Project Gutenberg's Harper's Young People, January 18, 1881, by Various
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Title: Harper's Young People, January 18, 1881
An Illustrated Monthly
Author: Various
Release Date: January 5, 2014 [EBook #44597]
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, JAN 18, 1881 ***
Produced by Annie R. McGuire
[Illustration: HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE
AN ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY.]
* * * * *
VOL. II.--NO. 64. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. PRICE FOUR
CENTS.
Tuesday, January 18, 1881. Copyright, 1881, by HARPER & BROTHERS. $1.50
per Year, in Advance.
* * * * *
[Illustration: DUTCH SLEIGH-RIDING.]
WHO GOT THE MITTEN?
BY ROSE TERRY COOKE.
"DEER ANT ROXY,--Ive hed consider'ble many calls for mittins along
back this Winter: mostly they're wove goods, thet dont last no
time. Its come into my head that mabbe you'd jest as lives make a
leetle suthin to buy snuff an' handkerchers with, odd times, and
reklectin you used to be a master hand to knit this is for to say
that ef you'd fall to and knit a lot of them two-threaded mittins
we boys set by so, why I could sell 'em for ye--on commission. Ef
you're agreeble why drop me a line to 117 Blank St St Josephs, you
see its mostly drovers and sech wants 'em.
"Yours to command,
"JOHN JACKSON."
"The lands sakes!" ejaculated Miss Roxy Blair, as she laid down her
spectacles after reading this letter. "John was allers the beateree for
gumption. I allers said he'd make a spoon or spile a horn, an' I do
b'lieve it's the spoon. Well said! I've got full twenty run o' blue yarn
I spun last year, an' some red: guess there won't be no white wanted in
them parts. I'll set to an' get a lot more red over to Miss Billins's.
Wonder ef she'd git wind on't, and go to makin' mittins herself?--she
beats all to question folks up. I'll tell her I'm a-goin' to teach Nance
to knit; and so I be: 'ta'n't no lie. I will teach her to knit an' help
on the mittins. It'll be suthin for her to do nights, 'stead of readin'
all the newspaper scraps she can pick up."
Nancy Peck was Miss Roxy's bound girl; the old lady lived alone in a
small brown house on a hill-side far above Bassett; a grass-grown track
ran by the house, through the woods that clothed the hill-top, over and
away into the heart of the Green Mountains.
Little Nancy had been bound out to Miss Roxana only about a year when
John Jackson's letter reached Bassett. Miss Roxy was getting old;
rheumatism had laid hold of her, and she could not hobble up and down
hill to the village any longer: so she resolved to take a young girl
into her house to wait on her.
"'Twon't cost a great deal," she said to herself. "There's the gardin
a'n't half planted; she can drop potaters as well as a man, and hill 'em
up too; and I can set more beans outside the fence; when Isr'el comes up
to spade the gardin, he can fix up a place for more beans, and Ingin
meal's cheap. Fact is, anyway, I durstn't be up here alone no longer,
and hirin' some feller or 'nother to do arrands would cost more'n it
come to. There's ma's old gownds can be cut over for her, sech as is too
ragged for me."
Having made up her mind, the old lady persuaded a neighbor who sometimes
drove by her house to mill to take her in, and leave her at the
poor-house, which was on his way, until he came back with his grist.
When he returned he found two passengers, for Miss Roxy had fixed on
Nancy for an experiment.
"'Twas Hobson's choice," she explained to Mr. Tucker, as they drove
along; "there wa'n't no other gal there. She's real small, but Miss
Simons says she's spry an' handy, and she ha'n't got nobody belongin' to
her, so's't I sha'n't be pestered with folks a-comin' round."
In six months little Nancy had become so useful that she was formally
bound out to the old lady, and now she went to school in summer half a
day, and had learned to read and write tolerably. She was very lonesome
in that solitary house. There were children at the poor-house whom she
played with, tended, and loved, but Miss Roxy had not even a cat; and
when Nancy, in the longing of her loving little heart, took a
crook-necked squash out of the shed, tied a calico rag about its neck,
and made a dolly of it to be company for her in the little garret where
she slept, Miss Roxy hunted it up--for she kept count of everything she
had--boxed Nancy's ears soundly, and cut up poor little yellow Mary Ann,
and boiled her in a pot for pies.
Until the mitten business began, Miss Roxy found it hard to find enough
work for the child's active fingers to do; but after that she had no
trouble in keeping the little girl busy, as poor Nancy found out to her
sorrow. The evenings of spring, when she used to love to sit on the
door-step with her apron over her head, and listen to the frogs peeping
in a swamp far below, were now spent in winding hanks of yarn, or
struggling, with stiff little fingers, to slip the loops off one needle
and on to another, her eyes tired with the dull light of a tallow
candle, and her head aching with the effort to learn and the slaps her
dullness earned from Miss Roxy's hard hands. It was worse as summer came
on, and she had to knit, knit, all the time, with not a minute to get
new posies for her garden. Only by early dawn did she get her chance to
watch the blue liverwort open its sunny cup; the white eggs of bloodroot
buds come suddenly out of the black ground; the tiny rows of small
flowers that children call "Dutchman's breeches" hang and flutter on
their red stems; the azure sand-violet, dancing columbine, purple
crane's-bill, lilac orchis, and queer moccasin flower make that hidden
corner gay and sweet.
Even when school began, she had to work still. Miss Roxy was determined
to send a big box of double-knit mittens to John Jackson before winter
set in; and as fast as they were finished they were dampened, pressed,
and laid away in the old hair trunk in the garret where Nancy slept.
Poor little girl! she hated the sight of mittens, and this summer a wild
wish came into her head, that grew and grew, as she sat alone at her
knitting, until it quite filled head and heart too.
A child from the city, spending the summer near Bassett, came now and
then to school as a sort of pastime, and brought with her a doll that
really went to sleep when you laid it down: shut its bright blue eyes,
and never opened them until it was taken up!
It seemed to lonely little Nancy that such a doll would be all anybody
could want in the world. If only Nancy had such a dear lovely creature
to sleep in her bed at night, and sit up in the door beside her while
she knit, she knew she would be perfectly happy; but that could never
be. However, after much dreaming, wishing, and planning, one day a
bright and desperate idea came across her. That night she asked a great
many questions of Miss Roxy, who at last gave her a sharp answer, and
told her to hold her tongue; but the child had found out all she wanted
to know and did not mind the crossness.
Next morning she got up very early, and stealing across the garret, took
an old book from a dusty pile on a shelf, then with a pair of scissors
she had brought up overnight she cut out a blank leaf, and pinned it,
carefully folded, into the pocket of her dress.
She did not go out-of-doors at the school recess, but took the pen with
which she had been writing her copy, and smoothing the paper out, wrote
this queer little letter:
"DEER GENTILMAN,--I am a poor little gurl who nits mittins for Miss
Roxy. I am bound out and I havent got no folks of my own, not so
much as a verry smal baby. I wish I had a dol. I am real lonesum.
wil you send mee a dol. My naim is Nansy Peck, and I live to Mis
Roxy Blair's house in Baset Vermonte. I nit this mittin. when I am
big I wil pay for the dol.
"NANSY PECK."
The letter once written, and waved up and down under the desk to dry,
the paper was pinned into her pocket again, and when the next pair of
mittens she knit were done, pressed, caught together with a bit of yarn,
and sent up, by her, to the trunk, the daring and odd little note was
slipped safely inside one of them, and lay there several months
undiscovered.
One bitter cold day, at the end of the next November, a young man came
hastily into John Jackson's shop in St. Joseph.
"Hullo!" he said. "I want a pair of those knit mittens of yours. I'm
ordered off to the Denver station, and they do say it's colder 'n blazes
there. Handling express packages ain't real warm work anyhow!"
And so, while little Nancy, washing potatoes for dinner, wondered who
had got her mitten with the letter in it, Joe Harris, Adams Express
Agent for Denver, was cramming the pair into his pocket. The next week a
snow-squall with a gale and a half of wind swooped down on Denver with
all fury, and the new agent's teeth chattered and his hands smarted as
he stood waiting for the train that had just whistled; he pulled the
heavy mittens out of his overcoat pocket, twitched them apart, and
sticking his left hand into one of them, found the note. He had no time
to look at it then, for there was work on hand; but that evening, in the
bare little room at the hotel, he took the letter out of his pocket,
and, big strong man that he was, two great tears hopped out of his eyes
on to the eager, anxious little letter.
"By jinks! she shall have her dolly!" he exclaimed, fetching his fist
down on the rickety table, where his lamp stood, with a thump that
almost sent lamp and all to the floor. But how to get it? Denver was no
place then, whatever it is now, to buy dolls, and Joe was much disturbed
at it; but it happened that the very next week he was recalled to St.
Louis on some business which must be seen to in person; so, just as soon
as his errand was done, he went about to all the toy-shops until he was
satisfied at last with a doll. And well he might be! the dolly was of
bisque, with movable eyes and real golden hair, joints in her arms and
legs, and a face almost as lovely as a real baby; for a baby doll it
was, in long clothes, with little corals to tie up its sleeves, and tiny
socks on its feet. Joe had it boxed up carefully, directed to Miss Nancy
Peck, at Bassett, Vermont, and then stepped into the express office,
told the story, and read the letter. The Superintendent had little girls
of his own.
"It shall go free all the way there," he said, and wrote on the outside:
"Pass along the dolly, boys! get it there by Christmas, sure. Free.
X.Y.Z."
So the doll-baby began its journey; and the story Joe Harris told at St.
Louis was told and retold from one messenger to another, and many a
smile did it rouse on the tired faces; and here one man tied on a gold
dollar wrapped in paper and tucked in under the box lid, and there
another added a box of candy, and another a bundle of gay calico for a
child's dress, and one a picture-book, each labelled "Merry Christmas
for Nancy," till the agent at the last large town had to put all the
things into a big box, and pack the corners with oranges.
