George was
flying on the flag-staff on the green, and the
British colonel was quartered in Dame Perkins'
house.
That night Captain Perkins came back and
heard the doleful story. It was a foolish thing
to do," was all he said. But whether lie referred
to Oliver's going to the defense, or. to Captain
Blodgett's attempt to hold the battery, nobody
dared to ask. For it was plain that his grief was
great.
CHAPTER II.
1877.
SAY, ma may n't I go a-fishing down to the
Back Cove, with Joey Gardner? "

grassy ruins of the old fort on the hill, and, with a
wild cheer of savage joy in freedom, scampered
down the hill which slopes to the Back Cove.
The robins fled away from the newly plowed
ground as the boys approached; and a squirrel
that had been scolding at them from the top of
Dave Sawyer's fence dropped his tail and scudded
away in alarm. Squirrels and robins usually have
a wholesome dread of young people, though
neither Abe nor Joey was their enemy. These
boys had their thoughts on tom-cods, and they
scarcely noticed the green and velvety tufts of moss
that adorned the pasture-knolls, or saw the pale
petals of the May-flowers that sent forth their
delicate odors from the very edge of the lingering
snow-drifts under the spruce-trees.

"AND HERE IS WHERE THE BRITISH BULLET LEFT ITS MARKK"

Lincoln Parker's mother hung two more of her
boy's shirts on the clothes-line before she glanced
up at the summery sky, and said:
Why, my son, it is going to rain, I'm afraid.
Besides, there 's no good fishing in the Back Cove.
Better go down on the wharf."
Oh, you can catch tom-cods off the rocks, if
you only have a long pole. Say, ma, may n't I ? "
A few minutes later, Abraham Lincoln Parker,
with a luncheon-basket in his hand, was tugging
after Jotham Swansdowne Gardner, who was two
years older than he, and was accounted the most
knowing fisherman of all the village lads. The
two youngsters cut across the fields, scaled the

Young Dave," as he was called, was plowing
in the little patch which his father had fenced in
from the pasture. Summer comes late in Maine,
and though this was warm May, the time for plant-
ing had only just begun. The air was full of life.
The peewit and the chickadee were complaining in
the bushes. The water-spiders and pollywogs were
lively in the clear puddles that filled the grassy
hollows, and eye-brights and yellow violets were
blooming on the swale which is still called The
Battery."
Hullo, Dave what's that ?" asked Joey, as
Dave's plowshare turned up a brown bowl from the
earth. Dave stopped his horses, picked up the bowl,

[OCTOBER,

A CENTURY AGO.

and turning it over in his hands, said: I swan to
man, boys, but that 's a human critter's skull! "
"A skull!" cried both the boys at once, with
eyes agog with awe and wonder.
Abe drew back a little.
"Oh, it wont hurt ye," said Dave. "I reckon
this belonged to one of them Revolutionary fellers
that fit here, a hundred year ago."
Fought here, did they?" cried Joey, eagerly.
Yes, fit here, they did," said Dave, and he
seated himself on the cross-beam of his plow and
looked thoughtfully at the brown relic. "I 've
heerd my gran'ther Dunham tell the story many
and many a time. He was into the last war, but
his father he was a Revolutionary pensioner."
"What a little skull for a man !" remarked Joey.
: Should think it must have been a boy."
"Should n't wonder should n't wonder! And
here, you see, is where the British bullet left its
mark. Drefful good shot that," and Dave regarded
the little round hole with real admiration. "The
feller that put that there could knock over that red
squirrel yonder just as easy."
"What did they fight for?" denianded Abe.
To him it seemed wicked that people should
fight and kill each other, and that this remnant of.
a cruel war should now be turned up in the midst
of the life and beauty of spring.

Wal! you '11 hev to ask your ma about that.
She wuz a Perkins, and some of her folks fit into
the Revolutionary war. There wuz old Captain Joe
Perkins; he wuz your gran'ther Perkins' gran'ther,
or great-gran'ther, 1 don't justly know which. But
it wuz a great fight, anyway."
"A fight for independence," said Jotham, stoutly.
"That's it, Joey. They fit for their country.
Many a poor feller bit the dust in that war. But
they did their dooty, and it 's all the same in a
hundred years."
So, tenderly placing the skull on a rock, Dave
took up his reins and went on with his plowing.
Here 's something else!" cried Abe, as the
plow moved on. He picked up what seemed to
be a ball of dried grass. It fell into powdery dust
as he fingered it, and left in the palm of his hand a
little bar of lead.
"A tom-cod sinker!" exclaimed Joey. "And
that stuff must have been a fish-line. Tom-cod
line, d' ye suppose?"
Don't know," said Dave, who had turned back
to look. "'But I know I sha'n't get my stent done
afore night if I stop to talk with you boys. Get
up, Whitey !" and Dave drove on.
Abe fastened the strangely found sinker to his
line, and the lads went to their fishing in the Back
Cove.

PLEASE DON'T T OUCH MLI"

_ ~I

8o6

THE BAPTISTERY OF FLORENCE.

THERE is a curious building in the city of
Florence in Italy, which is called the Baptistery; it
stands in the middle of the city, and has stood
there for many hundred years, being for a long
time the cathedral of Florence. It is an eight-
sided building, having beautiful bronze doors, about
which you will be glad to know more some day.
They cost their makers twenty years of labor, and
are wonderfully decorated with scenes from the
Bible. Inside are five marble statues, ancient pil-
lars, tombs, and painted windows. But just oppo-

site to this building a grand cathedral was built a
long time ago, and this one has been used for
many years entirely for baptisms-all the babies
who are born in the city being brought there. It
is a curious sight, and worth going to see. Every
day, about four o'clock, they begin to come, and
there generally are from eight to twelve at a time.
The child is usually brought in a carriage, and
taken in with a large mantle of silk, satin, or fine
cloth thrown over it-the mantle being richly
trimmed and ornamented with a monogram in the

ITALIAN BABIES.

ITALIAN BABIES.

BY E. D. SOUTHWICK.

[OCTOBER,

HIS OWN MASTER.

center, or perhaps the baby's name. Then, when
the priest is ready, he comes forward, and the
godmother holds the infant while he makes a
prayer and puts a bit of salt on its tongue; then,
laying the end of his mantle over the baby, they
walk up some steps to a very large white marble
font, having a broad band around the top, and a
cover over it; the cover is raised, and child placed
standing upon the edge of the basin. Now, as the
children are very young, they could not stand at
all in our ordinary dress for babies, but the Italian
baby has a fashion of its own, or one that is ar-
ranged for it, which seems curious enough to us.
Its little body is bound tightly in a strong strip of
cloth, until it is made quite stiff, and only the arms
are free to move. Thus all the babies who are
brought to the baptistery can be placed standing on
the edge of the font while the holy water is poured
upon their heads; then a warm napkin is used, to
make them perfectly dry; and sometimes a mother
sends powder in a box, that some may be put on
after the napkin, to insure her darling against
taking cold. After the ceremony, the friends of
the babies usually spend some time in conversa-
tion, then return to their homes. Twelve hun-

dred babies are baptized here every year. Many
a time I have watched the bandaging process
with pity for poor baby, for I know how they love
to kick. The mother puts the bandage around
the body just under the arms, and winds it round
and round, binding the little legs fast together,
and draws it firmly over the feet; then the whole
of this little package is bound about like a bundle
of goods, with a very narrow strip of cloth, to keep
it from unrolling; sometimes a dress is put over
all this for show, and for baptism a very magnifi-
cent robe.
The little creatures are kept thus bound till they
are about a year old; and, as they know no better
way of being clothed, seem to enjoy life as much
as do any other babies. When they are taken
out to ride in their small wagons, they are well
protected from the air, even in summer, having
thick woolen covers or small down beds over them.
Sometimes it is difficult to see that there is any
child there, there are so many wrappings. The
babies of the poor have a very hard life, as their
parents have no comforts for themselves, and have
to work continually to get enough to keep them
from starvation.

HIS OWN MASTER.

By J. T. TROWBRIDGE.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.
JACOB WRITES A LETTER AND RECEIVES ADVICE.
JACOB was glad enough to get away from his
uncle and return to the Fairlakes. After coming
out of that dreary house, the little home of his new
friends seemed all the more charming to him. He
had never known but one other at all like it, and
that was Quaker Matthew's. Different as they
were in other respects, the two abodes resembled
each other in the pleasant, peaceful atmosphere
which pervaded both-the spirit of love which
alone, whether in poverty or wealth, in a cottage
or a mansion, makes for the human heart a home.
Friend Matthew's hospitality and parting words,
and recollections of dear little Ruth and her beau-
tiful mother, were much in Jacob's mind that day;
and, Mrs. Fairlake having shown him a desk and
writing materials in the library, which she invited

him to make use of, he resolved to write the prom-
ised letter.
While he was about it, Florie came into the
room, and he turned to speak to her.
Don't let me interrupt you," she said, with a
laugh. "I've no doubt you're writing to some
nice girl."
I am," replied Jacob, proudly; writing to a
very nice girl."
Then I am sure it is to your little Quakeress,
Ruth !"
For Jacob had told the Fairlakes about Friend
Matthew's family.
Of course it is to Ruth," said he.
Florence seemed about to make one of her pert
and, perhaps, stinging retorts; but seeing how
grave and grateful and sincere he looked when
speaking of those who had been so good to him,
she had not the heart to wound him.

HIS OWN MASTER.

"Is she dreadfully, awfully good?" she asked;
"a great deal better than I ? "
She is different from you. I don't know that
she is any better. But she is gentler. She does n't
say such sharp things as you do sometimes."
"What makes me?" cried Florie, with a flush.
"I don't know. It is your way, your spirit.
You don't mean to hurt anybody's feelings, I am
sure."
Do I hurt yours?"
"Not now," said Jacob, with a smile; "and I
don't think you ever can again."
"Why not?"
"Oh, I see how good you are, behind it all!
And you have been so kind to me !"
He spoke with so much feeling, that Florie
turned away for a moment.
Well, Jacob, my boy," she said, trying to carry
it off with a laugh, though her eye still glistened
softly as she turned once more upon him, "give
my love to Ruth. I know I should like her Tell
her she must visit me when she comes to town."
She bit her tongue, and added: "But when you
praised her so, you made me think I was n't good
at all-or good-looking,-like her! There! I've
said it!"
And, with a laugh and a blush, she ran out of
the room.
At the dinner-table that day, Jacob described
with a good deal of spirit and humor his interview
with Uncle Higglestone, and asked Mr. Fairlake
what he ought to do.
It is hard to give advice in such a case as this,"
said his host; "and before doing it, perhaps I
ought to see your uncle. I will go round and call
upon him this afternoon. Meanwhile, Jacob," he
added in a fatherly tone, "it will be well for you
to reflect that we have to do many things in this
life, not because they are pleasant or promise to be
profitable, but because they are duties. Who
knows but you may have a duty to your uncle to
fulfill. If you can do anything to comfort his
lonely and suffering old age, may be you will choose
to do it, and conclude to go to him, for his sake
solely, and not at all for your own."
Left to himself that afternoon, Jacob remem-
bered these words. The more he pondered them,
the more they troubled him. Was he sorry that
he had remained faithful and done his duty to his
aunt? Would he ever in the future regret that he
had performed a similar service toward his uncle?
Might not he do something to bring into that
dreary house the home-feeling that was wanting?
He was prepared for the result when Mr. Fair-
lake returned from his mission.
I have had a long and rather satisfactory talk
with your uncle," said that gentleman, sitting down

