Produced by Annie McGuire








[Illustration: HARPER'S ROUND TABLE]

Copyright, 1895, by HARPER & BROTHERS. All Rights Reserved.

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PUBLISHED WEEKLY. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, AUGUST 13, 1895. FIVE CENTS A COPY.

VOL. XVI.--NO. 824. TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.

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[Illustration]

THE STORY OF NOEL DUVAL.

BY FRANCIS STERNE PALMER.


The summer of 1814 was a troubled one for the people living in northern
New York. English troops were concentrating at points just across the
Canadian border, and there were rumors that they would soon invade the
territory of the States. The farmers were being hastily drilled into
militia companies--train-bands, as they were called; the women were
anxious and frightened; the boys shared the general excitement, and were
busy drilling.

Early one warm July evening four persons were sitting in the little
lattice-covered portico of a cottage in the outskirts of one of the
larger villages near the Canadian border. The most noticeable of the
little group was Madam Marston, an old lady, tall and straight, one of
the type that furnished the New England pioneers with wives as hardy and
brave as themselves. On the bench on the other side of the portico sat
her daughter; the Widow Duval, a slender, gentle woman, but with the
same look of determination in her fine gray eyes. Close to her side was
Noel Duval, a boy of about fifteen, whose dark skin and keen aquiline
features came from his French Canadian father, but who had his mother's
eyes. The sharpness of the boy's features was emphasized by the thinness
of his face, which was pinched, as if by suffering. While a child he had
met an accident that had brought on a long illness, and left one arm
withered and almost helpless. His sister, little Ninette, nestled close
to her stately grandmother.

"Mother," the boy was saying, "Abram Dodds made me very angry to-day. He
said I was not an American, because my father was not, and because I
have always lived in Canada."

"I wouldn't mind what the boys say. When they know you better I'm sure
they'll stop trying to tease you." She laid her hand on his shoulder as
if to check his impatience.

"Nay, daughter," interposed the older woman, her eyes flashing, "let him
stand up for himself--if he can. Because you chose, against my wishes,
to marry a Canadian is no reason why the boy should be sneered at. Was
not his grandfather, Caleb Marston, as good a soldier as fought in the
Revolution, and a captain, too? Let the boy stand up for himself, say
I!"

His mother only stroked the boy's hair soothingly. "Bide your time,
Noel," she whispered; "your chance will come, and in the mean time keep
guard over that quick temper of yours. Remember you must be strong to
take care of us all--Ninette, and your grandmother, and me--and a quick
unruly temper ever means weakness."

"I'll not forget," said Noel. "But still, it angers me to be told I'm
not an American. If my arm would only get stronger, I could be a soldier
like grandfather, and prove that I'm an American. I am, really, am I
not? for I was born in this country before my father took you back to
his home in Canada."

Noel got up and walked off down the road toward the field where the boys
held their drills. In spite of his weak arm he thought he could manage
well enough in the drilling, and he was anxious to be asked to join a
military company the boys had organized. This evening there had come
together about twenty boys, all of whom lived on the neighboring farms.
Their drill-ground was a level piece of pasture-land, bordered on one
side by the forest, which in those times stretched far away to the
north, even to the banks of the St. Lawrence River.

When they saw Noel coming toward them the boys had just finished one of
their evolutions and were resting, leaning on the wooden staffs which
served them instead of real muskets. Jacobus Boonter, who was captain,
had a real sword--one that his grandfather, Ensign Dirk Boonter, had
carried in the war of the Revolution. The boys had much respect for the
old sword, especially when Jacobus pointed out some spots on it that
looked as if they might be blood-stains.

"Captain," said one of the boys, "there comes Noel Duval. You know, he
came here with his mother from Canada only two months ago, and they live
with old Widow Marston on her little farm. He only has one good arm, but
to-day he wanted to fight Abram Dodds for saying he was not an American.
Shall we let him join the company? I know he wants to."

Broad-faced Jacobus shook his head gravely.

"No, I think we'd better not. He's so lately from Canada that he may be
an English spy. You can't be too careful. They say he talks French.
Besides, he's only one good arm. No, I think we'd best not have him. I
don't trust him, and a one-armed soldier wouldn't be good for anything,
anyway."

"Well, I'd trust him," said the first speaker, "and I know him better
than the rest of you do. It's true he's lived in Canada, and when he was
there he learned lots of clever things about the woods, too; but he
feels that this is his country, and he's just as good an American as any
of us."

However, the opinions of Captain Jacobus prevailed, and when Noel came
up he was treated in so cool a way by most of the boys that at first he
felt very angry; but he remembered to check his temper. He remained and
watched the drill, in spite of their evident intention to treat him as
an outsider.

Soon it got so dark that the boys had to stop drilling. They were lying
about on the ground near the edge of the woods, resting a little before
they parted, when of a sudden thirty or forty men, each leading a pony,
loomed out of the dusk. They were walking rapidly, and keeping close to
the forest. The startled boys remained quiet, and the men did not see
them till they were close upon them.

"Hello! What's this?" exclaimed the one who seemed the leader. "Here,
you little rascals, don't you stir! Not a word--not a move!"

The boys were frightened into complete submission, and lay huddled on
the ground staring at the new-comers. These, with the exception of the
leader, who wore the uniform of an English officer, were all dressed in
deer-skin suits, with fur caps and moccasins. The boys saw that they had
been captured by a band of the dreaded Canadian scouts--about whose
Indianlike ferocity many tales were told--and most of the young warriors
trembled with fright. Jacobus tried to say something, but his voice
broke, and the attempt ended in an ignominious mixture of gulp and sob.

"You won't be hurt if you keep quiet," said the officer, trying not to
smile when he saw Jacobus and his big sword. His voice grew stern as he
went on: "Pierre and Antoine, you stay and guard these boys. If one
moves you are to shoot him. Remember that order, boys; remember also
that my scouts always obey. Be careful, Pierre, to let none of them
escape to give the alarm. Join us when you hear firing. Come on, the
rest of you."

In a moment the stealthy company of scouts, leading their ponies, that
stepped carefully, as if they too understood the need of quiet, were
gone. The boys would have thought it all an apparition if the two
stalwart Canadians, Pierre and Antoine, had not been there to prove they
had not been dreaming. The two scouts talked together for a short time
in Canadian French; then, while the one called Pierre stood guard with
his rifle, Antoine picketed their two ponies, and next began to picket
the boys--that is, he tied together the wrists and ankles of each one,
using some long thongs of deer-skin which he and Pierre carried wound
round their waists. When all were securely tied the two scouts stretched
themselves out on the grass, and, paying little further attention to
their trembling prisoners, began talking--none of the boys save Noel
could understand French.

"How long must we wait here with these wretched youngsters?" said
Pierre.

"It will take an hour or more for them to encircle the village; and that
must be done before the attack is made."

"And we must lose it all! It's a shame. Well, they ought to give us a
better chance when--" Here he dropped his voice so low that Noel could
hear no more.

While Noel's ears had been busy, his fingers had not been idle. With the
deftness and patience born of his forest training in Canada he had
worked at the knots that bound him, and had at last succeeded, with the
help of the darkness, in untying them. He lay just at the forest's edge,
and it required only one sudden spring to carry him into the underbrush.

The leap had been a quick one, but Pierre's sharp eyes had seen the
boy's first movement; and as Noel crashed into the bushes, the scout's
knife--which he wore at his belt, and which he could throw as an Indian
throws the tomahawk--glanced through the air, severing a twig close to
the boy's cheek. Noel made two or three long leaps, then crouched down,
and, feeling along the earth, found a heavy stick, and flung it crashing
into the bushes at one side.

Pierre, leaving Antoine to guard the others, had sprung after Noel; he
carried his rifle, which had lain by his side, wrapped in his jacket to
protect it from the dew. It was very dark under the thick evergreens;
and as Pierre, misled by the sound of the stick, went a few yards to one
side, Noel rose and moved away, his moccasins making as little noise as
do the furry feet of a Canada lynx creeping up to a moose. But even a
lynx sometimes stirs a twig that rustles a dead leaf, and now this
happened to Noel. Pierre's ears caught a slight sound; instantly he made
out the crouching figure, and, throwing his rifle to his shoulder,
fired. Thanks to the darkness, the bullet missed, but whizzed so close
to the boy's head that the concussion almost stunned him. Yet he felt
like shouting for joy, for the scout, his muzzle-loading rifle empty and
his knife gone, was practically unarmed.

"Have you got him?" cried Antoine, from the open.

"Not yet," shouted back Pierre. "But I'll have him, alive or dead. He
sha'n't get away!"

Noel, knowing that there was now neither knife nor bullet to follow him,
had leaped forward, running like a deer. The scout sprang after him not
twenty yards behind. The little forest creatures that run about at
night--weasels and sables and hares--scrambled out of their way, and
crouched down, wondering at them as they came dashing by.

The two were not unequally matched; for while the scout had the
advantage in strength, Noel was the more agile. His small size was also
of great advantage, as any one who has tried to run through the woods
will understand. The low-growing branches of trees did not trouble the
boy as they did the tall Pierre, who several times measured his length
upon the ground.

They went on for what seemed a long time to the man and boy plunging
through the underbrush of the woods, but which was probably not more
than half an hour. By that time Noel felt that his strength was fast
going. He was breathing painfully, and had been forced to slacken his
pace, when he came upon what at first seemed a thick growth of bushes;
as he broke through he found that it was a brush fence which some farmer
had built through the woods to enlarge his pasture. The boy, agile and
light, had little trouble; but Pierre fared worse, and before he could
struggle through the brush and the tops of fallen trees that composed
the fence, Noel had doubled the distance between them.

As Noel hurried on as fast as he was able he was startled by some large
animal, which he stumbled upon just as it was getting to its feet; it
too was frightened, and ran on ahead. Noel saw that it was one of the
farmer's heifers. Here was an opportunity to mislead his pursuer, and
the boy dropped to the ground by the side of a log and lay perfectly
quiet. Pierre, out of breath, and struggling to make up the ground he
had lost, kept on after the heifer, thinking it was Noel. As he leaped
over the log, he was so near the prostrate figure that his foot actually
touched the boy's jacket.

As soon as the Canadian was out of hearing, Noel jumped up and started
toward the clearing, which he knew was near by. There was no time to
lose, for Pierre must soon find out his mistake and return. In a few
minutes Noel reached the edge of the wood, and far off across the fields
saw a black shaft in the starlight, the spire of the village church. It
was fully three miles away; for he had been running from the village,
rather than toward it. The attack, he knew, would be made within an
hour.

There was a stretch of nearly a mile across the fields before a road
could be reached. Noel, tired from his dash through the woods, started
forward across the uneven pasture-land. In spite of his anxiety, he
laughed to himself at the thought of Pierre's feelings when he should
discover that he was chasing only a frightened cow.

As he hurried on as fast as his tired legs would carry him, it seemed to
his strained senses that an unnatural and forbidding hush pervaded the
warm night. Even the notes of whippoorwills that came from the bushes
near the forest sounded less loud than usual, and seemed to foretell a
calamity. The hares and other animals that come out in the darkness had
hidden themselves.

Finally he came to the road that led on to the village, still two miles
away. There was little danger of being overtaken by Pierre; but there
was a chance of his being seen by the sentinels that the raiders might
station on the roads leading to the village. He could not go faster than
a slow trot now, and he was panting painfully. His moccasin-clad feet
ploughed through the dust, striking against the stones in the rough
road. He thought, a little bitterly, that the other boys were right if
they believed that he was not really able-bodied; the accident that had
hurt his arm had weakened him in every way. However, he plodded on
steadily, resolved that determination should take the place, as far as
possible, of bodily strength.

He had gone perhaps half the way when there was the sound of a horse's
hoofs coming from the direction of the village. He crouched down in the
shadow of some bushes, and waited. In a moment the horse and its rider
came in sight, and by the dim light Noel recognized the village doctor,
old Mr. Hedding, astride his white pony. Noel stepped into the road in
front of the pony.

"It's only I, doctor; Noel Duval, grandson to the Widow Marston," he
said, in a whisper. "Don't make any noise! Was everything quiet at the
village when you left?"

"Quiet as usual, and that's quiet enough, for certain. But what's the
matter, lad? Why are you stopping people in the high-road in this way?
And why are you trembling and panting so? That's not like a highwayman."

"They're going to attack the village--raiders from Canada! There's no
time to explain! But you must let me have the pony! I'm all tired
out--and I must get to the village!"

For a moment the doctor scrutinized the boy's face. Then he got down
from the pony. "I was going to farmer Tonwell's, who's down with his
rheumatism again, but he shall wait. I wouldn't do this at every boy's
word, but you look as if you know what you're about, and I will take the
chance."

Already Noel had sprung to the saddle and turned the pony back toward
the village.

"Look out for my saddle-bags," said the doctor. "There's enough costly
drugs in them to kill all the English in Canada. I'll follow on slowly,
and 'twill go hard with you if you've been trifling with me."

But the boy was out of hearing. It seemed as if Providence had come to
the aid of his weak body, and Noel, with renewed hope of reaching the
village in time to give the alarm, urged on the sturdy white pony.

They had almost reached the outskirts of the little town when a man on
horseback rode into the middle of the road, and confronting Noel,
ordered him to stop. Noel thought he recognized the dress of the
Canadian scouts. He bent low on the saddle and struck the pony sharply.
An instant later a rifle blazed in his face. Then he realized that in
some way the white pony had got by the other horse and was galloping
down the road, terrified by the rifle's flash. The scout's pony was
close behind.

The white pony was running as it had not done since it was a colt in
lower Canada, and had carried its habitant master in many a race, and
won them, too. Noel was conscious of a feeling of exultation; for he saw
that the scout was losing ground. He cried out to his pursuer in French,
and started to wave his hand in a derisive farewell. The effort caused a
sharp pain to shoot through his arm, and he found that his hand and
wrist were covered with blood. The scout's bullet had torn its way
through the flesh of his forearm.

He grew very faint, and had to clutch the saddle tightly with his knees
to keep from falling. His weak arm had served to hold the reins, but it
was good for little else. He was so dizzy that he could hardly see, and
he only dimly realized that he was close to the streams of light coming
from the windows of the village tavern. The sound of a galloping horse
brought several men to the tavern door.

"Raiders from Canada are coming! They're close by!" he gasped, then his
head swam round and he fell from the saddle. After that there was much
shouting and hurrying to and fro, and finally the beating of a drum and
the quick clang of the bell in the village church. But Noel, stretched
out on a table in the tavern, was undisturbed by all the turmoil.

       *       *       *       *       *

Even Congress heard of what had occurred that warm July night by the
Canadian border, and when the war was ended, Noel Duval was remembered
in such a substantial way that he was able to provide a good home for
his mother and the old Widow Marston and for little Ninette, and to keep
poverty from ever again pinching them.

One day in the autumn, Noel, who was now quite well of his wound, was
asked to come to the drill-ground. Jacobus Boonter met him, and led him
to where the company of boys were drawn up in line. "Noel Duval," he
said, "we ask you if you will please be our captain?"




THE LAZY HOUR.


    So bright are the branches,
      The shadows so cool,
    So dark is the water,
      So deep is the pool,
    So hard is the lesson,
      So hot is the school--
  If I were the son of a merman
  I never should hear of a rule!

    Light as the arrow
      Springs from the bow,
    Off the big ledges
      Down I should go
    Into the hollow
      Whose secret I know,
  Up I should come like a bubble,
  Shake off the water and blow!

    Now for a breast stroke
      Under the tide--
    Arm o'er arm sweeping
      I float on my side;
    Deep in green crystal
      Slowly I slide.
  There goes the class up in Cæsar!
  I wish I'd a corner to hide!

  HARRIET PRESCOTT SPOFFORD.




ARTIFICIAL ICE.


Sign-boards bearing the legend "Boston ice" over the doors of cellars
and other places where ice was kept for sale have long been a familiar
sight in the South. During the last twelve years, however, nearly every
Southern town of importance has established its own factory for making
ice, and the process has become so perfect and cheap that the artificial
ice competes with the natural article shipped from the New England
States.

The cost of transportation, handling, and enormous waste by melting
serves to make "Boston ice" a costly luxury to the Southern consumer.
This has stimulated the invention of improved methods of making
artificial ice.