Can any words tell what Nancy thought when that box climbed up to her
from Bassett on Mr. Tucker's wagon--the very same wagon that brought her
from the poor-house? Luckily for her, Miss Roxy could not leave her bed,
where she had lain a month now with acute rheumatism; for when she heard
Nancy's story she was angry enough to box her ears well, and did scold
furiously, and call the poor child many a bad name for her "brazen
impudence," as she called it. But what did Nancy care when at last, with
an old hatchet, she had pried off the box lid, and discovered its hidden
treasures! Miss Roxy was glad enough of a sweet ripe orange, and stopped
scolding to eat it at once; but Nancy could not look at another thing
when the doll box was opened at last, and the lovely sleeping baby
discovered. The child could not speak. She threw her apron over her
head, and ran into the garret. Miss Roxy smiled grimly under her orange.
"Little fool!" said she; "what upon airth does she want to cry for?"
But all the expressmen smiled when each one read a quaint little letter
dropped soon after into the Bassett Post-office, and directed "To all
the adams express Gentlemen betwene Basset and st louis Miss." It was
duly forwarded along the line, and ran thus:
"DERE GENTLEMEN,--I know by the Laybels how good everyboddy was,
and the doly is goodest of All, but everything is good. I Thank you
ten thowsand times. I am so glad, the Things was splendidd!
"NANSY PECK."
THE YOUNG TIN-TYPERS.
PART II.
"Now," said Jim, "to-day is Thursday, and if you can mix the sensitive
bath, I will go down town and buy the other things that we need. Then
to-morrow we can prepare everything, and Saturday--oh, just think!--we
can take a picture."
After Jim started off, Fred went to the dark chamber, which was a large
closet in their work-room, and at once set about preparing the mystic
solution to sensitize the plate.
He first took some rain-water, and let it drip through a filter paper
placed in a glass funnel, to remove all the impurities that might be
suspended in it. Then he added the crystals of nitrate of silver; then a
few grains of iodide of potassium were added, when, to his surprise, a
yellow powder began to form. However, he put the mixture aside to
saturate, as the Professor had directed him, having first stirred it
with a small glass rod, and went to study his lessons for the next day.
He had not been studying long before Jim entered, and with a very grand
air placed several small parcels on the table. He was about to explain
their contents, when he suddenly broke out in a wild fit of laughter.
"Why, Fred, what have you done to yourself?" said he.
Fred looked up from his book, and found, to his great disgust, a number
of heavy black spots on his hands and coat. "Well, I don't see what that
is," he said.
"I do," said Jim: "you have been and spattered yourself with silver, and
the sunlight has turned it black. You are in a nice fix, for nothing
will take it off."
"The coat was only a work jacket," said Fred, "and I don't care a bit
about my hands. But let us see what you have bought."
"In the first place," said Jim, opening his packages, "here are some tin
plates--great big fellows, too, and all for fifty cents. And here is
some collodion. These green crystals are sulphate of iron, and the man
says we must keep them in a very tight bottle, because if the air gets
at them they will spoil. He told me they were made of old nails and
sulphuric acid. Do you believe it? These green crystals we must dissolve
in water before using. This stuff in the bottle is acetic acid. Doesn't
it smell queer? And here is some hyposulphite of soda; and that's all.
Now let's get to work."
The two hours were now over, and Fred returned to his silver bath, and
let it run through a filter, when, by rule, the bath was ready. It was
placed in a flask, and tightly corked.
"Now, Jim," said Fred. "I guess we would better leave everything until
Saturday, because to-morrow we have an examination in algebra, and ought
to cram for that to-night; and to-morrow afternoon is the ball match,
and in the evening we shall be tired."
At last Saturday morning came, bright and sunny, and the two boys began
in earnest the task of taking a picture.
Fred had procured a tall narrow glass vessel to hold the silver bath,
and a glass dipper with which to suspend the plate, and having mixed the
developing and fixing solutions, the boys were at last ready.
"Now you pour on the collodion," said Jim, "and put the plate in the
bath, while I get the camera in position and adjust the focus."
"What are you going to take?" asked Fred.
"I guess I'll try old Spriggins's back yard," answered the other. "He's
got a big grape-vine arbor there that will take immense."
Fred, left to himself, poured the collodion over the plate, and gently
tilted it from side to side. The liquid did not flow evenly, but lay in
rings and streaks all over the surface.
"Why didn't we try the Professor's gum-arabic, and save collodion!" he
exclaimed. But not discouraged by failure, he tried again, and by sheer
luck succeeded in making a smooth surface. In about five seconds he put
the plate in the bath, and awaited the result. When he removed it,
instead of being finely coated with silver, the plate appeared cracked,
greasy, and spotted.
"Oh, misery!" he cried, "the bath is all full of yellow stuff. What
shall I do?"
Hearing this, Jim returned to the laboratory, and with his usual
calmness simply said, "Filter."
Fred did so, and in a few moments a clear bath was again obtained.
"How did that happen, I wonder?" said Fred.
"I don't believe you allowed the collodion time enough to set," was the
answer. "Let me try this time."
After a good deal of trouble with the collodion, Jim finally prepared a
smooth plate, which he allowed to wait thirty seconds, and then
carefully lowered it into the silver bath. After a few seconds he raised
it, and found it covered with streaks.
[Illustration: OLD SPRIGGINS'S GRAPE ARBOR.]
"Put it back," said Fred; and in it went. In about thirty-five seconds
more, it was of that fine opal tint mentioned by the Professor. It was
then placed in the slide and carried to the camera. Jim pulled out his
watch, and with a forced smile to hide his nervousness said, "Go," and
Fred drew up the sliding door. When the plate had been exposed long
enough, as he thought, Jim cried, "Time," the door was closed, the slide
taken from the camera, and the boys returned with it to the dark
chamber.
The plate was then taken from the slide, and Fred, seizing a bottle,
poured its contents over the opaline surface.
"As if by magic--" Jim began.
"Nothing appears," continued Fred, as he saw in astonishment every trace
of silver disappear from the plate, and the bare tin surface left
exposed. "I can't see through that," he added, in dismay.
"I can," answered Jim: "you were in such a hurry that you poured on the
fixing solution instead of the developer, and of course that has
dissolved everything."
Jim then prepared another plate with great care, placed it in the
camera, exposed it for such time as he thought fit, and returned with it
to the dark chamber. Removing it from the slide, he carefully poured on
the developer. By degrees the cloud on the surface dissolved, and a
picture slowly appeared, very imperfect, but still a picture.
[Illustration: GLASS BATH AND DIPPER.]
"Isn't that splendid?" said Fred, enthusiastically; "it's just as
natural as life."
Jim, cool and quiet as usual, washed the plate well with water, and
cautiously poured on the fixing solution, when the yellow coating of the
picture vanished, and old Spriggins's grape arbor came out in clear,
sharp lines.
"Now, Fred," said he, "you calm down a little, and varnish this."
"All right," answered Fred; and having lighted the spirit-lamp, he
poured on the varnish, and held the plate over the flame; but, alas!
there was a fizz, a vile smell, a great deal of smoke, and the pretty
picture was a mass of paste.
"I won't have anything more to do with this part of the work," said
Fred, impatiently, throwing the spoiled plate on the floor. "I can play
doctor's shop, and mix up solutions as well as anybody, but this endless
dipping, washing, and drying takes more patience than I possess. I shall
leave that to you, Jim."
"One more trial, and a perfect picture," answered Jim, quietly.
The next attempt proceeded smoothly up to the varnishing-point, when Jim
said he would do it without the aid of heat. The picture was accordingly
varnished and stood away to dry, when after a few minutes it was found
to be covered with a white film which entirely obscured it. Fred
declared he would never try again, but Jim, more persevering, decided to
heat the plate a little, and see what happened. He passed it gently over
the spirit-lamp flame, when, to his great relief, the cloud vanished,
and the picture re-appeared, increased in brightness, and covered with a
coating thick enough to protect it from scratches.
These boys had many other mishaps and disappointments before they became
skillful enough to be sure of obtaining a good picture. They learned,
too, that rules in books sound very easy, but that much practice and
experience are required to carry them out successfully. But having by
care and perseverance once conquered all obstacles, they had no end of
fun copying pictures for friends and school-mates.
Having become very fair tin-typers, they are now ambitious to take
negatives on glass, and print from them. If they succeed in doing this
well, some day they may tell you all about it, if you are interested
enough to listen.
[Begun in No. 58 of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, December 7.]
TOBY TYLER;
OR, TEN WEEKS WITH A CIRCUS.
BY JAMES OTIS.
CHAPTER VI.
A TENDER-HEARTED SKELETON.
"Now, then, lazy-bones," was Mr. Lord's warning cry as Toby came out of
the tent, "if you've fooled away enough of your time, you can come here
an' 'tend shop for me while I go to supper. You crammed yourself this
noon, an' it'll teach you a good lesson to make you go without anything
to eat to-night; it'll make you move round more lively in the future."
Instead of becoming accustomed to such treatment as he was receiving
from his employers, Toby's heart grew more tender with each brutal word,
and this last punishment--that of losing his supper--caused the poor boy
more sorrow than blows would. Mr. Lord started for the hotel as he
concluded his cruel speech, and poor little Toby, going behind the
counter, leaned his head upon the rough boards, and cried as if his
heart would break.
All the fancied brightness and pleasure of a circus life had vanished,
and in its place was the bitterness of remorse that he had repaid Uncle
Daniel's kindness by the ingratitude of running away. Toby thought then
that if he could only nestle his little red head on the pillows of his
little bed in that rough room at Uncle Daniel's, he would be the
happiest and best boy, in the future, in all the great wide world.
While he was still sobbing away at a most furious rate he heard a voice
close at his elbow, and looking up, he saw the thinnest man he had ever
seen in all his life. The man had flesh-colored tights on, and a
spangled red velvet garment--that was neither pants, because there were
no legs to it, nor a coat, because it did not come above his waist--made
up the remainder of his costume. Because he was so wonderfully thin,
because of the costume which he wore, and because of a highly colored
painting which was hanging in front of one of the small tents, Toby knew
that the Living Skeleton was before him, and his big brown eyes opened
all the wider as he gazed at him.
"What is the matter, little fellow?" asked the man, in a kindly tone.
"What makes you cry so? Has Job been up to his old tricks again?"