with Jacob alone in'the library. "You have made
an extremely favorable impression upon him. He
likes your frank manners, even when you disagree
with him, and that is a great point gained. If you
go to live with him, you will not have to sacrifice
your independence."
Do you think I had better go?" asked Jacob,
trembling with excitement.
Oh, I am not going to say that. I shall leave
you to decide the matter for yourself. But I will
tell you what I have learned. The old colored
woman showed me the room which will be yours if
you go. It is a very good room, but I objected to
the barrenness of the walls, and the poor and
scanty furniture; for I thought, considering his
wealth, that we might as well begin right. He
said to me that you could have it furnished in any
way you liked-he, of course, to pay the bills.
Then it occurred to me that, with my wife to assist
you in your selections,-she has excellent taste in
sucli things,-you might make really a pleasant
room of it. And, who knows? that might prove a
starting-point toward a reform in the old gentle-
man's whole manner of living. When he sees one
really comfortable and inviting chamber in his
house, I think he will like to have all the rooms
furnished with corresponding good sense and good
taste."
Jacob listened in a pleased way, but said nothing.
Another thing. He imagines that he is going
to take some pride in you, and he agrees with me
that it will be a good plan for you to go to school a
year or two, or at least carry on some studies in
connection with your business. I am inclined to
think he will be liberal with you in that and every
other respect, if you suit each other. If you choose,
you can go and try; but, even then, you wont
be obliged to stay if you don't wish to. Now make
up your mind."
My mind is already made up," Jacob answered.
" It was made up before you got back. I said to
myself then, It may be my duty to go, and I will
go,' though it seemed hard. It doesn't seem so
hard to me now, after what you have said."

CHAPTER XXXIX.
IN AND ABOUT THE GREAT CITY.
THE next morning Jacob went to visit Uncle
Higglestone, and met with a very different recep-
tion both from him and the old colored woman.
She was evidently expecting him, and had put
on a fresh gown and a smile for the occasion. She
had also set the sick man's room in order, and the
old uncle himself appeared in clean linen, his head
resting against a white pillow in his chair, and the
harshness of his features mollified by a fresh shave

808

OCTOBER,

HIS OWN MASTER.

and an almost eager look of welcome. His hair
was thin and white, his forehead bold and broad,
and Jacob was surprised to find him looking so
kind and venerable.
He was also pleased to see his coming into the
house regarded as an event of some interest.
"Ah!" said the old man, "I thought you
would! Mr. Fai-lake gives a good account of you,

all so new and strange to me, I don't know where
or how to begin."
"That 's right; I should be sorry to see you
show a headstrong confidence," said Uncle Higgle-
stone. "Mr. Fairlake thinks you had better not
come here to stay until your room is ready, and I
think so too. His wife will help you about that.
I am willing to leave everything to her. Mean-

UNCLE fHIGGLESOEGVSJCBA1ERYRCPIN

and I think we shall get along together. You are
to have your room, and do about as you please
with it,-only, no extravagance, you understand!"
"There 's not much danger of that," said Jacob.
"'No, I suppose not. You are a boy of good
sense and good habits; only keep so, and you are
safe. But a word of warning to begin with will do
no harm. Many a boy like you has come to the
city not knowing what extravagance was, and
rushed into it all the more recklessly for its novelty
and his previous ignorance. Now, to practical
matters, the first thing."
I want your advice," replied Jacob. This is

while, you should see a little of the city. Visit
me when you can; but feel yourself free to go and
come. You '11 want a little money."
Oh I had n't thought of that! said Jacob.
"But I suppose it will come handy."
"About how much ?"-and the old man looked
sharply into the boy's blushing and confused face.
"Oh, very little indeed," replied Jacob. "To
tell the truth, I hate to begin by taking money of
you. But if my friends are to go around with me,
I should like to be able to pay any little expenses."
"That's right!" cried the old man. "Any-
thing else?"

809

HIS OWN MASTER.

Jacob looked very thoughtful for a moment.
"I came away from home," he said, "leaving
some small debts unpaid. They have troubled me
ever since. I did a very foolish and a very wrong
thing, and I would like to make it right. But I
hoped to be able to earn money for that."
"That's right, that's right !" again cried the old
man, his eyes sparkling with satisfaction. "Pay
your honest debts before all things. Earn the
money for it before you earn clothes for your own
back. But in this case you 'd better not wait.
I '11 advance you the money and you can make it
right with me by and by. Anything else?"
"I borrowed a little of Friend Matthew Lane.
I have a letter written ready to send to the family,
and if I could inclose what I owe them I should be
very grateful."
The old man gave him all the money he required
to pay these small but by no means trifling debts,
and something for his pocket besides.
"Now," said he, "when you go out with Mrs.
Fairlake, get you a new suit of clothes the first
thing. I '11 give you a bit of paper which will pro-
cure you credit almost everywhere. Pull that table
up here. Give me the pen."
The old man scratched two or three lines on a
scrap of paper, evidently torn from an old letter,
and gave it to Jacob.
"There!" he said, "you might go and buy a
steamboat on the strength of that."
These were the lines: The bearer of this is my
nephew, Jacob Fortune. Please let him have what-
ever he wants on my account."
A coarse, strong signature, hard to counterfeit,
gave the paper its value. Jacob smiled. He was
beginning to find something to admire and like
about the old man, and he felt a sense of the power
there was in that scraggily written name.
Uncle Higglestone also wrote a list of the princi-
pal places in the city which he wanted his nephew
to visit.
I have put the Iron-works last," said he, "but
they ought to interest a lad like you as much as
anything. When you visit them, ask for Mr.
Miner, and tell him I sent you. Now, what do
you propose to do first?"
"I think I had better attend to having my room
got ready," replied Jacob.
"That sounds like business. Well, bring Mrs.
Fairlake to see it, and order the things as soon as
you please."
Jacob went off with a light heart, and returned
in the afternoon with Florie and her mother. He
introduced them to his uncle, and then took them
to look at his room.
"Why, this is really very nice !" said Mrs. Fair-
lake, or will be, after we have had the arrange-

ment of it. The down-look from the window into
those back-yards is not very enchanting; but the
off-look over the city and into the sunset sky will
always be interesting-when the smoke is n't too
thick. I 'm glad you 've got a fire-place; it will
make everything else cheerful when your little
grateful of coal is blazing on a winter night."
Oh, yes !"' said Florie; and see his mantel-
piece is n't so high but that he can put his feet on
it when he sits and smokes his cigar! "
Florie, be still !" said the mother, while Jacob
joined in the young girl's mischievous laugh.
" He is not that kind of boy. Here we '11 have
your writing-table, with the light over your left
shoulder. It will do for the few books you have at
first. Will you have the room newly painted?"
"I think not," replied Jacob, in a low voice.
" I 've an idea that everything ought to be plain-
not at all showy, I mean, so as not to contrast too
much with the rest of the house."
Quite right, Jacob. So we '11 make the paint
do, with a little soap and water, which old Dinah
will attend to. But the walls must be papered,
the floor needs a carpet; the windows want new
shades,"-and Mrs. Fairlake went on to name a
few other indispensable things. Let 's see what
Dinah can do for us first."
The old colored woman having been consulted,
the little party set off to make purchases. Jacob
had never been shopping before, and when he saw
designs of carpets unrolled, or a multitude of
patterns of wall-paper displayed, he was so be-
wildered he did n't know what to do. Had the
plainest things of any he saw been chosen for him.
and he had first seen them in his room, he would
have been perfectly satisfied. But, among so many
beautiful styles, he wondered how any one could
make a choice.
He felt that he could not have done anything
without Mrs. Fairlake. She let Jacob and Florie
argue and discuss, then took what she thought
most fit. The carpet having been decided upon,
then everything else was made to correspond with
that. Jacob was surprised to find how a little
experience and good sense simplified this great
puzzling mystery of shopping.
At Mrs. Fairlake's suggestion, the new suit of
clothes had been put off until the last thing. Per-
haps it was her way of showing that she and Florie
were not ashamed to go about with a well-behaved
young fellow in pepper-and-salt trousers and a coat
which he had slightly outgrown. At a first-class
clothing store he was fitted, without much trouble,
to a neat ready-made suit, which, as the shopman
said, would "do to wear anywhere;" and he put
it to the test by wearing it home to supper, with
Florie and her mother.

8IO

[OCTOBER,

HIS OWN MASTER.

Well, that's a sensible suit," said the old man,
when he saw Jacob in it the next morning. I
hope I shall be able to say as much of your other
purchases. The paper-hangers are already in the
house; but I have n't looked at the paper, and
don't mean to till it's dry on the walls. Now you
must think of something to do for your friends who
are doing so much for you."
I should like to, if I could," said Jacob.
"For one thing, do you think they would care
to go and ride with us this afternoon? If the
weather continues fine, I think I should enjoy it;
and, if they will go, we'll have a barouche."
I am sure they will," replied Jacob; "for they
said they would go with me to-day anywhere I
pleased."
So the ride came off. It was a beautiful after-
noon, Florie and Jacob were in high spirits, and it
was surprising to see how courteous the crabbed
old uncle could be on an occasion of this kind. He
showed great respect for Mrs. Fairlake, who occu-
pied the rear seat with him in the carriage, and
seemed pleased to see the children enjoy them-
selves. Jacob was already bringing sunshine to
this lonely old man's life.
They drove up through the city, and up, up, by
zigzag roads, to the summits of the mighty hills
that rise still beyond. They were then in the midst
of the finest suburbs in the world-villas, gardens,
groves, charming vales and slopes, and heights
that commanded magnificent views. Uncle Hig-
glestone, who was full of information with regard
to everything they saw, pointed out many things
of interest, and did not fail to tell Jacob that these
suburbs comprised five separate small cities, each
on its hill, where lived the wealthiest people doing
business in the great city below.
He took them past the buildings of the famous
Lane Theological Seminary (which did not look
very inviting, to Jacob), and afterward sat in the
carriage while Mrs. Fairlake and the young people
climbed the cupola of the Mount Auburn Young
Ladies' School, on one of the highest and finest
hills, and beheld from the top all the beautiful,
green, sunlit, blue-ringed world outspread around.
Then home, after one of the most delightful days
in Jacob's life.
The next morning, he went alone to visit one of
the great pork-packing houses for which Cincinnati
is celebrated, and saw an endless drove of hogs
move up an inclined plane into the building, and
come down, through a number of spouts, in the
shape of hams, shoulders, sides of pork, pigs' feet,
and so forth, at the rate of twelve or fifteen hun-
dred hogs a day. Much of the process by which
the drove was converted into pork and lard was
not agreeable to look at, but in its order and skill,

its swiftness, and even its neatness, considering the
nature of the work, it was all wonderful.
In the afternoon he visited the Iron-works, of
which more anon.
Jacob's room was ready for him by Thursday,
and Mrs. Fairlake and Florie went with him to
look at it. Everything was plain and neat about
it; yet he could not help blushing as he entered it
from the other part of the house, and found it,
after all, so much better and more comfortably
furnished than any other room.
Something made him very thoughtful as he
walked home with Florie and her mother, and
took leave of them at the door.
"No," said he, "I wont go in; it will only
make it still harder for me to leave you if I'do.
My uncle expects me back to dinner, and I must
remember that is my home now."
"But you are going to be a near neighbor.
Come and see us very often !" said Florie.
Jacob swallowed the lump in his throat, smiled
resolutely, and said:
Yes, if you will let me."
The sadness of parting was not all on his side,
for these good friends had become no less attached
to him than he to them. He could not thank
them then for all their kindness to him, but with a
last grateful, affectionate look, he turned from
them and hurried away. He had many things to
think of on his way back to his new home.
Just before reaching his uncle's house, he saw a
person come down the steps and advance toward
him, with a jaunty air and a graceful flourish,
which belonged to only one person in the world.
Jacob did n't know whether he was glad or sorry to
see him, but he went forward and shook the dain-
tily proffered hand.
How do you do, Mr. Pinkey ?"
I am cheerful-I am all serene, thanks to you,
Jacob my boy! I've just been to hunt you up at
your uncle's, and I'm delighted to know that he
has taken you into his heart and home, just as I
told you he would,-don't you see ? I was n't far
wrong, after all, Jacob my boy!"
"Tell me about yourself," said Jacob. What's
the news?"
Why, here I am, and that's good news for one
person in the world, at least," replied Alphonse,
gayly. Your call on Brother Loring did the busi-
ness; you must have pleaded my cause like a young
Cicero, Jacob my boy, for he came trotting round
to the jail-I mean, to my lodgings," said Al-
phonse, glancing quickly about him,-" that very
afternoon, and allowed me to bring my eloquence
to bear upon him. And what do you think? He
not only got Bottleby to withdraw his complaint,
and procured my release, but lent me money to

