[Pg 1049]

Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers. All Rights Reserved.

SEA RANGERS.

BY KIRK MUNROE,

Author of "Road Rangers," The "Mate" Series, "Snow-shoes and Sledges," "Fur-Seal's Tooth," etc.

CHAPTER VII.

LEFT ON A DESOLATE ISLAND.

The damage to the Millgirl was of so serious a nature that Captain Crotty instantly realized the necessity for prompt action if he wished to save his vessel. So, while shouting to the Rangers to get their bedding, provisions, and everything else movable up from the hold, and so place them beyond reach of the in-rushing waters, he headed the sloop for the nearest beach. As she grounded in about eight feet of water, and while still at some distance from the shore, her sails were lowered, and preparations were made for transferring the passengers and their belongings to land. Of course this disaster put a sudden end to the canoe-race that had caused it, and as the sloop's headway was checked, the entire fleet of dainty craft flocked about her. The canoe-boys were loud in their expressions of sorrow over the sad plight of the vessel, and profuse in their offers of such assistance as they could render.

The very first to make his canoe fast and scramble aboard was Tom Burgess, whose appearance was received with a shout by his fellow Rangers. But they were too busy rescuing their belongings from the impending water for any more extended greeting just then. Besides, they were too greatly excited in trying to realize the astounding fact that they were actually shipwrecked, a situation they had never dared hope for even in their wildest dreams of what might happen during this cruise. So Tom and his canoe friends turned in and worked with the others, while all introductions and explanations were left for some future time.

Young Jabe made trip after trip in the small boat between sloop and shore, carrying a big load every time, and in this work he was assisted by such of the canoes as had cockpits of any size. Thus provisions, bedding, a huge tarpaulin, several casks of fresh water, pots, pans, and a certain amount of table-ware were soon conveyed to the beach, and there piled in a promiscuous heap. Last of all, the shipwrecked Rangers, to whom the whole affair was a delightful novelty, were transferred to the island. There,[Pg 1050] no longer restrained by a polite sympathy for Captain Crotty, they gave vent to their feelings in a series of whoops and howls, combined with antics that would have done credit to a band of young monkeys.

"Whoop-pee!" shouted Si Carew. "Here we are shipwrecked, and cast away on a desolate island. It's the real thing too, and not a bit of make-believe about it."

"Just like Robinson Crusoe or Swiss Family Robinson," chimed in little Cal Moody, joyously kicking up the warm sand with his bare feet; "only I hope there won't be any savages or pirates."

"More like the mutineers of the Bounty," suggested Hal Bacon, "for we did really mutiny, you know, and came out ahead, too."

"You did!" exclaimed Tom Burgess, in open-eyed amazement. "How did it happen? Tell us about it."

So the story of the cruise and its double mutiny had to be told then and there to Tom and the other canoe-boys, who listened with envious interest.

"Well!" declared Tom, when from the confused recital of half a dozen Rangers at once he had gleaned the main points of the story. "It beats anything I ever heard of outside of a book, and I only wish I'd waited in Berks so as to come with you. But look here! You fellows haven't been over to our camp yet. So come on, and see what you think of the New York style of doing things."

The Rangers, only too ready to see or do anything new, sprang up, and would have followed him in a body, had they not been restrained by practical Will Rogers, who called out:

"Hold on, fellows! We've got our own camp to fix first. It's most sundown now, and it wouldn't be much fun working in the dark. Besides, we've got supper to think of."

"I'm thinking of it now," laughed Mif Bowers, "and wondering what we are going to do about it."

"Oh, that'll be all right," said Tom Burgess, hospitably. "You'll all come over and eat supper with us to-night, and we'll help you rig up your tent. Just wait till I run over and tell the cook."

The canoe-boys, who knew nothing of the Rangers' previous training as firemen and other things, under Will Rogers's leadership, were surprised to see the businesslike manner with which these country lads set to work to make themselves comfortable. While some cut tent-poles or gathered firewood, others overhauled the big tarpaulin that was to form their tent, and provided it with stout cords at corners and sides. When it was finally raised and stretched into position, it formed a serviceable and roomy shelter, which, though lacking the whiteness of the New York tents, was decidedly more picturesque and in keeping with the Rangers' present character of shipwrecked mariners. Beneath its dingy spread all the provisions and camp equipments were neatly piled on one side, while the blankets, spread on the ground above some bits of old canvas, were so arranged on the other as to make one long bed.

All this was hardly completed when the loud banging of an iron spoon against a tin pan sounded a welcome supper call from the other camp, while at the same moment Tom Burgess appeared to act as host and escort.

The canoe-boys had brought along a regular cook, and their camp consisted of a kitchen tent, a mess tent, and a big living or sleeping tent, in which, however, very few of them ever slept. It was lots more fun to lie in their canoes under the little striped canoe tents hung from the masts, and making enclosures so charmingly snug, that the Berks boys declared them even superior to the bicycle shelter tents that had so excited their admiration when they were Road Rangers.

As the sloop's galley was flooded with water, Captain Crotty and young Jabe had also accepted a supper invitation from the hospitable New-Yorkers, and while they ate, the skipper outlined his plans for the future. As the tide had already turned ebb when the wreck occurred, he had at once carried an anchor out on the side opposite to that through which the water was pouring. From this anchor a cable was extended to the sloop's mast-head, and thence led down to the deck. Here it was subjected to a heavy strain, that, as the tide fell, would careen the vessel to that side. By this means the skipper hoped to get at the hole on the opposite side and plug it. As he could only expect to do this in the crudest manner with the appliances at hand, and as he knew the leak would merely be checked without being stopped, he further proposed to leave his passengers where they were for a few days, sail for the nearest port, where he could haul out for repairs, and return for them as quickly as possible, which proposition was hailed with delight by both the Rangers and their newly made friends.

This programme was carried out as arranged. That very evening the stranded vessel was careened by the aid of many willing hands, so that a temporary patch of tarred canvas and boards could be rudely secured over the jagged fracture that appeared in her planking just under the bend of the bilge. It was midnight before this job was finished, and the hold was pumped comparatively free of water. At daylight next morning, as the tide served and the wind was fair, the Millgirl, after being revictualled from the tent, sailed away with Captain Crotty at the helm, and young Jabe working wearily at the pump. Work as he might he could not gain an inch on the leak, and, in spite of the skipper's cheery assurance that he would be back again within three or four days, Will Rogers, who of all the tired Rangers was sole spectator of the departure, could not repress a feeling of anxiety as the sloop slowly rounded the point and disappeared.

He was aroused from the reverie into which he had fallen by loud shoots from the canoe camp, and looking that way saw a line of naked figures tearing down the beach and dashing into the sparkling waters. The New-Yorkers were taking the morning plunge, without which no yachtsman nor canoe-man, who is after all only a yachtsman in a small way, fails to begin the day when he is on a cruise. This sight at once altered the current of Will's thoughts, and with a yell that effectually startled his own camp into wakefulness he tore off his clothing and took a splendid header from a jutting rock. Two minutes later every Ranger had followed him, and with the gambols of a school of young porpoises the boys from Berks were revelling in their first salt-water swim.

"Isn't it glorious!" sputtered Si Carew, as the dripping lads finally emerged from their bath. "It beats river swimming all to nothing."

"Yes, and doesn't it make a fellow feel fresh and salty?" cried Cracker Bob Jones.

"And shivery," chattered little Cal Moody.

"And hungry," added Mif Bowers. "What are we going to do for breakfast, Will?"

Sure enough! No one had thought of that, and the Rangers had not even started a fire, while in the other camp the cook was already beating lustily on his big tin pan.

In this emergency the canoe-boys again extended the hospitality of their mess. Moreover, they offered to do this so long as they remained on the island if the Rangers would furnish the provisions, as their own were nearly exhausted.

Of course the Berks boys readily entered into this arrangement, though Will Rogers remarked to Hal Bacon that he wished they had brought along a larger supply of provisions, and wondered how the New York boys had expected to hold out for ten days longer on the scanty allowance of food remaining in their mess-tent.

"They didn't," answered Lieutenant Hal. "They've only got to live on 'em for two days more. This is Thursday, and they are going back on Saturday, you know."

"What!" exclaimed Will.

"Yes, didn't you know? Cousin Tom asked me last night why we didn't come sooner, and then I found out that we had made a mistake in the date, and got here during the second week of their camp instead of the first. It'll be all right, though, for Captain Crotty is sure to be back in a few days. In fact, I think it's a lucky thing he had to leave, for he'd been certain to want us to go back when the other fellows broke camp, while now, perhaps, we can stay a whole week longer."

"Yes," replied Will, dubiously. "I suppose it's all right; at the same time I shall be mighty glad to see him coming back."[Pg 1051]

CHAPTER VIII.

WAR CANOES, CRUISERS, AND RACERS.

Never in their lives had the Sea Rangers enjoyed themselves more than they did during the two days following that of their shipwreck. They swam, and fished, and paddled, and watched the most exciting of match races between rival canoes, and at night gathered about the roaring camp-fires for songs, stories, and high jinks, until it seemed to them that no other form of life was half so well worth living as this. They looked back with disdain upon the quiet humdrum of Berks, with its houses and beds and school and chores, and regular hours for meals, and all such things. Even their fire-engine and their bicycles no longer seemed to possess the attractions that had once caused them to appear so desirable, and when Sam Ray hoped Captain Crotty would not be able to come for them in less than a month, he voiced the sentiment of every Ranger on the island.

Their sole present ambition was to become canoe-men, and all their interest was centred in the fascinating craft of their New York friends. At the same time they found it impossible to decide which of the several types of canoe represented at the meet was the most admirable. There was the big war canoe Kosh-Kosh, that required a dozen paddlers to urge it over the water, and could carry as many more passengers as well. As they dashed about the bay in this great craft, chanting what they believed to be war-songs, and uttering blood-curdling yells, they could easily fancy themselves South-Sea warriors bound on a foray, against the cannibals of some adjacent island.

Besides this huge vessel there were other paddling canoes, light open affairs in each of which two boys, transformed for the time being into Indian hunters, could glide swiftly and silently in and out of sheltered coves, or close under overhanging banks, in search of game or scalps, they cared not which.

Then there were sailing canoes of two kinds—cruisers and racers—dainty bits of cabinet-work built of cedar and mahogany, varnished and polished until they glistened in the sunlight, fitted with spars not much heavier than fishing-rods, silken or linen sails, delicate-looking but unbreakable, cordage, and cunning little blocks of boxwood or aluminum that would answer equally well for watch-charms. The cruisers had open cockpits long enough to lie down in at full length. At night these, covered by tents of striped awning cloth, and lighted by little swinging lanterns, formed the coziest of cabins. Thus housed, the cruising canoe-man could cook a meal over an alcohol lamp, eat it from a hatch-cover table, lie at his ease, and read, or turn in and sleep through rain and storm as snug and dry and thoroughly comfortable as though in his own home. "Besides having a thousand times more fun," as Tom Burgess said, while all the Rangers well agreed that he spoke the truth.

Tom owned a cruiser, and to him, of course, she was the most perfect craft in the world. "She can go anywhere that a yacht can, except, of course, across the ocean, or on voyages like that," he explained, "and into lots of places that a yacht can't, besides, such as up small streams and down rapids. You can either sail or paddle in her, and if a storm comes, all you have to do is to run your ship ashore, step out, haul her beyond reach of the tide, and there you are, just as comfortable and well fixed as if you owned the biggest hotel in New York city."

Attractive as they found the cruisers, some of the Rangers thought the racers even more so. They too were decked over, but their cockpits were only little wells—just big enough for one's feet. All else was water-tight compartment, so that, even if the canoe were rolled over and over in the water, she could not fill or sink, but would float on the surface like a bubble. The sails of a racer were twice as large as those of a cruiser, and to keep her right side up under her great spread of silk or linen the crew would "hike" himself out on the end of a long sliding deck-seat, and there, poised in mid-air, would skim above the crests of the waves with the speed and safety of a sea-bird. The racer's sails cannot be lowered, and are never reefed; but if the squall blows so heavy that the outboard weight of the crew can no longer hold the canoe up to it, he allows her to gracefully capsize, and the outspread sails lie flat on the water, while he clings to the air-tight hull, or stands on the brass centre-plate until the blow moderates. Then, using his sliding-seat as a lever, he pulls his craft once more into an upright position, scrambles aboard, and speeds away as though nothing had happened. This sort of work is like circus-riding, and only through much practice may one attain perfection at it; but as the Sea Rangers watched the movements of the swift-darting racers, it seemed to them not only the most fascinating sport in the world, but also the perfection of sailing.

They were even ready to admit that all their previous knowledge of seamanship and sailing was but ignorance when compared with that they were now acquiring.

As Cracker Bob Jones said: "What chumps we were to think we knew how to handle a boat before we came here. Now, though, we have got the whole thing down so fine that if ever we get a chance to sail all by ourselves, I rather guess somebody'll be surprised."

In spite of this self-confidence, all that Cracker Bob or any others of the Rangers really knew of canoe-sailing was what they learned by looking on; for while the canoe-men were perfectly willing to take them out paddling, not one of them cared to trust his fragile craft to inexperienced hands when under sail.

If the Sea Rangers were pleased with the New York boys and their belongings, the latter were no less so with the lads from Berks, and when, on the last evening of the meet, the latter enlivened the camp-fire gathering with several scenes from Blue Billows they fairly "brought down the house."

In one way it is sad that all such good times must come to an end, though if they did not they would soon cease to be good times, and we should long for anything in the way of a change. The Rangers had not wearied of this good time, though, by Saturday morning, and when the steamer appeared that was to take the canoe-boys back to the big city they openly rejoiced that their own hour for departure had not yet arrived. In vain did Tom Burgess and his comrades urge them to take advantage of this opportunity for leaving the island, and so return to Berks by way of New York. They declared that they were bound to await Captain Crotty's return in the very place where he had left them, and found a dozen other reasons for declining the invitation. So the canoe-men reluctantly boarded their steamer, and with much cheering and blowing of the steam-whistle, and dipping of flags, and waving of hats, sailed away, leaving the island to the undisturbed possession of our young Sea Rangers.

No sooner, however, was the steamer lost to view and the boys from Berks realized that their sole means of communication with the world was thus cut off, than they began to experience a complete change of feeling. Will Rogers was struggling bravely against it as he shouted:

"Hurrah, fellows! Now we are really and truly cast away on a desolate island, and thrown on our own resources. Isn't it fun, though! and aren't we in great luck?"

