^ ff W^ fi ^ l ^ ' '"" ' i »"""«»^""* ou teach me, aha, ha, ha! I don' lig that you cut with a sword, Ani-San. Oh — oh — oh' Mebby you git kill sometime, an' I jus' liddle ole widows. \Vhat you thing?" AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 45 " That I shall stay right here and not run the risk — of making you a widow. I am entitled to my discharge. We will be married at once." "No — no — I — I am marry jus' now. They make me marry account I so poor. This hosban' — he gittin' tire' of me now. An' me? Oh, how I gitting more tire' of him! An' of that mother of him! He go'n' divorce me, I egspeg, account I don' lig those mother. Me ? I will naever lig her! See! Tha' 's how I make him divorce me. Then — then — ah, Ji-Saburo — you shall marry me! Jus' lig I been praying for aever sinze I been borned. Ah — ah — ah! All the gods in the sky! What I done with you to put such a loog in your face? Speak it to me! Ji-Saburo, speak!" " Permit me to go without speaking — that is best. I was mistaken in thinking I am Japanese. I am nothing. Born here; bred there." "Ah, Ji-Saburo, will you not tell me why you go'n' be so crule with me ? See, I beg on my both knees." "You will never forgive me if I do." "Me? I forgive you bifore! Now — tell me. By all the gods, tell me!" "To be 'married' and 'divorced' so easily, Glory, is held an evil custom by all the rest of the world. Forgive me — you are innocent. I am not." "Oh, Shaka! Jus' one minute ago I was that happy! Ah, Ji- Saburo, all the days, an' nights, an' months, an' years I have waited an' prayed. Alas! the gods have both answered an' denied my prayers — for I asked only to see you. I did not dream that you might wish for marry me. If I had jus' dreamed those — I should have been a nun for you, Ji-Saburo. An' I — when you see me I am jus' — evil. Forgive me, Ani-San. I would die rather than make you thing — ■ regret — Jus' — jus' I shall always be sad in hereafter. An' will you be a liddle kine to me — oh, jus' a liddle — account I got be always sad ? " He took her hands gently, kissed them one after the other, and was gone. "Sayonara!" she sobbed, "foraever an' foraever — sayonara!" Her husband came in. She faced him savagely. "Oh, all the gods, how I hate you! You have made me evil." 46 WERNER'S READINGS One moment of amazed silence. Then he struck her. As she lay at his feet she heard him say to the man-servant : "Find the nakodo. Let him return her to her father. Take all the presents she brought." She was divorced. Her purification began at the great temple of Asakusa. I cannot stop to tell what it cost — of penance and travail. But at the end the bronzes assured her that she was again without sin. They had never seen the evil she accused herself of. But for the repose of her soul they humored her — the gentle priests. Now she was without sin, they said. So she meant always to remain. They burnt incense upon her, gave her the blessings of all the gods, and she went forth to find Ji-Saburo. But it was long, and everywhere the wounded needed her, and she became a nurse. Soon there was not a field-hospital where the wan face of the "Spirit Nurse" was not known. And one day the great commander himself came to see and thank her. She told him quite simply all her little story. And he, looking into her worn face, told her, with generous untruth, that Ji-Saburo had been made a colonel, had gone home to marry her, had not found her there. He would be with her in six days now. She must rest a great deal — sleep — and Ji-Saburo would come. A courier left for the front within an hour. In six days Ji-Saburo was at her side. She was dead. The peace on her wan face had come, they told him, with her last words, which had been his name. SHOPPING VS. BUYING. BESSIE. — Let's play we are going shopping. Nellie.- — Let's. But then, where's our money ? Bessie. — Oh, we don't need any money. All we have to do is to price things, and say they are no good, and make the clerks mad. I've seen mamma do that lots of times. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 47 WHEN THE COWS COME HOME. AGNES E. MITCHELL. WITH klingle, klangle, klingle, 'Way down the dusty dingle, The cows are coming home: Now sweet and clear, and faint and low, The airy twinklings come and go, Like chimings from some far-off tower, Or patterings of an April shower That makes the daisies grow; Ko-klarg, ko-klarg, ko-klinglelingle, 'Way down the darkening dingle, The cows come slowly home ; And old-time friends, and twilight plays, And starry nights, and sunny days, Come trooping up the misty ways When the cows come home. With jingle, jangle, jingle, Soft sounds that sweetly mingle, The cows are coming home; Malvine, and Pearl, and Florimel, De Kamp, Redrose, and Gretchen Schell, Queen Bess, and Sylph, and Spangled Sue. Across the fields I hear her 00-00, And clang her silver bell; Go-ling, go-lang, go-linglelingle, With faint, far sounds that mingle The cows come slowly home ; And mother songs of long-gone years, And baby joys, and childish tears, And youthful hopes, and youthful fears, When the cows come home. 48 WERNER'S READINGS With ringle, rangle, ringle, By twos and threes and single, The cows are coming home; Through the violet air we see the town, And the summer sun a-slipping down; The maple in the hazel glade Throws down the path a longer shade, And the hills are growing brown; To-ring, to-ring, to-ringleringle, By threes and fours and single, The cows come slowly home. The same sweet sound of wordless psalm, The same sweet June-day rest and calm, The same sweet scent of bud and balm, When the cows come home. With a tinkle, tankle, tinkle, Through fern and periwinkle, The cows are coming home. A-loitering in the checkered stream, Where the sun-rays glance and gleam, Starine, Peachbloom, and Phcebe Phyllis Stand knee-deep in the creamy lilies In a drowsy dream ; To-link, to-lank, to linklelinkle, O'er the banks with buttercups a-twinkle, The cows come slowly home; And up through memory's deep ravine Come the brook's old song and its old-time sheen, And the crescent of the silver queen, When the cows come home. With a klingle, klangle, klingle, With a loo-oo, and moo-oo, and jingle, The cows are coming home; And over there on Morlin hill Hear the plaintive cry of the whippoorwill; AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 49 The dewdrops lie on the tangled vines, And over the poplars Venus shines, And over the silent mill ; Ko-ling, ko-lang, ko-lingielingle; With ting-a-ling and jingle The cows come slowly home; Let down the bars ; let in the train Of long-gone songs, and flower and rain, For dear old times come back again When the cows come home. A FORLORN HOPE. "'I ^EN thousand a year, and so fair and petite! ±- Well, a cottage with Jessie, and all things en suite, By Jove! I'm hard up, and the end of my rope I must shape in the conjugal noose," said Fred Hope. They had many a tryst 'neath a shady old ash, Where he played his fine eyes, pulled his tawny mustache — Jessie shook her small head, all sunlight and curls, "Ah, you've said the same thing to a hundred young girls' But Fred placed his hand where his heart ought to be ; Said he'd flirted, but ne'er been in love until she Crept into his heart, and he blessed his dear fate — "Tf you're earnest," said Jessie, "we're young, we can wait." Alas! many are promised that never are matched, And chickens are counted that never are hatched ; Even mice have outwitted the wisdom of man, And Fred's castle buildings are chateaux en Espagne. On the hotel piazza, 'neath midnight's bright stars, Sipping "Widow Cliquot," smoking fragrant cigars, Sit Fred and his crony, young Tony McVay, And the confab grows louder, more rapid and gay. 50 WERNER'S READINGS Do listeners ever hear good of themselves ? And why should dear Jessie, most wakeful of elves, Be sitting behind her own green jalousie, And hear her name spoken by Tony McV. ? ' Now tell me about her (here, fill your glass, Fred) — The girl with the big eyes and jolly red head." ' Well she's not over bright." said the hopeful young roue, And, tapping his head, ' there's appartements a louer. "I've been very spooney, made love to her aunty (She's an orphan, you know), I've read Byron and Dante. She's ten thousand a year — I was getting the blues — Et que voulez vous, Tony, le roi il s'amuse." Ten o'clock the next morning, the stage to the West Swings up to the porch, and like bird to her nest Sinks Jessie, all smiling — not sad and forlorn, Unconscious that Fred Hope had ever been born. Till he stammers: "Why, Jessie' there's something amiss!" " Yes, sir, I'm a miss and I'll stay one till this — ' Not over bright ' head shall be furnished with brains That may prompt me to go within doors when it rains. "So good-bye! we are starting. For your kindness to aunty I really do thank you. When again you read Dante, Don't forget the inscription, it will bring me to mind, 1 All ye who here enter, leave hope (Fred) behind ! ' " AIM HIGH. ERNEST NEAL LYON. ATTEMPT the highest I Nobler far To scumble gazing at a star, Than, by a glow-worm lantern led, To follow in another's tread AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 51 AFTER THE ACCIDENT. GEORGE HIBBARD. THE automobile stood half in and half out of the ditch. He was on his knees, gazing frantically down at her. She lay motion- less at the foot of the tree whither he had carried her. She moved slightly. Her eyelids quivered, and she gazed straight into his anxious face. "Which of the other worlds did we strike?" she asked dreamily. "Are you all right?" "I hope it was Jupiter. Mars would have been too humiliatingly little." "You're not hurt? There's nothing the matter with you?" "I don't seem to miss any part of myself. But what happened ?*' . "I wasn't watching the road. Thinking of something else, as you know. We were going like sixty — " " No. We'll say like twenty -five. That must be about the average of our ages." "Anyway, we got thrown out and came near being killed in the first ditch." "I've always understood that a certain merit attaches to dying in the last." " You are sure there's no harm done ? ' " If you mean to the automobile — " "Don't be ridiculous. Are you all right?'' "In answer to your-money- or-y our life way of asking after my health, I may say that I am." "It's annoying enough." "That I am well?" "You are annoying enough, if -you like. I am extremely sorry that you have had this unpleasant experience I wish ihat it had been at any other time. But man proposes and automobiles — Well, the machine itself furnished the climax." "Wasn't it something of an anticlimax?" 52 WERNER'S READINGS "If you mean that I'd have had a worse header if there had been no interruption, it's very likely." "I can hardly consider it nattering to have you intimate that you would rather be thrown from an automobile — ■" ''Than thrown over by you. Oh, you do not know your own powers." She permitted her eyes to meet his for a brief time. " There's no harm done, except to the automobile." " You don't know. When we had our smash-up I lost my head — " "Then our accident was not without its — casualties." "And I think that there is something which I ought to tell you." "Is it important?" " You must judge. I wish to be an honorable criminal." "Aren't the terms contradictory?" " A fault confessed is half atoned for, but I am not sorry at all." " Of course, if there were mitigating circumstances — " "I should call this an aggravating one." "Be careful! You don't seem to be helping yourself." But she beamed upon him for a moment, though again she looked away. "It was — you." "What!" "You were the circumstance." "I — a circumstance! But how can a circumstance be five feet six inches high and weigh a hundred and twenty-three pounds?" "That's the trouble. And have the prettiest, palest, most appeal- ing face. And closed eyes that I'd have given all the world to see open — " "A most remarkable kind of circumstance." "It was. You know, when the accident happened, for a few moments you were unconscious." She busied herself winding a blade of grass about her finger. " My heart stood still. I couldn't breathe. I lifted you and carried you away from the machine. I put you down here. On my knees at your side I bent over you, and as you lay there unconscious — " "Yes." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 53 "I kissed you!" "Do you think that was— pretty behavior?" "I admit it was bad enough." ''And the bitter disappointment I must naturally feel." "Why?" "To find that one whom I thought I could trust — " "You could — usually. But, remember, I had just asked you to marry me. The next instant I found you lying before me appar- ently lifeless. Think of the shock. I wasn't a doctor. I was in love with you." "You don't pretend to claim that there is any recommendation in any of — the means that you employed to bring me to?" " On reflection, I believe that I might have done worse. Anyway, you opened your eyes." "Any one would at such conduct." "What do you think I should have done?" "I think that you should have behaved toward me as a friend and a brother, or perhaps I should say a sister." "Why not your grandmother?" "I am sure that would be an ideal example." "And I am a cad and a coward and a thief and a brute and a beast — " "N— no." For a moment she paused. "What will you think of me?" "The question before the house is what you think of me?" "I have a confession to make that may change everything." He looked at her in wonder. "I — I wasn't unconscious at all." "Not when I lifted you up and brought you here?" "No. I was a little bewildered and I suppose that I closed my eyes. And then you jumped at me and carried me off." "And you let me — " "I suppose I let you kiss me. Though, of course, I never could have anticipated that you would." "But how could I know that you hated me?" 54 WERNER'S READINGS "What?" she asked in the most unmistakable surprise "Well, if not that, that you didn't feel toward me as I wanted you to feel." "And how do you know that I didn't?" " On the very best authority — yourself." She turned and looked at him with the sincerest astonishment. "I didn't tell you so." " In the first place, I think you make a mistake when you say that you were not unconscious. You might have fainted for a moment and not known it. I should not have kissed you — but I'm glad that I did." "Oh!" "I didn't know when I did it, of course, or I shouldn't have done it; but—" "Know what?" " What I learned from what you said." "I said something?" "You spoke a name — " "Yes, what if I did?" "You said— 'Tom.'" "Very well;" she looked at him swiftly, shyly, almost appealingly, and then glanced away. " Of course, as my name is Harry — " "Your name is Harry!" In her excitement she sprang to her feet and stood looking down at him. "Certainly." "Oh!" she moaned, putting her hands over her face. "How awful! What shall I do!" "Believe me, that your secret, which I learned in this accidental manner, is quite safe with me." "How can I make you understand?" She hesitated. "I told you that I was not unconscious." "Yes." "So that I knew what I said perfectly." "You knew that you used the name?" AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 55 "Of course, I did;" and she added boldly, though she blushed heavily, "I did it on purpose." "But, why?" " Why ? It's an awful thing for me to tell you — to confess, but I thought that it was — your name." "Tom!" "I was with your Aunt Margaret coming across in the steamer, and she did nothing but talk about you and always called you ' Tom.'" "So she does," he cried, jumping up in sudden enlightenment. "It's the name I used to be called when I was a little boy. I hadn't heard it for so long that I had forgotten that it was ever used. And you thought that it was my name, and you were not unconscious. I don't understand, and yet — " "The conclusion is rather — obvious." "I wonder," he exclaimed as he drew nearer to her, "if it could be that—" " Yes," she said in the faintest whisper. TO BE OR NOT TO BE. I'D rather be a Could Be, If I cannot be an Are; For a Could Be is a May Be, With a chance of touching par. I had rather be a Has Been Than a Might Have Been, by far; For a Might Be is a Hasn't Been But a Has was once an Are! Also an Are is Is and Am ; A Was was all of these; So I'd rather be a Has Been Than a Hasn't, if you please. 56 WERNER'S READINGS MISS AMELIA'S COLORED LOCHINVAR. CHARLES T. GRILLEY. \ COON named Ephrum Bascom loved a Miss Amelia Starr; -C\. One day she told him 'bout th' ride of gay young Lochinvar; She filled Eph's head with romance 'bout knights of high degree, Of barons bold, an' ladies fair, an' deeds of chivalry. Next day Eph stole an old gray mule, then made a suit of tin, An' like those knights he'd heard about, rode forth his bride to win. He galloped to Amelia's house, and as she lay in bed, She heard Eph's voice out in the road, an' this is what he said - " O, Miss Amelia, I've come to steal you, An' take you 'way from heah, I don't care whar; Come be my blushing bride ; on dis milk-white steed we'll ride, So come out an' join your colored Lochinvar." The noise awoke Amelia's dad, an', thinking that some thief Was prowling 'round, he grabbed his gun an' started after Eph. Through the window-pane he thrust th' gun, then fired at Ephraim's head ; The shot went low, an' the ol' gray mule received the charge instead. For a minute all was still as death, then waiting for no more, The mule let out an awful wail, then down th' road he tore. Amelia called out, "Lochinvar, oh, come back to your bride," But Eph had other business, an' thus to her replied : " O, Miss Amelia, I got to leave you; I'm gwine to let you stay jes whar yo' are; Don't talk no mo' to me 'bout dem knights an' chivalry, — Yo' can git some othah coon fo' Lochinvar." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 57 WHITE AZALEAS. HELEN ELLSWORTH WRIGHT. I TELL you, stranger, it's no use. I couldn't part with that clay- hill up yonder, not if your wife has took a dozen notions to it, and you was to pay me ten thousand dollars an acre. Why, man, I don't want your money. I'm forty-six years old this fall, I've got enough to last, and there ain't a chick nor a child to leave it to, and that hill — well, it's no use, that's all. The place ain't good for raisin' much, just pines and berry brambles and them there white azalies, but when it comes my turn to die I want 'em to leave me there. See that place where the trees grow thick an' it's dark an' cool an' still? That's it! That's where I'm going to lie. Your wife, she fancied that? Peculiar, ain't it? Womenfolks likes light most always, light and sunny parts, though once I knowed a girl — but that was twenty year ago. Buy half my hill, you say? No, sirree, you can't have half an inch. I tell you, once for all, you can't buy half an inch. Mebby you city folks can't understand, but, I'll tell you what, there's things up here that money couldn't touch, and that there spot's one of 'em. Confound it, man, I'll tell you why! You see, 'twas more than twenty year ago that I come here to see a friend o' mine named Ephraim Jones. You knew Eph Jones? Well, that's odd, ain't it? He an' I was chums. This place was mighty lively then. Those cabins there was full of folks, an' men was takin' fortunes out o' quartz most every day. The school-house stood up yonder near my hill, an' the teacher's name — well, that don't matter anyhow. I couldn't say what she was like; I couldn't tell a blind man what a lily was! Your cities never grow that kind, no more than they do sugar pines or rhododendron flowers. Well, we was — friends. We used to go for white azalies, she an' I, upon my hill when school was through. It wasn't my hill then, not till long after, when she'd gone away, and yet we called it " ours." 58 WERNER'S READINGS We used to sit there where the trees grow thick an' plan out what the years would bring. We'd sit there till the shadows came an' shut the world away, an' then were glad, for all the night an' all the stars seemed made for just us two! The wood-owls nested in those 1 ees, an' when I'd say I loved some one, they'd always ask me, '• vVho?" An' so the summer slipped along an' time come for me to go. I was to fix a little home, an' when next the white azalies bloomed to go back again for her. Well, first she wrote me regular every week, and then her letters got to soundin' queer, like one who laughs an' wants to cry, an' then — well, then they stopped. Those were busy times with us, but I wrote by every stage. One evenin' — 'twas along in May, an' I was potterin' round at dusk a-doin' up the chores — I saw a man come down the trail. The man was Ephraim Jones. He never said a word — just reached out an' took my hand, an' wrung it hard, an' kind o' choked. By and by he said : "Look here, old man, it takes an awful blast, you know, to shatter out that hard gray rock so you can get the gold. Well, the good Lord blasts us hard sometimes, — perhaps to find our gold." Then he told me how her father'd got in debt, an' gone away, an' left her mother sick an' them two little sisters on her hands, with nothing but the money from her school; how she had tried to keep it from me all those weeks, and then — a man had come, a Judge from heaven knows where, an' old enough to — Say, stranger, be this sun too hot ? You look so kind o' faint an' fuddled out. Perhaps you'd rather have me stop my yarn? Go on? Well, there ain't much more to tell. The Judge he come a-courtin' her, but she said always, "No." He told her how he'd take them all, an' make her mother well, an' send the girls away to school, an' do a heap o' things. Then winter come, an' they hadn't even wood, nor clothes, nor things to eat. The mother blamed her some an' cried; the little girls both teased and coaxed, an' the Judge— come every day. And AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 59 so the winter turned to early spring, but things weren't better much. One evenin' Ephraim come across our hill an' found her up there, where the trees grow thick. The leaves were comin' on the white azalie plants, an' her hands were full of tender little shoots. "Go, take him these," she said, "and say when they bloom I'll be another man 's bride. My mother and the children need me most my duty is to them!" Well, the Judge, he married her an' took 'em all away. And I? I've got them little dry shoots yet, — an' shall have always, too! Ephraim went down to see 'em once — he knew the Judge, you know. They were livin' in a splendid house, with carriages an' every- thing. The Judge was doin' all he could, but money can't buy love! She seemed so kind o' sweet an' still, like a lily that's been picked an' taken from the sun. There was a baby, too, a puny mite — her baby — an' she called him — Joe! I guess the Judge, he didn't know what for, but it was — me! What is it, stranger? Be you ill? Perhaps the air's too light up here, an' your heart ain't over-strong! Well, to go on, he died, did little Joe, an' she sent Ephraim word. The white azalies was in bloom, an' I got most a hundred sprays, an' Eph, he took 'em down. The little chap had lots o' flowers, all boughten ones, you know; but mine the mother took — an' held 'em close — an' cried. (Confound this smoke! It's getting in your eyes?); Well, after that they went away, somewhere in foreign parts, and that was — fifteen year ago! The Judge, if he's a-livin' now, must be as old as — you! The pines keep singin' on our hill, an' everything grows just the same as when we two was young, an' some day — Say, you've seen quicksilver in with gold? The part that isn't used rolls down the sluice in little shiny balls, but when they meet they form a whole so well that nobody can tell just which is which. The gold divides it mebby, by an' by, but each takes somewhat of the other's part an' holds it till they meet again, to give it back with its own self besides. Well, hearts is just like that. You see, I couldn't sell the place, — it's "ours!" In this world she's the Judge's wife, but in the next — she's mine! 60 WERNER'S READINGS Why, man, for God's sake, what's gone wrong? She's what? She's what, you say? The Judge? Your wife! Consumption, man? Dear Heaven, be more kind! Say, mister, that clay hill is — yours. I'm goin' — I'm goin' away. You'll pay me? No. You've paid a thousand times. You've brought her back — to die. You tell her this: A queer old chap, rough as the gray rock peepin' through the hill, says the owls have always nested where the trees grow thick, an' the white azalies have waited— twenty year! WHAT THE MOSQUITO SANG. " TT — U — M! hum! shut your eyes, sir. J-X The noise you hear is flies, sir; Awh — m ! don't be scared, sir. Go to sleep — your sheets are aired, sir. Hu — m — a hymn it is I'm singing. Its music in your ear is ringing. I won't sting you, sting you, s — t — i — ng! I'd scorn to do so mean a thing ! A h — u — m — bug it is. i" don't bite. Take care! don't slap; I never fight. Slap! whang! Take care, you nearly hit me. 'Twas me, 'twas me, my friend, that bit ye. There — there again! it comes to blows. You fool, it didn't touch your nose ! What in the world's the use of slapping Your own face, when you should be napping ? A he — m! Don't be alarmed; You really ought to be quite charmed. H — u — m! hum! Don't play the boy; I merely sang your lullaby. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 6» A whang again! there, there you go! No use — you can't hit me, you know. Now go to sleep. Oh ho! you're going. Now for a feast, my friend; I 'go in.' All right — he's gone; I'll have my fill. So now, old Sleepy, here's my bill!" WHAT A PITY. WE had paused to watch the quiver Of faint moonbeams on the river By the gate. We had heard something calling, And a heavy dew is falling, Yet we wait. It is no doubt very silly To stay out in all this chilly Evening mist. Still I linger hesitating, For her lips are plainly waiting To be kissed. So I stooped to take possession Of the coveted concession On the spot; But she draws back with discreetness Saying, with tormenting sweetness: "I guess not." Her whole manner is provoking. " Oh, well, I was only joking," I reply. She looks pentiently pretty, As she answers : "What a pity! So was I." 62 WERNER'S READINGS SHE FELT OF HER BELT. {SAW her go shopping in stylish attire, And she felt Of her belt At the back. Her walk was as free as a springy steel wire, And many a rubberneck turned to admire As she felt Of her belt At the back. She wondered if all the contraptions back there Were fastened just right — 'twas an unceasing care, So she felt Of her belt At the back. I saw her at church as she entered her pew, And she felt Of her belt At the back. She had on a skirt that was rustly and new, And didn't quite know what the fastenings might do, So she felt Of her belt At the back. She figdeted round while the first prayer was said, She fumbled about while the first hymn was read — Oh, she felt Of her belt At the back. Jack told her one night that he loved her like mad, And she felt For her belt At the back. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 63 She didn ; t look sorry, she didn't look glad- She looked like she thought, "Well, that wasn't so bad," And she felt For her belt At the back. But — well, I don't think 'twas a great deal of harm, For what should the maiden have found but an arm When she felt For her belt At the back. SERGIUS TO THE LION. GEN. LEW WALLACE. THE scene is laid in Constantinople, during the reign of the last Constantine. The Princess Irene, kinswoman to the Emperor and greatly beloved by all the people, is a firm friend of the monk Sergius, who, a short time previous to the opening of our scene, pub- licly announced "I believe in God and in Jesus Christ, His Son." For this he was called "the Heretic," and condemned to the old lion Tamerlane, in the Cynegion. Nilo, a huge African, is attached to the Princess Irene and Sergius, and has been imprisoned on account of services rendered to them. The Princess, by bribery, has con- trived to reach the gate through which Sergius is to enter the Cynegion. The gate was open-barred, and permitted a view of nearly the whole circular interior. The spectacle presented was so startling that she caught one of the bars for support. Throwing back her veil, she looked, breathing sighs which were almost gasps. The circular arena was fifty feet in diameter and thickly strewn with wet sand. There were walls twenty feet high, shutting it in like a pit, and on top of them, on the ascending seats back to the last one, were spectators, men, women, and children, compacted against the sky. Thousands and thousands! She clasped her hands and prayed. "Merciful God! 64 WERNER'S READINGS Are these beings indeed in Thy likeness?" Suddenly the crowd became impatient, and the occupants of the benches applauded long and merrily, crying, "Tamerlane! Tamerlane!" The woman shrank back terrified. At length a man entered the arena from the western gate. Going to the center, he looked carefully around him; as if content with the inspection, he went next to a cell and knocked. Two persons responded by coming out of the door; one, an armed guards- man, the other, the monk. Instantly the concourse on the benches arose. There was no shouting, but directly a word began passing from mouth to mouth. " The heretic ! The heretic ! " His guard conducted him to the center of the field and left him there. Sergius, calm, resigned, fearless, turned to the east, rested ,his hands on his breast palm to palm, closed his eyes and raised his face. They who saw him with his head upturned, the sunlight a radiant imprint on his forehead, and wanting only a nimbus to be the Christ in apparition, ceased jeering him; it seemed to them that in a moment, without effort, he had withdrawn his thoughts from this world and surrendered himself. They could see his lips move. He was saying, "I believe in God and in Jesus Christ, His Son." A trumpet rang out from the stand. A door at the left of the tunnel-gate was then slowly raised; whereupon a lion stalked out of the darkened depths, and stopped on the edge of the den. He turned his ponderous head from right to left and up and down, like a prisjoner questioning if he were indeed at liberty. Having viewed the skiy and the benches, and filled his deep chest with ample draughts of fresh air, suddenly Tamerlane noticed the monk. The head rose higher, the ears erected; and, snuffing like a hound, he fretted his shaggy mane; his yellow eyes changed to coals alive, and he growled and lashed his side with his tail. A majestic figure was he now. He stepped out into the arena, and, shrinking close to the sand, inched forward, creeping toward the object of his wonder. From the man to the lion — from the lion to the man — the multitude turned shivering. Presently the lion stopped, whined, and behaved uneasily. Was he afraid ? He began trotting around at the base of AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 65 the wall, halting before the gates and seeking an escape. From the trot he broke into a gallop, without so much as a glance at the monk. A murmur descended from the benches. It was the people recovering from their horror, and impatient. They yelled at the cowardly beast, "Shame, shame, Tamerlane! shame!" In the height of this tempest the gate of the tunnel under the grand stand opened quickly, and was as quickly shut. Death brings no deeper hush than fell upon the assemblage then. A woman was crossing the sand toward the monk! Round sped the lion, forward she went! Two victims! Well worth the monster's hunger through the three days to be so banqueted on the fourth! She was robed in white. The dress, the action, the seraphic face, were not unknown. Recognition was in- stantaneous, and through the eager, crowded ranks the whisper flew: "God o'Mercy! It is the Princess — the Princess Irene!" Strong men covered their eyes, women fainted. Innumerable arms were outstretched, and cries filled the arena with, "Save her! Let the lion be killed!" Then Nilo looked out of his cell. He saw the monk, the Princess, and the lion making its furious circuit — saw them, and retreated; but a moment after reappeared, attired in the savageries which were his delight. In the waist-belt he had a short sword, and over his left shoulder a roll like a fisherman's net. The Princess reached Sergius safely, and placed a hand on his arm. "Fly, little mother — by the way you came — fly! O God! it is too late." " No, I will not fly. Did I not bring you to this ? Let death come to us both. Better the quick work of the lion than the slow torture of conscience. I will not fly. We will die together. I, too, believe