HIS OWN MASTER.

get to town with, which I am to repay at my
earliest convenience."
Then I trust his need of the money is not very
pressing," said Jacob.
"Oh, I'm going to surprise him and you, and
everybody else, by paying up my debts now with
the most rigid conscientiousness. Fact! By the
way, Jacob my boy, what I want of you more par-
ticularly at this moment: I'm trying to make a
new start in life, but it's awkward in the extreme
to begin without means, and now that you've got
your hand in Uncle Higglestone's pocket, please
remember 't was I who told you that he was the
vein for you to work."
"Please come to the point, and tell me what
yod want," said Jacob.
"To be brief, then-to come at once to the
sordid business question-if you can accommodate
me to-say twenty-five or thirty dollars-though
more will not be decidedly objectionable-posi-
tively to be repaid, with the larger sum I owe you,
at my very earliest-- "
"Mr. Pinkey," Jacob interrupted him, I have
not a hand in my uncle's pocket, and I have no
money to lend you."
Gracious heavens! has n't he yet opened his
heart in that gratifying, practical way,-I mean,
soothed your soul with the sight of odd dollars ? "
Yes, he did ask me if I was in need of any-
thing, and I told him I would like to settle up those
accounts at home, which I left standing when we
came away so suddenly, you remember. As the
money which ought to have been used to settle
them had gone in another direction," added
Jacob, dryly, I took some that he gave me for the
purpose; for, to tell the truth, those small debts
have troubled me more than I suppose much larger
ones ever will you."
"Jacob, my boy, give me your hand I admire
your honesty. So, you can't do anything for me ?"
Nothing, Mr. Pinkey. But tell me what you
are going to do for yourself."
"Well, Jacob, my boy, I'll take you into my
confidence. I 'm going to brush up my Latin,
walk through a medical school, purchase a diploma,
cultivate a little different style of curls, and set up
for a fashionable physician. How 's that for Pro-
fessor Alphonse P. ? Ha, ha! Well, good-day,
Jacob, my boy; I 'm off."
Jacob watched him with a smile as he disap-
peared around the corner; and then walked home
to his new quarters in Uncle Higglestone's house.
Well, how do you like your room ? said the
old man, as they sat together that day at dinner,
in the old man's chamber.
One thing about it I don't like at all," replied
Jacob.

What a room like that ? cried the old man,
sharply. "It's positively sumptuous, compared
with anything I ever had when I was a boy. Mrs.
Fairlake has done the thing in remarkably good
taste, I think. I 've just been thinking, I would n't
object to such a room myself. What is it you
don't like about it? If anything in reason, I'11
have it remedied, if I can."
You can remedy it," said Jacob. "And I
hope you wont take offense when I name it."
Certainly not. We're going to be plain with
each other, you know."
Jacob paused, gathering courage to speak.
"Well, uncle," he said at length, "it's just
this: the room is beautiful, comfortable, home-
like,-everything I can wish: more than I ever
hoped to have. But I 'm ashamed, when I go into
it, to think that I, a boy, well and hearty, have
such a room in your house, while you, an old man,
and sick "
He hesitated, glancing his eye about the dreary,
uninviting chamber, and then added, earnestly:
It is n't right !"
"No, it isn't said the old man, huskily.
" But 1 'm used to it. Living alone, a man some-
times gets so he does n't care how he lives. Now
you are with me, I'll see to having things in a
little better shape. I had thought of it myself.
But now let's talk of something else. What have
you seen around town that interested you most ?"
The Iron-works," replied Jacob, promptly.
"Ah I 'm surprised at that. What of them ?"
I found Mr. Miner, and when I gave him
your name, he took great pains to show and ex-
plain everything. I think I was never so much
interested in anything before. Such power!-
such machinery !-all through the ingenuity of
men !-it is wonderful! I have heard people talk
about inspiration; I never in my life," Jacob went
on, with earnest eloquence, had such a feeling,
as when I walked through the different shops with
Mr. Miner, and saw what was done; a sort of
inspiration came over me, and I got an idea."
"Well! what's that?"
You told me, uncle, I must be thinking what
I would like to do. I've been two or three times
to your store, and seen the trade going on. But
it seems to me there is something better than trad-
ing,-and that is, making. I think I 'd rather be
one of those who do something, than one of those
who deal in what others have done."
You had, eh ? said the old man, penetrating
Jacob with his keen gaze. What do you think
of me ? I 've been in trade all my life."
I know it. And I don't say but that trade is a
good thing. Only I think what's back of it is bet-
ter. But you have n't confined yourself to trade,"

812

[OCTOBaR,

HIS OWN MASTER.

said Jacob. Mr. Miner told me you were more
of a manufacturer than a merchant,-that you are
one of the principal owners of the Works."
To be sure; I have an interest there; I am
one of the oldest iron-men in the city," said Uncle
Higglestone, with satisfaction.
"Well," continued Jacob, "when he told me
that, I thought perhaps you could get me a chance
to do something there."
At the Iron-works The old man looked at
the lad in astonishment. "You want to go to
work with your hands, in the midst of clangor, and
grime, and disagreeable things, rather than be a
genteel clerk in a store ? "
The things are not so disagreeable to me; I
sha' n't mind the grime; I rather like the clanging,"
replied Jacob, with a smile. My idea is, to
begin at the beginning, and learn .. i r',;l1, in
a business like that; become a perfect master of
it; know how to make everything, from a rivet,
or a nut and screw, to the finest kind of ma-
chinery."
For a minute the old man did not speak. He
was trembling with emotion. At last he said,
winking the unusual moisture from his eyes:
I did n't think any boy nowadays would make
a choice like that. Boys want to be genteel; they
don't like to soil their fingers Instead of pro-
ducing anything with their hands and brains, they
want to live, some way, and grow rich, on what
other people produce. Jacob you could n't have
made a choice that would please your old uncle
better."
Oh! you will let me, then? cried Jacob,
joyfully.
Let you ? I'll give you every advantage. I
thought I would like to have you work into my
business. But this will be better for you, if it is
your choice. It is a noble ambition And you
will be working into my business, in a way, after
all. But how about going to school ? "
"I've talked with Mr. Fairlake about that,"
said Jacob. I want a good education. But that,
he says, means something very different now from
what it did a few years ago. Then it meant Latin
and Greek, among other things. They are good
to learn, if any one has the taste and the time for
them. But for practical life, he says, other things
are taking their place. He advises me to learn one
modern language instead, and recommends Ger-
man. His family talk German just as they do
English; and hearing them makes me want to
study it."
Yes; that will be useful. There are a great
many Germans in this part of the country," said
the old man, listening with interest to all the boy
had to say.

Then there are the modern sciences,-some-
thing people knew nothing about when they made
so much of Latin and Greek," Jacob went on.
" I had some talks with a man I met up the river,
-a queer fellow,-a peddler of the name of Long-
shore."
"What! Sam?" cried the old man. "I know
him. An odd chick! shrewd and honest, but a
little crack-brained about some things."
"Yes, I thought so. But he has read a good
deal, and, though he is n't very deep, he gave me
some ideas about modern science that have been
turning and turning in my mind, ever since. I 've
a great curiosity to know more' about them. And
when Mr. Fairlake told me that-these are his
words-'modern science goes hand in hand with
the practical arts, which depend upon it in many
ways,' I thought I would like to know something
about science in general, and a good deal about
those particular sciences that have to do with my
own business."
"But how are you going to learn all that without
going to school?" the old man inquired.
"I mean to go to school. But I don't think it
is necessary to give all my time to it. Mr. Fair-
lake says that when a young man is really inter-
ested and determined to get knowledge, it will
come to him in all sorts of ways,-through his eyes
and ears, and 'even through the pores of his skin.'
Now, I want to work, and at the same time I want
to read and study. He says there are always
chances for that. There is the Mechanics' Insti-
tute, where, he says, young men go in the evening,
and learn drawing, mathematics and other things,
and have a good library where they can find books
on all sorts of subjects. I shall go there," added
Jacob, positively. Then, as for German, the
Fairlakes say they will teach me the pronunciation,
and I can learn the grammar and translation by
myself, from books. I 've a pretty fair foundation
to begin on. At school I was as good as any boy
of my age in geography, arithmetic, grammar and
other common branches; though I had to stay at
home and work more than some boys did. Be-
sides, I 've concluded to take Mr. Fairlake's advice
about going to school this coming season, if you
approve of it. Then, in the spring, when I am
sixteen years old, I should like to go into the Iron-
works."
I approve of everything said the old man,
heartily. "And I confess-I confess, Jacob, I am a
good deal surprised at the turn you have taken."
"I am a little surprised at it myself," replied
Jacob. "The smelting-furnace at Jackson gave
me a disagreeable notion of everything connected
with working in iron. But it was n't alone on
account of the heat and steam in the casting-room.

813

HIS OWN MASTER R.

I might have been interested if the grbuty foreman
had been such a man as Mr. Miner is, at your iron-
works. "
"Well," said the old man, I am glad you are
going to school for six or eight months. That will
give you time to think of what you will go at next.
Perhaps you will change your mind."
Perhaps," said Jacob, with a smile.