"Yes, I suppose so," admitted one or two of the others, hesitatingly; but Cal Moody spoke right out, and said he thought it was awful, and he wished Captain Crotty would come, or that they were safe at home in Berks, or anywhere except on that horrid island. The little chap was about ready to cry: but was prevented by Will Rogers, who, realizing the effect of such despondency on the others, sang out:

"Oh, cheer up, Cal! What's the matter with you? The skipper's sure to be here in a day or two, and is probably on his way to us at this very minute. And we've got lots to do before he comes, I can tell you. We must hoist a signal of distress on the very highest place we can find, and explore the island so as to discover its resources, and fortify our camp against—well, against anything, you know, and all sorts of things. Besides, we've got to cook dinner, and I think we'd better start in on that the very first thing."

With their gloom a little brightened by the prospect of immediate action, the Rangers set to work to prepare the first meal that they had ever undertaken all by themselves.[Pg 1052] They were somewhat dismayed to discover what serious inroads had been made in their stock of provisions; for only a portion of what was originally placed on board the sloop had been rescued from the inflowing water when she was wrecked, and in anticipation of her speedy return this had been used with the utmost freedom, not to say recklessness. But this was a trifling cause for anxiety when compared with the startling announcement that the contents of their largest water-barrel had leaked away until it was empty. Only one small cask of water remained to them; and, upon learning this, every Ranger immediately imagined that he was suffering from a burning thirst.

About cooking they really knew very little, though each member thought he knew enough to prepare a pretty fair meal for people who were not particular. So they all tried their hands at getting up that dinner, and a sadder culinary failure was never made. Everything was smoked, burned, underdone, or in some other way made uneatable, and they finally partook of a most unsatisfactory meal of dry crackers and smoked herring, which made them so very thirsty that but for the firmness of their young captain they would have drained the small cask then and there.

The cooking of succeeding meals was equally unsatisfactory, and by nightfall of the second day after the departure of their friends our Rangers had not only expended most of their provisions and drunk up all their water, but were thoroughly alarmed at their situation. The whole of that day had been spent on the highest point of the island, gazing with strained eyes over the surrounding waters in the hope of sighting some approaching sail. With the coming of darkness they sadly returned to camp, and flinging themselves gloomily down on their blankets, sought forgetfulness of their unhappy situation in troubled sleep.

Some hours later Will Rogers was awakened by little Cal Moody, who said, in a terrified whisper: "Oh, Will, there are pirates on the island, and they are swearing dreadfully, and I know we're all going to be murdered. I've been listening and watching them for a long time. See their lights down there?"

Sure enough, Will could see lights, like moving lanterns, down on the beach and out on the water, where they seemed to be passing to and fro between the land and a vessel that was dimly visible in the little harbor. He could also hear loud rough voices, and, as Cal had said, some of them were swearing.

[to be continued.]

THE BUILDING OF MODERN WONDERS.

AN ELECTRIC TROLLEY-CAR.

BY HERBERT LAWS WEBB.

One day, not very long ago, when electric cars were something of a novelty, a city official was talking about them to one of the electrical engineers in charge of a certain electric railway.

"It seems to me," said he, "that those trolley-poles on top of the cars ought to be very much stronger than they are."

"Why so?" asked the electrical man. "We very seldom have any accident with them. They almost never break."

"Don't they!" queried the other, with some astonishment. "Well, they don't look to me half strong enough to push those heavy cars along."

I suppose very few readers of the Round Table have such very foggy ideas about electric cars as that man had. But still it is something of a mystery to many people how the slender wire stretched along the street takes the place of the hundreds of tugging horses or of the rattling, whirring cable that glides ceaselessly through the long iron trough under the pavement.

Many years ago one of those famous scientific men who were always making experiments to discover new things about electricity, so as to enable practical men in these days to invent machines to do useful work, discovered that when he moved a wire about in front of a magnet an electric current appeared in the wire. This was a great discovery, because it brought to light the wonderful sympathy between magnetism and electricity. It made no difference whether the wire or the magnet were moved; as long as they were close enough together any movement of either caused a current to appear in the wire.

Then another famous discoverer found that by winding a wire round a bar of iron and sending a current of electricity through the wire he turned the bar of iron into a magnet. As long as the current was passing through the wire the iron bar acted just like a permanent steel magnet; it would attract pieces of iron and hold up nails, but the moment the current was stopped the bar lost its magnetism, the nails or pieces of iron dropped off, and it became just an ordinary bar of iron again. This invention is called the electro-magnet, and the electro-magnet is used in some form or other in every electrical industry.

The electric dynamo owes its being to those two discoveries. It consists of coils of copper wire wound on a shaft, and that shaft is revolved close to a powerful magnet. The influence of the magnet causes electric currents to be produced in the coils of copper wire, and these currents are delivered by the coils into suitable conductors or wires by means of which the currents are led to the place where they have to do their work. One very interesting thing about the modern dynamo machine is that it is what electrical men call "self-exciting." That does not mean that it gets into a state of excitement about itself. It means that the dynamo provides its own magnetism. At first dynamos were made with great big steel magnets, but those were very expensive and unsatisfactory. Then a clever inventor hit upon the plan of using electro-magnets, and sending part of the current of the dynamo through their coils to give them magnetism. This is the action of the self-exciting dynamo. When the collection of coils wound on the revolving shaft first begins to turn, very little current is produced, because there is very little magnetism in the iron magnets. Part of this current goes through the magnet coils and increases the magnetism; this strengthens the current in the coils, and this process goes on until, after a few minutes, the magnets are fully magnetized and the coils are giving their full strength of current.

Diagram showing the electric circuit through each car, and illustrating the method of sending more than one car along the same wire.

[Pg 1053]

Some time after this was discovered, it became known that if the two wires from a dynamo were joined to a second dynamo instead of to an electric lamp, this second dynamo would revolve, and could be used to drive a machine, such as a sewing-machine or a printing-press.

At first this electric motor, as it was called, was used only for turning wheels that were stationary, but it was soon seen that there was good work for it to do in turning wheels that should travel along over the ground. Then began the electric railway.

Having got your electric motor it would seem a comparatively easy job to mount it on a car, to fix up a moving connection with an electric wire, and to make the motor turn the car-wheels. It looks easy enough to-day in places where hundreds of horseless cars are running about in all directions as if by magic. In the beginning it was not such an easy job, and those who led the way in the building and running of electric cars had many difficulties to contend with and many obstacles to overcome before they made the electric street-car the practical everyday affair that it is now.

Just look first at your electric motor. It is, like all electrical instruments and machines, a pretty delicate affair, very likely to suffer serious injury from hard usage or exposure to bad weather.

To place such a machine underneath a jolting car close to the surface of the street, and make it work properly at all times and in all weathers, is no small feat. One great difficulty was to keep the wire coils of the motor properly insulated. If two neighboring coils get connected with each other the motor goes wrong, and as water is a powerful conductor of electricity such accidents often happened at first through parts of the motor getting wet from splashings from the street. Now motors are made water-proof, and the cars go along merrily, even though there may be an inch or two of water in the streets, or several inches of snow or slush.

The motor is attached to the frame of the car-truck, and the power is transmitted to the axle of the car by means of gearing. In some electric locomotives that have been made the armature of the motor is wound on the axle itself, but for ordinary street cars it is found best to keep the motor separate from the axle, and to transmit the power by geared wheels.

THE TROLLEY-CAR.

The current reaches the motor under the car by means of the trolley-wheel and pole. The trolley-wheel is a solid copper wheel, deeply grooved, which is pressed upward against the bare copper wire stretched over the middle of the track; the long flexible pole which carries the trolley-wheel has a strong spring which tends to press it forward, and so keeps the wheel always firmly pressed against the wire however much the car may jump about in rough places. An insulated wire connected with the trolley-wheel is led down the pole and through the car to the switches and regulating boxes placed at either end of the car, just against the dash-board. No current can reach the motor without passing through the switch and regulating box under control of the motorman. With the switch the motorman can turn the current on or off completely, he can regulate the amount of current that reaches the motor so as to start gradually or go slowly in crowded places, or fast in quiet ones, and he can even reverse the motor and make the car go backwards, a thing that neither the driver of the horse-car nor the gripman of the cable-car can do.

Perhaps it is not quite clear how so many motors can work from a single line. As a rule electric railways are provided with but a single wire from which the motors obtain their supply of current, and this system has come to be called the single trolley system in distinction to the double trolley, or double wire system, which was tried in the early days but has been abandoned in all but one or two places. The single wire hung over the centre of the track carries the current out from the station where the dynamos are placed, and the rails and the earth carry it back to the dynamos after it has passed through the motors and has done its work. The trolley wire is kept constantly charged with electricity, which the dynamos at the power station pump into it, much as if they were pumping-engines forcing water into a long pipe. If any connection is made, by means of an electrical conductor, between the trolley-wire and the ground, the current will flow down into the ground. The only connections made with it are those made by the cars, and then the current has to pass through the motors and turn the wheels.

The trolley-wire has to be carefully put up so as to be just the right height, and exactly in the middle of the track. It must be properly insulated so as to prevent the escape of the current down the poles or along the suspension wires, so at every point where it is attached to a pole or a suspension wire it is hung from an insulator of some material that will not conduct electricity. Every here[Pg 1054] and there you will notice that heavy electric wires or cables are connected with the trolley-wires. These-wires are called "feeders"; they are run out from the dynamos at the power-house, and connect on to the trolley-wire to force fresh supplies of current into it. When an electric current travels along a wire it loses a certain amount of power by reason of the resistance or electrical friction of the wire itself, so in order to keep the supply of current up to the proper pitch required for working the motors at all points of the line, these "feeders" are run out from the power-house, and they literally feed the trolley-wire with the current that the cars are always demanding from it.

It is often said in the newspapers that the trolley-wire is very dangerous to human life. This is not really so. Nobody has ever been killed by a shock from a trolley-wire. The current used for electric railways, although great power is conveyed by it, has not the property of giving a fatal shock to the human system. There are just as great differences between the electric currents used for different purposes as there are between streams of water. Some streams have great volume, but very slow flow, others fly out of a half-inch nozzle with sufficient velocity to drill a hole through a man's body as cleanly as a rifle bullet. It is the same with an electric current. You may have a current capable of fusing bars of iron, yet you could not feel it pass through your body, and another kind of current that can be carried by a fine wire will give a shock strong enough to kill. Therefore, believe me, there is a great deal of nonsense written in the newspapers about the "deadly trolley."

Where the "deadliness" of the trolley certainly comes in is in the extreme handiness of the cars. The horse-car driver has hard work to get much speed out of his team; the gripman of the cable-car can go no faster than the cable will drag him; but the motorman of the trolley-car can with a twirl of his wrist send his heavy car bounding on like a thing of life. The temptation to "speed up" when it is so easily done is too much for human nature. This accounts for the many accidents that occur, though it is only fair to say that the fault is partly with the mothers who allow their little ones to play in streets where there are car tracks, for the victims of the trolley-cars seem to be nearly always young children.

A PARTNERSHIP ARRANGEMENT.

BY WALTER CLARKE NICHOLS.

A partnership once, as some historians state,
Was formed on the banks of the slow-flowing Nile
By a young Cheshire cat, an elephant straight
From the jungle, and, thirdly, an old crocodile.

"For surely," the elephant plausibly said,
"We can all of us turn in the forth-coming years,
When sad, to the crocodile, whom we've been led
To believe an exceptional expert in tears."

"Quite right," quoth the latter. "We cannot begin
Too early, and when we need mutual mirth
We can look to our pussie, whose broad Cheshire grin
Excels in duration all others on earth."

"And then, when we're travelling," chimed in the cat,
Who had been for some moments in solemn thought sunk,
"We can carry conveniently coat, shoes, and hat,
Since we'll always have with us the elephant's trunk."

Many boys and girls have seen the famous actor Joe Jefferson in his great play Rip Van Winkle, that delightful story of the Catskill fairies, and in it that weird scene where he partakes of the spirits that the elves give him, making him sleep for twenty years. Well, there is a good story told about Jefferson in that particular scene. Once being near some good fishing-grounds, he spent the day drawing in the gamy trout, and was thoroughly tired when the curtain rolled up for the evening performance. Things moved smoothly enough until he is supposed to fall asleep. Now that sleep in fiction lasts twenty years, but on the stage about two minutes. This time, however, the two minutes were lengthened out into ten, much to the amusement of the audience and provocation of the stage-manager. Jefferson had really fallen asleep, and his snores, it is said, were quite audible beyond the footlight. Several remarks were fired at him by the audience, and, finally, the stage-manager had to go beneath the stage and open a trap near where Jefferson was lying to try and wake him up.

He called and called, but it was no use, and in desperation he succeeded in jabbing a pin into him, which made Jefferson jump up with a sharp cry, and quickly realize where he was.

"A PIECE OF WORK."

BY JAMES BARNES.

The train-despatcher's window at the Jimtown crossing commanded a good view of the yards. It was a wet night, with a penetrating drizzle so fine that it almost led one to believe that the earth was steaming from the heat of the forenoon. The ray of light that shot over the train-despatcher's shoulder as he looked out into the darkness showed, however, that it was rain drifting downwards in the minutest drops.

It was almost time for the night despatcher, Rollins, to put in an appearance, and Mr. Mingle looked at his watch and drummed with his fingers on the pane of glass.

The light of the switchmen's lanterns occasionally gleamed from the shining slippery rails. A noisy little engine that had been drilling freight cars about the yard stopped on the siding just beneath the window, and commenced to roar angrily with a burst of feathery vapor. The despatcher watched the fireman open the door of the furnace and stand for an instant silhouetted against the red glare that was reflected by the dampness all around. Suddenly as he glanced up he saw a man on the top of a freight car across the yards swing his lantern about his head and make a jump clear to the ground into a pile of cinders.

"That was a foolish thing to do," said Mr. Mingle to himself. "He might have broken his legs; then he'd have sued the company."

The man was not injured, however, for he skipped across the tracks and approached the tower-house on a run. He stopped and shouted to the fireman of the engine that was raising such a row beneath the window. The glow from the rosy coals made everything quite plain.

Never in his life had Mr. Mingle seen a face wear such a look as that.

