



Produced by Annie McGuire








[Illustration: HARPER'S ROUND TABLE]

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

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PUBLISHED WEEKLY. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, JUNE 11, 1895. FIVE CENTS A COPY.

VOL. XVI.--NO. 815. TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.

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[Illustration]

SAVED BY A CARCASS.

A WHALEMAN'S YARN.

BY W. J. HENDERSON.


"Han'some," said Farmer Joe, having stretched himself on the shady side
of the forecastle-deck and set his pipe going, "it 'pear's to me that
it's about time we heard what happened to you after you got back to your
own ship."

"You mean on my whaling voyages, I suppose," said Handsome.

"That's a right peert guess," responded Farmer Joe.

Handsome blew a whirling cloud of smoke that went swiftly out to leeward
under the swelling foot of the fore-staysail. He watched it in a
meditative manner until it disappeared, and then said:

"I was pretty glad to get back to my own ship, the _Ellen Burgee_,
because, in spite of the fact that they treated us very well aboard the
_Two Cousins_, you see I had a pretty good lay on the _Ellen_, and I
didn't want to lose it. Of course nobody ever gets rich by going to
sea, but a fellow likes to stick fast to all he gets. Well, we didn't
stay very long in the bay in company with the _Two Cousins_. We got to
sea again, and laid our course for a bit of cruising-ground away to the
southward, where our Captain said he believed the whaling was good. The
voyage down there was as stupid as a Sunday-afternoon sermon in hot
weather, and for the matter of that so was the cruising for two days,
because we didn't raise a single spout. On the third day, however, we
were gladdened by the welcome cry of 'There she blows!' There were half
a dozen whales in sight, and the old man had great hopes of getting at
least two of them. But that was not to be our luck that day. The first
mate got fast to one big fellow, and killed him, but the rest of us
returned to the ship empty-handed.

"Now I haven't told you anything about what's done with a whale after
you get him; but as this story depends on that, I'll have to explain.
The first job is to get the whale alongside the ship."

"Why not sail the ship alongside the whale?" asked one of the listeners.

"That ain't wholly practicable," answered Handsome, "because you might
run into him and sink him. The ship does sail as close as she dares, but
the boats must do their share. Two boats take the ends of a light line,
with a weight slung on the bight so as to sink it, and they pass this
under the whale's tail and around his 'small,' as the slimmest part of
him is called. By means of this line, the ends being passed aboard the
ship, a chain is run in a slip-noose around the 'small,' and Mr. Whale
is hauled alongside and kept there. Next comes the business of
cutting-in, which means cutting off the blubber and bone that are
wanted. Stages, such as ships' painters use, are slung over the side of
the vessel, and the first-class cutters, generally the ship's officers,
stand on these stages with long-handled spades. The cutting-in begins at
the place where the backbone joins the head, and the first strip taken
off there is called the blanket piece. The pieces of blubber are hauled
up with tackles, and these rip them off while the spades cut. It's a
long and tough job, and it makes a new hand pretty sick. But it's
child's play to what comes next, which is the trying-out. Say, I'd
rather be a green hand again than have another job at trying-out."

"Well, tell us about it, anyhow," said Farmer Joe.

"It ain't any use to make a long yarn of that," continued Handsome. "The
try-works, as they call them, are a sort of Dutch oven, built of bricks,
and situated amidships. A couple of big iron pots stand on top of the
oven, and the blubber, minced up, is put into them. You start a fire in
the oven, and that boils out the oil, which is ladled out into casks,
and then all hands turn to and pick out the pieces of fat and scraps so
as to have nothing put pure oil. Well, to heave ahead with the yarn, we
had our whale alongside overnight, and the next morning we started at
cutting-in. About the time we'd got ready for trying-out, and started
the fires, the breeze began to freshen up, and it looked rather dirty up
to windward. The Captain said we must shake a leg with the trying-out.

"'Boys,' says he, 'we got to boil this oil with stu'ns'ls set, because
before we get it done we'll be under a close-reefed maintops'l.'

"Well, bless you, he hadn't much more than got the words out of his
mouth than the mast-head fellow lets out a yell:

"'There she blows! And there she breaches!'

"Now it wouldn't make any difference to a whaler if he thought the world
was a-going to come to an end in ten minutes, he'd lower away if he saw
a spout. So the Captain gave orders for two boats to get under way in
chase of the new whales. One of the boats was the one I belonged to, and
the next thing I knew I was sitting on my thwart. The sail was hoisted,
and we went scudding down to leeward at a rattling gait. Say, it wasn't
altogether agreeable to sit in that boat and notice the width and height
of the sea that was getting up. But we soon forgot all about it in the
excitement of going on.

"'It's a-going to be a tough job getting this whale alongside,' says one
of the crew.

"'Wait till we get him first,' says Bacon.

"Well, it was our chance, and Bacon slung the iron into him with a vim.
Up went flukes and down went whale. He soon came up and began to swim to
windward at a fearful speed. The seas thundered against the bow of our
boat, and great sheets of water came tumbling inboard.

"'Bale there, bale!' yelled Bacon, 'or the boat'll fill and sink!'

"You can bet we didn't need to be told twice. We hadn't fairly got
started when the whale sounded, and we could tell by the trend of the
line that he was coming back toward the boat.

"'Look out!' shouted Bacon.

"The next second the brute shot clear out of the water not fifty feet
off the starboard beam of our boat, and raised such a wave when he fell
back into the sea that he nearly swamped us.

"'For goodness' sake," says one of the men, 'cut the line and let him
go.'

"'We'll never get back to the ship alive,' says another; 'look at the
sea. It's blowing a gale.'

"Well, it was blowing in a bit of a squall just then, but Bacon's blood
was up, and he was bound to have that whale.

"'Pull me up to him!' he shouted.

"We obeyed orders, and Bacon drove the lance right into his life.

"'Starn all!' he yelled, and we didn't get out of the way a second too
quick, for the monster went into his flurry, and beat the sea into an
acre of foam with his immense flukes. However, there he was dead enough,
and in the mean time the ship had worked down to leeward of us, and was
close at hand. It was a pretty troublesome piece of work to pass the
line around his small in such a nasty sea; we managed to do it after
four or five trials, and he was hauled alongside the ship just as it
began to grow dark. Now I tell you what, lads, it was a very uncommon
sight. There was the ship beginning to roll uneasily in the rising sea,
with a blazing, smoking furnace amidships, looking for all the world as
if she was on fire, and a whale on each side of her. The boats were
hauled up, and then the Captain looked about him.

"'Cut the old whale adrift,' says he; 'we can't tow the two of them in
this weather, and we've got about the best of his oil.'

"So we cut the carcass adrift, and it went rolling off down to leeward.
It hadn't got fifty yards from the ship before all the water around it
was black with sharks' fins, and the next instant a dozen of these
wolves of the sea appeared, leaping and thrashing the water in their mad
struggles to get at the remains of the whale. They seemed like regular
demons, so fiercely did they attack the carcass, ripping away the
remaining shreds of flesh, and smashing the bones in their powerful
jaws. In five minutes the body was torn to pieces and the sharks
disappeared, leaving us to imagine what would have happened to some of
us if a boat had happened to capsize in the chase. Well, the gale
increased in strength, and the sea rose more and more. The Captain
didn't want to lose the whale, so he hove the ship to with the dead
monster under our lee, where he rode pretty well, except that once in a
while when we rolled heavily he would come up against the side of the
ship with a thump that threatened to shake the timbers apart. However,
the Captain said he was going to hang on till he found it was a case of
life or death. All of a sudden we were startled by a terrible cry,

"'Fire!'

"Every man looked in the direction from which the cry came, and we saw a
small but lively flame stealing up near the foot of the mainmast.

"'It's from the try-works!' shouted Bacon.

"Sure enough the gale had taken up every one's attention so that we all
forgot about the fire in the try-works. It hadn't been put out, and now
a coal or a spark or something had fallen on the deck, and the damage
was done."

"'Why didn't you put it out?' asked one of the listeners.

"Put it out!" exclaimed Handsome: "why, man alive, don't you know the
condition a whale ship is in when trying-out is going on? She was
simply afloat with whale oil. The deck was running with it; every plank
and bit of loose rigging was soaked with it. Put it out! Why, we did all
that mortal man could think of. The Captain ordered us to get up all the
tarpaulins and spare canvas, and try to smother it, but, bless you, as
soon as we threw them over the fire they soaked up the oil and began to
burn. We fought the fire with the energy of desperate men, for we knew
that if we had to take to the boats the chances of our ever seeing land
again in such a sea would be pretty slim. Finally the Captain said he
would try a desperate scheme. As yet the flames were around the decks
and lower masts. What he proposed to do was to let the ship fall off
into the trough of the sea in hopes that a big wave would sweep her deck
and drown out the fire. Everything was made ready, and then with a face
full of sorrow he gave the order to cut loose the carcass of the whale.
He was afraid to let it hang there with the ship broadside on. We cut it
loose, and then he ordered the helm to be put up, and all hands to take
to the rigging. We went up with a good deal of misgiving. The ship fell
off into the trough and wallowed there. The seas broke over her here and
there, but not in sufficient volume to drown the fire, which was gaining
headway all the time, and was now beginning to send tongues of flame up
the rigging, as if in a mad attempt to drive us poor fellows out of our
refuge.

"'It won't do,' says the Captain; 'we must lay down, lads, and take to
the boats.'

"We all started for the deck, when suddenly Bacon uttered a fearful cry:

"'Look! Look!'

"He was pointing to windward, and looking in that direction, we all saw
a tremendous wave rolling down upon the ship with the speed of an
express train. We stopped where we were, and clung with an intense grip
to the rigging. The wave came. It pitched the vessel up as if she were a
chip of wood, and flung her over on her beam ends. There was a crashing
and rending of wood, and several wild shrieks from the men as the
foremast went by the board. There were half a dozen fellows on it, and
they were plunged into that raging sea. I never saw them again. The rest
of us were hanging on as best we could, when the very next wave that
came put out the fire sure enough, for it turned the _Ellen Burgee_
bottom up."

Handsome paused for a moment, as if overcome by the dreadful
recollection.

"Well," he continued, "when she went over, I let go of the rigging and
threw myself into the sea. I made up my mind it was all over with me,
yet it turned out that this was not to be the case. I was buried under a
ton or two of foaming water, but I came to the surface again, and found
myself a long distance off from the overturned ship, which was fast
settling in the water. I struck out, as a man will even when he doesn't
know what use it is, and kept myself afloat for several minutes, the
waves all the time driving me to leeward. Suddenly I saw a dark mass
tumbling on the seas a short distance away. I thought it must be one of
our boats that had got loose when the ship went over, and so I struck
out for it. I was growing weak, blind, and dazed in the heavy seas, when
I was caught up by a wave and flung squarely on top of the floating
object. I grabbed wildly, and caught hold of something hard and slimy. I
clung to it, though, and to my great amazement I found I was hanging to
the flipper of the dead whale. You know they float on their sides when
dead, with one flipper up in the air and the other under water. Well, it
wasn't much of a life-raft, as you may well suppose, but a man in such a
fix as I was will take anything he can get. I hung on there all right,
the dead whale jumping and tumbling under me like a live fish. Toward
morning the wind shifted, and at sunrise the gale broke. The sea began
to go down right away, but a great swell was running. When the sun got
fairly up I realized what a terrible position I was in. The heat was
intense, and the gases from the carcass nearly overwhelmed me. But that
was nothing. The air was filled with the discordant cries of hungry
sea-birds. They swooped down from every direction, and pecked at the
carcass. They beat at me with their wings, and acted as if they knew I
was a doomed man, and the sooner they could drive me into the sea the
better for me. But I fought them off, and sitting with one leg on each
side of the flipper and clasping it with one arm, I clung to my dreadful
life-buoy.

"And now came a new horror. Sharks appeared and began to fight around
the whale, snapping and biting and tearing off pieces of the flesh. I
realized that if this continued my life-buoy would be destroyed; but I
was helpless. Then thirst began to torture me. All day long I tossed on
that dead whale, with the birds and the sharks around me. At nightfall a
gentle shower came, and by holding my mouth open I managed to relieve my
thirst a little. As soon as it became dark the birds and the sharks left
me, and presently, utterly exhausted, I fell asleep, leaning against the
flipper. I remember that I was quite conscious of the danger of falling
off my perch into the sea and drowning; but I didn't care. How long I
slept I do not know. It must have been five or six hours. I was awakened
by a heavy shock, and I found myself plunged into the sea. Involuntarily
I uttered a scream for help.

"'Great Scott! there's a man,' I heard a voice say. 'Hang on there, lad.
Catch this.'

"Plump came a circular white life-buoy into the sea, luckily falling
within my reach. A few minutes later a boat had been lowered away, and I
learned that my dead whale had been run down in the darkness by the ship
_Full Moon_, bound for Liverpool from Hong-Kong. And so I was taken to
England, with a pretty clear determination in my head never to go
whaling again."




JUNE FLOWERS.


  Here and there a daisy?
    And now and then a clover?
  And once a week a buttercup,
    And so the whole land over?

  A rose within the garden?
    A lily in the sun?
  Does dear old Mother Nature
    Count flowers one by one?

  No; daisies by the acre,
    And clovers millionfold,
  The meadows pink with blushing,
    The pastures white and gold.

  And roses, like the children,
    Abloom at every door,
  And buttercups as countless
    As the sand upon the shore.

  Dear Mother Nature scatters
    Her flowers on road-side edge;
  She carpets every forest,
    And curtains every ledge.