"I don't know what his old tricks are"--and Toby sobbed, his tears
coming again because of the sympathy which this man's voice expressed
for him--"but I know that he's a mean, ugly thing, that's what I know;
an' if I could only get back to Uncle Dan'l, there hain't elephants
enough in all the circuses in the world to pull me away again."
"Oh, you run away from home, did you?"
"Yes, I did," sobbed Toby, "an' there hain't any boy in any
Sunday-school book that ever I read that was half so sorry he'd been bad
as I am. It's awful; an' now I can't have any supper, 'cause I stopped
to talk with Mr. Stubbs."
"Is Mr. Stubbs one of your friends?" asked the skeleton, as he seated
himself on Mr. Lord's own private seat.
"Yes, he is, an' he's the only one in this whole circus who 'pears to be
sorry for me. You'd better not let Mr. Lord see you sittin' in that
chair, or he'll raise a row."
"Job won't raise any row with me," said the skeleton. "But who is this
Mr. Stubbs? I don't seem to know anybody by that name."
"I don't think that is his name. I only call him so, 'cause he looks so
much like a feller I know who is named Stubbs."
This satisfied the skeleton that this Mr. Stubbs must be some one
attached to the show, and he asked,
"Has Job been whipping you?"
"No; Ben, the driver on the cart where I ride, told him not to do that
again; but he hain't going to let me have any supper, 'cause I was so
slow about my work, though I wasn't slow; I only talked to Mr. Stubbs
when there wasn't anybody round his cage."
"Sam! Sam! Sam-u-el!"
This name, which was shouted twice in a quick, loud voice, and the third
time in a slow manner, ending almost in a screech, did not come from
either Toby or the skeleton, but from an enormously large woman, dressed
in a gaudy red and black dress, cut very short, and with low neck and an
apology for sleeves, who had just come out from the tent whereon the
picture of the Living Skeleton hung.
"Samuel," she screamed again, "come inside this minute, or you'll catch
your death o' cold, an' I shall have you wheezin' around with the
phthisic all night. Come in, Sam-u-el."
"That's her," said the skeleton to Toby, as he pointed his thumb in the
direction of the fat woman, but paid no attention to the outcry she was
making--"that's my wife Lilly, an' she's the fat woman of the show.
She's always yellin' after me that way the minute I get out for a little
fresh air, an' she's always sayin' just the same thing. Bless you, I
never have the phthisic, but she does awful; an' I s'pose 'cause she's
so large she can't feel all over her, an' thinks it's me that has it."
"Is--is all that--is that your wife?" stammered Toby, in astonishment,
as he looked at the enormously fat woman who stood in the tent door, and
then at the wonderfully thin man who sat beside him.
"Yes, that's her," said the skeleton. "She weighs pretty nigh four
hundred, though of course the show cards says it's over six hundred, an'
she earns almost as much money as I do. Of course she can't get so much,
for skeletons is much scarcer than fat folks; but we make a pretty good
thing travellin' together."
"Sam-u-el," again came a cry from the fat woman, "are you never coming
in?"
"Not yet, my angel," said the skeleton, placidly, as he crossed one thin
leg over the other, and looked calmly at her. "Come here an' see Job's
new boy."
"Your imprudence is wearin' me away so that I sha'n't be worth five
dollars a week to any circus," she said, impatiently; but at the same
time she came toward the candy stand quite as rapidly as her very great
size would admit.
"This is my wife Lilly--Mrs. Treat," said the skeleton, with a proud
wave of the hand, as he rose from his seat and gazed admiringly at her.
"This is my flower, my queen, Mr.--Mr.--"
"Tyler," said Toby, supplying the name which the skeleton--or Mr. Treat,
as Toby now learned his name was--"Tyler is my name, Toby Tyler."
"Why, what a little chap you are!" said Mrs. Treat, paying no attention
to the awkward little bend of the head which Toby had intended for a
bow. "How small he is, Samuel!"
"Yes," said the skeleton, reflectively, as he looked Toby over from head
to foot, as if he were mentally trying to calculate exactly how many
inches high he was, "he is small; but he's got all the world before him
to grow in, an' if he only eats enough-- There, that reminds me. Job
isn't going to give him any supper, because he didn't work hard enough."
"He won't, won't he?" exclaimed the large lady, savagely. "Oh, he's a
precious one, he is, an' some day I shall just give him a good shakin'
up, that's what I'll do. I get all out of patience with that man's
ugliness."
"An' she'll do just what she says," said the skeleton to Toby, with an
admiring shake of the head. "That woman hain't afraid of anybody, an' I
wouldn't be a bit surprised if she did give Job a pretty rough time."
Toby thought, as he looked at her, that she was large enough to give
'most any one a pretty rough time, but he did not venture to say so.
While he was looking first at her, and then at her very thin husband,
the skeleton told his wife the little which he had learned regarding the
boy's history, and when he had concluded she waddled away toward her
tent.
"Great woman that," said the skeleton, as he saw her disappear within
the tent.
"Yes," said Toby, "she's the greatest I ever saw."
"I mean that she's got a great head. Now you'll see about how much she
cares for what Job says."
"If I was as big as her," said Toby, with just a shade of envy in his
voice, "I wouldn't be afraid of anybody."
"It hain't so much the size," said the skeleton, sagely--"it hain't so
much the size, my boy; for I can scare that woman almost to death when I
feel like it."
Toby looked for a moment at Mr. Treat's thin legs and arms, and then he
said, warningly, "I wouldn't feel like it very often if I was you, Mr.
Treat, 'cause she might break some of your bones if you didn't happen to
scare her enough."
"Don't fear for me, my boy--don't fear for me; you'll see how I manage
her if you stay with the circus long enough. Now I often--"
If Mr. Treat was going to confide a family secret to Toby, it was fated
that he should not hear it then, for Mrs. Treat had just come out of her
tent, carrying in her hands a large tin plate piled high with a
miscellaneous assortment of pie, cake, bread, and meat.
[Illustration: TOBY GETS HIS SUPPER.]
She placed this in front of Toby, and as she did so she handed him two
pictures.
"There, little Toby Tyler," she said--"there's something for you to eat,
if Mr. Job Lord and his precious partner Jacobs did say you shouldn't
have any supper; an' I've brought you a picture of Samuel an' me. We
sell 'em for ten cents apiece, but I'm going to give them to you,
because I like the looks of you."
Toby was quite overcome with the presents, and seemed at a loss how to
thank her for them. He attempted to speak, couldn't get the words out at
first, and then he said, as he put the two photographs in the same
pocket with his money: "You're awful good to me, an' when I get to be a
man I'll give you lots of things. I wasn't so very hungry, if I am such
a big eater, but I did want something."
"Bless your dear little heart, and you shall have something to eat,"
said the fat woman, as she seized Toby, squeezed him close up to her,
and kissed his freckled face as kindly as if it had been as fair and
white as possible. "You shall eat all you want to, an' if you get the
stomach-ache, as Samuel does sometimes when he's been eatin' too much,
I'll give you some catnip tea out of the same dipper that I give him
his. He's a great eater, Samuel is," she added, in a burst of
confidence, "an' it's a wonder to me what he does with it all
sometimes."
"Is he?" exclaimed Toby, quickly. "How funny that is! for I'm an awful
eater. Why, Uncle Dan'l used to say that I ate twice as much as I ought
to, an' it never made me any bigger. I wonder what's the reason?"
"I declare I don't know," said the fat woman, thoughtfully, "an' I've
wondered at it time an' time again. Some folks is made that way, an'
some folks is made different. Now I don't eat enough to keep a chicken
alive, an' yet I grow fatter an' fatter every day--don't I, Samuel?"
"Indeed you do, my love," said the skeleton, with a world of pride in
his voice; "but you mustn't feel bad about it, for every pound you gain
makes you worth just so much more to the show."
"Oh, I wasn't worryin'; I was only wonderin'; but we must go, Samuel,
for the poor child won't eat a bit while we are here. After you've eaten
what there is there, bring the plate in to me," she said to Toby, as she
took her lean husband by the arm and walked him off toward their own
tent.
Toby gazed after them a moment, and then he commenced a vigorous attack
upon the eatables which had been so kindly given him. Of the food which
he had taken from the dinner table he had eaten some while he was in the
tent, and after that he had entirely forgotten that he had any in his
pocket; therefore at the time that Mrs. Treat had brought him such a
liberal supply he was really very hungry.
He succeeded in eating nearly all the food which had been brought to
him, and the very small quantity which remained he readily found room
for in his pockets. Then he washed the plate nicely, and seeing no one
in sight, he thought he could leave the booth long enough to return the
plate.
He ran with it quickly into the tent occupied by the thin man and fat
woman, and handed it to her with a profusion of thanks for her kindness.
"Did you eat it all?" she asked.
"Well," hesitated Toby, "there was two doughnuts an' a piece of pie left
over, an' I put them in my pocket. If you don't care, I'll eat them some
time to-night."
"You shall eat it whenever you want to, an' any time that you get hungry
again, you come right to me."
"Thank you, marm. I must go now, for I left the store all alone."
"Run, then; an' if Job Lord abuses you, just let me know it, an' I'll
keep him from cuttin' up any monkey shines."
Toby hardly heard the end of her sentence, so great was his haste to get
back to the booth; and just as he emerged from the tent, on a quick run,
he received a blow on the ear which sent him sprawling in the dust, and
he heard Mr. Job Lord's angry voice as it said, "So, just the moment my
back is turned, you leave the stand to take care of itself, do you, an'
run around tryin' to plot some mischief against me, eh?" and the brute
kicked the prostrate boy twice with his heavy boot.
"Please don't kick me again," pleaded Toby. "I wasn't gone but a minute,
an' I wasn't doing anything bad."
"You're lying now, an' you know it, you young cub!" exclaimed the angry
man as he advanced to kick the boy again. "I'll let you know who you've
got to deal with when you get hold of me."
[Illustration: JOB LORD LEARNS A LESSON.]