On his first visit to an ice factory, one who is not familiar with
ice-making machinery will be surprised to see large steam-engines and
boilers, with great piles of coal, and will wonder how the use of fire
and steam can assist in producing cold; but a little understanding of
the chemistry of the process will enable him to perceive the need of
such machinery.

All objects contain a certain amount of heat. The capacity for retaining
this heat varies in different substances. Liquids retain more than
solids, and gases more than liquids. If gases be compressed, their
heat-retaining capacity will be reduced in proportion. Nearly all of the
known gases may be compressed until they assume the liquid form. Gas
made from ammonia when subjected to a pressure of about one hundred and
fifty pounds to the square inch, becomes a liquid. Should the pressure
be now removed, the liquid ammonia will instantly rush into gas again,
and in doing so tries to absorb the heat which has been squeezed out of
it.

[Illustration: AN ICE "CAN."]

If this expansion into gas be allowed to take place in pipes sunk in
brine, it will draw all the heat out of the brine, and cause the brine
to become cold enough to freeze fresh water in cans suspended in it, and
convert the fresh water in the cans into solid ice.

In the factories which freeze the water in cans there is provided a very
large brine-chamber or vat, so deep that the cans may be immersed in it
nearly to their tops. The cans are about four feet deep, and are made of
galvanized iron. They are filled with pure water, and let down into the
brine through openings in the top of the vat. Between the rows of
water-cans are tiers of iron pipes running back and forth through the
brine, and throughout these pipes the expansion of gas takes place,
cooling the brine to ten degrees below zero. Ice soon begins to form on
the inside and bottom of the cans under the influence of this intense
cold. It becomes thicker and thicker, until it is finally a solid mass
of clear crystal ice, usually with a small core of opaque or snowy ice,
exactly through the centre.

As fast as their contents are frozen the cans are removed by a special
lifting apparatus, and dipped for a minute into hot water to loosen the
block from the can. Then it slides out easily, and is stored away for
use.

There are other factories conducted on a somewhat different plan from
the foregoing, in which the ice is made to form on iron plates, in cakes
weighing several tons each.

In such factories the brine-chamber is in the shape of double partition
walls of iron plates, about four inches apart. The partition divides a
deep wooden water-tank into two equal rooms, and in the narrow space
between the iron plates the brine and pipes for the ammonia gas are
placed. The rooms are filled with pure water, which is in contact with
the brine-chamber on one side. Ice soon begins to form on the iron side
plates, precisely in the same way as on a pond or river, except that the
sheet of ice is vertical instead of horizontal. Only about half of the
water in the rooms is allowed to freeze.

[Illustration: A BLOCK OF MANUFACTURED ICE.]

When the cakes of ice are considered to be of sufficient thickness, the
cold brine is pumped out of its compartment into another tank, and its
place is filled with water of ordinary temperature. This soon thaws the
ice cakes loose from the plates, and allows the mass of ice to be lifted
out by hoisting machinery. The ice is then passed on to the
sawing-machine, which divides it into blocks weighing about two hundred
pounds each. The only essential difference in the two systems described
lies in the fact that in the can method all the water is frozen, and if
there be any impurity in the water the ice will contain it. In the plate
method the ice is formed entirely from one side of the cake, and only
about one-half of the water is allowed to congeal into solid ice. Since
water, in freezing, tends to purify itself in the way in which the
natural ice of ponds and rivers purifies itself, the plate method more
nearly resembles the natural way, and the ice shows its characteristic
structure.

After having performed its work in cooling the brine, the expanded gas
is drawn from the pipes by means of powerful steam-pumps, and it is then
compressed into a coil of iron pipes kept immersed in a tank of cold
running water. This compression of the expanded gas requires very heavy
machinery, and the operation develops much heat, which is absorbed by
the running water. In other words, the expanding gas having absorbed
much heat from the brine, and having been made cold by this means, must
be deprived of the heat thus gained by compression again into a coil
surrounded by running water, which takes away the heat as soon as it is
developed by compression.

Being now restored to the liquid form, the gas is ready to go on another
round, and may be used again and again. The only loss of gas sustained
is from leaky joints in the pipes.

It is a curious sight to see these pipes and pumps, even in the hottest
weather, all coated with a thick layer of snow-white frost, so thick
that it may be scraped off with the hands and squeezed into a snowball.
The brine-pumps soon lose their characteristic shape, and are scarcely
recognizable, looking more like a fantastic snow-drift than a piece of
iron machinery.

[Illustration: A BLOCK THAT STOOD SOME TIME IN THE SUN.]

Sometimes we see fine fruit or a bouquet of handsome flowers which had
been so placed in the water as to become frozen in the centre of a large
block of crystal ice. Such objects form beautiful ornaments while they
last.

Many people believe that coal is really at the foundation of cheap ice,
and that it will presently be cheaper to use coal to make ice than to
use it in transporting ice to the place where it is wanted. Artificial
ice is already produced in considerable quantities in districts where
natural ice is also cut for the market.




GRANDFATHER'S ADVENTURES.

AS A PIRATE.


"Ralph," said Grandfather Sterling, one winter's evening, as they sat
together before a fire of crackling logs, and listened with a dreamy
sense of snugness and comfort to the howlings of the storm without, "did
I ever tell you about the time that I was a pirate?"

"Grandpop!" exclaimed the startled boy, "you don't mean to say that you
were once a real pirate, the kind that rob people and cut their throats
and all that, just like the story of Captain Kidd in my school Reader?"

Grandfather Sterling nodded his head in assent.

"Yes, Ralph, your grandfather once sailed under the black-flag having a
white skull and cross-bones painted on it, and, what is more, he was a
member of the crew of the pirate schooner _Dragon_, commanded by Captain
Brand, the most notorious pirate that ever cruised among the West India
Islands."

An amused smile crept over the old sea-captain's face, and his eyes
twinkled mischievously as he detected his nephew's horrified, pained,
and reproachful look.

"Well, Ralph," said his grandfather, with an affected air of shame and
remorse, "I'll tell you how it happened:

"You see, it was my second voyage as boy on board of the brig _Saucy_,
commanded by Captain Abraham Smith, belonging down Salem way in
Massachusetts, and trading between that port and the West Indies. We
left harbor one summer morning, loaded with all kinds of hardy
vegetables, which we expected to exchange in Cuba for sugar. After a
fortnight at sea we sighted San Salvador Island, belonging to the Bahama
group, which island, by-the-way, was the first land that Columbus
discovered on his great voyage. That afternoon we were sailing along
past Crooked Island, which lies just to the southward of San Salvador,
when a trim-looking schooner with very tall masts, on which were spread
enormous fore-and-aft sails, stood out from under the lee of the land,
and came down rapidly upon us. Knowing that we could not escape from
her, the stranger openly showed his colors--the pirate's black-flag. We
crowded every stitch of canvas on the poor little _Saucy_, but in less
than an hour the pirate was so close that his shot commenced to carry
away our spars and rigging.

"'Men,' said our Captain, 'there's no good in trying to escape, so let
us heave to. Perhaps when he finds out that our cargo is of no value he
will let us go our way.'

"Well, we shortened sail at once, and put our wheel down, waiting for
the enemy to board us. Seeing that we had given up the race, the pirate
kept getting in his light sails as he swept down on us, and after he had
forged ahead a little he tacked ship, leaving his jib to windward, and
so laid hove to. Immediately one of his boats pulled out from under the
lee of the schooner, and a minute later was alongside of us.

"Preceded by a fair, handsome, lightly built man, who proved to be none
other than Captain Brand, a dozen swarthy, evil-looking pirates, armed
to the teeth, tumbled over the rail. Captain Smith stepped forward to
address the chief, but was immediately cut down with a cutlass wielded
by the latter, who haughtily remarked,

"'Excuse me, I've no time for conversation.'

"The pirate's action was a signal to his men, and before our crew could
offer the slightest resistance they shared the master's fate. A
wicked-looking scoundrel with an ugly scar across his cheek made a
savage swing at me with his sword, but before the blow could fall the
pirate's cutlass was sent flying from his grasp, and he uttered a shriek
of pain and seized his arm where Brand's blow had fallen.

"'I don't make war on children,' was all that the Captain said.

"Fifteen minutes later the _Saucy_ had been ransacked and set on fire,
and sick at heart I was on board the schooner, having been given to
understand that my name had been entered as a pirate's apprentice, and
that I was a regular member of the crew and must obey orders.

"At once the word was passed to get the vessel under way, and I found
myself trailing on to the fore-topsail halyards alongside of a
sad-looking lad of about my own age, who was addressed by the men as
Dick, and who, I took it rightly, had been forced to join the _Dragon_
under similar conditions to my own.

"That night we two found ourselves in the same watch, and, after
answering to roll-call, we stowed ourselves away between two of the guns
and exchanged confidences. Later on we talked over various plans to gain
our freedom. Dick informed me that the schooner was on her way to the
pirates' stronghold, where he had been once before, on the island of
Tortugas, there to divide the spoils of the voyage, and to gamble and
carouse for several days before starting on another expedition.

"Two days later we reached the island in a small securely locked bay on
the western side. After lowering and furling the sails, a chest about
two feet square was brought out on deck, and its contents, consisting of
gold and silver, money and jewels, were divided among the men by Captain
Brand. After that a barrel of rum was lowered into the long boat, and
the crew entered her and rowed away, leaving the Captain and we two boys
the only ones on board.

"Late in the evening Captain Brand ordered Dick to row him ashore, and I
was left alone. About an hour later Dick sculled the boat quietly
alongside out of the darkness, climbed on board, and addressed me in an
excited whisper:

"'Now's our time, Sterling; the Captain has gone up to his shore house
and thinks I'm waiting for him on the beach; we will cut the cable, and
the wind will set us out of the bay; they can't follow us, for I've sent
their boat adrift, with the plug pulled out so that it will sink!'

"While Dick ran to the wheel I jumped forward and sawed my knife through
the anchor hawser, and immediately saw the schooner's head falling off
against the stars under the influence of the easterly wind. In a quarter
of an hour we were outside the mouth of the harbor and drifting to the
westward. We knew that we never could hoist the sails and handle the
vessel to sail anywhere, and that if a gale sprang up we would probably
founder; but these dangers could not rob us of great happiness, for we
realized that we were free from the pirates' clutches.

"During the night we took turns at steering the schooner so as to keep
her before the wind, but just before daybreak it fell a flat calm. When
the sun rose Dick was the first to see a large man-of-war about a mile
away on our beam, also lying becalmed. They made us out at the same
time, and evidently disliking our looks they fitted out three large
launches with guns in their bows, and pulled toward us. When they got
within hailing distance we told our story. One of the boats then came
alongside and took possession of the pirate craft. Dick and I were then
sent off to the cruiser to tell our story to her Captain.

"Well, Ralph, to make a long story short, the commander of the
man-of-war determined to take the pirates by surprise, if possible, so
he stood off to the northeast all day to get the island under his lee,
and when night fell he crowded on sail and ran for the place that we had
escaped from twenty-four hours before. We made the entrance to the
harbor about midnight, and while the man-of-war remained hove to, all
the boats were fitted out and sent in to the bay.

"About an hour later we heard the sound of distant firing, and toward
morning the boats returned with all the officers and men safe and sound,
who stated that they had found the pirates stupefied with drink, and had
made short work of the gang. Captain Brand, however, had not been seen,
and it was supposed that he had escaped to the interior of the island.

"Now, Ralph, you have the history of your grandfather at the time he was
a pirate and sailed under the black-flag with Captain Brand, the
notorious robber chief."




CORPORAL FRED.[1]

A Story of the Riots.

BY CAPTAIN CHARLES KING, U.S.A.


CHAPTER IV.

Four miles away, in the heart of the great city, a throng of men and
women and children surrounded the massive stone walls, and peered up at
the narrow windows of a formidable-looking building, from whose lofty
flag-staff the Stars and Stripes were fluttering in the fresh lake
breeze--a crowd even denser than that we saw in the distant dusty yards.
Here, too, among them were faces grave with anxiety. Here, too, among
the women were eyes red with tears; but here all was silence and order.
Suddenly from within the huge brown walls there rose the shrill summons
of the bugle, sounding in quick, spirited call the well-known
"assembly," and in company rooms, crowded to suffocation by wives,
mothers, sisters, sweethearts, and friends of the guardsmen, the men of
the --th regiment fell in for roll-call. Almost at the same moment, in
other sections of the city, the same signal called two other commands to
their ranks. The State was waking up at last, but waking up in earnest.

Down in the paved court below the chargers of the field and staff
officers were awaiting their riders, every swish of their tails slashing
the faces of boys and men wedged in an almost solid mass about them.
Orders had been given that only members of the regiment and people
having important business with its officers should be allowed within the
walls; but the summons for duty had reached over eight hundred of its
men while still at their places of business downtown. There was no time
to go home, and the Colonel could not resist the pleas that came from
without. First by threes and fours, then by dozens, scores, and finally
in one uninterrupted stream, relatives and friends, followed by mere
curiosity-seekers, swept past the guarded gates, until the great
interior was packed, and there was no room for more. Before it was
possible to form the command in the big drill-hall the guards had to
clear the court, then drive all men and boys into the space thus
redeemed, and post a solid section across the sally-port to hold it
against further ingress. It was 3.50 when the Colonel was handed his
orders, and touched the button that flashed the summons to each company
commander. It was just 5.45 when he reported his command in readiness,
and just 6.30 when, amidst a storm of cheers, tears, and God-speeds,
through a flashing sea of white handkerchiefs he guided his startled,
spirited horse, and followed by his staff and a solid column of fours,
eight hundred strong, turned into the broad avenue and led the way. No
exultant strain of martial music, no gayly decked bandsmen at the head
of the regiment; only the hoarse throb of the drums. No nodding plumes
and snowy helmets, cross-belts, trousers. This was war's array,
magnificently stern, but as magnificently simple. Officers and men alike
wore the drab slouch hat of the regulars in the field, and the sombre
blouses of dark blue, the broad drab ammunition belt, crammed with
copper cartridges, the brown equipments, haversacks, leggings, etc., all
without an atom of show or tinsel. Even the popular idea of glittering
bayonet and gleaming musket seemed rebuked, for the sloping Springfields
were brown and businesslike as the belts and leggings. Out they strode
with steady swinging step, and the heart of the great city seemed to
leap to its throat, the spray of the eastward billows to its blinking
eyes, for riot, insurrection, defiance to law and order, peace and
security, had again burst forth, and were raging every instant nearer
and nearer its very vitals. Police and sheriff had grappled or cajoled
in vain, and here at last was its right arm--the hope and strength and
pride of house and home, the pet regiment of the Western metropolis was
being sent to check the torrent where it raged its maddest, through that
mile-long reach of the Great Western yards. "Eight hundred strong with
more a-coming," as the papers put it, the --th went swinging down the
applauding avenue to face far more than ten times its weight in foes. No
wonder women wept and waved their hands, and strong men prayed as they
said God-speed and good-by.

Out to the rioters flashed the news of the muster. Trainmen, switchmen,
one and all, knew the coming force. Many a time had they carried them to
the summer encampments in the interior of the State. More than once
within the year had they hurried them away to the scene of some mad
outbreak among the mines and iron-works. The masses of the mob might
hoot and jeer and cry derision and boast of the reception they would
give the "dudes," the "tin soldiers"; but these railway men, schooled
themselves in lessons of order and discipline, knew the stern stuff of
which the regiment was really made. Already the thinking men among them
had begun to edge away, leaving only an occasional crack-brained
enthusiast like Farley in the crowd. Long since had the promoters of the
row, such restless agitators as Steinman and Frenzal, slipped off to
shelter, where neither bullet nor bayonet could reach them, but where
they could dictate further violence and plan madder schemes. Over about
the deserted shops, away from the mad tumult of the yards, numbers of
the strikers stood in gloomy contemplation of the wreck, but taking no
further part in the proceedings. Work had been suspended during the day,
for such was the need of old and trusted hands in the passenger stations
and on the abandoned switch-engines that other foremen besides stern old
Wallace had been called away, and these were stalwarts to whom the
strikers had appealed in vain. Struck between the eyes by a coupling-pin
while handling the lever of a switch-engine an hour before, Mr. Ainslie,
the master-mechanic of the Air Line, had just been borne by in an
ambulance: and Wallace, looking even older, sadder, sterner, than he did
at dawn, bore down upon the muttering shamefaced group as he returned
for his coat, hanging there on its accustomed peg in the darkening
shops. Something of the smouldering fire in his eyes seemed to overawe
them, for they gave way in sullen silence, many of them turning to avoid
the glower of the old Scotchman's gaze, and let him by without a word.
There were those among them who earlier in the day could have cried him
shame for his blunt refusal to either strike or sympathize. Stoltz, who
called upon him with fiery words and fierce gesticulation at ten
o'clock, had been told to go and stay. At one, when men were needed to
man the engines, he had sent word to Jim to come and take his place in a
cab and handle the lever like a man, or keep out of his sight till he
could behave like one: and as no Jim came, the father himself manned the
throttle of the first engine to force a way to the yards, just in time
to see his beloved son shot down, apparently by the senseless folly of a
deputy trained neither to aim nor to endure. His heart was hot against
the leaders who had brought this madness on the men he had known and
almost swayed for years, and he could not refrain from harsh invective
now. Halting short, he turned upon the sullen group.