  And then she sets us dancing
    To such a merry tune,
  For all the world is laughing,
    And, darlings, this is June!

       *       *       *       *       *

"Harry, here are three apples; now suppose I wanted you to divide them
equally between James, John, and yourself, how would you do it.'"

"I'd give them one and keep the others."

"Why, how do you make that out?"

"Well, you see, it would be one for those two, and one for me, _too_."




STORIES OF OUR GOVERNMENT.

WHAT OUR REPRESENTATIVES DO.

BY THE HONORABLE HENRY CABOT LODGE,

UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM MASSACHUSETTS.


[Illustration: HON. C. F. CRISP, SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE.]

It is not easy to describe in a short article an average day in the
House of Representatives. The great days are exceptional, and a single
historic scene gives no idea of the every-day work of the House.
Moreover, if history is made on the days when excitement runs high, the
business of carrying on the government is done every day, and it is
about the latter that you wish to learn. By way of beginning, let me say
a word about the place where this work is done. The House of
Representatives holds its sessions in the southern wing of the Capitol
at Washington. The House is very large, right angled, and rigid, with
little ornament, and without beauty of proportion. The walls go up for
about fifteen feet, and from that point the galleries slant back until
they reach the next floor of the building. The roof is a vast expanse of
glass, with the arms of each State painted on the square panels. The
general effect is grayness of color and a size which can be measured in
acres better than in feet. Against the southern wall is placed a high
white marble dais or tribune, where the Speaker or presiding officer
sits. Below the Speaker's desk and in descending tiers, also of white
marble, sit the clerks of the House and the official reporters. Facing
the Speaker, and ranged in a semicircle, are 360 desks, with a
corresponding number of chairs, which are, or ought to be, occupied by
the 350 Representatives and the four Territorial delegates.

Such is the place, but it would require a volume, and a very
uninteresting one, too, to explain the machinery used in transacting the
business for which this great hall is provided. Nevertheless, it is
possible, perhaps, to give you in a general way some idea of an ordinary
day's work in the lower branch of Congress. In theory, the House ought
to take up its calendars on each day and dispose of each article in its
order. But the great beauty of the calendars is that in practice they
are never taken up at all.

How then, you will ask, is business done if the House never takes up the
list of measures prepared for its consideration? It is done by a system
of special rules. The Committee on Rules brings in a rule that the House
shall take up, let us say the tariff, on a certain day, shall debate it
a certain length of time, and shall then vote. This rule is adopted, the
bill selected is taken from the calendar, and everything else gives way
until the tariff is disposed of. Appropriation bills are privileged,
because they provide the money necessary to carry on the government, and
require no rule to be brought up. But all the other business of the
House is done practically under special rules; in other words, the
Committee on Rules selects out of the mass of business presented a small
portion which the House shall consider, and to that small selection all
the time of the House is devoted.

Imagine, then, that the House as you watch it from the gallery has come
to the end of the morning hour, and has taken up the special order of
the day made for it by its Committee on Rules. If it is the first time
the subject has come up, the chairman of the committee making the report
opens the debate. In any event, when the business of the day is thus
laid before the House the debate begins. To any one who comes into the
House gallery for the first time, the scene on the floor is one of
apparently hopeless confusion. Members are reading, writing, talking,
and moving about the chamber. There is an incessant murmur and buzz of
conversation along the aisles and in the galleries. You who are looking
on see a member rise and begin to talk, sometimes quietly, more often
with great violence and excitement, not because he is really excited,
but because he wishes to be heard above the din. Your ears are not
accustomed to the noise, and you do not hear what is said. Still less
can you guess what it is all about, and yet business is not proceeding
by chance, and there are men on that confused floor who know exactly
what is happening, and how the business is going on. You may have been
unlucky in your day, and no measure of great interest being up, it may
seem as if it were useless to stay, but if you will be patient, and bear
with the confusion for the time, or perhaps come back another day, you
will have your reward. You will see the House reach an exciting point in
a debate, or some subject of great popular interest will come up, and
then a sharp contest will follow between different members, which will
be full of interest.

[Illustration: AN EXCITING MOMENT IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.]

Instead of reading and writing and talking and moving about, you will
see the members gather about the man who is speaking and those who are
debating with him. Silence will come on the floor and in the galleries,
broken by bursts of applause, as one member makes a sharp point or
retorts quickly on his opponent. Nothing is more interesting than good
debate of this kind, when men who are fencing or sparring with their
wits instead of their hands. You will be surprised to see how easy it
now is to know what is going on. You will be glad that you came to the
gallery, for every wholesome-minded being likes to see a fair contest,
whether of brains or muscles, and incidentally you will see how we
English-speaking people have hammered out by discussion the laws under
which we live, and have gained the liberty we enjoy. On the other hand,
let us suppose that you are fortunate enough to get into the gallery on
a day of great debate, when set speeches are to be made by the leaders
on either side. A man arises near the middle of the House, a man whose
face is familiar to you, because you have seen it so often in the
illustrated papers, and all in a moment the House is hushed, and every
word that the speaker says falls distinctly upon your ear. Then, again,
you feel rewarded, for you are hearing a party leader speak and are
seeing a man about whom you have read. If it is the day upon which a
great debate closes, the last speeches are made by the two leaders of
the opposite sides, the galleries are crowded, but as every one is eager
to hear, there is no difficulty in catching every word. The leader of
the minority delivers his last assault upon the bill, the leader of the
majority replies to him, and then the Speaker of the House says: "The
hour having arrived at which the House has ordered that the debate be
closed, the vote will now be taken upon the bill and amendments." Then
comes the voting, a dreary process for everybody, for each roll-call
occupies half an hour, and when it is done the Speaker announces the
vote, and declares the bill passed or defeated as the case may be. If it
is then more than five o'clock one of the leaders of the majority moves
that the House adjourn, the Speaker declares the motion carried, and
then the House stands adjourned until the next morning at twelve
o'clock.

Such in very rough outline is a day in the House of Representatives when
some subject which awakens differences spring up, or when a great debate
closes or some important bill is passed. But there are many other days
when no conclusion is reached, and still others which are consumed in
roll-calls and motions designed to waste time, and to stop all action.
If you chance to come on a day of that kind, the sooner you go away the
better for your own comfort. The members must stay, but you need not.

It would, however, take a great deal more space than I have here to give
you a description of the various scenes which occur in the House of
Representatives, but the rough sketch which I have drawn may help you to
some idea of what happens in the great popular body which with the
Senate makes laws for the people of the United States. It is a good deal
better, however, that every American boy and girl should come to
Washington if they can possibly manage it, and try to learn from
observation what their government is, and how it is carried on. They
will have some dull hours if they pass many in the galleries of the
House of Representatives, but they may have some minutes of great
interest, which they will always be glad to remember, and they are
certain to go away with a greater ability to judge intelligently their
public men, and in this way be of better service themselves as American
citizens responsible for the government of their country. If you cannot
get to Washington, try to see your own Legislature in session, or your
own city and town government. You will learn a great deal that will be
useful to you when you come of age, and therefore responsible for your
vote or influence for the government of the United States, which is
always in the long-run what the people themselves make it.




THE LITTLE COLLECTOR.


  I don't care much for the postage-stamps
    Themselves--'tween me and you;
  The fun I get collecting comes
    From sticking 'em in with glue.




AN ENTERPRISING PHOTOGRAPHER.


The recent war between China and Japan, which now seems to be
practically over, fortunately, was watched by all the military and naval
men in the world with a great deal of interest, for it was the first
real war in which many of the modern inventions in war-ships and army
accoutrements were given a fair trial. To be sure, China had little that
was modern in her army and navy, though some of the ships of her navy
were of recent European build, and were manned by capable seamen and
good fighting-men. But the Japanese certainly did have many of the
modern inventions in their cruisers, and they made most effective use of
them.

The correspondents of the great papers of the world, however, seem to
have suffered, and whether this is a development of modern warfare, or
because the Japanese and Chinese did not understand and appreciate their
position, does not appear to have been settled. At all events, the
correspondents from Japan and China, as well as those from European and
American countries, went about their always dangerous business at their
peril, and were in constant danger of being captured and hung or
murdered by either party. Some of these bright and daring men did lose
their lives there, and no one takes the trouble to sing a requiem over
them in verse or prose, but others, in spite of all the opposition, got
to and remained at the front, and succeeded in sending out accurate news
to their papers.

[Illustration: PHOTOGRAPHER AT WORK.]

It was one of these successful newspaper men, and a Japanese at that,
who originated the idea of using a balloon to help him get to the front,
as well as to keep him safely out of the reach of both contestants. He
procured a balloon, several, in fact--and had a peculiar metal
frame-work constructed, which held him firmly in place under the
balloon, and left his arms free, so that he could use them to write, or
to work a huge camera that was also attached and supported by the same
iron frame. By means of straps over his shoulders and about his body he
could keep himself moderately firm in his position, and his camera
reasonably stationary, except, of course, for the movements of the
balloon itself, which he could not regulate.

Several times this correspondent was sent up in his balloon, and held by
an assistant with the help of a long rope far above houses, and even
hills, so that he could take photographs on his huge lens of the general
view of a battle, while he himself was either too far away or too
unimportant at the moment to the combatants to tempt them to fire upon
him. In this way he succeeded in securing some astonishing views. They
were, of course, very far removed from the scene of action, too far to
give much of the small details, but they presented a bird's-eye view of
the whole battle, which proved of great interest. Occasionally, because
of a sudden movement of the balloon, he "took" the sky or a distant
landscape instead of the raging battle beneath him, but these little
mistakes were insignificant when on being hauled down, he discovered two
or three views that showed charges of cavalry here, repulses of infantry
there, and smoke and strife, bursting shells and burning houses,
everywhere.

Sometimes the photographer would go up in his camera-balloon without
being held to the earth by a rope, and then he might drift with the wind
over the battle-field, or quietly drift away without getting a chance to
"shoot." As a rule, however, calculations were pretty well made before
the rope was dropped, and then the balloon was allowed to float where it
would, with the comparative certainty that it would pass over, or nearly
over, the scene of action.

Here is a chance for photographers who want to take new scenes and
original things with their cameras. The earth at a few hundred feet
distance would look like a big bowl covered with many little roofs,
laced with white roads, along which funny little animals would be seen
crawling along at a snail's pace.




OUR FLAG.


  Fling it from mast and steeple,
    Symbol o'er land and sea,
  Of the life of a happy people,
    Gallant and strong and free.
  Proudly we view its colors,
    Flag of the brave and true,
  With the clustered stars and the steadfast bars,
    The red, the white, and the blue.

  Flag of the fearless-hearted,
    Flag of the broken chain,
  Flag in a day-dawn started,
    Never to pale or wane.
  Dearly we prize its colors,
    With the heaven light breaking through,
  The clustered stars and the steadfast bars,
    The red, the white, and the blue.

  Flag of the sturdy fathers,
    Flag of the loyal sons,
  Beneath its folds it gathers
    Earth's best and noblest ones.
  Boldly we wave its colors,
    Our veins are thrilled anew;
  By the steadfast bars, the clustered stars,
    The red, the white, and the blue.

  MARGARET E. SANGSTER.

       *       *       *       *       *

A wise old doctor, for the benefit of his health, travelled around the
country in a caravan, in which he lived, stopping for short periods at
the larger towns. He had a young lad for an assistant, who was more or
less quick and intelligent, but rather inclined to jump at conclusions.
The doctor taught him a little medicine whenever he could spare the
time, and he learned considerable, but diagnosis were to him still a
mystery, especially in some cases, when the wise old doctor had used his
eyes to detect the source of the illness.

They were staying for a few days in the town of B----, and the doctor
had been in some demand, having at a previous visit secured a reputation
by some apparently marvellous cures. His young assistant accompanied him
on one occasion, when the doctor had pronounced the patient sick from
eating too many oysters. This puzzled the lad, and when they left the
house he asked his master how he knew the patient had been eating
oysters. "Very simple," his master replied, "I saw a lot of oyster
shells in the fireplace, and the answers to a few questions were all I
needed to make a diagnosis."

One day, his master being away when a call came, he determined to answer
it, and see if he could diagnose the case. He returned shortly after,
and triumphantly told the doctor that the man was sick from eating too
much horse.

"A horse, you stupid fool!" cried the irate doctor. "What do you mean?"

"Why, master, it couldn't be anything else, because I saw a saddle and
stirrups under the bed."




A PLEASANT DISAPPOINTMENT.

BY J. SANFORD BARNES, JUN.


I don't believe that Mr. Henry ever thought what a queer combination of
nicknames his son would have when he named him Thomas Richard. Some
called him "Tom," some "Dick," and others, instead of calling him by his
last name, Henry, changed that, too, to "Harry," so he became Tom, Dick,
and Harry rolled into one.

Mr. Henry was a great sportsman, and many a time had Tom listened to his
father and one of his friends plan out a day's shooting. Tom had often
made his little plans, only to be carried out in his dreams. But at
last, one September evening, in his twelfth year, dreams could no longer
satisfy him. As he sat in his father's "den" after supper, looking for
the hundredth time through the book of  sporting incidents and
game-birds, taking occasional long glances at the little sixteen-bore
which hung over his father's head, as he sat at his desk reading the
_Forest and Stream_, Tom was really developing a plan. He must go
shooting, and with a real gun of some kind. "Sling-shots" he was done
with; then he knew if he asked permission, what the answer would be, and
therefore he decided that his hunting-trip must be made "on the sly,"
and this alone was one cause for the rather restless night which
followed. As he turned the pages of the big book he began to imagine
himself in the place of the tall man in the picture just taking a
partridge from his dog's mouth, and on the next page he was the short
thick-set man in brown hunting-coat walking up to his dogs, who were
"stiff" and "stanch" on a covey of quail, which in pictures you can
always see hiding in the clump of bushes.