"And I'll let you know who you've got to deal with when you get hold of
me," said a woman's voice; and just as Mr. Lord had raised his foot to
kick the boy again, the fat woman had seized him by the collar, jerked
him back over one of the tent ropes, and left him quite as prostrate as
he had left Toby. "Now, Job Lord," said the angry woman, as she towered
above the thoroughly enraged but thoroughly frightened man, "I want you
to understand that you can't knock and beat this boy while I'm around.
I've seen enough of your capers, an' I'm going to put a stop to them.
That boy wasn't in this tent more than two minutes, an' he attends to
his work better than any one you have ever had; so see that you treat
him decent. Get up," she said to Toby, who had not dared to rise from
the ground, "and if he offers to strike you again, come to me."
Toby scrambled to his feet, and ran to the booth in time to attend to
one or two customers who had just come up. He could see from out the
corner of his eye that Mr. Lord had arisen to his feet also, and was
engaged in an angry conversation with Mrs. Treat, the result of which he
very much feared would be another and a worse whipping for him.
But in this he was mistaken, for Mr. Lord, after the conversation was
ended, came toward the booth, and began to attend to his business
without speaking one word to Toby. When Mr. Jacobs returned from his
supper Mr. Lord took him by the arm, walked him out toward the rear of
the tents, and Toby was very positive that he was to be the subject of
their conversation, and it made him not a little uneasy.
It was not until nearly time for the performance to begin that Mr. Lord
returned, and he had nothing to say to Toby save to tell him to go into
the tent and begin his work there. The boy was only too glad to escape
so easily, and he went to his work with as much alacrity as if he were
about entering upon some pleasure.
When he met Mr. Jacobs, that gentleman spoke to him very sharply about
being late, and seemed to think it no excuse at all that he had just
been relieved from the outside work by Mr. Lord.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLE.
ABOUT TO BE ERECTED IN THE CENTRAL PARK, NEW YORK.
BY REV. J. S. HOLME.
Cleopatra's Needle is not such a needle as we use to sew with: it is a
great stone--sometimes called an obelisk--nearly seventy feet long, and
about seven feet square at the base on which it stands. Its sides
gradually taper from the bottom until at the top it ends in a small
pointed four-sided pyramid. It is of red granite, and the sides are
covered all over with pictures of birds, animals, and other things, cut
into the stone. It is called a needle because it is so long and slender.
But why it should be called Cleopatra's Needle is not quite so clear.
Cleopatra was a famous Queen who lived in Egypt a little while before
the birth of Christ. She was a very beautiful woman, and well educated;
but she did many foolish things, and some very wicked things; and, as
such people often are, she, though a great Queen, was at last so very
unhappy that she wickedly put an end to her own life.
This obelisk was at first erected by Thothmes III., one of the old Kings
of Egypt, at Heliopolis, about 3600 years ago. It was taken from that
place to Alexandria, where Cleopatra lived, not long after her death, by
the Roman Emperor Augustus Cæsar, as a trophy of his victory over the
Kings of Egypt, and it was called "Cleopatra's Needle," we suppose,
merely in compliment to the late Queen.
Egypt is supposed to be the oldest nation in the world. The Kings used
to be called Pharaohs, and many of them were very great and powerful.
Some were great warriors, others were great builders--builders of
pyramids, cities, temples, and obelisks. They were very vain of their
glory, and they were great boasters, fond of inscribing their names and
deeds on stone. Cleopatra's Needle is one of two great obelisks which
one of these Pharaohs erected, and placed one on each side of the
entrance to the Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis. The Egyptians
worshipped the sun as their god under the name of Ra, and the name of
Pharaoh, by which the Egyptian Kings were known, means "a son of the
sun."
The Pharaohs did great honor to their sun-god, as they thought they were
his children. The Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis was the greatest in
all Egypt, and its ruins now cover nearly a mile in extent. Thothmes
erected these obelisks at the entrance to this Temple of the Sun, partly
in honor to the sun-god, and partly to honor himself, as he wrote his
own history up and down the sides of the obelisk, not in letters such as
we use, but in pictures of birds, animals, and other things, which kind
of writing these old Egyptians used, and we call them hieroglyphics.
This obelisk stood a great many years near the door of this temple at
Heliopolis--or, as it is called in the Bible, "the city of On"--where it
was at first erected.
Some of the children may remember that a few weeks ago, in the regular
Sunday-school lesson, it is said that "Pharaoh gave to Joseph in
marriage Asenath, the daughter of Poti-pherah, priest of On." This
Poti-pherah was the high-priest--a very great man in Egypt, and lived in
the Temple of the Sun at On. And it is quite likely that this very
obelisk stood before his door on the day that Joseph married his
daughter Asenath. And if this is so, is it not wonderful that this great
stone that weighs 213 tons, on which Joseph may have looked on his
wedding day 3600 years ago, should now be in a country 5000 miles away,
of which the old Egyptians never heard? And is it not still more
wonderful that, while the children in the Sunday-schools of America
should be studying their regular Bible lesson about Joseph's marriage,
this great obelisk, that stood at the door of his father-in-law's house,
should be lying in the street, at the door of one of our schools, on its
way to the Central Park in New York?
But now we must tell you how this great obelisk came to be brought to
this country. Obelisks are great curiosities. There are only a few large
ones in the world. These all used to be in Egypt, and the Egyptians
thought a great deal of them. But four or five of these were taken at
different times, without leave of the people of Egypt, to different
countries in Europe. Two stand in Rome, one in Constantinople, one in
Paris, and one in London. Now Mehemet Ali, the late Khedive of Egypt,
had a great liking for America. He thought that the United States had
treated him better than the European nations; and it seemed to him that
we ought to have an obelisk as well as the nations of Europe. And when
the American Consul asked for one, he said, "I will think of it." It was
supposed he might give us a little one. But no one ever thought of
asking for "Cleopatra's Needle" at Alexandria: this was one of the
largest and most beautiful in all Egypt. But it so happened that this
obelisk stood very near the sea. The waves of the Mediterranean rolled
right up to its base. There was great danger of its being undermined. It
was thought already to begin to lean a little. Many feared it would soon
fall. This gave the Khedive great anxiety; and so he proposed to remove
it to another part of the city of Alexandria. But this would cost a
great deal of money, and the Khedive was not at this time rich; so he
proposed that the wealthy men of the city should raise by subscription
one-half of the money needed to remove it, and he would provide the
other half. But the people of Alexandria thought the government ought to
do it all, and did not subscribe a dollar. At this Mehemet Ali was
greatly displeased; and he thereupon made up his mind to make this
beautiful obelisk a present from Egypt, the oldest nation of the world,
to the United States of America, the youngest nation. And glad, indeed,
we were to get it; and sorry enough were the Egyptians at last to lose
it.
One of our wealthy citizens, on learning the intention of the Khedive of
Egypt, said he would pay $75,000, the estimated cost of its removal,
when the obelisk should be erected in the Central Park.
Lieutenant-Commander Gorringe, U.S.N., undertook the task of bringing it
over--and a very great one it has been; but he has done it with great
skill and success, and thus far at his own expense and risk. And it will
cost much more to complete the work than the $75,000 promised; but New
York, without doubt, will see Lieutenant-Commander Gorringe repaid for
his outlay, for it will be a great thing to have a genuine Egyptian
obelisk, Cleopatra's Needle, in the Central Park in this city.
[Illustration: THE MONKEYS.]
THE MURDER OF THE PRINCES IN THE TOWER.
[Illustration: THE UNFORTUNATE PRINCES.]
One of the wickedest acts of the wicked King Richard III. of England was
the murder of his two young nephews in the Tower. He had seized upon the
crown that belonged of right to them, and had shut them up in a gloomy
cell of that huge castle that still stands on the banks of the Thames,
below London. They were separated from their mother, the widow of the
late King Edward IV., and kept like prisoners and criminals in the part
of the vast fortress now known as "the Bloody Tower." The elder, Edward,
Prince of Wales (now Edward V., King of England), was thirteen, his fair
and gentle brother, the Duke of York, only eleven. Their cruel uncle
sent orders to the Governor of the Tower, Brackenbury, to put them to
death secretly, but the honest man refused to do so wicked an act.
Richard then placed Sir James Tyrrel, his evil instrument, in command of
the fortress for a single day; the keys of the gates and cells were
given up to him by Brackenbury, and the plans for the murder were
carefully prepared by the King. Tyrrel hired two hardened
criminals--John Dighton, his own groom, and Miles Forest, a murderer by
trade--to commit the act, and remove from their uncle's path the two
innocent princes who might yet dispute his title to the throne.
It was a dark and gloomy night when Tyrrel, followed by his two
assassins, crept up the narrow stone staircase that led to the room
where the young children were confined. He found them clasped in each
other's arms asleep, having just repeated their prayers, and lying on a
bed. It is easy to imagine the terrors of the poor children in that
stony and gloomy chamber, shut out from their mother and all their
friends, and seeing only the cold, strange faces of their jailers. But
now they had forgotten all their sorrows in a sleep that was to be their
last. What dreams they may have had at that fearful moment no one can
ever tell. By the light of a flickering torch Tyrrel probably looked
into the chamber to see that his victims were safe. But he did not go
in, and stood watching and listening at the door while Dighton and
Forest performed their dreadful deed. They took the pillows and bolsters
from the bed, pressed them over the faces of the children, and thus
smothered them to death. When they were dead they carried their bodies
down the long staircase, and buried them under a heap of stones at its
foot. It was reported that Richard III., touched by an unusual feeling
of superstition, had removed them to consecrated ground, and that the
place of their final burial was unknown. But long afterward, in the
reign of Charles II., when it was found necessary to take away the
stones, and dig in the spot where it was supposed the assassins had laid
them, the bones of two persons were found that corresponded to the ages
of the young princes. They were buried by the King beneath a marble
monument.