in God and in Jesus Christ, His Son." She reached up and rested her hand on his shoulder. The repe- tition of the Creed and her companionship restored his courage, and smiling, despite the tears on his cheeks, he said: "Very well, little mother. The army of the martyrs will receive us, and the clear Lord is at His mansion door to let us in." The lion now ceased galloping. Stopping over in the west quartei 66 WERNER'S READINGS of the field, he turned his big, burning eyes on the two thus resigning themselves, and, crouching, put himself in motion toward them — his mane all on end, his jaws agape, the crimson tongue lolling adrip below the lips, bent upon his prey. The near thunder of his roaring was exultant and awful. Nilo, taking position between the devoted pair and their enemy, shook the net from his shoulder with practiced hand, and proceeded to give an example of his practice with lions in the jungles. Keeping the brute steadily eye to eye, he managed so that while retaining the leaden balls tied to its disengaged corners one in each hand, the net was presently in an extended roll on the ground before him. Leaning forward then, his hands bent inwardly knuckle to knuckle at his breast, he waited the attack — to the beholders a figure in shining ebony, giantesque in proportions, Phidian in grace. Tamerlane stopped. Nilo's intent was to bide the lion's leap, and catch and entangle him in the net. Just at this crisis there was a tumuli in the grand stand. Those who turned that way saw a man in glistening armor pushing through the brethren there in most unceremonious sort. In haste to reach the front, he stepped from bench to bench. On the edge of the wall he tossed his sword and shield into the arena, and next instant leaped after them. Before astonishment was spent, before they could com- prehend the intruder, or make up their minds to so much as yell, he had fitted the shield to his arm, snatched up the sword, and run to the point of danger. There he took place behind Nilo, but in front of the Princess and the monk. His agility, his amazing spirit, together with the thought that the fair woman had yet another champion, wrought the whole multitude into ecstasy. They sprang upon the benches, and those who but a little before had cheered the lion now prayed aloud for his victims. Tamerlane surveyed the benches haughtily once, then set forward again, intent on Nilo. The move- ment, in its sinuous, flexile gliding, resembled somewhat a serpent's crawl. And now he neither roared nor growled. The lolling tongue dragged the sand ; the beating of the -tail was like pounding with a flail; the mane all erect trebly enlarged the head; and the eyes were like live coals in a burning bush. The people hushed. Nilo stood AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 67 firm; and behind him die Italian, Count Corti, kept guard. Thirty feet away — twenty-five — twenty — then the great beast stopped, col- lected himself, and with an indescribable roar launched clear of the ground. Up, at the same time and forward on divergent lines, went the leaden balls; the netting they dragged after them had the appear- ance of yellow spray blown suddenly in the air. When the monster touched the sand again he was completely enveloped. And before the spectators realized the altered condition Nilo was stabbing him with the short, glistening sword. The pride of the Cynegion lay still — then the benches found voice: "Free! free' Sergius is free I Heaven hath signified its will. Let him go free 1 " GOING ON AN ERRAND. A POUND of tea at one and three, And a pot of raspberry jam ; Two new-laid eggs, a dozen pegs, And a pound of rashers of ham. I'll say it over all the way, And then I'm sure not to forget, For if I chance to bring things wrong My mother gets in such a pet. A pound of tea at one and three, And a pot of raspberry jam; Two new-laid eggs, a dozen pegs, And a pound of rashers of ham. There in the hay the children play — They're having such j oily fun; I'll go there, too, that's what I'll do t As soon as my errands are done. 68 WERNER'S READINGS A pound of tea at one and three, A pot of — er — new-laid jam; Two raspberry eggs, with a dozen pegs, And a pound of rashers of ham. There's Teddy White flying his kite, He thinks himself grand, I declare; I'd like to try to make it fly sky-high, Ever so much higher Than the old church spire, And then — but there — ■ A pound of three and one at tea, A pot of new-laid jam ; Two dozen eggs, some raspberry pegs, And a pound of rashers of ham. Now, here's the shop; outside I'll stop And run my orders through again ; I haven't forgot — no, ne'er a jot — It shows I'm pretty 'cute, that's plain. A pound of three at one and tea, A dozen of raspberry ham; A pot of eggs, with a dozen pegs, And a rasher of new-laid jam. SHE COULDN'T HELP IT. " f\H-, I'm sure I've met you before," declared a smart young Vy man to a pretty woman whose name of course he had not caught. Ignoring the warning frown from a friend, he rushed on: "Why, of course I used to see you around a lot with Blank-Dash; now didn't I?" And he smiled triumphantly. "I can't deny it," she returned sweetly, "but I couldn't help it. I used to be married to him." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 69 HYMN BEFORE ACTION, RUDYARD KIPLING. THE earth is full of anger, The seas are dark with wrath? The Nations in their harness Go up against our path ! Ere yet we loose the legions— Ere yet we draw the blade., Jehovah of the Thunders, Lord God of Battles, aid! High lust and froward bearing, Proud heart, rebellious brow=> Deaf ear and soul uncaring, We seek Thy mercy now: The sinner that forswore Thee ? The fool that passed Thee hy 9 Our times are known before Thse~- Lord, grant us strength to dieJ For those who kneel beside us At altars not Thine own, Who lack the lights that guide us. Lord, let their faith atone; If wrong we did to call them, By honor bound they came,? Let not Thy wrath befall them. But deal to us the blame From panic, pride, and terror, Revenge that knows no rein- Light haste and lawless error, Protect us yet again. 70 WERNER'S READINGS Cloak Tbou our undeserving, Make firm the shuddering breath, In silence and unswerving To taste Thy lesser death ! Ah, Mary pierced with sorrow, Remember, reach, and save The soul that comes to-morrow Before the God that gave! Since each was born of woman, For each at utter need — True comrade and true foeman, Madonna, intercede! E'en now their vanguard gathers, E'en now we face the fray — As Thou didst help our fathers, Help Thou our host to-day ! Fulfilled of signs and wonders, In life, in death, made clear — Jehovah of the Thunders, Lord God of Battles, hear! A PUBLIC PROPOSAL. SHE entered the train at California avenue and sat down with a nervous but triumphant air. "I vas mos' got lef," she said, addressing the passengers cordially. " 'Cos I vasn't so young like I vonce vas, und de train hurry up. Vonce I vould yump on — but I got some crandchilluns now alreadty — und I vas better vait a minute en go deadt." Her blue eyes were mild and deeper roses burned in her cheek than American lassies wear. An old German right across the aisle looked at her from around the Staats Zeitung's edge, saying at intervals admiringly : AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 71 "Veil, veil, veil!" After awhile the man began to cough and the eyes of the old lady were turned toward him with deep interest and compassion in their depths. "Oh, dot vas too bat! How you got dat col' ? Oh, my! oh, my!" There were many smiles among the spectators, but the old man seemed delighted with the sympathy. He patted his chest and shook his head, to show how serious the case was, and the old lady went oyer to the vacant seat by his side, leaning forward anxiously. " Haf you got some honey ? " she asked. " Ah, dot est goot. Honey vast de bes' medicine. But you mus'n't put nodding in mit it. De Lord sen' de bees to take all kindts of extracts vat ve need from de flowers und crains. Ef he vant some visky in it, he vould tell! Den he make it all up nice und say: 'Here vas vat I make you.' Den ve eat und lif all de time, alreadty." She folded her mitted hands and spoke, quite simply; and the old man beamed and nodded impressively. By and by he said : "You got some chil'ren? Yah? Dat ist goot! You got some money? Nein? Some — husban' — nein?" The old lady shook her head and the man relapsed into meditative silence. Then he leaned forward and took her hand. "Mebbe ve get married some tay, eh?" he asked, questioningly, and, all unconscious of the smiling people about her, she gravely nodded and said : "Yah!" CUSHIONS BUT NO SEATS, C^USHIONS gay on every chair, S But never a place to sit ; Cushions, cushions everywhere, Till I nearly take a fit ; Cushions strewn upon the floor On every side I see — My wife has taken a cushion craze, And there is no room for me. 12 WERNERS READINGS GRANT— DYING. T. C. HARBAUGH. IT seemed to me that yester-night I heard the branches sighing Beneath my window, soft and low : "The great war chief is dying ! " His marches o'er, his battles won, His bright sword sheathed forever, The grand old hero stands beside The dark and silent river ; Whilst fame for him a chaplet weaves Within her fairest bowers, Of Shiloh's never-fading leaves, And Donelson's bright flowers; Grim Vicksburg gives a crimson rose. Embalmed in deathless story, And Appomattox adds a star To crown the wreath of glory. He's dying now ! — the angel Death, Insatiate and impartial, With icy fingers, stoops to touch The Union's old field-marshal, Who, like a soldier brave, awaits The summons so appalling, While o'er the land, from sea to sea, The silent tear is falling. Still in his veterans' hearts to-day His battle drums are beating; His bugles always blew advance — With him was no reti eating ; And tenderly, with moistened eyes, Columbia bends above him, And everywhere the sorrowed heart Tells how the people love him. AND RECITATIONS NO. 3 j. 73 Prom golden-lruitecl orange groves To where the pines are sighing, The winds waft messages of love To Grant, the hero, dying. The Old World sends across the waves A token of its sorrow; The greatest chief alive to-day- May fall asleep to-morrow. O touch the hero gently, Death ! — The land is filled with weeping ; And be his passing like a child's — The counterfeit of sleeping. A million boys in blue now stand Around their dying brother ; The mighty world knows but one Grant, 'Twill never know another. So let him die with honors crowned To live fore'er in story ; The fields he won, the land he saved, Will be his lasting glory. mighty Ajax of the North ! Old field-marshal immortal ! My saddened heart's with thee to-day Before the darkened portal. 1 listened to the winds last night, • How mournful was the sighing ! It seemed to me a nation's sobs O'er Grant, the soldier, dying. O touch him, touch him softly, Death- Insatiate and impartial : He is the Union's mightiest chief — My cherished old field-marshal ! 74 WERNER'S READINGS A WOMAN'S DESCRIPTION OF A PLAY. ZENAS DANE. WELL, you know," she says after the matinee, as she was riding home on the horse-car with a woman who hadn't seen the. play, but wanted to know all about it, "you see there's a lovely young lady in the play, and oh! she did wear some of the loveliest dresses." "Oh, tell me about them!" "Well, in the first act she wears a pale pink silk combined with brocaded ruby plush and — " "Oh, that must have been perfectly lovely." "It was. Well, this young lady, you know is betrothed to a hand- some and rich young squire, you know, and she — oh! I must tell you about the dress she wore in the second act." "Yes, do." "Well, it was of azure satin and garnet velvet, with — " "How lovely it must have been!" " Yes, indeed ; it had a watteau pleat in the back and an immense train of the velvet, lined with pale blue satin, and — " "Wasn't it beautiful ? " "Perfectly lovely! Well, you know, this rich young squire is a terrible wreck of a fellow. Oh! he's just perfectly awful, and she don't know a thing about it and she loves him dreadfully; so, you know, she — oh! I wish you could have seen the dress she wore in the third act." "What was it like?" " Well, it was a lemon-colored faille Francaise, worn under a rich black lace, with — " "How striking that must have been!" "It was! The train was very long and square, and the corsage was low, and she had lovely arms' and shoulders, and she wore such masses of corn-colored ribbons and flowers, and — well, there is an old gypsy in the play who is perfectly splendid, you know, and in the AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 75 fourth act this young lady is walking in the garden and I wish you could have seen the dress she wore there." "Tell me about it!" "Well, it was of white and crimson combined in the oddest and loveliest way, and she wore with it a short crimson plush cloak, lined with white, and thrown back over her shoulders so gracefully." " She must have looked lovely." "She did. Then, you know, there is an old countess in the play who wears the most magnificent black velvet and lace dress I ever saw." "I think black velvet so elegant for old ladies." " So do I. In one act she wears a very striking dress of black and white, with her hair dressed in puffs and powdered, you know. She did look so sweet." "Yes, she must have." "Well, the play goes on and it becomes real exciting in the fifth act, because, you know, this squire has already been secretly married, and his wife comes in wearing the loveliest drake-neck green ottoman silk I ever saw." * "Well, this wife gets suspicious. Some one sends her a note or something, you know. I was so taken up with her dress that I can't remember just how it was. Anyhow she raises an awful row and it's just splendid. Then this beautiful young lady gets suspicious, too, you know. This old gypsy puts a flea in her ear, and she hires a detective, you know, and the squire finds it out, and — that part of it is just splendid, too." "I should think it might be." "It was. The young lady's brother fights the squire, and at last the young lady marries an artist, and her wedding-dress is of — here's my corner; good-bye, you really must see it, good-bye; it's lovely, and — good-bye." " Good-bye, come and see — " "Yes, I will; good-bye." " Good-bye." " Good-bye." WERNER'S READINGS THE PLAIN MISS PRETTY. ETHEL SIGSBEE SMALL. THE elder Miss Pretty was a beauty. I saw her first at the horse- show. "Who is she?" I asked Algy Vannerdale. "Miss Pretty," said Algy. His soul — all he's got — was in his eyes. Somehow it irritated me. "I'd like to meet her," I said. "But if you have any claims, or are thinking of having any claims, I'll forego the introduction." "That's all right, old, man," said Algy. "I'd give my soul for claims, but then so would every man she knows, and she knows a good many." "So instead of one I am to have one hundred rivals. Ah, well, she's worth fighting for! Known her long ? ' ' "She only came yesterday. That's her mother with her." "And the girl?" "What girl? Oh, that's the plain Miss Pretty." That night Algy very gallantly made me known to the most wonder- ful being in the world. She did not talk much, so far as I remember, but looked at me so that I nearly forgot to ask'for any dances. She had none to give me. I grew desperate, and asked her if she would golf with me the next day. She turned those wonderful eyes on me. " My sister golfs ; I do not." Here I was introduced to the plain Miss Pretty, and as the situa- tion seemed to demand it, I extended my invitation to her. She accepted. I took a dance with the plain Miss Pretty. I had plenty to choose from, and we sat it out, as she said she was tired. I watched the dancers and Miss Pretty talked. I heard very little until she mentioned her sister's name. Beatrice! How it suited her. "Mine is Mary Anne — that suits me, too, don't you think?" I assured her it did. Then I hastened to make matters better — or worse, but she laughed at me. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 77 "Good-natured,*' I said to myself, "but plain — quite plain!" The plain Miss Pretty golfed very well. On the way to and from the links she talked of her sister. "Isn't she a dream?" said Miss Pretty. "Did you notice the wonderful color of her eyes ? " It is refreshing to hear one woman praise another. I looked down approvingly upon my companion, whereupon she looked up, and I received a distinct surprise. Her eyes were most attractive. We found the beautiful Miss Pretty on the hotel veranda, sur- rounded. My heart stifled me as she gave me one of her rare cold smiles. "It has been a glorious day, and I think we shall have a cool night," I stammered. The beautiful Miss Pretty agreed with me. I compared the color of her misty gown to the color shimmering in the sea below us. She said she had always liked green. By this time many of the men had remembered their breeding and were talking to the plain sister. She seemed to be amusing them. I asked the beautiful Miss Pretty if she would walk with me on the board-walk. "Thank you, I fear I must dress for dinner. Will you tell Mary to come and dress, please?" I walked back to the plain Miss Pretty. She was talking viva- ciously. "Oh, bother dressing!" she said. "I came here to have a good time." Miss Pretty — I mean the plain Miss Pretty; her sister did not care for sea-bathing — Miss Pretty in a bathing-suit was a nymph. She had quite a group about her as I joined her on the beach the next day. The plain Miss Pretty swam like a fish and floated like a feather. She raced some of us, some she splashed with water, laughing like a child. She swam far out with me, and, growing tired, rested her hand on my shoulder. She seemed to weigh nothing at all. That night there was another dance at the Seacrest. The beautiful Miss Pretty, in black, was a picture to stir the soul. I had the 78 WERNER'S READINGS good fortune to secure three dances with her. Then I sought her sister. "I'm so sorry," said the plain Miss Pretty. "I haven't one left." I felt rather bad-tempered about it. I enjoyed her naive talk about her sister. "Suppose we make an engagement to walk 'to-morrow morning?" " Oh, dear, I can't go to-morrow, I've promised — ■" "It doesn't matter." I felt that the girl had snubbed me quite enough. I had tried to be nice to her for her sister's sake, but I resolved to make no more self-sacrifices. I would have done with her. " But the next day I should like so much to go." "The next day, then, I shall remember." I left to claim a dance with her sister. The beautiful Miss Pretty did not talk while she danced, and I was left to my own reflections as we glided through the waltz. I wondered if she liked me, and whether she would be very much surprised if I made her an offer of marriage after the dance finished. I had quite made up my mind to it when the music stopped. "That was perfect!" I said softly in her ear. "Charming, I thought." Somehow her calm, cool voice gave my ardor a check. After all, a dance was no place to propose to a girl; and I had known her but three days. Then a thought came to me. I would ask her sister what she thought about it. Her sister was nowhere to be found, but I heard her light, laughing voice floating in with the breeze from the piazza. I have no opinion of a girl who frequents dark corners during the intervals of a dance. I sat alone in the ballroom through- out the intermission, very much bored. It was at the beginning of the tenth dance that I caught the plain Miss Pretty's eye, and saw her beckon me. "Mr. Williams has gone home ill," she said. "You may have this one if you like. Do you like?" Williams had been her companion oh the piazza. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 79 "I like beyond anything in the world," I said as I put my arm about her. She danced like a little fairy, and kept up a steady stream of non- sense as we waltzed. Her merry jests, her teasings, her roguishness held me during the dance and after. "Have you one more for me?" I asked her. "Mr. Williams had the fourteenth, too," she said, wrinkling her brows at her card. "You may have it, as he is ill, poor fellow!" "Oh, don't give it to me if you are going to pity him all through the dance." "Very well." "You are going to give it to me?" "I told you so, silly." I had never been called "silly" before. After the dances were over which blocked the way to mine, I carried her off to the end of the piazza. We were alone. Her sister — with Algy — passed us, tall, willowy, wonderful. "Isn't Beatrice lovely to-night?" "She is wonderful," I said seriously. "I brought you out here to talk about your sister." "Of course. They all do. Well — she is beautiful, isn't she?" " Beautiful," I murmured. There was a silence. "Go on." "Go on?" "About Beatrice." "Do you think it would be quite inexcusable to propose to a girl at a dance after knowing her just three days? I've been wondering. A dance seems hardly the place." " Oh, it isn't at all the place. Isn't that the next dance beginning ? I really must go in." I dislike to see a girl so eager for dancing. It seems to show that tendency toward the frivolous which I have observed more than once in the plain Miss Pretty. It struck me that I might offer a few brotherly suggestions. 80 WERNER'S READINGS "There are a number of things I do not approve of in you." "Why, what are they?" "One is your going off alone with a man to a dark corner of the piazza." I looked at her sternly, expecting her to flush. Instead, she rose. " You are right, I'll go in." I caught one end of the scarf she held and stopped her. "Of course, it is all right your being here with me. I meant Williams." " I see. It's all right to be here with you, but all wrong with Mr. Williams." She sat down. "The difference is — er — the difference between Williams and myself is that Williams may possibly be in love with you, and I— er — " "And you are not." She smiled at me. We were very near together. In some un- accountable way I suddenly found myself holding the plain Miss Pretty in my arms. "When will you marry me?" I asked hotly. "Please don't," said Miss Pretty disengaging herself. "A dance isn't the place to propose to a girl." "A dance is the best place on earth for it!" "And when you have known a girl only three days — " "It can't be helped. I have loved you from the first minute I saw you. That counts for something, doesn't it?" "When did you first see me?" "At the horse-show, I said then — ask Algy — I said I was going to win you, that very day!" "Are'nt you getting rather mixed? Wasn't it Beatrice?" "Beatrice! Good heavens, how can you talk of Beatrice now? That's another thing I disapprove of in you. Why should a girl always talk about her sister? When will you marry me-?" I had the plain Miss Pretty in my arms again. "There's the dance," she said, freeing herself, "and here comes Mr. Davidson." I glared at Davidson, and, strange to say, he glared at me. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 81 Pacing the piazza after Miss Pretty had left me, I ran into Algy. "Mind where you're going," he said savagely. "By George, I wish I'd never let you into this contest!" " That's all right, old man. I retire of my cwn free will. There she is now, sitting alone in the moonlight. The field is yours. Go in and win ! " We looked where a Titian head rose from an ivory neck. " Who are you talking about ? That isn't the one. It's her sister — the plain Miss Pretty!" "You're crazy, man; it's Beatrice you're in love with." "Don't I know whom I'm in love with?" Algy almost shrieked in his fury. I had no patience with him. The fellow's fickleness was disgusting I turned and left him. After the dancing was finished, I captured the plain Miss Pretty and bore her off to our corner of the piazza. "Now, when will you marry me?" "I can't marry you all." " All ? Who else wants you to marry him ? " "Who doesn't?" "You needn't marry any one but me." Miss Pretty came nearer. She put a timid hand on my arm. "Couldn't you marry Beatrice?" she asked pleadingly. "No, I couldn't." Her face fell. "That is what they all always say — always! It is just the same every summer." Then she sighed. "I'm rather tired." I took her in my arms. She was so little and soft and sweet, ho'>v could I help it ? "Won't you marry me?" I pleaded, but she shook her head. "I'll see about it," she said, drawing away. That was years ago, I am still making it the business of my life to win the plain Miss Pretty, who is now Mrs Arrowborn, the widow of a Chicago millionaire. Unfortunately, some hundred others are making it their life-work, too. The beautiful Miss Pretty is still beautiful. She is also still Miss Pretty, 82 WERNER'S READINGS THE WEEDS OF THE ARMY. CAPT. JACK CRAWFORD. SOME of the papers tell us that the boys of the G. A. R. Never smelt powder in battle, nor went to the front in the war; They brazenly tell us our roster bears only the names of those Who paused at the roar of conflict and northward pointed their toes ; They say that the true, brave soldiers have never entered our ranks, That we never were known to muster but a lot of political cranks. As one of the papers put it, we are but the weeds of the crop, — - But loafers and shirkers and cowards, who never heard muskets pop. Pray who are these traitorous writers, who are casting their venomous slime O'er the men who gave all to their country, at that trying and terrible time ? They are the poor cringing cowards who never dared go to the front And stand with our brave, fearless soldiers, and help bear the battle's brunt. They clung to the skirts of the women and as soon as our backs we had turned, Our flag and our cause and our country the cowardly miscreants spurned. Let us pause on a shaded corner, and see a procession pass At a great Grand Army reunion, when the veterans form in mass. Just note the dismembered bodies, the crutches and canes and the scars, That mutely tell the sad story of the bloodiest of wars. See the tattered flags they are bearing, all riddled with shot and with shell. The flags they carried undaunted right into the gateway of hell. See the bodies bent and disabled, made so in the battle's fierce blast- Are these the weeds of the army at whom these insults are cast? AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 83 Brave Garfield, our honored martyr, wore the badge of the boys in blue. And Hancock, the mighty soldier, was a comrade, tried and true ; And Logan, our own loved Logan, undaunted in peace or in war, Was proud to be called a member in the ranks of the G. A. R. And Grant, that intrepid chieftain, who was honored in every land, Stood up in the ranks of veterans, a comrade noble and grand. Go search o'er the whole broad country for the heroes who fought in the war, And you'll find on each notable bosom the eagle and flag and star; 'Tis worn as a badge of honor, o'er hearts that were loyal and true, And is borne by the greatest soldiers, who ever the bright sword drew. Just glance o'er the mighty roster, and pause at each honored name And reflect for a passing moment o'er each hero's deathless fame; Then answer me this one question, if you find it is in your power, If those are the weeds of the army, please tell me where is the flower ? GOLIATH. THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. EDWIN WATSON, an old college acquaintance of mine with whom by chance I had recently become quite friendly, was in the banking business: he had been married one or two years, and was living out of town in what he called "a little box," on the slope of Blue Hill. He had once or twice invited me to run out to- dine and spend the night with him, but some engagement or other disability had interfered. One evening, however, I accepted his invitation for a certain Tuesday. Watson, who was having a vacation at the time, was not to accompany me from town, but was to meet me with his pony-cart at Green Lodge, two or three miles from "The Briers," the name of his place. "I shall be proud to show you my wife," he said, "and the baby — and Goliath." "Goliath?" 84 WERNER'S READINGS "That's the dog," answered Watson with a laugh. If Watson had mentioned the dog earlier in the conversation, I might have shied at his hospitality. I may as well confess that I do not like dogs, and am afraid of them. They sally forth from pictur- esque verandas and unexpected hidings, to show their teeth as I go by. In a spot where there is no dog, one will germinate, if he happens, to find out that I am to pass that way. Sometimes they follow me for miles. Strange dogs that wag their tails at other persons growl at me from over fences, and across vacant lots, and at street corners. " So you keep a dog?" I remarked carelessly. "Yes," returned Watson. "What is a country-place without a dog?" I said to myself, "I know what a country-place is with a dog; it's a place I should prefer to avoid." But as I had accepted the invitation, and as Watson was to pick meup at Green Lodge station, and, presumably, see me safe into the house, I said no more. The Tuesday on which I was to pass the night with Watson was a day simply packed with evil omens. I was in no frame of mind for rural pleasures when I finally seated myself in the six-o'clock train with my gripsack beside me. The run from town to Green Lodge is about twenty-five minutes, and the last stoppage before reaching that station is Readville. We were possibly half-way between these two points when the train slackened and came to a dead halt amid some ragged woodland. Presently a brakeman, with a small red flag in his hand, stationed himself some two hundred yards in the rear of the train, in order to prevent the evening express from telescoping us. An overturned gravel-car lay across the track a quarter of a mile beyond. It was fully an hour before the obstruction was removed. I smiled bitterly thinking of Watson and his dinner. The station at Green Lodge consists of a low platform on which is a shed covered on three sides with unpainted deal boards hacked nearly to pieces by tramps. I looked around for Watson and the pony-cart. What had occurred was obvious. He had waited an hour for me, and then driven home with the conviction that the train must AND RECITATIONS NO, 37. 