"Are you satisfied with your work now, you blind, misguided fools? Have
you gained one point? You've struck down--killed, perhaps--the best man
that ever handled a wrench in these shops. You've stoned my flesh and
blood. Why don't you mob me? I would have run that engine back until
every track was clear had I had my way. Why don't you mob me? I begged
Mr. Williams to let me go and fetch away those trains, car by car, if
need be. Why don't you mob me, I say? Your advisers are frauds, and you
are fools or worse. Look there at your doing!" he cried, pointing to the
heaping wreck up the long lines of rail.

They would not answer him. Some already realized the extent of their
blunder; others, sullen and disheartened, knew not how. All seemed to
start and turn as though at sound of a familiar voice, when a man
stepped from the open office door and began to speak, calmly at first,
then with growing resonance and effect, as though he were again upon the
rostrum preaching to the oppressed.

"No one would willingly harm you, Mr. Wallace: no one would knowingly
have injured Mr. Ainslie. Our people, even when wronged and
down-trodden, respect gray hairs, but the time has come when even
patience has its limit. We are not the wreckers yonder, though we well
might be. All that is the work of a great sympathetic people, long
protesting against the tyranny to which we have bowed in the past. We
would have spared the road and its officials as we have spared you, but
let me say to you now the blow that downed your son was a blessing in
disguise, for had he joined those coming minions of the
government--those fancy soldiers of the aristocratic wards--I would not
be answerable for what might happen, not only to him, but to you and
yours."

Wallace let the speaker finish before he strode a long step nearer.

[Illustration: "YOU MADE THOSE THREATS LAST NIGHT," HE THUNDERED.]

"You made those threats last night," he thundered, shaking his bony
forefinger under the other's rubicund nose. "I know your voice, and I
want to know your name. Who are you, I say, who have come here sowing
seeds of riot among honest men? You dare not give your name, and these
men will not. My own son said he could not tell me. No man afraid or
ashamed of his name was ever in honest work. I answer you that if he
hasn't gone already, just so soon as he can stir my boy shall take his
place, musket in hand, and you and yours may do your cowardly worst."

"You've had fair warning, Mr. Wallace," said the stranger, backing
uneasily away from the menacing hand of the old mechanic. "You've done
enough already to merit mobbing, as you call it, and it was our mercy
and our forbearance that spared you in the cab this day. But as for
those who live in this suburb and have gone to join the gang of
organized murder, and, under the guise of militia-men, to shoot down
their suffering brothers, may Heaven help them if they once again show
their faces here!"

And even as the speaker finished, over in the yards, beyond the long
line of brown freight cars, went up a yell of wrath, a savage sort of
cheer that seemed to carry a shudder with it, a sound as of the rush of
a thousand feet, and presently men came darting under or scrambling upon
the cars, and gazing eagerly through or over the high picket-fence that
separated them from the shop enclosure. Catching sight of the gathering
at the main entrance, and recognizing some familiar form, many among
them began to gesticulate, and cries were heard of "There he is!"
"Traitor!" "Scab!" "Scoundrel!" And fists were clinched, and clubs were
brandished, and more men clambered to the car roofs, and boys beat upon
the fence with stones, and shouted shrill taunt and insult.

"You hear?" said the stranger. "They're talking about you now, and the
traitor work you've done this day. Will you go to your home and stay
there, and see to it that Fred makes no attempt to join his regiment?
Will you promise--promise to pull no throttle, handle no tool, until
this trouble's ended?"

"Will I deal or dicker with such as you, do you dare to think?" burst in
old Wallace, mad with indignation. "Out of my way, or I'll handle a tool
to some purpose. Stand aside and let me go where I belong," he ordered,
for the man stood at the doorway as though to oppose his passage, but
the fire and fury in the Scotchman's eye appalled him, and instinctively
he drew aside. Then with something like the snort of a Highland stag, in
sheer contempt the foreman strode by and into the gloomy, unlighted
shops, just as Jim, with alarm and misery in his face, came panting to
the spot.

"For goodness sake, don't let them touch the old man, fellows! Think how
he's worked for the road for years before we were born. It's like home
to him. You'd feel as he does if you'd worked for it so long. Stoltz has
been making a speech inciting them to mob him. They're coming now. Speak
to them, Mr. Steinman," he implored the stranger. "Speak to them, and
stand them off."

"It's his own folly," said Steinman, waving Jim aside, and starting to
get out of the road. "I've pleaded with him--warned him to no purpose.
He insulted me--threatened to split my skull. Ask these men here," he
continued, and the nodding heads and murmured words of the by-standers
gave quick assent. "I promised him protection if he'd simply agree to go
home and stay there, and keep that fool of a brother of yours from
joining his regiment."

"He couldn't promise that," protested Jim, all breathless with anxiety
and grief. Already a crowd of rioters were surging through the gate a
hundred yards away, and coming threateningly towards them. "The moment
Fred could get his head dressed he left. He's gone two hours ago."

"Gone!" cried Steinman; "to join men who'd shoot us down like dogs! Then
let the old man swallow his pill," and turning to the coming throng the
furious leader shouted, "Come on!"

To Jim Wallace's side came running now, trembling, weeping with
excitement and fear, a little boy of nine. With one grab the burly
freight conductor seized and fairly slung him through the doorway into
the dark interior, sprang after him, turned and barred the heavy oaken
door, then seizing again the little fellow's hand, rushed him through a
long lane of half-completed cars, through dim and gloomy aisles, and a
maze of work-benches, until they reached the north end of the shops, a
long block away.

"Now, Billy boy," he cried, straining his little brother one instant in
his arms, "be a man for daddy's sake. Run like the wind for the avenue.
Fred's regiment can't be six blocks away. Tell the Colonel they're
killing father at the shops. Away with you, laddie!"

And like an arrow from the bow the little fellow sped, even as the sound
of battering beams thundered through the resounding arches of the dark
deserted shops, and Jim went groping back to find his gray-haired
father.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Begun in HARPER'S ROUND TABLE No. 821




OAKLEIGH.

BY ELLEN DOUGLAS DELAND.


CHAPTER VIII.

Miss Betsey Trinkett had risen betimes this Friday morning. She had
planned to do some work in her garden, and, besides, Miss Betsey was an
early riser.

Ebenezer, the "hired man," when he came back from driving the cows to
pasture, found her hard at work, in her huge sun-bonnet and garden
gloves, pruning the box that formed the border of the old-fashioned
garden.

Here bloomed together in delicious profusion roses--white, red, and
pink--sweet-william, dahlias, peonies, mignonette, and heart's-ease,
while the labyrinth which wound in and out among them was the pride of
Miss Betsey's heart.

After a time she straightened herself and stood gazing at the view, her
quaint little figure, in its old-time gay-colored gown, looking not
unlike the flowers among which it stood.

"Well, I want to know!" she said, aloud, her hand raised to shield her
eyes. "Any one who says his view is better than mine must be just about
daft. Land sakes! I'd just about die if I didn't get that sweep of the
Merrimac and those mountings beyond!" And then, satisfied, she returned
to her weeding.

Miss Betsey's house--in which she had been born, and her father
also--stood on the side of a hill. Behind was a steep pasture, full of
rocks and stubby bushes. In front, on the other side of the road, the
ground sloped abruptly to the village. Even the old white meeting-house,
built on a hill though it was, stood lower than the Trinkett farm.
Beyond the village flowed the beautiful Merrimac. A broad stretch of
meadow-land and cultivated fields rested the eye with their peaceful
greens, and far away was the dim outline of the hills.

"Silas don't get a touch of the river," continued Miss Betsey; "and as
for the medders, they're nowhere to be seen. He thinks because he can
see the Common and the Soldiers' Monument his view's better than mine!
He expects me to give up the Merrimac for the Soldiers' Monument! Sakes
alive!"

She worked steadily for some time, until the click of the gate attracted
her attention.

[Illustration: "I WANT TO KNOW!" SHE EXCLAIMED, DRAWING OFF HER OLD
GLOVES.]

"I want to know!" she exclaimed, laying down her tools and drawing off
her old gloves; "if here ain't Nephew John and Jackie and that naughty
Cynthy. Well, well! And this must be the bride." And she hurried down
the path to meet them.

Cynthia came shyly forward after the introduction of her step-mother and
the greetings were over. All the way in the train she had been
meditating what she should say. With Jack's help she had composed a
little speech. His help had consisted in acting as audience, for Cynthia
was seldom at a loss for words. But when the time came the speech
deserted her, and all she could think of doing was to put her arms
around Aunt Betsey's neck, and, looking into the depths of the big
sun-bonnet, say, softly:

"Aunt Betsey, I'm so sorry! Will you forgive me?"

"Forgive you, child!" exclaimed the old lady, her resentment melting at
sight of her favorite niece. "I want to know! Did you suppose I'd
remembered to be angry all this time? La, Cynthy, when you're as old as
I am you'll have learned to take a little joke. And don't you suppose
I'm real pleased to have you look so much like me? If Mrs. Parker
couldn't tell us apart there must be some resemblance."

"Nor Jack, either," put in Cynthia, eagerly, with a lightened heart.

"I think you are too good to her, Aunt Betsey," said Mr. Franklin, as
they walked towards the house. "I brought her up here to-day for the
sole purpose of apologizing."

"Do tell! And I nearly disremembered it entirely! But I'm _real_ glad to
see you and my new niece. Come right into the best parlor."

She opened the door, and with reverent step ushered them into the
carefully kept "best parlor." An immaculate carpet, ever shielded from
the light of day, covered the floor, and a horse-hair sofa and a few
chairs of the same inhospitable material stood at regular intervals from
one another.

A pair of tall vases and some sea-shells decked the mantel-piece. During
their childhood it had been a rare treat to Jack and Cynthia to hold
these shells to their ears and listen to the "roar of the ocean" within.
On a table between the windows were some wax flowers under a glass, and
on the marble-topped centre table were a few books placed together in
neat little piles.

Mrs. Franklin was given the place of honor, the large arm-chair. The
chair being a high one, and she being a rather small woman, her feet
barely touched the floor, and she sat in constant terror lest she should
slide ignominiously to the ground.

It was so dark when they entered the room that Mr. Franklin stumbled
over a worsted-work footstool which stood in a prominent place, but Miss
Trinkett opened the blinds a crack, and two bars of blazing July
sunshine fell across the carpet. Then she sat down to entertain her
guests, but her mind wandered. The Franklins all talked, but Miss Betsey
was unusually silent. "I want to know!" and "Do tell!" came at random.
Finally she said, with a hasty glance at the sunlight:

"I wonder now if you'd mind coming into my sitting-room? I'd be real
pleased to have you, and maybe we'd find it cooler."

They all jumped to their feet with alacrity. Miss Betsey closed her
blinds again with a sigh of relief, and in the freer atmosphere of the
sitting-room, secure in the knowledge that her best-parlor carpet was no
longer fading, she found her tongue.

"I was coming to see you, niece, just as soon as I could see my way to
it. Marthy, my hired girl, has been off for a spell, and that's kept me
busy. I'd have written, but I'm a poor hand at writing. Silas he says he
wonders the letters I write ever get there, but then he's one of the
doubting kind, Silas is. I've great faith in government. I think as long
as they undertake to carry letters about at all, they've got sense
enough to carry 'em safe, even if I do disremember part of the direction
sometimes. And it's wonderful, as I've said many a time before, what you
can send through the mails nowadays. But now tell me about those poor
little orphans in the poultry-yard."

The success of the last hatch was described to her; in fact, all the
news of Brenton was asked for and received, and in turn bits of
Wayborough gossip were told to the attentive Mrs. Franklin, while
Silas's latest sayings were repeated and commented upon.

When Jack and Cynthia had gone out-doors, Miss Betsey drew her chair a
little closer to that of Mrs. Franklin.

"My dear--Hester, I think your name is, and Hester it will be my
pleasure to call you--my dear Hester, I want to tell you first and
foremost that I'm real pleased you should come and be a mother to those
children of Nephew John's. They needed you; they needed you badly. And
now I'm going to treat you as one of the family, and talk over a little
matter with you and John. You've probably heard of Silas Green. He's
been courting me these forty years, and now he's got it into his head
that he can't be climbing this hill any more of a Sunday night. He wants
me to fix the day! I declare, it kind of takes the stiffening right out
of me to think of fixing the day after all these years, and I still hold
out, as I can't give up my view of the river."

"What are you going to do about it, Aunt Betsey?"

"That's just it, John. Well, I'm going to hold out a little longer, and
I think--in fact, I'm pretty sure--that Silas is weakening. You see,
it's kind of lonesome for him down there, now his sister's dead that
kept house for him, and it _is_ depressing to have nothing much to look
at but the Common and the Soldiers' Monument. Yes, I think he's
weakening, and I shouldn't wonder if you were to find him here next time
you come. But I'll let you know in time to come to the wedding, you may
be sure of that. But there's something else I want to speak about."

Here Miss Betsey paused. She folded her hands anew in her lap, and,
rocking briskly, waited for some one to speak. The clock on the
chimney-shelf ticked comfortably, and Miss Trinkett's canary chirped and
hopped about in its cage at the window. Mrs. Franklin looked at her
husband.

"And what is that, Aunt Betsey?" said he. "Somehow you have so taken my
breath away by hinting that you are going to make Mr. Silas Green happy,
after all these years, that I can't take in anything else."

"Ah, now, my dear boy, don't jump too quickly at a conclusion. Things
may not be any nearer a settling now than they were forty years ago.
It's all a question of view, and men are terribly set in their ways.
However, to continue: I want to make each of the children a present. I
feel that I'm getting on in life--though I'm not so very old either, but
still no one knows what may happen--and I'd rather do things up before I
die than have it all a-going on after I'm laid away. I never did think
much of wills, anyhow. So I'm going to send 'em each a present from time
to time as I feel inclined."

"Nonsense, Aunt Betsey!" said Mr. Franklin. "You are not going to die
for many a year yet, and you give the children enough. Keep your money."

"Now you needn't say a word, John. My mind's made up, and it takes a
deal to make me change it--it's in the Trinkett blood. And then I like
to get the letters the children write to thank me. I must say I'm
powerful fond of their letters, 'specially Cynthy's. She does write a
beautiful letter. I'll send 'em each in turn, beginning with Edith and
ending up with Willy. Of course they can do what they like with the
money, but it would be my advice to put it in the savings-bank. It's
wonderful how money does roll up in an institution of that kind."

Miss Betsey could not be turned from her purpose, so her nephew was
forced to content himself with begging her, if she sent money through
the mails, to address it carefully.

"One would think, nephew, from the way you talk that I didn't know how
to write," said the old lady, with some asperity.

Jack and Cynthia in the mean time were exploring the farm. It was a
never-failing source of pleasure to them, accustomed to farm life though
they were.

"This is a really true farm," said Cynthia; "not a make-believe, like
ours, with a hired farmer to do it all. And Aunt Betsey's garden is a
thousand times nicer than ours, and her hens are all so big and
strong-looking."