But wherever they slept, the murder of his nephews must have forever
haunted the brain of the wicked Richard III. His people hated and feared
him. He grew every day more cruel and tyrannical; he murdered friend and
foe. At last Henry, Earl of Richmond, of the house of Lancaster, landed
in England with a small force, which was soon increased by the general
hatred of the King. The nobility and the people flocked to his camp. His
army was soon very strong. Richard, at the head of a powerful force,
marched to meet his rival, and on Bosworth Field, August 22, 1485, the
decisive battle was fought. Richard was betrayed, as he deserved, by his
own officers. He rode raging on horseback around the field, and when he
saw Henry before him, rushed upon him to cut him down. He killed one of
his knights, but was stricken from his horse, and fell dead in the
crowd. Then the soldiers cried, "Long live King Henry!" and that night
Richard's body, flung across the back of a horse, was carried into
Leicester to be buried. His wicked reign had lasted only two years.
MISS SOPHONISBA SYLVIA PLANTAGENET TUDOR.
BY LILLIAS C. DAVIDSON.
Far away, across, the blue Atlantic, lies an island--not a very big
island, but a wonderful one, for all that. Its name is England. Who
knows what is the capital? London? quite right; I see the Young People
are well up in their geography. Well, in this London there is a great
square called Portland Place, and before one of its big tall houses
there was standing a carriage one bright afternoon.
Presently the house door was flung wide open by a most gentlemanly
butler in black, and down the steps there came an imposing procession.
First, Lady Ponsonby, in silks and laces, very stately and very
beautiful; then little Ethel; and last, but not least--oh no, indeed! by
no means least--Miss Sophonisba Sylvia Plantagenet Tudor, closely
clasped in the arms of her doting mother, Miss Ethel.
"What, only a doll?"
My dear Young People, can it be possible that I hear you say "only"?
Miss Sophonisba Sylvia Plantagenet Tudor was by far the most important
member of the present party--at all events, Ethel would have told you
so, for so she firmly believed. Never was there so lovely a doll. Eyes
like violets; real golden hair, cut with a Gainsborough fringe (what you
American little girls called "banged," although why, I don't know, I am
sure); complexion as beautiful as wax and paint could make it; and a
costume which was the admiration and envy of every one of Ethel's
particular friends. Muriel Brabazon, who lived in Park Lane, had
actually shed tears when she saw Miss S. S. P. Tudor's new black satin
jacket with its jet fringe; but then poor Muriel had no mamma, and was
not as well brought up as might be desired.
All the same, Miss Sophonisba was a pride and joy to any possessor, and
Ethel felt a thrill of calm happiness at every fresh glance that was
cast at their carriage as they drove quickly through the busy streets
toward the Park. Hyde Park, you must know, is to London what the Central
Park is to New York; and in it there is a long drive called Rotten Row,
where London people go in crowds, and on this afternoon it was a perfect
crush of carriages of every description.
The Ponsonby carriage had to go at a slow and stately pace, and all the
throngs of people who walked by the side of the Row, or sat on the green
chairs under the trees, had a fine opportunity of gazing their fill at
Miss Plantagenet Tudor's glories.
All at once there was a little stir and flutter among the crowd, and
murmurs ran about from one to another of "The Princess! the Princess!"
Ethel clapped her hands, and nearly danced upon her seat, for this was
almost _too_ delightful; and in another minute there came in sight a
very plain, neat carriage, with dark horses, and servants in sober
liveries, and there, smiling and bowing, sat the sweet and gracious lady
who will probably one day be Queen of England. She is so good and so
charming that the English people love her dearly; and all the
gentlemen's hats came off in a minute, and all the ladies bowed, and
everybody looked as pleased as possible. As for Ethel, she bowed so hard
that she looked like a little Chinese Mandarin, and even jumped up to
get another glimpse as they passed, for their own carriage was just
turning out of the great Park gates to go home to Portland Place.
Actually, for five minutes, she had forgotten her beloved doll; but what
may not happen in five minutes?
"Sophonisba Sylvia, my precious," she murmured, turning to take her in
her motherly arms, "did you see the Princess? Isn't she
_loverly_?--almost as beautiful as you?" But here she stopped quite
short.
Alas! it is almost too dreadful to go on writing about. How can I tell
you? There was no Miss Sophonisba S. P. Tudor! She had totally vanished.
Oh, poor, poor Ethel! Nine years old, and beginning to learn German
verbs, and yet her tears rained down like an April shower.
"Oh, my Sophonisba! The best, the dearest, of my twenty-three dolls! Oh,
mamma! mamma! _can_ I go on living without her?"
"Ethel, my own," cried her distracted mother, clasping her in her arms,
"don't cry, my pet, don't cry. We'll advertise for her; we'll offer
rewards; we'll go to Creamer's this moment, and buy you another; we'll
send to Paris, Vienna, anywhere."
But oh! you among my readers who are mothers of dolls yourselves, you
can fancy how Ethel rejected this last consolation. Another doll! Could
there be another Sophonisba? Never! oh, never! And should her place be
taken by another, even if there were?
"Please, mamma," she murmured, burying her tear-stained face in Lady
Ponsonby's best silk mantle, "I would so much rather not. I don't want
another. I couldn't love any one else like her. Oh, Sophy Sylvia!"
No use to look for the dear lost one. They drove back the whole way they
had come, and asked five policemen, but not a trace was to be found.
But where, all this time, was Miss Plantagenet Tudor? Scarcely had she
recovered her senses from the shock of her violent fall upon the wood
pavement at Hyde Park Corner, when she was seized by the waist, and a
rich Irish brogue greeted her ears.
"Arrah, thin, what an illigant doll! Sure and it's wild wid joy Norah'll
be to get it. Come along, me darlint."
Then perhaps she fainted with horror, for the next thing she was aware
of was being clasped in the arms of a little girl, nearly the same age
as her beloved little mistress, but ah! how different in all but age!--a
little red-haired girl, clean and tidy, to be sure, but with what
patched and faded clothes, what little red rough hands, what a loud
voice, and what an accent! Neither Miss Tudor's nerves nor her temper
could stand it. She made her back far stiffer than nature and Mr.
Creamer had ever intended it to be, and refused all comfort. In fact,
did what in a less distinguished and high-bred doll would have been
called sulking; and little Norah at last left her in despair, with a
sorrowful sigh.
It really was not for three days after this that she came out of
her--well, yes, sulks; and that was because she was disturbed by a
terrible noise of sobbing and crying.
"Och, thin, don't ye now, Norah--don't ye. It's no mortal use, I tell
ye; we'll have to go to prison, and that's the blessed truth. My lady's
grand lace handkerchief, and it's worth three guineas or more; and the
housekeeper says as it's never come home, and I'll swear I sint it; and
how iver are we to pay at all, at all?"
Now Miss Plantagenet Tudor had by no means a bad heart; she felt really
sorry to see such distress. However, it was no business of hers, and she
was just going off into her dignified gloom again, when her blue eyes
spied something thin, white, and lace-like under the edge of the big
chest in the corner.
There was the missing handkerchief, the cause of all this woe. Should
she show it to them, and make the poor things happy? Yes, she would; she
knew Ethel would, if she were there. And so, with the lofty grace which
was all her own, Miss Sophonisba Sylvia Plantagenet Tudor fell flat,
face downward, upon the floor, with one stiff arm stuck out straight
before her.
Norah rushed to pick her up, and as she stooped she too saw the
handkerchief, and clutched at it.
* * * * *
"La, Miss Ethel," said the little school-room maid, "there's such a
funny tale Mrs. O'Flannigan's been telling in the kitchen. I know you'd
like to hear it--it's about a doll."
"Oh, Susan, I don't think I can bear to hear about dolls to-night. Who's
Mrs. O'Flannigan?"
"The washer-woman, miss; and she lost your ma's best
pocket-handkerchief, and very likely would have had to gone to prison,
and been hung" (oh, Susan! Susan! that was a dreadful stretch of
imagination on your part), "only her little girl Norah's doll fell down,
and when they picked it up it was a-pointing in the corner, and there
was the pocket-handkerchief; and Norah she says she's sure she done it a
purpose."
"Why, of course she must have. What a dear delightful doll! I think,
Susan, really, that I should like to see her. May I?"
"La, miss, of course you may. I'll tell Mrs. O'Flannigan to bring her."
Ah, little did Sophonisba Sylvia guess where she was going that evening
when Norah wrapped her carefully in a corner of her shawl, and trotted
off by Mrs. O'Flannigan's side through the gas-lit streets! They went in
by the kitchen steps--a way Miss Tudor had never been before; but
somehow the great tiled hall looked strangely familiar; and who was that
coming a little timidly out of a door held open by a tall and powdered
footman?
Ah, dear Young People, it is as hard to write of joy as of sorrow.
Ethel's shriek rang through the house, and brought her papa, Sir Edward,
from his billiards, and Lady Ponsonby from her drawing-room, in a
tremendous hurry.
Norah went home happy in the possession of five dolls out of Ethel's
twenty-three, and her good fortune did not stop there. Indeed, she had
the greatest reason to bless the day when Miss Sophonisba Sylvia
Plantagenet Tudor had her eventful fall from the Ponsonby carriage at
Hyde Park Corner.
[Begun in YOUNG PEOPLE No. 58, December 7.]
MILDRED'S BARGAIN.
A Story for Girls.
BY MRS. JOHN LILLIE.
CHAPTER VI.
"Miss Lee," said Mr. Tom, as Milly entered the store Wednesday morning,
"will you please to take my place for two hours at the desk? I have
something to do for father."
Milly had once or twice filled the same office, and so she quietly sat
down upon Tom's stool, receiving his directions about the money wearily.
"I've been counting the money over," he said, rather insolently, "and I
know _just_ what is there."
Mildred glanced up with a slight surprise. She had not fully understood
"Mr. Tom" of late. He and his sister, who served in the cloak-room, were
both, as she knew, jealous of her indifference to them. Their conduct
hitherto she had perfectly understood, but not their extreme suavity of
the last week. Mary Hardman had determined to make an "intimate friend"
of Mildred when it was known she had visited Miss Jenner, but the vulgar
ostentation of her employer's daughter completely shocked Milly's better
taste; and so, while she openly snubbed the brother, she took care to
withdraw, though civilly, from the sister's advances. This had produced
the effect of irritating Miss Hardman, wounding her self-love, and
bringing out all the latent vulgarity in her nature, so that poor Milly
was constantly subjected to annoyance and rudeness, which she bore only
through fear of losing her place; but the new part toward her was more
annoying than the old. Miss Hardman received her with smiles, while Tom
was sarcastically polite to her on all occasions.