85 have passed before he got there, and that I, for some reason, had failed to come on it. A walk of three miles was not an inspiriting prospect, and would not have been even if I had had some slight idea of where " The Briers" was, or where I was myself. Just then my ear caught the sound of a cart-wheel grating on an unoiled axle. It was a withered farmer in a rickety open wagon slowly approaching the railway-track, and going toward the hills — my own intended destination. I stopped the man and explained my dilemma. He was willing to give me a lift to the end of the Green Lodge road. There I could take the old turnpike. I climbed up beside him with alacrity. It was a balmy evening, the air was charged with sweet wood scents, and, after the frets of the day, it was soothing to be drawn at a snail's pace through the fragrance and stillness of that fern-fringed road ; suddenly I thought of Goliath. At that moment Goliath was probably prowling about Watson's front yard seeking whom he might devour; and I was that predestined nourishment. I knew what sort of a dog Watson was likely to keep. There was a tough streak in Watson himself a kind of thoroughbred obstinacy. An animal with a tenacious grip, and on the verge of hydrophobia, was what would naturally commend itself to his liking. He had specified Goliath, but maybe he had half a dozen other dragons to guard his hillside Hesperides. I wished myself safely back among the crowded streets and electric lights of the city. When we reached the junction of the Green Lodge road and the turnpike, I felt that I was parting from the only friend I had in the world. I hinted that it would be much to his pecuniary advantage if he were willing to go so far out of his course as the doorstep of Mr. Watson's; but he made no answer and rattled off into space. Fifteen or twenty minutes later I stood in front of what I knew at a glance to be "The Briers," for Watson had described it to me. I cautiously approached the paling, and looked over into the facade of Watson's villa, and then I contemplated the somber and unexplored tract of land which I must needs traverse in order to reach the door- step. How still it was! The very stillness had a sort of menace in 86 WERNER'S READINGS it. There certainly was an air of latent dog about the place, though as yet no dog had developed. However, unless I desired to rouse the inmates from their beds, I saw that I ought to announce myself without much further delay. I softly opened the gate, which, having a heavy ball-and-chain attachment outside, immediately slipped from my hand and slammed to with a bang as I stepped within. I was not surprised, but I was paralyzed, all the same, at instantly hearing the familiar sound of* a watch-dog suddenly rushing from his kennel. The next sound I heard was the scramble of the animal's forepaws as he landed on the graveled pathway. There he hesitated irresolute, as if he were making up his diabolical mind which path he would take. He neither growled nor barked in the interim, being evidently one of those wide-mouthed, reticent brutes that mean business and indulge in no vain flourish. I held my breath and waited. Presently I heard him stealthily approaching me on the left. I at once hastened up the right-hand path, having tossed my gripsack in his direction with the hope that while he was tearing it to pieces, I might possibly be able to reach the piazza, and ring the bell. My ruse failed, how- ever, the dog continued his systematic approach and I was obliged to hurry past the piazza steps. A few seconds brought me back to the point of my departure. I had forgotten which way the gate swung; besides, as I had no stop- over ticket, it was necessary that I should continue on my circular journey. So far as I could judge, the dog was now about three yards in my rear; I was unable to see him, but I could plainly detect his quick respiration, and his deliberate footfalls on the gravel. I wondered why he did not spring upon me at once; but he knew he had his prey, he knew I was afraid of him, and he was playing with me as a cat plays with a mouse. By this time my brisk trot had turned into a run, and I was spin- ning around the circle at the rate of ten miles an hour, with the dog at my heels. Now I shot by the piazza, and now past the gate, until presently I ceased to know which was the gate and which the piazza. I believe that I shouted ' : Watson!" once or twice, no doubt at the wrong place, but I do not remember. At all events, I failed to make AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 87 myself heard. My brain was in such confusion that at intervals I could not for the soul of me tell whether I was chasing the dog or the dog was chasing me. Now I almost felt his nose at my heel, and now I seemed upon the point of trampling him underfoot. In spite of my terror, an ironical smile crept to my lips as I re- flected that I might, perhaps, keep this thing up until sunrise, unless a midnight meal was one of the dog's regular habits. A prolonged angry snarl, now and then, admonished me that his patience was about exhausted. I had accomplished the circuit of the yard, for the twentieth time, when the front door of the villa was opened with a jerk, and Watson, closely followed by the pretty housemaid, stepped out upon the piazza. "Good Heavens! Willis, is this you? where did you tumble from? How did you get here?" "Six-o'clock train — Green Lodge — white horse — old man — I — " Suddenly the pretty housemaid descended the steps and picked up from the graveled path a little panting, tremulous wad of something, — not more than two handfuls at most, — which she folded tenderly to her bosom. "What's that?" I asked. "That's Goliath," said Watson. CRISS-CROSS. IF you stick a stick across a stick Or stick a cross across a stick Or cross a stick across a stick Or stick a cross across a cross Or cross a cross across a stick Or cross a cross across a cross Or stick a cross stick across a stick Or stick a crossed stick across a crossed stick Or cross a crossed stick across a cross Or cross a crossed stick across a stick Or cross a crossed stick across a crossed stick, Would that he an acrostic ? 88 WERNER'S READINGS A TALE OF TWO CHAIRS. I. ELIJAH on his Lizzie calls When chores are done and ev'ning falls. Elijah's bashful, Lizzie's shy, But then her parents sit close by. "Good night, Elijah; Liz, good night," And pa and ma trudge off to bed and leave to bliss Their daughter and her beau with chairs like this: | [First finger [First finger oj left hand.] of right hand. II. Elijah " 'lows this weath'r'll do For hayin'; " Liz thinks so, too. "Went coonin' 'long with John last night." " Get any coons ?" " No, moon warn't bright." And so they court. Naught goes amiss, Till Lije and Liz have chairs like this: III. With Sparta will to do or die, Elijah seems to grow less shy, And chairs become bewitched, I wis: They hitch and hitch, until they look like this: IV. "Liz, do you love me?" "O Lije! I do." They kiss, Then round gets caught in round, and chairs resemble this: X AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 89 In Stanza I., last line, raise arms at side, elbows bent and hold ringers parallel with body. In Stanza II., first line, move finger of left hand slowly toward finger of right hand. In second line of Stanza II., move finger of right hand near left. Continue this during conversation. In Stanza III., fourth line, jerk fingers toward each other. In Stanza IV., on "Liz, do you love me," bend finger of left hand over finger of right hand On "O Lije! I do " bend right hand over left hand, finally holding fingers crossed. CAPRICE AT HOME. NO, I will not say good-by — ■ Not good-by, nor anything. He is gone ... I wonder why Lilacs are not sweet this spring ? — How that tiresome bird will sing' I might follow him and say Just that he forgot to kiss Baby, when he went away. Everything I want I miss. Oh, a precious world is this! What if night came and not he ? Something might mislead his feet. Does the moon rise late? Ah, me! There are things that he might meet. Now the rain begins to beat : So it will be dark. The bell ? Someone someone loves is dead. Were it he — I cannot tell Half the fretful words I said. Half the fretful tears I shed. 90 WERNER'S READINGS \ Dead ? And but to think of death; Men might bring him through the gate : Lips that have not any breath, Eyes that stare — and I must wait! Is it time or is it late ? I was wrong, and wrong, and wrong , I will tell him, oh, be sure! If the heavens are builded strong, Love shall therein be secure ; Love like mine shall there endure. Listen, listen — that is he! I'll not speak to him, I say. If he choose to say to me, "I was all to blame to-day; Sweet, forgive me," why — I may! THE WIDDER JOHNSING. RUTH McENERY STUART cc »rp AIN' n0 use t er trv t er hol'er. (She^ des gwine f'om fits ter i- convulsions, an' f'om convulsions back inter fits!" Jake Johnson was dead, and Lize Ann Johnson again a widow. The churchfolk were watching her with keen interest; and, indeed, so were the worldlings, for this was Lize i\nn's third widowhood within the space of five years. As girl first, and twice as widow, she had been rather a notorious figure in colored circles. Three times she had voluntarily married into quiet life, but during the intervals she had played promiscuous havoc with the felicity of her neighbors. During both her previous widowhoods she had danced longer, laughed louder, dressed more effectively than all the women on the three plantations put together, and when she had passed down the road on Sunday evenings, and had chosen to peep over her shoulders AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 31 with dreamy half-closed eyes at some special man whom it pleased her mood to ensnare, he had not more been able to help following her than he had been able to help lying to his wife or sweetheart about it afterward. But for the first few months of her recovered widowhood Lize Ann was conspicuous by her absence from congregations of all sorts. When for five long months the widow had maintained her position as a heart-broken recluse, the people began to regard her with a degree of genuine respect; and when one Sunday morning the gathering congregation discovered her sitting in the church, a solitary figure in black, on the very last of the Amen pews in the corner, they were moved to sympathy. As she was first at service to-day, she was last to depart, and not a sister in church had the temerity to join her as she walked home. From this time forward the little mourning figure was at every meeting, and when the minister asked such as desired salvation to remain to be prayed for, she kneeled and stayed. But the truth was, the Rev. Mr. Langford, a tall, handsome bachelor of thirty-three or thereabouts, was regarded as the best catch in the parish. When he conducted the meetings there were always so many boisterous births into the kingdom that he had not the time to seek out the silent mourners, and so had not yet found himself face to face with the widow. Finally, however, one Sunday night just as he passed her, Lize Ann heaved one of her very best moans. He was on his knees at her side in a moment. "Ain't you foun' peace yit, Sis' Johnsing?" The widow only groaned. "Can't you speak to yo' preacher, Sis' Johnsing? He crave in 'is heart ter he'p you." "I can't talk heah, Brer Langford; my heart's clean broke. I goes back ter my little dark cabin mo' sinfuler'n I was befo'. Des de we'y glimpse of dat empty cabin seems lak hit turn my heart ter stone." "Don't talk dat-a-way, don't talk dat-a-way. I'll call an' see you and talk an' pray wid yon in yo' cabin whensomever you say de word. When shill I come ter you ? " W WERNERS READINGS "*' De mos' lonesome's time, Brer Langford, an' de time what harden my heart de mos', is in de dark bewilderin' night-times when I fust goes home. But, co'se, I don't expec' no yo'ng man lak you ter tek de trouble ter turn out'n yo' path fur sech as me." "I will do hit, Sis Johnsing, an' it will be an act o' pleasurable Christianity." Lize Ann had nearly reached her cabin when the reverend brother stepping forward, gallantly placed his hand beneath her elbow, and aided her to mount the one low step which led to her door. As they entered the room she threw a split pine upon the coals and as the young man locked about the apartment he could scarcely believe his eyes. The hearth, newly reddened, fairly glowed with warm color, and the gleaming white pine floor seemed fresh from the carpenter's plane. Dainty white muslin curtains hung before the little square windows, and from the shelves a dazzling row of tins reflected the blazing fire. The widow leaned forward, stirring the fire; and when his eyes fell upon her his astonishment confirmed his speechlessness. She had removed her black bonnet, and the heavy shawl, which had en- veloped her figure, had fallen behind her into her chair. What he saw was a round, trim, neatly clad, youngish woman, whose face, illumined by the flickering fire, was positively charming in its piquant assertion of grief. Smiling through her sadness, she exclaimed, as she turned to her guest: "Lor' bless my soul, ef I ain't raked out a sweet 'tater out'n deze coals! I's feerd you'll be clair disgusted at sech onmannerly doin's, Brer Langford ; I don't reck'n you'd even ter say look at a roas' 'tater, would you, Brer Langford?" The person addressed was rubbing his hands together and chuckling. "Ef yer tecks my jedgmint, Sis' Johnsing, on de pertater question, roas'n' is de onies' way to cook 'em." "Ef you will set down an' eat a roas' 'tater in my miser'ble little cabin, Brer Langford, I 'clare fo' gracious hit'll raise my sperits mightily. Gord knows I wishes I had some'h'n good to offer you, a-comin' in out'n de col'; but ef you'll please, sir, have de mannerliness ter hoi' AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 93 de candle, I'll empty my oP cupboard clean inside out'n but I'll find you some'h'n nother to spressify your welcome." Langford rose, and as he held the light to the open safe, his eyes fairly glowed. He was hungry, and the snowy shelves were covered with open vessels of tempting food. "I 'clare Sis' Johnsing, — I 'clarel" were the only words that the man of eloquent speech found. " Dis heah cupboard mecks me shame, Brer Langford. Dey ain't a thing fer any sech as you in it. Won't you please, sir, teck de candle an' fetch a bottle of milk dats a-settin' outside de right-hand winder in my room?" He had returned with the bottle, when the disconsolate widow actually burst into a peal of laughter. "Lor' save my soul! ef he ain't gone an' fetched a bottle o' beer! You is a caution, Brer Langford! Does yer think fur a perfesser ter teck a little beer er wine when dey feels a faintness is a fatal sin, Brer Langford?" "Why, no, Sis' Johnsing! Succumstances alter cases, an' hits de succumstances 0' drinkin' what mecks de altercations; an' de way I looks at it, a Christian man is de onies' pusson who oughter dare ter trus' 'isse'f wid de wine-cup, 'caze a sinner don't know when ter stop." "Dat sound mighty reason'ble, Brer Langford. An' sence you fetched de beer, now you 'bleege ter drink it. But please, sir, go lak a good man an' bring my milk, on 'tother side in de winder." The milk was brought and the Rev. Mr. Langford was soon smacking his lips over the best supper it had been his ministerial good fortune to enjoy for many a day. As the widow raked a second potato from the fire, she remarked in a tone of inimitable pathos: " Seem lak I can't git usen ter cookin' fur one. Seein' as you relish de beer, Brer Langford, I's proud you made de mistake an' fetched it. Gord knows somebody better drink it! I got a whole passel o' bottles in my trunk." It was an hour past midnight when finally the widow let her guest out the back door. As she held his hand in parting, she said : 94 WERNER'S READINGS " Gord will bless you fur dis night, Brer Langford, fur you is truly sacerficed you'se'f fur a po' sinner." Langford returned the pressure of her hand and even shook it heartily during his parting speech: "Good-night, my dear sister, an' Gord bless you!" With this beautiful admonition the Rev. Mr. Langford disappeared in the darkness. He never felt better in his life. The widow watched his retreating figure until she saw one dark leg rise over the rail as he scaled the garden-fence; then coming in, she hooked the door, and throwing herself on the floor, rolled over and over, laughing until she cried, verily. "Stan' back, gals, stan' back!" she exclaimed, rising, "Stan' back, I say! A widder don' headed you off wid a cook-pot! I 'clare fo' gracious, I is a devil! Po' Alick — an' po' Steve — an' po' Jake! But Brer Langford gwine be de stylishes' one o' de lot. I mus' go buy some mo' beer. Better git two bottles. He mought ax fo' mo' bein' as I got a trunkful. Well, Langford, honey, good-night fur to-night! But prepare yo'ng man, prepare!" During the next two months the Rev. Langford never failed to stop, after evening meeting, to look after the spiritual condition of the "Widder Johnsing," while she saw to it that without apparent forethought her little cupboard should always supply a material enter- tainment, full, savory, and varied. Langford had heard things about this woman in days gone by but now he was pleased to realize that they had all been malicious inventions prompted by jealousy. The dozen bottles of beer had been followed by a second and these again by a half dozen. At last there were but two bottles left. It was Sunday night again. The widow had not gone to church; and, as it was near the hour for dismissal, she was a trifle nervous. Finally she detected the minister's familiar step. "Lif up de latch an' walk in, Brer Wolf. Heah, teck de shovel, an' rake out a handful o' coals please sir, an' I'll set dis pan o' rolls ter bake. Dat's hit. Now kiver de lid wid live coals an' ashes. Dat's AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 95 a man! Now time you rastle wid de jints o' dis roas' guinea-hen, an' teck de cork-screw an' perscribe fur dis beer bottle, de rolls'U be a-singin'. Now is de accepted time." It was no wonder the young man thought her charming. But all things earthly have an end, and so by-and-by it was all over. "Well, Sis' Johnsing, hit's a-gettin' on time fur me to be movin'." " Yas, I knows it is, Brer Langford, an' dat ain't de wust of it." "How do you mean, Sis' Johnsing?" "Brer Langford, I — I — been thinkin' 'bout you all day an'— an' — ter come right down ter de p'int, I — I — I feerd I done put off what I oughter said ter you till look lak hit'll mos' brek my heart ter say it. You — you — you mus'n't come heah no mo', Brer Langford." >'Who — me? Wh — wh — what is I done, Sis' Johnsing?" V "You ain't done nothin', my dear frien'. But — don' you see for yo'se'f how de succumstances stan' ? You is a yo'ng man, li'ble to fall in love wid any lakly young gal any day, an' ter git married, an', of co'se, dat's right; but don't you see dat ef a po' lonesome 'ooman lak me put too trfuch 'pendence orn a yo'ng man lak you is, de time gwine come when he gwine git tired a-walkin' all de way f'om chu'ch des fer charity ter comfort a lonely sinner lak I is; an' — an' I made up my mind dat I gwine scuse you f'om dis task while I kin stan' it." "You— you — you — you talkin' 'bout you kin stan' it, Sis' John- sing, an' — an' seem lak you's forgittin' all 'bout me. I — I knows I ain't nothin' but a no-count yo'ng striplin', an' you is a mannerly lady o' speunce, but hit do seem lak fo' you'd sen' me away, des lak ter say a yaller dorg, you'd ax me could / stan' hit; an' — an' tell de truf, I can't stan' it, an' I ain't gwine stan' it." " Brer Langford — " "Don't you say Brer Langford to me no mo', ef you please, ma'am; an' — an' I ain't gwine call you Sis' Johnsing no mo' nother. You is jest so far as you consents, hencefo'th an' fo'ever mo', in season an' out'n season — des my Lize Ann. I don' tooken you fo' my sweetness 'fo' ter-night, Lize Ann, my honey." Before he left her the widow had consented that he should come to her on the following Sunday with the marriage license in his pocket. Lize Ann arrived late at service on the following Sunday evening. 96 WERNER'S READINGS Her name had just been announced as a happy convert; and, when she stepped demurely up the aisle, the congregation was eager to welcome her into the fold. When, however, it was announced that this identical convert, Mrs. Eliza Ann Johnsing, was then and there to be joined in the holy state of matrimony to the Reverend Julius Ca?sar Langfcrd, these same blessed damosels actually did turn their backs and refused to speak to her. Though no guests were bidden to share it, the wedding-supper in the little cabin that night was no mean affair; and when Langford, with a chuckling, half -embarrassed, new-proprietary air, drew the cork from the beer bottle beside his plate, Lize Ann said : "Hit do me good ter see how you relishes dat beer." But she did not mention that it was the last bottle. A FALLEN STAR. ALBERT CHEVALIER. THIRTY years ago I was a fav'rite at the "Vic." A finished actor, not a cuff and collar shooting stick. I roused the house to laughter, or called forth the silent tear, And made enthusiastic gods vociferously cheer. Those were the days, the palmy days of Histrionic Art; Without a moment's notice I'd go on for any part. I do not wish to gas, I merely state in self-defence, The denizens of New Cut thought my Hamlet was immense. Thirty years ago! I can hear them shout " Bravo!" When after fighting armies I could never show a scar. That time, alas ! is gone, and the light that erstwhile shone Was the light of a falling star. From patrons of the circle, too, I had my meed of praise. The ladies all admired me in those happy, halcyon days. My charm of manner, easy grace, and courtly old-world air, Heroic bursts of eloquence, or villain's dark despair. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. V I thrilled my audience, thrilled 'em as they never had been thrilh" And filled the theater nightly as it never had been filled ! Right through the mighty gamut of emotions I could range, From classic Julius Ca:sar to the "Idiot of the Grange." Thirty years ago! I was someone in the show, And now I pass unrecognized in crowded street or bar. The firmanent of fame holds no record of my name, The name of a fallen star! The dramas that I played in were not all upon the stage, Nor did I in an hour become the petted of the age. Oft in my youthful days I've sung "Hot Codlins" as the clown, And turned my face away to hide the tear-drops rolling down. And when the pit and gallery saw I'd wiped the paint away ; They shouted: "Go it, Joey!" " Ain't 'e funny ? Hip hoo: : My triumphs and my failures, my rise, and then my fa! 1 They've rung the bell, the curtain's down, I'm waiting ic '■ , •- • Bills — not those I owe — but old play -bills of the show, My name as Hamlet, Lear, Virginius, Shy lock, Ingomar! The laurel on my brow — a favorite — and now Forgotten! A fallen star. THE LID OF THE GRAVE. EMERSON HOUGH. IN a little room of a poor hotel situated on a back street of the city of New Orleans a man bent over an old trunk which had that day been unearthed from a long-time hiding-place. It was like open- ing a grave now to raise its cover. The man almost shuddered as he bent over and looked in, curious as though these things had never before met his gaze. There was a dull odor of dead flowers long boxed up. A faint rustling as of intangible things became half audible, as though spirits passed out at this contact with the outer air. "Twelve years ago — and this is the sort of luggage I carried then. "What taste! What a foolish boy! Heavens! it's strange. There 98 WERNER'S READINGS ought to be a picture or so near the top." He touched the tray, and the dead flowers and dry papers rustled again until he started back. His face, tired, dissipated, deeply lined, went all the paler, but presently he delved in again. "Pictures of myself, eh? the first thing. I was always first thing to myself. Nice, clean boy, wasn't I? Wouldn't have known it was myself. Might have been a parson, almost. Here's another. Militia uniform, all that. Might have been a major, almost. Uh-hum! High-school diploma here — very important. Eighteen — great Heaven, was it so long ago as that? University diploma — Latin. Can't read it now. Might have been a professor, mightn't I? Diploma of law school; also Latin. Certificate of admission to the bar of -. Might have been a lawyer. Might have been a judge, mightn't I? Might have a home now; white, green blinds, brick walk up to the door, paling fence — that kind of thing. Might have had a home — wife and babies — eh! Baby? Children? What? Well, I couldn't call this much of a home, could I, now?" He unfolded some old newspapers and periodicals of a departed period, bearing proof of certain of his own handicraft. "Might have been a writer — poet— that sort of thing! Not so bad. Not so bad. I couldn't do as well to-day, I'm afraid. Seem to have lost it — let go somewhere. I never could depend on myself — never could depend- — ah, what's this? Yes, here are the ladies, God bless them — la — ladies — God bless 'em!" The lower tray was filled with pictures of girls or women of all types, some of them beautiful, some of them coarse, most of them attractive from a certain point of view. " What a lot ! How did I do it ? By asking, I reckon. Six of one — six of another. Women and men alike, eh? Well, I don't know. Ask 'em, you win. Or, don't ask 'em, you win." His hand fell upon the frame of a little mirror laid away in the old trunk. He picked it up and gazed steadily at what it revealed. "Changed, changed a lot. Must have gone a pace, eh? Lawyer. Judge. Writer-man. Poet. I thought these beat all of that," — and he looked down again at the smiling faces. He picked them up one at a time and laid them on the bed beside him. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 99 "Alice, Nora, Clara, Kate, Margaret — I'll guess at the names, and guess at some of the faces now. It's the same, all alike, the hunt- ing of love — the hunting — the hunt — ing — of — love! Great thing. But, of course, we never do find it, do we? Ladies, good night." He bowed ironically ; yet his face was more uneasy now than wholly mocking. He looked once more at the trunk-tray, and found what he apparently half-feared to see. "Madam!" he whispered.- "Alice!" He gazed at a face strong and full, with deep curved lips and wide jaw, and large dark eyes, deeply browed and striking, the face of a woman to beckon to a man, to make him forget, for a time — and that was Alice Ellison, as he had known her years ago, before — he turned away. He tried to laugh, to mock. " Bless you, ladies, I've often said I would like to see you all together in the same room. Eh — but the finding of it — oh, we never do find it, do we? Not love. I never could depend on myself. "What's this? Why, here's my old pistol. Twelve years old. I thought I'd lost it. Loaded! My faith, loaded for twelve years. Wonder if it would go off." He sat on the edge of the bed looking into the trunk, the revolver in his hand. Slowly, slowly, as though against his will, his face turned, and he found himself looking down at the pictured smiling faces that stared up at him. The last picture seemed to frighten him with its smile. "Alice!" he whispered. Then all the pictures smiled. "My God!" cried Henry Decherd. "They're alive! They're coming to life!" They stood about him now in the little room, smiling, beckoning — Alice, Nora, Kate, Jane, Margaret, all the rest, as he addressed them. They smiled and beckoned; but he could not reply, whether to those honest or not honest, to those deceived or undeceived. The face of Alice Ellison, strong-jawed, dark-browed, large-eyed, stared at him steadily from behind a certain chair. He could see that her hair was wet. It hung down on her neck, on her shoulders. It clung to her temples. Her eyes gazed at him stonily now. He saw it all again — the struggle! He heard his own accusations and hers. He heard her pleading, her cry for mercy; and then her cry of terror. He saw her face, staring up at him from the water. As he gazed, the 100 WERNER'S READINGS other faces faded away into the darkness. He stocd, staring, with the pistol in his hand, Henry Decherd 5 murderer of the woman whom he once had loved. * * * * * # * * The porter of the hotel said on the next day that he remembered hearing late in the night a sort of crash, which sounded like the dropping of a trunk lid. He did not know what it was. The lid of the grave had fallen on Henry Decherd ! HOW A WOMAN BUYS MEAT. ¥ MARY TUCKER MAGILL. QCENE— A butcher's stall with a butcher behind it. Enter a O youngish woman with a doubtful, bewildered air. Butcher [rubbing his hands]: "What will you have, madam, this morning?" "I'll take some mut " (stops suddenly as her eye catches sight of a ham). "Is that nice ham?" "Best ham I ever saw, ma'am — country cured. How much will you take ? Cut you any quantity." " "Is it hog ham?" <^ " Certainly, ma'am ; certainly." "Has it got any of those little bugs in it that kill people?" (."Oh, no, ma'am; it's perfectly healthy. I'll warrant it." "Well, you may give me three p 1 don't know, either. My husband was saying he'd like some sausage. Have you any real nice sausage?" " Plenty, madam. Now, then, how much sausage will you have ? " "Is it pork sausage?" "What else could it be, my dear madam?" "Well, I don't know; but I have heard that they make it of cats and dogs, and even rats, sometimes." (Butcher regards her with silent indignation.) "Well, how much do you sell for a family of four persons?" AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 101 "Indeed, madam, it would depend upon your appetites." "Well, I suppose a pound would be enough." f""Shall I weigh you a pound, madam?" " Wait a moment. I was just wondering if a veal pot-pie wouldn't suit him better. You have veal ? " /^Certainly, madam; the very best of veal. Here is as good a piece as I ever saw." "That looks very nice. Is it made of the young lamb?" {" Oh, no, madam ; veal is calf meat." /"Oh, yes; I forgot." CWillyou take it?" £ Let's see! [muses] Y no. I guess I had better take pork^hops." {" Nice chops. How much?" ~""One of those slices will weigh a pound, I suppose?" (^NhovX a pound, madam." "And you are sure it was a young pork?" C A very young hog." uid you'll cut the rind off?" 5; madam." ( -* r Well 1 don't know about it. I don't like to take the responsibility of hog meat. I think I will take beefsteak." £_'_yery nice steak." "Will you cut the meat part, and be sure to cut out the bone?" <^Yes, madam, as it's for you." "What's the price of it?" {^'Fourteen cents a pound." "Oh, dear, that's too much!" - Butcher [in despair]: "Well, madam, here's some good sound liver, five cents a pound, if you'll take it.' "Oh, that's very nice. My husband is very fond of liver. I'll take half a pound!" ""And - she did take half a pound, and walked off triumphantly, leaving the butcher about as savage as his own meat-axe. 102 WERNER'S READINGS THE OLD FLAG. FRANK L. STANTON. SHE'S up there — Old Glory — where lightnings are sped She dazzles the nations with ripples of red ; And she'll wave for us living, or droop o'er us dead — The flag of our country forever : She's up there — Old Glory — how bright the stars stream! And the stripes like red signals of liberty gleam! And we dare for her, living, or dream the last dream 'Neath the flag of our country forever! She's up there — Old Glory — no tyrant-dealt scars — No blur on her brightness — no stain on her stars ! The brave blood of heroes have crimsoned her bars- She's the flag of our country forever! ANNOUNCING THE ENGAGEMENT. JOHN HABERTON. MR. HARRY BURTON was spending his vacation at the house of his sister, Mrs. Laurence, and taking charge of the house and two small nephews, while Mr. and Mrs. Laurence were visiting a friend. Mrs. Mayton and her daughter were boarding in the neighborhood, and Mr. Burton and Miss Alice Mayton were soon on quite intimate terms. Mrs. Mayton was sitting in her own room, leisurely reading, when she accidently dropped her glasses. Stooping to pick them up, she became aware that she was not alone. A small, very dirty, but good featured boy stood before her, his hands behind his back, and an inquiring look in his eyes, " Run away, little boy, don't you know it isn't polite to enter rooms without knocking ?'* AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 103 "I'm lookin' for my uncle," said Toddie in a most melodious accent, "and I thought you would know when he would come back." "I don't know anything about little boys' uncles. Now run away, and don't disturb me any more." "Well, your little girl went with him, and I thought you would know when she would come back." "I haven't any little girl. Now, go away." " She isn't a very little girl, that is, she's bigger'n I am, but you're her mother, an' so she's you're little girl, isn't she?" "Do you mean Miss Mayton?" "Oh, yes that's her name 1 couldn't think of it, an' ain't she awful nice? 1 know she is!" "Your judgment is quite correct, considering your age, but what makes you think she is nice ? You are rather younger than her male admirers usually are." "Why, my Uncle Harry told me so, an' he knows everything. Mrs. Mayton grew vigilant at once. "Who is your uncle Harry, little boy?" "He's Uncle Harry; don't you know him? He can make nicer whistles than my papa can." " Who is your papa ? " "Why, he's papa — I thought everybody knew who he was." "WTiat is your name?" "John Burton Laurence." " Is Mr. Burton the uncle you are looking for ? " "I don't know any Mr. Burton, uncle is mamma's brother, an' he's been livin' at our house ever since mamma an' papa went off visitin', an' he goes ridin' in our carriage, an' an' he rides with just the loveliest lady that ever was. He thinks so, an' I know she is. An' he 'spects her." I What?" " 'Spects her, I say — that's what he says. I say 'spects means just what / call love. Cos' if it don't, what makes him give her hugs and kisses?" Mrs. Mayton caught her breath. "Gives h« v, *a and kisses?" 