"That's only because you've been looking so much at the 'little
orphans.' By-the-way, I wonder how they're getting on. I do wish I
hadn't had to leave home to-day. I wonder if Neal will attend to things?
Queer kind of a duffer, isn't he, Cynth?"

"Yes: but I like him. He's awfully lazy and all that, but I think I'd
trust him."

"Oh, I'd trust him far enough, except where hard work's concerned. In
that line I think I'd rather trust myself. But I wish it was time to go
home."

"So do I," said Cynthia, thoughtfully. "I have a feeling that something
is going on there and we are missing it. Aunt Betsey's isn't as much fun
as usual, though she was awfully good to forgive me so easily. And you
have been frightening me about it all the way, Jack."

At last the day wore on, and amid cordial good-byes from Miss Betsey,
her relatives took leave.

"I'll send you something for those little orphans at Christmas-time,
Jackie," she called after them, "though this being only July, I hope to
see you before then."

When the party reached home they found Bob shaven and shorn, Neal in his
most careless and teasing frame of mind, Edith depressed and silent, and
the children in disgrace.

"I knew something was happening while we were away," whispered Cynthia
to Jack.

"If only we hadn't missed it!" returned he. "Smashing the buggy and
shaving Bob, all in one day! It's a regular shame that we weren't on
hand."

"It seems to me that you were neglecting things somewhat to-day, Edith,"
said her father, when he heard the story.

There! it had come. Of course she was to be censured, as she had
expected.

"I didn't know I was to be tied hand and foot and look after the
children every minute of the day," she answered, crossly; "and it was
not _my_ fault that we went to the woods and broke the buggy."

"I don't care in the least about the buggy, but about Neal's dog."

This was too much. Edith felt badly herself about the dog, but surely
she was not responsible. She had not been the means of bringing him to
Oakleigh, she said to herself. She was about to reply, when Mrs.
Franklin interposed and diverted her husband's mind from the subject.
This still further annoyed Edith.

Why should Mrs. Franklin feel called upon to interfere between her and
her father? And she encouraged herself to dislike more than ever the
"intruders" at Oakleigh.

The summer went by. More chickens were hatched, until they numbered four
hundred, and then "Franklin & Gordon" concluded that they would not fill
the machine again this season. The stock must be carefully tended during
the winter, and Jack would have his hands full, though one of the men
would help him if necessary.

Jack was to go to Boston to school this winter. Neal was going back to
boarding-school; it was his last year, and next autumn he hoped to begin
college life.

One fine day towards the end of the summer Cynthia and Neal walked out
over the pasture to the "far meadow," and sat down in the shade of a
huge hay-stack. The air was full of the hum of fall insects, and
grasshoppers alighted here, there, and everywhere about them. Neal tried
in vain to catch one with his hat. Then he tossed it to one side, and
clasping his hands behind his head, leaned back against the hay with a
heavy sigh.

"'What is the matter?" asked Cynthia. "I should think you had the weight
of the world on your shoulders."

"And so I have. I've a good mind to trot out the whole story to you,
Cynth. I wonder if it would do any good?"

"Of course it would," replied Cynthia, promptly. "There is nothing like
talking a thing over, and, besides, I've wanted dreadfully to know what
has been the matter with you."

"How did you know anything was?"

"I have seen you growing glummer and glummer. You haven't been nearly as
jolly lately. And when you got that letter this morning you looked as if
you would like to punch somebody."

"You do take in a lot! I never supposed anybody would notice. I wonder
if Hessie did?"

"I saw her looking at you."

"I wish she'd look to some purpose, and hand out what I want. She's so
taken up with you Franklins nowadays."

"What do you want?"

"Money, of course."

"Why, Neal, mamma gave you a lot the other day!"

"Oh, that was a mere drop in the bucket. Yes, I really think I'll have
to tell you what a fix I'm in. Perhaps you'll see some way out of it."

"Do," said Cynthia, sympathetically; "I am sure I will."

"Well, it's just this: I owe a lot of money to a fellow that goes to St.
Asaph's, and I had a letter from him this morning asking me to fork out
at once, or he would write to my guardians or speak to the trustees at
the school. It's a nasty thing to do, anyhow. I don't think the fellow
is a gentleman."

"Then why did you ever have anything to do with him?"

"That's just like a girl! I'm sorry I told you."

"Oh, don't say that! Indeed, it only just struck me that people who are
not gentlemen are so horrid. Please go on, Neal, and tell me the rest."

"There's nothing to tell except that I owe him a hundred dollars."

"One hundred dollars! Neal!" To Cynthia this seemed a fortune. "Why, how
did you ever spend it all?"

"Spend it! Easily enough. Suppers once in a while, ginger-pop, candy,
cigarettes."

"I didn't know you smoked."

"Neither I do. I just do it occasionally to show I'm up to it. But it's
no go if you're training, and I'm training most of the time. But you
have to keep cigarettes on hand for the fellows."

"But, Neal, you told me once how large your allowance is, and I don't
see how you ever in the world managed to spend so much more."

"Easily enough, as I said before. You see, I have the name of being a
rich fellow, and I have to live up to it, which makes it hard. I have to
live up to it, when, after all, I'm practically dependent on Hessie. I
haven't a cent of my own until I'm twenty-five. This fellow Bronson
offered to lend me a fiver one day, and I got into the habit of asking
him. I didn't mean to let it run on so long. He's a queer lot--awfully
smooth on the outside, and inside hard as nails. We were good friends at
first; then he did something I didn't like, and I cut him; but he didn't
seem to mind it, and afterwards when he offered me the fiver I thought I
might as well take it. What a mean will that was anyhow of
grandmother's!"

Neal moodily tugged at a wisp of straw which he held in his teeth, and
looked across the meadow. A herd of cows came down on the opposite side
of the river for a drink, and Bob barked at them loudly, running as near
to them as he dared.

For a time Cynthia did not speak. Then she said,

"Aren't you going to ask mamma?"

"I suppose I'll have to. I wouldn't mind a bit if she were not married,
but I suppose your father will have to know about it."

"I suppose," said Cynthia, sagely, "mamma would have just given it to
you without saying anything, while papa will ask questions."

"That's just about the size of it. And he will not only ask the
questions, but he won't like the answers. I think I won't tackle them
for a hundred all at once. I'll put it at fifty, and try to get Bronson
to wait for the rest. I suppose I'll get some tips at Christmas-time."

"I think it would be ever so much better, Neal, to tell the whole truth.
It will save ever so much trouble in the end."

"But it won't save trouble now, and I hate a fuss. The fifty business
will be bad enough. I like to take things quietly."

"That's just it, Neal. Do take my advice, and tell mamma the whole
thing."

"That's the worst of telling a girl anything. They always want to give
advice. I wonder why it is that a woman from her earliest years loves to
advise?"

"Much you know about it," said Cynthia; "and you needn't have told me
about your scrape if you didn't want me to say anything."

"Well, I've told you now, and you must give me your word of honor that
you will never give me away. Now promise, Cynthia."

"Of course I'll promise, Neal. I wouldn't tell it for the world if you
don't want me to. But, oh, I wish you would tell the whole thing
yourself!"

But Neal was obdurate: and when he found how his brother-in-law received
his demand for fifty dollars he thought he had acted wisely.

"Of course it is not really my affair," said Mr. Franklin, "except that
I am your sister's husband, and have a right to advise her. The money is
hers, to do with it what she likes, and she can spend it all on you if
she wishes. But I think fifty dollars is a good deal for a school-boy,
with the allowance that you have, to owe. If you were my boy I should
look into the matter pretty carefully, you may be sure. However, I am
neither your father nor your guardian. But it is a bad precedent. If you
spend money in this way at school, what will you do in college?"

Hester expostulated with her brother, but wrote a check and gave it to
him. Neal was almost sorry then that he had not placed the sum at one
hundred.

He sent the check to Bronson, assuring him that he would pay him the
balance before long. This done, Neal became as gay and debonair as ever.
Cynthia, knowing the facts, wondered that he could so completely forget
the burden of debt that was still resting upon him. She thought that he
must have discovered some other way of settling the matter.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]




THE UNITED STATES NAVY AT THE BALTIC CANAL.

BY A JUNIOR OFFICER.


"General Signal 6421 from flag-ship!" cried the signal boy to signal
officer of the U.S.S. _San Francisco_, as our fleet approached the
entrance to Kiel Fiord.

"Report to the Captain that we are ordered by the flag-ship to take
position at head of column," replied the signal officer, referring to
signal-book.

Simultaneously the U.S. flag-ship _New York_ stopped her engines,
allowing the U.S.S. _San Francisco_ and U.S.S. _Columbia_ to steam
ahead, leading the column into the harbor of Kiel, Germany, in order
that they might be in proper sequence for picking up the buoys assigned
them during the festivities attending the opening of the large and
important canal connecting the Baltic with the North Sea. Ahead, beyond
the light guarding the entrance to Kiel Fiord, which is nothing more
than a long land-locked harbor five miles long by one and a half broad,
we could see ships and boats by the score.

We are entering the harbor. Ding! and the engines are stopped, lines are
thrown to the small launch coming alongside, and a German officer is
helped aboard, who volunteers to show us to our assigned buoyage. The
first of the unbroken series of hospitalities shown us by the Germans
during our entire stay has been performed. Changing course to port,
ahead we could see the spires and buildings of Kiel several miles
distant; abeam, the little town of Friedrichsort close aboard; on our
bow, distant about four miles, lay the little town of Holtenau, really
little else than a suburb of Kiel, and here was pointed out by the pilot
the canal, the opening of which we had come to celebrate. On our port
hand the shore extended evenly from Kiel to our port beam, clothed in
verdure, sprinkled by occasional villas, and marked particularly by a
small hill just opposite the entrance to the canal, which had been
surmounted by an immense stand for the reception of spectators to the
yacht races following the opening week. In this harbor lay the German
fleet, consisting of twenty-eight vessels, aside from torpedo-boats, and
the Austrian fleet of four, many yachts, tugs, and steamers chartered
for the functions. While gazing at the array before us we are aroused by
the 21-gun salute of the flag-ship, fired in honor of the port. We now
approach the German training-ships. The men are in the rigging. Three
cheers ring out from the mass in the rigging. "Stand by to cheer ship!"
yells the First Lieutenant. "Lay aloft!" and our rigging is a mass of
human beings. "Stand by to cheer--hip, hip!" and the three long, hearty
cheers of the Germans are returned. Again and again is this repeated as
we slowly steam up by the line of ships riding to their moorings, the
cheers ringing out even above the guns of the _New York_, which, it must
be remembered, are all of this time engaged in a constant fusillade in
extending and returning salutes to the Admirals of the various fleets.

Arriving at our buoy, we find that the boat which we had manned, ready
for lowering, is unnecessary, as a German boat was waiting to carry out
our hawser to the buoy. We are moored. Our position is not the best,
but, being near the town, it counterbalances the disadvantage of being
some distance from the canal entrance.

The two days now elapsing before the opening of the festivities, the
grand ball at Hamburg, are days of preparation. The last touches are
put on our white lustrous sides; the smallest particles of dirt or stain
are carefully removed; morning and evening the various ships' boats are
seen practising for the coming races. Entertainments have already begun.
The officers of each German ship diligently apply themselves to the
entertainment of the officers of the ship or ships assigned them, while
the crews of our vessels accept similar hospitalities from the crews of
theirs. These days also witness the arrival of the other numerous
fleets--Denmark with two cruisers and four torpedo-boats; England with
six battle-ships, two large cruisers, and two torpedo-boats, and two
yachts; France with the _Hoche_, _Dupuy de Lôme_, and _Surcouf_; the
Italians with nine vessels of all classes; Holland with two cruisers;
Norway with two; Portugal with one; Roumania with two; Russia with
three; Sweden three; Spain three; and others, making a total in harbor
on the morning of June 19th of eighty-six war-vessels, aside from
torpedo-boats. Besides this, the numerous yachts, liners, and tugs made
the harbor fairly covered with floating habitations.

[Illustration: THE WAR-SHIPS PASSING THROUGH THE CANAL.]

On this date the Admiral of our fleet, accompanied by his staff, went to
Hamburg, where he had previously ordered the _Marblehead_, our smallest
vessel, to await him. Here, after the ball, which opened the
festivities, he went aboard that vessel and steamed down to Brunsbüttel,
the mouth of the canal, where a column of sixteen vessels, headed by
H. M. steam-yacht _Hohenzollern_, began at 4 a.m. the passage through
the canal. This canal connects the Elbe (at Brunsbüttel) to the Baltic
at Kiel by a rather tortuous passage of 65 miles in length. It is from
27 to 30 feet deep, 70 feet broad at the bottom, and 120 feet at the
top. The total cost was 156,000,000 marks--$39,000,000.

At 8 A.M., June 20th, the holiday aspect suddenly came over the fleets.

The few flags and banners that the smaller boats had flown proudly the
past few days were put to shame when at one instant, on the stroke of
eight bells (A.M.), every ship hoisted her rainbow of every flag,
extending from water-line forward over masts to water-line aft. Then the
celebration began at Kiel. At noon the exit of the Emperor's yacht with
the imperial party aboard was celebrated by the firing of thirty-three
guns by each ship in the harbor, with rails manned, and officers in full
dress.

At 8 P.M. the grand ball was given at Kiel. Four thousand people were
present, representing all nations. The Emperor and royal party were
there, and officers not having already met him were there presented.

[Illustration: THE EMPEROR'S YACHT OPENING THE CANAL.]

The following day the ships were full dressed at 8 A.M. At 1 P.M. were
the inaugural ceremonies at the mouth of the canal. Uniform full dress.
Rails were manned, and ships passing by the Emperor gave three cheers.
During the afternoon the _Hohenzollern_ steamed through the fleet, and
was saluted and cheered as before.

This was the night of the grand illumination. The commanders of the
visiting countries had their ships outlined by electric lights, taking
in funnels, masts, rails, etc. Those of the United States had besides
this their name in three-foot letters, and a large shield showing stars
and stripes. In the midst of this display lights were suddenly cut off,
and for an hour the flag-ship _New York_ sent forth a display of
fireworks not equalled in any other fleet. The most notable features
were fire-likenesses of President Cleveland and Emperor William II. and
the American and German coats of arms, all in immense frames, 16 by 20
feet.

As the festivities approach an end, so do I near the point where I shall
leave you to fill in the omissions in your imaginations.

[Illustration: THE AMERICAN SQUADRON AT THE KIEL NAVAL REVIEW.]

On the 22d the ships did not again hoist the rainbow, but instead
floated a flag from each mast-head. A German manoeuvring fleet went
out in the early morning for fleet manoeuvres, sham-battle, and review
by Empress. At noon they returned, and the festival-time of Kiel was
over.

The officers were still entertained, courtesies extended as before.
Boat-racing received an impetus as the time approached. Visitors were
received aboard ship, but the difference could be felt; the throng on
the water diminished; the town, hitherto so gayly decorated, became more
sober. Everything pointed that the festival was over, the canal was
open, the entire celebration was a grand success.

America's fleet of snow-white cruisers, her display, her representation,
when so far distant, have won unanimous praise and applause, and may be
reckoned by all Americans as the grandest success of all.




[Illustration: THE CAMERA CLUB]

     This Department is conducted in the interest of Amateur
     Photographers, and the Editor will be pleased to answer any
     question on the subject so far as possible. Correspondents should
     address Editor Camera Club Department.


PAPERS FOR BEGINNERS, No. 11.

INTENSIFICATION OR REDEVELOPMENT.

A negative which has been overexposed and developed in a normal
developer, while perfect in detail, will be thin and without contrast.
This is because it is underdeveloped, the chemicals acting too quickly
to allow it to gain density. A satisfactory print cannot be made from
such a negative, as the film, being so transparent, allows the light to
reach all parts of the paper almost at once, and the print when toned is
a dull slaty gray.

An overexposed and underdeveloped plate may be redeveloped, and this
process is usually called strengthening or intensifying. Solutions come
ready prepared for use, but the amateur who wishes can prepare his own.