CHAPTER XLI.
MASTERY AT LAST.
JACOB found that living with his uncle was not
by any means so unpleasant as might have been
expected. They liked each other more
and more. The old man was often sharp-
tempered enough; but the boy had made
up his mind beforehand not to be dis-
turbed by any outbreaks of that kind.
Uncle Higglestone, like Aunt Myra, had
a great deal more kindness in his nature
than the world had given him credit for,
and, like her, he had sometimes an odd
way of showing it to Jacob. But the boy
looked steadily at the good and noble
side of his character, and respected him
for that.
It was to Jacob's credit that they were
able to get along together at all. Uncle
Higglestone's previous idea of a nephew
had been a lazy young fellow, invented
for the purpose of spending an old man's I
money. He found that Jacob was not
one of that kind. He was delighted to
see him choose an independent career,
involving hard study and hard work.
The less he relied upon his uncle the
more anxious his uncle was to help him.
The less he cared for the old man's
money, the more willing the old man
was to spend it for him.
The uncle's health improved fast after
Jacob came into the house. The quickening of his
affections seemed to renew his life. He was soon able
to go about his business, and appeared as well as he
had been for years. There is nothing like some-
body to love to keep the heart young and strong.
Something else improved too, and that .was the
old man's housekeeping. The furnishing of Jacob's
room was the beginning of a revolution which did
not end until every room in the house had put on
an attractive and home-like appearance. In the
following winter, when Jacob became associated
with a club of young fellows for purposes of mutual
improvement, Uncle Higglestone's parlor was one
of the pleasantest places where they met.
Of course, Jacob saw a great deal of his friends

the Fairlakes ; and while he was making many new
acquaintances, he now and then met an old one.
He was walking on the levee one afternoon when
he saw coming toward him a puckered mouth, a
long, lean, twisted neck, and a pair of outstretched
hands. The hands grasped his, and the mouth
unpuckered enough to say :
"Well! I declare! Glad to see you! Didn't
know as ever I should after that morning I saw you
starting for Jackson, and I was drifting down the
creek so fast I was n't able to say just what I wanted
to about the power of the sun; but I 've thought
on it fifty times since, and I'll tell ye now. Ye see,
the bigger the mass of an attracting body "

"MAY LOVE AND PEACE BE WITH THEE, MY SON!"
"Oh, Mr. Longshore !" said Jacob, who could
not help laughing at this abrupt return to the old
hobby, "tell me about yourself now. And about
Friend Matthew's family. Have you seen any of
them lately?"
"About myself I haint much to tell," replied
Sam; 'cept that I 've had a successful season,
sold more goods, I 'm bound to say, than any
other six men on the river; and t' other day I got
hold of a treat-ise on spectrum analysis. You
know, this spectrum analysis is the great discovery
of the age;-you can tell by the lines on the spec-
trum just what any luminous body is made of; and
it shows us that the sun is made up of about the
same ingredients as our earth, for instance, iron

[OcTOBER,

HIS OWN MASTER.

and other metals, hydrogen and other gases, only
in an intensely heated state of liquid or vapor.
Now -"
I shall be very glad to know all about it some
time," Jacob again interrupted his friend. But I
asked you "
"Oh, yes about the Quakers; have I seen any
on 'em lately ? said Sam. I should think so,-
if an hour ago is lately."
"An hour ago! exclaimed Jacob. "Which
of them ? where ? "
Friend Matthew himself. He's in town. And
I guess I can take you right where he is now."
"Oh, I '11 be ever so much obliged to you, if you
will "
Come right along," said Sam. He told me
he had heard from you, and that your drowned
friend had turned up again. Just as I expected.
Didn't I prove it to ye? Oh, you'll find along
head has got hold of a subject, when Sam Long-
shore puts his mind to it "
Talking by the way, Jacob slipped half a dollar
into his old friend's hand. Sam looked at it,
winked, smiled, and slipped it into his pocket.
"Glad 't was of use to ye," he said, as Jacob
thanked him for the loan. And, by mighty I
only wish everybody was as ready to pay their hon-
est debts Some of us, then, would be rich enough
to retire from business."
They found Matthew Lane in a warehouse in
Front street; and there Jacob also had the pleas-
ure of making acquaintance with the man he had
once been so anxious to find,-the same who had
led him on that wild-goose chase from Jackson to
Chillicothe,-Mr. Benjamin Radkin. He was now
in a position to laugh over that adventure; and to
decline, with thanks, an offer from Mr. Radkin of
a place in his smelting-works at Jackson.
He took leave of Mr. Radkin; made Sam Long-
shore promise to come and see him; then had a
long private talk with Friend Matthew. He had
many questions to ask, about Ruth and her mother;
and many to answer about himself.
When thee has a vacation," said Matthew,
"thee must surely come and see us. We were
right glad to get thy letter; and a visit from thee
will be still more welcome. Meanwhile, I wish thee
the best success, which is n't always what shows
most to the world. The real rewards and punish-
ments of life are not what we usually see men enjoy
or suffer; they lie deeper than that. They are in
the mind and heart. May love and peace be with
thee, my son And love and peace did seem to
go with Jacob, in that good man's blessing.

After a winter of thought and study, Jacob had
not, when spring came, changed his mind about
going into the iron-works. Nor has he yet had
reason to regret that he kept to his resolution. His
uncle still lives, and manages his own business; and
Jacob is all the more respected by him because he
has worked out for himself an independent career.
It was long before he saw Mr. Pinkey again.
Being in Philadelphia on business some years
afterward, he was one day approached by a man
of slight figure, a jaunty air, and very stringy ring-
lets, in a rather seedy coat; who thrust a guide-
Sbook into his hand, glibly recommending him to
purchase it. Jacob glanced at the book, then
looked earnestly at the man.
Mr. Pinkey !" said he, don't you know me ?"
What cried Alphonse; "Jacob, my boy !-
my man, I ought to say How could I know you,
in that fine beard ? "
"How are you? and what are you doing?"
Jacob inquired.
"You see what I am doing," Pinkey replied,
somewhat ashamed, -. ih.'ii. .. the guide-book.
"A mere make-shift, these hard times. Anything
to turn an honest penny, you know."
"That's right," said Jacob, approvingly. And
to encourage his friend's humble but praiseworthy
effort, he bought a guide-book of him, though he
had already several on hand.
When I saw him a few days later, he made me a
present of the book.
I thought I should have a good chance to give
it away," he said, laughing.
It lies before me now as I write. It is a Guide
to Philadelphia and the Centennial Exhibition.
And Jacob's business there ? He had in charge
one of the finest iron exhibits to be seen at that
great show. Many of the articles were made by
his own hands ; a few of the most curious and inter-
esting were his own invention. 1 found that he
was not only a favorite with all who knew him, but
that he had already received tempting offers for his
future services from two or three large American
firms, and one of which he had good reason to be
proud-from the Chinese government He smiled
as he spoke of this, but said he was very well con-
tented where he was, and thought he should
remain.
All which has to be very briefly told; for it would
take many chapters still to relate how Jacob, by
the exercise of patience, perseverance and self-con-
trol had become not only a master of his business,
but finally, in the truest and best sense, His OwN
MASTER.

THE END.

THE REVENGE OF THE LITTLE HIPPOPOTAMUS.

THE REVENGE OF THE LITTLE HIPPOPOTAMUS.

BY PARK BENJAMIN.

i All at once an idea struck him,
And he broke into a smile.
.- I have it cried he, joyfully;
"I '1 fix that crocodile!"
Then he trotted through the rushes
S-Until he reached dry land,
.. When he crept along quite silently
STo a mound in the hot sand,

-- Where the crocodile had buried
H; er eggs, because she knew
The torrid sun would hatch them
S Within a month or two.
Now, the savage mother-reptile
Was nowhere to be seen,
For she was calmly slumbering
Among the rushes green.

A FAT young hippopotamus
Sat grimly by the Nile,
Contriving dire vengeance
On a lady crocodile,

2-

Who, that morning, for her breakfast
Ate up his brothers twain;
So he pondered long and deeply
How to pay her back again.

The little hippopotamus
Moved cautiously and slow,
Until he saw the heap of eggs,-
Than laughed he long and low.

P '

Then boldly he marched forward,
And stamped upon that nest,
And jumped and kicked and pranced about,
As if he were possessed,

816

[OcTOBEir,

-X-

S THE REVENGE OF THE LITTLE HIPPOPOTAMUS. 817

Till all the eggs were scattered -
And broken every one,
While all the little crocodiles
Forth from the shells did run.

N' -' .- I

Waving her frightful tail. He 's somewhere on the ground.

The little hippopotamus
Was having then huge fun,
Stepping upon the babies,
To smash them one by one;
So he failed to see the mother,
Nor dre amd of his mishap,
Till-whacraddlin against his side so fat

Being too fat to clamber down.. '
It lifted him from t ff his feet,
And hurled him up on high,in a balloon
And away he went careeringay.
Like a rocket in theI skyV.
How far he flew I know not,Ta
But 't is said that he was thrownHo
On the pyramid of Cheops, -I ".
Straddling the topmost stone.

Being too fat to clamber down. .
He may be there this day, "
Unless some one in a balloon a
Has carried him away. FAN ..
VOL. IV.-53.

818

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.

[OCTOBER,

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.*

BY RICHARD A. PROCTOR.

THE northern map given below explains itself, of New Orleans, a portion of the Dipper is con-
because we have already considered separately the cealed from view. Nearly the whole constellation

constellations which appear in it. The Dipper is Ursa Major is seen in London, when due south
well placed for observation at this season for all below the pole; but, as you see, the paws of the
places in America north of the latitude of Louisville, Great Bear are not seen in America at this time.
or not more than about two degrees south of it; but Turning to the southern skies for the month we
for places between this last-named latitude and that find that the constellation Pisces (or the Fishes) is
SIn order to complete this series within the present volume, the stars for November and December are included in this paper.

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.

the ecliptical constellation now ruling in the south.
It is usually represented by two fishes tied together
with a ribbon, one of the fish has its tail at n, and
its head close to Andromeda; the other has its
head at y and P. You must be careful to distin-
guish the two fishes, Pisces, from the southern fish,
Piscis Australis.

The Fishes belonged to the watery signs of the
zodiac,-Capricorn (the Sea-Goat), Aquarius (the
Water-Pourer), and the Fishes, whose natural home
is in the water. Below Aquarius you see another
fish. Below Pisces there is the sea-monster Cetus,
and close by Cetus, as you will see in the second
southern chart for this month, is the watery sign

The constellation Pisces now includes the point Eridanus, named later as a river, but undoubtedly
marked v which is where the sign of the Ram in the older system of the constellations represented
begins, and was formerly occupied by this constel- as a great stream of water simply, something like
lation; though, more anciently still, the Bull was the streams which were represented as flowing from
the constellation occupying this part of the heavens, the water-can of Aquarius.

819

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.

I have already mentioned the old superstition of
the astrologers that when the sun and moon and
the other five planets (for the sun and moon were
planets in the old system of astronomy) were con-
joined in the watery signs, or specially in Capri-
cornus, the world would be destroyed by a flood.
It is rather curious that the history of the flood was,

in the older temples of the stars, on the walls below
the dome-roof, which sprang from the circle repre-
senting the equator.
The coincidences are curious enough to be worth
noticing, though to many the natural thought will
be that the zodiac temples represented on their walls
a more ancient history of a flood, not that the his-

in a sense, portrayed among the constellations tory was a later explanation of zodiac temples made
which (when the figures were first formed) lay long before.
south of the equator, insomuch that some have We have the Water-Pourer casting streams of
gone so far as to suggest that the narrative of the water downward from the equator, as explained
flood is an account in words of what was pictured, last month, the waters rising until the uppermost

820

[OCTOBER,

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.

of the fishes rose nearly to the equator (so it would hinder quarters of the horse forming the fore part,
have been pictured in the remote ages referred to), at present missing, of the great ship). This man
while the great sea-monster and the still heavier was represented bearing a sacrifice toward the altar,
streams of Eridanus on one side, with the Sea- Ara, from which the smoke of burning incense rose
Goat on the other, indicate the prevalence of the into the heavens. We know that Noah when he
waters which had been poured by Aquarius over went forth from the ark, builded an altar, and took
all things. Passing onward (see successively the of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and

southern maps for January, February, March, etc.),
we come first to the great ship Argo, which was
associated in the earliest ages with the Ark; next
is the Centaur, which again we find from early
authorities was formerly depicted as a man (the

offered burnt offerings on the altar; and that the
smoke of burning incense rose from the altar of
Noah may be inferred from the words which imme-
diately follow, in the authorized version of the Bible
narrative: "The Lord smelled a sweet savor."