The fireman closed the furnace door with a slam, and the engineer, who had been out on the foot-board, hurried back at a gesture. Two words, and he dropped the bundle of waste in his hand and pulled wide the throttle. At the same time the engine shrieked for open switches. What could it mean? As the despatcher turned to the door of the staircase, he ran into the man whose face he had seen in the glare from the fire-box. It was the assistant yard-master.

"Lord, Mr. Mingle!" he exclaimed, "is No. 44 on time? Hurry and find out! Has she passed the junction yet?"

The despatcher in one stride stepped to the instrument on the desk. With his fingers on the key-board, he paused. "Tell me, quickly," he said, "what has happened. Talk, man!"

"The ore train!" exclaimed the yard-master, sinking back into the worn arm-chair and dropping his hands helplessly to either side of him. "Some one left the switch open, and the brakes slipped or something. She pulled out by herself down the grade on the main track. I saw her going from the top of the freight. How she started, Lord knows. She slipped out like a ghost, sir."

Mr. Mingle had caught only the first few words. His nervous hand was jumping as he sounded the call for the operator at Selina Junction, twenty-five miles down the road. At last he stopped, and suddenly switched off for the return.[Pg 1055]

"Tick! Tick! Tick-a-tick!" the answer came; the yard-master watched the despatcher's face as a condemned man might look at the face of a judge—and Mr. Mingle had grown paler.

"Forty-four has just passed the junction," he said, in a high strained voice. Then his teeth chattered as if he had felt a blast of icy wind. There was nothing to do.

Fifteen of that twenty-five miles was all down grade on a single track—a bad grade that necessitated an extra engine to help its brother puff and tug the heavy trains up out of the valley. Between Jimtown and the junction there was no station, and only one siding that ran out to the Fetterolf quarries, ten miles below.

"The switch engine has gone after her," said the yard-master. "If she can catch up before they reach the steep grade near the pine woods they may be able to make a flying couple."

"She will never catch them now," said Mr. Mingle. "Heaven help all in 44!" A great sob like a shiver shook him. "Quick, hurry, Tomes!" he said, shaking the yard-master violently. "Make up a wrecking train, and send one of the boys to gather all the doctors. There are three of them up near the hotel. I'll telegraph headquarters. They will be safe for twenty minutes yet. Hurry, man. Don't sit there like a fool!"

The yard-master slipped his hat on his head and plunged down the steep stairway.

The despatcher rubbed his forehead.

It was a hard thing to do! Sixty miles away they would know of the accident before it occurred, simply by his touching the little instrument that his trembling hand reached forward for. How could he begin the message? The idea of that load of ore gathering frightful headway every minute, whirling along through the darkness toward that slowly approaching train, made him sick and faint. There was going to be a wreck, and nothing in the whole world could stop it. In his mind's eye he could see the crash. He could see what that fireman and engineer of 44 would see through the rain-drops in the glare from the head-light. Old Jack Lane, he knew him well. It would be Jack's last trip. There would not be time to think; no time to press the throttle. It would be on them all at once.

The despatcher called up headquarters. Would they never answer? It seemed already half an hour since the yard-master had left him.

Somebody thumped up the stairway.

"Hello, Mixer!" said a cheerful voice. "Fine night for ducks, eh?" The speaker, a young man with a slight athletic frame, dashed his hat on the table. "What's up, cully?" he asked; as Mr. Mingle turned from the instrument, and the other caught a glimpse of his scared white face.

Mr. Mingle's voice was hoarse, as if he had been shouting, but he spoke slowly and distinctly. The young man he had been addressing had thrown off his rubber coat. The tails had been pinned up, and his back was covered with a streak of mud. When the despatcher had finished, his companion reached the head of the stairs in a jump.

"I'll try for it!" he said. "There's just one chance. I'll try to make the quarries!"

Despite the fact that headquarters was now calling back, Mingle ran to the door. He was just in time to see the night despatcher lifting something down the steps outside.

"Try for it, Rollie!" he shouted, and ran out into the rain. As he stood there he caught a glimpse of a figure fast leaving the yards. It was a man bent low over the handle-bars of a bicycle, his feet rising and falling with the quickness and ease of the trained racer. Mingle caught a flash of the steel spokes as the night despatcher turned the corner under the lamp-post into the road. Then he pulled himself up the stairs as if his feet were made of lead, and telegraphed the message to headquarters as slowly as if he had been a beginner, and not one of the best operators on the line.

The road that led outside of Jimtown stretched along through a bit of woods, and then plunged down the side of the mountain so steeply that loaded teams would halt every hundred feet or so to rest in the ascent.

A year before Rollins had coasted down Coon Hill, on a wager, but that was in broad daylight, with his club-mates stationed at every curve, and the roadway was cleared for him as far as the sandy stretch before the railroad crossing. Every stone had been picked out, and the water-bars evened up at the left-hand side. At one place, he remembered, his speed had been reckoned, in a measured one hundred yards, at forty miles an hour.

The railroad, to avoid the grade, followed the course of the Coponie, and circled about to the northward. Rollins had only to ride four miles to the ore-cars eleven—but such a night for coasting!

The rain made it hard for him to follow the little circle of light that his lantern threw before him as he scorched along the level stretch.

Before he reached the hill-top it seemed to him that he was standing still, and the road coming up at him like the surface of a great wheel.

At last, he felt that he had reached down-grade. How he longed now for the brake that he had so disdained! He determined to keep his feet going as long as he safely could, and he back-pedalled gently to keep them in place.

Thud! he struck the first water-bar, and his cap came forward over his eyes. He threw it off with a backward toss of his head.

Another jolt! He was too much in the middle of the road. He must keep more to the left. He was flying now. The rain poured down his face and stung him in a thousand prickling points.

The wind roared frightfully in his ears, and he straightened up as far as his crooked racing-handles would allow. He was at the first turn. He swirled about it, and his feet came off the ratchets. He lifted up his knees, and placed his legs on the rests. He was riding a runaway.

"Hard to the left!" he kept saying to himself, with his arms braced straight like iron rods. The front wheel wriggled, and he knew he had struck the bit of sandy road above the second angle, and the worst. It warned him just in time. He remembered the huge rock with the advertisements on it, and a ray from the lantern caught it as he flashed by and then swooped off to the right. A sharp jingle as a stone flew up against the spokes; he was once more in the straight shoot for the last turn of all.

With wide-staring eyes he prayed; his tongue formed the words behind his closely shut teeth. "Bear to the left now!" He knew the path was better on that side.

Again the front wheel wriggled fiercely. It was by nothing but luck this time that he had chosen the right moment. There was a hollow thump as he crossed a wooden culvert and bounded for a moment clear into the air. The greatest danger was passed. Below him stretched a straight decline, and then the sandy patch before he reached the crossing.

How could he stop? He could never catch those flying pedals. But stop he must or he would overshoot his mark a half-mile before he found the level.

It was no easy thing to do to hold that struggling front wheel steady. He straightened up, and bending his right knee, placed the sole of his foot against the tire of the front wheel. He could feel it warming through the leather, but he had partly checked the speed. Then there was a ringing sound, a twist of both his arms, and over he went with a sickening momentary cry of fear.

He rolled up on his hands and knees. To save his life he could not help that choking, whimpering sound. His mouth was full of sand, and he felt as though his breast had been crushed in against his lungs. A sharp pain ran through his left leg; but at last he caught his breath.

There was the track within thirty feet of where he had fallen. He could only tell this by seeing the ghostlike danger-post that stretched above the roadway like a white warning gallows. There, a few rods down the track, was the switch that turned through the sharp cut to the quarries.

Rollins gave a cry. "The key!" The switch was locked. Would he have to stand there and see the ore-cars rush by[Pg 1056] him? He twisted with both hands at the guard chain to the lock. It wouldn't move. But what was that standing close on the siding?

A hand-car is a good lift for two men at any time, but it seemed as if made of pine wood instead of heavy iron wheels and bars. He rolled it to the track, and up-ended it as easily as a laborer would throw over a wheel-barrow.

Then he heard a roaring sound above him along the grade. The sharp staccato tooting of the drilling engine he heard also. Then far below him, four miles away, the long confident whistle of No. 44 at a grade crossing. The rails were slippery, and he knew that the train was coming slowly up the grade. As the hand-car toppled across the track he threw upon the heap two heavy ties, and scrambled up the opposite bank. Now the roaring was upon him! Crash! A snap and a whirl, and the wheels of the foremost ore-car caught the obstruction. The load piled forward, and the flats behind reared up and threw their heavy freight in all directions. He had wrecked her just in time.

He hurried back to the crossing. A tangle of wire and frame-work, the bicycle lay at the road-side. He must have missed striking that huge rock by nothing short of a miracle. The lamp, twisted and broken, was attached to the front fork. He could smell the oil, and he sopped it with his handkerchief. His hands were sticky, and the match refused to light. At last he struck a handful of them; they flashed feebly, then sputtered and went out. In the brief space Rollins had seen that his hands were dripping red.

A great white eye and the tinkling of the rails told that the little switch engine would strike the obstruction first.

It was alongside now! The young man saw that the wheels were reversing furiously. Then he heard a second crash and a screeching, long continued, that went through and through his dizzy brain.

"Safe! safe!" he said, and fell limp in the sand.

"Are you hurted, Bill, lad?" said the engineer of the switch engine, rubbing his bruised sides and letting up for a minute his pull on the whistle rope. "Them ore-cars jumped the track."

"No; all O K," came the answer from the opposite side of the cab. "Jest bumped a bit. Listen! There's old Jack whistling for brakes."

The shrieking of the switch engine was warning No. 44 in time. They could make-out her head-light through the leaves of the trees just at the tangent of the curve a quarter of a mile below. Some figures were running up the track, for they could see a lantern bobbing up and down, and soon the voices were quite close.

"What has happened here?" inquired a man with brass buttons, as he caught a glimpse of the engineer swinging himself painfully off the step to the ground behind the wreckage.

"The Lord's finger, I reckon," said the engineer. "I swear I saw a light!" and in a few words he told the story.

"I SAY, YOU PEOPLE, THERE'S A DEAD MAN OR SOMETHING HERE IN THE ROAD."

A group of passengers had surrounded the heap of boards, ore, iron wheels, and axles. The head-light of the switch engine had gone out in the jar, and there was not a face shown in the dim rays from the lantern that did not pale.

A drummer in a silk travelling-cap struck a match to light a paper cigarette, but his hand trembled so that he gave up, and sat down on the ties, and mechanically brushed off his shoes with his pocket-handkerchief as if it were dusty and broad daylight.

Another whistle sounded up the grade.

"There's no train due," said the curly-headed young brakeman who had come up with another lantern on his arm. A large crowd of the passengers of No. 44 accompanied him.

"I presume likely that's the wrecking-train," said the engineer, "come down to pick you fellows up."

"Get up the track and flag her, Billy! Jump quick!" ordered the conductor.

The brakeman started on a run. As he passed the grade crossing he shouted back,

"I say, you people, there's a dead man or something here in the road," and, without a pause, he hurried on.

Rollins opened his eyes and felt the familiar motion of a moving train, but for an instant he could not call back his wits to think. He was lying on a mattress on the floor and his head and shoulders were propped up comfortably. There was a crowd standing about him.

"You're all right, my lad," said a voice. "There are four of us here to look out for you." The doctor arose from his knees and laughed.

Rollins faintly smiled. "Oh, I'm kind of comfortable," he said.

"The company ought to give him a gold bicycle set with diamonds," said the conductor.

"I'd rather have a trip to Europe," said Rollins.

A quiet-looking man standing in a corner of the car heard this remark and made a note of it.

The whistle hallooed exultantly at the entrance of the Jimtown yards.

The sound reached the ears of Mr. Mingle as he sat with his forehead resting on the edge of his desk. The three sharp toots that were being given so often in succession could be nothing else than cheers.

"Headquarters there! O. K. My side partner saved the train. Hurrah! Forty-four is safe!"

He twitched the dots and dashes out with his nervous fingers. Then he drew his sleeve across his eyes and dashed down the steps to meet the train.

"Rollie's a piece of work," he said to himself.[Pg 1057]

OAKLEIGH.

BY ELLEN DOUGLAS DELAND.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Edith recovered slowly; but the shock had told upon her, and it was thought she needed a change of air.

"Take her to a city," suggested the doctor. "She requires diversion."

And very hurriedly and unexpectedly they decided to go to Washington for a week or two, stopping in Philadelphia on their way back for a glimpse of Neal.

The party consisted of Mrs. Franklin, Edith, and Cynthia, with the addition at the last moment of Aunt Betsey. Each of the three Franklins felt a slight pang of disappointment when they heard that Miss Trinkett intended to join them; it would have been just a little nicer to go alone. But the old lady never suspected this, and she met them in Boston on the morning of the 1st of June, full of excitement and pleasure at the thought of seeing "the inner workings of this wonderful government of ours."

Hester's one thought was that she should soon see her brother again. During the last few weeks a letter had come from the head master at St. Asaph's, deeply regretting the unjust judgment that had been passed upon Neal in suspending him from school. It had since been proved that he was innocent, and the faculty would be only too glad to welcome him back. Mrs. Franklin felt that she could not do too much to atone to Neal for having suspected him, and she longed to tell him so.

"And if I once see him I can persuade him to come back. I know I can!" she said, joyfully, to Cynthia.

The visit was an unqualified success. The Franklin party did a vast amount of sight-seeing, Miss Trinkett being the most indefatigable of all. Indeed, Cynthia was the only one who was able physically to keep up with her energetic little grand-aunt, and even she was sometimes forced to plead fatigue.

Miss Betsey left nothing undone. She journeyed to the top of the Monument, she made a solemn pilgrimage to Alexandria. She was never too tired to go to the Capitol, and her little black-robed figure and large black bonnet soon became familiar objects in the visitors' gallery, while she listened carefully to all the speeches, thrilling or dull as they chanced to be. When the latter was the case, as frequently happened, Miss Trinkett waxed warm with indignation at the lack of attention paid to the prosy old member by his inconsiderate colleagues.

"Look!" she would whisper to Cynthia; "they are actually reading and writing and talking quite load to each other while that poor old gentleman is speaking; and some have gone out. How shocking!"

And she would lean forward again in an attitude of renewed attention, and listen to the reasons for or against some very unimportant project.

At Mount Vernon, Miss Trinkett's joy and patriotism knew no bounds. She bought little hatchets by the score, and herself drew up the bucket from the General's own well. She was even guilty of breaking off a twig in Mrs. Washington's garden, notwithstanding the signs which informed her that she was doing it under penalty of the law.

