mandments!' I turned away from that letter, hardened. I spurned my teachings. Now I am here."
Several lawyers rushed forward. A crimson stream dowed from her lips. They leaned her lifeless head back against the chair. The old magistrate had not raised his eyes; "Great God!" said a lawyer, "he is dead!" The woman was his daughter.
LAKE SARATOGA.-JOHN G. SAXE.
A lady stands beside the silver lake.
"What," said the Mohawk, "wouldst thou have me do?" Across the water, sir, be pleased to take Me and my children in thy bark canoe."
"Ah!" said the Chief, "thou knowest not, I think,
The legend of the lake,-hast ever heard
That in its wave the stoutest boat will sink,
If any passenger shall speak a word?"
"Full well we know the Indian's strange belief,"
The lady answered, with a civil smile ;
"But take us o'er the water, mighty Chief;
In rigid silence we will sit the while."
Thus they embarked, but ere the little boat
Was half across the lake, the woman gave
Her tongue its wonted play-but still they float,
And pass in safety o'er the utmost wave!
Safe on the shore, the warrior looked amazed,
Despite the stoic calmness of his race;
No word he spoke, but long the Indian gazed
In moody silence in the woman's face.
"What think you now?" the lady gayly said;
"Safely to land your frail canoe is brought!
No harm, you see, has touched a single head!
So superstition ever comes to naught!"
Smiling, the Mohawk said, “Our safety shows
That God is merciful to old and young;
Thanks unto the Great Spirit!-well he knows
The pale-faced woman cannot hold her tongue!"
THE CLOWN'S BABY.-MARGARET VANDEGRIFT.
It was on the Western frontier;
The miners, rugged and brown,
Were gathered around the posters;
The circus had come to town!
The great tent shone in the darkness
Like a wonderful palace of light,
And rough men crowded the entrance—
Shows didn't come every night!
Not a woman's face among them;
Many a face that was bad,
And some that were only vacant,
And some that were very sad.
And behind a canvas curtain,
In a corner of the place,
The clown, with chalk and vermilion,
Was "making up" his face.
A weary-looking woman,
With a smile that still was sweet,
Sewed on a little garment,
With a cradle at her feet.
Pantaloon stood ready and waiting;
It was time for the going on,
But the clown in vain searched wildly;
The "property-baby" was gone!
He murmured, impatiently hunting,
"It's strange I cannot find-
There! I've looked in every corner;
It must have been left behind!"
The miners were stamping and shouting,
They were not patient men.
The clown bends over the cradle-
"I must take you, little Ben!"
The mother started and shivered,
But trouble and want were near;
She lifted her baby gently;
"You'll be very careful, dear?"
"Careful? You foolish darling,"-
How tenderly it was said!
What a smile shone through the chalk and paint,"I love each hair of his head!"
The noise rose into an uproar,
Misrule for the time was king;
The clown, with a foolish chuckle,
Bolted into the ring.
But as, with a squeak and flourish,
The fiddles closed their tune,
"You'll hold him as if he was made of glass?" Said the clown to pantaloon.
The jovial fellow nodded;
"I've a couple myself," he said,
"I know how to handle 'em, bless you! Old fellow, go ahead!"
The fun grew fast and furious,
And not one of all the crowd
Had guessed that the baby was alive,
When he suddenly laughed aloud.
Oh, that baby-laugh! It was echoed
From the benches with a ring,
And the roughest customer there sprang up
With, "Boys, it's the real thing!"
The ring was jammed in a minute,
Not a man that did not strive
For "a shot at holding the baby,"
The baby that was "alive!"
He was thronged by kneeling suitors
In the midst of the dusty ring,
And he held his court right royally,―
The fair little baby-king,-
Till one of the shouting courtiers,
A man with a bold, hard face,
The talk, for miles, of the country,
And the terror of the place,
Raised the little king to his shoulder,
And chuckled, "Look at that!"
As the chubby fingers clutched his hair,
Then, "Boys, hand round the hat!"
There never was such a hatful
Of silver, and gold, and notes;
People are not always penniless
Because they don't wear coats!
And then, "Three cheers for the baby!"
I tell you, those cheers were meant,
And the way in which they were given
Was enough to raise the tent.
And then there was sudden silence,
And a gruff old miner said,
"Come boys, enough of this rumpus!
It's time it was put to bed."
So, looking a little sheepish,
But with faces strangely bright,
The audience, somewhat lingeringly,
Flocked out into the night.
And the bold-faced leader chuckled,-
"He wasn't a bit afraid!
He's as game as he is good-looking;
Boys, that was a show that paid!”
BY THE SEA.-PHILIP H. WELSH.
I lay on the rocks and watched the sea,
As it sparkling danced 'neath a sunny sky;
The warm, sweet wind just touched my cheek-
And I sighed that romance had passed me by
I gazed at the sea, and sky, and shore,
Till a sudden sight made my pulses bound,
For a little way from my rocky nook
Was an open parasol, low on the ground.
'Twas large, and white, and of India silk;
Its top tilted down was my vis-a-vis;
But I guessed its lining,-such shaded rose
As paints the murmuring shells of the sea.
Beneath, on the earth, spread a soft gray rug;
The fringe of a shawl I could also note;
And trailing outside of the parasol disc
Was a bit of a lace-trimmed petticoat.
My heart beat high with expectant hope-
Shall I find my romance here by the sea?
While life endures will fancy repeat
The memories tender of white pongee?
No longer I lay on the rocky shore,
Watching the ocean's foamy creep;
Softly to windward I stole for a view--
'Twas somebody's baby sound asleep.
STILL WATERS.-W. C. RICHARDS.
Beside the still waters! O infinite peace!
When God leadeth me there, my troubles all cease;
And my feet, by the thorns of life's wilderness torn,
Are bathed in the dews that are wept by the morn.
Beside the still waters, where pastures are green
And the glad sky bends o'er them in shadow and sheen;
I think of the glooms through whose terrors I fled,
And bless the dear Hand which my footsteps hath led.
Beside the still waters my cross it grows light,
That, fainting, I bore through the storms of the night,
The same, though another it seems; and I pray
No more that my burden be taken away.
Beside the still waters, ah! ripple and gleam
A thousand-fold rarer in loveliness seem,
For the billows and foam, and the tumults of wrath
In the tempests of trial that compassed my path.
Beside the still waters my hunger is fed,
And sweeter than manna drops daily my bread;
While of Christ, the great Rock that shadows their brink, The full-flowing streams of salvation I drink.
Beside the still waters! Ah! why should I know
Rough ways for my feet, and the torrent's wild flow,
When he who still leadeth me morning and night,
Could hold me for aye in the spell of delight?
Beside the still waters, shut in by God's hills,
The exquisite sense of protection that fills
My bosom is born of the perils o'erpast;
As he led me at first, so he leads me at last!
A BOY'S ESSAY ON GIRLS.
Girls is a queer kind of varmint. Girls is the only thing that has their own way every time. Girls is of several thousand kinds, and sometimes one girl can be like several thousand other girls, if she wants you to do anything. Girls is all alike one way, they are all like cats. If you rub 'em the right way of the hair they'll
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