Mildred made no answer to his remark about the money. In fact, after an
unusually fatiguing night with her mother, she was too weary to speak,
and sat leaning her head on her hand, only moving to respond to the call
of "Cash!" at the desk window. How good the money looked, Mildred
thought, as she slipped the notes between her fingers! Over and again
she had the sum she needed in her hands--if conscience was not in the
way. "Yes," thought Milly, "that is how temptation steps in."
* * * * *
Deborah was standing in the kitchen window the next evening when Mildred
came down from her mother's room, asking her to relieve her for ten
minutes.
"My 'business' woman is coming in the gate, Debby," she said, with a
nervous laugh; "but it will be her last visit, and after she goes away I
will tell you all about her."
Deborah went up stairs a little mollified, and Mildred prepared to
confront her "Shylock."
"Here I am," said Mrs. Robbins, shaking out her skirts, and sitting down
as soon as she entered the bare little parlor, "and here I'm likely to
remain, for I know what I mean to _have_ instead of money if you don't
pay me; and I know," added the woman, with her insolent laugh--"I know
you haven't it, for old Mr. Hardman refused to lend it to you
yesterday."
Mildred flushed, but she returned the woman's bold stare with a look of
quiet dignity.
"You are mistaken, Mrs. Robbins," she said, producing a roll of bills.
"Here is your money. Will you be kind enough to give me a receipt as
quickly as possible?"
The peddler stared, but she could offer no further remonstrance. There
were the bills, fresh enough, and genuine. She took the money in her
hands, counted it over and again, and then, with angry reluctance, and a
glance at the ornaments in the room, which showed what she had "meant to
have," she wrote her receipt and departed....
* * * * *
"And that's the whole story, Deborah," whispered Milly, an hour later,
as she and the good old woman sat over the fire in Mrs. Lee's room.
"It's nearly killed me this winter--but I _can't possibly tell you_
where or how I got the money. I scarcely like to think of it myself,"
and Mildred rose with the air Debby knew very well, and which plainly
said, "You'll hear no more."
"Well," said Deborah, "I won't ask if I'm bid not. I only hope no
trouble'll come of it."
"Trouble!" said Milly, rather sharply. Deborah did not know how tired
and ill she felt, and, indeed, poor Milly was very near a hearty burst
of crying. She was relieved of one anxiety, she thought, as she lay down
to sleep in her mother's room; but had she not burdened herself with
another?
On entering the store two days later, Milly observed a certain air of
reserve among the girls nearest her, yet they all looked at her
critically. One or two whispered as she went by them with her usual
friendly "Good-morning," and others gave a little significant toss to
head or shoulders as she spoke. Mary Hardman was busy in the cloak-room,
and as Mildred entered she said, with a short laugh,
"I don't believe you will be wanted here to-day, Miss Lee. However,
father's coming in directly, and he'll tell you for himself."
Before Mildred could answer, the burly figure of Mr. Hardman senior came
toward them.
"'Morning, Miss Lee," he said, nodding his head. "Will you be kind
enough to step into my room?"
It was a sort of office, close at hand, where the girls went to receive
special orders, their weekly salary, or any necessary reprimands. The
day before Milly had penetrated this sanctum to beg a loan of twenty-two
dollars from her employer; now she followed him with doubting steps.
What could it mean? Mr. Tom was seated in a big leather chair by the
table, with the air of judge and jury, witness and lawyer.
"Sit down, Miss Lee," said the elder man, motioning her to a seat. "Now,
Thomas, I think you can tell the story."
While Mildred mechanically dropped into a chair, the old man paced the
floor, and Mr. Tom, veiling a sneer, began:
"Miss Lee, I'll go right to the main question. We've missed some money
from the drawer. It disappeared day before yesterday morning. _The sum
was twenty-two dollars._ Now as you were at the desk between twelve and
two o'clock on that day, _can you account for it_?"
Mr. Tom drew up his little ferret eyes with a most malicious expression.
"Twenty-two dollars!" gasped Milly; her face was crimson. "No, I can not
account for it. Twenty-two dollars?" she repeated the question with a
look of blank dismay.
"Go on, Thomas," said Mr. Hardman senior.
"Well, then," said Tom, "we happen to know you _needed_ just that sum.
You tried to borrow it of my father, and _you paid it out_ in the
evening."
Evidently Mr. Tom thought this sentence his crowning success, for he
rose up, trying to look very fine, as he finished it.
To Mildred the next moment seemed an hour of pain. She sat still, gazing
ahead of her, trying to realize the situation. Then they accused her of
stealing the money!
"And you think _I_ took it?" she said, faintly.
"I'm afraid we don't _think_ much about it," said Mr. Tom.
"Circumstances are dead against you."
Mildred stood up, putting out one trembling hand as though she would
implore some consideration. She thought of her mother lying ill at home;
of all the miseries of the past few weeks. It made her head dizzy, and
she sank back into her chair, while Tom continued:
"Now I know all about it, Miss Lee, as you'll see. You bought a gray
silk dress of a peddler; the girls all saw it; and you didn't know how
you were to pay for it. You got awfully hard up Wednesday for
money--twenty-two dollars--and you tried to borrow it of father. He
couldn't lend it to you, and, in plain words, you _stole_ it from him.
Pity I wasn't a lawyer," added the young man, with a chuckle.
[Illustration: "HOW DARE YOU SAY SUCH A THING?"]
"Mr. Hardman, how _dare_ you say such a thing?" cried Milly, starting
from her chair.
"Then prove you did not," said the young man. "Where did you get your
twenty-two dollars for Widow Robbins?"
Mildred drew a long breath. "I can not tell you," she said, quietly.
Father and son laughed. "Now do you know, young lady," said the old man,
"if you're put into court, you'll have to tell. There'll be no questions
asked until that one is answered."
Milly could not speak. Terror, weariness, and shame filled her mind.
"You may go now," said Mr. Hardman. "I don't say we've finished with
this business, but we no longer need your services. There is your weekly
salary." And the old man tossed a five-dollar bill before her.
Mildred never could remember how she left that room. Her tongue seemed
paralyzed. She could not speak; she only thought of getting home, to cry
out her misery on Deborah's shoulder. When she went out into the street
a heavy snow was falling. The girl's brain seemed to be on fire. She
scarcely knew where she was going, and as she walked along she
remembered that to-day for the first time her mother was to sit up, and
she had agreed with Debby to bring in a bird to roast for her supper.
They had meant to make a little celebration of the mother's
convalescence, to which Milly thought she could bring a cheerful spirit,
since her terrible load of private debt was removed. But now, how was
all changed! Mildred stood still in the wild storm, putting her hand to
her head, and even trying to remember where she was going. Suddenly a
thought occurred to her. She would go to Miss Jenner's, and tell her the
whole story. "But not where I got the money," the poor child thought,
with a moan. Half driven along by the heavy snow-storm, Milly turned her
steps toward Lane Street. There was the beautiful brick house, its
trees veiled in white; but, oh! to her delight, Milly saw the curtains
of Miss Jenner's room drawn back. She must be better, if not well again.
It was a very miserable little figure that appeared at the door when the
old servant opened it. Drenched through by the storm, and with lines of
pain and fatigue in her face, Milly stood there. She scarcely heard what
the servant said as he conducted her down the hall and into the library,
where a big wood fire was blazing cheerily, and where Miss Jenner,
wrapped in soft shawls, sat, with Alice at her knee.
Mildred took one glance at the sweet, home-like picture, then she
recalled her own position; she remembered the scene at Mr. Hardman's. As
the servant closed the door, she moved forward with tears in her eyes,
saying:
"Miss Jenner, I am in great trouble at the store. They say--they say--I
am a thief."
Mildred remembered Miss Jenner's standing up, and Alice's exclamation of
horror; then the room, the fire-light, the books and pictures, and the
two figures, seemed to whirl before her, and she knew no more.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
[Illustration: SOMETHING IN THE WAY.--DRAWN BY JESSIE MCDERMOTT.]
[Illustration: OUR POST-OFFICE BOX]
BROOKLYN, E. D., LONG ISLAND.
The Young Chemists' Club is in a very prosperous condition. The
meetings are held at the residences of the members every Saturday
evening at half past seven. The order of exercises commences with
the calling of the roll, then the collection of weekly dues, and
the consideration of whatever business is necessary. Compositions
by the members treating of scientific subjects are then read.
Communications from scientific gentlemen are read by the
secretary, and at some meetings they are present and give a short
lecture.
When this part of the exercises is disposed of, experiments are
then tried. The ink with which this letter is written was made by
the club. Is it not a good sample of our skill?
We are happy to say that we consider HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE as our
official organ, and we thank it cordially for supporting us.
If desired, we will occasionally send some experiments and
scientific notes from our meetings. We now send the following
simple and pretty experiment:
Cut three leaves of red cabbage into small pieces, place them in a
basin, and pour a pint of boiling water over them. After allowing
them to stand an hour, pour off the liquid into a decanter. This
liquid will be of a bright reddish-purple color. Now take three
wine-glasses; into one put about six drops of strong vinegar; into
another, six drops of a solution of soda; and into the third, the
same quantity of a strong solution of alum. Then pour into each
glass a small quantity of the liquid from the decanter. The
contents of the glass containing vinegar will quickly assume a
beautiful brilliant red color; that containing soda will be a fine
green; and that containing alum a very dark, rich purple.
CHARLES H. W., President of Y. C. C.
SENECA W. H., Secretary.
We congratulate the members of the Young Chemists' Club upon their
perseverance and success. We shall always be glad to receive reports of
anything interesting which may occur at their meetings, and also
occasionally to print simple and safe experiments, which we doubt not
will be of interest to many of our young readers. The ink with which the
above communication was written is of a bright, clear purple color, and
appears of an excellent quality.
* * * * *
ST. JOSEPH, TENSAS PARISH, LOUISIANA.
I have only been taking YOUNG PEOPLE for a few months, but I like
it so much I hope never to be without it. I want to write a letter
to the Post-office Box, but I can not write myself, for I am only
five years old; so somebody has to write it for me.