"I just couldn't help it," she said afterwards to her nieces, in apologetic tones. "To think of that labyrinth and that box-border being Martha Washington's own, and me with the same thing in my garden at home! It made me fairly thrill to think of Martha and me having the same tastes in common. I knew she'd have let me take it if she'd been here, for I always heard she was real kind-hearted, if she was dignified, so I just did it."[Pg 1058]

But the most exciting day of all was when they visited the Dead-letter Office. Miss Trinkett, interested as she had always been in the mail service, was much impressed. She sat upstairs for hours, and gazed over the railing at the rows of men who were opening and examining thousands of missent letters. She could only be torn away by the entreaties of Cynthia, who begged her to come see the collection of curiosities which had found their way to this vast receptacle.

At the first glass case Miss Betsey stood appalled.

"CYNTHIA FRANKLIN," SHE EXCLAIMED, "LOOK THERE!"

"Cynthia Franklin," she exclaimed, "look there!"

Cynthia looked. There was every conceivable thing in the place, from a beehive to a baby's rattle.

"Do you see?"

"What, Aunt Betsey?"

"There! Look, my own rag doll!"

"Aunt Betsey, it can't be!"

"It is, Cynthy. Don't I know the work of my own hands, I should like to ask? Well, well, I want to know! I want—to—know! Find me a chair, Cynthy. I feel that taken aback I don't know but what I'm going to faint, though I never did such a thing. But do tell! do tell! Oh, this government of ours! It is an age to live in, Cynthy."

Cynthia brought her the chair, and the old lady seated herself in front of the case.

"I do declare if there ain't the very eyes I sewed in with my own hands—black beads they are, Cynthy—and the hair I embroidered with fine black yarn! And the petticoats, Cynthy! The flannel one's feather-stitched. I could tell you what that doll has on to her very stockings. To think that something I made so innocently, away off in Wayborough, for our little Janet, now belongs to the United States government! Well, well, it's a great honor; almost too good to be true. But the little satchel, Cynthy—the satchel that hung at her side with the gold in it, where's that?"

That indeed was missing.

"Well, well, we won't say anything. I'm sure government deserves it for all the trouble it takes, opening all those letters and bundles."

But her family thought differently, and wheels within wheels were set in motion by which the fifty dollars in gold were recovered—the famous fifty dollars, the loss of which had so affected the fortunes of Neal Gordon.

It seemed that in her agitation, after the death of Silas Green, Miss Betsey, though she stamped it generously, had put no address at all on the package, and having sent it off by the half-blind Mr. Peters, the deficiency had not been discovered.

He had taken it to Tottenham post-office, where both he and Miss Trinkett were unknown, and hurried away, leaving the valuable package to the mercies of government.

"And to think that government takes care of things and gives them back to you when you are as careless as all that!" said Miss Betsey. The doll she would not receive.

"No, no," she said; "let it stay where it is. I'll make another for Janet some day. It's an honor I never expected, to have one of my rag dolls set up in a glass case in a public building in the city of Washington for thousands and thousands of the American people to gaze at! Indeed, I want to know!"

The two weeks in Washington finally came to an end, and the Franklins bade farewell to the beautiful city with its parks and circles, its magnificent avenues, its public buildings, and towering Monument.

"Well, well," said Miss Betsey, as she took her last look. "I haven't lived all these years for nothing! I've been to the capital of my country, and I've visited the tomb of Washington. And, Cynthy, now it's all over and we're safely out of the way, I'm real glad I took that twig from the garden. I had a kind of an uneasy feeling about it all the time I was in town, but now I feel better."

When they arrived at Philadelphia Mr. Carpenter was waiting for them at the station. Neal, he explained, was at the lumber-yard; he could not get off at that hour. They intended going to a hotel, but William Carpenter, with Quaker hospitality, insisted that they should stay under his roof while they were in the city.

"Rachel expects thee," he said to his cousin when she remonstrated; "she has made the necessary preparations."

"But there are so many of us," said Mrs. Franklin.

"There is room for all, and more," he replied, calmly.

Miss Trinkett was much pleased with all she saw, though somewhat surprised when she heard herself called by her given name on so short an acquaintance.

"However, it gives you an at-home feeling right away," she confided to her nieces. "It seems as if I were back in Wayborough with the people that have known me ever since I was born, I wouldn't like to say how many years ago, though not so very many, either."

It was the middle of the afternoon when Neal came in. Hester heard his familiar step coming down the long narrow hall to her room, where she was resting. There was a knock at the door, and she called to him to come in. In another instant his arms were around her.

"Neal, Neal," she cried, "is it really you at last? Oh, how I have longed to see you! Let me look at you."

She held herself away from him, and scrutinized the face which was far above hers.

"You've grown. You are taller than ever. I only come up to your shoulder, Neal. What a big man you are going to be! And you have altered—your face looks different. What is it?"

"Can't say," he laughed. "Don't stare a fellow out of countenance, Hessie; it's embarrassing. Did you have a good time in Washington?"

It was evident that he did not wish to refer to past events, but Hester insisted upon speaking. She felt that something must be said sooner or later, and there was no time like the present. It would be well to get it over.

"Neal," she said, tenderly, taking his hand as they sat together on the sofa, "I never really thought you took the money. I only did for an instant after you ran away. Of course that seemed strange. But, Neal, you will forgive us for thinking so at all. You will come back, won't you, dear? John wants you to as well as I, and you will go to college."

Neal rose and walked to the window. He stood there for a moment, with his hands in his pockets. Then he turned, and, coming back, stood in front of her.

"I'll tell you what it is. Hessie, we've both got something to forgive. I was beastly extravagant at St. Asaph's, and not at all fair and square when I asked you for the money that time. Then, being suspended was all against me, and of course John had a right to get mad. It's awfully hard to swallow the fact that he wouldn't believe me, and he thought I would steal; however, he had some excuse for it. My old pride was at the bottom of it all. You see, I've had time to think it over since I've been here; two months is a good long time. I've been alone a lot, and when you're not measuring boards at a lumber-yard you have plenty of time for thinking over your sins. And I suppose I was pretty well in the wrong, too. I ought not to have run away; I know that."

Now that Neal had reached this conclusion he was courageous enough to acknowledge it.

"And you will come home now, and go to college."

"No, I don't think I will. Cousin William seems to think I do pretty well in the business, and I shouldn't wonder if he'd feel rather badly to have me go. He was very good to take me in. Then I made up my mind I'd stick at the old thing and show Cyn—show some people I'm no coward. Then I'm not very much gone on books, Hessie, and if I went to college I'd want to give a good deal of time to sports and all that, and I'd need a lot of money. Somehow I don't seem to be able to see other fellows spending a pile without doing likewise. I haven't got it, and I am not going to be dependent on you, Hessie dear, much as I know you would like to give me every cent you own. But, on the whole, I think I like better to make my own living. I rather like the feeling of it."

Hester felt that Neal was showing that he was made of good stuff. She was not a little proud of his independent[Pg 1059] spirit. She was greatly disappointed that he was not going through college; but, after all, she reflected, there was great wisdom in what he said. She determined to say no more until she had consulted with her husband, but she knew that he would agree with Neal.

"And now where are the girls?" demanded Neal, with a view to changing the subject. "I want to see them."

His sister called them in from the next room, and they had a merry meeting.

"How funny it is," thought Cynthia. "The last time I saw Neal we were like two drenched water-rats on the river at home. Whoever thought we should meet away off here in a strange house and a strange city, where all is so different? I believe things are really going to come right after all, and that day I was perfectly certain they never would. Here is Edith well and strong when I thought she was surely going to die, and mamma has seen Neal and seems as happy as a lark, and Neal himself looks fine. Somehow he seems more like a man. I'm proud of him."

All of which train of thought took place while Cynthia was indulging in an unwonted fit of silence.

Neal soon suggested that they should take a walk, and the girls acceding to it, the three set forth, Neal feeling extremely proud of the two pretty maidens with whom he was walking.

"Philadelphia has an awfully forlorn look in summer," he said, with the air of having been born and brought up a Philadelphian. "You see, everybody goes out of town, and the houses are all boarded up. You're here at just the wrong time."

"We are certainly here at a very hot time," remarked Edith, as she raised her parasol.

"They call it very cool for this time of year," said Neal. "You forget you are farther south than old Massachusetts. It is a dandy place, I think, though I wouldn't mind knowing a few people that are not Friends."

"How can you know people unless they are friends?" asked Cynthia, gayly.

"Cynth, what a pun!" said Neal, with an attempt at a frown. "I say, though, it's awfully jolly to have you two girls here, even if Cynthia does keep at her old tricks and make very poor puns. How long are you going to stay?"

"As long as we're bidden, I suppose," returned Cynthia, with one of her well-known little skips, as they set foot on Walnut Street Bridge.

It was six o'clock, but being June the sun was still high above the horizon. A gentle breeze came off the river, and the afternoon light threw a soft radiance over the masts of the vessels which lay at anchor at the wharves, and the spires and chimneys of the town.

They wandered through the pretty streets of West Philadelphia; Neal, happy in having companions of his own age again, laughing and talking in his old way, care-free and fun-loving once more.

To Cynthia the past year seemed a hideous dream, now to be blotted out forever.

She and Neal had one conversation alone together. It was the night before the visitors were to leave Philadelphia, and the two were in the old garden that was at the back of Mr. Carpenter's house. It was not like Aunt Betsey's garden, nor the more modern one at Oakleigh, but the roses and the lilac blossoms suggested a bit of country here among city bricks and mortar.

Neal was very quiet, and Cynthia rallied him for being so, as she herself laughed heartily at one of her own jokes.

"Well, perhaps I am rather glum," said he; "but I think you are horribly heartless, Cynthia, laughing that way when you're going off to-morrow, and nobody knows when I shall see you again."

Cynthia was sobered in a moment.

"Neal, I want to tell you something," she said. "Mamma told me that you have decided to stay here and work instead of going to college, and I admire you for doing it. Of course, it's a great pity for a boy not to go to college, but then yours is a peculiar case, and I'm proud of you, Neal. Yes, I am! You're plucky to stick it out."

"Wait until I do stick it out," said Neal, coloring hotly at the unexpected praise. "But it's rather nice to hear you tell me I'm something besides a coward."

"Hush! Don't remember what I said that day. Just forget it all."

"Indeed, I won't! It is written down in my brain, every word of it, in indelible ink. There was something else you said, Cynth. You said you had faith in me. I mean to show you that you didn't make a mistake. It will be harder work than ever now, though. Having seen you all makes the idea of toiling and moiling here pretty poky. My mind is made up. I will stick it out!"

[to be continued.]

IN THE VALLEY.

The night has filled the valley up
Brimful of darkness, like a cup;
But day will spill the mists again
Over the brim—in driving rain.

Marrion Wilcox.

A PARSLEY BED.

BY EMMA J. GRAY.

"I wish I could make a little money," said confidential Florence to her friend Annette.

Now Annette was notably practical, and though a diligent student, managed to find time for apparently everything else, money-making included. Indeed, had she not been as enterprising, much of her enjoyment would necessarily have been left out. Her father and mother had many conferences to contrive ways and means to supply their children's needs. And stern necessity made frequent entertainments and many dainty gifts quite impossible. So Florence appealed to the right person, and her friend's advice would apply to any boy or girl who, like Florence, would like to make a little money.

"Raise parsley." And Annette smilingly nodded her bright little head.

"Why, how could I make any money out of parsley?" was the doubting query.

"If, Florie dear, you'll do exactly as I will tell you, you will see. Now listen:

"Next spring have your ground turned to the depth of one foot. And be sure to have it well manured, for parsley loves a rich soil. Some people put soot around the young plants, and think it is very helpful. Before planting your seeds soak them for an hour in warm water. Cover them half an inch with soil, and watch carefully. The ground must never be allowed to become parched, for your parsley would die. Raise as much as you can, and if the supply is greater than the demand, dry some. Cut off close to the roots, and dry in a shallow tin pan in a moderate oven. It will scorch very easily, so look out. When it is dry, powder it in your fingers, and pack in paper or tin boxes. You will find the dried parsley will help out your winter supply wonderfully."

"But, Annette," interrupted Florence, "surely you cannot raise parsley in the house?"

"Why not? Of course you can. During September, and later at intervals, plant seeds in boxes and pots, and place in your sunny windows. It will grow beautifully all winter, and you'll find you can get good prices for it. By-the-way, so that your prices may be honest, inquire in any grocery store, and aim to sell at the same figure. Of course in summer it will be much cheaper.

"About customers. Arrange for them while your plants are growing. Your family and friends will do to start with, and soon you will find more and yet more. For parsley has such multiplied uses. For soups, fish, entrées, meat, and game, for flavoring and garnishing. You know people must have it. And remember parsley may be cut down to the root again and again, and up it will come bravely each time. But frost is a great enemy. Before its approach gather all you can and try transplanting the roots. They may not always be depended upon, but often they will live and flourish from season to season."[Pg 1060]

THE EAST-SIDE BOY AND HIS GAMES.

BY REV. JOHN T. WILDS, D.D.

Being a boy in a crowded city and being a boy in a village are two different things, though boys the world over are always boys. The balance of fun and sport is, after all, in favor of the city lad, the offspring of the tenement-house.

WAR.

After spending my boyhood in a delightful mountain village, and after being much of a boy, although a man, for years in the crowded tenement section of the East Side of New York, I am inclined to believe that pity is greatly misplaced when a youthful reader of the Round Table spreads himself in summer days under a great tree, feels sorry for the poor East-sider of New York, and says, "It's too bad he can't be here with me." Right now, my delightful friend under the tree, shouts of merriment ring in my ears from boys who last night slept in a close room, or possibly on the fire-escape, whose breakfast was most meagre because their parents are poor and honest. They are as happy as the day is long. They are happier longer than the day, because they never go to bed until ten o'clock, and they only go then because the hall light is turned out at that hour, and they don't like to climb up to the top story, or go through a long alleyway in the dark any more than you enjoy going through a graveyard in the night-time.

Necessity keeps the East-sider active. If he lolls on the street the police stir him; if he hangs about a store the keeper chases him away; but they tolerate him when he is playing. Necessity also make him inventive. They make their games and have them in season. They would as soon think of wearing an ulster in summer-time as play top in July. I don't know but that they have a code quite as reasonable as the high-classed youth who patterns after the dude.