Now, Tom, Dick, and Harry had a friend, and that friend had a Flobert
rifle, and on that friend's willingness to lend he was counting
strongly. The game did not seem to worry him; he kept thinking of a
certain patch of blackberry bushes just outside a small piece of woods,
where he had often started up an old cock partridge, in fact, he knew so
much about that partridge that once he crept up on him, and almost got a
shot at him with the now-to-be-despised "sling-shot"; and with a
Flobert--even if his father had said that no true sportsman would shoot
a bird on the "sit"--he felt sure he could get him, and if he did he'd
come home, own up, and trust to luck for the rest, but he was somewhat
doubtful as to the reception he would meet.

The morning was bright and clear as Tom left the house to go down and
"see what Jim Vail was going to do that day," and once outside the gate
excitement again got hold of him, and he broke into a run; it was well
he did, for about ten minutes later, as he turned into Mr. Vail's place,
Jim was on the point of mounting his bicycle to start for a ride.

"Say, Jim," he shouted, "wait a second; I want to ask you something."

"Well, Tommy," he answered, "what can I do for you to-day? I'm going to
get some exercise and get in shape for football at school; I got a
letter from Ted yesterday, and he asked me to. I guess he's written to
the rest of last year's team to do the same thing. I suppose you're
going to ride your pony. But, really, what do you want?"

"Jim," said Tom, "I'm going to ask a favor of you. But first I want you
to say you won't tell anybody anything about it. You won't, will you?"

"Of course not; but what it is?" replied Jim.

"Well," said Tom, slowly, "I'm going shooting, and I want you to lend me
your Flobert rifle; you don't use it very much since your father gave
you that beauty gun. I'll be careful, and I'll clean it all up for you
when I'm done. Say, will you do it?"

Jim saw a chance for a little lecture, and came near giving it, but he
thought of his popularity with the small boys and resisted.

"But, Tom," he answered, "how are you going to work it? I'll lend it to
you, of course, but I don't want to get into any scrape with your
father, and you'd better be careful, too. Now, what's your plan?"

Tom had this all arranged the moment he had seen Jim and the bicycle.

"I've got that all fixed," said Tom. "Say, you don't mind where you
ride, do you? Now, I tell you what you do; just give me some cartridges,
and then you start off with the rifle on your 'bike' and ride down the
hill by 'Daddy Wilson's'--that's where I'm going to go shooting. When
you get to the bridge, get off just a minute, and go down under the
bridge and leave it on top the highest log under the boards on this side
the brook, and then ride on and forget all about it. Catch?"

Jim "caught," and after another word of warning to be very careful, both
in regard to the rifle and getting caught, he started, having left a box
of Flobert cartridges with Tom.

[Illustration: HE CAUGHT A GLIMPSE OF A CERTAIN FAMILIAR WHITE HORSE.]

"Daddy Wilson's" was quite a mile and a half from Jim's house; but it
did not take Tom long to cover the distance, and in a very short time he
was under the bridge and out again on the other side with the rifle
under his arm. His experience had been very limited with firearms, but
he had a natural gift of being "handy" with almost anything, and he
acted as though hunting were an old pastime, and the gun a companion of
years. However, he thought it best to try and see how it went, and was
just taking aim at a little yellow chipmunk, when the sound of an
approaching carriage made him change his mind, and dart under the bridge
and wait; he had caught a glimpse of a certain familiar white horse, and
as it trotted over the bridge, shaking a little stream of dust through
the cracks and down his neck, he realized he had had a narrow escape.
After it had gone by, he tried his aim on an old green frog, and laid
him out "flatter'n a pan-cake," as he said to himself. Two or three more
trials were made, and he started through the woods for his blackberry
patch, first walking very carefully, and finally creeping on all fours;
but whatever the reason, that wily cock partridge had had his breakfast
and declined to be found, and Tom was disappointed and cast down; he had
counted on that bird to ease the reception he would meet at home, and
now he would have to return empty handed. However, he made up his mind
"he'd shoot something," and for an hour or more be popped ineffectually
at chipmunks and small birds, and was really enjoying the sport, when it
struck him that late to dinner would require an explanation, and thus
greatly increase the chances of the very thing which he now wanted to
avoid. So he hurried towards home, and went in through the place by a
back way, intending to leave the rifle at the stable. The coachman was a
good friend of his, and would clean and return it, and everything would
be all right again. Now it happened that Mr. Henry was having built a
small shed and tool-house behind his house, and, as luck would have it,
he was watching its progress at the very moment when Tom emerged from
behind some bushes, and unconsciously was walking down this back road
towards the stable with the Flobert held close along his leg on the side
farthest away from the house, so that "no one could guess he had
anything." All looked smooth sailing. Suddenly he was startled by a
familiar voice,

"Hey, Tom!" it called; "what you got there?"

There was no escape.

"A rifle, sir," replied Tom, in a rather muffled voice.

"A what!" cried the voice.

"A rifle, sir," replied Tom, again.

"Bring it here," was the short reply, and over across the field went Tom
to his doom.

"Go back there and get one of those carpenters to give you a good sized
shingle," said Mr. Henry, "and give me the gun."

"Well," said Tom to himself, "I knew I was taking risks," and he
returned in a moment with the shingle, and looking his father straight
in the eye waited the next command.

"Now," said Mr. Henry, in his severest tones, "take that shingle and put
it up against that big tree, and give me a cartridge."

Surprise and wonder are no names for the feelings that ran through Tom's
mind; it made him tingle up and down his backbone--he couldn't say a
single word; but there were more surprises to follow.

"What you been shooting, Tommy? Elephants, hey?" said Mr. Henry, after
firing all the cartridges Tom had left; "or was it only small game--a
panther or lynx--you were after this morning?"

Tom's courage began to return, and as he found his father in such a
splendid mood he was not going to allow himself to be bluffed.

"I went out after partridges, sir," he said, "and I thought I'd have one
for supper to-night for mamma; but he wasn't there. I was sure I'd get
one."

In a short time Mr. Henry had the whole story, and not a word of fault
was found, and Tom thought he had the finest father in the world; he
thought so before, but after this incident there was no doubt about it.

       *       *       *       *       *

On the evening of the same day Tom was again devouring the "bird book,"
as he had always called it. Mr. Henry, who had been writing at his desk,
pushed himself back, and looking at Tom, a smile crept over his face.
His son was exactly as he had been at that age, and the reason of his
lenient treatment of what many fathers would have given a severe
punishment for was because he knew a good deal of the world, and
especially how to treat a boy who had inherited a sportsman's love of
woods and guns, and was not to blame for it. Tom was bending close over
the book to see whether it was a woodcock or a quail the dog was
pointing, when Mr. Henry startled him as he said with a laugh,

"My boy, did you really think you'd get a partridge? Why, Dr. Carver
himself couldn't shoot a partridge with a rifle; why didn't you come and
ask me for my gun?"

"'Cause I didn't think you'd lend it to me," said Tom, "and I was afraid
you'd suspect something. I'll come to you to-morrow," he added, as a
quiet joke on his father.

But the way his father took his little joke nearly made him "have a
fit," as he told Jim Vail afterwards.

"All right, Tommy," said Mr. Henry, "come to me after breakfast and I'll
fix you out."

Another restless night followed by another beautiful morning, and down
across the field trudged Tom, Dick, and Harry, but it looked like a
brown shooting-coat walking by itself with two setters following after
it through curiosity. There went Tom with a real gun--the little
sixteen-bore--a real hunting-coat, sleeves rolled up and pinned to hold
them, and down below his knees, to be sure; real cartridges in his
pocket, and to make it complete two real bird-dogs. He was going to be
the man in the "bird book," and best of all there was no "on the sly"
about it.

Down back of the place beyond the "muck pond," where Tom had often
caught live bait for his father, and had slaughtered many a fine fat
frog, to say nothing of the turtles and lizards which had been the
starting of a small museum of which he was sole proprietor, down beyond
this pond he struck into the woods and let "Jet" the Gordon and "Bang"
the Irish setter run. He followed them closely. Soon they came to a
point, and he walked towards them. But here's where there was a
difference between the picture and his position at that moment; he
looked in vain for the bird; in the picture he could see it, but, try
his best, he could not see it in life. The dogs worried a little, he
stepped on a twig which cracked; whir! and up got Mr. Partridge from the
bushes--not exactly where Tom had expected--and whirled off, Tom
crouching down to see where he lit, to try him again. Time and again the
same thing happened, but Tom never could seem to see the bird till he
got up, and he never thought to try him flying. The dogs got tired of
this kind of shooting and came in "to heel," and finally, rather
discouraged and decidedly tired, Tom sat down to decide whether he would
go home or not. He was sitting under a large pine-tree and thinking what
his father would say, when out of the branches above his head sailed,
with a quiet, subdued whir, the very bird he had been chasing so long.
It settled not more than thirty yards off on the roots of an upturned
birch-tree and began a gentle cluck, spreading its fanlike tail and
shaking its feathers, but only for a moment. Tom's chance had come. A
hurried and excited aim, a loud bang, and the partridge was fluttering
on the ground, and Tom was stooping over it; the gun was back where he
had shot from; he had gotten to the bird before the dogs. What he wanted
was a partridge in his coat pocket; he did not seem so anxious to have
the dogs hand it to him, as his dreams had made him.

Tell the truth, Tom ran most of the way home. He met his father on the
driveway, and a sudden composure took hold of him.

"Say, Pop," he said, "it ain't so easy as one thinks, is it?"

"I'll bet you didn't get anything, not even a chipper bird," said Mr.
Henry; "now did you?"

Tom braced himself, his heart was beating fast, and the shivers were
again making him jump and wriggle.

"I only got one decent shot," replied Tom, beginning very coolly, "but I
got him, and mamma'll have that bird I didn't get yesterday to-night for
supper. Look at that!" he shouted the last part of his sentence, and
swinging the bird in front of his father's face, darted past to show and
tell all in the house, leaving Mr. Henry in blank astonishment. What he
was saying to himself was:

"I'll get that boy the prettiest gun in the city for Christmas, that's
what I'll do; he'll be giving me points before long."




SNOW-SHOES AND SLEDGES.

BY KIRK MUNROE.


CHAPTER XXIX.

A WILDERNESS-ORPHAN.

The position in which Phil now found himself was certainly a perplexing
one. By the very simple process of getting lost he had discovered Cree
Jim's cabin, but was appalled to consider what else he had found at the
same time. He now knew that the remainder of their journey, its most
difficult and dangerous portion, must be undertaken without a guide. Not
only this, but they must be burdened with a child so young as to be
practically helpless. In the mean time, what was to be done with those
silent and motionless forms whose dread presence so pervaded that lonely
cabin? And how was he to communicate with his friends? There was no back
trail to follow, for the snow had wiped it out. He did not even know in
which direction camp lay, for in the ardor of his chase the evening
before he had taken no note of course nor distance.

There was the stream, though, on whose bank the cabin was perched. It
must flow into the river. Yes, that was his only hope. But the river
might be miles away, and the camp as much farther, if, indeed, it could
still be found where he had left it. But of course it would be! So long
as Serge Belcofsky and Jalap Coombs had life and strength to search for
him that camp would remain a permanent fixture until he returned to it.
Phil was absolutely sure of that, and he now realized, as never before,
the priceless value of a friendship whose loyalty is beyond doubt.

So the plan was formed. He would go down the stream and up the river
until he found camp. Then he would bring Serge and a sledge back with
him. In the mean time the child must be left where he was, for Phil
doubted if he could carry him over the weary miles that he knew must lie
between the cabin and camp, while for the little fellow to walk that
distance was out of the question.

Phil sat on a stool before the fire while doing all this thinking. As he
rose to carry out his plan, Nel-te, who was becoming terrified at his
mother's silence in spite of his efforts to attract her attention,
slipped from the bed, ran to his new friend, and thrusting a cold little
hand into one of his, looked up with a smile of such perfect trust that
Phil snatched him in his arms and kissed him, at the same time giving
him a great hug.

Then he said: "Now, Nel-te, brother Phil is going away for a little
while to get some doggies for you to play with, and you must stay here
like a good boy, and not open the door until he comes back. Do you
understand?"

"Yes; me go get doggies. Nel-te like doggies. Good doggies." And almost
before Phil knew what the child was about he had slipped from his arms,
run to the door, and was putting on the tiny snow-shoes that had been
left outside. Then with an engaging smile, he called, cheerily: "Come.
Nel-te say come. Get doggies."

"All right, little chap. I expect your plan is as good as mine, after
all," replied Phil, into whose mind had just flashed the promise made to
that dead mother, never to desert her baby. "And here I was, about to
begin by doing that very thing," he reflected as he glanced at the
marble face overspread by an expression of perfect content that his
promise had brought.

Moved by a sudden impulse he picked up the boy, and, bringing him back,
held him so that he might kiss the peaceful face. This the child did
with a soft cooing that served to convey both love and pity. Then he ran
to the stalwart figure that still lay on the floor, and, patting its
swarthy cheek, said something in the Cree tongue that Phil did not
understand.