I had two pretty gray kittens. You could not tell them apart.
Their names were Jack and Jill. But poor little Jill died. Jack
loves me so much! He goes to sleep with me every night, and the
first thing in the morning, when he comes into the room, he looks
all around for me, and if I am still in bed, he will jump up and
cuddle down near me.
I have some pretty dolls I would like to write about, but I am
afraid if my letter is too long it will be thrown away.
I have no brothers or sisters except in heaven, and I am very
lonely sometimes, and always so glad to see YOUNG PEOPLE.
SADIE B. N.
* * * * *
POUGHKEEPSIE, NEW YORK.
I am a little girl eleven years old. I like YOUNG PEOPLE very much.
I think the best story was "The Fair Persian," but I like them all
more than I can tell.
I have ten dolls. The last one I got Christmas. Her name is Madame
Arabella.
I am going to be an artist when I am old enough.
ADDIE W.
* * * * *
BRATTLEBOROUGH, VERMONT.
I like HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE very much. I study Harper's School
Geography. I am just learning how to skate. For Christmas I got a
chamber set and a tea set, a pretty book, two bags of candy, and a
bag of nuts.
I am eight and a half years old.
MARY W. W.
* * * * *
MARIETTA, OHIO.
I am ten years old. I have a little sister named Julia, but when
she commenced to talk she called herself Jupi, and we all call her
so. Mamma says we ought to spell it _joujou_, which is the French
word for plaything.
We like YOUNG PEOPLE so much we can hardly wait for it to come.
Papa has taken it for us ever since it was published.
Jupi and I each have a pet kitty. One of them will scratch on the
door, just like a dog, until some one opens it.
Jupi has a Paris doll. It is a baby doll, and it has a little
nursing bottle. You can fill the bottle with milk or water, put
the tube in the doll's mouth, and by pressing a button at the back
of its head, all the milk goes out of the bottle. Then press the
button again, and it all goes back.
We have a toy bird which imitates a canary so you would think it
was a real one.
CHARLEY R. H.
* * * * *
GREENVILLE, _December_ 28, 1880.
DEAR MR. HARPER,--I'm in an awful situation that a boy by the name
of Bellew got me into. He is one of the boys that writes stories
and makes pictures for YOUNG PEOPLE, and I think you ought to know
what kind of a boy he is. A little while ago he had a story in the
YOUNG PEOPLE about imitation screw-heads, and how he used to make
them, and what fun he had pasting them on his aunt's bureau. I
thought it was a very nice story, and I got some tinfoil and made a
whole lot of screw-heads and last Saturday I thought I'd have some
fun with them.
[Illustration]
Father has a dreadfully ugly old chair in his study, that General
Washington brought over with him in the _Mayflower_, and Mr.
Travers says it is stiffer and uglier than any of the Pilgrim
fathers. But father thinks everything of that chair and never lets
anybody sit in it except the minister. I took a piece of soap,
just as that Bellew used to, and if his name is Billy why don't he
learn how to spell it that's what I'd like to know, and made what
looked like a tremendous crack in the chair. Then I pasted the
screw-heads on the chair, and it looked exactly as if somebody had
broken it and tried to mend it.
I couldn't help laughing all day when I thought how astonished
father would be when he saw his chair all full of screws, and how
he would laugh when he found out it was all a joke. As soon as he
came home I asked him to please come into the study, and showed
him the chair and said "Father I can not tell a lie I did it but I
won't do it any more."
[Illustration]
Father looked as if he had seen some disgusting ghosts, and I was
really frightened, so I hurried up and said "It's all right
father, it's only a joke look here they all come off," and rubbed
off the screw-heads and the soap with my handkerchief, and
expected to see him burst out laughing, just as Bellew's aunt used
to burst, but instead of laughing he said "My son this trifling
with sacred things must be stopped," with which remark he took off
his slipper, and then-- But I haven't the heart to say what he
did. Mr. Travers has made some pictures about it which I send to
you, and perhaps you will understand what I have suffered.
I think that boy Bellew ought to be punished for getting people
into scrapes. I'd just like to have him come out behind our barn
with me for a few minutes. That is, I would, only I never expect
to take any interest in anything any more. My heart is broken and
a new chocolate cigar that was in my pocket during the awful
scene.
I've got an elegant wasps' nest with young wasps in it that will
hatch out in the spring, and I'll change it for a bull-terrier or
a shot-gun or a rattlesnake in a cage that rattles good with any
boy that will send me one.
Ever affectionately
Your son
JIMMY BROWN.
(That's the way they taught me to end letters when I was in
boarding-school.)
* * * * *
MEADVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA.
I have some little toy dogs and rabbits. I had the diphtheria, and
took such bitter medicine that old Santa Claus brought me a dolly.
I was six years old on New-Year's Day. I guess this letter is big
enough.
MABEL A.
* * * * *
WATERBURY, CONNECTICUT.
We are two sisters, and we would like to tell you about our pets.
We have a bird named Dicky, and we have two gold-fishes, a
pearl-fish, and a roach, which live in a large aquarium over a
fernery. We each have a cat. Our cats are almost exactly alike, and
are named Tabby-gray and Frolic. We took the names from YOUNG
PEOPLE. We have two horses named Bonner and Charlie. Bonner is five
years old, and Charlie is twenty-seven. Charlie is a remarkable
horse. Two years ago he was very sick. We thought he was dying, and
told a man to shoot him; but he said Charlie looked at him so
intelligently that he could not do it. After that, Charlie got
well, and we have taken many long, delightful drives with him, and
he has been driven in a span with Bonner twenty-seven miles in one
afternoon. We have had him sixteen years, and when papa was living,
Charlie, when the gong sounded for dinner, would back out of his
stall, and go to the office door to bring him home. Do you not
think we ought to love such a faithful old horse? We do love him,
and he has a nice home and kind treatment.
HATTIE and NETTIE D.
* * * * *
LEESBURG, FLORIDA.
I am a subscriber of this very interesting little paper, and get it
regularly every week. I don't know how I would do without it. You
can not imagine how anxious I am to go to town and get it the
moment I know it is in the post-office.
I live in the land of flowers, and I like my home very much.
EVA H.
* * * * *
IVANPAH, CALIFORNIA.
I am the little girl whose letter was printed in YOUNG PEOPLE No.
45, that was going to the mines. I am there now. I will try to tell
you all about my trip. We came two hundred and ten miles across the
Desert in the stage. We were over eight days on the road. We camped
out two nights, and made our beds on the ground. I gathered many
beautiful stones in the Desert. I saw a rattlesnake.
I have been down in the mine eight hundred feet, and I am going
down a shaft which is nine hundred feet below the level.
I have three pet cats here, and I have thirty hens, which I feed
twice every day. I have no brothers or sisters, but I amuse myself
by reading YOUNG PEOPLE, and by running over the rocks and
prospecting.
FLORENCE R.
* * * * *
PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND.
We have taken YOUNG PEOPLE ever since the first number, and we all
like it. I have two brothers and two sisters. Christmas my brother
had the book called _Old Times in the Colonies_ for a present.
There are the same stories in it that were in YOUNG PEOPLE, and a
great many more. One is about King Philip and the wars with the
settlers in Rhode Island. I have read many of the other stories,
and they are very interesting. I am twelve years old.
LOUISE S.
* * * * *
TRENTON, NEW YORK.
I am a little girl six years old. I have a papa and mamma, but no
little brother or sister. I have a doggie named Dick, and a kitty
named Flossy, and eleven dollies with a black nurse. I take
HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, and can hardly wait for it to come. I wish
every little girl could have it. I am learning to read and write.
ABBIE MAUD B.
* * * * *
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.
I go to school and Sunday-school, and have my music lessons to
practice, but I always find time to read my YOUNG PEOPLE. I went to
the country this summer, and had a splendid time. I went
boat-riding on the Shenandoah River. I am eleven years old.
ELEANOR E. A.
* * * * *
DETROIT, MICHIGAN.
I have a little dog. His name is Prince. He sleeps with me. He
weighs four and one-half pounds.
I have been in bed a week with scarlet fever, and I enjoy YOUNG
PEOPLE so much!
I have a nice stamp-book, but not many stamps yet. I will have
some to exchange soon. I am eight years old.
JOHNNIE E.
* * * * *
FARMINGTON, NEW YORK.
I am a boy ten years old. I go to school, and read in the Fourth
Reader, and study arithmetic and geography. I take YOUNG PEOPLE,
and hope I can have it always.
I have a cat. His name is Dick. He will follow me over to
grandpa's, and stay with me until I come home.
This is the first letter I ever wrote.
SIDNEY J. C.
* * * * *
AROYA STATION, COLORADO.
I take much pleasure in reading all the letters and stories. I hope
all the readers enjoy YOUNG PEOPLE as much as I do.
Since my letter requesting exchange was published I have received
many pretty things. I wish to inform the correspondents that I
have no more specimens now, except enough to pay what I owe for
favors I have received. I would request the correspondents not to
send me anything more, as I could not make any return.
CLARA F. R. SWIFT.
* * * * *
BARRANQUILLA, UNITED STATES OF COLOMBIA.
A happy time it is for me when the steamer from New York for South
America arrives, and brings YOUNG PEOPLE. I pity the little
correspondent who wrote in the Post-office Box about four feet of
snow, for I believe it must be very cold there, although I have
never seen snow yet. Here even now we have many blooming plants in
our garden at Oasis, our beautiful country-seat, near Barranquilla.
I am nine years old. I have my own horse, a deer, and a little
circus.
We have all tropic plants, and I should like to exchange some
Southern, German, and French postage stamps, or dried flowers and
leaves from the tropic zone, for all kinds of minerals. Letters
and packages may be sent to my uncle in New York city, whose
address is at the end of my letter, and who will forward them to
me. He will also be kind enough to receive and forward my answers
to correspondents.
If any young readers would like to know more of my country, I will
send another letter.
JUDITH WOLFF, care of Mr. D. A. De Lima,
68 William Street, New York City.
* * * * *
PASSAIC BRIDGE, NEW JERSEY.