Our happy lad of the tenement, until he is fourteen when he leaves school and goes to work, is compelled to play in crowded streets where hundreds of children swarm like bees, and necessarily within a narrow space. But he has broad ideas, and insists upon doing, accommodating the space in some way, whatever others do. The asphalt pavements are of the greatest blessing—far better than roof-gardens, and since we cannot have many parks, they are of greater importance to all concerned than the little squares that dot our city. At evening-time, when the street-organs have not gathered all the girls of the block for a dance and during the day on the sunny side of the street one may find a most energetic crowd of boys, eager, and intensely excited over a game. The streets and pavements are all marked over with strange diagrams, each one of which tells of a conflict. "Tip Cat" is always popular, but played, as a rule, in the morning; so also is "Kicking the Stick or Can." When the sun is hot they get on the shady side and play "Long Branch" and "War." Later on they have the "Hopping Game" and "Spread the Woman." Then when night comes—and it is not night, for the streets are as light as day because of the electric-light or gas—they dart about as detectives and robbers playing "Relievio."

BASEBALL.

It will be observed that they play what men do. You may often hear an imitation of the fire-gong, and see boys rush out before an imaginary wagon and engine, and go through the motion of having a fire. Children are rescued, the dead are laid out, medals are awarded for bravery. When the Ludlow Street Jail robbers escaped, the boys devised a jail, and the three noted robbers were impersonated, and escaped. The jailer was in dismay. Detectives and police went forth, climbing on tops of houses, over fences, eagerly searching for the men. And they were successful, be it said to the honor of the boys.

Of course they play baseball. What boy does not? These East-siders have not the green diamond—if they had they would roll over the grass, pat it in love, sit down and look at it a long time before they would play ball upon it. I have taken children to the Park, far up to the Bronx, where everything is delightfully free, and they have sat down and rubbed the grass, and petted it as a child will a tender animal. But they have their ball games and get excited over them, although the diamond is on stone, and not two feet square.

They are always at something, and less frequently in mischief than one would think. They are divided into crowds, each street or block has its gang, and woe be to him who dares encroach. They have chosen leaders whose command they obey. There is a vast deal of honor among them, and I am not sure but that he is somewhat better than the lad that hangs around the country store or goes swimming, in the mill-pond of the village.

The following are some of the summer games that engage his attention and keep him out of mischief:

BASEBALL.

Construct a square having four squares within, each marked as in the illustration. Then construct your score-card after the usual manner. Stand ten or more feet off and toss a penny or piece of lead, which the boys call the lead digger, into the squares. If it touches a line or falls outside he is out. If it falls within one of the squares it counts for so many base hits as the square indicates. For example, if it is on H.-R., it is a score, that being a home-run. If on 2 B., that means two-base hit, which puts him on second base. The rest of the game is like baseball.

H. R.—Home-run. 3 B.—Three-Base Hit. 2 B.—Two-Base Hit. 1 B.—One-Base Hit.

TIP CAT.

A two-foot circle is made, or more commonly with the lad of these parts the manhole or steam-escape tap selected. On the side of it is drawn a mark which is called the measuring spot. In the centre of the circle is placed a[Pg 1061] stick about four or six inches long, tapered to one end. This is called the cat. The batter strikes this tapered end so that it will fly up, and then bats it as in baseball. The one in the field returns it. If he throws it within the distance measured by the bat from the measuring spot the batter is out. If that is not done the batter measures to the cat, and the number of times it takes the stick to reach it counts so many tallies. The game is limited by a number from one hundred and up.

RELIEVIO.

Make a boundary-line embracing such territory as is wise or as your space allows, across which no player can go. If he does he is captured. Then make a den by drawing a square 3 x 4 feet.

Divide the players into two equal parts, each side appointing a captain and den-keeper. The two sides are called detectives and robbers. The side being out are the robbers.

The robbers then hide in any place within the boundary. When hid the captain of the robbers cries "relievio!" meaning "ready." The captain of the detectives then sends out his men to search for the robbers. When a robber is found and caught he must not struggle until within six feet of the den, when he can try to get away. The work of the detective is to get the robber within touch of the keeper. If the keeper touches the robber he yields and enters the den. It is necessary for the keeper to stand with one foot in the den. If both feet are placed in the den, or both outside, the prisoners are free. If at any time a robber, not captured, can place his foot in the den and cries "relievio!" he sets the prisoners free. If in his attempt to free the prisoners the keeper simply touches him he is captured. Only one detective at a time can take a robber.

When all the robbers are captured, the sides change.

"SPREAD THE WOMAN."

A hat or tin-can is placed on the ground between a player's feet, whose name is "It." All the other players gather near him for the purpose of kicking the object. If a player kicks the object, and is touched by It, he becomes It. If It chases the one who touched the object, the others may kick it, and then It has to return.

The game has time limit. Each one plays for himself.

LONG BRANCH.

Construct a diagram like the illustration; place a penny on a spot about six inches from lower line, and shove it with the finger for one of the numbered spaces. If it touches a line it is out. If it is on a space, that space is marked by a line first drawn across, as seen on first line. If first line is touched four times a star is made, as seen in second space. If again it falls on that space a bullet is made, as seen on third space. If the digger is on "Long Branch," it gives a mark to each space. The side that has the most bullets on the stars, as in the third space, wins. The players alternate in playing. The players are equally divided. Two or more may play.

HOPPING GAME.

Make a diagram like the illustration, each square about six inches square, and five for each player. The first player hops around in each space, commencing with "start" and finishing at "end." If he touches the line he is out for that turn. If he goes round successfully, he is permitted to put his initial or number on the space he may choose. When he is hopping he may rest on both feet at such spaces, but all other players must hop over them. The game is finished when all the spaces are filled, and the one whose name is most numerous is winner. "F. L." has won in the illustration.

WAR.

Construct a diagram like the illustration; place a penny on a spot six or more inches from the last line, and shove or shoot it with the finger. If it touches a line the play is a failure, and the next player takes his turn, but if it stops on a space, you make a round mark in imitation of a man's head. If it falls on the part marked "War," it entitles you to a mark in each space. After the head are formed the body, the legs (one at a time), then the arms (one at a time), then a gun is placed in the soldiers' hands; each play in that space then gives a bullet, so marked by little balls, until there are three; then the next successful play on that space fires the gun, and, of course, kills the enemy. Thus the game continues until one side has all its soldiers killed by the men of the other.

During the war between Japan and China, those two countries were at war every day on the sidewalks of the city. Often I have heard shouts that called me to my window, when I would see the triumphant party rejoicing over their victory.[Pg 1062]

HOW A BOY CAN COME TO NEW YORK AND GET A SITUATION.

BY H. G. PAINE.

This is a question that cannot be answered specifically, or to meet every case. It cannot certainly be answered in a way to meet any case. All that I am going to undertake is to show how some boys whom I have known have come to New York and obtained situations, and by throwing some light on business methods and business chances in the metropolis to help some other boys who may read this to find answers to suit their own individual cases. In the first place I will assume that the boy to whom I am speaking is living in the country, or in a small town, and that he wishes to go to New York for the purpose of getting a position in a mercantile or business house, and that he will be entirely dependent on his own resources as soon as he leaves home. Of course I do not mean by this that he will come to New York penniless. He must, of course, expect to have enough money saved or spared him to live on until he gets a place. But he will expect to support himself as soon as he finds work. On this account, unless he has had some previous experience, or has some special knowledge that he can make useful, he would better stay at home. For he will at once find himself competing against the city boy, who lives at home, and who therefore can work for little and sometimes no wages.

That same word "home," too, is a great stumbling-block to the boy from away. "You don't live at home? Well, I'm afraid we can't engage any boy who doesn't live home," will become a too familiar sentence to the inexperienced lad looking for work in a strange city. Yet this is perfectly natural and proper. "Home" implies some older person to be responsible for the boy out of business hours. It implies the ties of church and of school and of social life. For this reason the country boy who wishes to come to New York and get a situation would better first try to get a situation nearer home. If there is no chance for him in the "general store" close at hand, perhaps in some nearby town he can learn the rudiments of business—of stock, of book-keeping, of attending to customers—for his keep. Then if he is a wide-awake boy, and determined to try his fortunes in a big city, he will perhaps make friends, in so far as he can properly, with the salesmen of the large city commission and jobbing houses who sell goods to his employer. Many of these salesmen are very influential men in the houses where they are employed; some of them are men who find it more profitable to sell goods on commission than to accept partnerships in the firms for which they work. I have known of several boys who have attracted the attention of New York salesmen by their bright and attractive manners, and by their evident knowledge of their business, and have secured employment in New York through their influence. This, however, is not a way that it would be safe for a boy to count on. It is only the exceptional boy who will get to New York in this way.

Sometimes a boy's employer may help him to get a place in New York, if he likes the boy, and has influence with some of the big wholesale establishments, or the boy may have personal or family friends whose influence may secure him the coveted place. This is the age of the summer boarder, and the country boy may be so fortunate as to be thrown every summer into acquaintance with city people who, if they become interested enough, may help him in his ambitions. But, after all, few country boys can command enough influence to get places in the city. The country boy, then, must go to New York armed with the best recommendations that he can obtain from his former employers, and with as much experience as possible. He must also have personal letters from his father or other guardian, and from the pastor of the church which he attends, and perhaps one from his last school teacher as to his mental progress and attainments. Not every business man would ask to see all of these, but it is best to be fully prepared.

If he have some friend to whose house he can go, he will be more fortunate than most boys who come to New York, but he should at least have some known objective point to which to go on his arrival. If there is no friend to whose house he can go, at least temporarily, until he can find a suitable boarding-house, he should endeavor to secure through trustworthy friends the address of some such house, and, previous to leaving home, he should make arrangements for staying at least a week or two there. If none of these things be possible for him, he may have to depend on the advice of the clergyman to whom his own pastor will have given him a letter. Perhaps there is no better way of establishing a headquarters for himself, a place and people to tie up to, than by identifying himself at the start with the Y.M.C.A. A letter enclosing a stamp for a reply to the Secretary of the New York Branch, Twenty-third Street and Fourth Avenue, will soon put him in possession of a great deal of useful information. Five dollars will make him a member for one year, and give him many advantages, among others, what will be immediately available, a directory of cheap but respectable boarding-houses, and an employment bureau. Unless a boy has exceptional facilities he will easily save the cost of joining in the first few weeks after coming to the city in the advice and opportunities afforded him.

The first thing that the country boy will have to consider is where and how to live. As a matter of fact it is a question which rapidly resolves itself into a choice of hall bedrooms in boarding-houses. For in no other way can he live so well within the income that he is likely to earn. The best way is to spend as little as is consistent with decency and getting enough to eat, at least until employment is secured, and then the style of living can be improved if the wages warrant it. They probably will not warrant it until after a year or two. Good board and clean beds can be secured in New York for as low as five dollars a week, and an occasional landlady will be met who will put up a plain bread and butter lunch to be taken to business without extra charge. This is the kind of landlady for whom the country boy must look. Washing and car fares will amount to a dollar or a dollar and a half more, depending on the amount of clean clothes required, and the distance of his boarding-house from his place of business when he gets one.

The young adventurer having now found a place to eat and sleep in, and where he may leave his satchel, can start out with the knowledge that he must find a place where he can earn at least six or seven dollars a week to begin on. And then he will have nothing over for clothes, repairs, emergencies, and last of all for spending money. Eight dollars a week is about the smallest sum on which a self-respecting boy, well brought up, and accustomed to decent living, can keep himself going. For the first year, if he is well stocked with clothes, he could perhaps, with a little assistance from home, manage to scrape along on seven or even six, but such an experience would be pleasanter to look back on than to pass through.

Boys beginning at the beginning in large commercial houses generally get about three or four dollars a week if they are in the stock, and from five to seven dollars if they are in the office. But a boy who goes into the stock and learns it, and how to sell it to customers, has acquired a knowledge of a business, while a boy who goes into the office learns how to become a book-keeper only. For this reason a knowledge of some sort of stock is very valuable to the boy from the country. If he can go into a business house and make himself immediately useful, instead of merely helping around while he is learning about the goods that the house deals in, he may be able to earn enough at the start to support himself.

It is the office, however, which is very apt to capture the country boy, because it offers wages on which a boy can at least sustain life. Almost any boy who has worked in a country store has picked up some knowledge of book-keeping, and book-keeping is taught theoretically in many high-schools, as well as in the countless business "colleges" of the country. It is not difficult, therefore, for a boy to obtain sufficient knowledge of its rudiments to be able to take the first position above that of office-boy. To fill such a place, however, he must be bright, neat, prompt, attentive, write a good hand, and be quick at figures. Though a boy may fill the bill in all these particulars, and not be[Pg 1063] able to find work at once, he will succeed in the end, keep his place when he gets it, and win promotion. He will look through the advertisements for help wanted in the daily papers, and answer all such as seem to come from good houses.

He must, however, beware of a too common kind of swindler—the smooth-tongued man who offers to get a boy a place for a money consideration. He usually works in with a partner who runs a mythical business, and engages the victim at an unexpectedly large salary. The happy boy pays over all his savings to the agent, and suddenly finds himself discharged on some trumped-up charge, or comes down-town next day to find the office locked and employer and "business" flown. Sometimes this game is worked by the "employer" alone, who requires a deposit, usually accurately gauged to the amount the victim has or can raise, as a guarantee of faithfulness in a position of trust. The trust turns out to be entirely on the part of the employé, and he soon finds himself without job or money.

Many business houses, however, never advertise for help—most of them have a list of applications of portentous length, from which they can choose people who come recommended by friends or employé's. It is well to make as many friends as you can, and to ask them to let you know of any vacancies likely to occur. It is permissible to go to a business house and to apply for a place. This sort of work is very discouraging, yet I have known of many places obtained in just that way.