After that Phil carefully closed the door to prevent the intrusion of
wild beasts, and the two, whose fortunes had become so strangely
interwoven, set forth together down the white surface of the
forest-bordered stream, on whose bank Nel-te had been born and passed
his few years of life. He was happily but unconsciously venturing on his
first "little journey into the world," while his companion was filled
with a sense of manliness and responsibility from the experiences
through which he had just passed that the mere adding of years could
never have brought.

Phil wondered at the ease with which the little fellow managed his
snow-shoes, until he reflected that the child had probably been taught
to use them from the day of taking his first step. So the two fur-clad
figures, ridiculously contrasted in size, trudged along side by side
down the winding stream, the one thoughtfully silent and the other
chattering of "doggies," until he began to lag behind and give signs
that the pace was telling on his slender strength.

"Poor little chap," said Phil. "But I had been expecting it, and now we
will try another scheme." So, slinging the tiny snow-shoes across the
child's back, he picked him up and set him astride his own broad
shoulders; when Nel-te clutched his head, and shouted with glee at this
delightful mode of travel.

After they had gone a mile or so in this fashion they rounded a sharp
bend, and came so suddenly upon poor Serge, who was making his way up
the stream in search of some trace of his friend, that for a moment he
stood motionless and speechless with amazement. He could make nothing of
the approaching apparition until Phil shouted, cheerily:

"Hurrah, old man! Here we are, safe and sound, and awfully glad to see
you."

"Oh, Phil!" cried Serge, while tears actually stood in his honest blue
eyes, "I can hardly believe it! It seems almost too good to be true. Are
you sure you are not wounded nor frozen nor hurt in any way? Haven't you
suffered terribly? If you haven't, we have. I don't believe Mr. Coombs
slept a wink last night, and I know I didn't. But I am happy enough at
this minute to make up for it all, a hundred times over. Oh, Phil!"

"I have suffered a little from anxiety, and been a trifle hungry, and
had some sad experiences, but I haven't suffered half so much as I
deserved for my carelessness in getting lost. I found Cree Jim, though;
but--"

"And brought him with you?" interrupted Serge, smiling for the first
time in many hours, as he glanced at the quaint little figure perched on
Phil's shoulders.

"Not exactly," replied the other, soberly. "You see this little chap is
his son, and I've adopted him for a sort of a brother, and he is going
with us."

"You've done what?" cried Serge.

"Adopted him. That is, you see I promised my aunt Ruth to bring her
something from Alaska that was unique in the way of a curio, and it
seems to me that Nel-te here will please her about as well as anything.
Don't you think so?"

"Perhaps so," assented Serge, doubtfully. "But was his father willing
that you should have him?"

"Oh yes, perfectly. That is, you know he is dead, and so is the mother;
but I promised her to take care of the little chap, and as there wasn't
anything else to be done, why, here we are."

"Of course it's all right if you say so," agreed Serge, "and I don't
care, so long as you are safe, if you carry a whole tribe back to your
aunt Ruth; but now don't you think we'd better be getting along to camp?
It was all I could do to persuade Mr. Coombs to stay behind and look out
for things; he is so anxious. The only way I could induce him to was by
suggesting that you might come in tired and hungry, and would feel
awfully if no one was there to welcome you. But he is liable to set out
on a hunt for you at any moment."

"Certainly, we must get there as quickly as possible," replied Phil.
"How far is it?"

"Not more than one mile up the river from the mouth of this creek, which
is only a few rods below here. But oh, Phil, to think that I have found
you! When I had almost given up all hope of ever again seeing you alive
too. I have been down as far as our first camp on the river this
morning, and this creek was my last hope. I wouldn't have left the
country without you, though, or at any rate without knowing what had
become of you. Neither would Mr. Coombs. We settled that last night
while we talked over what had best be done."

"I was sure you wouldn't, old fellow," replied Phil, with something like
a choke in his voice.

At the camp they were hailed by Jalap Coombs, who almost hugged Phil in
his revulsion of feeling and unaffected joy at the lad's return.

"But you don't do it again, Philip, my son!" he cried. "That is, the
next time you feels inclined to wander from home and stay out nights, ye
may go, of course, but you'll have to take me along. So ef you gits
lost, I gets lost likewise; for, as my old friend Kite Roberson useter
say consarning prodergal sons, 'It's allers toughest on them as is left
behind.' But Phil, what be ye doing with that furry little beggar? Is he
the pilot ye went sarching for?"

"Yes," laughed Phil, lifting Nel-te down from his shoulders. "He is the
pilot who is to lead us from this wilderness, and if you have got
anything to eat, you'd better give it to him before he devours one of
the dogs, which he seems inclined to do. I can answer for it, that he
has been on short rations for several days, and is properly hungry."

"Have I got anything to eat?" cried the other. "Waal, rather! How does
fresh steaks, and roasts, and chops, and stews strike your fancy?" With
this he pointed to one side of the camp, where, to their astonishment,
the boys saw a quantity of fresh meat, much of which was already cut
into thin strips for freezing and packing.

"Where did it come from?" queried Phil, looking at Serge; but the latter
only shook his head.

"It's jest a bit of salvage that I raked in as it went drifting by,"
explained Jalap Coombs, his face beaming with gratified pride. "It's
some kind of deer-meat, and _for_ a deer he was pretty nigh as big as
one of those elephants back yonder in the moss cave. You see, he came
cruising along this way shortly after Serge left, and the dogs give
chase and made him heave to. When I j'ined 'em he surrendered. Then I
had my hands full in a hurry, driving off the dogs and lashing 'em fast
so as they couldn't eat him, horns and all, and cutting of him up. I
hain't more'n made a beginning with him, either, for there's pretty nigh
a full cargo left.

"But how did you kill him? There wasn't any gun in camp?" asked Phil,
utterly bewildered.

"Of course there warn't no gun," answered Jalap Coombs, "and likewise I
didn't need one. Sich things I leave for boys. How did I kill him, say
you? Why, I jest naturally harpooned him like I would any other whale."


CHAPTER XXX.

JALAP AND THE DOGS SING A LULLABY.

"Harpooned a moose!" cried Phil and Serge together; for they had by this
time discovered the nature of the sailor's "big deer." "And where did
you get the harpoon?" asked the former.

"Found it, leaning agin a tree while I were out after firewood," replied
Jalap Coombs, at the same time producing and proudly exhibiting a heavy
A-yan spear, such as were formerly used by the natives of the Pelly
River valley. "It were a trifle rusty, and a trifle light in the butt,"
he added, "but it come in mighty handy when it were most needed, and for
an old whaler it are not a bad sort of a weepon. I'm free to say,
though, that I might have had hard luck in tackling the beast with it ef
he hadn't been already wounded. I didn't know it till after he were
dead, but when I come to cut him up, I saw where he'd been bleeding
pretty free, and then I found this bullet in his innards. Still, I don't
reckin you'd have called him a mouse, nor yet a rat, if ye'd seed him
like I did under full sail, with horns set wing and wing, showing the
speed of a fifty-ton schooner. If I hadn't had the harpoon I'd left him
severely alone; but I allowed that a weepon as were good enough for a
whale would do for a deer, even ef he were bigger than the sun."

"It's a rifle-bullet, calibre forty-four," said Phil, who was examining
the bit of lead that Jalap Coombs had taken from his "big deer." "I
wonder if it can be possible that he is the same moose I wounded, and
without whose lead I should never have found Cree Jim's cabin. It seems
incredible that he should have come right back to camp to be killed,
though I suppose it is possible. Certainly good fortune, or good luck,
does seem to be pretty steadily on our side, and without the aid of the
fur-seal's tooth either," he added, with a sly glance at Serge.

As soon as breakfast was finished, Phil and Serge slipped away, taking a
sledge, to which was lashed a couple of axes, with them. They were going
back to bury the parents of the child, who was so happily oblivious of
their errand that he did not even take note of their departure.

The lads had no idea of how they should accomplish their sorrowful task.
Even with proper tools they knew it would be impossible to dig a grave
in the frozen ground, and as they had only axes with which to work, this
plan was dismissed without discussion.

They had not settled on any plan when they rounded the last bend of the
little stream and gained a point from which the cabin should have been
visible. Then they saw at a glance that the task they had been dreading
had been accomplished without their aid. There was no cabin, but a cloud
of smoke rising from its site, as from an altar, gave ample evidence of
its fate. A blazing log from the fire Phil left in its hearth must have
rolled out on to the floor directly after his departure. Now only a heap
of ashes and glowing embers remained to mark Nel-te's home.

"It is best so," said Phil, as the two lads stood beside the smouldering
ruins of what had been a home and was now become a sepulchre. "And oh,
Serge! think what might have been the child's fate if I had left him
behind, as I at first intended. Poor little chap! I realize now, as
never before, how completely his past is wiped out and how entirely his
future lies in our hands. It is a trust that came without our seeking,
but I accepted it; and now beside his mother's ashes I swear to be true
to the promise I gave her."

"Amen!" said Serge, softly.

They planted a rude wooden cross, the face of which was chipped to a
gleaming whiteness, close in front of the smouldering heap, and near it
Serge fastened a streamer of white cloth to the tip of a tall young
spruce. Cutting off the limbs as he descended, he left it a slender
pole, and thus provided the native symbol of a place of burial.

[Illustration: "A FLYING-FISH-CATCHER FROM OLD HONG-KONG--YO HO! ROLL A
MAN DOWN!"]

As they approached the camp they were astonished to hear Jalap Coombs
singing in bellowing tones the rollicking old sea chant of "Roll a Man
Down!"

  "A flying-fish-catcher from old Hong-Kong--
    Yo ho! roll a man down--
  A flying-fish-catcher comes bowling along;
    Give us some time to roll a man down,
    Roll a man up and roll a man down,
    Give us some time to roll a man down.
    From labbord to stabbord away we go--
    Yo ho! roll a man down."

Jalap's voice was not musical, but it possessed a mighty volume, and as
the quaint sea chorus roared and echoed through the stately forest, the
very trees appeared to be listening in silent wonder to the unaccustomed
sounds. Even Musky, Luvtuk, big Amook, and the other dogs seemed by
their dismal howlings to be expressing either appreciation or
disapprobation of the sailor-man's efforts.

The performers in this open-air concert were too deeply intent on their
own affairs to pay any heed to the approach of the returning sledge
party, who were thus enabled to come within full view of a most
extraordinary scene unnoticed. Just beyond the camp, in a semicircle,
facing the fire, a dozen dogs, resting on their haunches, lifted both
their voices and sharp-pointed noses to the sky. On the opposite side of
the fire sat Jalap Coombs holding Nel-te in his arms, rocking him to and
fro in time to the chorus that he was pouring forth with the full power
of his lungs, and utterly oblivious to everything save his own unusual
occupation of putting a baby to sleep.

"Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho!" roared Phil and Serge, unable to restrain
their mirth a moment longer. "Oh my! Oh my! Oh, Mr. Coombs, you'll be
the death of me yet! What ever are you doing? Didn't know you could
sing! What a capital nurse you make! What a soft voice for lullabies!
The dogs, too! Oh dear! I shall laugh at the thought of this if I live
to be a hundred! Don't mind us, though. Keep right on. Please do!"

But the concert was ended. Jalap Coombs sprang to his feet with a
startled yell, and dropped the child, who screamed with the fright of
his sudden awakening. The dogs, whose harmonious howlings were so
abruptly interrupted, slunk away with tails between their legs, and hid
themselves in deepest shadows.

"There, there, little chap. Don't be frightened," cried Phil, darting
forward and picking up the child, though still shaking with laughter.
"It's all right now. Brother Phil will protect you, and not let the big
man frighten you any more."

"I frighten him indeed!" retorted Jalap Coombs, indignantly. "He was
sleeping quiet and peaceful as a seal pup; and I were just humming a bit
of a ditty that useter be sung to me when I were a kid, so's he'd have
something pleasant to dream about. Then you young swabs had to come
creeping up and yell like a couple of wild hoodoos, and set the dogs to
howling and scare the kid, to say nothing of me, which ef I had ye
aboard ship I'd masthead ye both till ye larnt manners. Oh, ye may
snicker! But I have my opinion all the same of any man as'll wake a
sleeping child, specially when he's wore out with crying, all on account
of being desarted. And I'm not the only one nuther. There was old Kite
Roberson who useter clap a muzzle onto his wife's canary whenever she'd
get the kids to sleep, for fear the critter'd bust inter singing. But
it's all right. You will know how it is yourselves some day."

Phil, seeing that, for the first time since he had known him, the mate
was thoroughly indignant, set out to smooth his ruffled feelings.

"Why, Mr. Coombs," he said, "we didn't mean to startle you, but those
wretched dogs kept up such a howling that we couldn't make ourselves
heard as we neared camp. I'm sure I don't see how you could think we
were laughing at you. It was those absurd dogs, and you'd have laughed
yourself if you'd looked up and seen them. I'm sure it was awfully good
of you to take so much trouble over this little fellow, and put him so
nicely to sleep with your sing-- I mean with your humming, though I
assure you we didn't hear a hum."

"Waal," replied Jalap Coombs, greatly mollified by Phil's attitude. "I
warn't humming very loud, not nigh _so_ loud as I had been at fust. Ye
see, I were kinder tapering off so as to lay the kid down, and begin to
get supper 'gainst you kim back."

"Yes, I see," said Phil, almost choking with suppressed laughter. "But
how did it happen that you were compelled to act as nurse? The little
chap seemed happy enough when we went away."