I like YOUNG PEOPLE very much. Papa bought me the first volume
bound. I have two kitties; one is white, the other is black. We
call them Romeo and Juliet, because they are so loving; they always
go to sleep with their paws around each other's necks.
WINNIE V.
* * * * *
I like YOUNG PEOPLE very much. When I was in the White Mountains
this summer I went to a silver and lead mine, where I got a number
of specimens, which I should like to exchange for foreign postage
stamps. Or to any one sending me twenty-five foreign postage stamps
I will send forty-five foreign and United States postmarks.
G. L. BRIGGS,
P. O. Box 560, Brookline, Mass.
* * * * *
The following exchanges are also desired by correspondents:
Postage stamps for curiosities, Indian relics, or anything suitable
for a museum.
SAMUEL CARPENTER, JUN., Oswego, Kansas.
* * * * *
Postmarks and foreign postage stamps.
FRANK K. LIPPITT,
Petaluma, Sonoma County, California.
* * * * *
Gray moss and postmarks for minerals (especially ores), fossils,
coins, or stamps.
CHARLES P. MATTHEUS, P. O. Box 13,
Fort Covington, Franklin County, N. Y.
* * * * *
Twenty-five postage stamps, or ten postmarks and eight stamps, for
a box of ocean curiosities and a star-fish.
R. LAMP, care of William Lamp,
Madison, Dane County, Wis.
* * * * *
WILLIAM H.--The term "blizzard" is applied in Canada and the
Northwestern Territories of the United States to an extremely sharp
snow-storm, when the particles of snow are blown by the wind like fine
pieces of steel. One can hardly walk the distance of a city block in
such a storm without getting one's nose and ears frozen.
* * * * *
C. B. F.--Mrs. Elizabeth Goose, who lived in Boston before the
Revolution, is generally supposed to have been the first to sing, for
the amusement of her grandchildren, most of the nursery jingles that
have ever since been known as "Mother Goose's Melodies." The _Tales of
Mother Goose_, such as "Blue Beard," "Tom Thumb," "Cinderella," etc.,
were the production of a celebrated French writer of the seventeenth
century, named Perrault. He composed these fairy tales to amuse a little
son. They were first published in Paris in 1697, under his son's name,
and have since been translated into nearly every language.
* * * * *
JOHN W.--It is said that a Mr. Beyer, an eminent linen-draper of London,
underwent in his youth the comical adventures which Cowper has described
in his ballad of "John Gilpin." It appears from Southey's life of the
poet that his friend Lady Austin once repeated to him a story told to
her in her childhood of an unfortunate pleasure party of this
linen-draper, ending in his being carried past his point both in going
and returning, and finally being brought home by his horse without
having met his family at Edmonton. Cowper is said to have been extremely
amused by the story, and to have composed his famous ballad while lying
awake one night suffering from headache.
* * * * *
WILLIAM D.--_Old Times in the Colonies_ is ended. You will find a notice
of the book in No. 56 of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE.
* * * * *
E. H.--You will find very good directions for painting magic-lantern
slides in a letter from Harry J. in the Post-office Box of YOUNG PEOPLE
No. 62.
* * * * *
HARRY W.--Directions for catching and preserving insects were given in
the Post-office Box of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE No. 27, and in the same
department of No. 34 is a description of a cheap and simple case for
mounting butterflies and other specimens.
* * * * *
A. RUSSELL.--See answer to S. H. M. in the Post-office Box of HARPER'S
YOUNG PEOPLE No. 22.
* * * * *
Favors are acknowledged from Abel Caldwell, Harry, Maud E. Chase, L. M.
Weter, Blanche Dougan, Isabel W. Harris, Ellen and Edna B., Pert Gates,
J. A. Tannahill, C. S. G., J. W., James A. Harris, Edward McNally,
Florence Stidham, Mabel Going, Josie Belle B., Bessie Guyton, Helen S.,
C. H. Mathias, Florence F. S., W. B. Wyman.
* * * * *
Correct answers to puzzles are received from Belle Bloom, Arthur D.
Prince, M. W. and E. W., Bessie R. Howell, Walter P. Hiles, A. D.
Hopper, A. Russell, Nellie V. Brainard, Annie W. Booth, Richard O.
Chester, John N. Howe, Mary E. DeWitt, Fanny Squire.
* * * * *
PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.
No. 1.
CONNECTED DIAMONDS.
1. In play-time. A small barrel. A coin. An animal. In play-time. 2. In
trouble. A minute part. Kingly. A label. In trouble. Centrals
connected--An aromatic plant.
BOLUS.
* * * * *
No. 2.
WORD SQUARES.
1. First, to babble. Second, to mature. Third, separately. Fourth, neat.
Fifth, to register.
CAL I. FORNY.
2. First, custom. Second, a dwelling. Third, a certain variety of an
important article of commerce. Fourth, mental. Fifth, water-fowls.
LONE STAR.
3. First, elevated. Second, inactive. Third, joy. Fourth, to mind.
WILLIE F. W.
4. First, one of the signs in the zodiac. Second, a dress of dignity.
Third, a boy's name. Fourth, to encircle.
LAURA.
* * * * *
No. 3.
CHARADE.
My first is a cooking utensil. My second is a species of tree. My whole
is used in making soap.
WILLIE L. K.
* * * * *
No. 4.
ENIGMA.
In kennel, not in dog.
In pen, not in hog.
In new, not in old.
In hot, not in cold.
In sound, not in noise.
In candy, not in toys.
In beak, not in bill.
In monkey, not in drill.
My whole is the dark "and bloody ground"
By the names of a huntsman and statesman renowned.
HALLA.
* * * * *
ANSWERS TO PUZZLES IN No. 61.
No. 1.
Chicago.
No. 2.
K I D D E R M I N S T E R
S W I T Z E R L A N D
M A L A D E T T A
Y E N I S E I
A L T A I
L E E
R
U R E
A D A M S
T A U N T O N
M A C K E N Z I E
B R A H M A P U T R A
S A N B E R N A R D I N O
No. 3.
Moscow.
No. 4.
B A L E M A L T
A P E S A R E A
L E A P L E A R
E S P Y T A R T
C A M P I M A G E
A R A L M O L A R
M A T E A L U T A
P L E A G A T E S
E R A S E
* * * * *
Charade on page 144--Sea-mew.
HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE.
SINGLE COPIES, 4 cents; ONE SUBSCRIPTION, one year, $1.50; FIVE
SUBSCRIPTIONS, one year, $7.00--_payable in advance, postage free_.
The Volumes of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE commence with the first Number in
November of each year.
Subscriptions may begin with any Number. When no time is specified, it
will be understood that the subscriber desires to commence with the
Number issued after the receipt of the order.
Remittances should be made by POST-OFFICE MONEY-ORDER OR DRAFT, to avoid
risk of loss.
Volume I., containing the first 52 Numbers, handsomely bound in
illuminated cloth, $3.00, postage prepaid: Cover, title-page, and index
for Volume I., 35 cents; postage, 13 cents additional.
HARPER & BROTHERS,
Franklin Square, N. Y.
[Illustration: WHAT CAN THE MATTER BE?]
A curious story is told of the way in which Admiral By-the-sea, V.C.,
C.B.--a very distinguished English naval officer, who has lately
retired, after many years of service, from his profession--first came by
his name. It is said that when an infant he was picked up by the sailors
of a man-of-war in the open sea. They found a bale of goods floating in
the water, and lashed to it was the body of a lady with a child in her
arms. The mother was dead, but the boy still lived. No clew was found by
which the relations of this little waif of the sea could be discovered;
and so, after the officers had made some vain attempts to communicate
with them by means of advertisements, they determined to adopt the boy,
and not knowing his real name, they christened him "By-the-sea." He was
sent to a naval school, and when old enough, went to sea again, and was
fortunate enough to join the same ship by the crew of which he had been
rescued years before. Soon he showed himself a clever and active sailor,
ready for anything, and doing whatever he did well; and when the Crimean
war came, he displayed such gallantry in assisting his wounded comrades
that he gained the Victoria Cross, and was made a Companion of the Bath.
After this, promotion came quickly; his services were, later on,
transferred to India, where for many years he filled the responsible
post of Consulting Naval Officer to the government; and now he retires
with the full rank of Admiral. The men who rescued the poor child from
the sea, so many years ago, little knew what an honorable and useful
life they were preserving by this act for the service of their country.
CHARADE.
Although in sable plumes my first
Displays himself on high,
His reputation is the worst,
His tastes are low, his race is curst--
We're glad to see him die.
My next is in the water found,
Or in the cozy inn,
Where talk and drink go freely round,
Or in the court maintains its ground,
Or keeps the thief from sin.
My whole is placed in humble hands,
And when with skill applied,
Will bring to light the golden sands.
'Tis known and used in many lands;
It seeks what others hide.
=Killed by Fright=.--Many an illness is caused simply by imagination, and
those of us who go about our work with calmness and confidence are much
more likely to escape disease than others who are filled with
apprehension should infection come within a hundred miles of them. In
connection with this, the Arabs tell the following story: One day a
traveller met the Plague going into Cairo, and accosted it thus, "For
what purpose are you entering Cairo?"
"To kill three thousand people," rejoined the Plague.
Some time after, the same traveller met the Plague on its return, and
said, "But you killed thirty thousand!"
"Nay," answered the Plague, "I killed but three thousand; the rest died
of fright."
SLEIGH-BELLS.
"Sleigh-bells, sleigh-bells,
What are you saying?"
"Merriest thing in all the world
'Tis to go a-sleighing:
Laughter ringing,
Shouting, singing,
Bells a-jingling,
Noses tingling,
Horses prancing,
Hearts a-dancing,
Sky all brightness,
Earth all whiteness;
Diamonds in the icicles,
Sunbeams round them playing:
Merriest thing in all the world
'Tis to go a-sleighing!"
[Illustration: "TUM, HORSIE."]
[Illustration: "DET UP, HORSIE!"]
[Illustration: "WHOA! WHOA!"]
End of Project Gutenberg's Harper's Young People, January 18, 1881, by Various
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