I knew a boy, an Englishman, a stranger in the country, who in less than a day's seeking got a place as entry-clerk at five dollars a week in a large notions house. He lived on it, I don't know how, and I fancy he would have difficulty in explaining, for six months, and then applied for an increase. The firm, which was noted for its close methods, refused; and the English lad, who was nearly desperate, simply resigned and walked into the place next door and applied for work. There was nothing for him there, nor next door, but before he had gone two blocks he found employment at seven dollars a week. The firm was doing a large business, which necessitated his staying until seven or eight o'clock two or three evenings a week. On such occasions he received fifty cents supper money. This boy shared a furnished room in Brooklyn with a friend, and took his meals at cheap restaurants. His extra fifty cents was, therefore, clear gain. The boys who boarded did not fare so well. One of them, however, was able to find a boarding-house near enough for him to go to it for all his meals, and so secured the same benefit, and, in addition, all the advantages that come with having a settled home and regular habits. This boy, too, had secured a place with no more influence than that of the roommate his slender finances compelled him to take when he came to the city looking for work. Both of these boys were unusually bright. Though they had to work hard, they found time to study at night. The English boy studied mechanical drawing, and is now a successful designer in an architectural iron-works. The other boy studied medicine, and is now a resident physician in a large hospital. A third boy in the same office is now an editor. A fourth is a successful life-insurance canvasser, and has lately insured the lives of the other three. All four of these boys would rather have been in the stock, but they couldn't afford to live on the low wages they would have had to take. They were too ambitious to remain clerks, and so fitted themselves for other employments. A fifth boy had not sufficient application or ambition to follow their example, and a short time ago he was still a book-keeper, and was making not over twenty dollars a week—not a rapid advance in fourteen years. A sixth boy staid in the office until he was earning ten dollars a week, lived on eight, and saved two. When he had a hundred dollars he applied for a place in the stock. As he had been four years with the firm, and was twenty-one years old, they gave him six dollars a week to begin on. This, with the money he had saved, enabled him to live as well as the year before. The following year he was raised to eight dollars; in six months, to twelve; six months later, to fifteen, and he is now head of his department and buyer for a large importing house. He receives a salary of five thousand a year, and a share in the profits of his department, which amounts to as much. He makes two trips every year to Europe, and has all his expenses paid while he is travelling for the house. Of those six boys, the parents of only two lived in the city.

Thus far I have treated only of the chances in wholesale mercantile establishments, such as deal in dry goods, hardware, and so forth. These, however, form only a small portion of the business enterprises in New York. There are banking houses, manufacturing concerns, publishing houses, insurance companies, and hosts of agents for anything and everything, not to mention the great number of retail stores, all of which employ clerical assistance, and in any one of which the country lad looking for work may suddenly find himself employed. It is a saying, as true as it is old, that it is the unexpected that happens.

I know a boy who had lived all his life in the city, whose parents were people of position and influence. He spent three weeks, working six hours a day, in calling upon every business man he knew, or whom his father knew, or to whom he could get letters of introduction, asking for work, and finally found it through a young fellow of his own age whom he had met casually during his previous summer vacation. So it may be with the country boy. The opening, when it does come, may be in the very opposite direction from that in which he is looking. If he is wise he will slip into it, however different it may be from what he wants. He will at least be earning money, and can keep up his search for what he does want until he finds it. If he is faithful and energetic he will gain the approval of his employers, and be able to take a city reference with him when he leaves for the "something better."

He may even find that there are unsuspected opportunities in the place that seemed so unpromising to him when he took it. A great deal depends upon the boy. Some boys will rise more quickly in one place than in another. The boy who is bound to rise will get to the top no matter where he finds himself. Few boys would take a position behind the counter in a retail store if they could get anything better, yet some clerks rise to be floor-walkers, and some floor-walkers rise to be buyers, and some buyers become partners and proprietors and amass great wealth.

I know one young man who had a good position in a wholesale hardware house, who gave it up to take a place at lower wages in a retail store. He argued that as the retail hardware business was not one which usually attracted energetic and ambitious young men he would meet with little competition from his fellow clerks. He was right. They knew only one side of hardware, the retail side. He knew hardware inside and out. He soon found that he knew more than the proprietor, and showed him how he could buy to better advantage. Then he said he thought he would go back to his old place, but his employer offered him an interest in the business, and he staid.

I know another boy who had some experience in retail clothing in an interior town. He came to New York, answered an advertisement, and obtained work in a large retail clothing house here. Then he studied clothes. When he had learned all about clothes, he studied cloths. He made friends with young men of his own age who were employed in importing houses and commission houses, and learned the difference between English cloths and French cloths and American cloths. Whenever he could he would go into other clothing stores, price their goods, perhaps try on a suit, and observe their methods. One day a fellow-salesman came to him, and said: "I have just come into a legacy of twenty thousand dollars, and I am going into business on my own account. But all I know is how to sell ready-made clothes. I know very little about cloth, and nothing about manufacturing or buying clothes. If you will come with me and attend to that end of the business, I will give you a two-fifths interest." That firm now imports its foreign cloths direct, and its American goods are manufactured to its order.

Such are the stories of a few boys whom I know. They show how some boys came to the city to seek employment and found it, and may serve to show the way to others.[Pg 1064]

THE HORSE OF THE SHEIK OF THE MOUNTAIN OF SINGING SANDS.

With the money which they secured from the spoils of the Arab tribe, Ducardanoy, the ventriloquist, and Bouchardy, the prestidigitateur, purchased a fine vineyard at Nouvelle Saar-Louis. The story of the manner in which they had acquired their money passed from mouth to mouth among the European population, and at length the Arabs of the town heard it, and repeated it to their brethren of the desert. At times the ex-chiropodists saw strange Arabs loitering in the road before their premises and regarding the house with careful scrutiny, but the garrison was not far away and no acts of violence were committed. It was nearly a year, however, before they ceased to have apprehensions of poniard thrusts in the back or of awaking to find their house in flames.

"It is plain," said Ducardanoy, as they were celebrating the anniversary of their arrival at Nouvelle Saar-Louis by a dinner to their friends, "that those fellows regard us as magicians of great power, else they would have sought revenge before this."

"I don't know about that," said Bouchardy. "Everybody here is well acquainted with our story, and I'll wager that the frightened tribesmen themselves now know that there was nothing supernatural in the entertainment to which we treated them. It is the proximity of the garrison that has prevented them from taking a revenge."

"I would like another encounter with the fellows in trade or in battle," said Ducardanoy. "There would be money in it, there would be money in it." And as if in answer to his wish, there was ushered in an Arab mulatto of the giant stature that characterizes the cross of the Arab and negro. He was a messenger from the Sheik of the Mountain of Singing Sands, he said, and had come to request the professional services of the two gentlemen in the case of the Sheik's horse Sunlight, who was grievously afflicted with a corn on his right forefoot. The chiropodists opened their eyes. Everybody in Algeria had heard of the stallion Sunlight, an animal whom money could not buy, and who was said to wear shoes of gold set with precious stones.

"A corn on a horse's hoof is not the same thing as a corn on a man's foot," said Ducardanoy.

"But we can cure it, nevertheless," said Bouchardy.

"Do not interfere, Bouchardy. You know nothing of surgery of the feet," said Ducardanoy, scornfully. "I shall require more pay for curing a corn on a horse's hoof than I would in the case of a man."

"The Sheik will fill your mouth with gold," said the messenger.

The Sheik's camp was pitched in the open desert, and the men of science vainly looked about in every direction for the far-famed hill against whose western face lay an immense heap of sand that hummed and sung whenever its surface was disturbed and sent sliding downward. The Sheik was himself troubled with a bad foot, due to his imprudently wearing a pair of razor-toed patent-leather shoes presented to him by the General commanding the department, and Ducardanoy was asked to relieve him before examining the golden-shod horse.

"Where is the Mountain of Singing Sands?" asked Ducardanoy, as he finished tying the last bandage on the Sheik's foot.

"We do not always camp in one place, you know," said the Sheik; "but you will see it shortly."

"How so?" asked Ducardanoy, in surprise. "It is not visible on the horizon, and must be a day's journey. How shall I see it shortly?"

"You will see it as the Evil One flies through the air with your soul on the way to the abode of the lost. Mustapha, bring out Sunlight and his consort, and make ready to drag these infidels asunder."

The chiropodists turned pale as this command was given, and the horses were brought forth, one a dapple gray with gold shoes, the other a dapple gray with silver shoes, and they had not yet uttered a word when the Sheik's retainers advanced to bind them.

"Stop!" cried Ducardanoy. "Why are we to be killed? What is our crime?"

"Do you not remember the time when by your devilish arts you frightened some true believers at the Roman tower and took their property? The Sheik of that tribe was my nephew, and even if he were no kin of mine, you infidel dogs should die for robbing true believers."

"When death is a punishment," said Bouchardy, "it is where the man desires to live and cannot, for if he desires to die, death can be no punishment. Now when you subject us to the slow torture of being pulled apart by these horses, we hail death with delight as a relief to pain, and your punishment has failed."

The Sheik scowled and said nothing.

"Where death comes quickly and without pain," continued Bouchardy, "the desire to live is intense, and death is all that the utmost hate can ask for as a revenge."

"Why do you point out these things to us?" asked the Sheik's vizier. "If what you say is true, why do you point out to us a way to make your punishment more terrible?"

"To show you how much wiser we Frenchmen are than you Arabs. To make you see how hopeless is the design you witless Arabs cherish of driving the wise French from the land. If my sorrow can accomplish anything for the republic, I willingly endure it."

"Let them be shot, and at once," growled the Sheik.

"I crave a boon," said Bouchardy. "We have cured your painful foot, and we have the right to ask a boon."

"If it be nothing that interferes with your death before the edge of the sun touches the horizon it shall be granted."

"It is that we be shot with my revolver, and I be allowed to load it."

The revolver was loaded, and the Sheik himself stepped forth and aimed it at Bouchardy.

Bang!

"Ha! ha!" laughed Bouchardy, and opening his mouth, he dropped out the bullet.

Bang! went a second chamber of the revolver.

"Ha! ha!" laughed Bouchardy again, and again he dropped a bullet from his mouth.

"Ha! ha!" chuckled a big dromedary at the right of the Sheik, and the man turned in startled fright and fired at the animal.

"Ha! ha!" said the dromedary, and Bouchardy stepped up to it, and opening its mouth, produced the bullet.

"Ha! ha!" said the dromedary. "Ha! ha!" said the donkey of the Sheik's favorite wife. "Ha! ha!" said the horse of the vizier.

"Dogs, scoundrels, cowards!" sneered the dromedary.

Bang! But not the bang of the revolver, and the flint-lock of the vizier was smoking, and the dromedary had fallen, and its life blood was pouring out on the sand. Bang! bang! went other flint-locks. Bullets whizzed by Bouchardy'a ears, and he did not take them out of his mouth.

"Hold!" came a voice from the mouth of the dying camel. "The curse of Allah is on the tribe. He has loosed the Singing Sands from their place, and they are sweeping over the desert to overwhelm you. Listen!"

Guns that had been raised to the position of aim were lowered, half-drawn swords dropped back into their scabbards, and all listened as a low hum was heard in the distance, and rapidly began to grow louder and nearer.

"I see it," cried Ducardanoy. "Fly! fly!"

The Arabs rushed wildly to their steeds. Bouchardy and Ducardanoy sprang upon Sunlight and Moonlight and spurred away to the north, and the Arabs rushed away to the west, and the hum of the approaching Singing Sands, if it was still sounding, was drowned in the confusion. It was not until they had ridden half an hour that Bouchardy and Ducardanoy saw the Arabs pause in their flight and finally turn northward.

"They have begun to suspect that we outwitted them, and are after us," said Ducardanoy.

"Let them come," said Bouchardy. "There is not a horse in Africa that can catch us."

W. A. Curtis.
[Pg 1065]

It is to be regretted that the New York I.S.A.A., at its meeting two weeks ago, failed to take any decisive action in regard to the formation of a National Interscholastic Association, for an enterprise of this nature requires much time and thought to ensure success, and in order to hold a creditable field day next June preparations for the gathering should be begun at once. We may confidently count, however, on definite action being taken at the meeting to be held a fortnight hence, and then the work will be pushed along rapidly, and the plans hitherto merely talked of will be crystallized into permanent form. That the various scholastic associations all over the country are anxious to have the scheme put through there is no doubt. The Maine and the California associations have already given notice, through their secretaries, of their desire to join a National Association, and similar informal notifications have come from the New England, the Pennsylvania, the Connecticut, and the Iowa associations. I would suggest that all other interscholastic associations whose sentiments lean in this direction communicate informally with this Department, giving the name and address of some member with whom the N.Y.I.S.A.A. committee on preliminary organization may correspond as soon as they organize, and these communications will be submitted to the proper officers of the N.Y.I.S.A.A. in due time.

One of the questions that must come up at the outset, and that as a matter of fact has already come up in the informal discussions of the subject, is whether membership in the proposed National Association shall be restricted to State and city I.S.A.A.'s, or open, as well, to individual schools. It were better at first, I think, that membership be restricted to associations; that is, that the larger body be made up of smaller organizations, which in turn are composed of individual institutions. Then the competitors at the national meeting would represent the best and strongest athletic talent of the State and city leagues—men who had earned their right to compete by having won in their event at their own State or city contest.

Some sort of exception could be made in favor of large schools that do not belong to any association, or whose association, should they be members of one, could not for some reason send a team to the national meeting. The question will come up for decision in the case of the Oakland High-School of California. This school belongs to the Academic Athletic League of the Pacific Coast, and is imbued with sufficient sporting spirit to wish to come East, and enter the National Interscholastic lists. The A.A.L. might hesitate at undertaking to send a team to New York on account of the expense; but because the A.A.L. cannot send a representative team is no reason why the O.H.-S. should not be allowed to compete. As a matter of fact any team representative of the A.A.L. would be largely made up of O.H.-S. athletes. It is very probable, however, that the A.A.L. will be perfectly willing, and even anxious, to have the O.H.-S. team come East (at its own expense), as the representative not only of the Oakland School, but of the entire Academic League. It could place its reputation in much worse hands. But whatever the A.A.L.'s inclination may be, the organizers of the National Association must formulate some rule that shall cover this and similar cases, or they will find themselves constantly called upon to solve knotty and complicated questions.

The New York interscholastic football season is more backward this year than ever before. There seems to be almost no interest in the game except here and there, and several schools have announced that they will not even put teams in the field. Harvard School is one of those. The reason given is that the principal considers the game as played now too rough for his pupils. A member of the school, however, asserts that the true reason is that the Harvard scholars are not good enough at the game for the school to stand any chance in the league contests, should it enter. There is a good deal too much of the desire to win "prizes" in most of our local scholastic athletics which ought to be strongly discouraged. It is regrettable to have to admit it, but I am persuaded that if it should be announced that only ribbons would be given as prizes at all future track-athletic games, five-eighths of those who go into the games at present would cease to take any interest in the sports. As a purifier of athletics I think the ribbon system might be a good thing to try.