"So he were, till he found you was gone. Then he begun to pipe his eye
and set storm signals, and directly it come on to blow a hurricane with
heavy squalls. So I had to stand by. Fust off I thought the masts would
surely go; but I took a reef here and there, and kinder got things
snugged down, till after a whilt the sky broke, the sun kim out, and
fair weather sot in once more."

"Well," said Phil, admiringly, "you certainly acted with the judgment of
an A No. 1 seaman, and I don't believe even your esteemed friend Captain
Robinson could have done better. We shall call on you whenever our
little pilot gets into troubled waters again, and feel that we are
placing him in the best possible hands."

At which praise Jalap Coombs was greatly pleased, and said as how he'd
be proud at all times to stand by the kid. Thus on the same day that
little Nel-te McLeod lost his parents he found a brother and two stanch
friends.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]




UNCLE SAM AS A STAMP-MAKER.

BY FRANCES BENJAMIN JOHNSTON.


"Here, boys, is a piece of legislation which will add a new series of
stamps to your collections," said Mr. Copeland, as he glanced up from
his morning paper. "The bill transferring the printing of stamps to the
Bureau of Engraving and Printing has just become a law, and hereafter
Uncle Sam will manufacture his own stamps, as well as his own paper
money."

"Why, father, if they make them here, we can see just how it's done!"
exclaimed Donald, the eldest of the Copeland boys, who, with his
brothers Jack and Ezra, was now experiencing the severest stage of the
"stamp fever."

"Huh!" grunted the latter--nicknamed "The Parson," from his
old-fashioned ways and a solemn assumption of wisdom. "Perhaps they'll
not let you know anything at all about it. Bobby Simonds told me that
the big company in New York that has always made 'em is awful particular
about letting people see their machinery and things; and Bobby ought to
know 'cause his uncle's an engraver there."

"Are they going to make all the stamps here in Washington?" broke in
May, the baby of the family. "That'll be nice for you boys,'cause you
can get 'em cheaper at the factory, can't you?"

"That's just like a girl," laughed Jack. "Anybody would think they were
going to sell stamps by the yard."

"Well, my boy," said Mr. Copeland, "your sister is right, in a sense, as
under this act the Post-office Department will buy its stamps wholesale
from the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, at a nominal price per
thousand, without reference to their face value. I think you also are
mistaken, Parson, as the public will doubtless be as free to inspect the
manufacture of stamps as they now are to see the process of
bank-note-making. When the stamp-printing plant is established, there
should be a great deal in it to interest you youngsters. What do you say
to a tour of investigation some Saturday?"

Their father's suggestion delighted the children, who waited eagerly for
the fulfilment of the promise.

This came on a bright October morning, when the little party climbed the
hill beyond the towering Washington Monument, and reached the grim brick
building which is known as the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

Here they were shown into a small reception-room, and kept waiting, with
a throng of other sight-seers, until a card from the chief procured for
them a special guide through the building. As she led them through a
long corridor, this lady explained something of the complete and
ingenious system which is in force here to prevent fraud or loss to the
government. No visitor is permitted inside the building without one of
the guides especially detailed for this service, while the work of each
of the hundreds of employe's is so carefully checked and recorded that
even the most insignificant error is readily traceable. Ink, paper, the
engravers' dies, the printers' plates, are all given out on properly
signed receipts, and until all are accounted for, even to the tiniest
scrap of paper, the employes who have handled them are not permitted to
leave the building; so that only by a widespread plot could all these
safeguards be successfully eluded.

[Illustration: THE ENGRAVING-ROOM.]

The little party was now shown into a very long room, at one end of
which was ranged a row of compartments like sentry-boxes. In each of
these sat a silent engraver, bent over the small square of steel upon
which he was cutting some part of the design for paper money or stamps.
The plates from which the stamps were formerly printed are the property
of the government, so that the old designs, with a slight modification,
are still in use. This modification consists of a trefoil mark placed in
the upper corner of the new stamps, which will serve to distinguish them
from the old issues printed by the American Bank-note Company. The work
of the engravers is necessarily so painstaking and slow that the
original dies are considered too expensive to use in the
printing-presses. Thus, after the engraver has completed a die, it is
subjected to a hardening process, and the design multiplied indefinitely
upon soft steel plates by what is known as the transfer-press. The
children were shown a long row of these presses, as well as the great
vaults where all the designs, dies, and plates are locked up after the
day's work. From the silence of the engravers' department they were led
into the din and clatter of the press-room below. Here they found the
new steam-presses as well as old-fashioned hand-presses in operation,
and were able to see every detail of the actual printing of stamps.

[Illustration: TAKING SHEETS OFF THE PRESSES.]

The hand-presses are worked by a plate-printer and one assistant, the
printer first inking and polishing the engraved plate over a series of
small gas-jets, after which it is placed on the press. His assistant
now lays a dampened sheet of paper upon the plate, the printer gives the
press a turn, and a sheet of bright new stamps is drawn out at the other
side. This work is done quickly and accurately, but it is a very slow
process compared with that of the steam-presses, which turn out sheets
of four hundred stamps each at the rate of one hundred thousand stamps
an hour. The steam-presses carry four plates on an endless chain around
the sides of a large square, in the circuit of which the plates are
automatically heated to the proper temperature, inked, wiped off, and
printed. The blank paper is laid on the plates by one assistant, while a
second helper takes out the printed sheet. The printer in charge of the
press has the most difficult part of the work, which consists in
polishing the plate with his bare palms after it has been mechanically
inked. This must be done so delicately as to leave neither too much nor
too little ink upon the plate, but only _just enough_ to give a clean,
fine impression.

The presses clattered and clanked, and the children watched with
breathless interest while a great stack of the dampened paper
disappeared rapidly, sheet by sheet, through the press, reappearing
again to be stacked in a second neat pile in the form of thousands upon
thousands of new red two-cent stamps.

Besides the ordinary issues, the young investigators were much
interested in seeing the printing of revenue stamps, of the long-strip
stamps for cigar-boxes, and other tobacco stamps, and particularly the
new two-cent stamps for playing-cards.

Having watched to their entire satisfaction the various movements of the
great presses, the children began to feel that the object of their visit
had been realized, and that there was nothing more to see. They were
therefore somewhat surprised to learn that the _printing_ of the stamps
is merely the beginning of the work upon them, and that a number of very
important things must happen to these small squares of red, blue, brown,
and purple before they are ready to be sold through the little window in
the post-office. After they are printed the sheets must be dried and
pressed out, gummed, dried and pressed again, the sheets perforated and
cut apart, trimmed, and, in addition, carefully counted before and after
each of these operations.

In the early days of postage-stamps, and for several years after they
first came into use, two serious difficulties presented
themselves--_i.e._, the gumming and separating of the stamps. For a time
a thick muddy mucilage was used, which curled up the sheets in a very
inconvenient way. Then, again, before the ingenious device of
perforation was hit upon, it was necessary to cut the stamps apart with
a pair of scissors. Imagine a post-master in these busy days supplying
his customers by the scissors method!

[Illustration: IN THE DRYING-ROOM.]

Fortunately a clever Frenchman conceived the plan of punching a series
of small holes between the stamps, and his invention was promptly
introduced into this country. The children were now eager to see the
finishing processes of stamp-making, and so followed their guide into a
large room, where they were greeted by a rush of warm air. Here their
guide showed them the method of gumming the stamps and the curious
apparatus used for the purpose. Along the entire length of the room,
with a narrow passage between, are ranged a series of wooden boxes,
quite sixty feet in length. These are heated by steam, and through each
box passes a sort of double endless chain. The sheets are fed, face
down, into this queer machine, and passed under a roller, which allows
the escape of just enough gum to coat the sheet thinly and evenly. The
sheet is now caught on the endless chain by two automatic clamps, and
carried into the long hot-box. It takes only a few moments for the
journey through, but the sheets appear at the other end perfectly dried,
and ready to be trimmed and perforated.

As the method of gumming stamps used by the various bank-note companies
has been a carefully guarded and secret process, the Bureau of Engraving
and Printing has been forced to invent its own machine for this purpose.
The sheets are gummed at the rate of about eighteen a minute, which is
certainly a vast improvement over the old method of putting on the gum
by hand with a brush.

[Illustration: MIXING THE GLUE.]

When the children were weary of watching the funny little brass fingers
move along and hurry the sheets off into the hot-box, they turned to a
corner where a workman was busy over a series of vats and buckets mixing
the gum, which looked very clean and nice, and is made of dextrine, a
vegetable product. The guide now showed them how the gummed sheets are
pressed smooth for perforation, and then led them into a room where a
score or more of odd little machines were in swift operation. Each
machine is tended by two workwomen, most of whom wear fantastic caps of
paper to shade their eyes, as the sheets must be fed into the machines
with absolute accuracy in order that the perforations shall come in the
right place. Each sheet has register lines printed in the margin, which
must be adjusted exactly under a black thread fastened across the
feeding-table. A quick whir of the wheels puts a neat line of pin-holes
lengthwise between the stamps, cutting the sheet in half at the same
time. The next machine perforates the sheet crosswise, and again cuts it
in two, so that the sheets are now divided up into the regulation size
of one hundred stamps each.

The children thought the minute disks of paper punched out by the
perforators too insignificant to be considered, and were accordingly
much surprised to learn that the sheets again have to be smoothed out,
under great pressure, to reduce their bulk and remove the "burr" caused
by the perforation.

After inspecting the final process of making up the stamps into
packages, to be mailed to the postmasters all over the country, the
children were taken by their father to the office of the chief of the
bureau. Here they received a cordial welcome, and learned many
interesting and curious details about stamps and stamp-making. About
3,000,000,000 stamps are annually furnished the Post-office Department
by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, at the rate of five cents a
thousand. Ninety per cent. of these are the two-cent stamps, and
according to the last Post-office report the revenue from the sale of
stamps is a little over $6,000,000 a month.

"By-the-way," observed the chief, "you young people should be very much
interested in the Report of the Third Assistant Postmaster-General for
1893, which contains a carefully prepared and elaborately descriptive
list of every stamp and postal card issued by the United States
government. It must seem hard to you stamp collectors that the most
beautiful stamps issued--the newspaper and periodical stamps--are not
permitted to be sold to the public. One of the chief reasons for this is
that the values of these small squares of paper run up to such high
figures, viz., $24, $36, $48, and $60, that they would offer a great
field in counterfeiters if generally circulated. There are some queer
denominations among these stamps, notably the $1.92 stamp, which is
about to be discontinued, and some very pretty colors. That reminds
me--did they show you our ink-mills in your tour of inspection?"

Mr. Copeland explained that they had not seen the mills, so the children
had the pleasure of being escorted by the chief himself into the grimy
region which is seldom penetrated by the public. Here they saw the
colors ground and mixed in small mills, from which the workmen--smeared
from top to toe in a rainbow of colors--gathered the thick greasy ink by
the bucketful. About one hundred thousand pounds of dry color is used
annually for the two-cent stamps alone, the color being mixed with an
equal quantity of burnt linseed oil, making two hundred thousand pounds
of ink. Of course a large percentage of this color is lost in inking and
polishing the plate.

The tour was now ended, and leaving the oily little wheels to their
ceaseless grinding, the children, with a grateful good-by to their new
friend, went home with their young heads full of the interesting things
they had seen in Uncle Sam's stamp factory.




[Illustration: THE PUDDING STICK]

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


Girls who are terrified by thunder and lightning lose a great deal of
enjoyment during the summer, when we have storms as well as sunshine. It
may not be quite possible for every one to help being afraid when the
sky is black with clouds and the lightning's flash, but it _is_ within
the power of most people to control the expression of fright. Once or
twice having resolutely refrained from showing your terror, you will be
surprised and pleased to find the terror itself lessening.

I know persons who go through life in a sort of bondage to fear of
various kinds. They tremble and turn pale, or grow hysterical and cry,
when the dark clouds gather and the thunders roll. There is a pretty
German hymn which begins,

  "It thunders, but I tremble not,
    My trust is firm in God,
  His arm of strength I've ever sought
    Through all the way I've trod."

I advise all of you who need the advice to remember that God rules in
the heavens, and His hand sends the storms. Trust in God when you are
afraid--really _trust_, and you will grow calm and be happy. Another
grain of comfort may be found in the fact that when you see the bright
zig-zagging flash and hear the rumbling thunder, the danger for you is
over. You will never see or hear the electric current which hurts or
kills. It is far too swift to wait and warn you in that way.

Many of us have some pet aversion, which goes far to make us cowards in
one direction, even if in other conditions and situations we are brave.
I have seen women almost faint at the sight of a poor little scurrying
mouse, and have heard others scream at a bat or a beetle. I confess to a
very great dislike on my own part to things with wings and with stings,
especially those which fly in at the window when the lamp is lighted,
and buzz and fizz and snap and pounce and bounce. But I would be ashamed
of myself if I could not keep from shrieking in the presence of these
innocent little marauders. Depend upon it, girls, we _can_ display a
cool front and wear a brave face if we choose to do so, let what happen.
It is all a question of will.

Numbers of travellers never get the full meed of pleasure when on a
journey because they carry too great a load of care. They fancy that
this or that will happen. They are distressed because of accidents which
may possibly occur. They make the friends with them uncomfortable
because they suggest dreadfully unpleasant catastrophes as just around
the corner. When you think of it, this behavior is both stupid and
silly. Trains and boats are in the hands, as a rule, of competent and
responsible persons, who wish to take their passengers and freight safe
to the journey's end. You, being neither captain, nor engineer, nor
conductor, are called upon to feel no concern in the matter.