The bichloride-of-mercury formula is one of the most satisfactory for
the young amateur. This is in three solutions, made up and kept in
separate bottles, labelled respectively No. 1, No. 2, No. 3. No. 1 is
composed of bichloride of mercury, 120 grains; chloride of ammonium, 120
grains; distilled water, 10 ounces. No. 2 is composed of chloride of
ammonium, 120 grains; water, 10 ounces. No. 3 is sulphite of sodium
crystals, 1 ounce; water, 9 ounces.

Wash the plate for a few minutes, and then place it for ten minutes in a
five-per-cent. solution of alum, and wash for half an hour. Place the
negative in a glass tray, and flow enough of the solution marked No. 1
to cover it. The negative will turn white, and as soon as it is white,
or nearly so, turn off the solution, and flow with No. 2 for one minute.
Rinse the plate again, and cover with the solution marked No. 3, and let
it remain till the negative has changed to a dark brown or black. Wash
for an hour and dry. No. 3 can be returned to the bottle, but the others
had better be thrown away after using once.

Another method is to bleach or whiten the plate with a solution of
bichloride of mercury, and then treat the plate with a hydrochinon
developer. Dissolve a quarter-ounce of bichloride of mercury in 12
ounces of water. Soak the plate for a few minutes in clear water, till
the film is thoroughly wet. Place it face up in a glass tray, and turn
the mercuric solution over it, till the image first disappears and again
becomes visible. Take the plate from the tray and wash away every trace
of the mercury. Place it in a developing tray, and cover the plate with
a fresh solution of hydrochinon developer. (Any formula will answer.) In
a few minutes the negative will come out almost as strong as if it had
been properly exposed and developed. Wash thoroughly and dry. If the
plate does not need much intensifying, leave it in the mercuric solution
just long enough for the surface to whiten.

Another formula for intensifying is one which can be used as soon as the
plates have been developed and fixed, and gives the required strength to
quite thin negatives. This is prepared in three solutions, and used in
the same way as the first formula given. No. 1, bichloride of mercury, 2
parts; water, 100 parts. No. 2, iodide of potassium, 3 parts; water, 33
parts. No. 3, sodic acetate, 4 parts; water, 33 parts.

Caution: Mark all bottles containing intensifying solutions "Poison," be
very careful in handling, and keep them locked up when not in use.
Bichloride of mercury (corrosive sublimate) is a violent poison, and a
grain or two of it taken internally may prove fatal. An antidote is the
whites of eggs beaten up with water and given promptly, repeatedly, and
abundantly. The albumen of the egg renders the salts of mercury
insoluble, and enables the stomach to throw off the poison instead of
absorbing it into the system.

     MLLE. C. DE GRAMONT, Paris, France, asks "If an amateur can make a
     non-halation plate, and how, and what is the best method of
     sensitizing the salted paper described in No. 796?" Plates already
     sensitized can be covered, rendered almost free from halation by
     painting the back or glass side with a mixture of collodion and
     rouge. In place of the rouge any dark red or brown pigment may be
     used. The mixture dries quickly, and is easily wiped off the plate
     before developing. Another mixture may be made of 1/2 oz.
     gum-arabic, 1 drachm of glycerine, 1/2 oz. burnt sienna, and 5 oz.
     water. Heat enough of the water to dissolve the gum-arabic, and
     when cold mix all the ingredients together. Apply with a brush.
     After exposure and before developing it should be wiped off the
     plate with a cloth wet with benzine. In No. 803 will be found
     further directions for preparing plain salted paper. The easiest
     way to sensitize the paper is to cut it into 8 by 10 sheets, lay a
     piece on a pane of glass, holding it from curling by two or three
     letter-clips; or, if preferred, a smooth board can be used and the
     paper fastened to the board with small thumb tacks. Apply lightly
     and evenly, first one way and then the other at right angles. Be
     sure that all the paper is covered. Dry in a dark room, pinning
     the paper to the wall or some smooth surface. After two or three
     times trying one can apply the solution evenly. The prints are
     very beautiful, and if well washed do not fade.

     ANSWERS TO SEVERAL CORRESPONDENTS.--We have had many queries as to
     how one may become a member of the Camera Club. Any member of the
     Round Table may become a member of the club by sending his or her
     name to the Round Table. We hope all of our readers who own
     cameras will join the club, as we expect to give some new and
     original plans for work during the year.

     SIR KNIGHT B. P. ATKINSON, Tilton, New Hampshire, asks, 1. What is
     Eikonogen made from, and what is the chemical name. 2. What is the
     difference between chrome alum and alum crystals. 3. When we
     expect to have another photographic contest. 4. Is Watkin's
     exposure meter a reliable machine. 5. How can films be kept from
     curling.

     1. Eikonogen is the sodium salt compounded from three different
     chemicals, and comes in whitish-gray crystals. It is the name of a
     developing agent patented by Dr. Andreson about six years ago. It
     is not poisonous, does not stain the fingers, and gives a clear
     negative with plenty of detail. 2. The difference between chrome
     alum and alum crystals is principally that chrome alum has twice
     the strength of alum crystals, being a double salt, instead of the
     commercial alum usually sold. Both chrome alum and alum crystals
     are used for the same purpose in photography, for clearing and
     hardening the film of the negative. 3. The date has not yet been
     fixed for our next photographic contest, but we intend to have
     another soon. 4. It is out of our province to pass judgment on any
     kind of photographic apparatus. 5. Films may be kept from curling
     by soaking them after they have been developed and before they
     have been dried, in a solution of glycerine, 1/2 oz., distilled
     water, 16 oz., for five minutes, and then drying as usual.




[Illustration: THE PUDDING STICK]

     This Department is conducted in the interest of Girls and Young
     Women, and the Editor will be pleased to answer any question on
     the subject so far as possible. Correspondents should address
     Editor.


One of my girls inquires how to ask for an autograph of a person whom
she admires, and which she thinks would add to the interest of her
collection. Such a letter might be written in this way:

  DAISY MEAD, BROOKVILLE, NEW YORK.

  _Mrs. Sarah Maria Chester:_

     DEAR MADAM,--I am making a collection of autographs, and would
     feel much honored if you would kindly allow me to add yours to the
     number I have already received. I enclose a slip of paper and a
     stamped and addressed envelope, and thanking you in advance for
     granting the favor I ask, I am,

  Very sincerely yours,
  ELEANOR ALICE AMES.

     Or perhaps you may like better this simpler form:

  NO. 189 ASHTABULA STREET, ROME, ILLINOIS.

     DEAR MRS. LADYLOVE,--I am a little girl twelve years old, living a
     great many miles from you, but I have read your poems and stories,
     and like them very much. It will make me very happy to receive
     your autograph. Please use the slip of paper which I enclose in
     the stamped and addressed envelope, which I add to save you
     trouble.

  Admiringly yours,
  EMILY ANNE JINKS.

The form of address, you observe, is not arbitrary. But you must be
polite. You are soliciting a favor. And you must certainly send the
envelope addressed to yourself, and stamped. Always enclose return
postage in a letter which asks a friend to do you a kindness, to send
you information, or in any way to oblige you. One little two-cent stamp
is not very much to either your correspondent or yourself, but
postage-stamps soon count up when one has a great many letters to write
and answer.

Another girlie says, "Please tell me how soon I ought to answer my
friend's letter--the same day, or the next, or in a week, or what?"
Bless your dear heart, my child, answer as soon as you please, and if
you are writing to somebody you love, who loves you, the sooner the
better. A lady who has a large correspondence tells me that she always
replies to her friends while their letters are fresh in her mind, before
the glow and tenderness have faded. It is, as a rule much easier to
answer a letter when you have recently read it than when it has been put
aside for days and weeks. Still, much depends on the style of the
correspondence, and on the tie which binds you to your friend.

I have lately been reading some very remarkable letters. They are
published in a book called _Letters from the New Hebrides_, and are by
Maggie Whitecross Paton, the wife of the great missionary Dr. John G.
Paton. I think these letters are very nearly perfect, so bright, so
chatty, so full of simple goodness. Mrs. Paton has the gift of seeing
things, and then telling about them so that we see with her eyes.

I wish I might impress on you the importance of answering questions
which may have been asked by your correspondent. Before closing a letter
which is by way of reply, why not read over the one which calls it
forth, and make sure that you have not omitted anything concerning which
you have been asked to give information.

Postal cards should be used exclusively for purposes of business, the
exception being that when on a journey it is a good plan to carry a
postal card, addressed before you leave home, pencil on it the news of
your safe arrival, and mail it in the station before going to your
journey's end. This often gives the home people news of you some hours
in advance of the letter you write at the first opportunity after
reaching your friend's house.

No letter should ever be marred by excuses and apologies.

[Illustration: Signature]




TRAVELLING STONES IN NEVADA.


The curious "travelling stones" of Australia are paralleled in Nevada.
They are described as being perfectly round, about as large as a walnut,
and of an ivory nature. When distributed about on the floor, table, or
any smooth surface within two or three feet of each other, they
immediately commence travelling toward each other, and meet at a common
centre, and there lie huddled in a bunch like eggs in a nest. A single
stone removed to a distance of four feet, upon being released, returns
to the heap, but if taken away as much as five feet remains motionless.
It is needless to say that they are largely composed of magnetic iron
ore.




ON BOARD THE ARK.

BY ALBERT LEE.


CHAPTER II.

As soon as Tommy recovered his self-possession--or as much of it as he
could under these trying circumstances--he opened his eyes and looked
about him. He could not see much, for they were apparently racing down a
dark, narrow corridor, "like a telegram in a pneumatic tube," he
thought. But his eyes gradually grew accustomed to the darkness, and he
could see that there were pictures on the walls--battle pictures, and
scenes representing all sorts of historical events. He caught a glimpse
of Washington crossing the Delaware, and of the battle of Bunker Hill;
he saw the taking of the Bastille, and the great London fire. Soon he
saw the Spanish Armada and the Crusades, and, later, the burning of
Rome, Julius Cæsar crossing the Rubicon, the siege of Carthage, the
building of the Parthenon, the destruction of Troy, the fall of Babylon,
and afterwards many other things that he could not recognize. They all
seemed to whiz past him in a sort of confused blur. He screwed up
courage enough finally to call out to the ex-Pirate:

"Wh-wh-wh-at is th-this pl-pla-ce, and how l-long are we g-going to go
l-like th-this?"

"Th-th-these are the halls of Time," the ex-Pirate shouted in reply. "We
are going back through them as far as the Deluge."

This explanation was not very satisfactory to Tommy, and although up to
the present moment he had not had a chance to think of getting scared,
he now began to feel slightly alarmed at what had happened. He was about
to question the ex-Pirate again, when suddenly there was a great burst
of light, and they seemed to shoot out of the tunnel they had been
travelling through. Tommy felt the grasp of Father Time's hand loosen,
and the next thing he knew he was rolling head over heels on top of a
big hay-stack in the middle of a broad sunny field. He pulled himself
together as soon as he could, and found the ex-Pirate sitting in the hay
beside him with a somewhat bewildered expression on his face.

"I don't think I like that sort of thing very much," remarked Tommy.

"I can't quite say that I do either," said the ex-Pirate, feeling to see
if his pistols were still in his sash.

"Where is Father Time?" continued the little boy.

"I don't know. Perhaps he is going ahead now at his regular rate of
sixty seconds to the minute."

Tommy scratched his head meditatively and looked about him. The field in
which the hay-stack stood was surrounded by hills and forests, and here
and there could be seen various kinds of animals travelling in pairs.
Over the crests of the trees, directly in front of them, the little boy
espied something that looked like the roof of an immense barn. He called
the ex-Pirate's attention to it.

"That must be the Ark," said the latter, rising. "Let's go and find
out."

They clambered down the hay-stack into the field, and started off in the
direction of the woods. There was not any path for them to follow, and
occasionally they had to wade through tall grass that reached almost up
to their waists. In one of these clumps of herbage they heard voices.

"Oh dear! oh dear!" said one voice, "I am sure we shall be late. We are
_always_ late. Oh dear! oh dear! I wonder what time it is!"

Tommy and the ex-Pirate stopped and looked about them; but they could
not see any one, and were about to proceed on their way, when they heard
the same plaint again. They parted the tall grasses and followed the
direction whence the sounds appeared to come, until they found two
Turtles plodding along as fast as they could over the rough ground. It
was the larger of the two Turtles that was wailing over the probability
of their being late in arriving wherever they were going.

"What's the matter?" asked the ex-Pirate.

The Turtles paused and looked up.

"The matter?" exclaimed the larger Turtle. "Look at this," and he pulled
a newspaper clipping out from under his shell. "I am sure we shall be
late."

The ex-Pirate took the piece of paper and looked at it. It was an
advertisement:

  DELUGE LINE: ......................

  THE ARK

  (_Captain Noah_)

  Will sail at NOON precisely.

"I am sure we shall miss the boat," continued the Turtle, nervously.
"What time is it, please?"

Tommy and the ex-Pirate looked at each other. Neither one had a watch.

"I can't tell you what time it is," answered the little boy. "I'm not
big enough to have a watch; and the last time I saw the clock it was
going so fast, I could not tell what time it was."

"Well," said the Turtle, "you are more polite than the Cuckoos, anyway.
But I am sure we shall be late."

"I guess not," said the ex-Pirate, reassuringly. "Don't get nervous
about it. There is always a delay. The Ark won't sail on time. And
besides, they will have to wait for the mails."

"Oh no," persisted the Turtle. "They won't have to wait for the males,
because we are going aboard in pairs."

"Can't we carry the poor things?" suggested Tommy. "It would be too bad
if they got left."

The Turtle looked up at the little boy with an expression of
overwhelming gratitude. This was all that was needed to persuade the
ex-Pirate, and so he and Tommy leaned over and each picked up a Turtle
and tucked it under his arm.

"This reminds me of a conversation I overheard once," said the
ex-Pirate, as they started off again. "I made a classic out of it; and
as the Sheep is not here to object now, I will recite it to you:

  "'It is much to be regretted,'
    Said the Turtle to the Snail,
  'That as rapid-transit creatures
    We so signally must fail.

  "'But yet we should be thankful
    That Nature still allows us
  To carry on our weary backs
    The wherewithal to house us.'"

"Correct!" blurted out the Turtle from under the ex-Pirate's arm. "Is
there any danger of these pistols going off?"

"No," replied the ex-Pirate; "they are loaded."

"That's all right, then," he said, with a sigh of relief; "I was afraid
they were not loaded."

Tommy and the ex-Pirate, with the Turtles under their arms, picked their
way through the trees toward the Ark. As they advanced they could hear
sounds as of a vast congregation of creatures, and at last, when they
came to the edge of the woods, they looked out upon a broad plain, in
the centre of which rested the huge house-boat that Noah had
constructed. Around it were gathered hundreds and hundreds of animals,
and in the air above were flying countless birds.

[Illustration: "WHY, THAT ARK IS JUST LIKE MINE!" EXCLAIMED TOMMY.]

"Why, that Ark is just like mine!" exclaimed Tommy, "only a million
times larger." The ex-Pirate looked at him in a half-surprised way, but
made no reply.

"I guess you can drop us here," then said Tommy's Turtle; "and we are
ever so much obliged." As soon as the two creatures had been put down
upon the ground again they scampered off in the direction of the Ark as
fast as their legs would carry them.

"Now what shall _we_ do?" said Tommy.

"I guess we had better hold a council of war. When you don't know what
to do, always hold a council of war," answered the ex-Pirate, and the
two sat down in the shade of a big oak to consult.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]




[Illustration: INTERSCHOLASTIC SPORT]


[Illustration: LEONARD E. WARE.]

Ware has turned the tables on Whitman. They met in the finals at
Newcastle, but it was 6-4, 7-5, 4-6, and 5-7 before the interscholastic
champion could make it 8-6 in the fifth set, and call the tournament
his. There was good playing that day, and the schools can take pride in
the fact that they are sending new material, and better, into the tennis
ranks this season than has entered for many a year. These new-comers are
putting up a careful, steady game too. The principal failing of young
and promising players in former years has been their inclination to play
more for the benefit of the spectators than for the points of the game.
But to sacrifice points for applause is a very evident absurdity, and so
I was glad to see at the Wentworth that most of the men aimed to put up
a steady game.