The Long Island Association, like its cousin on this side of the river, has decided to adopt the Yale-Princeton football rules. This is fortunate, because it will save considerable trouble in view of the Inter-City games, and we should always be glad when we can get rid of an element of dispute. For the Fates only know that there are enough squabbles in athletics already without borrowing any from the colleges or anywhere else. And, besides, the Yale-Princeton rules are the most suitable for the schools in this section. In New England it is different, for the presence and influence of Harvard there enter into the question.

The St. Mark's eleven is making every effort to get into form for the game with its old rival, Groton, and in its preliminary games thus far the men have shown up well. White is a veteran, and is playing again at full-back, where he did good work last year. The previous season he was at quarter-back, but his punting makes him a more desirable man further back. Nash is playing right half-back, and Captain Mills will probably play left half. Nash is a new man on the team, but has improved greatly since the beginning of the season. Hatch is another novice on the first eleven, but had some practice at quarter-back on the second last year which position he will fill on the first this year. In the line, Watson, right tackle, Hare, left tackle, and Davis, right end, filled the same positions last year. The new men, Watson, Egbert, and Humphreys are all improving fast under good coaching, and there is no reason why the team should not develop into a strong one at the end of the season.

The Connecticut League has been reorganized, and now consists of the following schools: Hillhouse H.-S. and Hopkins Grammar, of New Haven; Hartford, Bridgeport, New Britain, and Waterbury high-schools; and Norwich and Suffield academies. The schedule of championship games begins on October 26th, when Hartford meets New Britain, Suffield meets Norwich, Hillhouse meets Bridgeport, and Hopkins Grammar meets Waterbury. The winners of these matches will play on November 2d, and the championship will be decided on the Yale Field a week later.

All the teams of the league have been getting good practice, and have played a number of smaller games. The Hartford H.-S. team seems to offer the greatest promise at present; but since their defeat by the Springfield H.-S. there has been a notable shake-up. Bryant is playing at tackle again, and Smith, last year's centre, is in his old place. Grant, a new man, is playing guard in Lyman's place, while Lyman has moved up one to tackle. Goodell has dropped back of the line, taking Jenkins' place, who is[Pg 1066] laid off. Morcum is holding down right end, vice Twitchell. This new arrangement will probably be in effect when Hartford lines up against Hillhouse on the 2d of next month.

For some years past there have been rumors, more or less well-founded, that certain players on teams of the Connecticut League had no business playing, and hints of pecuniary recompense were not whispered in low tones, but called out loudly. New Britain came in for a generous share of these aspersions, and from all I am able to learn richly deserved them two or three years ago. I believe, however, that a better appreciation of sportsmanship prevails there at present, and I doubt if the other schools in the league will find it necessary to protest any of the New Britain players this year.

Complaints have been made, to be sure, but upon investigation I find that the trouble arises out of the fact that the New Britain Captain has allowed two or three outsiders to play on his team in practice games (notably in the recent contest at Waterbury), rather than to jeopard his chances of victory by using weak substitutes. I am assured, however, that no such tricks will be played in any championship match. The method ought not to have been adopted even in practice. It is not sportsmanlike, and is cowardly in that the New Britain men are knowingly and unfairly taking advantage of their opponents if they allow players on their eleven who are not in regular attendance at the New Britain High-School.

By doing anything of this kind a captain not only attempts to conquer his opponents by unfair means and false representations, but he stultifies himself. He admits that he has not men good enough, or is incapable to training players who shall be strong enough, to defeat the eleven with whom he has agreed to play. He therefore secures a few good-natured, able-bodied outsiders, who are the means of earning a victory; but it is not the High-School team that has won. It is a team made up of a few High-School players and a few others. All this sounds harsh when put into cold type. The case seems so different when smoothed over with pleasant words. It is good for sport to have facts put in plain English occasionally. So far there has been no great harm done at New Britain this year, and I hope the players there will soon see the justness of restricting membership on their team to bona fide scholars. And, in passing, let me add that there are a number of other captains who may read the foregoing paragraphs to their great advantage, for this criticism is by no means intended to be particular, but general.

Next Saturday the New Britain team will play the Hillhouse High-School eleven on the Yale Field at New Haven. The game should be of interest not only because both teams are good ones, but because these two schools have not met since the championship game played in the fall of 1893, when New Britain succeeded in defeating the New Haven eleven for the championship of the League. At the time a protest was entered against a player named Wheeler, of the New Britain team, who was charged with being a professional athlete. There is little doubt that Wheeler was a professional, but the charges were not sustained at a later meeting, and the trophy went to the New Britain team.

The biggest score at football that the Harvard Varsity ever made against Exeter was 158 to 0. That was in 1886, I believe, and unless I am mistaken it is the record for big scores in a game between two regularly organized and trained elevens. Nevertheless, the P.E.A. team that was vanquished by this enormous score went down to Andover and defeated their rivals 26 to 0. This year Harvard's score against Exeter was 42 to 0, and yet there is little doubt that Andover could easily take Exeter into camp if the two schools should meet. This shows how little teams can be judged by comparing scores. The Exeter eleven this year is not a good one, and yet the figures of the Harvard game would seem to show that it is. When the play is analyzed, however, the truth is apparent. For instance, at no time during the game did Exeter succeed either in advancing the ball the necessary five yards on four downs, nor were her men able to hold Harvard for four downs, or to compel the Harvard back to punt.

The Play between each touch-down was almost identical. Exeter would kick off and the ball would be punted back by one of the 'varsity players. If the crimson forwards got down the field fast enough, as they frequently did, they secured the ball and proceeded with the play until they scored. If a P.E.A. man got the ball then Harvard would force the school-team to lose a few yards, and at the fourth down Williams would punt. Sometimes he would, and sometimes he would not, because the Exeter rush-line was seldom able to hold the college men. As soon as Harvard got the ball on a play of this kind a couple of runs around the end or dives through the centre would net a touch-down. It is surprising that the winning score was not twice as large. Two halves of fifteen minutes only were played. If I remember correctly the 158-0 game lasted two full-time halves, and in those days each half lasted three-quarters of an hour.

New leagues are springing up continually. A few days ago the three most prominent military schools of the West met in Chicago and organized the Northwestern Military School League, which is to consist of the Shattuck Military School, at Faribault, Minnesota; St. John's Military Academy, at Delafield, Wisconsin; and the Michigan Military Academy of Orchard Lake, Michigan. The organization is to cover baseball, football, and track athletics. It is to be a triangular league at present, but other schools may be admitted by unanimous vote. No arrangements have yet been made for baseball or track contests, but a football schedule has been laid out as follows: Shattuck will meet St. John's at Minneapolis or St. Paul the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and the winner will play Orchard Lake at Chicago the week following. This league ought to grow and prosper, for it is just the kind of thing that is needed among the schools of the Northwest to encourage and foster interscholastic sport.

The Inter-Preparatory League and the Cook County High-School F.B. League, of Chicago, are at present the most nourishing scholastic associations of the West. They are both strong in members, and some of the school teams are putting up good football. The Cook County H.-S.F.B. League's schedule is made out as follows:

The season of both the Chicago leagues began Saturday, as the schedules show, the Inter-Preparatory A.L. arrangement of games being in this order:

The opening game of the Junior League of Boston proved a walk-over for Newton High, whose eleven defeated Roxbury High, 30-0. The Newton team has greatly improved since Brookline High forced it out of the Senior League, and will be able to give the Brooklinites a hard tussle should they meet again. The team-work, especially, in the Roxbury game was good. Every man knew his place, and played it for all he was worth, and the interference for the backs was excellent. Roxbury, on the other hand, put up a weak game, and their rush-line seemed incapable of shutting off the Newton backs. The Roxbury ends did the best work for the visitors.

The Graduate.

Little Margaret. "Mamma, I jes b'lieve 'twas Johnny 'at broke my doll."

Mamma. "Why, dear? What makes you think so?"

Little Margaret. "'Cause he said he didn't 'thout my askin'."

The prettiest way to arrange your hair? Especially if it is very long, very thick, and a most beautiful color, yet cannot be worn hanging down in braids, because you are too tall for anything so childish, nor fastened up in a graceful Psyche knot at the back of the head, quite near the neck, because it is too heavy, and comes tumbling down at inconvenient seasons. Lovely hair, but an embarrassment of riches, is it not?

If it were my hair, and I were the dear young girl who finds it a bother and a burden, I would coil it on top of my head and wear it like a crown. I wouldn't mind its having the effect of making me look taller, and I would stand up very straight, and look as tall as I could. In my opinion height is a beauty, and I never care about a girl's being tall, except to admire her. Tall girls must mind that they carry themselves well, and do not stoop nor crane their heads forward as if they had lost something and were perpetually looking for it. You remember Tennyson's picture, do you not, a word picture such as only a poet could paint:

"A daughter of the gods,
Divinely tall, and most divinely fair."

If the coronal effect were unbecoming, or gave a feeling of weight on top of my head, then I would braid the hair in several strands, and mass it all over the back of the head. I would simply part it in the middle, and avoid fringes, and bangs, and little curls, crimps, and other attempts at decoration in front. When hair has a natural wave or ripple it is very pretty, and should have its way, but straight hair is pretty too, and girls should be satisfied to wear their hair in the style nature intended for them.

Avoid following a fashion in hair-dressing simply because it is a fashion. Simon says "up," and, presto! a hundred thousand young women alter their way of arranging their hair, and pile it steeple-fashion above their heads; Simon says "down," and in the twinkling of an eye the towers fall. Now any sensible girl can see that the shape of the head, the shape of the face, and the general style of the individual are to be taken into account in her dress, and her hair is an important part of this. Choose a style, and do not change it, except for some reason stronger than a caprice. Do not use oils or liquids of any kind on your head, and never try to change the color of your hair. Whatever its color, it is the one which best suits you, or it would not be yours. Red, golden, brown, black, flaxen, whatever be the tint, be sure it is the one tint that matches your eyes and your complexion better than any other could.

Wash your hair thoroughly and dry it well once a month. Brush it carefully for a long time every night, and braid it on retiring.

The girl with thin hair has a harder problem than the girl whose hair is thick. She must beware of straining it back and of braiding it tightly. Loose coils are best for her. The girl who insists on crimping and waving her hair should know that by wetting her hair with cologne before putting hot irons on it she can insure the waves staying in for a long time, and she must not forget that very great heat often applied will kill the life of her hair at the roots.

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Commit to Memory

the best things in Prose and Poetry, always including good Songs and Hymns. It is surprising how little good work of this kind seems to be done in the Schools, if one must judge from the small number of people who can repeat, without mistake or omission, as many as Three good songs or hymns.

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which is sent free on application to the Publishers, there are found dozens of the best things in the World, which are well worth committing to memory; and they who know most of such good things, and appreciate and enjoy them most, are really among the best educated people in any country. They have the best result of Education. For above Contents, with sample pages of Music, address

Harper & Brothers, New York.

[Pg 1068]

Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers.

At the junction of Huntington Avenue and Boylston Street is Copley Square, one of the most artistic spots in Boston, and a very convenient and popular starting-point for cycling trips into the suburbs and the outlying country. For the ride to Lexington and Concord one should leave the Library on the left, and, continuing through Dartmouth Street, turn to the left into Commonwealth Avenue. At the statue of Leif Ericson turn to the right onto Massachusetts Avenue and pass over Harvard Bridge, a mile in length. After crossing the river turn to the right at Norfolk Street, and then to the left, onto Harvard Street. You now pass a section of new asphalt road, and, approaching Harvard Square, keep to the right past the College, with the Common on the left. Among the interesting buildings of the University there stands out the commanding form of Memorial Hall, where hundreds of students board. On the left, at the beginning of Brattle Street, is the old elm, and near by it a tablet indicating the spot where Washington took command of the Continental Army. A few minutes' run out Brattle Street will bring one to the home of the poet Longfellow, opposite Longfellow Park. From Cambridge Common the ride to Arlington and Lexington is a direct road via Massachusetts Avenue. The condition of the road is good. The surface for most of the distance has been macadamized, while the other portions are gravelled and well rolled.

At the corner of Beech Street you come upon the line of march of the royal army which was sent out to capture Adams and Hancock at Lexington, and to destroy the stores collected by the patriots at Concord. From this point on almost every old house has some historic association, and occasional tablets by the road-side mark scenes of heroism. In the vicinity of Lexington the country becomes more rolling. The village itself is two hundred feet above the sea-level. Follow the main street, and pass on the left an old-time house shaded in front by two magnificent trees. This is the Monroe Tavern, where the British officers made themselves at home. On the rising ground to the rear of this house were some of Lord Percy's fieldpieces. Shortly after you come to the village green, where the first stand was made for liberty, and where there has been erected a beautiful monument in memory of the first Revolutionary martyrs. To the right, and a short distance from the Common on the road to Bedford, is the old Hancock-Clarke house, in which were Hancock and Adams when the royal troops approached Lexington. From the Common keep to the left on Lincoln Street to the Five Corners. There turn to the right, into Marrett Street, and then turning to the left there is a straight way into Concord by the Lexington road. At Merriam's Corner, not far from Concord, is a stone marking the beginning of the British retreat. Passing this, and entering the village, you come upon the green where stands the old Wright Tavern, a popular place for wheelmen to dine. A run should be made out Monument Street, past the Thoreau House, to the monument which marks the fight at the bridge. It is located on a lane leading from the left of Monument Street, and a sign at its entrance gives you the cue.

In coming back to Boston follow the same route to the Five Corners, and there turn to the right into School Street, and to the right again into Waltham Street. Here[Pg 1069] the rider has before him a long and gradually descending road with excellent surface and good coasting most of the way to Waltham. Keep on the direct road until Main Street is reached, and there turn to the left, following Main Street into Watertown. Then turn to the right into North Beacon Street. This is practically the continuation of Commonwealth Avenue, and the rider can now follow a direct way to Dartmouth Street, where, turning to the right, he passes into Copley Square.

Distances are: Boston to Arlington, seven miles; to Lexington, five miles; to Concord, six miles; to Waltham, nine miles; to Watertown, three miles; to Boston, seven miles; in all, thirty-seven miles.

NOT ENCOURAGING.

A French paper tells of a discouraging experience an ambitious young tenor once had when trying to show what kind of a voice he had to a manager. After he had sounded three or four notes the manager stopped him.