I wish I could impress on every young girl the beauty and dignity of
simple, quiet courage. Not recklessness, nor indifference to danger, but
a gentle acceptance of every situation, and a rising above fear. Fear is
the feeling of a slave. It fetters one's mind, and makes one's body
clumsy and awkward. The Bible says, "Fear hath torment." It is usually
ignoble, not the appropriate sentiment for bright, capable,
kind-hearted, and winning girls like you. Resolve to put fear under your
feet, and walk through the world with hearts superior to it in its every
form and phase.

[Illustration: Signature]




[Illustration: STAMPS]

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


One of the first requisites of any science is to know its terms.
Stamp-collecting is now not only a hobby, but an exact science as well.

[Illustration: Regular perforations: holes punched out.]

[Illustration: Rouletted: lines cut in.]

[Illustration: Pin perforated: pin-holes.]

[Illustration: Rouletted _en arc_: curved lines cut in.]

[Illustration: Rouletted _en scie_: saw-tooth lines cut in.]

[Illustration: Rouletted _en serpentine_: fancy lines cut in.]

[Illustration: Rouletted _en points_: diagonal lines cut in.]

[Illustration: Rouletted _en losange_: diagonal cuts not joined.]

[Illustration: Rouletted in half squares: lines cut in.]

Formerly little note was taken of the condition of stamps, but to-day
the smallest details are important. You have doubtless noticed that
almost all stamps issued during the past thirty years have "scalloped"
edges. These are perforations made to enable persons using stamps to
detach one or more without using scissors. Previous to 1856 all stamps
were printed on sheets of paper, and had to be cut off one by one with a
knife or scissors. These are known as "unperforated." Many experiments
were made to do away with the necessity of using scissors, and we
illustrate the different methods used. Gradually all nations have
adopted the "regular" perforations, which consist of a series of holes
punched out along all four edges of each stamp. Now this difference
between perforated and unperforated stamps makes not a little difference
in the prices asked. For instance, the 24c. U.S. of 1851 unperforated
would be cheap at $100, whereas the same stamp perforated is worth $2.50
only. The Victoria twopenny of 1867 is worth $1.50 perforated, while $25
is asked for the unperforated. So none of the ROUND TABLE collectors
should trim the edges of any stamps they may have. Next week we will
illustrate the scale of regular perforations.

The so-called _error_ of the 5c. red-brown U.S. 1890 issue in the color
of the 4c. dark brown has been demonstrated to be a _changeling_, by a
very simple chemical test. The dealer who offered these stamps for sale
at $30 each has notified the thirty-seven people who bought copies at
that price that their money will be returned on demand.

I would advise all collectors to keep all the different shades of the
U.S. stamps which they get at little or no expense, but to avoid paying
any extra for shades of current or late stamps.

     A PENROSE SCULL.--The common stamps of the U.S. are worth about
     $50 to $100 per million if in good condition. The 10c. brown is
     quoted at 10c.

     BUCKSKIN.--This is not the place to quote arguments in favor of
     stamp-collecting. Most boys, and many men, find great pleasure in
     this pursuit. Ask one of them to tell you of its pleasures.

     H. W.--There are two varieties of Baltimore and Ohio Telegraph
     stamps. One is worth $2 each, the regular perforated are worth
     65c. per set.

     ARTHUR L. EVANS.--The 10c. green is worth 6c. The 6c. and 8c.
     Columbians can still be bought at face in many post-offices.

PHILATUS.




SCHOOL-BOY'S SONG OF THE SCHOOL WEEK.


  On Monday black, at four o'clock,
  The key is turned in the school-room lock,
  And I've given old Time a terrible knock,
            For the head of the Week is broken.

  At four of a Tuesday afternoon,
  The hour that cometh none too soon,
  I strap my books to a merry tune,
            For the neck of the Week is broken.

  As the four glad strokes on Wednesday ring,
  My cap in the air I gayly fling,
  And homeward run as I loudly sing,
            "The grip of the Week is broken."

  Ah, welcome the sound of the Thursday's four,
  And the joyous thought of "but one day more
  That opens and shuts the school-room door,"
            For the back of the Week is broken.

  But sweeter than story in prose or rhyme
  The musical notes of the Friday chime,
  For the Week lies dead in the arms of Time,
            And the school-boy's chains are broken.

  L. H. BRUCE.




KING ARTHUR AND HIS KNIGHTS.


II.--THE SWORD.

"Now while the lords and their followers were gathered in the great
church," the Story-teller said, as Jack and Mollie began to show some
curiosity as to what this miracle for which Merlin hoped might be,
"there was discovered in the church-yard near the altar a great black
stone, about four feet square, on the middle of which stood a steel
anvil a foot in height. Thrust into this, with its shining point
visible, was a beautiful sword, and about it, written in letters of
gold, were these words:

"'WHOSO PULLETH OUT THIS SWORD OF THIS STONE AND ANVIL IS RIGHTWISE KING
BORN OF ENGLAND.'"

"Who put it there?" asked Jack.

"I don't know," said the Story-teller. "It was there, and that is all I
know about it, and the people when they saw it were full of wonder, and
marvelled greatly to read the words written about it. I imagine,
however, that Merlin and the Archbishop had something to do with it, for
when the people went into the church, and told the Archbishop what they
had seen, he did not appear to be at all surprised, but commanded all
to remain within the church and not to touch the sword until the service
was over. The people and the gathered knights and all their followers
obeyed the Archbishop's command, for they did not dare do otherwise;
but, when the service was over, they all rushed out into the church-yard
to see the stone and the anvil, with the wonderful sword stuck into it.
And then, when the lords had read the golden inscription upon the stone,
each made an effort to pull the sword out of its anvil-sheath, but not
one of them could do it. They pulled and tugged and pulled and tugged,
but it was all in vain. They neither broke nor budged it, and the
Archbishop of Canterbury said it was evident that none of those present
could claim to be the rightful King. He added that he believed that the
right one would yet be discovered, and suggested that ten of the best
knights of the land should be made a guard of honor to watch over the
sword until New-Year's day, when any one who wished might come and in
the presence of all make the effort to pull it from the anvil. This was
agreed to, and it was decided to have a great tournament upon the coming
New-Year's day, after which the trial should be made. This kept the
knights and their followers in London, for it was important that all
should be present at the trial, success in which meant so much, not only
to the successful man, but to the whole kingdom as well."

"Didn't Merlin try to pull it out?" asked Mollie. "If he put it in, I
should think he could have pulled it out, and then he could have been
King himself."

"Possibly; but I imagine he didn't want to be King, for one thing, and,
for another, he had been too good a friend to Arthur, and to Uther, his
father, to wish to betray them. The Chronicles do not say whether he
tried it or not, but if he did, he failed; and so the week between
Christmas and New-Year's went by without any one's having moved the
sword; and the lords made their preparations for the tournament, and
many of them, I have no doubt, spent a great deal of their time getting
their muscle up in the hope of winning the crown.

"On the New-Year's day all again assembled in the church, and, after the
service, proceeded to the field where the tournament was to take place.
Sir Ector, followed by his son, Sir Kaye, who had himself been made a
knight, and Arthur, rode with them, when it was discovered that Sir Kaye
had left his sword behind him at his father's lodging. Summoning Arthur,
he requested him to return to the house and get it for him. This Arthur
readily consented to do, for he was fond of Kaye, whom, as we have
already seen, he supposed to be his own brother. Turning his horse
about, he rode full speed back to the lodgings; but when he arrived
there he found every one had gone to the tournament, and he could not
find his foster-brother's sword. For a moment he was perplexed. He knew
it would never do for Sir Kaye to be found at a tournament without his
sword, for the sword was the sign of his knighthood, and a knight who
had lost it would have been considered unworthy of the honor which had
been bestowed upon him. Suddenly Arthur bethought him of the sword in
the anvil, and without much hope that he should succeed where so many
others had failed, he resolved to make the effort to loosen it anyhow,
and in case of success to carry it to Sir Kaye.

"So he rode to the church-yard, and found it as deserted as Sir Ector's
lodgings had been. The ten knights who had been left to guard the sword,
like every one else in London, had gone to the tournament. Dismounting
from his horse, Arthur strode into the yard, and grasping the handle of
the sword as firmly as he could, pulled at it fiercely, when, to his
surprise and delight, it came out of the anvil. Without stopping to
think of all that this meant for him, he remounted his steed, and rode
hastily back to Sir Kaye, to whom he handed the weapon.

"The instant Sir Kaye looked at it he knew it to be the sword of the
stone, and putting his spurs to his horse, he dashed to where his father
stood, and, showing him the glittering blade, told him that it was the
sword of the stone, and said,

"'I must be King of this land!'

"But Sir Ector was cautious, so he questioned Kaye closely as to how he
had come by the weapon, and he made him go with him and Arthur back to
the church and swear to what he said; and Sir Kaye told him the whole
story--how he had left his own sword at home and had sent Arthur back
for it; how Arthur had gone there, and not finding any one, had
bethought him of the sword in the anvil, and had taken it, though no one
had witnessed the act."

[Illustration: THE RIGHTFUL KING OF ENGLAND.]

"Whereupon Sir Ector made Arthur return the sword to the anvil, and
himself tried to pull it out, but it would not come; and then he made
Sir Kaye try it, and still it would not come; and then bidding Arthur
make an effort, the boy did so, and it came out easily, at which both
Sir Kaye and his father knelt before Arthur, and hailed him as the man
who should be rightful King of England."




[Illustration: INTERSCHOLASTIC SPORT]


With the New England Interscholastic games next Saturday the season of
track and field athletics--as far as school leagues are concerned--will
practically come to a close. The season has been a most successful one.
Records have been broken on every hand, even in events where it was
supposed that many a year must go by before that performance could be
bettered. This excellent showing is the natural result of the hard
training and constant energy of the hundreds of runners and jumpers in
the schools; and the ever-increasing number of contestants all over the
country proves that track and field sports have secured a firm foothold,
and now deserve to be recognized as equal in importance to both football
and baseball. In the vicinity of New York, at least, there are fully
twice as many who indulge in track athletics as there are baseball and
football players. In other regions I think the proportions are more
nearly equal. The growth of these sports has been very rapid. In almost
every centre there is an Interscholastic Association or League, and the
daily newspapers, not only of the East but of the West, have been
printing reports of scholastic meets for the past two months. The work
of the school athletes has decidedly become a factor in amateur sport.
In some of the school leagues there are better men than the colleges can
boast of.

The annual meeting of the Inter-collegiate Athletic Association at the
Berkeley Oval, usually characterized as the "Mott Haven games," because
they were first held at Mott Haven, brings together the best college
athletic talent from all parts of this broad country. This year a team
from the University of California travelled three thousand miles
overland to contest for the championship on that day. Besides them, an
unknown runner with a rapid gait and a queer cap came out of the West,
and left the crack sprinters of the East straining and striving behind
him, while he, with a broad smile, pocketed two gold medals, and carried
them back to Iowa. I don't believe there was ever any better sport at
Olympia, and if the colleges can be so successful in these things, and
can draw men to compete at these games from every point of the compass,
why should not the schools follow their example, and form one great
Interscholastic Association, and have a big meeting once a year? There
is no reason why they should not. I can think of hardly a single
obstacle in the way of the formation of such a league. All that is
needed is that some energetic individual or individuals, or some
enthusiastic and sporting spirited Athletic Association take the matter
in hand and put it through. Once started, the routine of organization
would roll along as if on wheels.

It is not necessary that every school in the country should be asked to
join at the outset. On the contrary, I would suggest that the greater
Association under discussion be made up of the various I.S.A.A.'s now
existing, and that the big annual games be a contest among the winners
of the annual games of the individual associations. This scheme commends
itself, because only the best men from every locality could compete at
the meeting, and the number of entries could in that manner be limited.
We have all had experience with a superfluity of contestants, and we
know what interminable trial heats mean. If the movement to form a
general Interscholastic Association should be started in New York, there
would be no lack of leagues already in good standing to call upon for
membership. There are the New York and the Long Island I.S.A.A.'s right
here. Near by we have the New England I.S.A.A., the Western
Massachusetts I.S.A.A., the Maine I.S.A.A., the Connecticut I.S.A.A.,
the Pennsylvania Inter-academic A.A., the Dartmouth I.S.A.A., and the
New York State I.S.A.A. of Syracuse. In addition to these there are many
others that I need not mention here. A large and influential league in
the West is the Academic Athletic League of the Pacific Coast, of whose
prowess on track and field I have had occasion to speak of many times in
this Department.

Of course, one of the first questions that would arise upon the
organization of such an Interscholastic Association would be, Where
shall the annual meeting be held? The answer to that is simply, hold it
where it will be most convenient for the greatest number of schools
interested. It would not be advisable to hold the meeting in a different
city each year, for the Portland and Bangor athletes would not care to
journey to Philadelphia, neither would the Pennsylvanians care to travel
up into Maine. New York is a central location, but in many respects it
would be a poor place for a meeting of the kind under consideration. The
ideal spot, to my mind, would be New Haven. This for two reasons
principally. It is half-way between Boston and Philadelphia, which are
the centres of the New England and Pennsylvania districts; and it is
also about equally distant from New York and Hartford, which are the
homes of the N.Y. & L.I.I.S.A.A's, and the Connecticut I.S.A.A. The
second good reason is that Yale University is situated at New Haven, and
I have no doubt that the authorities of college athletics there would
only be too happy to offer the use of the Yale field, and to do
considerable work toward the management of the games.