Ware and Whitman are so nearly even in their play that it is difficult
to determine which is the better man. Ware no doubt has the greater
powers of endurance, and I should count on him to win more tournaments
in the long-run, but Whitman is certainly strong in emergencies and
steady at critical moments. Ware's best strokes are his cross-court
plays, which I have no doubt he will eventually develop to a standard of
proficiency superior to that of any player in the country. He volleys
well, too, and when in back court often puts in some good smashes.
Whitman is clever at a drive, and puts speed into his strokes, but he
has not the physical development to stand a long match. His game would
no doubt be greatly improved if he should devote himself during the
winter to general athletic exercise. He smashes well, and is excellent
on volleying. The performance of Beals Wright at the Wentworth
tournament was a surprise to many. For a fifteen-year-old lad he
certainly can play tennis. Scudder was also on hand, and repeated some
of his clever work at Longwood. He put up even a better game at
Newcastle, defeating Budlong in the second round, but he succumbed to
Ware in the semi-finals.

Whitman was apparently not in the best of condition when he stepped into
court for the final match, but he warmed up to his work as the games
piled up, and showed good form in the last three sets. The first offered
no exhibition of particularly fine play. The score seesawed, until
Whitman took the fifth and sixth games, and then Ware got the next four
and the set. But in the second set there was pretty tennis. Whitman did
some clever placing, and Ware's drives called forth considerable
applause. In the eighth game there was an amusing lobbing contest, which
finally turned to Ware's favor, and he followed up the advantage with
some clean passes across that added the ninth to his score.

Poor play characterized the opening of the third set, not a point being
earned in the first game. Whitman took it, and Ware got the second on
his opponent's successive outs. Then Ware came up to the net and put in
some good strokes; but Whitman was steadying down by this time, and with
some clever passes and good volleying he got his first set. He took the
next one, too, made lively by sharp work on both sides with many deuce
games and plenty of fierce volleying. Then came the rubber. Ware was
warmed up, and kept driving the ball at his opponent. Whitman set his
hopes on placing, and played a careful steady game. Ware took the first
two games, and Whitman got the following three, and then it was a seesaw
until the twelfth. Deuce was called five times in the eleventh game
before Whitman could win it. He was leading, then, 6-5. But Ware quickly
brought the score to games all, and by beautiful placing earned the two
following, the set and the match.

It is to be regretted that all the interscholastic cracks will not meet
at Newport. Sheldon of Hotchkiss Academy, winner of the Yale
interscholastic tourney, cannot be present because he is out West, where
he must stand again to defend the championship of Ohio, which he won
last year. For a similar reason McMahon, the Brooklyn interscholastic
champion, will be absent. He has won the Leland House tournament at
Schroon Lake for the past two years, and if he wins again this summer
the Leland House cup is his. That tournament occurs about the same
period as the Newport Interscholastic. But the schools will be well
represented, nevertheless, and we may look forward to seeing even better
tennis this year than at any previous interscholastic tournament.

Although it is now somewhat late in the season to recur to the spring
championship series of baseball, it seems advisable to insert the result
of the New England Interscholastic League contest, if only for the sake
of the record which it will serve. The outcome of the series was not
wholly satisfactory, because the Cambridge High and Latin School nine
tied Hopkinson's for first place, and no deciding game was arranged. Had
it been, the Cambridge men would doubtless have won. They were heavy
hitters, and in the field gave excellent support to Stearns, who was
one of the best pitchers in the association. The Hopkinson players were
likewise strong at the bat, but prone to get rattled. The surprise of
the season was English High's defeat of the Cambridge team--in a most
exciting contest--after having lost to almost every other nine in the
league. The scores follow:

  _April_ 26.--Hop., 13; Som. H., 11.
  _May_    1.--Hop., 6; B.L.S., 5 (12 innings).
    "      9.--B.L.S., 5; Som. H., 4.
    "     10.--Hop., 15; E.H.-S., 14.
    "     11.--C.H. and L., 24; R.L.S., 12.
    "     16.--E.H.-S., 14; Som. H., 1.
    "     17.--C.H. and L., 8; Hop., 5.
    "     21.--B.L.S., 8; R.L.S., 6.
    "     22.--C.H. and L., 7; Som. H., 0.
    "     24.--Hop., 19; R.L.S., 13.
    "     25.--C.H. and L., 17; B.L.S., 0.
    "     28.--R.L.S., 5; Som. H., 4.
    "     31.--B.L.S., 10; E.H.-S., 5.
  _June_   4.--R.L.S., 15; E.H.-S., 10.
    "      7.--E.H.-S., 4; C.H. and L., 3.

Canoeing is about as good an out-door sport as any for the month of
August, but it is a pastime largely restricted to inland waters. You can
paddle and sail a canoe along the sea-shore, of course; but this is
dangerous business for any but the most experienced canoeist, and
thoroughly unadvisable. Canoes were not intended for rough water. But
there is nothing more delightful than to paddle yourself along a winding
stream through the quiet woods, or sail in your light craft across some
beautiful lake in the mountains. To those who have never tasted this
pleasure it can truly be recommended. One of the objections to indulging
in it, many will say, is the expense involved in the purchase of a
canoe. But this may be very easily overcome by any one gifted with even
the slightest constructive ingenuity. If you can saw to a line and plane
an edge, and drive a nail, you can build a canoe for yourself at very
small cost.

[Illustration: Fig. A.]

The simplest kind of canoe is made of canvas, and for the purpose of a
novice in the graceful art of paddling it is just as serviceable as a
more expensive boat. Very little material is required to construct one,
and the cost, including everything, will not exceed $12. First procure
two strips of pine board 12-3/4 feet by 2 inches by 3/4 of an inch; a
bunch of oak strips 1-1/4 by 1/2 inch, and about 4 feet long; a bunch of
pine strips 12 feet long by 1-1/4 by 1/2 inch; and a piece of spruce
12 feet long by 2 inches by 1-1/8 inch. This last piece is to be used
for the keel, to the ends of which are fastened the stem and stern
posts. These are both alike, and should be sawed out of a pine plank in
the curved shape displayed in Fig. A. Lay out your curve on the plank in
pencil first, then saw to the line, and level the edge, so that the prow
will slip through the water easily. Next, saw into both ends of your
keel piece, insert the stem and stem pieces; then plane the keel piece
so that it will come to a point both forward and aft. Fasten these
uprights to the keel with copper nails or rivets. They are better than
any other kind because they do not rust.

[Illustration: Fig. B.]

Next, lay out a cross section of your canoe on a plank, and saw this
out. Your section should be 2 ft. 6 in. across the top, which is the
breadth of beam of your canoe; it should be 24 inches high, which is the
depth of the craft; and the side lines of the section, which will
determine the lines of your canoe, should be gracefully rounded, so that
the boat when finished will appear as in Fig. B. Now, then, fasten your
section upright on the keel, and with the bow, the stern, and the
breadth of beam thus settled, all you have to do is to nail your two
pine strips (12-3/4 ft. by 2 in. by 3/4 in.) to the bow and the stern.
They will get their spread from the mid-section. The skeleton of the
canoe is now complete, and the inside ribs may be bent on.

In order to make the oak strips pliable, boil them in water until you
can twist them into any shape you choose. Then nail them to the keel at
their middle point and to the gunwale boards above, sawing off the
protruding ends. These strips form the ribs, and when they dry out they
will keep the form they assumed when nailed on. All the nails should be
of copper, and clinched when driven in; this is done by holding a flat
iron against the points as they come through. There should be six inches
of space between each rib. Next take your thin pine strips, which are of
about the same length as your sheer planks, and plane them on one side
only. These are now fastened to the ribs lengthwise, the unplaned side
out, parallel to the gunwales, about two inches apart. This brings all
the planking on the outside of the ribs. Be sure to have the protruding
lines (after the canvas is put on) run fore and aft, and do not forget
that the planking is brought down to a fine point at the stem and stern,
and is securely clinched.

[Illustration: Fig. C.]

The canoe is now ready to be decked. Fig. C shows about where the deck
pieces should be fixed to form the cock-pit. They ought to be inserted
about a quarter length of the boat from each end. The deck beams should
be of one-inch square spruce, and as soon as they are clinched in you
can saw out your mid-section, which is now of no further use except as
lumber. As such it will come in handy for braces, etc. On top of your
deck beams lay the cock-pit combing of 2 in. by 3/8 in. pine, putting in
braces of triangular-shaped pine underneath as a support to and from the
ribs. After all the ribs are thus securely fastened, turn your boat
bottom upward and lay on the canvas.

This is by no means an easy matter, as you will soon find out, but
patience and care will do much toward making the undertaking less
difficult. Medium-weight sail duck is a good kind of canvas to get, and
second-hand material will do, provided it is firm; in fact,
weather-beaten canvas is preferable, as it has a smoother and more
pliable surface. To insure its setting firmly and smoothly make four
gores along the upper edge on each side and sew them firmly. Sponge the
canvas off on both sides with water, and while damp tack it along the
gunwale, allowing the stem and stern-posts to protrude half an inch. Use
galvanized iron or copper tacks, and do not be afraid of putting them
too near together. If you don't use plenty of tacks there will be danger
of a leak. Now turn your boat right side up again, and as the canvas
dries it will tighten and set with a firm surface. Have the canoe dry in
the sun if possible.

Before tacking on the deck canvas, give the inside and outside of the
hull a liberal coat of a mixture composed of three-quarters boiled oil
to one-quarter raw oil, with some patent drier. This acts as a filler
for the canvas, and makes it water-tight. When this has become perfectly
dry, apply two coats of brown ready-mixed paint for the inside, and two
of dark green for the outside. These are serviceable colors. But before
applying the last coat of paint, put on a gunwale-waring strip of 1-in.
spruce, and a spruce keel of 1 in. by 5/8 in. As the keel and waring
strips are put on after the canvas has been painted, they ought to
receive two coats of filler and one of spar varnish. This adds greatly
to the appearance of the canoe. It is not advisable for the novice to
attempt to manufacture his own paddle. It is cheaper in the end to buy
one, and a good paddle is to be had for $3.

[Illustration: S. A. SYME.]

The two scholastic representatives at the Metropolitan championships of
the A.A.U. held in Syracuse were Syme of Barnard School and Baltazzi of
Harvard School. Syme entered as a member of the New Jersey Athletic
Club, while Baltazzi wore the winged foot. The latter did not jump to
his usual mark, dropping out at 5 ft. 9 in. Some excuse for this may be
that he wrenched his ankle at that period of the contest, and could not
do better afterwards. But Syme was in better fortune. He contested the
low hurdles with Sheldon and Chase, and won. To be sure, Sheldon fell on
the eighth obstacle, but Syme breasted the tape nevertheless in 28-4/5
secs. It is encouraging for all lovers of sport to see how the school
athletes--the real representatives of the younger generation--are
getting in everywhere, and getting in with credit to themselves.

  THE GRADUATE.




[Illustration: STAMPS]

     This Department is conducted in the interest of stamp and coin
     collectors, and the Editor will be pleased to answer any question
     on these subjects so far as possible. Correspondents should
     address Editor Stamp Department.


The rise in value of many scarce stamps during the past two years has
been phenomenal. For instance, the £1 brown, 1878 issue, with anchor
water-mark, in unused condition. Two years ago this stamp could be
bought for $15, whereas the last copy sold of which I have any record
brought $250. The one shilling 1862, with white line across the corners
of it, unused, was catalogued at $50, a little more than a year ago, but
to-day would probably bring $300 at auction. The curious thing about
this stamp is that hitherto not a single copy has been found in used
condition. Without the white line this stamp used is worth fifteen
cents, and hundreds of thousands were sent to this country every month
for three years (1862-65).

The finest and most complete catalogue of U.S. stamps from 1853 to 1870
has just been published in England at ten shillings. The work is
illustrated by numerous plates and fac-similes, and it takes note of the
most minute varieties. It was written by Gilbert Harrison, who possessed
at the time of his death the finest collection of U.S. envelopes ever
made.

Active steps have been taken to form a list of those philatelic pests,
"speculative" issues which threaten to bring stamp-collecting into
disrepute. Quite properly the initial steps have been taken in London,
as some of the earliest as well as latest offenders in this respect have
been some of the colonies of Great Britain. All the so-called Chinese
local stamps, the San Marino Jubilee, St. Anthony Jubilee of Portugal,
as well as many of the surcharged colonial stamps, should be avoided by
every collector. The money spent on them is simply thrown away.

     C. A. S.--The 1834 dime is catalogued at 40c., in fine condition;
     20c., in fair.

     M. S. S.--Fifty cents a thousand.

     H. F. COOPER.--The Paris and London prints are much finer than the
     Belgium and Athens prints. The same plates being used in both
     places.

     W. T. BLACKWELL.--"Re-engraved" stamps mean those stamps of which
     the original die having been somewhat worn by the many transfers,
     has its lines deepened. The result is always a commoner-looking
     stamp than the original, and if the same ink is used, the
     re-engraved looks much darker and heavier. An article on the
     different kinds of paper will probably be printed soon.

     J. HARING.--Probably no $1 U.S. coin was issued in 1904. The die
     was prepared but not used. About fifty years ago the die
     disappeared from the Mint, but was returned after an interval of
     some months. Ever since that time, at long intervals, one of the
     coins comes upon the market. The first one brought $1000, the last
     one about $500.

     A. R. KETCHAM.--Always send a 2c. stamp if you wish an answer, or,
     still better, a self-addressed stamped envelope.

  PHILATUS.




BOUGHT HIS OWN FURNITURE.


An amusing story is told of a gentleman living in London. As the
anecdote goes, it seems that he had a passion for the purchase of
second-hand furniture at auctions, and that in making "good bargains" he
had filled his house with antiquated and almost useless articles. Upon
one occasion his wife took the responsibility, without consulting her
husband, to have a portion of the least useful of the pieces removed to
an auction-room to be sold. Great was her dismay when, on the evening of
the day of the sale, the majority of the articles came back to the
house. The husband had stumbled into the auction-room, and, not knowing
his own furniture, had purchased it at a better bargain than at first.




INDIA-RUBBER BAIT.


According to a Troy fisherman, the latest triumph of Yankee inventive
genius is an India-rubber fish-worm. It is said to be a remarkably good
imitation of the common earthworm, is indestructible, and in actual use
proves as alluring to the fishes as the genuine article. The old
fisherman will be quick to see its advantages. One can equip himself for
a day's sport without digging over a whole garden in his search for
bait. A handful of India-rubber worms will last him a whole season, and
there will be no necessity for pulling up the line every few minutes to
see if the small-fry nibblers have left the hook bare. It is possibly
hardly necessary to add here that the fisherman who tells of this
invention may be like other fishermen, in which case the reader need not
believe the story unless he wants to.




QUICK WIT.


A comedian in a French theatre once made a great hit out of a painful
accident. One day, while indulging in a bit of horse-play on the stage,
he hit his head violently, entirely an accident, against one of the
pillars of the scene on the stage. On hearing the thud everybody uttered
a cry. "No great harm done," said the comedian, "Just hand me a napkin,
a glass of water, and a salt-cellar." These were brought, and he sat
down, folded the napkin in the form of a bandage, dipped it in the
glass, and emptied the salt-cellar on the wet part. Having thus prepared
a compress according to prescription, and when every one expected he
would apply it to his forehead, he gravely rose and tied it round the
pillar. The effect of his action was such that every one set him down as
the readiest and wittiest man in his profession.




THE FIRST TELEPHONE.


The Sheffield _Telegraph_ gives the following interesting account of the
first telephone of which there is record:

The first telephone that was ever used was not electrical, nor was it a
scientific instrument in any sense of the term. A little more than fifty
years ago the employees of a large manufactory beguiled their leisure
hours by kite flying. Kites large and small went up daily, and the
strife was to see who could get the largest. The twine that held them
was the thread spun and twisted by the ladies of the village.

One day to the tail of the largest kite was attached a kitten, sewed in
a canvas bag, with a netting over the mouth to give it air. When the
kite was at its greatest height, some two hundred feet or more, the
mewing of the kitten could be distinctly heard by those holding the
string. To the clearness of the atmosphere was attributed the hearing of
the kitten's voice. This is the first account we remember of speaking
along a line.




ADVERTISEMENTS.




Highest of all in Leavening Power.--Latest U. S. Gov't Report.