THE STARS IN OCTOBER.

Next after the altar, or rather above it, and in fact
in the smoke from the altar, is the bow of Sagitta-
rius,-and corresponding with this we read that
God, after the savor of the altar had reached him,
said : I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall
come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth
that the bow shall be seen in the cloud." Close by
the ship Argo, again, is the raven, perched on Hy-
dra, the great sea-serpent, represented in the old
sculptures immersed in the waves of ocean on which
the ark was floating. Orion was from time imme-
morial associated with Nimrod, the mighty hunter
before the Lord, and accordingly has his dogs
beside him; while the first vineyard and vintage
may be supposed to be indicated by the cup, Crater.
(It seems also that Virgo-close by Crater-was
represented of old as bearing grapes, and to this day
the star e of the Virgin is called Vindemiatrix, or
the Lady Gathering Grapes.)
The constellation Pegasus (or the Winged Horse)
is a singular one for several reasons. There is not
the slightest resemblance to a winged horse among
the stars of the group; and as usually represented
the winged half horse has his head downward, the
neck joining the body at a and extending to C, etc.
The constellation is easily recognized by the three
bright stars /3, a and 7,' which with a of Andromeda
form what is commonly called the square of Pega-
sus; for a Andromeda was also, of old, a star of
Pegasus, to wit, 6 of this constellation. You will
observe that the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet
has no representative star, at present, in the con-
stellation.
The sun in his annual course along the ecliptic
passes the point r, or crosses the equator moving
northward, on or about March 21st.

And now we pass to the last of our set of twelve
pairs of northern and southern maps, viz., the pair
which, indeed, properly belongs to December.
The northern map contains no new star-groups.
It is only necessary to remark that this map makes
the circuit of the northern heavens complete, the
northern skies for the month following being those
already shown in the first northern map of our
series.
Turning to the second southern map, the last of
the southern series, we see that due south and high
up toward the point overhead, lies the group of
three stars, a, 3, and 7, forming the head of Aries
(the Ram). The brightest of the three is called
Hamal (or the Sheep). It is not easy to under-
stand why this group was likened to a ram. One
can just imagine the outline of a sheep's face look-
ing toward the right (or west) as formed by the
three stars a, 3, and y; but in the maps the face
of the ram is turned the other way, looking toward

the Bull, which lies on the left. This has been the
idea for many centuries, for old Manilius wrote:

First Aries, glorious in his golden wool,
Looks back, and wonders at the mighty Bull.

Yet there is a tradition that in remoter times the
Ram looked toward the west. Aries is one of the
constellations of the zodiac, a set of twelve arranged
as a zone or band round the heavens, along the
middle of which runs the ecliptic, which is in fact
the path of the sun. Formerly Aries was the first
of the zodiacal constellations, but the same change
which has shifted the pole from the Dragon to the
Little Bear has shifted the Ram from his former
position.
The sun in his course along the ecliptic crosses
the point marked 8, or enters the sign Taurus, on
or about April 2oth.
The stars /i, 39, and 41, at one time formed a
separate constellation called Musca (the Fly)-
rather a large fly if Aries represents an ordinary
ram.
Below the Ram there is the great straggling con-
stellation called Cetus (or the Whale). In reality
it was intended, I suppose, to represent some imag-
inary sea-monster, for the whale could hardly have
been known to the astronomers who formed the
older constellations. The group suggests rather
an animal like the sea-serpent, rearing its head
above water, than the great lumbering mass of a
whale; and I am almost disposed to venture the
idea that either some recollection of the Enalio-
saurian or long-necked (and long-named) reptiles
was thought of, or that the monster was no other
than the crocodile. Slightly to modify the words
of Shakspeare, we may say of this star-group,

It's almost in shape of a crocodile.
By the mass and 't is a crocodile, indeed.
Methinks it's like a weasel.
It is backed like a weasel.
Or like a whale ?
Very like a whale.

However, it is more important at present to note
that the star marked Mira (or the Wonderful Star)
cannot be seen at present. This is one of those
strange stars which vary in brightness. It shines
for about a fortnight as a star of the second magni-
tude, then by degrees fades away until at the end of
three months it cannot be seen. After remaining
nearly five months invisible, it gradually increases
in brightness for about three months, when it is
again a second-magnitude star. It occupies about
331 days eight hours in going through these
changes. During the first half of April next this
star will be in full luster.
Above the Ram you will see the Triangles, one
triangle formed of faint stars, the other of fairly

[OCTOBER,

BO-PEEP.

conspicuous ones. The constellation Eridanus (or
the River Po) is seen to the left of the south,
passing on a winding course such as a river should
follow, to the southern horizon. At places in the
latitude of New Orleans the bright star Achernar
(of the first magnitude) shows where the river

823

comes to an end. (Achernar signifies the latter
part or end.) The Bedouin Arabs call Eridanus
the Ostrich. The wide region almost bare of stars
between Cetus and Eridanus is occupied by the
modern constellations Fornax" (the Chemist's Fur-
nace) and Sculptor* (the Sculptor's Workshop).

These Latin names are abbreviations for Fornax Chemica and Officina Sculptoria.

BO-PEEP.

By E. NORMAN GUNNISON.

WHAT becomes of the baby-stars
That play all night at their game--Bo-peep,
When the moon comes out with her silver bars,
And we little children are fast asleep?

Now, this is why, when the moon is bright,
We scarcely see the little stars:
She puts them to sleep by her silver light,
And fondles them close, behind her bars.

S )

But when the moon has gone away,
And happy children sing their song,
The baby-stars come out to play,
And laugh and twinkle all night long.

They laugh and twinkle the livelong night,
When we little children are fast asleep;
When the moon no longer gives her light,
The stars are playing their game-Bo-peep I

^ /

'S IJ:I r

..- I /~i

"OH, THE DUTCH COMPANIES IS THE BEST COMPANIES
THAT EVER CAME ACROSS -'ROM THE OLD COUNTRIES "

824 FOR VERY LITTLE FOLKS. [OCTOBER,

WHAT THE PARROT TAUGHT THE LITTLE GIRL.

PECKY was just a poor poll parrot, with nothing of his own but his
pretty gray feathers and sharp beak, that could bite little fingers when
they came too near his cage; and yet this same Pecky taught Katie
Scott a very useful lesson. When he was first brought home, Katie
was just the happiest little girl "Mamma!" she cried. "Mamma, please,
he must be placed where he can see Libbie and Mary play croquet !"
Libbie and Mary lived next door, and, when the weather was fine, the
three friends-Katie, Libbie and Mary-used to have fine games on the
lawn between the two houses.
There were four friends when Pecky came, for he was put close by
the window, where he could see the fun. Before long, he learned many
new words. He would cry, Croquet her away! Take care, Katie! I
have won! Ha! ha! ha!" And he could laugh louder than any of
them. They thought there never was such a wonderful pet.
Katie told her mamma it was "just the cunningest, nicest little polly
in the world." So it was; and Katie was one of the nicest little girls
in the world when she could have what she wanted, but sometimes little
people want what is not good for them. One day, at dinner, mamma said:
You can't have any more melon, Katie dear; it will make you ill !"
I hope none of the little girls and boys who read this would do as
Katie Scott did;-I am really sorry to have to tell it;-she threw herself
on the floor, and kicked and screamed so loudly, that Libbie and Mary,
who were playing outside, heard her.
What is that noise?" asked Mary.
"Oh!" said Libbie, "it is just Katie Scott-Cry-baby"
Libbie did not know that she was heard, but such was the case.
Mr. Pecky had two little sharp ears open, and turning one up and then
the other, he walked up and down chuckling to himself, as much as to say:
"I guess I know what that means!" And then he cried softly, imitating
Katie's voice: "Boo-hoo! Boo, hoo, hoo !"
He did not forget it for a whole week, and I am glad to say that,
for a while, his little mistress was a perfectly good girl.
But there came a day-a damp, cold day-and mamma said there
could be no croquet. Katie forgot that she was trying to be good, and,
lying down near Pecky's perch, screamed like a very naughty child.
Pecky thought so, I know. He watched her some time, then jumped

FOR VERY LITTLE FOLKS.

down to the floor of his cage, crying: "Bo-o-o-o Boo, hoo! Boo-o--o !"
Katie very quickly stopped crying, peeped up at him, and ran out of the
room very much ashamed. Mamma and Aunt Jane laughed, and Pecky
thought: I must have done something very funny. I '11 just do it again !
Oh, yes, I '11 do it again !"
And he did it all that day, whenever any one came into the room.

PECKY.
When mamma was putting Katie to bed that evening, a little voice
whispered: "Mamma, wont you make Pecky stop doing that "
What do you think mamma said ? She whispered to Katie: "When
Polly does not see any little girl doing so, I am sure he will forget it."
Then I'll never do so any more!" said Katie. And she kept her word.

825

JACK- IN -THE-PULPIT.

J,, -. "'

SA ACiK- IN -T 1 PU LPI T.

THIS month, I 'm told, somebody gives in the
pages of ST. NICHOLAS full directions for making
pretty landscape-pictures out of moss, lichen, tiny
fern and other lovely things to be found in a coun-
try walk.
So your Jack advises you, dear young folks, to
look about you as you wander in the fields and
forests and to collect carefully and preserve fine
specimens of delicate ferns, leaves, grasses, moss,
and lichen, for possible future work. It will do no
harm, at any, rate, to examine these exquisite won-
ders of nature closely and with an eye to business,
-for, even if nobody comes to help you, you can
help yourselves, and arrange your treasures in some
way, so as to delight yourselves and others.

HOW NOT TO DO IT.
THE birds tell me, by the bye, that some folk
just load the walls of their living-rooms with stiff
wreaths or chains of varnished leaves and pressed
Hartford fern, strung about in the stiffest and most
absurd fashion,-up one side of the picture cords
and down the other, straight as pairs of tongs,-in
clumps and bunches in every conceivable corner,-
sprinkled on the white curtains,-pinned on, a leaf
at a time, without any idea of arrangement,-and,
in short, made the most conspicuous things about
the room. This, the Little Schoolma'am says, is
always wrong, for ornamentation should never put
itself forward in that way.
Now, don't do these things, my dears. Be mod-
erate and tasteful in all your doings, and don't
abuse those beautiful, beautiful things, autumn
leaves and ferns.
Don't pluck any Jack-in-the-Pulpits, either.
They don't press well,-at least, I would n't.
But this you can do. If you come across a fine,
stately, pleasant-looking Jack in your rambles,

bend low and whisper something nice in his ear.
It will please him. All sorts of flowers and grow-
ing things like to be noticed. Don't flowers and
growing things whisper pleasant things to you, my
chicks, all summer long? yes, and through the
autumn too ? Of course, they do !
Now we'll talk about:

TURKEY AND ROSES.
I DON'T mean the turkey-gobbler; he does n't
pay much attention to roses. But I mean the other
Turkey, about which Deacon Green was reading
aloud the other day. He had come quietly along
by the brook with a new-looking volume under his
arm and a city friend by his side; and they sat
down in the shade close by me and read some re-
markable things, of which I will give you the sub-
stance.
In the warm plains of Turkey, south of the Bal-
kan Mountains, whole districts are covered with
rose-plants set in lines about five feet apart, and
tended for some years with the greatest care.
At length, on some fresh, sweet morning of the
early summer, and while the roses are yet wet with
dew, the tender flowers are torn off by laborers,
and cast at once by heaps into huge coppers, there
to boil and boil for hours in water. The fragrant
steam is carried along a tube, and, on cooling,
becomes a kind of thick rose-water. This is boiled
up again, and its vapor cooled into a liquid on the
top of which floats a yellowish oily scum that is
known as attar of roses." It takes about four
thousand pounds of roses to make a pound of attar.
Once a merchant opened a cupboard in his store
and showed a visitor thirty large glass bottles in
which, he said, was sixty thousand dollars' worth
of the precious essence.
This quantity must have taken nearly four mil-
lions of roses in the making! Poor roses But
may be, after all, their fragrance in that form would
give more and longer-lasting pleasure than could
have been given by the flowers had they been left
upon their bushes, where they could have cheered
only the passers-by.