104 WERNER'S READINGS "Um, I saw him the day I hurt my finger in the grass-cutter, an' he was so happy he bought me a goat-carriage next mornin'. I'll show it to you if you come down to our stable, and I'll show you the goat, too." But here he stopped, for Mrs. Mayton put her handkerchief to her eyes. Two or three minutes later she felt a light touch on her knee; "I'm awful sorry you feel bad, are you afraid to have your little girl ridin' so long?" "Yes." "Well, you needn't be, for Uncle Harry's awful careful an' smart." "He ought to be ashamed of himself." "Well, I guess he is then, 'cos' he's ever'thing he ought to be. He's awful careful; tother day when the goat run away, he held on to her tight, so she couldn't fall out." Mrs. Mayton brought her foot down with a violent stamp. " I know you'd 'spect him if you knew how nice he was. He sings awful funny songs, an' tells splendid stories." "Nonsense!" " They ain't no nonsense at all. I don't think it's nice to say that, when his stories are always about Joseph, an' Abraham, an' Moses, an' when Jesus was a little boy, an' the Hebrew children, an' lots of people that the Lord loved. An' he's awful 'fectionate, too." "Yes, I suppose so." "When we says our prayers we prays for the nice lady what he 'spects, an' he likes us to do it." "How do you know?" "'Cos' he always kisses us when we do it, an' that's what my papa does when he likes what we pray." Mrs. Mayton's mind became absorbed in earnest thought, but Toddie had not said all that was in his heart. " An' when we tumbles down an' hurts ourselves, 'taint no matter what Uncle Harry's doin'; he runs right out an' picks us up an' comforts us. He froed away a cigar the other day when a wasp stung me, an' I picked it up an' ate it, an' it made me awful sick." Mrs. Mayton had been thinking rapidly and seriously, and her heart had relented somewhat toward the principal offender. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37, 105 "Suppose that I don't let my little girl go riding with him any more?" "Then I know he'll be awful unhappy, an' I'll be awful sorry for him, 'cos' I don't fink nice folks ought to be made unhappy." "Suppose, then, that I do let her go?" " Well, I'll give you a whole stomack full of kisses !" And assuming that the latter course would be adopted, he climbed into Mrs. Mayton's lap, and began to make payment at once. "Bless your dear little heart!" exclaimed Mrs. Mayton, "you're of the same blood, and it is good, if it is rather hasty." And the young people who were perplexed about the best way of announcing their engagement found it done for them, and Mrs. Mayton's blessing about to follow. THE CRATCHITS' CHRISTMAS DINNER. CHARLES DICKENS. TINY Tim's active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back he came escorted by his brother and sister to his stool beside the fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs — as if, poor fellow, they were capable of being made more shabby — compounded some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and round, and put it on the hob to simmer, Master Peter and the two ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the goose, which they soon returned in high procession. Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course; and, in truth, it was something very like it in that house. Mrs. Cratchit made the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigor; Miss Belinda sweetened up the apple-sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner, at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for every- body, not forgetting themselves,, and, mounting guard upon their posts, 106 WERNER'S READINGS crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek fcr gcc^e before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was suc- ceeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving-knife, prepared to plunge it into the breast; but when she did, and when the long-expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all round the board; and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried hurrah! There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there was ever such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheap- ness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by the apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (sur- veying one small atom of a bone on the dish), they hadn't ate it all at last! Yet every one had had enough, and the youngest Cratchits in particular were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows! But now, the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs. Cratchit left the room alone — too nervous to bear witness — to take the pudding up and bring it in. Suppose it should not be dene enough! Suppose it should break in turning out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the back yard and stolen it while they were merry with the goose! A supposition at which the two young Cratchits became livid. All sorts of horrors were supposed. Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the copper. A smell like a washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastry-cook's next door to each other, with a laundress's next door to that! That was the pudding. In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit entered, flushed, but smiling proudly, with the pudding like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top. Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that now the weight was oft her mind, she would confess she had had her doubts about the AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 107 quantity of flour. Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for so large a family. It would have been flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a thing. At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth swept and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovelful of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass; two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle. These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets could have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed : " A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!" Which all the family re-echoed. "God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all. ONE, TWO, THREE. H. C. BUNNER. IT was an old, old, old, old lady, And a boy who was half -past three ; And the way they played together Was beautiful to see. She couldn't go running and jumping, And the boy, no more could he; For he was a thin little fellow, With a thin, little, twisted knee. They sat in the yellow sunlight, Out under the maple tree: And the game that they played I'll tell you, Just as it was told to me. 108 WERNER'S READINGS It was Hide-and-Go-Seek they were playing, Though you'd never have known it to be — ■ With an old, old, old, old lady, And a boy with a twisted knee. The boy would bend his face down On his one little sound right knee, And he'd guess where she was hiding, In guesses One, Two, Three! "You are in the china closet!" He would cry, and laugh with glee — It wasn't the china closet; But he still had Two and Three. "You are up in papa's big bedroom, In the chest with the queer old key!" And she said: "You are warm and warmer; But you're not quite right," said she. "It can't be the little cupboard, Where mamma's things used to be- So it must be the clothes-press, Gran'ma!" And he found her with his Three. Then she covered her face with her fingers, That were wrinkled, white and wee; And she guessed where the boy was hiding, With a One and a Two and a Three. And they never had stirred from their places Right under the maple tree — This old, old, old, old lady, And the boy with the lame little knee — This dear, dear, dear old lady, And the boy who was half-past three. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 109 WHAT JACK SAID. J. L. HARBOUR. IF there is one thing more than another calculated to throw a man into a gnashing of the teeth and tearing of the hair condition, it is his attempt to give the wife of his bosom an account of some ordinary affair, to which she listens after this fashion : He. Oh, my dear, I must tell you something Jack Burroughs told me to-day while — ■ She. Where did you see Jack Burroughs ? "Oh, we went to luncheon together, and — " "How did you happen to go out to luncheon together?" "Well, we didn't exactly go out together; I met Jack on the restau- rant steps, and — " " What restaurant ? " " Calloway's ; and Jack — " "How did you happen to go to Calloway's ? I thought you always lunched at Draper's." "I nearly always do; but I just happened to drop into Calloway's to-day along with Jack, and — " "Does he always lunch at Calloway's?" "I'm sure, my dear" (a little sharply), "that I don't know if he does or not. It makes no earthly difference if — " "Oh, of course not." (Hastily.) "I just wondered if he did; that's all. Go on with your story." "Well, while we were eating our soup, Jack — " "What kind of soup?" "Turtle. Jack said that—" "I thought you disliked turtle soup." "Well, I don't care much about it; but — " "How did you happen to order it if you didn't care for it?" "Because I did." (Severely.) "But the soup has nothing to do with the story." "Oh, of course not." (In a grieved tone.) "I never said that 110 WERNER'S READINGS it did. I don't see why you should get cross over a simple question. Go on." Well, while we were eating our soup, Lawrence Hildreth and his new wife came in, and — " "They did?" "I have just said so." " Well, you needn't be so cross about it." "They came in, and — " "Is she pretty?" " Pretty enough. Jack bowed and — " " Does he know them ?" "Well, now, do you suppose he would have bowed if he hadn't known them ? I declare if I — " "How was she dressed ?" "How should I know? I never looked at her dress. What I was going to tell you was that — " "Did they sit near you?" "Yes, at the next table. And while they were ordering, Jack said that they — " "Couldn't they hear him?" "Do you suppose" (fiercely) "that Jack would have no more sense than to let them hear him talking about them? I'll swear if — " " James, if you can't tell a simple little incident without getting into a passion, you'd better keep it to yourself. What did Jack say?' "He said that Mrs. Hildreth's father was opposed to the match, and—" "How did he know that ? " "Great Casar! There you go again!" "James, will you please remember that it is your wife to whom you are speaking, sir?" " No other woman would drive me raving, distracted crazy, asking silly questions about — " "James!" "Every time I try to tell you anything you begin, and you — " "James" (raising with dignity and saying stiffly), "I do not propose listening to any such insulting remarks, and — " AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. Ill "You never listen to anything. That's the trouble. If — " " When I ask a simple question, you — " "I'd say 'simple.' You've asked me a million 'simple' questions in the last half hour, just because I was going to tell you that Jack Bur- roughs said that — " " I do not wish to hear what Mr. Jack Burroughs said, if you can not tell it respectfully. I shall have my dinner sent to my room, since it is so painful for you to eat with an idiot/" (Retires scornfully, while he narrowly escapes an attack of apoplexy.) NATHAN HALE. SARA KING WILEY. \ SWIFTLY through the silent forest, Life and death hung in the scale, When each heart-throb seemed a drum-beat, Sped the spy — young Nathan Hale. He had done his dangerous errand, Learned each British stronghold well, Now rejoicing and successful Ran the longed-for news to tell. Sudden, through the tangled bushes, Gleamed a rifle close at hand, And like cannon in the stillness Came the sentry's challenge, "Stand!" In the British camp reigned fury ; " Do not let the scamp be tried ! Shooting's far too noble for him, Hang him like a dog!" they cried. Flashed the golden autumn sunshine On the waving lines of steel, Sweetly o'er the river echoing Rang the bugle's stirring peal. V WERNER'S READINGS Brighter than the scarlet maple, Flamed the throng about the jail; Forth, in worn and ragged homespun, Came the rebel — Nathan Hale. Standing pinioned on a wagon, Looked the young man on the crowd, "Speak," the soldier said beside him, "Speak your last, it is allowed." "I've but one regret," thus said he, "Since I've this short time to live; •That for my beloved country I have but one life to give." As he spoke, a sudden glory Shone across that face so pale, And with lips of smiling courage, Died the hero — Nathan Hale. J- ts* NGEL'S WICKEDInESS. MARIE CORELLI. THATE God!" said Argel, and surveyed her horrified audience defiantly, t was a Sunday afternoon, and the Reverend Josiah Snawley was ^.intending a Bible-class in one of the worst quarters of the East End, assisted by Miss Powser, a lady of uncertain age. The children were the miserable offspring of fathers and mothers whose chief business it was to starve uncomplainingly. And Angel was one of the thinnest and most ragged of them all. "Was that Angel Middleton who spoke?" inquired the Reverend Josiah. "Say it again, Angel! but no. You will not dare to say it again!" " Yes, I will. I hate God ! There ' " A terrible pause ensued. The other children stared in stupc-^- AND RECITATIONS NO. jy. 113 amazement; they did not quite understand who "God" was, but they had a dim idea that it was very wrong to hate Him! Miss Pow- ser was limp with horror ! "I am shocked," said the Rev. Josiah Snawley, "and pained and grieved I^TI ere is a child — one who has been taught Bible-lessons Sunday after Sunday — who tells me she hates God ! What blasphemy ! What temper! Stand forward, Angel Middleton! Come out of the class!" Angel obeyed. "Now! Explain yourself! Why do you hate God ?" Angel looked steadily on the floor, and her lips quivered. "Because I do/" "That's no answer! Really, Miss Powser, you should not have admitted such a child as this into the Sunday-school. She seems a mere insolent heathen! " Miss Powser feebly murmured that the child had better be dismissed- " Dismissed ? Of course. Angel Middleton ? You must never come here again!" "All right. I don't care." " Oh, Angel!" moaned Miss Powser. " I had hoped for much better things from you. Your father — " u "That's it. That's why I hate God. You teach us that God does everything; well, then, God is killing father. Father never did any harm to any one; and yet he's dying. I know he is! He couldn't get work when he was well, and now there isn't enough to eat, and there's no fire, and we're as miserable as ever we can be, and all the time you say God is good and loves us. I don't believe it! If God won't care for father, than I won't care for God." " You are a very wicked, ignorant child,' the Rev. Josiah declared sternly. "If your father can't get work, it is most probably his own fault. If he is ill there is always the workhouse. And if God doesn't take care of him as you say, it must be because he's a bad man. ' Angel's big eyes flashed fire. "Yer lie! He's worth a dozen such as you, anyway." And with this she turned on her heel and left the school-room, jj ' v, turning $£ igk Co feing t " * olemnl y : p*e-oK \ " 114 WERNER'S READINGS " Children, you have seen to-day a terrible exhibition of the power of Satan. Now, remember, never let me see any of you playing with Angel Middleton, she's a bad girl — do you hear?" He was about to resume his instructions, when a little shrill, piping voice cried out: "Please, sir, I want to leave the class, sir!" " You want to leave the. class, Johnnie Coleman! what for?" "Please, sir, 'cos Angel's gone, sir! Yer see, sir, I can't anyways promise not to speak to Angel, sir; she's my gal!" "Your gal! John Coleman, you surprise me!" " 'Iss, sir. She's my gal, an' l ? m her bloke. Lor' bless yer, sir, we've bin so fur years an' years — ivver since we wos babbies, sir. Yer see, sir, 'twouldn't do fur me to go agin Angel now — 'twouldn't be gentleman-like, sir! I spec's Angel's hungry, sir. Yer don't know, sir, what it is to 'ave a gnawin' in yer inside, sir. Oh, it's orful bad, sir! really 'tis, sir — makes yer 'ate everybody wot's got their stum- micks full. An' when Angel gets a bit 'ere an' there, she gives it all to 'er father, sir, an' niver a mossul for 'erself; an' now e's a going to ; is long 'ome, so they sez, an' it's 'ard on Angel anyways, and — -" "That will do!" burst out Mr. Snawley loudly. "You can go." "'Iss, sir. Thank-ye, sir. Much obleeged, sir." And, with many a shuffle and grin, Johnnie startea .1 at a run, intending to join Angel and comfort her as best he might. For once, however, he failed to find her in any of those particular haunts they two were wont to patronize. "S'pose she's gone home!" he muttered discontentedly. "An' she won't thank me for botherin' round w'en 'er father's so bad. Never i mind! I'll wait near the alley in case she comes out an' wants me for enny think." Angel had gone home — "home" being a sort of close cupboard where on a common truckle-bed, scantily covered, lay the sleeping figure of a man. He was not more than forty at most — but Death had marked his pale, pinched features with the great Sign Ineffaceable, and as he slept the rapid breath was drawn in shorter gasps of pain and difficulty. ;c ensued. *.. .-.<.- AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 115 "How can I?" murmured Angel, "how can I love God, when He is so cruel to father?" Just then the sick man stirred and smiled faintly. "Is that you, Angel?" "Yes, father." "Ain't you been to class, dearie?" "Yes, father. But — but they don't want me there no more." "Don't want yer there no more! Why, Angel — " "Don't ye worry, father. I said I hated God, and Mr. Snawley said I was wicked, an' I s'pose I am, but I'm sick of their preachin' an' nonsense, an' it don't make you no better." "Don't ye, Angel! Don't ye hate God, my little gel! ye mustn't — ■ no, no! God's good; always good, my dear! It's all right wi' Him, Angel; it's the world that forgets Him that's wrong. God does every- thing kind, dearie. N - , He gave me your mother, an' He only took her away when she was tired an' wanted to go. All for the best, Angel! All for the best, little lass! Love God, my child, love Him with all your heart, an' all your soul, an' all your mind." "Why was I called Angel, father?" "Just a fancy o' mine an' your mother's, my dear. We was young an' happy-like then, an' work was easier to get; an' such a dear sweet baby lass y,e were when ye were born, with gold curls all over your head an' bonnie bright eyes, that we said ye were like a little angel. Angel by name an' angel by nature, dearie. Yes, yes! it's all right. God gave ye to me, an' He knows all — all the trouble an' worry an' fret—" He broke off suddenly, and sat up straight in bed. "Father! father! what is it?" cried the child. "Angel! look! there's your mother! I knew she'd come! Don't ye hate God, my little gel! He's sent her for me." "Father! father!" she sobbed, sinking on her knees in a passion of grief. His hand wandered feebly to her bent head, and lay coldly on her warm soft hair. "Don't ye — hate — God — Angel. Love Him! — an'- — an' He'll take All right, my lass, I'm coming!" f^e 0*.. 116 / WERNER'S READINGS He fell back heavily. With a shriek of agony the desolate child flung herself across her father's stiffening corpse, unable to realize his death. Late on that same evening Johnnie Coleman, sleepy and disappointed, prepared to leave the corner of the alley where he had kept faithful vigil all the afternoon. Suddenly his eyes were attracted by a bright glare in the sky and the cry "Fire! Fire!" resounded through the street. It was some distance away, and 'as he ran he was unaware that Angel Middleton pursued him. She had crept out of her dwelling, sick with hunger and stupefied with grief, and perceiving her ragged boy-friend waiting for her at the corner had been just about to call him by name, when off he had rushed at the pace described and she followed. Soon the two were lost in a great crowd of people who stood looking up at the flames that darted from the roof and walls of the house of a grocer. Because of the inflammable nature of the goods, the fire grew fast and furious, and though the engines rapidly arrived it was evident that very little could be done to save the perishing build- ing.\ The owner of the place threw himself from one of the windows and escaped by a miracle without injury; but when his wife, half- suffocated with smoke, was dragged out from the burning walls more' dead than alive, she struggled frantically to rush back again into the heart of the flames. "My children! my baby!" she screamed. "Save them! Oh, let me die with them!" "Steady, mother!" said one of the pitying firemen. "'Tain't no use frettin'. Leave the little 'uns to God!" Yes, truly to God, and — His "Angel!" For suddenly the crowd parted; a little girl, white-faced and dark-eyed, with golden-brown hair streaming behind her like a comet, rushed through and made straight for the burning house. There was a horrified pause; then Johnnie Coleman's shrill voice cried out: "It's Angel!" "Angel Middleton!" roared the crowd. "Hooray for Angel! There's a brave gal for ye! See; she's got the baby!" And, sure enough, there, at one of the burnt-out windows, St£ smoke and flame eddying around her, stood Angel, with a ti AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. I 117 in her arms. Several people rushed forward, holding an extended sheet. "Throw it, Angel! Never fear! Throw it down!" She did so and vanished only to reappear again with two more small children. She leaned far out over the smoking window-frame and called: "Are there any more children? Are these all?" "All!" shrieked the mother. "You've saved them all! Go J love you, dear!" Once more the protecting sheet was outspread, and Angel let one child after another drop straightly and steadily from her hold; they were caught and saved, uninjured. A great cry went up from the crowd. "Quick, quick, Angel! Jump!" A smile crossed her pale face; she was just about to leap when, with a sickening crash, the brickwork beneath her gave way and crum- bled to ruins. Quickly all hands went to the rescue and in a few minutes they dragged her forth crushed and dying, but not dead. "I was wicked," said Angel softly. "You must tell them all, Johnnie — at class — that I was wicked, an' — that I am — sorry I sail I hated God; I didn't understand. It's all for the best — father's gone, an' I'm goin' — an' I'm so glad, Johnnie — -so happy! Bury me with father, please — an' tell everybody — everybody— that I lovs God — ■now."' There was a silence. The fireman supporting the girl's head sud- denly raised his hand and those who wore hats in the crowd reverently lifted them. The smothered sobbing of tender-hearted women alone broke the stillness; the stars seemed to tremble in the sky as the Greater Angel descended and bore away the lesser one on wings of light to heaven. \J WHAT THEY CALL IT. GRANDMA says we're right in style, A-sittin' in our automo-bile. Grandpa says we're fit to kill, A-ridin in our automo-bili. 118 WERNER'S READINGS Ma, she says we ought to feel Grateful fer our automo-beel. Pa says there ain't no other man Kin run an auto like he can. Auntie preaches near and far 'Bout our lovely touring-car. Uncle Bill says he ain't seen Nowhere such a good machine. Brother Jim, he keeps a-braggin' 'Bout the speed of our new wagon. But, oh, it sounds so grand and noble When sister Sue says automoble. THE GREAT COLLEGE-CIRCUS FIGHT. JESSE LYNCH WILLIAMS. THE telegram said : " You are hereby warned finally to keep away from this town with your show." "Colonel" Charles Baker, proprietor of Cherokee Charlie's Grand Combination Circus and Wild West Wonders, said, "Well, Bill, if those young college dudes are looking for trouble I reckon we ought to be able to accommodate 'em." One-Barrel Bill said, "Huh." This meant that he agreed with his boss and anticipated a diversion. "We did last year," said Cherokee Charlie. "We did," said One-Barrel. "I reckon we can again," said Cherokee Charlie. "I reckon," said One-Barrel solemnly. So that is the way it was decided. No circus ought to come to any college town. At this college it was one of the traditions that no parade should pass in front of the campus gate — without being broken up. 3j* *JC ^C 5JC 3|S tP 5|» -J* AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 119 Two days before the circus was due a special meeting of the Dis- cipline Committee was called. "If we could only induce the ringleaders to be sensible for a few minutes," the President of the University was saying. "Who is at the head of the movement ? " "Mr. Stehman, of course," said one of the younger professors. " It was he who instigated the disturbance last year ; it is chiefly for that you recollect, that he is now on probation." "He is absolutely fearless, and quite as unscrupulous," said another professor. The President looked thoughtful. "I was under the impression that he was endeavoring to be serious." If the Faculty had been infallible, it would not have sent out at just this point an edict in which glared the word "forbid." With Jack Stehman it stirred the lingering boy within him to the surface. "Say," he said to a crowd of students, "what do they think this is, anyway — a university or a prep, school? I tell you what we'll do; we'll call an indignation meeting of the undergraduate body and see about this."' "Right! That's the stuff!" said other voices approvingly. " Come on," said Stehman. '' Tell everybody you see." The crowd began to scatter. "Oh, Mr. Stehman, may I speak with you a moment?" Stehman looked around, stopped smiling, and hurried over to the walk. It was the President. "Mr. Stehman. I'm afraid I'll have to trouble you to help me about this affair. I can't do it alone. You have more power over this body of men than I have. They would do for you what they would not for me. I mean that I can forbid their making trouble, but you can keep them from making it." Stehman liked this, but he only said: "Well, sir, thank you very much for the compliment; but I don't believe I have any influence — except, of course, over the team." " This is no mild college prank ahead of us. Among those coming 120 WERNER'S READINGS to this town to-morrow are some of the wildest types our country pro- duces. They will certainly carry arms — they will probably use them. There will be serious trouble — a riot — bloodshed — perhaps death. Think of what that means, Mr. Stehman. Think what it means to the parents of those hurt. Think what it means to all of us — to the fair name of the University for whose honor you and I are both supposed to be working in our different ways." Stehman was looking steadily into the President's eyes now. "It takes a long time to make the public forget headlines such as those that appeared in the papers lait year. Such occurrences do more harm than can be balanced by winning football championships. Don't you think so?" Stehman was kicking up gravel. "Very likely," he said. "Well," thought the big football player, watching the President hurry off, his shoulders bent with worry, "I never knew before how white that man was. It's just my luck! if he had only talked to me like this a couple of weeks ago when the show-bills were first posted; I don't say I could have done much, but I would have kept my mouth shut, anyhow. Or if he had only tackled me five minutes ago it wouldn't have been so bad, but now — the fire's started, and I don't see how / can stop it. Listen to that ! " A few loud voices in the distance were already shouting, with evident enthusiasm.: "Hel-lo-o! Every- body! Indignation meeting — eight o'clock this evening — in the English room. Everybody come ! " Everybody did. The place was crowded. A self-appointed committee had prepared resolutions. " As the cowboys got the better of us last year, it is the duty of every loyal son of the Alma Mater to pitch in and clean out the cowboys this year, particularly since the Faculty has forbidden it." It was received with great applause. Then a modest, hard-working fellow whom few knew arose and said in a self-conscious manner that he did "not agree with the words of the last speaker nor with the purport of the resolutions." They did not jokingly interrupt him; they kept coldly quiet. His speech did more harm than good to his side of the question. Another man jumped up. "It's not so serious as all that," he said, smiling confidently at the crowd, who smiled back. " Our friend here AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 121 has too much conscience and not enough sense of humor. Besides, we are not infants, to be told we must and we must not. It's against our inalienable rights and privileges as citizens of these great and glorious United States. Anyway, let all those who are afraid of the Faculty or of a little bloodshed stay behind the fence or in their rooms!" Just then Long Jack Stehman jumped up, and the crowd yelled and howled delightedly. "Now, fellows," cried a shrill, enthusiastic voice, "let's have three good, rousing cheers for Captain Stehman. Are you ready ? Hip — Hip ..." The cheers made the windows rattle. When silence was gained and he cleared his throat to speak, some one remarked audibly: "Where's that bolus, little Jackie?" and the room yelled with laughter again. This referred to an incident of the previous year, when Stehman took the bolus away from the Mexican who had knocked Reddy Armstrong down. It now hung over the mantelpiece in Steh- man's room. They had now quieted down for the great man to begin. "You won't cheer me when you hear what I've got to say. I started the rumpus last year. And now, I wish — I wish I hadn't. I wish I had minded my own business." "What are you giving us, Jack?" cried a voice. They were still loving him, still admiring him. "I mean every word of it. This is no time for joking. If you fellows make trouble to-morrow you'll be doing the worst thing that could happen to the college. I am heartily opposed to passing this resolution." But they looked puzzled; they did not believe him. Reddy Armstrong leaned over toward Stehman and whispered: "Don't, I tell you, old man; don't; it will only hurt you." This meant that it would kill Stehman's prospects for the senior class pres- idency; but Jack, who had thought of that, waved him aside. "I am going to do all in my power to prevent what you fellows seem to have made up your minds to." It was like thunder out of blue sky. A loud, sneering voice now came from the far corner: "Oh, h — 1!" was what it said. It was the first hostile tone directed toward Stehman, publicly, since his greatness began, and it paralyzed him. He sat down defeated. 122 WERNER'S READINGS "There goes the class presidency," whispered Reddy to Lamason. Ignance Holland got up. He knew that any one would be welcome now; and, true enough, the room veiled with relief. He had always been jealous of Stehman's popularity, and now he saw his chance to get up in the estimation of the college world by stepping on his rival's head. His had been the voice from the far corner. "Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen," he began, "self-preservation is the first law of nature. I think each of us can imagine himself in circumstances in which he — " "It's a lie!" shouted Jack Stehman. Holland, pretending to be surprised, turned toward him. "What is a lie, Jack, old man? Have I referred to you?" Holland's trick had worked, and he went on, feeling that he had the sympathy of his hearers : "If, in the eyes of the world, we, as an undergraduate body, are cowed by ignorant cowboys and greasers, where will our prestige go — where will our strength be? Who with spirit or athletic ability will be drawn hither? And, then, how shall we be able to cope successfully with universities three and four times our size, as in our glorious past ? (Loud yells.) Let those who will, skulk at home — no doubt they have good reasons ; but let all who are true sons of their glorious Alma Mater, all who would live up to her past, come forth and avenge her honor." The Chairman jumped up. "If there are no further remarks, the question will be put. All in favor — -" Then came a thunderous "Aye!" " Contrary minded ?" "No!" shouted Stehman. There were not twenty voices that joined with him, and these were feeble. The meeting was adjourned. The following morning, soon after chapel, groups of students began to gather on the main street. The calliope after awhile started up, and the procession turned the corner. At the head of the cavalcade, in Western costume, rode Cherokee Charlie. He had given careful instructions to his men. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 123 "All right now, fellows," whispered Holland. He was the leader this time, and meant to make more of a success of it than Stehman had made last year. "Now, then, all together!" he shouted. Out of several hundred coat pockets came an assortment of the products of market gardening. The next instant they began whizzing through the air at Cherokee Charlie's Grand Combination. The students were strung out along the whole line, so that, except for the four-in-hand, in the lead, on which sat the "Coterie of Western Beauties," the whole cast of performers was receiving attention at once. But the procession did nothing but duck and swear and hold in the horses. They were following instructions. Holland's strong voice began again: "Now's the time, fellows! At 'em! Rush 'em!" With loud yells the whole line of collegians suddenly turned out upon the street and charged in upon the cavalcade, shouting and hooting vigorously; they jerked bridles, threw the remainder of the ammunition in the showmen's faces, slapped the horses' heads, pulled the cowboys' stirrups, and tried to upset the smaller wagons. "Ride through the crowd," suddenly said Cherokee Charlie in a matter-of-fact way; and, without stopping to wipe away the debris on their faces, they pulled hard on the bit, turned their horses' heads, dug in their spurs, and began charging the students. The latter were obliged to fall back to the sidewalk. "All right!" shouted Cherokee Charlie; "I guess we'll go on with the parade now." He seemed good-natured about it. "Do 'em fellows! Do 'em up!" called Holland, who stood in the rear. "Ride through 'em again," said Cherokee Charlie. "Wow! Wow! Whoop — hee!" yelled the cowboys, warming up to their work. They rounded the fellows up like cattle. Holland shouted: "Here, take rocks to 'em!" He picked up a sizable stone from the street and let drive at Cherokee Charlie; it crashed through a shop window opposite. "Let up on that!" shouted several voices. But others followed Holland's example. 124 WERNER'S READINGS Cherokee Charlie whipped out his revolver and yelled, "That'll do. The next that throws a rock gets this! Pull your guns, boys!" But Billy Carew, the catcher of the 'Varsity baseball nine, let drive at Cherokee Charlie very much as if throwing to second base. The crowd heard it thump against Cherokee's solid shoulder. The latter wheeled about, shouted. "Who did that?" and fired, shouting, "Boys, let loose at these devils! Let daylight through 'em! There's not a court in the land that can touch us now!" Purposely Cherokee Charlie fired high, but the report thrilled like murder. "This way, gun club," cried a clear voice. It was Shorty Simmons, Captain of the University Gun Team, the best shot in college and a very cool man in a tight place. "Two can play at that game." They had stacked their guns in the campus for a joke; now they were going to use them. Just then came a sudden scuffle of horses' feet and the clatter of wheels. It was the four-in-hand carrying the "Coterie of Western Beauties," and it came straight down the street, gaining speed every second. The horses had taken it into their heads to run away. The crowd was scattering right and left. The Western beauties were screaming. The coach was swaying from side to side; the women were clinging together. "Good Heavens!" one of them cried. It was Cherokee Charlie's wife. He turned his horse and tried to cut in and grab the leaders. His horse veered off. Out from the campus driveway shot a long, strong runner.. It was Jack Stehman. That was the way he ran on the football field. He was making one of his famous dives through the air, with head tucked in between his shoulders. The leaders, suddenly seeing him, veered off to the other side, as some half-backs do when running with the ball. The Captain's sure, strong arms met about the neck of the horse. "He's got 'em!" shrieked some shrill voice. "No, they're dragging him — they're slacking — he's stopping them! Down they go! Lord!" The leaders had fallen. The others stumbled over them. The coach slacked so suddenly that the rear wheels lifted up, came down with a bang, and stopped. But Stehman did not spring up as he AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 125 usually did after making one of his brilliant tackles. The whole University came crowding down the street toward him. "Stand back! Give him air — Will you fellows keep the crowd back? Here's the water! You're all right now, aren't you, Jack?" The Captain opened his eyes. "Yep," he said, then closed tliem again as they carried him to the drug store. The President next morning in chapel spoke on the subject of the highest kind of bravery. He did not mention any names, but — when senior class election came around there was no balloting for president. There was only one nominee, and the election was unanimous for Jack Stehman. STORY OF A KICKER. HOLMAN F. DAY. THERE lived two frogs, so I've been told, In a quiet wayside pool; A.nd one of those frogs was a blamed bright frog 3 But the other frog was a fool. Now a farmer man with a big milk-can Was wont to pass that way ; And he used to stop and add a drop Of the aqua pura, they sa}^. And it chanced one morn in the early dawn When the farmer's sight was dim, He scooped those frogs in the water he dipped, Which same was a joke on him. The fool frog sank in the swashing tank, As the farmer bumped to town, But the smart frog flew like a tugboat screw, And he swore he'd not go down. 126 WERNER'S READINGS So he kicked and splashed and he slammed and trashed, And he kept on top through all; And he churned that milk in first-class shape In a great big butter ball. Now when the milkman got to town And opened the can there lay The fool frog drowned; but, hale and sound, The kicker he hopped away. MORAL. Don't fret your life with needless strife, Yet let this teaching stick. You'll find, old man, in the world's big can It sometimes pays to kick. MISS ANGEL. ETTA W. PIERCE. IT was at the opera-house I first saw her, on a grand night, when the carriages were full of swell folks, and the show at the dooi was as good as tother inside. She was dressed in a shiny cloak bordered with feathers, and where it fell back her gown showed shiny, too; and her brown hair curled about her face bright and joyful like. Two other folks were with her— a stout lady and a tall, fair dude. They passed so close that I heard her say, " This is the very happiest night of my life. " And the tall dude, says he, "It is now my privilege, Edith, to see that you are always happy." And then they vanished into the opera-house. # "She's one of the angels they tell about at the mission," says Tim who was standin' near me. "That's what she is, Bobby!" When we had sold out our extras we sneaked back to the opera- house door to see the show Come out. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 127 Presently that girl appeared again, but with another man — a fat, dark party, who wore a blazing stone in his shirt-front and mustaches twisted up at the corners. The girl looked tired. The tall, fair dude followed with the stout lady, and he was as sulky as a wet hen. The others got into the carriage, but the dude stayed on the pavement and only lifted his hat. Tim and I saw the girl lean and offer him her violets. They were withered, but he took them and raised them to his lips. I didn't see her again till the day the street-car ran over Tim. Her coupe was standing near, and she says, "Oh, let me try to help?" Her dress was black and plain and her face thin, and all the bright- ness seemed gone out of it. But somehow I thought her lovelier than ever. The breath was out of Tim, but she roused him and he looked up at her. "Miss Angel!" says he, and that was the last of Tim. She and I got to be first-rate friends, and I never lacked food nor fire from that time out. She was everywhere among the poor of the district, but she got paler and sadder all the time. One day I happened upon her near a big shop. Some smart car- riages stood near the curbstone — in one I saw the stout woman who had been with Miss Angel at the opera. "Is this a protege of yours, Edith?" says the old one, and she looked at me as if I was dirt. "My dear girl, how long will you go on with your slumming and your charities?" says she. "Do you mean to renounce the world just because your engagement with Dacre is off? It would have been better had you accepted Colonel Hay." That same day I saw a man coming down the steps of a grand club-house on a fashionable street, and the instant I clapped eyes on him I knew the dude that was with Miss Angel at the opera-house. I made after him. "Buy a paper, sir?" I shouted, but he wouldn't notice till I brushed hard against him. Then his hand went up to his breast, and finding no loose change, he pulled out a pocketbcok. When he opened it, what do you think I spied ? A bunch of withered violets! The next day there was snow, and the rich folks were sleighing in the park. So I thought if I went that way I might catch a glimpse 128 WERNERS READINGS of Miss Angel. At the proper hour I took a place on a bench alongside one of the main drives and began to watch. Someone stole softly up to me and plumped down on the seat at my side. "For whom are you looking, Bobby?" "For you, Miss Angel," says I, and I came near letting out a yell of pure joy. She hadn't fairly settled herself when along came the fat dark man, with the big stone in his shirt-front. "I saw you from afar, Edith," says he; "pray, allow me." And he just shoved me aside and sqiieezed himself down beside Miss Angel. "I am so delighted to see you again, Edith," says he; "I called re- peatedly, but your servants refused to admit me." "They obeyed my orders," says Miss Angel. "Ah, Edith, that is an unkind cut!" says he "Was I not your father's friend for many years? Now that he is dead, and you are left a prey to fortune-hunters, you need me greatly, my dear child." "I am not aware that I have any need of you whatever." "I see that you bear me some grudge," says he. "Maybe it is about Dacre. Ah, he is a sad dog — that Dacre! He has made ducks and drakes of everything." "And who has helped Dacre in his downward way?" says Miss Angel. " Well, really, I don't pretend to know," says the fat man. " Some say that it is that French actress, Bebe, and that she has a mysterious forest bower a few miles out of the city, to which Dacre makes frequent pilgrimages. I have reason to think the rumor true. Dacre is a great favorite with your sex. Then his fast male companions — " "Stop! Dacre's closest companion has been yourself , Colonel Hay. To you he owes his financial ruin. As for the other charge," and she grew as white as chalk, "I tell you I do not believe a word of it." "My dear Edith," says the fat man, "are you not a little unreason- able? To be sure, Dacre was once your lover, but you broke the engagement when your father insisted upon it." "You poisoned my father's mind against Mr. Dacre," says she; "and, being ill, he believed all that you said." " Edith," says he, "you refuse to believe in his little errors? Well, here is a message which he gave me to wire not an hour ago." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 129 He thrust a paper under her eyes and I looked, too. "I sail to-morrow for Australia, to begin life over again. I must take Bebe with me; I cannot bear to leave her. Will come to-night." "There!" says Colonel Hay. "Is Mr. Dacre going to Australia?" says Miss Angel. "Yes," says he. "I have obtained a situation for him in a com- mercial house in Melbourne. He will sail in the morning. I have done my best to give him a fresh start in life; and if you ask why, I answer, because you yet preserve an interest in him, Edith. I love you, and desire to make you happy.'" "You have said enough!" says Miss Angel. "Leave me now, Colonel Hay. " His face grew black as thunder, but he got up from the bench and went away. Miss Angel sat awhile looking down at the ground; then says she: "Bobby, if you had a friend whom you had loved and trusted a long time, and you should see him lying very low, and all the world against him — tell me, what would you do?" "Why, lend him a hand, of course," says I. She bent and kissed me — heaven and earth! Yes, she kissed me ! "You clear, dear Bobby!" says she. "I don't know where Mr. Dacre can be found, yet I must send him a token, and it must reach him to-night." "I'll take it," says I. "According to that fat man, he must be somewhere in the city." She opened her purse and took out a ring, engraved with some motto that I couldn't read. She wrapped it in a bank-note. Her eyes were full of tears. "I am a damsel in distress, Bobby," says she. "If you cannot help me, my heart will break." You bet that was enough lor me. The day was going fast — I knew I must hustle. I began to look through the streets and squares. I chose such as the swell folks usually stroll in. I went up and clown, and at last I spied a tall, fair man in a light overcoat, moving away at a good gait. "That's my dude, sure!" says I. 130 WERNER'S READINGS But the street was full of folks, and they didn't give way before a little chap like me. One old duffer nearly knocked my eye out with his elbow, but with the other eye I made out that my tall, fair man was just crossing the street. I tore after him. There was ice on the stones, and of a sudden my heels flew into the air and I found myself sprawling. Some team that was coming up at a round pace pounded straight "'over me. Lord! That was a nasty crunch! A cop grabbed me up and carried me to the sidewalk. But by that time I had lost my man. "I ain't hurt," says I, "lemme go! I've got pressing business." And I wriggled free and was off again like a pup on the track of his master. Somebody cried out, "Why, that bey is crazy!" But I didn't wait to explain. I had to stop in a doorway to wipe the blood out of my eyes and while I was pulling myself together, I remembered the message that Colonel Hay had shown Miss x\ngel. "If Mr. Dacre is going to visit that Bebe to-night," thinks I, " what's the matter with looking around the depots ?" With that I jumped on a car and started for the nearest one. It was pretty big. On one track a train was ready to move out. I saw people with grips running for it, and heard the engine snorting. The train panted out. As it went a tall man in a light overcoat whizzed by me like a shot, and made a leap for the last car. I grabbed his coat-tails. "Stop, sir!" says I, "stop!" But he was in a mighty rush, and he gave me a back-handed fling that tumbled me heels over head on the platform. I saw a million stars in a minute. By the help of a trainman he caught his car, and when I picked myself up Mr. Dacre wasn't anywhere in sight, nor the train either. I went to the ticket-office and asked a clerk where the tall man in the light overcoat was going. "How should I know," says the clerk. "But I've got to follow that gentleman," says I, We had words, but I didn't budge. Finally he flung me out a ticket for Hemlock Hollow, and said the next train would leave in three-quarters of an hour. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 131 Hemlock Hollow was black as pitch when the train stopped there I was the only passenger that got off. A station-master came out on the platform swinging a lantern. I asked if he'd seen a young gen in a light overcoat. He concluded he remembered such a party, because he'd hired a carriage and gone away on the swamp road. I made off as fast as my legs could carry me. The weather had turned killing cold. The road was narrow, with high bushes on both sides. Not a house was in sight. The wind howled and the tall bushes rattled ike dry bones and clutched at me as I ran under 'em. Then the trees grew thicker and blacker, till they shut out all the light, and I couldn't see my hand before me. Says I to myself: "I ain't much stuck on country air." And I had to feel for Miss Angel's ring in my jacket pocket, or I'd have taken to my heels and gone back to the railway station. Well, after I'd chased over a hundred miles or so, I saw a light. Sure enough, the carriage track stopped at a gate. I went through it and up to a small, low house. I rapped on the door A gray, elderly man appeared. "Is Mr. Dacre in this house?" says I. "Yes," says the man. "I want to see him bad," says I. "Come in," says he; "you look about frozen, my boy." I found Mr. Dacre sitting before a fire. At his feet a big mastiff la) r sleeping on a mat. "I'm the chap," says I, "that caught you by the coat-tails as you was jumping on the train to-night. "Why, yes — the very boy!" says he. I put Miss Angel's ring in his hand. "Where did you get it?" says he, and his voice was amazing queer. "Miss Edith sent it to you," says I. I thought he was going crazy. He dragged me to the fire, chafed my hands, pulled the shoes off my frozen feet, and the man that had let me in brought snow and rubbed on my ears, that were stiff as stakes, and the big dog woke on the mat, and rose, with a growl to see what was going on. 132 WERNER'S READINGS "Keep still, Bebe!" says Mr. Dacre, and when I heard that I thought I'd tumble into the fire. Well, the two men brought hot coffee and a dish of roasted chicken, and I had to tell Mr. Dacre everything. "Bobby," says he, "you are of the right stuff! The nan who lives here was a servant of my dead father, and this dog is also a family relic. I am particularly fond of Bebe, for she saved my life when I was a boy. These facts were well known to my good friend, Colonel Hay. Now, Bobby, you and I must go back to town by the last train." Well, Mr. Dacre didn't go to Australia — he stayed at home and married Miss Angel. Colonel Hay wasn't at the wedding — I know, for / was there, and looked for the fat man everywhere. But he didn't turn up. A STRANGE PARENT. JAMES NOEL JOHNSON. I DO not think the babe so sweet As most of fathers do; I do not think "it can't be beat" Below this vault of blue. I do not think it's from the skies Dropped by an angel choir; I do not think " it looks so wise," Or has a cherub's hair. I do not think it's like a flake Of downy, rosy snow! I do not think that it will make " A heaven here below. " I do not think it is a gem, Shaped by a hand divine. I do not think it is — but then — ■ But then — it isn't mine! AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 133 TWO HOME-COMINGS. ANNIE HAMILTON DONNELL. T was one of Scarecrow's poorest days. They were all poor. There were seldom many errands to do, and never, never enough to eat. When a boy is only ten, and lives all by himself in the dreariest attic in the dreariest tenement in the very, very dreariest alley in a great city, and when the errands fail — well, is it any wonder a boy gets downhearted ? Scarecrow was downhearted. The invalid in the other attic, across the bit of a hallway, had not heard him whistle for three days. She could hardly have imagined beforehand how she would miss the shrill, cheery sound. "Poor little fellow, he's a-dreadin' havin' her come home. No wonder he ain't whistlin !" the invalid mused. Was that what Scarecrow was dreading ? Or was it something else ? There were so many things to dread. He crept downstairs again, and' out through the noisome alleyway, to a corner on one of the busy streets. There he waited on listlessly. It was almost night when his good luck came. " Errand, mister ? Gotter errand fer a feller ? Kin I run ? Gimme a try! On'y a fiver to go a mile — dat's de bargain price." "Eh, eh, what's that?" The figure half halted, and looked down absently into the anxious face. Then it went on. Scarecrow ran along beside it. "Gotter errand, mister — say?" " Oh, you want a job, eh? That's it." "Yes, sir — wot'll yer bet I does! De doctor has prescribed a dose er vittles fer me stummick. Oh, say, mister, mister! Gimme a job!" "But I haven't any job — well, well, let's see. Come with me. I suppose you might run on ahead, with the little chap's greens." At a florist's up the street he bought a load cf trailing green vines and cheap, bright flowers, and put them into the boy's hands. "Take them to Cham'ler Street — one hundred and seven. Here's a quarter. Nov; run!" 134 WERNER'S READINGS "I ain't got no change — I runs 'em fer a five." The man laughed good naturedly. "Well, run this one 'fer' a quarter. It's worth it — it isn't any common errand," he said. And his face, as he strode away, was radiant with a sudden joyful remembrance. No, no, this was no common errand! This was an errand out of a hundred — a thousand! All at once Scarecrow felt his hand on his shoulder again, and another silver quarter dropped through the vines into the small, brown hand. "It's worth it. Off with you!" The man laughed. It did not occur to him to distrust the tattered little messenger. He was not in a distrustful mood. At Chandler Street, 107, seemed to be a regular illumination. Scare- crow could see through the unshaded windows a big, bright room, that seemed full and running over with eager-faced little boys. Tall boys — short boys — curly boys — straight boys — and one little kilted boy who danced wildly about. One, two, three — Scarecrow counted boys. There were six of them ! And what was this they were doing ? " W-e-1-c-o-m-e," he spelled slowly to himself, as one by one the big green paper letters were tacked up over the mantel in the big, bright room. The word, complete, meant nothing definite to Scarecrow. He puzzled over it curiously. Then he knocked loudly at the door, beside the window. A troop of boys answered the knock with a headlong rush. "Oh, oh! it's the flowers! Daddy's sent 'em! A boy's brought em!" "The flowers have come!" "An' the smile-axel!" "They're red an' pink an' yellow — an' they smell — my!" "Goody, goody — hooray!" In an instant little Scarecrow's arms were empty, and the rush back to the bright-lighted room had begun. Scarecrow plucked the sleeve of the rear boy boldly, and whispered : "Say, wot's de game?" he asked, eagerly "Wet's dem letters in dere spell out?" "Why, don't you know?" the little fellow exclaimed in astonish- AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 135 ment. "They spell 'Welcome,' because mother's coming home to- morrow. To-morrow morning — yes, sir-ree ! They've cured her at the hospital, and she's coming home. We've got pieces to speak, and singing, and we're going to drape the picture with vines and flowers. I tell you there's times, when your mother comes home!" Little Scarecrow crept away in the darkness. Even the bright silver quarters clinked, unheard, in his pocket. There are "times" when your mother comes home. That is what Scarecrow was thinking. Scarecrow's mother was coming home, too, to-morrow. Had they "cured" her at that great, grim hospital for sick souls over there? All at once Scarecrow remembered something. She was coming out weeks earlier, because of "good behavior," they said. Scarecrow was conscious suddenly of being proud of his mother. He had never been proud of her in his life before. "Dey're goin' to let her out- sooner along o' her behavin' good," he murmured, a little glow warming his thin, brown cheeks. " Oh, I say, mebbe" — his voice quavered excited — "mebbe dey'se cured her!" But there would be no green and flowers or " Welcome" on the wall. The utter contrast smote Scarecrow like a dull blow. He stopped in the street and sobbed in sudden compassion. There would be no vines, no flowers, no singing — -no anything — when Scarecrow's mother came home. That other mother would have them all. Then the silver coins clinked remindingly. They bore inspiration straight from the tattered pocket of despondent Scarecrow to his brain under the tattered cap. Fifty cents will " carry" a great way sometimes, and it was Scarecrow's trade to carry things. There were the odds and ends of greens and half- wilted flowers that the florist let him have cheap ; there were the buns and sausages and the tea — and the bit of sugar and milk. He carried them all home to the attic in the dreary alley. All the way upstairs, flight after flight, Scarecrow whistled. Across the dark hallway the invalid woman took up her needle again and smiled. "Maybe she ain't comin' home after all — then I don't wonder he feels like whistlin'," she thought. "It's dreadful good to hear him again!" 136 WERNER'S READINGS The little attic was swept and polished and decorated with the treasures from the florist's. Scarecrow got up at the first ray of day- light to do it. And he set out his little feast on the tilting old table. Over the one little window he nailed a gigantic W that he had fashioned patiently out of shreds of green. It was crooked and queer, but it was a W, and it began the word welcome. "1 wish I could remember de way de other letters went," he thought, standing off and eyeing the solitary letter wistfully, "but I'll tell her wot it stan's fer, an' how she's welcome home again, an' when she comes in de door I'll set up an' whistle loud. Dat'll be de singin'." It was midway in the dull, wet morning when the mother of little Scarecrow came home. Sore-hearted and hopeless, with the brand of shame on her forehead, she dragged listlessly up the stairs, flight after flight. She had "been good" over on the Island, but now — "I say!" It was Scarecrow on the upper landing, nodding cheerfully. His little brown, lean, hungry face was elate with pride. " Yer come along in an' look, will yer!" he cried, exultantly, hur- rying her before him. "It stan's fer 'Welcome,' see? — it's de first letter. I couldn't spell de rest. An' de flowers an' vines an' de vittles — dey all stan's fer 'Welcome.'" Then the boy's lips pursed into a whistle, and the whole decorated little attic was filled with shrill music. A moment the mother gazed — for a moment she listened uncom- prehendingly. Then, with understanding, arose something sweet and warm in her calloused breast, and she caught little whistling Scarecrow in her arms. The music stopped when she kissed him. He could never remember to have been kissed before, and the prophecy of better things was in the strange, warm touch on his lips. The faith of a little child and the love of a mother were born then, and the squalid little attic blossomed into a home. He. — If I were not in a canoe I would kiss you. She. — Take me ashore instantly, sir ! AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 137 1/ POE'S " RAVEN " IN AN ELEVATOR. CHARLES BATTELL LOOMIS. f P^HE reading was to be in the apartment of Mrs. At water, who had X done so much for the Sunshine Day Nursery, and had sold two hundred dollars' worth of tickets. Mrs. Atwater lives on the fifth floor of "The Waterloo," and one has a choice of ways to her rooms. For those who are fond of Alpine exercise there are five flights of stairs, but for those who prefer to exer- cise in other ways there is an elevator. If there had been no elevator, there would have been no story. You see, the elevator was put in at least twenty years ago, and it is neither so swift nor so accurate as those of to-day. It was a little after three-thirty in the afternoon. Most of the audience had assembled, and most of them had walked up, because it was one of the elevator's balky days. But it was not only the elevator that was causing the buzz of excite- ment in Mrs. Atwater's parlors: it was the fact that the reader who was to entertain the assembled audience had not come. It is now time to divulge the fact that I, Bertram Harland, was the reader, and although I am generally the soul of punctuality I was at half-past three nearly a mile away from Mrs. Atwater's on an Elevated train that was delayed. But at last the train pulled into my station, and I raced down the steps and made my way through slippery streets to "The Waterloo." The hall man who opened the door for me is also the elevator man, and as I am a frequent visitor to the apartment and know the ways of the elevator I asked if it was running. "Creepin' 'd be better," was his answer. "There's a reception upstairs, an' it has the heaves." I was winded by my hurry from the station, so I asked him to "creep me up," and we entered the cage together at a quarter to four. Up, up, up we went. After a time I looked out at the landing and discovered that we were passing the second floor. 138 WERNER'S READINGS "Slow but sure," said I to the attendant. "It's slow, all right, but ye can't be sure till ye'r up," said he. Then I heard a voice from above. It was that of Mrs. Atwater. "Is that you, Mr. Harland?" "It is I. I beg a thousand pardons. I was detained by a block on the Elevated." " Oh ! I thought maybe it was the elevator that was detaining you. Every one is here, and we're only waiting for you." "Well, tell them that I am in the building. I'd walk up, but it would put me out of breath. Can't read when I'm out of breath." "No, of course not," said Mrs. Atwater. "Well, I'm awfully glad you're here. Thought something dreadful had happened to you. I'll go in and announce you." I thought it a trifle premature, for we were only passing the third floor; however, she left and I said to the elevator man: "What sort of an elevator is this ? " "A highdrawlick," said he, as if it were spelled that way. I told him I thought I recognized the drawl perfectly, but I was somewhat afraid we shouldn't go very high. " She seems to be stopping now," said I. Michael coaxed her, and at last we passed the fourth floor; then, after an agony of suspense, as the phrase is, I saw the sign " Fifth Floor." But it was like Moses's view of the Promised Land — I got no farther. The elevator bobbed and bumped and then came to a dead stop, like Mahomet's coffin mid heaven and earth — or, to be more literal, between the fourth and fifth floors. "What's up?" said I. "Not the elevator," said Michael with ill-timed levity. "Water given out?" "No, I'm afear'd somethin's broke." "Well, let me out," said I, picking up my little satchel containing Shakespeare's plays and the poems of Tennyson, Poe, and Browning — for it was on such fare that I was to regale my hearers. Michael was willing enough. He took my umbrella, and, standing on the seat, tried to reach the latch of the door above. But he could not do it. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 139 "Let me down, and I'll go out at the'fourth floor." "Can't do that, either," said he. "We're caged all right." "That's a pretty how-de-do. I've got to read to all those people up there." This plainly interested Michael, and having nothing else to do he proceeded to question me. "Is it rade to them? What'll you rade to them for?" "Because they've come to hear me." " And can't they rade for themsilves ? Sure, my Nelly is only eight, and she can rade." He was plainly surprised that in this enlightened age such people as he had seen climb the stairs needed to be read to. While he was revolving it in his mind Mrs. At water came into the hall again. " For mercy sakes I What are you doing ? " "We're stuck. I'm afraid I can't get out." "Oh, goodness, but you must come out. Michael, can't you squeeze a little higher and let Mr. Harland out? It's awfully late, and so many of the people are suburbanites, and they are fidgeting." Michael now seemed to realize for the first time that the case was important. He scratched his head vigorously and finally seemed on the point of saying something, when there came a voice from below. "Mike!" "What is it?" "Stay up there. There's something broke, and I've telephoned for a man. Don't bring her down." "I won't," said Michael with a wink at me. Mrs. Atwater had come down to the half landing. "What thall I do, Mr. Harland ? All the tickets are bought and paid for, and I hate to give the money back, because the Sunshine Day Nursery needs it so. Could you give the reading to-morrow?" "You mean if I get out in time? No; I go West to-morrow to be gone until the end of the season. I might give it in here," said I, jokingly. "Why, to be sure," said matter-of-fact Mrs. Atwater. But I could hear her saying in her earnest voice: "Mr. Harland is stuck between floors on that miserable elevator and he can't get out. 140 WERNER'S READINGS How many are willing to liste'n to him in the hall? All those in favor of it will please signify it in the usual manner." There was a perfect shout of "ayes." "Contrary minded." There were a few feeble "noes," but the question was carried, and out came Mrs. Atwater, her face wreathed in smiles, and said: "It's all right. They can sit on the stairs and in the two halls and they'll hear you perfectly well." Something seemed to strike Michael as funny; but Mrs. Atwater has a very limited sense of the ridiculous. I suppose if I had been doing it merely to oblige I would have refused, but the seventy-five dollars that was to become mine at the end of the reading was — well, let those who can, throw seventy-five dollars away. I have never formed the habit of doing so. So the people poured out with camp-stools — most of them women, with a sprinkling of girls, and here and there a man. It took them some. minutes to get seated, and then they had to make way for a stout man who lived on the sixth floor, and who looked an astonishment that was too deep for words as he made his slow way up through the chattering bevy of femininity. "Ladies and — gentlemen," said I, "I want you to feel that this is quite informal. Platforms, pulpits, and soap-boxes, but never an elevator for a rostrum in all my experience, and yet I've had my share of ups and downs." This provoked a few smiles from the thoughtless, and having broken what ice remained unbroken I said : " Being, as it were, in a cage, there will be a certain appropriateness in my first number, Poe's 'Raven.' " There was a kid-gloved clapping of hands, a unanimous squeak of camp-stools, and then I began, while Michael sat at my side and stared at me: "'Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, — While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping ' " (Voice from main hall: "Mike, what are you doing up there?") AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 141 This was followed by the ringing of the elevator bell and giggles from some of the younger women. Michael (in a whisper): "I'd like to answer him, sir; that's Mr. Hunt, the agent." " Go ahead," said I. "Mr. Hunt," said Michael, calling down the shaft, "we're stuck between the fourt' and fift' floors, and a gentleman is radin' to the people." "What's that?" came back in stentorian tones. Michael repeated his information, and then we heard a heavy tread and Mr. Hunt came up. I never shall forget the expression of his face when he saw the crowd of women sitting in the halls and on the stairs. "What in — time is the matter?" I should have liked to sink down the shaft, — in the elevator, — but Mrs. Atwater explained to him in her tense, important way that the reading had been booked for that hour in aid of the Sunshine Day Nursery, and that as Mahomet couldn't ccms to the mountain the mountain had come to Mahomet. "Well, I'll be s wiggled," was all that Mr. Hunt said. I sat down beside Michael and idly fingered the pretty volume of Poe's poems. "I think you'd better begin again," said Mrs. Atwater smiling sweetly at me, " I don't believe there will be any more interruptions, now that Mr. Hunt knows what's the matter." I was not so sure of that, for I heard hammering in the basement and judged that the machinists had come. I began again and read along swimmingly for several verses. Although it is highly improbable that Michael understood the meaning of the poem, he was alive to the rhythm of the thing, for he kept audible time with his heavy foot until I brought one of mine down on it with decision, and then he stopped, while I went on: "'Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing '" "Wishing that the door they'd ope and let me out upon the floor." This interpolated line, as I afterward learned, came from a young 142 WERNER'S READINGS Harvard man who was home for the Easter vacation. However, I affected not to hear him and went on: "'Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken '" Only it wasn't, for here a voice from 'way below called out: " Mike, where's that monkey-wrench?" "Oh, for the love of heaven, will ye never stop? Kin I answer him, sir?" "Yes, answer him, Michael." "Be the furnace door, I told ye before. Shut up. A gentleman's radin' a story to me." "Chase yerself," was the derisive message from below, and then I cut in with: '"And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?"'" Suddenly the impossibility of the whole thing came over me and I looked appealingly at Mrs. Atwater, hoping that she would relieve me; but she was evidently for seeing the thing through to its end, so I continued : "'This I whispered '" "Did you say the wrench was by the furnace door?" This chimed so perfectly with the rhythm that every one noticed it, and I could hear the young collegian chuckling in his room; but now I was angry and determined to go on, no matter what happened. "'This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore:" Merely this and nothing more.'" As if to give me the lie at this juncture a noise like that of a newly opened boiler factory came up the shaft. The workmen were ham- mering on metal of some kind, and the din came to us as if our ears were at a speaking-tube. Hammer ! hammer ! hammer ! One line was rendered inaudible, so I shouted the next: "'Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.'" This was too much even for Mrs. Atwater, and she dissolved in smiles behind her fan. As for the rest of the audience, they repre^ sented every form of laugh. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 143 "Mrs. Atwater," said I, "this has degenerated into a farce and is no longer a reading. I simply can't do anything more until we are released from this. Do you suppose we ever shall get out of here?" " ' Quoth the raven, " Nevermore. " '" (This from the collegian.) But at this moment there was a cry from below: "All right up there." And Michael, pulling the wire cable, we began to ascend, and a minute later I stepped out upon the fifth floor. I was followed by my audience, excepting Michael, who went to the regions below. "Now, Mrs. Atwater," I said, "we will continue the reading without further interruptions." When I left the apartments an hour later I walked down the stairs. An elevator can depress as well as elevate. A BOY'S THANKSGIVING. LYDIA MARIA CHILD. OVER the river and through the wood To grandfather's house we go ; The horse knows the way to carry the sleigh Through the white and drifted snow. Over the river and through the wood! Oh, how the wind does blow! 3t stings the toes and bites the nose As over the ground we go. Over the river and through the wood, And straight through the barnyard gate, We seem to go extremely slow; It is so hard to wait! Over the river and through the wood ! Now grandmother's cap I spy ! Hurrah for the fun ! Is the pudding done ? Hurrah for the pumpkin pie ! 144 WERNER'S READINGS | THE LOUIS D'OR. WHEN Lucien de Hem saw his last bill for a hundred francs clawed by the banker's rake; when he rose from the roulette- table where he had just lost the debris of his little fortune, scraped together for this supreme battle, he experienced something like vertigo, and thought that he should fall. His brain was muddled; his legs were limp and trembling. He threw himself upon the leather lounge that circumscribed the gambling-table. For a few minutes he mechan- ically followed the clandestine proceedings of that hell in which he had sullied the best years of his youth ; recognized the worn profiles of the gamblers under the merciless glare of the three great shadeless lamps; listened to the clicking and the sliding of the gold over the felt ; realized that he was bankrupt, lost; remembered that in the top drawer of his dressing-table lay a pair of pistols — the very pistols of which General de Hem, his father, had made noble use at the attack of Zaatcha; then, overcome by exhaustion, he sank into a heavy sleep. When he awoke his mouth was clammy and his tongue stuck to his palate. He realized by a hasty glance at the clock that he had scarcely slept a half-hour, and he felt the imperious necessity of going out to get a breath of the fresh night air. The hands on the dial pointed exactly to a quarter to twelve. As he rose and stretched his arms, it occurred to him that it was Christmas Eve. Just then old Dronski came up to Lucien muttering something behind his dirty grayish beard. "Lend me five francs, will you, Monsieur? I haven't stirred from this place for two days, and for two whole days seventeen hasn't come out once. You may laugh at me all you like, but I'll bet you my fist that when the clock strikes twelve, seventeen will be the win- ning number." Lucien de Hem shrugged his shoulders; and, fumbling through his pockets, he found that he had not even money enough to comply ivith that feature of gambling etiquette known among the frequenters of the establishment as "Pole's hundred cents." He passed into the antechamber, put on his hat and cloak, and disappeared down the AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 145 narrow stairway with the agility of people who have a fever. During the four hours that Lucien had spent in the den it had snowed heavily; and the street, one of those wedges between two rows of high buildings in the very heart of Paris, was intensely white. Above, in the calm blue-black of the sky, cold stars glittered. The exhausted gambler shivered under his furs, and hurried along with a blank despair in his heart, thinking of the pistols that awaited him in the top drawer of his dressing-table. He had gone a hundred feet when he stopped suddenly before a heartrending spectacle. On a stone bench, near the monumental doorway of a wealthy residence, sat a little girl, six or seven years old, barely covered by a ragged gown. She had fallen asleep there in spite of the bitter cold, her body bent forward in a pitiful posture of resigned exhaustion. Her poor little head and her dainty shoulder had moulded themselves into the angle of the freezing wall. One of her worn slippers had fallen from her dangling foot and lay in the snow before her. Lucien de Hem mechanically thrust his hand into his vest-pocket, but he remembered that he had not even been able to fee the club-waiter. He went up to the child, however, impelled by an instinct of pity, when suddenly he saw something glitter in the little slipper at his feet. He stooped. It was a louis d'or. Some charitable woman had passed there, and at the pathetic sight of the little shoe in the snow had remembered the poetic Christmas legend, and with discreet fingers had dropped a splendid gift, so that the forsaken little one might still believe in the presents of the Christ Child, and might awake with renewed faith in the midst of her misery. A gold louis. That meant many days of rest and comfort to the little beggar. Lucien was just about to awaken her and surprise her with her good fortune, when in a strange hallucination he heard a voice in his ear, which whispered with the drawling inflection of the old Pole: "I haven't stirred from this place for two days, and for two whole days seventeen hasn't come out once. You may laugh at me all you like, but I'll bet you my fist that when the clock strikes twelve, seventeen will be the winning number." Then this youth, who was twenty-three years of age, the descendant of a race of honest men — this youth who bore a greai military name, 146 WERNER'S READINGS and had never been guilty of an unmanly act — conceived a monstrous thought; an insane desire tcok possession of him. He looked anxiously up and down the street, and having assured himself that he had no witness, he knelt, and reached out cautiously with trembling fingers, stole the treasure from the little shoe, then rose with a spring and ran breathlessly down the street. He rushed like a madman up the stairs of the gambling-house, flung open the door with his fist, and burst into the rooms at the first stroke of midnight. He threw the gold on the table and cried: "Seventeen!" Seventeen won. He then pushed the whole pile on the "red." The red won. He left the seventy-two louis on the same color. The red came out again. He doubled the stakes, twice, three times, and always with the same success. Before him was a huge pile of gold and bank-notes. He tried the "twelve," the "column" — he worked every combination. His luck was something unheard of, something almost supernatural. One might have believed that the little ivory ball, in its frenzied dance around the table, had been bewitched, mag- netized, by this feverish gambler, and obeyed his will. With a few bold strokes he had won back the bundle of bank-notes which he had lost in the early part of the evening. Then he staked two or three hundred louis at a time, and, as his fantastic luck never failed him, he soon won back the whole capital that had constituted his inherited fortune. In his haste to begin the game he had not even thought of taking off his fur-lined coat, the great pockets of which were now swollen with the rolls of bank-notes and heavy with the weight of the gold. Everything became a recipient. And still he played and still he won. But, withal, there was a gnawing at his heart, something that felt like a red-hot iron there, and he could not rid himself of the vision of the child asleep in the snow — the child he had robbed. "In just a few minutes," said he, "I will go back to her. She must be there in the same place. Of course she must be there. I will make it right to her — it will be no crime. When the clock strikes again I will stop, I will go straight to where she is, I will take her up in my arms and will carry her home with me asleep. I have done AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 147 her no harm ; I have made a fortune for her. I will keep her with me and I will educate her; I will love her as I would a child of my own, and I will take care of her, —always, as long as she lives!" But the clock struck one, a quarter past, half-past, and Lucien was still there. Finally, a few minutes before two the man opposite him rose brusquely, and said in a loud voice: "The bank is broken, gentlemen; this will do to-night." Lucien started and wedged his way brutally through the group of gamblers, who pressed around him in envious admiration, hurried out into the street and ran as fast as he could toward the stone bench. In a moment he saw by the light of the gas that the child was still there. "God be praised!" said he, and his heart gave a great throb of joy. Yes, here she was! He took her little hand in his. Poor little hand, how cold it was! He caught her under the arms and lifted her. Her head fell back, but she did not wake. He pressed her close to his breast to warm her, and with a vague presentment he tried to rouse her from this heavy sleep by kissing her eyelids. But he realized then with horror that the child's eyes were dull, glassy, fixed. He put his lips to the child's mouth; he felt no breath. While Lucien had been building a fortune with the louis stolen from this little one, she, homeless and forsaken, had perished with cold. Lucien felt a suffocating knot at his throat. In his anguish he tried to cry out; and in the effort which he made he awoke from his nightmare, and found himself on the leather lounge in the gambling- room, where he had fallen asleep a little before midnight. The garcon of the den had gone home about five o'clock, and out of pity had not awakened him. A misty December dawn made the window-panes pale. Lucien went out, pawned his watch, took a bath, then went over to the Bureau of Recruits, and enlisted as a volunteer in the First Regiment of the Chasseurs d' Afrique. Lucien de Hem is now a lieutenant. He has not a cent m the world but his pay. He manages to make that do, however, for he is a steady officer, and never touches a card. He even contrives to econo- 148 WERNER'S READINGS mize, it would seem; for a few days ago a comrade, who was following him up one of the steep streets of the Kasba, saw him stop to lay a piece of money in the lap of a little Spanish girl who had fallen asleep in a doorway. His comrade was startled at the poor lieutenant's generosity, for this piece of money was a gold louis. THE OLD APPLE TREE. H. COYLE. HERE'S the old apple tree, where in boyhood I sported, When my heart was as light as the blossoms it bore; Where my old maiden aunt by the parson was courted, In her prim cap and gown such as ladies then wore. On this rude oaken bench, 'neath bending boughs seated, While the wild bee was humming its song in the tree, There we children oft-times by our elders were treated To share with their gossip some cakes and weak tea. Look ! here are the names of the many now sleeping, Of dear parents and kindred long gone to the tomb ; The old apple tree, like a true friend, is heaping The oak bench they sat on with beauty and bloom. In the glad days of spring, when the spirit rejoices, Where the old apple tree looks as gay as a bride, I could dream that I heard every one of the voices Of the friends who sat here on the bench at my side. Every rudely carved name has a story to tell me — And that true lover's knot, I remember it well; It was carved on the day when my first grief befell me, The day of my parting from sweet Isabel. Oh, the old apple tree, where in boyhood I sported, And the rude oaken bench, they are still in their place; But the dear household faces whose welcome I courted, They have vanished and left me the last in the race. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 149 THE STRANDED SHIP. L. CLARKE DAVIS. THE hero of our story, Luke Conner, was an outcast from society. When he was graduated from Harvard at the head of his class seven years before, all blessings of life seemed his — abundant means, superb physical health, and hosts of friends. But the very night of the commencement a letter was handed him, telling him that his sister, the last of his kin, was lying dead in their home; had died con- fessing an awful wrong and shame, and the man, who had wrought this wrong, was his friend, his classmate here, his old school and play- fellow at home. That was the bitter part of it all — his friend ! Stunned, maddened by the shock, he pursued and killed the man, and then gave himself up to justice, expecting and desiring death; but the jury acquitted him and he left the country. After remaining abroad several years, he returned and is spending a few weeks on the Jersey coast. Here he meets Professor Daunton, one of his college professors, who is there with his sister. A strong attachment .springs up between Conner and Margaret Daunton, and the Professor is much troubled; he cannot bear that his darling sister shall marry a murderer, yet how can he ruin the young man by telling his sad story? It was under these circumstances that, at the breaking of the day the guests at the old farmhouse were awakened from sleep by the discharge of a solitary gun, so near and distinct that it startled the sleepers from their beds. It was followed by a second report, and by others. There was hurried dressing and a quick tramp to the sea, for the slow-booming guns told of a wreck. Professor Daunton and Margaret hurried on with the rest. They got down in time to see the men and horses thundering along the hard beach, with the life-boats on their rough carriages surrounded by the yelling wreckers, grim, and alert like artillerymen hurrying to the front, full of the fire and bravery of the battle. The horses flew along untouched by whip or goad, as if they knew the necessity for speed; but when they arrived opposite to the stranded wreck, against which 150 WERNER'S READINGS the waves thumped mercilessly, there fell a dead silence among them all, they looked toward the monster wreck, and then into one another's faces, hopeless, dismayed. It was no use. No boat could live in such a sea. It was an emigrant ship from Liverpool, and about her decks and lower rigging clung her helpless doomed passengers and crew, as thick as bees about the hive. Captain Brown stood apart from his men talking to the Professor and Margaret. "Is there no help for these poor people, Captain Brown?" she asked. "Surely, you can do something, Do not let them go down into the sea before our eyes without making a single effort, Captain!" "It's no use, Margaret, she's doomed, that ship is, and she'll go down before our eyes, and we can't help 'em." "I am not a strong man, Captain Brown," said the Professor slowly, " but I was accounted a good stroke once in the Cambridge crew, and I should like to make one of a party to attempt the rescue of those people." " You would — you? Then by the good Lord, Professor, I'll make another. Hello men! Who'll volunteer to go out there with a line to that ship? It's a desprit service, but Professor Daunton is going an' I'm going; an' now who else'll go? "Good for you, Bill Shadrack! Good for you, Tom Hemphill; you're men, you are. Now, some more of you as has'nt got anybody at home. Who's the next man to go into the boat?" Two others instantly volunteered, and, despite the cries of children and wives, the men leaped into the boat; and each one, with a last look shoreward, quietly poised his oar in the air, stiffened himself in his place, and sat solemnly watching the mountainous wave over which he was to be hurled. Half a hundred brawny hands seized the boat and tried to launch her, unsuccessfully at first, but on the fourth trial she plunged into the breakers, and in the next moment was thrown high and dry upon the beach, smashed like an egg-shell; her crew of six all safe, but a good deal bruised and hurt. "I told you it was no use, Professor," the Captain said. "I know a sea when I see it, and I knowed no boat could live a minute out there." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 151 "God help them all, for only He can now," and the Professor turned away sick at heart. 5j» 3|C 5j» *!» 5j£ n* *P *P "What chance, Captain?" It was a pleasant voice that had asked the question. The old wrecker looked up at the gigantic figure of the speaker on horseback. "Captain Conner, there is no chance for them poor souls on that wreck. Only God and a miracle will ever let them see home again." "Only God and a miracle?" "Yes— jest that." "Have you tried the boat?" "Does that look as if we had tried the boat?" and the old wrecker pointed to where the shattered fragments lay strewn about the beach. "Very much like it, Captain Brown; but are there no more volun- teers?" Without waiting for answer he rode down to the wreckers. " My men, you know me, you know that I can make my offer good ; I will give a thousand dollars to every man who lends a hand to carry a line to that ship!" A dead silence among the men and dark scowls among the women. "What, no answer? You want more? Well, you shall have it. Any six of you stand out there and name your price; don't be afraid." No man stirred; the women crept closer to their husbands, glaring savagely at Conner. "You won't go? Then let one man alone swim to that ship and he shall be the owner of Captain Brown's sea-farm. I will give it out and out to the man who swims to that ship." Still no answer. "Why, you cowards, are you afraid of a bit of dirty water, or of some salt spray washing over you? Will nothing tempt you?" "We are not cowards, Captain Conner, but no boat can live out there; it has been tried," a wrecker said doggedly. "Try it again, you cowards; you have been upon the sea all your miserable lives, and yet not a man of you will stir." The bitter words were scarcely uttered, when a gaunt old fishwife, her arms bare to the shoulders, her face as brown as the dead kelp, seized his bridle, and with a quick jerk threw his horse back upon his haunches. 152 WERNER'S READINGS "Cowards are we," she cried, "then what are you? What are you coming here to tempt to their certain death these men with children and wives? Why don't you go yourself? What is your dirty money to you? You never worked for it, no, not a penny of it. You never worked in storm and sleet, in hail and snow, for a dollar a day at saving human lives. Go carry a line to the ship yourself, and save your filthy bribes, you murderer, and earn the right to call our sons and husbands cowards. Go yourself!" When the word "murderer" escaped her lips, his cheeks blanched and he grew dizzy for a moment, but recovering himself, he leaned forward in his saddle. " My friends, I was wrong, and the good wife is right. I will carry a line to the ship." The old woman stared hard into the man's face; but something she saw in the calm solemn eyes of Luke Conner told her that he meant to do it, and it chilled the blood in her heart. "You," she cried, "you carry a line to yon poor wretches! It can't be done, Captain Luke, it can't be done, I tell you. I didn't mean to be rough an' make you do a mad thing like that. You can't save 'em, Captain Luke! Only God can do that." "Then, under God, I will do it." She turned fiercely upon the wreckers. They liked this young fellow who threw his money around among them so lavishly and was a "hail fellow well met" with the humblest of them all. " Do you mean to let him throw his life away before your eyes ? If you do you are greater cowards than he called you just now. You speak to him, Captain Brown, he'll mind you." The young fellow leaped from his horse. "Captain Brown, I propose to carry a line to yonder ship. You said a while ago only God and a miracle could save those poor people there." "Yes, I did say that." "Well, Captain, is not your God as strong and able to help His people to-day as He was nineteen hundred years ago?" The old wrecker's eyes measured and weighed the sturdy giant before he spoke. "This are'nt the time of miracles, Capt'n Luke, now— look for AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 153 yourself — can you carry a line out yonder? Can any man do it?" Luke Conner deliberately surveyed the prospect before him; he saw all the danger, all the necessity, too, and felt how desperate the chances really were, but to his soul it was a solemn message from his God, which he would obey. "I can try," he said, "the most of the danger lies there in that first breaker; there is some in the second, and less in the third; if I could pass the three lines of breakers, the tide would favor me, and I could feel almost certain of success. Will you help me?" The Captain turned to his men for counsel, but the wreckers shook their heads. "It's no use, Capt'n Luke, it are'nt in mortal power to do it, an' we aren't goin' to stan' by an' see you dashed to pieces on this shore." " I am only one man, and there are at least a hundred on that ship. She cannot last much longer with that sea hammering the life out of her at every stroke." An awful piercing cry went up from the wreck, drowning the beat of the waves and the roar of the wind. The men turned — the vessel had parted amidships, and men and women were struggling in the sea, clinging desperately to fragments of the wreck. The old wrecking-master gave a signal glance at this new and imminent danger, and then said, "I'll help you, there's not a man here as won't help you. Now, when will you be ready?" "In a few minutes. Get out the lines at once, and let the first be light and strong as possible." It spread around among the people on the beach that Captain Conner intended carrying a line to the wreck. Margaret's face had grown pallid and haggard since she had heard the story. "Let us say good-by quickly," he said, "I must go at once." But the fierce love surging in her woman's heart mastered her, and she threw her arms about him and held him close to her breast. "O God!" she cried, "I daren't do what is right. I cannot let you go, Luke, I cannot let you go," and she sank down motionless upon the sands. "Are ycu quite ready, Capt'n Conner?" the wrecking-master asked a few minutes later, wiping great beads of sweat from his face. 154 WERNER'S READINGS "All ready, Captain." The voice was blithe and cheery, the man's step was free and assured. The old wrecking-master securely fastened the thin strong cord about his shoulders and under his arms. That was made fast to a thicker, stronger cord, and that in its turn to a cable of sufficient strength to sustain the life-car. As the mountainous wave rolled in foaming and hungry, he murmured, " God be merciful to me, a sinner." The thundering wave reared its awful crest and poised itself for the break upon the shore; he sprang forward, plunging headlong under it. Then the men about the ropes stood ready to receive back again his body with life or without it. But it did not return to them on the wave, and with terror on their faces, they turned to watch the line that slowly uncoiled itself and glided through the master's fingers For a moment they all stood silently watching coil after coil glide away, then the master looked up, his lips white, his hands trembling, "Thank God, mates, he has passed the first breaker." He had, and was thus far safe and he knew he would have a second's breathing-space to prepare himself for the next wave. He saw it as he emerged into the trough of the sea, sweeping down upon him with a mighty surge and roar, but, before it could reach him, he was down again beneath it, and in the undertow of the first breaker, going rapidly out to sea. The villagers and guests of the farm stood looking out among the waves with anxious hopeless faces, but nowhere could they distinguish the head of the swimmer. The line stood still or swayed from side to side, and then ran out rapidly and tightened in the Captain's fingers; again it slackened, and yard after yard of it was flung back to shore on the crest of a wave; the line gathered up and then tightened, giving assurance that Luke Conner was still alive. He was alive and the third breaker had passed harmlessly over him, but between him and the ship there was still nearly a quarter of a mile of mad turbulent sea, rolling and heaving before the wind on which he was tossed like a cork. On each wave he rose and fell, now going ahead, now losing in one moment more than he had gained in three, yet on the whole surely lessening the distance between him and the ship, for the tide carried him forward. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 155 By the side of the old Captain stood Margaret Taunton very quiet, pale, and tearless, watching every movement of the line. Directly they came to know by its decreasing coils that either he had drifted far away from it or that he was near the ship. The minutes seemed to have crept into hours, hours into days, and the cord glided away, or stood still, or was washed shoreward. But in the moment that hope was greatest in their hearts, yards and yards of the slender cord glided swift as lightning through their hands, and the Captain sprang forward and hauled it fiercely in. "What is it, Captain Brown? What is it that is wrong?" " Nothing wrong, Miss Margaret, but more nor an hour is gone, and we should a-drawed in afore now." A frightened whisper went through the crowd, and killed every particle of hope within her. What she heard was this, "There be a dead man, and a shark at tother end of that line." Suddenly she started up from among them, her hand tossing back from her eyes the golden splendor of her hair, her right arm stretched straight out before her, her voice ringing: "No, no, no, you mistake, see there! See there! Look at the ship, and thank God, O thank God, all of you!" They turned their eyes to where the white arm pointed, and they saw a man dragged up from among the jib-chains of the wrecked ship; they saw him mount to the deck, and heard the passengers and crew shout out their joyful cry of deliverance. "Now, then," the old Captain yelled, "can't you men raise a single cheer for the brave fellow who was saved a hundred lives?" No, they could not, the old Captain could not do it himself; their sudden gladness after their sharp pain was choking them. But the moment gone, they shouted till they were hoarse, and then all of them went to work like men who had just waked up and were beginning a new day, every one of them working like six. Away spun the line, and away until the last strong cable of all was made fast to the ship, drawn taut, and then along spun the life- car with a couple of brave fellows in it to the wreck. In five minutes it was back again on shore. The sturdy wreckers worked with a will and dragged the life-car to and from the ship, until every man, woman, 153 WERNER'S READINGS and child was landed. When the last load came ashore, every one crowded down as near to the sea as they could get, waiting to welcome their hero among them again. When he landed what a shout they sent up. The rescued drew near to him, craving only to touch the man who had conquered sea and land, delivering from the jaws of death a hundred lives. WHEN FATHER RODE THE GOAT. THE house is full of arnica And mystery profound ; We do not care to run about Or ~\ " e the slightest sound. We lc •■' ' piano shut Ana do n„, su'ike a note; The doctor's been here seventeen times Since father '•ode the goat. l lined ti±v odge a week ago — * \ M. Ai . . brethren brought him home, Though he says that he brought them. His wri' ;.as vp>-ained and one big rip Had rent hr unday coat — There must have been a lively time When father i ode the goat. He's resting on the couch to-day And practising his signs — The hailing signal, working grip, And other monkey-shines ; He mutters passwords 'neath his breath, And other things he'll quote — They surely had an evening's work When father rode the goat. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. li-7 He has a gorgeous uniform, All gold and red and blue, A hat with plumes and yellow braid, And golden badges, too, But, somehow, when we mention it, He wears a look so grim, We wonder if he rode the goat, Or if the goat rode him. WINNING HIM BACK. ANITA VIVANTI SCHARTRES. [From " Smart Set," by special permission.] " /^\NE always has to win a man back after one has married him," \_J said Fifine. "Win — him — back!" mused Grace. "How does one do it?" "By keeping up the Houp-la." "The what?" "My dear Gracie, did it ever occur to you that no one at school ever spoke about my mother? ' Everybody spoke about my father, the Count de La Corderie, but we always skipped my mother. That is because she was a dear little circus-girl with fluffy skirts, who perched on the backs of fat, white horses, and leaped through paper rings. My father fell in love with her because of the funny little way in which she used to cry 'Houp-la!' just before turning a somersault on the galloping horse. After she was married, she never allowed him to fall out of love with her. And she told me she did it — ' by keeping up the Houp-la.'" "But what did she mean?" "'The Houp-la,'" she used to say to me, "'is to married life what the sparkle is to champagne; nothing definite — but how essential!'" "I suppose it is all very lucid to you, but I do not see anything that applies to me or to Tom. And Tom was perfectly heartless 158 WERNER'S READINGS this morning. When I looked out of the window after him, he only just turned around once to wave his hand." "Now, then, to-morrow do not go to the window at all. If he mentions the fact, say, ' Dear, dear, did I forget ? ' And henceforward keep a little shadow of mystery over your soul, and let your eyes be dreamy. Spring surprises upon him. Pack up a powder-puff and a silk petticoat, and let him find you watch a cab at the door, going away forever! Take poison one day. Be shot at by a frenzied lover the next." "It sounds dreadfully wearing." " Oh, well, of course, if you are satisfied to be like everv other wretched wife, do it in your own way," said Fifine rising. " Are you sure it will work, Fifine?" "Sure? Of course, I am sure. Have I not tried it on Regi- nald?" "Who is Reginald?" "My dear. He is a tall, gentlemanly angel." "Oh, Fifine, to think that you are engaged, and that you have never told me!" "Well, I am not exactly engaged." "Perhaps, darling, a little less Houp-la — " Fifine cast a glance of withering scorn at her friend. "I will help you with your affairs, Grace, if you wish me to ; but I will manage mine in my own way." Little did Mr. Thomas Carrington know what was going on in his household in the days that followed. Grace resolved that she would be a stranger to him. But he came home in a very good humor, and did all the talking himself. So she left off being a stranger, and detemined to be dreamy, morbid, and unwholesome. When he came into the house redolent of perfumes, he said "Phew! You have had those wretched old maids, the Harrisons, up here again for tea. I smell them. Open up, Gracie, and let us have some fresh air." With Fifine, Grace practised fainting until she ached all over, and she arranged herself on the floor when she heard Tom's key in AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 159 the door down-stairs. But her little sister came in and tickled her so she had to get up and race around the table. "I don't know what to do," she said dejectedly to Fifine, "I don't seem to have won him back a bit." "I have done all these things successfully with Reginald, because, you see, he does not live in the house. He just comes in and sees me and is terribly moved; then I wave my hand weakly and say, 'Go! go!' as I fall back unconscious. And he goes. You must be shot at by a frenzied lover, Grace. That is infallible. You first take the bodice of a dress that you don't care about. And you shoot it through the sleeve. Then you put a piece of mustard plaster on your arm. When you take it off again the skin is sore and red, and that is where the bullet grazed past you. Of course, you refuse to divulge the man's name. But you will see how excited and anxious and adoring your Tom will be." Grace was inclined to scoff. "I will do it, Fifine, but it is against my better judgment." They found an old black bodice, and they took Tom's revolver and went down into the yard to do the shooting. They pinned the bodice to the wooden fence that separated their yard from the neighbor's and Fifine shot at it. They never knew how it happened, but the yard was suddenly full of people, and there were two policemen hold- ing the cook, who was struggling and shouting and kicking. The negro servant from the other side of the fence had come in, and was accusing the cook of already having tried to murder her three or four times. At this point a policeman took hold of Grace with one hand and of Fifine with the other, and said to the policeman who was holding he cook: "Bring them all along to the police station." The policeman got forty dollars and went away. The two girls wept hysterically and the cook left without notice, after getting very drunk, "This is my last suggestion," said Fifine. "I lay awake all night thinking it out — it is perfect! In order to make Tom jealous, you must have another man who sends you presents, flowers, letters, jewels Well, you get a man to send you a priceless gem — " 160 WERNER'S READINGS "Fifine, I have not got a man who will send me a priceless gem." "Of course not. But this is what yOu do. You go to a jeweler; you select a ring; you pay and take it on approval. Then you send it to yourself, with a bunch of flowers and a love-letter. Your husband finds all. He makes a scene of jealousy. You win him back. Then you return the ring to the jeweler, who refunds you the money. Thc:e ,you are!" Grace had sixty dollars, and Fifine knew a jeweler not far off. At the jeweler's, Fifine explained: "We wish to look at some handsome rings — what one would call priceless gems." Rosenstein showed them a diamond ring at two thousand dollars, an emerald ring at eighteen hundred dollars, and a pearl-and-diamond ring at four hundred dollars. " We want something cheaper," said Grace. He looked at the two ladies a moment, then brought a ring — some small diamonds around a large ruby. " And what a wonderful ruby," said Grace. "Vahnderful! I should say," agreed Rosenstein. "How much?" "Only two hahndred and feefty dahlars." "Laisscr-moi faire. Nonsense, Mr. Rosenstein. You asK two hundred and fifty — you are going to get a hundred. Of which we will give you sixty on account." "Ach! vaht a vahnderful calculator! Vaht I gif to haf such a beesiness voman in my beesiness!" He took Grace's address and the two friends went home in at pleasant flutter of excitement. "Oh, we forgot the flowers, Grace!" " And we have barely time to write the letter before Tom gets home, Fifine." "I'll run and order the flowers, dear. Hold my satchel. The ring is in it. You go up-'stairs and write the letter yourself; don't be afraid of making it passionate," and Fifine was gone. Grace opened the little bag and took the ring out, dropping a AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 163 who arrived with a large box of bonbons. She was going down, when she heard Rosenste-in's voice. She was on the second landing, when she saw her husband come in. "I vish to see Mrs. Carrington," said Rosenstein. "She hat from me, yesterday, a ruby ring." "Well, Mr. Wilkins," said Tom, "you got your ring back! and you are a cad and a blackguard." Mr. Wilkins arose from the sofa. "I beg your pardon. I think there is some mistake." "Dis man ant his wife are teifs. There is the voman!" "Will you allow me," said the real Wilkins stepping forward with raised hand. "Dere's my ruby ring, vaht you owe me de balance on, and vaht you say you returned, you many tiefs!" The bell had rung, and Collins had shown in Fifine. "Dere is de oder voman, do oder tief." "Oh, Tom! pay him, it is only forty dollars." "Tree hahndred and feefty dahlars, not one cent less, or I haf you all arrested." "Is this your ring?" asked Wilkins. "Why, take it — and get out!" "Ah! Gott im Himmel, you haf changed de stone. Dat's no ruby; dat's a piece of glass. Tree hahndred and feefty dahlars, or you all go to jail." Mr. Wilkins bought the ring, Rosenstein hurried to the door. "De ruby alone as a vahnderful imitation is vorth — " He left! There were explanations. "Is this yours?" Fifine asked of Mr. Wilkins, holding up the box of sweets. "No, deahwest, it is yours," said Reginald. "And so is this, if you will do me the honor," and he tried to slip the ruby ring on her finger. "You angel!" said Fifine; "go ahead!" And he went ahead. And she went with him, arm in arm— for all time. "I hope, dear," said Tom to Grace, "that you will not win me back any more. It upsets things so!" 164 WERNER'S READINGS A GARDEN PLOT. JULIA TRUITT BISHOP. TWO very fai at -hearted young people were looking at one another over the back fence of the vegetable-garden. " Of course, if you say so, I'll go to my paternal ancestor and speak to him about it," said the young man, resignedly. "I might as well take out a good slice of life insurance before I start. But if I do go you've got to promise that you'll go to your mother. I'm not going to run all the risks!" " Oh, yes, I suppose I'll have to go," said the girl, desperately. " And I'm just as afraid as I can be. I know there's some plot against us. Your father came to see mamma yesterday about something, and mamma looked at me just awfully after he had gone. I've been afraid to speak to her ever since!" "Maybe they're going to send you back to school again. I won't have it, Nell, and that's the end of it. If it comes to that, we'll run away'" "Oh, Tom, we can't! I'll — -I'll speak to mamma — and see you here to-morrow evening. Or why not come to the house? Mamma never has said you couldn't, you know." "Oh, but the way she looks at me! Not by a whole lot, Nell! We'll trust to these cold-hearted cabbages instead." Whereupon the two parted with such evidences of affection as the vines permitted, and went valiantly forth to make confession. Nell found her mother writing at her little desk in the corner; but at Nell's approach Mrs. Grayson shut and locked the desk with a snap, and turned an accusing face upon her daughter. There was no doubt that she knew all! Nell's heart beat a hurried double tattoo, and her nicely composed, dutiful little speech died on her lips. All that she managed to say was "Mamma!" Mrs. Grayson turned pale. "You had better go to your own room," she said, with austere dignity, "and remain there till you can listen to reason and talk over matters calmly." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 105 Mrs. Grayson swept out of the room, and thus abruptly ended Nell's confession. Tom, gifted with a knowledge of men that should make of him a diplomat some day, waited until Colonel Drane had eaten a remark- ably good dinner and was stretched at ease in a capacious chair. "I have come to speak to you, sir, about a certain matter — " Quick as a flash the Colonel was up, with an apoplectic look on his countenance. "You will do nothing of the kind, sir!" he shouted. "I know exactly what you would say! Well, sir, you needn't say it! My mind is fully made up! Not a word, sir! You may go! I wish to be alone!" And thus abruptly ended Tom's confession. The next day the butter -bean vines received two new experiences — the one very tearful and the other full of very determined laughter, "She sent for him to-day!" sobbed the tearful one. "I know I'll be sent away now. I heard him talking loud in there, and telling her something about not paying any attention to two children." "You are eighteen and I am twenty-three," said the laughing one. "Two good-sized children, I should think. I have the license in my pocket, Nellie. Run and get your hat, and come around to the side gate. We'll go up to Mr. Morrison's and be married. He's been married lately himself, and'll know how to sympathize with us." "Run away? Oh, Tom, let's not run away!" But the young man on the other side of the fence had the license, and, besides, he had the girl's heart. It began to be apparent that there was no other way. The end of it was that Nell came out of the side gate, trembling at every sound in the house she had just left, and she and Tom started off hand in hand, like two children. "Oh, I feel certain she'll overtake me!" "Let's run — we can beat them both running!" suggested Tom. And so they both ran, holding each ether's hand. They arrived at the Rev. Felix Morrison's quite breathless and full of laughter; and Felix Morrison's girl- wife laughed with them, and clapped her hands on hearing that they were going to be married right away. The Reverend Felix himself demurred. They were 166 WERNER'S READINGS both very young — had they presented the matter properly to those who had authority over them ? "Oh, that's all right!" said Tom, cheerfully. "We've done everything we could — begged and implored and entreated — they were hard as a rock. Here's the license — Mrs. Morrison can witness — fire ahead!" "Now do, Felix!" begged the little wife on the other side. "They love each other — almost as much as you and I do. Suppose anything had kept us apart!" The mere supposition of such a thing set the minister's lips and sent a spark into his calm blue eyes. " Stand up!" he said. It was at this awful moment that they heard the sharp click of the gate-latch, and Nell cast a terrified glance between the lace curtains. The light of the street-lamp showed two figures hurrying up the walk. "Oh, here they both come!" cried Nell, in an agony of fear. "They've followed us! Oh, do save us, somebody!" "Here, into the back parlor!" Mrs. Morrison was already pushing them under the portieres. "Now, do keep still!" she warned. "If you can throw them off the scent," cried Tom, running back and wringing the minister's hand. "If you could just lie a little — " "He can't, but I can!" said Mrs. Morrison, eagerly. "Here they come — what's the use if you don't keep out of sight?" Colonel Drane and Mrs. Grayson might easily have noticed that there was an air of subdued excitement in the parlor to which they were admitted, that Mr. Morrison's hand shook, and that a look of indignation and high resolve was on Mrs. Morrison's face. But the truth was, they did not notice it, for they had larger matters in hand. How guilty did the Reverend Felix feel when he saw Colonel Drane cast a stony glance around the room! ^"Very pleasant weather," said the Reverend Felix, with an air of deep impressiveness. "Very!" said the Colonel, drily. Tom, in the back parlor, groaned in spirit at the sound of that voice. "I thought this morning that we should have rain," ventured Mr. Morrison, firmly; "but the clouds — " " Ah, yes!" said Colonel Drane, curtly. "But we came up to see — " AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 167 "Certainly!" Mr. Morrison hastened to assure him. He felt that he could hear Tom and Nell breathing in the back parlor. "Now for it!" whispered Tom, holding Nell carefully to keep her from fainting. "The worst will be over in a few minutes!" "The fact is," said the Colonel, fixing the unhappy minister with his eye and speaking in an awed voice and with a very red face, "Mrs. Grayson and myself have come up to be married!" Rev. Felix Morrison tottered against the mantelpiece in the front parlor, and Tom tottered against the mantelpiece in the back parlor; but the Colonel went on, belligerently, "We have chosen this method because we do not wish any gossip or remark, and because my son and Mrs. Grayson's daughter have shown themselves so plainly opposed to any hint of it — " Mrs. Felix Morrison had gone off into the back parlor and into hysterics, and was laughing and crying at a great rate. Tom had set Nell down in an easy-chair, and was rubbing his chin with his hand as well as he could for a most undignified grin. "If the young people are opposed to it," said Rev. Mr. Morrison, chokingly, " would it not be better to wait awhile and gain their consent?" "No, sir, it would not!" roared the Colonel, testily. "They have been holding secret meetings and plotting against us for days! I do not propose to be dictated to by two such snips of children! Here is the license, sir. We are both of age, I think. Mrs. Morrison can witness!" And then, as they stood up, two figures swooped down upon them and stood facing them, side by side, holding each other's hand. "Well, father," said Tom, severely, "I must say I am scandalized. Running away to be married! And at your time of life!" "Tom!" ejaculated the Colonel, "Wha' — wha' — " "I wouldn't have thought it of you, mamma!" said Nellie, with much spirit. " To think of you doing such a thing without saying a word to me!" "A pretty thing this will be to get out!" remarked Tom, regarding his father gloomily. "How is a young fellow to get up in the world if his father runs away and gets married every time he takes a notion?" 168 WERNER'S READINGS " And what an example to set before me!" said Miss Nellie, primly. Mrs. Grayson had already sunk into a chair and buried her face in a handkerchief, and now the Colonel sank into another one close by. He felt very weak. "Now that you both know it, Tom," he said, feebly, "I don't mind waiting and being married quietly at home some evening. If you hadn't shown such determined hostility — " "We'll have the wedding at home," said Tom, willing to show a forgiving disposition. " And while we are about it we will have a double wedding — you and Mrs. Grayson, Nell and I." "You! You two!" cried Mrs. Grayson, emerging from her hand- kerchief. "We two," announced Tom, airily. "But you didn't catch tis running away." He spoke with a lofty moral tone, at the same time giving the Reverend Felix a furtive kick. The Colonel had taken time to digest the statement, but now he broke out with a roar of laughter, slapping his knees. "You two!" he roared. "Great Scott! Whoever would have d learned it? How did you ever keep it so close?" After which Mrs. Grayson and Nell were forced to go into the back parlor and give their personal attention to Mrs. Morrison, who seemed about to collapse. SAVE MY SON! VICTORIEN SARDOU. [Scene from the play " Robespierre."] ROBESPIERRE, President of the National Assembly of France, during the Reign of Terror, had unwittingly condemned to death his own son Olivier, whom he had not seen from birth. Olivier's mother Clarisse, and his fiance Therese, are waiting with Robespierre to have Lebas return from prison with Olivier free. The entrance door was pushed open. Lebas came in alone. Olivier was no longer at the prison of La Force! AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 169 "Escaped?" asked Robespierre, breathlessly. "Unfortunately not!" said Lebas, "but taken by order of the Committee of Public Safety, to — where? No one could tell!" "Before the Tribunal!" Clarisse screamed. Robespierre cried breathlessly to Lebas : "Oh, quick! Go down and see!" Lebas rushed off, and Robespierre ran to the window, Clarisse, in mad despair, following him. "If he is — you will, you must, cry out to the people that he is your son!" Therese, drawn from the bedroom by the deafening cries of the crowd, now entered, trembling with fear. The carts were there. She could hear them! She went straight to the window, but Clarisse barred the way. "Oh, no! You must not look at such a spectacle. Better kneel down and pray . . . Pray for those about to die and for us also; yes, for ourselves, pray with all your soul!" Therese fell on her knees and joined her hands, her large blue eyes, brimful of tears, lifted toward the deserted church opposite. The terrible tumult now burst on their ears like the rumble of thunder. The crowd was ushering the first tumbrel into the Rue du Martroy. Discordant strains of revolutionary songs rose above the rumbling of the cart-wheels, the clank of the horses' hoofs and the cracking of whips. Robespierre had. half opened the shutters and tried to distinguish the first cart through the dense crowd. Clarisse struggled with him to look also, but the Incorruptible held her back resolutely. "No; I will look alone!" "Do you see him? Tell me; is he there?" "No." "He is there; I know it!" and again she struggled to reach the window. "I swear to you he is not there!" and, exhausted, he quit hold of her to wipe his brow. The first tumbrel had passed. Olivier was not in the first. But the second? He was perhaps in the second. v , 170 WERNER'S READINGS Clarisse would have cried out in her despair, but she struggled against the mad impulse and suppressed her choking sobs lest she should reveal the awful truth to Therese, who, still on her knees, her eyes turned toward the church, prayed aloud: " Our Father which art in Heaven; hallowed be Thy name; Thy Kingdom come; Thy will be done. . ..." But she was interrupted by another outburst from the mob an- nouncing the second tumbrel. Already scraps of the furies' songs reached her from the distance. " Dansons la Carmagnole! Vive le son Vive le son Dansons la Carmagnole Vive le son Du Canon! . . ." Clarisse, taking advantage in a moment of Robespierre's relaxed vigilance, pressed nearer to the windows. "The second cartload!" "There are two of them," said Robespierre, who, taller than she, could command a more distant view. Two ! Two carts ! It was impossible for Olivier not to be in one of them. "He is' there; I feel it. . . . I tell you, he is there!" In her anxiety to see better, she grew regardless of precaution. Robespierre struggled to draw her from the window. It was madness. She might be seen! Therese still raised her voice, choked with tears, in supplications to Heaven: "Holy Mary, mother of God, fray for us sinners, now, and at the hour of our death. Amen!" A cry of anguish rent the air. Clarisse had recognized Olivier. "There, in that cart!" Robespierre strained his eyes, half dead with fear. . . . "Where? "Where?" He could not see him. "Oh, yes! Yes! there, in the second cart.' That young man standing, his head I AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 171 bent! ..." And, unable longer to contain herself, in the madness of grief, she placed her hand on the window clasp and would have opened it; but, no! she was mistaken! "You see, it is not he!" "Then he must be in another cart. ..." And, worn out with agonizing suspense and excitement, she sank down in a chair. Again the noisy clamor died into the distance. Robespierre took courage now. It was surely the last cart-load. ''You look!" cried Clarisse. ... "I cannot look again!" Oh, if it were the last and this torture at an end! She leaned her head on her hands and closed her eyes in order to see no more, while great silent tears trickled through her fingers. Robespierre lifted the shutters and stopped to look through, but quickly let them fall again. Alas! It was not over! There was still another tumbrel. The buzz of sounds advancing gradually be- tokened it too well! In one bound Clarisse was at the window. "Will it never end?" Robespierre made a gesture to close her mouth. "For God's sake, do not scream!" But Clarisse didmot heed him; she would go out! Out, into the street! Robespierre held her back with fresh entreaties. Maddened by the restraint, she struggled desperately to free herself. Therese, distracted from her orisons by the violence of the scene, turned her head. Seeing Clarisse's state, she understood all in a moment. Olivier was there in one of those tumbrels! Olivier was on the way to the scaffold! . . . And Clarisse, now regardless of consequences, owned the truth. "Oh, yes, Olivier, our Olivier, he is there! They are going to kill him! . . ." "Olivier! kill him!" repeated Therese, half dazed; then the awful reality rushed suddenly upon her. She started to her feet with a cry that echoed through the house. "Olivier going to die? Oh! mamma, mamma!" Robespierre continued his supplications, holding Clarisse^ who still struggled, in his grasp. She would have her son! She would 172 WERNER'S READINGS go and demand him from the executioner ! Every mother there would intercede for her! " If they will not give him to me, let them kill me, kill me with him! I will go! I will go! I must save my son! For God's sake, let me go!" Robespierre implored Therese to help him hold Clarisse back. But his voice was drowned in the roar of the mob that rose and beat against the window-panes like the waves of an angry sea. " Ca ira, ga ira, ga iral" howled the Mamads. Clarisse had now freed herself, and ran to the door to open it. But Robespierre, quick as thought, stood before her and barred the way. "Remain where you are, I charge you!" Then resolutely and solemnly he added : "I myself will go! And if he is in that cart, I will brave all to save him!" Seeing that Clarisse seemed doubtful, he added with emphasis, "I swear it to you!" A flood of tears, tears of gratitude, was Clarisse's only answer. "May you be forgiven all for those brave words!" she sobbed. He led her to. a chair near the window, and, in a state of exhaustion, she allowed herself to be seated. Therese bending over her forgot her own tears in drying those of Clarisse. Robespierre, drawn to the window by a fresh outburst in the street, turned and looked out. There was but one more cart now! The prison escort followed in the rear. It was indeed the last. The last! It was the last cartload. If Olivier was not there, he was saved! But he must be! Alas, he must, where else could he be? Struggling between hope and fear, Clarisse fell on her knees, and with clasped hands prayed aloud. "O Lord, my God! my God! God of mercy and compassion, grant that my child may not be there!" Robespierre, livid to the lips, continued his agonizing watch. Growing anxious at the silence of the Incorruptible, Clarisse would have risen, but her strength failed her. and she sank down again on her knees, her eyes fixed on Olivier's father, trying to read in his drawn features evidence of his hopes or fears. Therese joined her in this mute questioning. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 173 Robespierre was alternately raising himself, bending aside, or stooping lower to see more plainly. Suddenly he gave an exultant cry: "He is not there!" "Are you sure? Are you sure?" gasped Clarisse. Robespierre, to convince her, came and raised her, and, supporting her in his arms, carried her to the window. " Do you believe me now ? " he said . It was true. There were only women in the cart. "Only women! My God, what a relief!" exclaimed Clarisse leaving the window. She had fallen on her knees again, her head on the back of a chair, thoroughly prostrate with exhaustion. •Vague, far-away murmurs came to them from the distance, then ceased entirely, while the belfry clock of Saint Gervais struck six. THROUGH FIRE AND WATER. JOSEPH C. LINCOLN. [Cutting from "Cap'n Eri"; by special permission. Copyright, 1905, by A. S. Barnes & Co.] CAPTAIN PEREZ had made up his mind to ask Patience Davis to marry him. Love is like the measles; it goes hard with a man past fifty, and Captain Perez was severely smitten, but he lacked the courage to ask the momentous question. Patience had once said that a man who loved a woman should be willing to go through fire and water to win her. Captain Perez went home that night pondering deeply. "Fire and water! That's a turrible test. I wonder if I could doit. Fire and water! My! my! that's awful!" So the Captain delayed and Miss Patience, who had cherished hopes, found need of a good share of the virtue for which she was named. But one afternoon Perez set out for a call upon his intended which he meant should be a decisive one. 174 WERNER'S READINGS He found the lady alone. She was very glad to have company, and it required no great amount of urging to persuade the infatuated swain to stay to tea. When the meal was over, the pair were seated in the parlor. Then said Captain Perez, "Pashy, do you know what a feller told me 'bout you?" "No, I'm sure I don't, Perez." "Well, a feller told me you was the best housekeeper in Orham. He said that the man that got you would be lucky." "Landsake! Whoever told you such rubbish as that? Besides,. I guess no man would ever want me." " Oh, I don't know. I guess there's plenty would be mighty glad to git you. Anyhow, there's — there's one that — that — I cal'late the fog's thick as ever, don't you?" But Miss Patience didn't mean to give up in this way. "Well, I'm glad you're here to keep me comp'ny. I've never been sole alone in this house afore, and I should be dreadful lonesome if you hadn't come." "Pashy, I've got somethin' I wanted to ask you. Do you think you could — er — er — " "What, Perez?" "I wanted to ask you — to ask you — What in the nation is that?" *"Oh, that's nothin'; only the hens squawkin'. Go on!" "Yes, but hens don't squawk this time of night 'thout they have some reason to. It's that fox come back; that's what 'tis." Miss Patience, earlier in the evening, had related a harrowing tale of the loss of two of Mrs. Mayo's best Leghorns that had gone to furnish a Sunday meal for a marauding fox. "Oh, Perez! you don't s'pose 'tis the fox, do you?" "Yes, ma'am, I do! Where's the gun?" "There 'tis, behind the door. Come quick, and bring a lamp." When they opened the door the noise was louder than ever. "He's in the hen-house," whispered Miss Patience. "He must have gone in that hole at the side that had the loose board over it." "All right," murmured the Captain. "You go 'round with the lamp and open the door. That'll scare him, and I'll stand at trie hole and thump him when he comes out." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 175 So, shielding the lamp with her apron, the guardian of Mrs. Mayo' outraged Leghorns tiptoed around to the hen-house door, while Captain Perez, brandishing the gun like a club, took up his stand by the hole at the side. The darkness was pitchy. The Captain, stooping down to watch, saw something coming out of the hole. He swung the gun above his head, and, bringing it down with all his might, knocked into eternal oblivion the little life remaining in the finest Leghorn rooster. "Consarn it!" he yelled. "I've killed a hen!" Just then there came a scream from the other side of the hen-house, followed by a crash and the sound of a fall. Running around the corner the alarmed Perez saw his lady-love stretched upon the ground, groaning dismally. "Great land of Goshen! Pashy, are you hurt?" "Oh, Perez!" gasped the fallen one. "Oh, Perez!" This pitiful appeal had such an effect upon the Captain that he dropped upon his knees and, raising Miss Davis's head in his hands, begged her to say she wasn't killed. What had happened was this: The fox, having selected his victim the rooster, had rendered it helpless, and was pushing it out of the hole ahead of him. The Captain had struck the rooster just as Miss Patience opened the door, and the fox, seizing this chance of escape, had dodged by the lady, upsetting her as he went. "Well," she said, laughing, "there's no great harm done. Oh, my soul and body ! look there!" Perez looked as directed, and saw the hen-house in flames. The lighted lamp, which Miss Patience had dropped as she fell, lay broken on the floor. The flames were making such headway that they both saw there was practically no chance of saving the build- ing. "Oh, those poor Leghorns!" wailed Miss Patience. "Now they'll be all burned up! What shall I do?" "Pashy!" roared the Captain, "don't say another word. I'll save them hens or git cooked along with 'em ! " And turning up his coat collar Captain Perez sprang through the door. 176 WERNER'S READINGS ^ Miss Davis screamed wildly to him to come back, and danced about wringing her hands. The interior of the hen-house was now a mass of black smoke, from which the voices of the Captain and the Leghorns floated in a discordant medley. • "Hold still, you lunatics!" ("Squawk! squawk!") "Druther be roasted than have me catch you, hadn't you ? " ("Squawk! squawk!") ''A — kershew! Land! I'm smothered! Now I've got you! Thun- deration! Hold still/ HOLD STILL, I tell you!" Just as the agonized Miss Patience was on the point of fainting, the little window at the back of the shanty was thrown open and two hens, like feathered comets, shot through it. Then the red face of the Captain appeared for an instant as he caught his breath with a "Woosh!" and dived back again. This performance was repeated six times. The Captain at length announced, "That's all, thank goodness!" and began to climb through the window, but he stuck fast. "Catch hold of my hands and haul, will you, Pashy? That's it; pull hard! It's gittin' sort of muggy in behind here. I'll never complain at havin' cold feet ag'in if I git out of this. Now, Jhen! Ugh! Here we be!" He came out with a jerk, like a cork out of a bottle, and rolled on the ground at his lady's feet. "Oh, Perez!" she exclaimed, "are you hurt?" The Captain's face was blackened, and his clothes were scorched, but his spirit was undaunted. "Pashy," he said, "do you realize that if we don't git help, this whole shebang, house and all, will burn down?" "Won't somebody from the station see the light and come over?" " Not in this fog. You can't see a hundred foot. We've got to get help. Good land! Is the horse gone?" " No; the horse is here. But there's no carriage but the old carryall, and that's almost tumblin' to pieces." "I was cal'latin' to go horseback." "What! and leave me here alone with the house afire? No, indeed! If you go, I'm goin', too." " Well, then, the carryall's got to do, whether or no." AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 177 " As t'ney drove out of the yard the flames were roaring through the roof of the hen-house, and the lath-fence surrounding it was begin- ning to blaze. "Everything's so wet from the fog," observed the Captain, "that it'll take sometime for the fire to git to the barn. If we can git a gJhg here we can save the house easy, and maybe mere. By mighty! I tell you what we'll do. I'll drive across the ford and git Luther an 1 some of the station men to come right across. It was seven when I looked at the clock as we come in from washin' dishes, so the tide must be still goin' out, and the ford jest right. Git dap!" "My gracious, how dark it is! Think you can find the crossin'?" "Got to find it; that's all. 