"There, that will do," he said; "leave me your address. I will bear you in mind in case of emergency."

"What do you call a case of emergency?"

"Well, supposing my theatre got on fire."

"Eh?"

"Yes; I should engage you to sing out, Fire! fire!"

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STAMPS! 300 fine, mixed Victoria, Cape of G. H., India, Japan, etc., with fine Stamp Album, only 10c. New 80-p. Price-list free. Agents wanted at 50% commission. STANDARD STAMP CO., 4 Nicholson Place, St. Louis, Mo. Old U. S. and Confederate Stamps bought.

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Thoroughly revised, classified, and indexed, will be sent by mail to any address on receipt of ten cents.[Pg 1070]

The Game of the Ring.

Vincent V. M. Beede, R.T.F.

A Prize-Puzzle Story.

When I was going to St. Ives, you know about my meeting with that man who had seven wives. Well, the man, wives, sacks, cats, kits, and the rest were coming from St. Ives, and, being interested, I sat down by the road-side and asked the party about their journey thither. And this is what the man told me:

"It's a roundabout journey, this one from St. Ives, and queer things are to be seen on the way. Why, we came through a county in North Carolina (1) where nobody ever slept, and we saw on a sign-board this:

"'Be cordial to all your fellow-beings. Just cordial, and no more. Before counting them as friends, be sure you can trust them, and are certain of their true and generous confidence.'

"Notice.—Take every ninety-ninth word in the foregoing, arrange them in the order in which they are written, and you will have a good maxim (2).

"We crossed a lake in Michigan (3) that belongs to a drum corps; a river of Spain (4) that school-children play on astride a fence; a river of France (5) that ought to be a prison; through a county in Scotland (6) that bald-headed people should go to; and through another county in Illinois (7) that one could use to furnish his house with.

"We saw an island of Greece (8) that would not hold water, and a lake in Minnesota (9) that would not either, but you could play tennis with the latter. Beside a lake in Scotland (10) that is always the latest style, we saw another sign board bearing this:

"'I will not go there. I don't care where it is. If he asks me, I'll say no. He is like a child in regard to wisdom. Why, I never heard of the like! But I'll say no with perfect frankness.'

"Notice—Certain words in this sign form an old adage (11).

"A river in Russia (12) that is always all right was so high we had to be ferried across, and the boatman told us this:

"'A well-known, useful guide am I;
I am both far and near;
I travel fast, slow, up, and down.
To naught do I adhere.
I'm daily sought by rich and poor,
My home's both low and high;
I'm sometimes seen, and yet unseen,
Sometimes in depths I lie' (13).

"Not being an island of Michigan (14) I was not taken in by his tale, and guessed the answer quicker than river in Australia (15) believe I could—with so many wives, and river of Cuba (16) children, not one of whom is an island off the Mexican coast (17). One of my wives indulged in a game of island off the Cuban coast (18). She lost heavily, and when I chided her she was as short as pie crust made with lake in Iowa (19), and she shut me up like a mountain in Utah (20).

"This last happened only yesterday. I tell you, if the road to St. Ives is as bad as that from there, you have no envious journey. My wives have fallen to quarrelling. I see one river of Tennessee (21) another. I must box their ears with the island of Australia (22) of my hand. Good-day, sir."

As I resumed my journey to St. Ives I early found the prediction of the man of seven wives true. Here is a sample of one of the guide-board signs:

"I once was seen in water, but by substituting one verb for another I am now beheld on land." (23).

Do you wonder I never reached St. Ives?

In this story are four riddles and nineteen geographical names. Clews to the former are given, and the latter are described in the text, the catch being in the double meaning of the geographical name. Four prizes are offered for best solutions: $10 to the first, and $15 divided according to merit among the next ten. Put your name, address, and age at the top of the sheet, and write the answers, one below another, numbering each. Post solution not later than December 2, 1895. Address Harper's Round Table, New York. Only persons may send answers who have not passed their eighteenth birthday, but grown persons may help you find answers. Names of prize-winners, with correct answers, will be published in Harper's Round Table for December 31, 1895.

Answers to Kinks.

No. 106

1. Poppy. 2. Mayflower. 3. Boneset. 4. Butter-and-eggs. 5. Cardinal-flower. 6. Milkweed. 7. Sweet-william. 8. Jack-in-the-Pulpit. 9. Deer Grass (dear grass). 10. Marigold (marry gold) 11. Skull-cap. 12. Lady's-tresses. 13. Dandelion (dandy lion). 14. Black-eyed Susan. 15. Ragged-sailor. 16. Wandering-jew. 17 Mint. 18 Dutchman's-breeches. 19 Pennyroyal. 20 Shamrock 21. Bachelor's-buttons. 22 Tulips (two lips). 23. Honeysuckle. 24. Foxglove. 25. Lady's-slipper. 26. Rose (rows). 27. Pickerel-weed. 28 Phlox (flocks). 29. Arrow-head.

Grace V. Bedinger.
2 Forrester Street, Salem, Mass.

Fruits in Old Jamaica.

Fred L. Hawthorne.
Garden House, Kingston, Jamaica.

An excellent morsel. The Table thanks Sir Fred.

A Visit to a Marble-Mill.

James Maynard, R.T.K.
Knoxville, Tennessee.

Want Corner.

Harold P. Daniels, 73 East 127th Street, New York, collects beetles, and wants to hear from others in the United States and Canada who do the same. M. S. Newman, 722 East Ninth, New York, wants to receive sample copies of amateur papers. Jessie Loomis and Mabel Moreland, Box 156, Creston, Iowa, publish Our Own Idea, an amateur paper of much merit, and they want to exchange with other amateur publishers.

Wallace Gibbs, Galva, Ill., publishes The Sunbeam, a neat eight-page monthly. He offers to send us a morsel on the experiences of an amateur publisher, if we want it. We want it, Sir Wallace. Send it along. Tell us the discouragements, the pleasure, and the advantages. R. L. Miller, Jun., asks if an autograph of President Diaz is wanted by the Table. Yes, it is. Can you favor us with one?[Pg 1071]

THE HALLOWEEN WITCHES

BY MAMIE A. DENTON.

Mildred and Naomi Dean sat at opposite sides of a large room; Naomi with her fingers in her ears, and her elbows resting upon her knees, while Mildred gazed out of the window with dreamy eyes. The two girls were in search of ideas for a Halloween party: they were twin witches, born on witches' night, or Halloween, and had given regulation Halloween parties since their babyhood. Now they wanted a change, and after eagerly reading everything on the subject that came within their reach, they had finally decided to "think something out" themselves.

"It's no use," Mildred exclaimed, suddenly. "I can't think of a single thing except that we must have a party. Aren't you blest with an idea yet, Naomi?" she shouted.

Naomi turned slowly, taking her fingers from her ears. "Yes, I believe I am, but I don't know how you will like it. Why can't we have the girls all come dressed as witches, and then we can give a prize to the most bewitching?"

"The very thing, you dear little conjurer. That idea is worth elaborating, and you know I just exist to elaborate your ideas. Now wait till I finish my part."

Mildred ran to her desk, and was soon deep in its mysteries—wonderful things had been known to come from this desk. When she finally arose she handed Naomi two neat invitations, one of which read:

Two Weird Sisters of Halloween.
(Mildred and Naomi Dean.)

"Oh," said Naomi, when she had read the invitation, "it is too bad not to give the prize to the most attractive witch."

"No," replied Mildred; "witches are supposed to be ugly, and I think the one who wears the finest costume should pay the price of her own vanity. Now read the other invitation."

Naomi read it slowly aloud:

Two Weird Sisters,
(Mildred and Naomi Dean.)

"What do you think of my specimens?" asked Mildred.

"I think they are very brilliant elaborations," Naomi answered; "but I must see Nina, and caution her not to tell her brother what she is going to wear. Yes, I am glad that none of the rest are brothers and sisters."

On the night of the thirty-first the home of the Deans was brilliantly lighted, and the grounds were full of weird lights and mysterious music. The boys were the first to arrive, and were ushered into the front parlor, where they were commanded to stay until invited to come out. The girls were shown upstairs to a room where a card with a large white number upon it was pinned to each costume. When the boys were admitted to the back parlor the witches were drawn up in line with masks on, and numbers conspicuously displayed. The two weird sisters, unmasked, and making no attempt to conceal their identity, passed slips of paper to each gentleman, and explained that he must write the number of the one who most nearly represented his idea of a witch, and also the number of her whom he considered the most attractive. One of the boys complained that this was not fair, as they were not allowed to see the faces. When the votes were counted, and the prizes awarded, the signal was given, and the masks were dropped, amid much surprise, laughter, and applause.

The young lady who received the prize as the ugliest witch proved to be one of the most charming when unmasked, and the "booby" was a perfect vision of loveliness in a long red cloak and steeple-crowned hat. She surveyed her pretty face complacently in the hand-mirror which was given as the "booby" prize.

An impromptu programme was rendered, in which the little "booby" recited "The Elf Child," the "ugliest witch" and the "two weird sisters" gave the witch scene from Macbeth, and several weird songs were sung by different members of the company. The rest of the evening was given up to fortune-telling, witchcraft, and charms. The young people voted the party a "grand success," and the two weird sisters the most bewitching of all the witches.

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HARPER'S PERIODICALS.

Per Year:

Booksellers and Postmasters usually receive subscriptions. Subscriptions sent direct to the publishers should be accompanied by Post-office Money Order or Draft.

HARPER & BROTHERS, New York, N.Y.

How many of us know where Ipswich, England, is? An exhibition of stamps has just been opened there which must be fine, as English collectors value the stamps exhibited at over $100,000. A few years ago the New York collectors made an exhibit at the Eden Musee on Twenty-third Street, which probably called the attention of thousands to the "old postage-stamp craze," and led to the making of hundreds of new recruits in this absorbing hobby. Perhaps the same collectors may make another exhibit. If they obtain the assistance of some of the New England collectors the exhibit would be one of the finest ever seen. One gentleman in Maine has a collection valued at over $200,000, consisting chiefly of the great rarities.

Philatus.
[Pg 1072]

TWO GLANCES FROM THE ELEVATED RAILROAD.

At first glance our hearts ached to see such a sweet little girl so terribly afflicted; but

a second glance revealed the real owner of the feet in the person of the fond papa, who was thus securing a few moments to read his paper.

A QUESTION.

Willie. "Don't the little Esquimau boys live on oil?"

Mamma. "Yes, Willie."

Willie. "And do they always have a big lump of sugar after it for dessert?"

"EARLY ENGLISH."

From wise professors, Brother Ned,
In the college town,
Was learning "early English."
My! how it made him frown!
While baby sister Annie
Cooed at home in glee,
In purest early English—
'Twas as easy as could be!

Some Irishmen are naturally stupid, but their mistakes are at times so humorous as to provoke a laugh, which makes one forget the more serious part of the error. Recently a son of Ireland went out rowing on a lake at a famous summer resort. A stiff northwest wind came up, and not being skilful with the oars, in a short time his boat shipped considerable water.

A brilliant idea then seized him, and taking the butt end of the oar he battered away at the planks in the bottom of the boat, finally knocking a hole in them. Fortunately for him a steam-launch with a pleasure party aboard came along and rescued him as his boat sank. Upon being asked why on earth he drove a hole through the boat, he replied:

"An' phwat else would yez do? Sure the boat was half full of water, an' so oi knocked a hole in the bottom to let it out; but, yez see, there was so much more water in the lake that the little bit of a stream in my boat had no chance to get out."

Some time ago I read a little anecdote of Longfellow which illustrated his love for children. It seems that one little fellow in particular was fond of spending his time in the great poet's library. One day, after a long and patient perusal of the titles (to him great cumbersome works) that lined the shelves, the little chap walked up to Longfellow, and asked in a grieved sort of way, "Haven't you got a Jack the Giant Killer?" Longfellow regretted to say that in all his immense library he did not have a copy.

The little chap looked at him in a pitying way, and silently left the room.

The next morning he walked in with a couple of pennies tightly clasped in his chubby fist, and laying them down, told the poet that he could now buy a Jack the Giant Killer of his own.

We hear of veterans who have survived the wars of years ago, but here is a poor old veteran of the civil war, and it is claimed the only one living of his kind. His name is Ned, and he was captured near Washington by a scouting party from General Jubal Early's corps. For years Ned has taken part in the different memorial events and parades of the G.A.R. But during a recent parade in Louisville his declining years prevented his marching to the stirring music of the bands.

It grieved the poor old fellow's heart so that, as a compromise, his comrades provided him with a float, upon which he mounted, and was dragged through the streets, his kindly old head nodding to the time of the band. As you have doubtless guessed, Ned is an old war-horse, and it is said he has missed but one Decoration-day parade, and has reached the ripe old age of forty years.

Mother (to Albert, who came home from school looking very blue). "Why, you appear unhappy, Albert. Didn't you learn your lessons to-day?"

Albert. "Oh yes, I learned not to be sassy!"

Little Alice heard her father say that her Cousin Jack has the small-pox, and exclaimed, "Oh, papa, I think it's real mean of Jack not to send me any."

Papa. "Jack, what are you crying about?"

Jack. "The conjurer at the circus to-day took five pigeons out of my hat, and kept them for himself."

Tom. "Papa, I want a bicycle."

Papa. "Well, Tom, and what will you furnish towards getting it?"

Tom (thinking deeply a moment). "I'll furnish the wind for the tires."

KEPT HIS WORD.

To the pranks played by college boys there seems to be no end, and Professors are still suffering as much as ever from the undergraduate trick. An amusing tale comes from Edinburgh, in this connection.

An examiner at Edinburgh University had made himself obnoxious by warning the students against putting their hats on his desk. The university in the Scottish capital is remarkable for a scarcity of cloak rooms, and in the excitement of examinations hats are, or used to be, flung down anywhere.

The examiner announced one day that if he ever found another hat on his desk he would rip it up. The next day no hats were laid there when the students assembled. Presently, however, the examiner was called out of the room. Then some naughty undergraduate slipped from his seat, got the examiner's own hat, and placed it on his desk. When the examiner re-entered the hall, every eye was fixed upon him. He observed the hat, and a gleam of triumph shot across his face.

"Gentlemen," he said, "I told you what would happen if this occurred again." Then he took his penknife from his pocket, opened it, and blandly cut the hat in pieces, amidst prolonged applause. What he said when he discovered that he had destroyed his own hat the story does not say.