DOSING AN ELEPHANT.
DEAR JACK : Here is something that I cut out of an old news-
paper. I asked papa if it could be true, and he said: "Yes,
undoubtedly; for he himself had seen tremendous doses of physic
given to animals; and my brother said: "Pooh! he had often seen

men in the country give a horse a pill as big as a big potato." I
guess Mr. Bergh would object to that. But here is the story I cut
out.-Yours truly, JAMIE SrMTH.
Some of you children may now and then be given a dose of
medicine (though, 1 hope, not often); and probably whenever you
do take a dose, you consider it a very large one. Now, just for the
sake of comforting you with the contrast, I 'I tell you what doses a
poor sick elephant was made to take, some years ago. He was a
superb animal, and, for a time, delighted crowds at Cross's ..
in London by his wonderful intelligence and dignity. t1- .-.
sick at last, and what do you think his keepers gave him ? An ounce
and a half of tartar-emetic, six drachms of powder of gamboge,
twenty-four pounds of salts, twenty-four pounds of treacle, as much
croton-oil as could be given to sixteen men, and six ounces of calo-
mel, or enough to supply doses for twelve hundred human beings !
All these were taken within two days, and the next morning they
gave the poor fellow six pounds of melted beef-marrow, as a sub-
stitute for castor-oil !
"What do you think of that?
"Eh?
Yes,-the elephant got better "

826

[OCTOBER,

__

JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT.

HOME-MADE TARGETS.
TARGETS are expensive things to buy, I have
heard, but clever youngsters after once seeing one
can easily make them for themselves out of hay or
straw. An archery target is generally nothing
more than a round straw mat, covered with a piece
of muslin or canvas on which are painted the bulls-
eye and rings that show the value of the hits."

any way you happen to prefer. A target can be
hung against the side of a barn or out-building,
but it is better to set it upon a three-legged ar-
rangement known as a tripod. Any country boy-
with a word of help from his elders if need be-
can make a tripod. In fact, the boys of the red
school-house made theirs by setting three saplings
into the ground, in the form of a triangle, cutting
off the twigs and tying the tops together.

~-u 1
--

-' ~....... -~k

A SERMON ON AMIABILITY-WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF DEACON GRIEN.

It is made very much after the manner of the
grass bathing-shoes I described to you last month,
excepting that it is much more simple. All you
have to do is to keep lengthening your rope of
grass, hay or straw, by constantly working in new
wisps as you sew it together, round and round like
a great flat pin-wheel, until your target is large
enough. This is good work for boys as well as
girls. The sewing" is done with twine and a big
needle, such as upholsterers or sail-makers use. It
is best, for the sake of firmness, to cover both sides
of the target with canvas or coarse unbleached
cotton cloth. Its face can then be painted in

A NEEDLE-THROWING WEAPON.

CRUEL fellows some of those sixteenth-century
men were Now, I have heard about a little ma-
chine, small enough to be held in the closed hand,
which, on pressing a spring, would shoot out a
sort of needle with great force. It could be used
from a window, or in a crowd, and was so small
it could be easily concealed. The needles were
poisonous, and made bad wounds. Such imple-
ments would not be popular now. Torture is out
of fashion. People have improved, Jack is glad to
say, and their hearts are gentler.

828 THE LETTER-BOX.

MOSS PICTURES.

(A New Style of Fancy-Work for Boys and Girls.)

BY J. M. B.

IF you will come with me into the woods, the tall, dark pine woods,
I will prove to you that pleasure and profit may be found in the ma-
terial, as well as the sentiment of them. Heretofore you have enjoyed
the retirement, the shade, the grandeur, and the songs of birds, all of
which give peace to the soul; but when you leave the wood, you
leave all that belongs to it. You emerge from the quiet shades and
their influences, again to strive with the dry stubble of the heated
field, and the dust of an unwatered country road, and you say: "Is
it worth my while to twice pass through such as this for one transient
pleasure? "
Now I invite you to come with me, and I promise you shall bring
back fruit that will reward you for your dusty walk long after the
whispering leaves of the forest shall have faded from your memory.
Come with me into this wood road. The wide ruts on either side,
where the thin spiral grass is crushed in, show that they have lately
been pressed on by the wheels of the hay-wagon. The hay-makers
passed through here to reach the meadows beyond.
How many curious and beautiful things one treads upon in passing
along! Let us be careful. Ah do not step upon that little bit of
bark! See what a fine ruined castle it would make in a picture.
There are the crumbling, moss-covered turrets, and the vacant win-
dows formed by nature's own hand. Put it in your basket. What
an agreeable sensation it is to scuff one's feet through this. green
grass and these cool, dry leaves! I will have a few. They are of
use. On the edges of the road are some delicate specimens of moss.
Here are cups just large enough to hold one drop of dew, and here is
gray moss tipped with coral: take some of each kind-dried or fresh
-green, white, brown and black. Take, also, that little dried stick
you just knocked away with your fingers. "What in the world am I
going to do with that?" Why, don't you see it is the miniature stump
of a tree with branches? Trees without foliage are not particularly
picturesque, I admit; yet nature can remedy that. Come off the
road now, among these giant, odorous pines. There seem to be two
kinds-one is smooth-barked, the other is rough. The smooth suits
my purpose. Look closely, and you wi I see round, flat blotches all
about the trunk, of a rich green color. What ofit ?" Well, upon
examination, you will perceive they are like delicate sea-moss when
it is spread upon a moist surface. Now take your penknife, and
loosen the edges of one of them, then peel it gently off; it is real
foliage, you see, and exquisitely defined. We want quantities of this.
Take plenty of it. Now we will stroll along again. How slippery
the path, and how pleasant to walk upon! This brown, glossy car-
pet falls from the pine-trees, and country people call it fine trask.
We will take some of the little spiny things; they make excellent rail
fences.
Here we come to birch and maple trees, where the leaves are just
beginning to dress in bright colors-dark yellow and golden brown.
A little of crimson will be of use also. The brown makes good roads,
and the yellow and crimson serve for distant shading.
I think now you have sufficient in your basket to make a fine
landscape. "Make a fine landscape out of these things ?" Certainly;
as effective as many an oil painting; and then, you can make it your-
selves. A piece of water is an improvement in pictures; so when we
reach the barn we will find a nicely mildewed corn-husk-it makes a
better imitation of a lake than oil paint,
This is the fruit I promised; but remember, you have only gath-
ered it yet-by and by you shall taste it. We will return and pre-
pare the feast. Sit you down by me at this table, and observe.
I take a square of drawing or card board, and a few crayons-blue,

yellow and white. I sketch a sky on the upper half. It is well to
represent a morning or sunset sky, concentrating the deepest yellow
in small space upon the horizon, shading it from straw color to blue,
with a few scattered white clouds. Now dip the corn-husk in water,
to make it flexible, and place it lengthwise upon the card-board, let-
ting the edge meet the edge of the sky. Use mucilage to cause it to
adhere smoothly and firmly.
Here is a foundation for a lake, harbor or river: We will call this
the sea, allowing sky and water to meet within sight of opposite
land. I make a foreground thus: Select some of those dark,
dry leaves, and fasten them to the card below the water, all along
the bottom and up the sides as far as the corn-husk reaches,
allowing the jagged edges to protrude into the sea, as irregularities
of the shore. Stick some of these darkest mosses to the leaves,
leaving such spaces between as you wish for road or bare
ground. You must use yourjudgment (and a nice, artistic judgment,
too) as regards shade, turning the darkest sides where, if you were
painting, you would shade your picture. Quite by accident, you
now find a promontory near by, formed by the pointed end of a leaf,
which was surely meant to support a tree. Therefore erect your
little branched stick upon it, carefully gluing the inside to the picture.
Pull some of the moss apart, and you see that, separated, it becomes
little bushes, and even weeds, to plant about on the promontory, and
around the roots of the tree, to hide any awkwardness that may
appear. Now is the time to use those exquisite bits of foliage that
we peeled from the smooth pine-tree. Separate each little branch, and
join them to the twigs of the tree; let them droop and hang over the
water. As the foliage advances you begin to see the sky between
the rich branches. It will finish into a fine elm. The opposite side
needs our attention." All right; it shall have it. See, that gray leaf
has taken the appearance of a bluff. Now is the time for our castle.
Slip it down behind, only allowing the turrets and a part of the
edifice to appear. There is the blue sky again through the vacant
castle windows. The effect is extremely good. If we separate some
of this greenest moss, we shall find that each tiny stem vrpr-?nt
holly or pine. Set these about the rocky bluff and along
the castle.
Now use your good taste, and say where spaces may be improved
with a stem for a dead tree, or a faded bit of leaf for a distant hill.
Scatter about in crevices scraps of cup or coral moss. Here is a
little space that looks like a road leading from the foreground to the
water; put a rail fence on each side. An island will look well in the
distance. Now we have not spent much time over this, so it is but a
rough little landscape, though rich in color and effect. But I have
seen the inventor, or originator, of these produce splendid pictures of
country scenery, with hill and dale, forest and field, cottage and
barn, men and animals, loads of hay, and vessels and boats,-and, in
fact, everything that lends to the variety and beauty of pictures, only
on a much larger scale than we have attempted. I have seldom seen
any artistic fancy-work so beautiful. A few touches now of black
crayon, to deepen the shadows in the hollows and curves, and our
picture will do.
Take from that wall the horrible portrait of General What's-his-
name, or that pretentious chromo of an impossible scene on the
Rhine,-the frame is too pretty for the ugly thing,-throw it out, and
put this picture-made-up, but very effective-in its place. Then
hang it up. Is n't that a decided improvement ? A little more prac-
tice, and really marvelous effects can be produced by these simple
materials.

THE LETTER-BOX.