[Illustration: Royal Baking Powder]




[Illustration: If afflicted with SORE EYES USE Dr. ISAAC THOMPSON'S EYE
WATER]




HARPER'S NEW CATALOG.

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




[Illustration: BICYCLING]

     This Department is conducted in the interest of Bicyclers, and the
     Editor will be pleased to answer any question on the subject. Our
     maps and tours contain much valuable data kindly supplied from the
     official maps and road-books of the League of American Wheelmen.
     Recognizing the value of the work being done by the L. A. W., the
     Editor will be pleased to furnish subscribers with membership
     blanks and information so far as possible.


[Illustration: Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers.]

In No. 822, on the map of the city of Philadelphia, the reader of this
Department will notice Woodland Avenue, running out from Market Street,
across the Schuylkill River, southwest. This is the beginning of the
route to West Chester, a run of about twenty-seven miles. The run itself
may be made both ways, in which case the rider will have covered
fifty-three or fifty-four miles, or it may be only covered in one
direction, and the train from there taken back to Philadelphia. Starting
from the public buildings, and running westward on Market Street across
the ferry, and thence by a turn to the left down Woodland Avenue, the
rider will find asphalt pavement until he reaches Baltimore Avenue.
Woodland Avenue from here for a short distance down towards Darby is
paved with Belgian pavement, but it is very rideable, and for the six
and a half miles to Darby is as good a road as it is possible to find.
Running out of Darby, passing the car stables, the route, a mile and a
half, is direct to Lansdowne, where the rider crosses the railroad, and
makes direct for Haverford. The roads are here macadamized, in the best
of condition, and moderately level. On reaching Haverford, the rider
should turn to the left into the West Chester turnpike. There is a sign
here designating that it is four miles to Darby. Passing through Manoa,
hardly a mile further on, you continue always on the West Chester
turnpike through Broomall, two miles; Newtown Square, two miles and a
half; Edgemont, Willistown, and Milltown, to West Chester, eleven miles.
The road from Manoa to West Chester is macadamized as far as Newtown
Square. From this point on to West Chester it is more sandy and more
hilly, and the road is in a much poorer condition; but by making a
judicious selection of side paths, excepting when passing through the
villages, you will find the road very rideable. From Newtown Square to
West Chester there are a number of capital coasting hills. The road is
straight, you see the foot of the hill before starting to coast, and the
grade in most cases is long and gradual. In fact, this West Chester
route is famous for its good coasting. On the whole distance there is
but one doubtful turn, and that is about a mile out of Newtown Square
going towards West Chester, where the rider should take the left fork in
the road. The right fork, as will be noticed on the map, also runs into
West Chester, but the road is much more hilly, and not in such good
condition.

In giving these different trips in the vicinity of Philadelphia, or of
any other city, it must not be understood that they are not by any means
the only ones, or that the route really ends at the point designated on
the map. The road beyond West Chester is quite as good riding as between
West Chester and Newtown Square, but this particular ride is a very
pleasant one, through a pleasant country, and ends up in an attractive
village, where the rider may put up without discomfort at a good road
house--the Green Tree. This same trip, for example, can be extended from
West Chester to Wilmington. Delaware, which is about twenty miles
further on. The stop is arbitrarily made at West Chester because that
makes a pleasant day's run for the average rider. Next week we shall
give the first half of a two-day's run, and then, before treating of
more trips in the vicinity of Philadelphia, we shall move from New York
towards Boston, and give a series of trips in the vicinity of Boston
itself.

     NOTE.--Map of New York city asphalted streets in No. 809. Map of
     route from New York to Tarrytown in No. 810. New York to Stamford,
     Connecticut in No. 811. New York to Staten Island in No. 812. New
     Jersey from Hoboken to Pine Brook in No. 813. Brooklyn in No. 814.
     Brooklyn to Babylon in No. 815. Brooklyn to Northport in No. 816.
     Tarrytown to Poughkeepsie in No. 817. Poughkeepsie to Hudson in No
     818. Hudson to Albany in No. 819. Tottenville to Trenton in 820.
     Trenton to Philadelphia in 821. Philadelphia in No. 821.
     Philadelphia-Wissahickon Route in No. 822.




THE DEPTH OF THE SEA.


Small boys often ask their parents, "How deep is the sea?" The answer
depends entirely upon the sea. The following table, compiled by one who
has investigated, may help one to the solution of one of the small boy's
problems. Average depth in yards: Pacific, 4252; Atlantic, 4026; Indian,
3658; Antarctic, 3000; Arctic, 1690; Mediterranean, 1476; Irish, 240;
English Channel, 110; Adriatic, 45; Baltic, 43.




A SUBMARINE DINNER PARTY.


Some time ago the labor of deepening the harbor of Ciotat was completed.
To celebrate the completion of his labor, and to make the occasion
memorable, the contractor gave to the members of his staff and the
representatives of the press a banquet unprecedented for its
originality. The table was set eight metres below the level of the sea,
at the very bottom of the harbor, inside the "caisson" in which the
excavators had been at work, and only the narrow walls of this caisson
separated the guests from the enormous mass of water around and above
their heads. The new-fashioned banqueting-hall was splendidly decorated
and lighted, and but for a certain buzzing in the ears, caused by the
pressure of air kept up in the chamber in order to prevent the inrush of
water, nobody would have suspected that the slightest interruption in
the working of the air-pump would have sufficed to asphyxiate the whole
party. After the banquet an improvised concert prolonged the festivity
for several hours, after which the guests reascended into the open air.




A Visit to a Famous Furnace.


     Some time ago when I was staying at Lebanon, Pa., I had the
     pleasure of visiting the Colebrook furnace. This is what is called
     a "blast furnace," because the draught for the fires is made
     artificially by the forcing in of a strong current of air. Much
     iron is smelted in that region, the ore coming from the famous
     Cornwall ore hills near by. The Colebrook produces about 175 tons
     of iron daily.

     It was on a hazy June morning that our party took a new
     trolley-car that had been running only a few days, and after
     riding a short distance into the country, alighted quite near the
     furnace, which seemed to be composed of a few gray stone
     buildings, and several high red stacks. After passing over some
     waste land and a little brook we came to the office, where we
     inquired whether we had better have a guide to show us around, or
     go by ourselves. A young gentleman who belonged to the
     establishment offered to go with us. He was very kind, explaining
     everything, and was never tired of answering questions.

     They cast twice a day; there are two furnaces, one used for the
     casting in the morning, and the other in the afternoon. We began
     our tour of inspection by visiting one of the furnaces. Of course
     we found it quite warm near it. When they wished to see whether
     the fire was burning all right, they used to have to open large
     doors, but now there are pipes with holes and some kind of glass
     in them that they can look into and see the fire. The gas that is
     thrown off by the burning of the coke and ore is returned to the
     furnace and used as fuel, hence there is a great saving of coke.

     Next we went to see the "roasters." The ore has to be roasted
     before it is put into the furnace, to get as much sulphur out of
     it as possible. After it comes out of a "roaster," instead of it
     being of a gray color, most of it has a reddish tint. After being
     roasted and before being put into the furnace limestone is added.
     There are over twenty roasters. The next place we visited was
     called the "tunnel head"--in plain language, the top of furnace
     number two. We went up in an open elevator that quite took one's
     breath away. At the top of the furnace is the "bell and hopper,"
     which is a circular opening with a bell-shaped cover which keeps
     in the gas. In the opening the ore and coke are put in, then the
     bell is let down, and the fuel and ore is dropped into the
     furnace.

     After we came down from the tunnel head it was suggested that we
     should visit the "drawing room." I wondered whether a furnace's
     drawing-room was like one in a private house, but when we arrived
     there I found that it was quite different. Instead of tables and
     chairs it contained four engines, each having two fly-wheels about
     twenty-two feet in diameter. These engines made the draught to
     "draw" the fires, so the place they were in was called the
     drawing-room.

     To see the "casting" we had some time to wait after we had
     completed our tour, having been almost everywhere, except on top
     of the roasters. A railroad comes right to the furnace, and while
     we were waiting a train of eight cars containing coke passed by.

     At last it was almost ten o'clock, so we drew near the building
     where they were to cast. We could hear and see them opening the
     furnace-door to let out the ore and cinders. A locomotive and
     several "cinder-tubs," the tubs looking like large iron pots, were
     on a track beside the building, the front tub being under a trough
     where the cinders came out. When one tub was full, a man would
     hold the cinders back, and the engine would go forward until
     another tub was under the trough.

     Afterward the contents of the tubs were dumped on the bank of the
     stream near the furnace. The iron and the cinders can easily be
     separated, as the iron is heavier and goes to the bottom.

     The moulds for the iron are made on the floor of the building with
     sand. The pig-iron is made in small troughs. In order to keep the
     metal flowing in the large troughs, men have to loosen it
     constantly with long poles. The iron as it comes from the furnace
     looks like melted gold.

  GRANT KNAUFF.
  FLUSHING.




Questions and Answers.


Frank Dubois: The ROUND TABLE is to publish, about August 15th, a handy
book which will contain just the information you ask for. Besides
memorandum pages, it will contain lists of words often misspelled, cost
of college courses, values of the rare stamps, a calendar, and about
1000 other facts worth knowing. It will be sent free to all who ask for
it. Indeed, copies will be sent for all members of a Chapter, a class, a
school. The book is 2-1/2 by 4 inches, and has thirty-six pages.

Elizabeth A. Hyde, 1458 Euclid Place, N. W. Washington, D. C., desires
to hear from Washington members. Will you send her your name and
address? Her purpose is to arrange an entertainment in aid of the School
Fund.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE SECOND SUMMER,

many mothers believe, is the most precarious in a child's life;
generally it may be true, but you will find that mothers and physicians
familiar with the value of the Gail Borden Eagle Brand Condensed Milk do
not so regard it.--[_Adv._]




ADVERTISEMENTS.




[Illustration: Columbia Bicycles ad]




Walter Baker & Co. Limited,

[Illustration]

The Largest Manufacturers of

PURE, HIGH GRADE

COCOAS and CHOCOLATES

On this Continent, have received

HIGHEST AWARDS

from the great

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EXPOSITIONS

IN EUROPE AND AMERICA.

       *       *       *       *       *

=Caution:= In view of the many imitations of the labels and wrappers on
our goods, consumers should make care that our place of manufacture,
namely, =Dorchester, Mass.= is printed on each package.

       *       *       *       *       *

SOLD BY GROCERS EVERYWHERE.

       *       *       *       *       *

WALTER BAKER & CO. LTD. DORCHESTER, MASS.




Arnold

Constable & Co

       *       *       *       *       *

Ladies' Fine Cheviot and Chambray

SHIRT WAISTS

$1.00 and $1.50 each;

Reduced from $2.75.

       *       *       *       *       *

Broadway & 19th st.

NEW YORK.




Postage Stamps, &c.




[Illustration]

100 all dif. Venezuela, Costa Rica, etc., only 10c.; 200 all dif. Hayti,
Hawaii, etc., only 50c. Ag'ts wanted at 50 per ct. com. List FREE!

=C. A. Stegmann=, 2722 Eads Av., St. Louis, Mo.




[Illustration]

=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.




HARPER'S PERIODICALS.

Per Year:

  HARPER'S MAGAZINE        _Postage Free_, $4.00
  HARPER'S WEEKLY                 "         4.00
  HARPER'S BAZAR                  "         4.00
  HARPER'S ROUND TABLE            "         2.00

       *       *       *       *       *

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

       *       *       *       *       *

HARPER & BROTHERS, Franklin Square. N. Y.




[Illustration: If afflicted with SORE EYES USE Dr. ISAAC THOMPSON'S EYE
WATER]




Mr. Kirk Munroe to the Round Table Order.


  _My Dear Fellow-members of the Round Table:_

     I have just returned from a visit that I wish every one of you
     might have made with me. It was to the GOOD WILL FARM away down in
     the State of Maine. There I spent two happy days, and from there I
     have come away filled with enthusiasm for the most splendid
     charity of which I have any knowledge. If you could only see what
     I have seen, and hear what I have heard, that manual
     training-school that we are proposing to build for the Good Will
     boys _some time_ would long since have been built and in active
     operation. As you can't see it, and probably know just as little
     about it as I did before going there, which was practically
     nothing at all, I am going to try and give you a slight idea of
     what the Good Will Farm is, and what it is doing.

     The man who conceived the idea of GOOD WILL FARM, and has made it
     his life-work, is the Rev. G. W. Hinckley, a splendid, manly,
     whole-souled Christian, who when he was a boy had as a playmate
     the son of a very poor widow. This woman went away from home every
     day to work after giving her boy his breakfast. Then she locked
     the house, and left the boy to shift for himself _outside_ until
     she came home at night and prepared the second and only other meal
     of the day. Between those two meals the boy used to get awfully
     hungry, and one day he was caught with his hand in a workman's
     dinner pail. For this he was sent to a State reform school, from
     which he emerged three years later a thorough-going young
     criminal, ruined for life in body and mind. Distressed at the sad
     fate of his young playmate, Mr. Hinckley then and there declared
     his intention of devoting all the energies of his life to the
     saving of destitute boys from reform schools. By years of hard
     work he laid up $2000, with which, less than six years ago, he
     purchased a farm of 240 acres on the upper Kennebec River in
     Maine, about midway between the cities of Waterville and
     Skowhegan. Here, in an old farm-house, he began his work with
     three boys. He had no source of income, and the work is carried on
     entirely by voluntary subscriptions. These come from everywhere,
     and generally from strangers, of whom Mr. Hinckley has had no
     previous knowledge.

     To-day GOOD WILL FARM owns, besides the original farm-house, which
     has been wholly rebuilt, five handsome cottages, each in charge of
     a matron, and in each of which fifteen boys between eight and
     sixteen years of age find a comfortable, happy home. There are now
     seventy-six boys, most of them orphans, many without a relative in
     the world, and nearly all of them of American parentage, living,
     working, and growing up to a useful manhood amid the splendid
     influences of this farm. Each of the cottages in which these boys
     live has cost $3000, and has been presented as a free gift to the
     farm either by individuals or by societies, such as the Christian
     Endeavor Society of Maine, who presented the one that is named
     after it, and in which I was lodged.

     Beside these cottages there is a splendid brick school building
     that cost $20,000, which was presented by two Maine ladies as a
     memorial to their brother.

     The farm needs more cottages, many more of them, for Mr. Hinckley
     has been obliged to refuse nearly 700 applications for admission
     to GOOD WILL this year for lack of accommodations. It also needs a
     manual training-school, and needs it very much indeed. We, the
     Knights and Ladies of the Round Table, promised, more than two
     years ago, to build that school for them; but we haven't done it
     yet, and when visitors to the farm ask to be shown the Round Table
     building they are led to a most beautiful site, on which rest two
     great piles of stone, hauled there for the foundations. They are
     told that here is where the school will stand whenever the young
     Knights and Ladies get ready to build it; and Mr. Hinckley always
     adds, "They are certain to do it, for they have promised, and I
     have never yet been disappointed in any promise made in connection
     with this work."

     It made me feel awfully ashamed to think that we made that promise
     two years ago and had not fulfilled it yet. How do you feel about
     it?

     All the work of the farm is done by the boys themselves. They chop
     wood, and fetch water, and plough, and make hay, and bake all the
     bread, and wait on table, and sweep, and do a thousand other
     things, besides having regular study hours and drills. In addition
     to all this they somehow find time to attend to their own little
     private gardens--the produce of which, is bought by the Farm at
     the regular market price--to play ball, go in swimming, build
     "Cubbies" or cubby houses down by the river out of bits of refuse
     lumber, and do almost everything else that hearty, happy boys find
     to do in the country.

     The most striking features of the farm are the utter absence of
     profanity or even vulgar language, for I did not hear a word while
     there that could not have been uttered with perfect propriety in a
     Sunday-school; the prompt obedience to orders; the happy, homelike
     air pervading the whole farm, and Mr. Hinckley's infinite patience
     in dealing with the boys. He is always ready to listen to them,
     always ready to advise them, and is always interested in their
     most trivial affairs. As he says, "If I encourage them to come to
     me freely with their little perplexities, they will come to me for
     advice concerning their greater affairs later on."