'Tis dark, that's a fact." It was. They had gone but a few hundred yards; yet the fire was already merely a red smudge on the foggy blackness behind them. "Oh, dear me!" exclaimed Miss Davis. "Are you sure you're on the right track? Seems 's if we must be abreast the station, and this road's awful rough." VWhoa!" commanded the Captain. Then he got down, lit a match, and scrutinized the ground. "I'm kind of 'fraid, that we've got off the road somehow. But we must be 'bout opposite the crossin '. I'm goin' to drive down and see if I can find it." *rle turned the horse's head at right angles from the way they were going, and they pitched onward for another hundred yards. Then they came out upon the hard, smooth sand, and heard the water lap- ping on the shore. The horse shivered as the cold water splashed his legs, but waded bravely in. They moved further from the shore and the water seemed to grow no deeper. "Guess this is the crossin' all right," said the Captain. "Here's the deep part comin'. We'll be 'cross in a jiffy.". The water mounted to the hubs, then to the bottom of the carryall. "Oh, Perez! are you sure this is the ford?" "Don't git scared, Pashy! I guess maybe we've got a little to one side of the track. I'll turn 'round and try again." But the horse was oi.a different mind. From long experience 178 WERNER'S READINGS he knew that the way to cross the ford was to go straight ahead. The bottom of the carryall was awash. "Port your helium, you lubber!" shouted the Captain. "Heave to! Come 'bout!" VThen the horse tried to obey orders, but it was too late. He wallowed wildly to one side and snapped a shaft and the rotten whiffle- tree short off. The carryall tipped alarmingly and Miss Patience screamed. "Whoa!" yelled the agitated Captain. The animal, as much frightened by Captain's shouts as by the water, shot ahead and tried to tear himself loose. The other rotten shaft broke. The carryall was now floating. "No use; I'll have to cut away the wreck, or we'll be on our beam ends!" shouted the Captain. He took out his jack-knife, and, reaching over, severed the traces. The horse disappeared in the darkness. The carriage, now well out in the channel, drifted with the current. "Don't cry, Pashy!" said the Captain, "we ain't shark bait yit. I've shipped aboard of 'most every kind of craft, but blessed if I ever expected to be skipper of a carryall!" But Miss Patience, shut up in the back part of the carriage, wept hysterically. "Oh, dear! Now everything '11 burn up, and they'll blame me for it. Well, I'll be drownded anyway, so I shan't be there to hear 'em. Oh, dear! dear!" " Oh, don't talk that way. We're driftin' somewheres, but we're spinnin' 'round so I can't tell which way. Judas! I remember, now, it ain't but a little past seven o'clock, and the tide's goin' out." " Of course it is, and we'll drift into the breakers in the bay, and that'll be the end." " No, no, I guess not. We ain't dead yit. If I had an oar or some- thin' to steer this clipper with, maybe we could git into shoal water. I've a good mind to jump overboard, and try to swim ashore and tow the carryall." "Don't you do it! My land! if you should drown what would become of me?" AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 179 The tone of this speech hit the Captain hard. He himself almost sobbed as he said: "Pashy, I want you to try to git over on this front seat with me. Then I can put my coat 'round you, and you won't be so cold. Take hold of my hand." Miss Patience at first protested that she never could do it in the world. But her companion urged her to try, and at last she reached the fronj: seat somehow, and the carryall still remained right-side-up. Captain Perez pulled off his coat, and wrapped it about his pro- testing companion. lie was obliged to hold it in place. "Oh, you're so good!" murmured Miss Patience. "What should I have done without you?" The arm holding the coat about the lady's shoulder tightened a little. "Pashy, I've been thinkin' of you consider'ble lately. Fact is, I — I — well, I come down to-day a-purpose to ask you somethin'. I know it's a queer place to ask it, and — and I s'pose it's kind of sudden, but — will — will you — Breakers! by mighty!" The carryall had suddenly begun to rock, and there were streaks of foam about it. 'V We're capsizin'," yelled Perez. "Hang on to me, Pashy!" But Miss Patience didn't intend to let this, perhaps the final oppor- tunity, slip. "Willi what, Perez?" The carryall rose on two wheels and began to turn over, but the Captain did not notice it. The arms of his heart's desire were about his neck, and he was looking into her eyes. "Will you marry me?" "Yes," answered Miss Patience, and they went under together. The Captain staggered to his feet, and dragged his chosen bride to tiers. The ice-cold water reached their shoulders. And, like a flash, as they stood there, came a^orrent of wind that drove the fog before it like smoke. Captain Perez saw the shore, only a few yards away. Beyond that, in the blackness, was a flickering blaze The Captain dragged Miss Patience to the beach.-, "Run!" he chattered, "run, or we'll turn into icicle^" X « 4 V < & 180 WERNER'S READINGS With his arm about her waist Perez guided his dripping companion toward the light. It was Mrs. Mayo's hen-house, and Mrs. Mayo's fence. Their adventurous journey had ended where it began. Abner Mayo had piled against the back of his barn a great heap of damp seaweed that he intended using in the spring as fertilizer. The fire had burned until it reached this seaweed, and then had gone no further. The rain extinguished the last spark. " You see," said Captain Perez later, as he sat in the kitchen wrapped in an old ulster of Mr. Mayo's, "that clock in the dining-room that I looked at hadn't been goin' for a week; the mainspring was broke. 'Twa'n't seven o'clock, 'twas nearer nine when the fire started, and the tide wa'n't goin' out, 'twas comin' in, and we jest drifted back home ag'in. If I don't feel like a fool. Ail that scare and wet for nothin'." "Oh, not for nothin', Perez," said Miss Patience, looking tenderly down into his face. "Well, no, not for nothin' by a good deal! I've got you by it, and that's everything. But say, Pashy!" and the Captain looked awed by the coincidence, "I went through fire and water to git you!" A CHRISTMAS PRESENT AND WHAT CAME OF IT. ROSE TERRY COOKE. FETCH him right : n here, pa. Poor little feller! I hope he'll come to!" The man who had just fished this pickle of a boy out of the brook obeyed the kind voice, and Aunt Nancy Peck strippe 1 off the wet clothes, rubbed the cold body, and tried all her homely, old-fashioned ways of restoration. Boys are hard to kill; before the doctor got there Leslie Varick opened his eyes and laughed in Aunt Nancy's face, and the dear, kindly old face smiled back on the naughty boy. Leslie had been sent to spend the summer in Barrett, while his father and mother were abroad, and being a human boy, he got into AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 181 every variety of mischief known to that species. At last he got well, and in the late autumn went home, and told his mother how good Aunt Nancy had been to him ; and Mrs. Varick felt as mothers do feel, even about the naughtiest boys, that she owed her a debt of gratitude, and Leslie had a scrap of heart under all his mischief, and, putting his curly head on his mother's lap, began: "Mammy, haven't you got something I can give old Aunty Peck? She was tremendously good to me when I cracked my shinbone down there in Barrett." "O Lello! what a slangy boy! I meant to send her a nice gift at Christmas, but you may choose for yourself." "Oh, I've got it! send her those red things you got to wear on your neck and ears." "My pink corals? Why, child, they are set in pearls, and cut by the best artist in Italy; the set cost five hundred dollars. Try again, sir!" Leslie put his head on one side, thrust his hands in his pockets, and whistled "Captain Jinks" as he peered into the trunks. "Here's the very thing! — this dull old shawl. It does look rather dirty, but she could wash it, and its soft and warm." Mrs. Varick lifted up her hands and eyes. "Leslie, my camel's- hair shawl that your father would buy me, though I protested! The handsomest shawl in Paris, and the dearest!" " It looks dirty, anyway, I don't care if it cost fifty thousand dollars, and I know Aunty Peck wouldn't wear it till 'twas washed! She can't abide dirt. I guess you'll have to pick out her present, Pseem to miss it every time." c . "Don't you think, Lello, a nice black silk dress would be a good thing?" "Like enough," muttered Leslie, disgusted at such a commonplace thing. A crimson satin would have been more to his own taste, but he dared not suggest it. So Mrs. Varick bought twenty-five yards of excellent silk, heavy fringe to trim it, expensive buttons, and all needful linings and thread, supposing, from Lello's enthusiasm, that Ozias was a well-to-do farmer, instead of a poor blacksmith, whose daily fare was made dainty to Leslie by the keen air of Barrett and the uncompromising appetite of a boy. 182 WERNER'S READINGS So the dress was sent with a scrubby little letter from Leslie, wishing Aunty Peck a merry Christmas; and this was the end of it to the Varicks, but it was only the beginning of things to Aunt Nancy. When the package arrived she was as pleased as a woman could be. "Why, 'Zias Peck!" she exclaimed, "this beats all natur'. What upon airth shall I do with it ? It's heaps too good for an old creatur' like me." " 'Tain't nuther," retorted Ozias. "I've allers 'lotted on buyin' of ye a silk gownd some day, Nancy, but somehow things have went ag'inst me mortally. There ain't no woman in Barrett deserves it no more'n you do; 'nd I'm thankful to Providence for doin' of it, so be's I couldn't myself." Aunt Nancy's brown eyes shone with tears. "Well, well, pa, I don't say but what I'm glad on't, though I hed ruther 'twould ha' ben a suit of Sabba'-day clothes for you. My alpacky is good enough." " Sho, mother, you go 'long and sew your gownd, an' put it on, 'nd go to meetin' in't, Sabba-day clothes do wimmin-folks a heap more good 'n men-folks." So Aunt Nancy folded up her dress, and took it to Miss Salter to cut and baste, intending to sew it herself. But as the lengths of silk lay across Miss Salter's table in sailed Mrs. Gross, whose husbard kept the Barrett "store." "Whose dress is that?" she asked curtly. " Why, it's Aunt Nancy Peck's; ain't it a most elegant silk?" purred Miss Salter. "I want to know! what's happened to them Pecks? I thought he was shif'less as a Canady thistle. How come she by that dress ? It's curus how sech folks is always owin' and always havin'." " Why, she says 'twas sent to her by that youngster 'Zias fished out o' the pond last summer." "My sakes! I don't believe it. Boys ain't so skerce that folks pay that way for haulin' of 'em out of water. I don't believe but what she's laid by quite a spell to buy it herself." Mrs. Gross flounced out of the room, and took a straight course for the store. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 183 "Well, Hiram Gross," she began, "here I have been a-slavin' and a-savin' for you this seventeen year, and I haven't never had but one silk gownd to my tack; 'nd here's 'Zias Peck's wife has got a satin- finished black silk a-cuttin' to Sabry Salter's fit for the Judge's wife, trimmin's to match. Don't he owe ye a bill right along?" "Well," said the easy man, "I don't know but what he d-oos, a leetle. 'Zias means well — he means real well ; but he ain't fore-handed, 'nd I don' know's I feel to blame him. He was born tired, I expect." "Now, I want to see them books o' yourn, Hi Gross; ef he owes ye thirty dollars, jest you set a lawyer onto him, an' git the money, an' buy me a silk gownd ; she'd oughter hev paid ye the money b'fore she buyed sech finery as that, an' me goin' everywhere in nothing but a cashmere." "No, Sary, 'twouldn't be no use for ye to see them books n-ow; they ain't footed up." But she would not be baffled. Taking the matter into her own hands, she stepped into the little shanty one bitter cold morning, when Ozias sat crouched over the fire waiting for a job, and told the poor man that Mr. Gross wanted him to pay up his bill; he couldn't afford to be out of the money so long. "I'm dre'dful sorry, Mrs. Gross, I don't see no way to raise the money dyrect. I thought 'twas kind of 'greed on to take a share on't out in shoein' the horse, 'nd there's a little on my side to the good!" " Folks that can buy their wives black silk gowns had ought to pay their store-bills," snapped the woman, fixing her cold gray eyes on him. Ozias was struck dumb. The silk dress, that he took such pride in, was crumpled up and thrown in his face; and Mrs. Gross left him staring at her, his mouth open, and his jaw dropped. "What upon airth! She does beat all!" He ejaculated as she disappeared, "Well, I won't say nothin' to mother." WTrile this happened Aunt Nancy was sitting by the window, stitching away at the new gown, and in sailed Miss Beers, collector for the church contributions. "I'm awful sorry," said Aunt Nancy, "I did expect to have some- thing as usual to contriboot, but I hain't. Things is so this year that I can't do jest what I hev done." 184 WERNER'S READINGS "H'm!" sniffed Miss Beers, setting her pale lips more closely, and staring at the silk dress. " I should think if you sold your goods and gi'n the money to them that needs salvation a sight more'n you need a silk gownd, 'twould be a lot better for your immortal soul." "Why, mercy sakes! Miss S'manthy, the dress was gi'n to me, I couldn't give't away, nor sell it, ye know. That Varick boy that come so near gittin' drownded was here quite a spell with a broke leg, and I nussed him up, for his folks was to Eurup and he went and sent me this in a present, trimmin's an' all." "Well, I must say it's sing'lar; I should ha' thought they'd ha' thought five dollars a week was enough; sence you say so, of course, it's so, but seems as though 'twas scatterin' their means to do sech things." Five years before, Chester Peck, Ozias's only child, had been seized with a wild desire to go to California. He was a bright, energetic young fellow, and Ozias had sense enough to see that his son ought to go somewhere else to find success, so he mortgaged his house for three hundred dollars, and sent his boy off on his travels. But after two years his letters suddenly ceased, and his father and mother believed him dead ; but the mortgage did not die, and year after year it taxed Ozias to the utmost to pay its interest. Now Stephen Spencer was a man who made money by the most grinding economy and all kinds of petty shrifts and stratagems. When he heard that Ozias Peck's wife had a new black silk dress, and when he saw it on a bright March Sunday, rustling up the aisle on her well-rounded person, it seemed to him that he was about to lose the interest on his mortgage; he would foreclose at once. Monday Ozias had hardly got to work before Stephen Spencer appeared at the shop door and demanded his due. "You had ought to have been on time, 'Zias Peck. TV int'rest money was due Friday last, and I hain't seen hide nor hair on't." " Don't ye, now don't ye, Square Spencer. Times is so everlastin' bad, and business hez fell off. I'd ha' did it ef I'd ha' had it to hev done." "That's talk," said the Squire, "bizness is bizness; folks that AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 185 borrer must pay; ef you can buy your wife a silk gownd to go to mett'n' in, you can pay me fifteen dollars, sure as shootin', and you've got to." "Darn that gownd!" burst from Ozias's despairing lips. "No don't, nuther. The gownd's hern; 'twas a present, I didn't buy it no more'n you did, I wisht I could, but I couldn't." " Don't tell me no sech yarn as that, 'Zias Peck. Folks don't send silk gownds to old women round the country, no more'n they rain out o' the sky. I tell ye ag'in, I've got to hev that intrest money before Sat'day night, or I'll foreclose that moggidge as sure as I stan' here." Poor Ozias sank on to his nail-keg, and dropped his face in his hands. What could he do? There was nothing for it but to sell the heifer, a creature of their own raising; then he could pay Squire Spencer and part of the store -bill. He found Selah Hills ready to pay him thirty dollars in cash, and /ake the animal the next week. He put off telling Aunt Nancy as long as he could, but he had to tell Squire Spencer he would pay his debt the next Thursday; but as he drew near the barn on Tuesday an ominous cough smote on his ear; he hurried in and there stood Betty, her eyes dull but wild, her breath like the labored puff of rusted bellows, the dreaded "cattle ail" had attacked her. All day Ozias and Nancy worked over the suffering animal, sat up with her all night, and were beside her in the morning when Selah came over with the money. "Well, I declare," exclaimed Selah, "good as dead, ain't she? what'll ye take for hide and horns, 'Zias?" "Well," put in Stephen Spencer, "I come to dun ye, and I'm stayin' to dun ye. Either I'll foreclose that moggidge, or I'll put a 'tachment on to your goods and chattels. I guess that ere silk gownd '11 sell for my claim ef it won't for Gross's." " Do it, if ye dare! That there gownd is my wife's own. She came by it in a way you won't never come by a half cent — by bein' kind an' good to a feller creatur' in trouble. I'll chuck ye inter the mill-pond, and never look for ye no more, ef you touch a button on it, or as much as take it off'n the peg. "Four-close your old moggidge, five-close it, ef you want to; we can go to the taown-house to-morrer without howlin', an' I shan't 186 WERNER'S READINGS care a straw ef Nancy's along: but you shan't lay a finger on her nor hern." "No more he shall, father," said a strong young voice, and Aunt Nancy sprang up with a loud cry to be hugged by her boy, who had come home from California in the nick of time. In twenty-four hours the mortgage was cancelled, the store-bill paid, and five hundred dollars lodged in a Hartford savings-bank to his father's credit. THE HANDBOOK OF HYMEN. O. HENRY. [From The Mv.nsey. By permission of Frank A. Munsey.] "T^IS the opinion of myself, Sanderson Pratt, that the educational JL system of the United States should be in the hands of the weather bureau. Anyhow, the weather furnished me and Idaho Green with an elegant education. We was up in Montana prospecting for gold, with enough grub on hand to last an army through a peace conference. One evening it begun to snow. Me and Idaho moved camp into an old empty cabin, thinking it was only a November flurry. But, after falling three foot on a level, it went to work in earnest ; and we knew we was snowed in. We got in plenty of fire-wood and let the elements cut up all they thought proper. If you want to instigate the art of manslaughter just shut two men up in a eighteen-by-twenty-foot cabin for a month. When the first snowflakes fell, me and Idaho Green laughed al each other's jokes. At the end of three weeks Idaho says: "I never exactly hear sour milk dropping out of a balloon on the bottom of a tin pan, but I have an idea it would be music of the spears compared to the attenuated stream of asphyxiated thought that emanare out of your organs of conversation." "Mr. Green," says I, "if I had my choice for society between AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 187 you and a common, yellow, three-legged cur pup, one of die inmates of this here cabin would be wagging a tail just at present." This way we goes on for two or three days, and then we quits speaking. You see, me and Idaho never had any education beyond reading, and doing "if John had three apples and James five" on a slate. But, snowbound in that cabin, we felt for the first time that if we had studied Homer or Greek or fractions, we'd have had some resources in the line of meditation and private thought. One morning Idaho was poking around with a stick on top of a little shelf that was too high to reach. Two books fell to the floor. I started toward 'em, but caught Idaho's eye. He speaks for the first time in a week. "Don't burn your fingers," says he. "I'll give you a square deal. And that's more than your parents did when they turned you loose in the world. I'll play you a game of seven-up, the winner to pick up his choice of the books, the loser to take the other." We played; and Idaho won. He picked up his book; and I took mine. Then each of us got on his side of the house and went to read- ing. Mine was a little book about five by six inches called "Herkimer's Handbook of Indispensable Information." I may be wrong, but I think that was the greatest book that ever was written. There was the population of all cities in it, and the way to tell a girl's age, and the number of teeth a camel has, and a hundred times as many things besides. If there was anything Herkimer didn't know, I didn't miss it out of the book. I sat and read for four hours. I forgot the snow, and I forgot that me and old Idaho was on the outs. He was sitting on a stool reading away with a kind of partly soft and partly mysterious look shining through his tan-bark whiskers. "Idaho," says I, "what kind of a book is yours?" "Why," says he, "this here seems to be a volume by Homer K. M." "Homer K. M. what?" I asks. " Why just Homer K.' M.," says he. "You're a liar," says I. "No man is going 'round signing books 188 WERNER'S READINGS with his initials. If it's Homer K. M. Spoopendyke or Homer K. M. Jones, why don't you say so like a man." "I put it to you straight, Sandy," says Idaho, quiet. "It's a poem book by Homer K. M. I couldn't get color out of it at first, but there's a vein if you follow it up. I wouldn't have missed this book for a pair of red blankets." "You're welcome to it," says I. "What I want is a disinterested statement of facts." "Well," says Idaho, "give me old K. M.'s system of surmises. He seems to be a kind of a wine agent. His regular toast is 'nothing doing,' and he seems to have a grouch, but he keeps it well lubricated." So that's the way me and Idaho had it. Day and night all the excitement we got was studying our books. By the time the snow melted, if you had waked me suddenly in the middle of the night and said: "Sanderson Pratt, what is the number of bones in the human skeleton, exclusive of the teeth? or what percentage of the vote of the Nebraska legislature overrules a veto?" I could have told you quick as winkin'. About what benefit Idaho got out of his poetry book I didn't exactly know. This Homer K. M., from what Idaho said, seemed to me to be a kind of a dog who looked at life like it was a tin can tied to his tail. After running himself half to death, he sits down, hangs his tongue out, and looks at the can and says: " Oh, well, since we can't shake the growler, let's get it filled at the corner, and all have a drink on me." That spring me and Idaho struck pay ore. We unloaded on our grubstaker for eight thousand dollars apiece; and then we drifted down to this little town of Rosa to rest up. Rosa was no mining-camp. There was a three-mile trolley line champing its bit in the environs; and me and Idaho spent a week riding on one of the cars. We was soon right in it with the best society in Rosa, and was invited out to the most dressed-up entertainments. It was at a piano recital and quail-eating contest in the city hall that me and Idaho first met Mrs. De Ormond Sampson, the aueen of Rosa society. AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 189 Mrs. Sampson was a widow, and owned the only two-story hov.se in town. It was painted yellow. Twenty-two men in Rosa besides me and Idaho was trying to stake a claim on that yellow house. There was dancing after the song-books and quail-bones had been raked out of the hall. Twenty-three of the bunch galloped over to Mrs. Sampson and asked for a dance. I side-stepped the two-step, and asked permission to escort her home. That's where I made a hit. On the way home says she: "Ain't the stars lovely and bright to-night, Mr. Pratt?" "For the chance they've got," says I, "they're humping them- selves in a mighty creditable way. That big one you see is sixty-six billions of miles distant. It took thirty-six years for its light to reach us." "My!" says Mrs. Sampson. "I never knew that before. How warm it is! I'm as damp as I can be from dancing so much." "That's easy to account for," says I, "when you happen to know that if every one of your perspiratory ducts, which are a quarter of an inch long, was placed end to end, they would reach a distance of seven miles." "Lawsy!" says Mrs. Sampson. "It sounds like a irrigation ditch you was describing, Mr. Pratt. How do you get all this knowledge of information?" "From observation, Mrs. Sampson," I tells her. "I keep my eyes open when I go about the world." "Mr. Pratt," says she, "I always did admire a man of education. I'd be gratified to have you call at my house whenever you feel so inclined." I never imagined that Idaho was trying to work on Mrs. Sampson with old K. M.'s rules of courtship till one afternoon when I met the lady, her eyes snapping, and her hat making a dangerous dip over one eye. "Mr. Pratt," she opens up, "this Mr. Green is a friend of yours, I believe." "For nine years," says I. "Cut him out," says she. "He's no gentleman!" 190 WERNER'S READINGS "Why, ma'am," says I, "he's a plain incumbent of the mountains, with the usual failings of a spendthrift and a liar, but I never on the most momentous occasion had the heart to deny that he was a gentle- man." " It's right plausible of you, Mr. Pratt, to take up the curmudgeons in your friend's behalf; but it don't alter the fact that he has made proposals to me sufficiently obnoxious to ruffle the ignominy of any lady." "Why, now, now, now!" says I. "Old Idaho do that! I could believe it of myself sooner." " Ever since I knew him, he has been reciting to me a lot of irre- ligious rhymes by some person he calls Ruby Ott, and who is no better than she should be. And to-day he caps the vortex. I get a bunch of flowers from him, and on 'em is pinned a note. Now, Mr. Pratt, you know a lady when you see her. Do you think for a moment that I'd skip out to the woods with a man along with a jug of wine and a loaf of bread, and go singing and cavorting up and down under the trees with him? I take a little claret with my meals, but I'm not in the habit of packing a jug of it into the brush and raising Cain in any such style as that. Let him go on his scandalous picnics alone! Or let him take his Ruby Ott with him. I reckon she wouldn't kick unless it was on account of there being too much bread along." "Well, 'm," says I, "it may be that Idaho's invitation was a kind of poetry, and meant no harm. I'd be glad on Idaho's account if you'd overlook it," says I, "and let us extricate our minds from the low regions of poetry to the higher planes of fact and fancy. Though it is warm here, we should remember that at the equator the line of perpetual frost is at an altitude of fifteen thousand feet." " Oh, Mi\ Pratt, it's such a comfort to hear you say them beautiful facts after getting such a jar from that minx of a Ruby's poetry!" "Let us forget the inhumanity and ribaldry of the poets," says I. "If an artery is cut, compress it above the wound. A man's leg con- tains thirty bones. . The Tower of London was burned in 1841." "Go on, Mr. Pratt," says Mrs. Sampson. "Them ideas is so original and soothing." And so I had a fine afternoon with her. One night I was waked up by folks hollering "Fire!" I jumped AND RECITATIONS NO. 37. 191 up and when I seen it was Mrs. Sampson's house I was there in two minutes. The whole lower story was in flames. I saw Idaho trying to get away from six firemen who was holding him. They was telling him no man could go in and come out alive. "Where's Mrs. Sampson?" I asks. "She hasn't been seen," says one of the firemen. "She sleeps up-stairs. We've tried to get in, but we can't, and our company hasn't got any ladders yet." I runs around to the light of the big blaze, and pulls the Handbook out of my inside pocket. "Herky, old boy," I says to it, "you ain't ever lied to me yet. Tell me what, old boy, tell me what!" I turned to " What to do in Case of Accidents," an' I found it. "Suffocation from Inhaling Smoke or Gas. — There is nothing better than flaxseed. Place a few grains in the outer corner of the eye." I shoved the Handbook back in my pocket, and grabbed a boy that was running by. "Here," says I, "run to the drug-store and bring a dollar's worth of flaxseed. Hurry, and you'll get another one for yourself. Now," I sings out to the crowd, "we'll have Mrs. Sampson!" And I busted into the house. If I die first, I'll write you a letter and tell you if it's any worse down there than the inside of that yellow house was. The firemen helped me with their little stream of water, and I finally got to Mrs. Sampson's room. She'd lost conscientious- ness from the smoke, so I wrapped her in the bedclothes and got her on my shoulder. I carried her out fifty yards from the house and laid her on the grass. Then, of course, every one of them other twenty-two plaintiffs to the lady's hand crowded around with tin dippers of water. Ana up runs the boy with the flaxseed. I unwrapped the covers from Mrs. Sampson's head. She opens her eyes and says: "Is that you, Mr. Pratt?" "S-s-sh," says I. "Don't talk till you've had the remedy." 192 WERNER'S READINGS I runs my arm around her neck and raises her head, gentle, and breaks the bag of flaxseed with the other hand ; and as easy as I could I bends over and slips three or four of the seeds in the outer corner of her eye. Up gallops the village doc by this time and grabs at Mrs. Sampson's pulse, and wants to know what I mean by such nonsense. I gets out the Handbook. "Look on page 117," says I, "at the remedy for suffocation by smoke or gas. 'Flaxseed in the outer corner of the eye,' it says. I don't know how it works but Herkimer says it, and he was called to the case first. If you want to make it a consultation, there's no ob- jection." Old doc takes the book and looks at it by means of his specs and a fireman's lantern. "Well, Mr. Pratt," says he, "you evidently got on the wrong line in reading your diagnosis. The recipe for suffocation says: 'Get the patient into fresh air as quickly as possible, and place in a reclining position.' The flaxseed remedy is for 'Dirt and Cinders in the Eye,' on the line above." "See here," interrupts Mrs. Sampson, "I reckon I've got something to say in this consultation. That flaxseed done me more good than anything I ever tried." And then she raises up her head and lays it back on my arm again, and says: "Put some in the other eye, Sandy dear." And so if you was to stop off at Rosa any day you'd see a fine new yellow house with Mrs. Pratt, that was Mrs. Sampson, embellishing and adorning it. And if you was to step inside you'd see on the marble- top center-table in the parlor "Herkimer's Handbook of Indispensable Information," all rebound in red morocco, and ready to be consulted on any subject pertaining to human happiness and wisdom.