Montreal, July 2d, 1877. was very heavy and in a wonderful state of preservation. A book of
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: We have had an Exhibition here on the Queen Elizabeth's, one of Mary Queen of Scots', and one of Henry
occasion of the four-hundredth anniversary of the introduction of the Eighth's, along with the first book printed in Montreal and the
printing into England by William Caxton in the year 1477. The first one in Quebec, were exhibited. Of course I could not name one
chief feature of the exhibition was the Mazarin Bible, the first book quarter of the books; but I may as well mention Eliot's Indian Bible
ever printed. It was produced from Gutenberg's press in the year (the first Bible printed on this continent), Shakspeare's works, and a
1455. A gentleman very kindly allowed me to hold the book, which large volume containing illustrations of his plays; a book with pict-

[OcToBER,

0877.] THE LETTER-BOX.

ures of the different parts of the "Alhambra;" another old Bible,
and a large book with scraps cut from newspapers. Type-making,
printing and lithographing were going on in one end of the
building. The Numismatic and Antiquarian Society, under whose
auspices the exhibition was held, got the affair up in haste. How-
ever, there was a very good collection of coins and books.
Like many other readers of the ST. NICHOLAS, I should be very
lonesome without it. It would seem like losing a friend to lose it.
Your constant reader, NELLIE FAIRBAIRN.

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: If you think Mr. Joel Stacy wont mind it,
I'd like to have you put this picture and the Verses into your pages.
A funny gentleman who comes to see my sister did them, on account
of seeing that nice jingle in the August ST. NicHOLAS about "the
pretty little boy and the pretty little girl."
Your friend, JAMES C. E.

A dirty little boy and a dingy little girl
Once found a bitten apple on the street;
Said the dirty little boy to the dingy little girl:
"Now gim me that! It is n't good to eat."

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Said the dingy little girl to the dirty little boy:
"I would, but I am hungry, sir, you see;
So I thank you werry kindly, but I 'd werry much prefer
You'd get out o' this an' keep away from me."

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I know of a very interesting game for
children, and I am going to tell you something about it. I suspect
many of my young readers are in the habit of playing it, but there
may be some who will be glad to learn it. You must think of a bird
or beast, fish, insect or reptile, and give your companions its initial
letter, calling on them to guess it. The one who is successful in
guessing must give some account of the animal, as to where it is
found, what are its habits, its disposition, and whatever else seems
most interesting; and then proceed to name another. If no one can
guess it, and you are called upon to tell it, you are required to give
the account yourself, and then have the privilege of naming another.
You may call upon the mineral and vegetable kingdoms to furnish
subjects for your game of guessing, and 1 think you will find it
instructive, as well as entertaining. N. M. R.

West Newton, Mass., 1877.
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS; Can a bird-defender take a bird's-nest after
the bird has left it? Because I have taken birds'-nests after the bird
has left them.-Yours truly, MAsEL WILBUR.

In early spring it might be better, dear bird-defender, to let the
empty nest be where it is, for homeless birds to use, or put it in
another and, perhaps, quieter place, where they would be pretty sure
to find it. Later in the year the chances would be fewer that a bird-

family would want a fresh home, and if left out all through the winter
the storms might destroy it; so it would be kinder to keep the nest
carefully until the next spring, and then put it where birds are likely
to see it. It would be a pleasure to watch a new couple who had
just found a snug home ready for them on their return from the
south. They would twitter and chirp and flutter with delight. But
there is no real harm in your keeping it if you wish.

Philadelphia, 1877.
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I thought I would write you a letter. I
am one of the bird-defenders, and would like to tell the others about
something I saw once. Some friends of mine and myself went out
to take a walk. We went through a woods, and all along we saw
black feathers. After a short time, we came out in a field. There
we saw a great many crows that had been shot. We walked along,
and came to a large field back of a hotel. The field was just black
with dead crows. One of my friends said there had been a shooting-
match the day before. I think it is just dreadful that shooting-
matches should be allowed. I hope your magazine will continue for
a great many years yet, and that I may live to have the pleasure of
reading it. Your loving reader, ANITA HENDRIE.

Cincinnati, 1877.
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS : I would be very much obliged if you would
tell me why it is that a glass vessel will not break, if, having first put
in a silver spoon, any hot liquid be poured into it. I have seen it
tried again and again, and mamma cans her fruit in this way. She
places in her glass jar a silver spoon, and then pours in her fruit
boiling hot. The glass does not break, nor even crack, and as soon as
it is half full she takes out the spoon and fills up the jar. I can't see
the philosophy of that, but I should very much like to.
We have taken the Sr. NICHOLAs ever since it started, and think
there is nothing like it.-Yours truly, M. G.

Heat expands things, cold contracts them. The empty glass jar,
when cold, has a certain size. When hot water is poured into it the
glass expands; it really grows a little larger than it vas before. But
the curious part of this is, that when the glass begins to expand it
often breaks, because the outside of the glass cannot expand quickly
enough, and the inside spreads out before the heat can extend
through the glass; so away it flies, with a sudden snap. Now, if
the glass were heated equally on both sides, if the hot water touched
outside as well as in, it is plain both sides would expand together,
and the glass would be saved whole.
If the silver spoon assists in saving the glass, which is doubtful, it is
because the spoon is cold metal, and greedily takes up the heat from
the hot water, makes it cooler, and in this way saves the glass. The
spoon also serves to spatter the water about, and thus scatter the heat
so that the glass expands at more nearly the same rate in all its inside
parts. This is all "the philosophy of that." The spoon has no
magical influence on the glass, and it might often happen, if the
water were hot enough, that the glass would break in spite of the
spoon. The best way, however, is not to use a spoon at all, but
simply stand the glasses in hot water while the hot fluid is poured
into them.

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I love you very much. In the Centennial
I was in the garden which Mr. Stockton told about. I saw all the
animals except the flying foxes, which he told about. These I saw
in the New York Aquarium, where they were hanging up and sleep-
ing. I am very pleased with you. Will you please put this letter in
your Letter-Box? "His Own Master" is very nice, and I hope
Jacob will get his uncle. I am only ten years old, and have kept
you a year.-Yours truly, GILBERT REEDER.

Hartford, 1877.
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: May I tell you about our family pet
here-my Spitz dog Pip? Pip came to us-a fine, knowing, Spitz
dog-when I was three or four years old. This is the first prank of
his that I remember: Mamma had just given me a nice piece of
sponge-cake. Thinking I would enjoy it more out in the sunshine, I
ran over to the croquet-ground, and was about to seat myself on a
bench in perfect bliss, when Pip, who was playing around, quietly
walked up to me, and, taking my cake, ran off amidst my wails of
sorrow. Pip is now wiser and more sedate; but I will give one more
trick, and then tell of his knowledge and love: One day I was run-
ning around the lawn, and had just reached the dusty gravel. I had
on a nice, clean dress, and was feeling very happy, when, what was
my astonishment and disgust to find myself in an easy sitting position
on the gravel For Pip had acted the part of the goat to perfection,
and had butted me down.
Pip soon became curious to find where Aunt Anna went every
Sunday. So one pleasant day he watched aunty (who was his

THE LETTER-BOX.

former mistress), and trotted close behind her. She did not know he
was following her, and walked into church, never noticing, till she
reached the pew, the pitter-patter of his paws behind her. The organ
was finishing the voluntary, there was no time to be lost. What
should she do? Driven to desperation, she called him into the pew,
and patted him to quiet him. All went on very well through the first
part of the service, except that, now and then, a cold nose was thrust
into her hand, or she felt a moist tongue kissing her. By and by the
minister began to pray. Of course aunty covered her face with her
handkerchief and put her head down. Pip began to think something
was wrong, and to whine from sympathy. Every available means
was used to keep him still, but with no effect. At last, aunty had to
rise and go out, with Pip, beginning to feel the mortification, skulking
after.
Pip is the best dog in the world, though he seems from this
account bad and troublesome. But the story above was when he
was a young and inexperienced puppy, and besides, it was his sym-
pathy that got him into trouble.-Yours truly, ALICE HANSELL.

Stroudsburg, 1877.
DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I live part the time in England and part
the time in Minnesota. Last summer, I went on a visit to my uncle
and aunts at Burlington, N. J., where they gave me some land to
have for my own ; so I turned it into a garden, with a rustic seat
under a pear-tree (they used to call me the "Queen of the Shady
Nook"), where I used to read your books with delight. When I
came away from Burlington, my subjects-who were the birds, frogs,
and flowers-were so sorry that they sent me a "lament" in poetry
which I would like to see in print With much love, from your steady
reader, HEPSA H. L. SHEARMAN.
LAMENT FROM SHADY NOOK.
The blithesome frog no longer
Gazes upon the scene;
Nor the festive young mosquito
Plays now his tunes serene.
The motes have quit their dancing,
The bees have ceased to hum,
The ants have found their homes again,
And the summer days are done.
The birdies chirp no longer,
Hopping from spray to spray,
For how can there be joyousness
With their own dear queen away?
O queen who ruled us gently
In the days that now are flown !-
O queen we loved so fondly!
Return unto thine own!"

A LITTLE Philadelphia boy, named Crissy H- lately sent to
Aiken, S. C., some magazines to the school that asked for good
reading matter for the children. He received in return a letter from
the teacher, inclosing a number from the pupils. All these letters,
we think, would interest our young readers very much: but we have
only space for the teacher's letter and for three of the others. We
print them just as they were written by the little ones. Many of our
children may know of other children, and perhaps of schools, to
which they could send good books and magazines which they have
read and no longer need.
Oakwald, Aiken, S. C., 1877.
DEAR LITTLE CRISSY: Yesterday, after I had read your papa's
letter, I opened the many nice rolls of paper he sent, and found your
" Sunshine." Then I told my little girls and boys about you, and
asked if they could not write you a letter. Seven or eight of them
raised their hands, and then I gave them paper and pencil, and they
went to work; and now you read their letters, and know some of
their names.
You would be very much surprised if you could see so many
children together, and some of them notmoe orthan five or six years
old; but they have a slate and pencil, and when they learn the
a b c's they learn to make their on a slate, and then when they know
how to read they can write.
Most all of my children have black eyes, though a few have blue
eyes and very light hair. They are full of fun, and like to play and
sing, and then, when the bell rings, all get in line and march in to
their seats.
We have some that are as large as your papa, and some nearly as
old-but they had no chance o to go to school when they were little,
so they come now, and work very hard. We have several that walk
five miles, and then five miles home again. One little boy, only
seven years old, does this every day.
Good-by.-Your friend, M. SCHOFIELD.
Aiken S. C. Carolinia 21 of March 1877
CRISSY I am very glad you have took Much pleasure to Send
these papers to me and Ned Smoot and Kitty Branson and Julia

West and Fanny Parker and Mary Smoot. Nathan Phillips S. C.
I am nine years old and Miss Schofield .: -,.- ire eight years
old I comes to Miss Schofield School I j.. .- r k.. my abc and I
am in the first Class Shelton Reader do you go to School please send
your love to me again NATHAN PHILLIPS
South Carolina to little Crissy H- .