Even if the college men felt that they could not devote their time to
the management of an Interscholastic meeting--which I greatly doubt, for
it would be to their interest to do so--there are three large schools in
New Haven, members of the Connecticut I.S.A.A., which would certainly
see that business committees were appointed, and competent men set to
work for the successful carrying out of the enterprise. But I believe
the athletic authorities of Yale would be so glad of the opportunity to
help and assist the school athletes that they would even go so far as to
offer a cup to be contested for.

But I have run a little ahead of my subject. What we are all most
interested in now is the first step; the rest can easily be arranged
afterward. It is too late to think of holding a general Interscholastic
meeting this spring, but it is none too early to begin to think of
holding one next year. Preparations for such an important event require
much time. If there is anything that HARPER'S ROUND TABLE can do to
further the success of the plan, or if there is any work that I can
perform in my small way toward the carrying out of any idea that may be
formulated, it shall be done. I hope these few words on the subject will
appeal to the athletes of the schools, and I shall be only too glad to
hear from them, and, if possible, to give space to their suggestions.

PENNSYLVANIA I.A.L. GAMES, FRANKLIN FIELD, PHILADELPHIA, JUNE 1, 1895.

  Event.                    Winner--5 points.          Performance.

  100-yard dash             Jones, P.C.                   10-4/5 sec.
  120-yard hurdle           Branson, P.C.                 18-3/5  "
  Half-mile run             Gage, H.                 2 m. 17-1/2  "
  Mile bicycle              Whetstone, De L.         3 "   7      "
  440-yard run              Jones, P.C.                   58-2/5  "
  220-yard hurdle           Branson, P.C.                 29-4/5  "
  220-yard dash             Jones, P.C.                   24-3/5  "
  Mile run                  Thackara, G.             5  " 23      "
  Half-mile walk            Lippincott, De L.        4  "  5      "
  Running high jump         Rorer, P.C.              5 ft. 2-1/2 in.
  Running broad jump        Branson.P.C.            19  "  7      "
  Putting shot              Watts, C.               33  "  4-1/2  "
  Standing broad jump       Flavell, G.              9  "  7      "
  Pole-vault                Hanson, P.C.             9  "  2-1/2  "


  Event.                     2d--3 points.             3rd--1 point.

  100-yard dash             Hunsberger, P.C.          Bailey, P.C.
  120-yard hurdle           Coit, C.                  Remington, De L.
  Half-mile run             Thackara, G.              Farr, De L.
  Mile bicycle              Lagen, De L.              Beverlin, De L.
  440-yard run              Lambertson, C.            McCarty, G.
  220-yard hurdle           Rorer, P.C.               Coit, G.
  220-yard dash             Hunsberger, P.C.          Beasley, G.
  Mile run                  Guernsey, P.C.            Gage, H.
  Half-mile run             Shearer, P.C.             Sutton, H.
  Running high jump         Newhold, De L.            Remington, De L.
  Running broad jump        Rorer, P.C.               Johnson, G.
  Putting shot              Farr, De L.               Sayen, H.
  Standing broad jump       Branson, P.C.             Rorer, P.C.
  Pole-vault                Rorer, P.C.               { Flavell, G.
                                                      { Branson, P.C.


                 Points Made.

  Penn Charter       67-1/2
  De Lancey          23
  Germantown         17-1/2
  Cheltenham          9
  Haverford          10
  Adelphi             0
  Episcopal           0
                    ---
  Total             126

     NOTE.--P.C., Penn Charter School; G., Germantown Academy; De L.,
     De Lancey School; C., Cheltenham Military Academy; H., Haverford
     Grammar School; E., Episcopal Academy.

The unusual heat of ten days ago interfered mightily with the success of
the Pennsylvania schools' field-day on Franklin Field a week ago
Saturday. With the thermometer at 95 deg., and the officials so overcome
with heat that half of them did not turn up, it is not to be wondered at
that but two records were broken. The only men who seem to have remained
unaffected by the temperature, were Jones and Branson of the Penn
Charter School, the former taking first in the 100, 220, and 440, and
the latter winning three firsts, one second, and two thirds--a total of
twenty points. Rorer, also of Penn Charter, came pretty close to his
schoolmates by taking one first, three seconds, and one third. All three
leave school this year. The meeting was, therefore, a perfect walk-over
for P.C., as the score by points clearly shows, and at no time of the
afternoon was there much enthusiasm displayed. It began to rain just
before the field events were contested, and when the heavy shower ceased
the field was in no condition for jumping or pole-vaulting. This
accounts for the poor performances in those events.

Jones ran the final heat of the 100 in 10-4/5 sec., winning easily, and
came home twenty yards ahead of his second man in the quarter. He was
not pressed in the 220 either, and made the poor time of 24-3/5 sec. The
half-mile was one of the most interesting races of the day. The first
three men kept well bunched all the way around, and Gage made a good
spurt at the finish. Branson won both the high hurdles and the low
hurdles with comparative ease, most of his opponents appearing fagged
out. In the bicycle race, which occurred after the shower, a bad
collision, in which one man was seriously hurt, knocked out three
contestants and spoiled the event. In the mile, Guernsey, P.C., started
a spurt within 220 yards of the tape, and earned a lead of thirty yards,
but Thackara of Germantown showed better judgment by waiting until he
reached the 100-yard mark, when he forged ahead and won. The half-mile
walk was very close, the judges being unable to decide the first three
places for some time. They finally made the award in the order given in
the table. The records broken were in the shot event by Watts, who put
the ball 3-1/2 inches beyond the I.A.L. record of 33 ft. 1 in., and in
the pole-vault. The latter was broken by four men. Hanson and Rorer tied
for first, and as neither could better his jump, they tossed for first
place, with the luck in favor of Hanson. Branson, P.C., got third place.

In strong contrast to the ease of Penn Charter's victory on Franklin
Field was the sharp and exciting contest between the Bangor and Portland
High-Schools at the Maine I.S.A.A. meeting in Maplewood Park, Bangor,
the same afternoon. The result was a tie, each school scoring 37-1/2
points, and out of fifteen records on the programme eleven were broken.
Some of the best performances were Somers's jump of 21 ft. 5 in. in the
broad; Perry's pole-vault of 9 ft. 3 in.; and the winning of the low
hurdles by Edwards in 28 seconds. The most exciting period of the day
was toward the close of the meeting, when Portland High was 10 points
ahead of Bangor High, and only the hammer and standing high jump to be
decided. Portland felt almost sure of victory, but Godfrey and Connors
of Bangor went in and took the first two places in the hammer, with
Wakefield of Thornton third, thus shutting Portland out from winning any
points in that event. Not only this, but Godfrey broke the record by
more than eight feet. Then he answered to the call for the standing high
jump, clearing 4 ft. 7 in. at his first trial, and there tieing Jordan
of Portland. Both men tried to do better, but were unable to, and third
place again went to Thornton with Hidgdon. The tie will make the record
of victories count one year for each school in the holding of the cup
now in the custody of Bangor.

[Illustration: F. Munson. Albert Mooler. S. E. Gunnison. H. Simpson. J.
Beasley.

E. H. Jewell. H. Romer (Capt.). M. Forney.

J. Forney. A. Opp. A. Topping.


ADELPHI ACADEMY TRACK-ATHLETIC TEAM.

Champions of the L.I.I.S.A.A., 1895.]

Of the eleven point-winners from the Adelphi Academy, Brooklyn, at the
Long Island Interscholastic Games on May 11th, six will return to school
next year. These are Gunnison, who took three firsts in the championship
games, Mooler, Beasley, Topping, and both Forneys. Of the others,
Simpson expects to enter West Point, Opp will go to the Columbia Law
School, while Munson, Romer, and Jewell will go into business. The
last-named will be the greatest loss to the team, as he made almost as
good a showing at Eastern Park as Gunnison. Nevertheless, there is
plenty of good material left in the school, and with the nucleus that
remains Adelphi ought to be able to build up another champion team.

The Interscholastic Games of the New England Association, which are to
be held on Holmes Field, Cambridge, next Saturday, will bring together a
larger number of contestants than have appeared at any interscholastic
event this season. The New England I.S.A.A. includes about thirty
schools, and more than twenty will send representatives to strive for
the cup. While it is not so very difficult to guess the probable winners
of first place in the principal events on the card, the general result
of the day is by no means a certainty, for the smaller schools always
manage to send one or two "dark horses" who upset the closest
calculations of the best judges. Nevertheless, the championship probably
rests with the Worcester High-School, or the Boston English High-School,
or the Phillips Academy, Andover. The W.H.-S. team won the in-door
meeting last March by scoring 19 points, and most of the winners of that
day will compete on Holmes Field this week. Andover did not send a full
team to the in-door games, and the E.H.-S. was crippled by the absence
of some of its best athletes on that occasion, but both schools have
been training their strongest men for the past few weeks, and will
surely be well represented.

The 100-yards dash will be won by Roche of W.H.-S., Clarke of Worcester
Academy, or Dunbar of E.H.-S. These three sprinters breasted the tape
almost together in the 40-yard dash at the winter meeting, Roche winning
by a few inches only. I consider Ferguson the surest man for the high
hurdles, although Chase of Andover will be close upon him. The low
hurdles will make a pretty race for Fuller, Cambridge L.S., Heine, P.A.,
and Seaver, Brookline H.-S. Fuller's success will largely depend on
whether he has to run the 220 flat before he takes the hurdles. In that
case Heine and Seaver will have a slight advantage. But if Fuller does
run the 220 before this, he ought to win it, with Roche and Dunbar
behind him. There will be no fast time made in the quarter, and the race
will furnish a good opportunity for a surprise by some unknown quantity.
Fish, W.A., Carleton, Milton Academy, Purtell, E.H.-S., and Howe,
W.H.-S., are about equal in ability for that distance. Albertson,
W.H.-S., and Batchelder, R.L.S., will have a close race in the
half-mile, and I have no doubt that the record will be lowered.
Cunningham of Hopkinson ought to be third.

If Laing of Andover were not kept out of the contest by the age limit
ruling he would, beyond any doubt, take the mile for P.A. He ran it at
the Interscholastics last year in 4 min. 32-2/5 sec. And so, unless
Andover sends down another good man, Dow of E.H.-S. will probably win
the event. Moore of Newton H.-S. ought to take the walk, with Delaney of
W.H.-S. second, and Barstow of Hopkinson third. For the field events
Holt and Dole of Roxbury Latin, and Henderson of E.H.-S., will divide
the honors in the high jump, while the broad will be contested by
Purtell, E.H.-S. and Holt, R.L.S. The shot event will be won by O'Brien,
E.H.-S., with Jordan, W.H.-S. and Holt, P.A., in the places. Johnson,
W.A., should win the pole-vault, although Thenoin, R.L.S., may push him.
The hammer rests with Seargent of Hopkinson, Coan, E.H.-S., or Barney,
R.L.S. With so many men competing from such a large number of different
schools, it is not probable that the winning score will be much greater
than 25, and the winner of second place ought to come close to the same
figure.

The New York Interscholastic Tennis Tournament, under the auspices of
Columbia College, had a large entry list that required three days to be
played off. The games were all characterized by steady work rather than
by any particularly brilliant play, and the championship was won by
Waltz of the Leal School, Plainfield. He met Wigham of Harvard School in
the finals, and had a comparatively easy time of it, defeating the
New-Yorker in three straight sets--6-1, 6-2, 6-4. He will go to Newport
for the big Interscholastic tournament this summer, and will meet the
other school league champions, Ware of the N.E.I.S.A.A., Sheldon of the
Connecticut I.S.A.A., and Beaman, who won in the Pennsylvania I.A.L.
Tournament at Princeton. I consider Ware the strongest player of this
quartet, and expect to see him win at Newport. He will be heard from at
the Longwood Tournament next Saturday too.

The prospects of Lawrenceville being victorious over Andover in the
baseball game to-morrow have been daily increasing, and I believe now
that the Jerseymen will win. Andover does not seem to be able to reduce
the average of errors made in her games so far, and her players on the
left-field side must play a sharp game if they wish to offset
Lawrenceville's good batters. St. Mark's School, with little over a
hundred boys to pick a nine from, defeated the Phillips Academy team,
two weeks ago, by the score of 6-3, and the latter suffered another bad
defeat from the Yale Freshmen a few days later. St. Mark's victory was
in a considerable measure due to the effective pitching of White, who
held the Andover men down to six hits. The features of the game, besides
White's work in the box, were the catching of Drew, Andover's Captain,
and the fielding of Folger. Mills, too, made a beautiful running catch
of a long fly. I am surprised that the St. Mark's batters were able to
get seven hits off Greenway, as it has been Andover's boast that their
battery is as good as any in the schools. It is; and I surmise that
Greenway had an off-day at Southboro. He must do better to-morrow or
Lawrenceville will have an easy time with their Massachusetts rivals.
The Jersey players have greatly improved the past week, especially in
team-work. They have won within the past fifteen days two games from the
Pennington Seminary's strong team, they have defeated the Princeton
Freshmen, and they got excellent practice out of their match with the
Princeton 'Varsity. Andover will have the advantage of home grounds and
the crowd, but they will need more than that to pile up the runs.