     One boy is kept at the farm by an Odd Fellows Association, of
     which his father was a member, and who have pledged $100 per year
     for his support until he is fitted to care for himself. The head
     waiter of the dining-room, a merry-faced, curly-headed,
     sixteen-year-old chap, is to be sent through Bowdoin by this
     year's graduating class of that college; while this year's class
     of Colby has promised to send another Good Will boy through that
     university.

     Many of the boys don't want to go to college, but are very anxious
     to learn trades. The present facilities for teaching them are two
     carpenter benches and a few tools, all huddled into one little
     room in the old farm-house. Now don't you think this is a splendid
     charity, and that those boys need that manual training-school, and
     that it is a fine thing for us to work for? I do; though I must
     confess that I wasn't very greatly interested before I went there.
     But that was because I didn't know about it, and the reason the
     school building that we promised isn't occupying the lovely site
     set apart for it is because you haven't really known about it. But
     now you know about it, for I have been there and have told you
     something of what I saw; and I feel certain that you will believe
     that all I have said is true. So now we will go to work and build
     that school, won't we? Do you know that even five cents apiece
     from each Knight and Lady of the Round Table would do it? Who will
     follow me if I head a--let me say, ten-cent subscription list for
     the GOOD WILL FARM INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL? I am sure every member of
     all the "K. M." chapters will, and I am almost certain that every
     member of our splendid order of modern chivalry will. At any rate,
     I am going to try it, and shall enclose a dime in this very letter
     to Messrs. Harper & Bros. Next summer I want to go again to GOOD
     WILL FARM; but I shall not unless that school building is ready
     for dedication. In the mean time, I remain to all the Knights and
     Ladies of the Round Table, their loving friend and fellow-member,

  KIRK MUNROE.




The "Do-Without" Society.


Should one ask which has been the most heroic age of the world we
believe that the right answer would be "the nineteenth century." In past
centuries a few were imbued with the spirit of self-sacrifice. To-day
this spirit is manifest in nearly every life. Everybody seems to be
trying to help somebody else--to lift those just below them to a higher
plane of living and of thinking. It is said that the oldest book in
existence is one devoted to a harangue on the evils of the time, and a
longing for the good old times. Doubtless the last book that will ever
be written will be in the same vein. But for all that the world is
growing better.

During the last dozen years there have been many efforts made to urge
people to indulge in certain little self-sacrifices of their own
choosing in order to save money for charity. Special societies have been
formed with this end in view. Large societies have inaugurated annual
self-denial weeks, and have sent out envelopes in which the self-denial
money was placed. The returns from the small collections have massed
enormous sums.

A story issued in the interest of this feature of charity tells how a
little girl, because of her poverty, had nothing to give up for the sake
of another, so she decided to sell her pet dog, that she might have an
offering. The ways in which "do-without money" is obtained are many.
Some go without certain articles of food. Others walk instead of ride in
the street cars. Entertainments and excursions are given up and their
cost duly noted.




A Suggestion and a Promise.


P. E. Hawkins writing from Taunton, Mass., tells how to cure
skins--information we have printed from other sources, but we had not
done so when he wrote--and adds:

"A pretty mat for a lamp or ash-receiver can be made by cutting the skin
its entire length on the lower side of the animal. Then cut felt or
cloth after the shape of the skin but larger, and sew the skin to it.
The mat will be prettier if the felt or cloth be scalloped or 'pinked.'
Any bright color will do. May write again describing the method of
catching herring in the Taunton River, and the way the fish get above
the East Taunton dam."

Let us have the herring morsel. Thanks.




The Fun of the Amateur Editor.


     In answer to your request in your issue of June 11th, I write to
     tell you that I do not hire my paper printed as the other
     correspondent does. The name of my paper is _Our Young People_,
     and the printing on each of its four pages measures five by six,
     slightly larger than the _Amateur Collector_. _Our Young People_
     is eleven by eight when open. As we print it ourselves it does not
     cost much actual money, but it does cost quite a good deal of
     work.

     Our press has a five by eight chase--that is, it can print about
     five by seven. Our outfit cost sixty dollars in the first place;
     but this once bought, it does not cost much money to keep the
     paper running. At first it may be harder work to print one's own
     paper than to hire it printed, but in the course of a few months
     one gets used to the work, and it is easy to get out an edition.
     You save the money you would have had to pay the printer if you
     hired it done. But of course there are many difficulties where one
     prints his own paper.

     I find that I am much hampered for type. Although there is plenty
     of body type, I do not have enough _varieties_ to print
     advertisements, small hand-bills, etc., very well. Many a time I
     have spilled, or "pied" the printers say, something after I have
     had it all set up. But nowadays this does not happen as often as
     it used to. These are samples of our difficulties, but I have said
     nothing about the pleasures and fun which far outnumber the
     difficulties. So I am not sorry for having tried to become an
     editor in a small way. I would be glad to exchange _Our Young
     People_ with other amateur papers, and to send a sample copy to
     any one who wants it.

  CLEMENT F. ROBINSON,
  Editor of _Our Young People_.
  BRUNSWICK, ME.

Sir Clement wants to belong to the New England Amateur Press
Association. Will the secretary of that association kindly send him
particulars?




Childish Wisdom.


A boy of three was in the garden. Going up to a rose-bush he exclaimed,
"Oh, grandma, these flowers have teeth!"

  L. L. V.
  NEW HAVEN.




GOOD WILL MITE

       *       *       *       *       *

HARPER'S ROUND TABLE

INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL FUND

  _Amount_, $........................

  .............................
  _Contributor._

_This money is contributed, not because it is asked for, but because I
want to give it._

       *       *       *       *       *

If you use this Good Will Mite, simply pin it to your letter, in order
that it may be detached for filing. If the amount is given by more than
one contributor, add blanks for their names, but attach the added sheet
firmly to the Mite, that it may not become detached and lost. Include a
given name in each case, and write plainly, to avoid errors on the Honor
Roll.




More About Von Bülow.


Von Bülow had a continual headache, and that was sufficient excuse for
his irritability. After his death, in accordance with his wishes, an
autopsy was made, and it was found that a displaced bone pressed against
his brain, and this was the cause of his trouble. But Von Bülow as a
conductor was supremely great. His stronghold was as a Beethoven
conductor, and he considered Beethoven the greatest composer. He said
that the Ninth Symphony could not be appreciated in one hearing, so he
played it twice at a certain concert. Needless to say the hall was
almost empty during the repetition.

He did a similar thing once at another time with a composition of
Brahms. His great mentality made him an ardent admirer of Brahms; and on
this occasion the people were not all enthusiastic, upon which Von Bülow
turned to the audience and said, sharply, "What! you do not like it? I
shall make you like it!" And he immediately had the whole piece
repeated, to the dismay of the audience. After that lesson the people
applauded loudly whenever a Brahms piece was played. I wonder if Dr.
Holmes would not have classed Von Bülow among the men who have
"squinting brains," as he calls them?

Von Bülow could not endure having any one present at his rehearsals,
though it is said that people would be willing to risk a good deal for
that enjoyment. A very good story is told on this subject about a few
ladies who once gained access to the hall just before the rehearsal was
to begin. Von Bülow saw them, of course--for he wanted to see everything
that was to be seen, and also what was not to be seen--and he determined
to get them away without speaking to them. So he said to the orchestra,
"We will commence to-day by practising the bassoons." Thirty-two bars
rest to begin with, during which Von Bülow beat time unflinchingly--then
a snort here, and a snort there, for a little while--then sixty-four
bars rest--then a repeat--but the would-be auditors of the rehearsal had
made their exit!

At a certain concert the audience was very enthusiastic over a Meyerbeer
March, I think it was, which his orchestra had just played, and which
Von Halson, director for the opera, had also recently played. Seeing the
immense excitement, he turned and said, "No wonder you like it after
hearing it at the circus which Von Halson runs." Some time after came
the memorial concert for Von Halson. The conductor, fearing that there
might be some trouble, said he would not have Von Bülow in the house. So
he gave all the ushers portraits of Von Bülow, and told them to turn him
out of the hall. It was done; but Von Bülow knew well his own
favoritism, and the next day took a clever revenge, which rather turned
the tables. He was to play the piano at a concert, and for one of his
selections he chose a popular air of Mozart, the words of which happened
to fit the occasion, and played variations to it. The house of course
saw the joke, and there was an immense round of laughter and applause.

Von Bülow was once playing an accompaniment for a certain singer. She
had sung but a few phrases, when Von Bülow's admiration and emotion were
excited to their fullest extent; and he was then prompted to do a
strange thing. Rising from his seat, he pushed the stool aside, and
kneeling down before the instrument, he finished the accompaniment in
that position, saying that he could not accompany such a voice except on
his knees.

Do we not love Von Bülow the better for this?

  MARIE THÉRÈSE BERGE.
  NEW YORK CITY.




Did You Find that Verse?


Did you find the verse by Alice Cary in that travel story by Miss
Denton? Here it is:

  "True worth is in being, not seeming,
    In doing each day that goes by
  Some little good, not in dreaming
    Of great things to do by-and-by."

The capitals in the story, arranged in regular order, spell it.




[Illustration: Ivory Soap]

Keep the refrigerator clean. Use hot water, a cake of Ivory Soap (it
leaves no odor) and a clean scrubbing brush; scrub the sides, corners,
racks, outlet pipe and drip cup; rinse with cold water and wipe dry.

THE PROCTER & GAMBLE CO., CIN'TI.




OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT of the award on

=GILLOTT'S PENS= at the CHICAGO EXPOSITION.

=AWARD:= "For excellence of steel used in their manufacture, it being
fine grained and elastic; superior workmanship, especially shown by the
careful grinding which leaves the pens free from defects. The tempering
is excellent and the action of the finished pens perfect."

  (Signed) FRANZ VOGT, _Individual Judge_.

  Approved: { H. I. KIMBALL, _Pres't Departmental Committee_.
            { JOHN BOYD THACHER, _Chairman Exec. Com. on Awards_.




[Illustration]

=SEND for Catalogue of= the =Musical Instrument= you think of buying.
=Violins repaired= by the Cremona System. C. STORY, 26 Central St.,
Boston, Mass.




[Illustration: If afflicted with SORE EYES USE Dr. ISAAC THOMPSON'S EYE
WATER]




[Illustration]

EARN A TRICYCLE!

We wish to introduce our Teas, Spices, and Baking Powder. Sell 30 lbs.
and we will give you a Fairy Tricycle; sell 25 lbs. for a Solid Silver
Watch and Chain; 50 lb. for a Gold Watch and Chain; 75 lbs. for a
Bicycle; 10 lbs. for a Beautiful Gold Ring. Express prepaid if cash is
sent for goods. Write for catalog and order sheet.

W. G. BAKER,

SPRINGFIELD, MASS.




[Illustration]

WONDER CABINET =FREE=. Missing Link Puzzle, Devil's Bottle, Pocket
Camera, Latest Wire Puzzle, Spook Photos, Book of Sleight of Hand, Total
Value 60c. Sent free with Immense catalogue of 1000 Bargains for 10c.
for postage.

INGERSOLL & BRO., 65 Cortlandt Street, N. Y.




Harper's Young People Series

_Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.25 each:_

     =The Mystery of Abel Forefinger.= By WILLIAM DRYSDALE.

     =Raftmates.--Canoemates.--Campmates.= By KIRK MUNROE.

     =Young Lucretia, and Other Stories.= By MARY E. WILKINS.

     =A Boy's Town.= By W. D. HOWELLS.

     =Diego Pinzon.= By J. R. CORYELL.

     =The Moon Prince, and Other Nabobs.= By R. K. MUNKITTRICK.

     =The Midnight Warning, and Other Stories.= By E. H. HOUSE.

     =Phil and the Baby, and False Witness.= By LUCY C. LILLIE.

     =Flying Hill Farm.--The Mate of the "Mary Anne".= By SOPHIE SWETT.

_Illustrated. Square 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.00 each:_

     =Wakulla.--The Flamingo Feather.--Derrick Sterling.--Chrystal, Jack
     & Co., and Delta Bixby.--Dorymates.= By KIRK MUNROE.

     =The Talking Leaves.--Two Arrows.--The Red Mustang.= By W. O.
     STODDARD.

     =Prince Lazybones, and Other Stories.= By Mrs. W. J. HAYS.

     =The Ice Queen.= By ERNEST INGERSOLL.

     =Uncle Peter's Trust.= By GEORGE B. PERRY.

     =The Adventures of Jimmy Brown.--The Cruise of the Canoe Club.--The
     Cruise of the "Ghost."--The Moral Pirates.--The New Robinson
     Crusoe.= By W. L. ALDEN.

     =Toby Tyler.--Mr. Stubbs's Brother.--Tim and Tip.--Left
     Behind.--Raising the "Pearl."--Silent Pete.= By JAMES OTIS.

     =The Four Macnicols.= By WILLIAM BLACK.

     =The Lost City.--Into Unknown Seas.= By DAVID KER.

     =The Story of Music and Musicians.--Jo's Opportunity.--Rolf
     House--Mildred's Bargain, and Other Stories.--Nan.--The Colonel's
     Money.--The Household of Glen Holly.= By LUCY C. LILLIE.

     =Who Was Paul Grayson?= By JOHN HABBERTON.

     =Captain Polly.= By SOPHIE SWETT.

     =Strange Stories from History.= By GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON.

       *       *       *       *       *

Published by HARPER & BROTHERS, New York

_The above works are for sale by all booksellers, or will be mailed by
the publishers, postage prepaid, on receipt of the price._




[Illustration: A SWIMMING LESSON.]




WISE CHILD.


"Papa, I know why Napoleon needed to sleep only four hours every night."

"Why, my son?"

"Because he took a _Nap_ everywhere he went."




A district school teacher in New Hampshire has had great difficulty in
explaining adverbs to a class of children. After toiling faithfully with
them, he said: "Bring in a list of adverbs to-morrow. Remember that a
great many adverbs ends in ly."

The next day one boy's list began: Slowly, fastly, lily, emily!




  Mamma labelled her jars of sweets,
    "Put up by Mrs. Kay";
  Later it read upon those meats,
    "Put down by Tommy Jay."




A PUZZLER.


MRS. TEECHUM. "That small engine pounding away in the corner, Toby, is
called a donkey-engine."

TOBY. "And yet the engineer says it works with a four-horse-power.
That's funny, isn't it?"




AT THE ZOO.


BERTIE. "You say that is the bird of freedom, mamma?"

MAMMA. "Yes, Bertie."

BERTIE. "Then why is it in a cage?"




"Mamma, where do eggs come from?"

"Chickens, my dear."

"Well, that's funny. Papa says that chickens come from eggs."




Charles Mathews, the celebrated English comedian, was probably one of
the best mimics the world ever produced. Born June 28, 1776, after a
successful career he died on the same date, 1835, fifty-nine years
later.

One of his favorite amusements was that of mimicking children. One day
in Suffolk, England, he walked up to a group of boys all about eight
years of age, who were playing marbles, and adopting their actions and
tone of voice, he asked permission to join in the game. They were, of
course, rather startled at this big lad, and stared at him in silence.
However, everything he did was so like themselves that a little fellow
in the party cried out, "I say, fellows, what's the harm; let him play;"
and then turning to Mathews asked him, "Have you got any marbles?"

"No," said Mathews, "but I've got a penny."

"Well, then, you can buy some of ours," which he did, and then knuckled
down and proceeded to play.

The boys by this time had ceased to regard him as other than one of
themselves, never entertaining the slightest suspicion that it was the
celebrated comedian they had among them.

In a short time he squabbled with the boys, and the talk was something
like the following:

"You, Bill Atkins! I say you've no right to that."

"I have," said Bill.

"I say you haven't!"

"I say I have."

"Ah! you cheat! I won't play with you no more."

This shortly led to a quarrel, and taking off his coat Mathews offered
to fight any of the boys. One of the little fellows immediately threw
his coat and hat on the ground, and squaring up to the big fellow, urged
him to come on. Mathews got out of the row by giving his adversary the
marbles he had won, thus restoring good humor, and he left the scene,
delighted with the amusement he had received from it, although retaining
his mimicry to the end by calling out as he quitted them, "I must go to
my ma."






End of Project Gutenberg's Harper's Round Table, August 13, 1895, by Various