(This little boy will be nine years old in May. He works hard at
his lessons, and writes very well on a slate without lines.-M. S.)
Aiken South Carolina Mach 2ith 1877
MY DEAR FRIEND, I want to write to you to thank you for your
kindness toward the school Children and to tell you that I did not
know that you thought so much of the school I hope that God will
bless you. I was very glad for the paper that you sent me I will
have great pleasure in reading it the one that miss Schofield gave me
it had on it father coming home, I thought that I would learn it.
I am but a little girl I was ten the eleven of december and the
eleven of next december I have been coming to ,the Schofield
school two years I am learning very last I am going to tell you
something about the school Miss Schofield is a good teacher she
have got a 170 scholars we have three teachers and three school
houses we have put up a new fence and the girls is planting
flowers all around it we have a croquet set and a cistern the
boys has a foot-ball and they highly prize it. we had a jumping
roape but it is worn out we has a libiary it has about 450
volumes in it. we has an organ and we repeat psalms every
morning. Miss Schofield has given us the papers that you sent
on and also a verse every morning to say we have a book it is
call ragged Dick, I am going to send you a bouquet of flowers so I
must close, yours truly JULIA E WEST

LITTLE CRISSY I got a paper What You Sent us they came
on a Wenday I am glad of them I comes to Miss Schofield school
every day I am in addition I Will soon be in subtraction I am
Well and doing well and I thought I Woold Write to You been
(being) as You sent us them papers I am only ten Years old.
when I first came to Schofield School I did not know my a b c and
I am in addition I can read and spell and Write I am glad of Your
present I have a heap of friends one of them is Susie Cohen
Who sits by me my sister is name Etta Smallwood and my mother
is name Biddy Smallwood my father is name William Smallwood
I has a bunch of flowers I Will send You in my letter to You I Wish
You Will get these letters me and Julie and Fannie, Kelly Mary
Edward We all Write to you and I Wish You Would get them all
Aiken S C 1877. LIZZIE SMALLWOOD

"SISTERS."-We refer you with pleasure to the SOCIETY TO
ENCOURAGE STUDIES AT HOME," which has been in successful
operation for more than three years. (See "Letter-Box," ST. NICH-
OLAS for March, 1876, and Atlantic Monthly for August, 1877.) If
you are seventeen years of age or older, you undoubtedly can join
this society to your great advantage.

M. D.-Yes. We copy with pleasure the newspaper paragraph
you send us,-the more so because we have personal knowledge of
Miss Silone, and can vouch for its truth:

"A letter from Newport, under date of July i9th, says: 'To-day
has been a remarkable one in the history of Newport, for the scholas-
tic honors of the year were taken by a colored girl, Josephine Amelia
Silone, who graduated at the head of her class in the Rogers High
School. She received the gold medal awarded with the first scholar-
ship, and pronounced the valedictory. Her examinations and recita-
tions have been pre-eminently satisfactory, her averages in every
study being within a fraction of one hundred, which is the maximum.
Miss Silone, who is quite dark-complexioned, took her last two-years'
studies in one year, which makes her case all the more remarkable.
She excels in Latin, Greek, French, and German. She is a native
of Mattituck, Suffolk County, Long Island, and now eoes to college.
Her mother is a cook, the young girl earning her own ir I. .
ing when not at school.'"

Miss Silone is a daughter of Alexander Silone, of Mattituck, Long
Island, well and favorably known in that neighborhood.
Lately we heard a Long Island farmer say: When I was a boy,
there was one thing I could do, and that was to repeat Bible verses.
There was n't but one youngster in the school who could get ahead
of me, and that was a colored girl, who beat everything at remember-
ing. She was so exact, too, never missing a word,-and I hardly
ever could match her in the number of verses. If I said ten, she'd
give a dozen; if I'd give twenty, she'd come on with thirty. Why,
she knew chapter after chapter, word for word! And that girl was
Josephine Amelia Silone's aunt."

830

[OCTOBER,

1877.1

THE RIDDLE-BOX.

THE RIDDLE-BOX.

REBUS.

1.i *'i __
* _1, .1

DOUBLE DIAMOND PUZZLE. SQUARE-WORD.
THE whole is a sweet harbinger of spring in New England. i. A KING who had more gold than he wanted. 2. Part of a foreign
Upper diamond: i. A consonant. 2. Better than tallow candles, animal, much used in manufactures. 3. A benefactor. 4. Ascended.
3. A kind of tree. 4. Cunning. 5. A vowel. 5. A dangerous singer. j. P. B.
Lower diamond: a. A consonant. 2. The fruit of a tree. 3. A
West India product. 4. A sailor. 5. A consonant. o'B. lA I

DIAGONAL PUZZLE.
-~ A ---
--A
A ----
A

FILL the vacant spaces with letters to form words having the follow-
ing meanings: i. A fierce look. 2. A hamper. 3. An article of com-
mon domestic use. 4. A bird. 5. An over-garment worn by the
Scotch. Diagonally downward, from left to right, a word meaning
great; upward, to talk foolishly. H. H. D.

RIDDLE.
(Six words of six letters, all to be made of the same six letters.)
FIND a word of six letters which (transposed) will run up into the
land and (transposed again take measure
SI. I' .. :d) it is a suplerfcial, ..... i, .r,
..Ii : tom b, itw ill al .. i... .' ', :' '
,and, finally, : .. 1- A -. ..t.i i I I
ofthe fonas ofa certain active verb. J. s.

COMBINATION PUZZLE.
I.- CONCEALMENTS,
x. Do you suppose John will arrive in time to split the wood ?
a. Near the river Po, Dennis found a seed-case. 3. Shall I dust the
cover of the box ? 4. Maria persevered in taming an animal. 5. The
hall opens at ten o'clock, so you would better cut the wood before
you go.
In each sentence a word is concealed, and the definition of the
word is given in the same sentence.

II.-DoUBLE CROSS-WORD ENIGMA.
a. In Peter, not in Saul;
2. In Eunice, not in Paul;
3. In Anna, not in Tim;
4. In Cassy, not in Jim;
5. In Hester, not in Noah;
Five letters to each word-no more;
Primals give us much content;
Finals, a name for you not meant.
Now join these letters to the concealed words, and you will have
five words of the following definitions: 2. A shrub. 2. The third, or
last, part of an ode. A girl's name. 4. Divisions of land. 5. To
escape from.
These, written down, form complete words; beheaded and cur-
tailed, complete words remain; while the letters taken away form a
double acrostic. CYRIL DEANE.

FIRST, a part of a column;
A stamp; or to cease;
To stain; while in gaming
I 'm never left at peace.

Baby sits on my second,
Most gladly I think;
'T is a part of a garment;
And one way to drink.

Third, a part of a needle,
A plant, and to view.
My fourth is an era;
A fruit it is, too.

My fifth is a letter;
A river of fame,
And a part of a harness,
Are known by that name.

My whole you will know,
When the five you are told;
It is often applied
To things ruined and old.

H. H. D.

NUMERICAL ENIGMA.

PLEASE to x, 2, 3, 4 5, 6, 7, 8 of those 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 pictures
to me. CYRIL DEANE.

EASY DIAMOND PUZZLE.
i. A VOWEL. 2. A boy's name. 3. A "Riddle-Box" contributor.
4. A beverage. 5. A vowel. N. B. s.

DOUBLE ACROSTIC.
THE initials and finals name an event of universal interest through-
out this country.
r. A pungent spice. 2. A man famous in Queen _i ...i....
3. Good for sleepy folks. 4. A huntsman's call. I ''-
throat. 6. Something distilled from orange-flowers. 7. A New
England watering-place. 8. A faithful officer under King David. 9.
A river of Italy. io. A tropical fruit. o'B.

PUZZLE.
FRoM what word of seven letters is the following sentence made?
[The same letter may be duplicated, but none used that are not in
the word):
"A glad lad and a good old dog go along on a load, and nod."
B,

THE RIDDLE-BOX.

[OCTOBER.

PICTORIAL PROVERB-ANAGRAM.

TRANSPOSE the letters in the following sentence so that they shall make the familiar proverb which the picture illustrates:
As for events here,-give the sly lad one sermon." AUNT SUE.

1-

//-

ANSWERS TO PUZZLES IN SEPTEMBER NUMBER.

EASY NUMERICAL ENIGMA.-Perihelion.
DECAPITATIONS.-I. Pink, ink. 2. Kale, ale. 3. Pear, ear. 4.
Heel, eel. 5. Dace, ace. 6. Fowl, owl. 7. Wasp, asp. 8. Sash,
ash. 9, Rice, ice. to. Yawl, awl.
DOUBLE ACROSTIC.- S -no- B
C-one-Y
O-live- R
T-ass- 0
T-aver-N
PICTURE PUZZLE.-I. A well-mated pair. 2. Good quarters. 3. A
broken circle. 4. A little neglected soul (sole) in the broken circle.
5. The neglected soul healed (heeled .
CHARADE.-Exile.
HIDDEN ANIMALS.-I. Bear. 2. Lion. 3. Badger. 4. Llama.
s. Goat. 6. Leopard. 7. Camel. 8. Horse. 9. Panther. 1o. An-
telope. ii. Tiger. 12. Beaver. 13. Otter. 14. Chamois. i5. Bison.
CENTRAL SYNCOPATIONS AND DOUBLE ARosTIC.-Lamina, Ani-
mal.-. HaLts, hats. 2. GrAin, grin. 3. LiMes, lies. 4. MaIne,
mane. 5. WaNds, wads. 6. RoAds, rods.
INCOMPLETE DIAMOND.-
M

SAD I
MADAM

SA
M
METAGRAM.-Place, lace, ace, pace, clap, ale, cap, ape, pea, pale.

BIRD PUZZLE.-I. Kite. 2. Swan. 3. Wren. 4. Flamingo. 5. Jay.
6. Falcon. 7. Rail. 8. Martin. 9. Heron. 10. Raven. is. Lark.
2z. Goose 13. Quail. 14. Grouse. 15. Rook. 16. Swallow. 17. Chaf-
finch. 8I. Sparrow. i9. Crane. 20. Magpie. 21. Curlew. 22. Tur-
key. 23. Crow.
GEOGRAPHICAL DOUBLE ACROSTIC.-
D -win- A
A-msterda-M
N -evad- A
U Z
B -orne- O
E -ri- N
HIDDEN BAYS.-I. Plenty. 2. Hawke. 3. Shark. 4. Botany.
5. Antongil. 6. Bembatook. 7. Delagoa 8. Notre Dame.
EASY SQUARE REMAINDERS.-
S-0 L
F-I R E
F-L ED
RIDDLE.-Cabbages.
ENIGMA.-Sans Dieu rien.
SQUARE-WORD.- S H A V E
HABIT
ABASH
V I S N E
ETHER
PICTORIAL SYNCOPATIONS.-r. Crowd, COW. 2. Fringe, ring. 3*
Round, rod. 4. Beacon, bean. 5. Beard, bar. 6. Glass, ass. 7-
Scrap, cap. 8. Bread, bed.

ANSWERS TO PUZZLFS IN THE AUGUST NUMBER were received previous to August 8th from A. U. Gust, Gyp and Jule," H. A. L.,
B. O'Hara, Florence Wilcox, S. Decatur Smith, Jr., Helen M. Shaw, Martie and Aggie Irwin, "Cousin Sue, Lucy and Nina," EnmIa
Elliott, Lucy C. Morse, Benjamin R. Huske, Kittle L. Tuttle, Lillie May Furman, B. P. Emery, Eddie H. Eckel, Ella P. S. Robinson,
Fred. Darlington, A. H. Keen, Lottie E. Skinner, "Yankton," Howard Steel Rodgers.

832

::i
";--;- li;r
3

	Front Cover
	Mother
	Gone astray
	The little girl who grew small...
	Two french story-tellers
	Which had it?
	Hare and hounds
	Haroun al Raschid - Caught by the...
	Autumn poetry
	A century ago
	Italian babies
	His own master
	The revenge of the little...
	The stars in October
	Bo-peep
	What the parrot taught the little...
	Jack-in-the-pulpit
	Moss pictures - The Letter-box
	The riddle-box
	Back Cover
	Spine

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