A new invention by Professor E. W. Scripture, of Yale, will be
interesting to all track athletes. The apparatus is one that will
measure a runner's "reaction time." This time is that which elapses
between the moment the pistol is discharged and the moment the sprinter
starts. The brief period between these two moments is taken up by nature
in transmitting the sound from the ear to the brain, and the impulse to
run from the brain to the muscles of the legs. Professor Scripture
believes that the length of reaction time is frequently an important
factor, and he argues that with a runner it must be reduced to the
shortest possible limit, as one-fifth of a second counts in a race. By
experiments the inventor has proved to his own satisfaction that the
time which elapses between the firing of the starter's pistol and the
actual start of the runner is long enough to influence the winning of a
race. The reaction time of a runner may vary from one-sixth to one-third
of a second. The new invention is an arrangement by which a runner's
reaction time may be measured to within the one-thousandth part of a
second. The starter's pistol is arranged so that an electric contact is
broken when the pistol goes off. A thread is attached to the right foot
of the runner, and this thread breaks an electric contact the moment he
starts. The distance marked on a cylinder by these two contacts measures
the individual's reaction time. Sport may soon reach such a scientific
stage of advancement that sprinters will be handicapped with reference
to their "reaction time."

  THE GRADUATE.

       *       *       *       *       *

Charlotte Cushman, a celebrated actress, was filling an engagement at
the opera-house in B----. A man in the gallery created such a
disturbance that it seriously impeded the progress of the play, and
finally brought it to a standstill. Immediately the audience, furious
with anger, cried: "Throw him over! Throw him over!"

Miss Temple stepped to the edge of the footlights, and in a sweet and
gentle voice exclaimed: "No, I pray you, don't throw him over. I beg of
you, dear friends, don't throw him over, but _kill him where he is_!"

       *       *       *       *       *

An Irishman was on trial for committing a burglary, and had conducted
his own case. The evidence against him was strong, and the judge, after
summing up, remarked, while looking at the prisoner, that he could
detect the rascal and villain in his face. "Hold there!" shouted the
prisoner. "I object; that is a personal reflection."




ADVERTISEMENTS.




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[Illustration: Royal Baking Powder]




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be sent by mail to any address on receipt of 10 cents.




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




[Illustration: BICYCLING]

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


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

The run from Brooklyn to Babylon along the south shore of Long Island is
perhaps the best bicycle run on the Island, and is the first thirty-five
miles of the famous century run which is made every year by the Kings
County Wheelmen; and there is no doubt that this 100-mile course along
the shore of Long Island is as easy a run as there is in the east United
States. The road is macadamized most of the way to Babylon, and is at
present finished about as far as Seaford. From Seaford on to Babylon the
road is a good one, though not all macadamized. The wheelman intending
to make this run should examine the map of Brooklyn published in last
week's ROUND TABLE. He will there find the way to get from his
residence, whether in Brooklyn or New York, to Prospect Park. Starting
from Prospect Park, run up the Boulevard to Liberty Avenue at East New
York, and, turning right into this, continue thence to Woodhaven. At
Woodhaven take the left-hand fork and run out to Jamaica. The road
through Jamaica is clearly enough marked, as it is the beginning of the
Plank Road that continues on to Jericho. The rider should keep on this
road, which is in good condition, out of Jamaica a mile or more, passing
through Hollis and Holliswood Park. At the latter place, and just before
reaching Queens, a turn should be made to the right, and after crossing
the track the rider will run out over a good road about seven miles to
Hempstead. On entering Hempstead he may turn to the left and run up to
Garden City, where there is a hotel that is well kept, and a good place
for a short stop if one is desired.

Returning to Hempstead, the rider keeps to the main road, running down
towards Ridgewood, and comes into the Shore Road, and thence the run
continues straight on through South Jerusalem, Seaford, Amityville,
Lindenhurst, into Babylon. The whole run from Brooklyn is practically a
forty-mile journey, and if the wheelman intends to return on his wheel
to Brooklyn he can keep straight on the Shore Road, passing through
Freeport, Rockville Centre, and Valley Stream, instead of turning to the
right near Ridgewood, and going back through Hempstead. The great
advantage of this run is that there are almost no hills along the line
of the road, and the wheelman has as "clean" a ride as can be found in
the vicinity of New York. When all the roadway along the South Side of
Long Island is finally macadamized there will be hardly a single run in
the country to equal it.

     K. L. T.--The cost of a bicycle trip from New York to Liverpool,
     thence to France, and perhaps into Germany, depends entirely on how
     much luxury the traveller expects to indulge in, and whether he or
     she will ride entirely or will frequently use railway trains. It is
     safe to say, however, that it is possible after reaching Europe to
     make a bicycle tour through France and Germany on an average of two
     dollars per day, though that requires the greatest care in
     expenses. (2) It would be hardly advisable for two ladies to travel
     through France and Germany alone on bicycles, though it could be
     done. The difficulty would be that bicyclists still attract
     attention, and two foreign women would be much more likely to meet
     with difficulties than if they travelled by rail, to say nothing of
     the possible accidents to their machines. (3) The necessary luggage
     would be comparatively easily carried in the triangular water-proof
     bicycle bag, which is carried on a diamond frame machine inside the
     diamond, and on a woman's bicycle in a different shape bag attached
     to the handle-bar in the front. Any woman going on such a trip
     should learn how to take a bicycle to pieces and put it together
     again, and in the process of learning she will discover what tools
     are necessary. Material for mending tires is absolutely
     necessary--a good monkey-wrench, oil cans, a tire inflator,
     pincers, and a reasonably good supply of small wire and twine for
     making repairs where such material is necessary. In France you will
     probably find no difficulty in having all necessary bicycle repairs
     made, especially in the cities and larger towns. It would be much
     cheaper to stop at houses, and in England, and perhaps to a certain
     extent in France and Germany, such travellers are very well
     received in the cottages of the peasants in the middle classes. (4)
     The best bicycle roads in the world are in England, and England has
     for many years been called the "bicyclist's paradise." The French
     government roads come next, both being comparatively free from
     hills. German roads are by no means as good, and the country is
     more hilly. Swiss roads are moderately good, and in some places
     very fine, but they are apt to be extremely hilly. Northern Italy
     would probably come next; but it is safe to say that for two women
     taking their first bicycle tour, England is by far the best place
     to travel in. (5) If two ladies travel second-class on a steamer to
     Liverpool they might meet with some unpleasant incidents, but it is
     now possible to get a first-class return ticket on some of the
     smaller steamers of the important lines quite as cheaply as a
     second-class return ticket on the larger steamers. For instance, a
     first-class ticket and return to Havre, France, or Southampton,
     England, can be bought for from ninety to one hundred dollars on
     the smaller steamers of the Hamburg and North German Lloyd lines.
     It would, of course, be cheaper to buy a return ticket.

     NOTE.--Map of New York city asphalted streets in No. 809. Map of
     route from New York to Tarrytown in No. 810. New York to Stamford,
     Connecticut, in No. 811. New York to Staten Island in No. 812. New
     Jersey, from Hoboken to Pine Brook in No. 813. Brooklyn in No.
     814.




[Illustration: THE CAMERA CLUB]

     Any questions in regard to photograph matters will be willingly
     answered by the editor of this column, and we should be glad to
     hear from any of our club who can make helpful suggestions.


BROKEN NEGATIVES.

Sometimes one is so unfortunate as to break a negative which cannot well
be replaced. The amateur who understands little about photographic work
is, in such a case, quite likely to think that the negative is ruined,
and throw it away; but unless it has been broken in many pieces it can
be repaired so that one can get as good a print from it as before it was
broken.

If there is one clear break across the glass, but not through the film,
place the negative in the printing frame, pushing the broken edges
closely together, holding them while adjusting the sensitive paper.
Fasten in the printing frame, and print in a diffused light--that is,
not in the direct rays of the sun. Place the negative at such an angle
with the light that the crack across the glass shall not make a shadow.

If there are several cracks in the glass, but not in the film, put the
negative in the printing frame, supporting it by a piece of plain glass;
tie cords to the printing frame so that it may be suspended by them;
hang the frame from some projection where it will not hit anything, and
keep it revolving during the printing process. The plate moving all the
time, the cracks in the glass do not cast a shadow long enough in one
place to make any impression on the sensitive paper. If one cannot
arrange the frame in this way, it may be placed at the bottom of a large
deep box without a cover, and left to print.

If the film is broken as well as the glass, take a piece of plain glass
the size of the negative--a spoiled plate is just the thing--lay the
broken pieces on this plain glass, taking care that the picture lines of
the negative are true, and bind the edges of the glass and negative
together with strips of gummed paper. When the strips are dry, varnish
the film with negative varnish. It is better to purchase the varnish
ready prepared than to attempt to fix it one's self.

If the negative is badly broken, but not splintered, apply Canada balsam
with a toothpick to the edges of the broken parts, and press them firmly
together, keeping the negative on a flat surface during the process, a
glass plate a little larger than the negative being the best thing to
use. When the balsam is thoroughly dry, flow the negative with varnish,
and as soon as it begins to set cover it with a piece of glass the size
of the negative. When dry, bind the edges together with strips as before
directed. If the negative is very badly broken, it should be enclosed
between two pieces of plain glass, putting on the second in the same
manner, after the first is dry. Bind the three together.

An excellent paste for binding negatives and lantern slides is made of
rice flour. Mix rice flour with water till it is smooth and free from
lumps. Set the dish containing it into another of hot water, and boil
till it becomes thick and semi-transparent, stirring it all the time.
When done it should be about the consistency of laundry starch made for
collars and cuffs. This paste is very strong--in fact, almost as durable
as cement. If a few drops of carbolic acid are added to it, it will keep
for some time. The bottle should be tightly corked when not in use.

If the film has not been broken it can be removed from the glass in the
same way that films are stripped, and transferred to another clean
plate.

For very valuable negatives it is a good plan to make a paper negative,
in case of accident to the glass one. A paper negative is made by taking
a good print of the negative and waxing it according to directions given
in No. 782 "answers to queries." Make a print from this waxed positive,
supporting the paper while in the printing frame by a sheet of plain
glass. Tone and fix this print, which will be a negative. Wax it, and if
you are so unfortunate as to break the original, you will still have the
paper copy, which can be used in its place.

For negatives that can be replaced it is not wise to spend the time in
repairing them if broken, but it sometimes happens that a valuable one
is broken which cannot be duplicated, and with careful handling it can
be made "as good as new."

     SIR KNIGHT HARRY T. LUTHER, New York, asks what causes his
     negatives to turn yellow, and if there is any remedy for it. The
     reason why negatives turn yellow is usually because they have not
     been washed long enough. They should be washed in running water an
     hour. If running water is not convenient soak the plate for two
     hours, changing the water several times. The yellow stains may
     sometimes be removed by soaking the negative for a short time in a
     solution of one ounce sulphite of soda and nine ounces water, to
     which a few drops of sulphuric acid have been added. Sir Harry
     also asks what toning solution to use with the plain paper
     described in Nos. 796 and 803. The combined toning solution used
     for aristo paper is the best solution for the plain paper. It
     works quickly, and gives soft clear tones.

     SIR KNIGHT WILLIAM KELSEY asks if a combined toning and fixing
     solution can be prepared for aristo-type paper--how long negatives
     and prints should be washed in running water--and what use is made
     of hyposulphite of soda and alum in developing negatives. A
     combined toning solution for aristo may be bought ready prepared,
     or one can prepare it at home. A formula comes with each package
     of paper, and half the quantity given is enough to prepare at one
     time, unless one has a large number of prints to tone.
     Hyposulphite of soda and alum are used for fixing the negative
     after developing. The hypo can be used for fixing without the
     addition of the alum. The alum hardens and clears the film, and is
     good to use in warm weather to prevent the frilling of the film.

     SIR KNIGHT GEORGE H. BENZON, JUN., Philadelphia, Pa., asks for the
     best solution for fixing plates. A solution of 4 ounces water and
     1 ounce of hyposulphite of soda is the formula used by the editor
     of this column both in warm and cold weather. In warm weather the
     tray containing the fixing solution is set in a pan containing
     pieces of ice, which prevents the frilling or softening of the
     film. A formula for a fixing solution with soda and alum is given
     in No. 808, answer to Sir Knight Frederick Kopper.

     SIR KNIGHTS D. G. STANBROUGH, A. SMITH, HARLOW BROWN, and LADY
     FLORENCE CRANE all ask for a good formula for a toning solution,
     but neither one says for what kind of paper. The formulas for
     toning baths are very numerous, and different chemicals are used
     for different sensitive papers. As aristo paper is at present a
     very popular paper, we give the following standard, combining
     toning and fixing bath for prints made on this paper: Water, 10
     ounces; hyposulphite of soda, 2 ounces; sulphocyanide of ammonium,
     1/8 ounce; acetate of lead, 30 grains; nitrate of lead, 30 grains;
     chloride of gold (neutral), 1 grain.

     This bath must be made up twenty-four hours before using, that it
     may clear and settle. In preparing, add the ingredients in the
     order named, dissolving each before adding another. Put the
     prints, without washing, in this bath, one at a time, taking care
     that no air bubbles form on the print, as they will leave spots on
     the finished prints. The prints will turn at first a
     yellowish-brown, then to a warm red, and finally to a rich brown.
     Remove from the bath as soon as the desired tone is obtained. Wash
     for one hour in running water. This bath keeps well, and by
     multiplying each ingredient by four one can make four times the
     quantity.

       *       *       *       *       *

FEED THEM PROPERLY

and carefully; reduce the painfully large percentage of infant
mortality. Take no chances and make no experiments in this very
important matter. The Gail Borden Eagle Brand Condensed Milk has saved
thousands of little lives.--[_Adv._]




ADVERTISEMENTS.




Arnold

Constable & Co

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NEW YORK.




[Illustration]

Trilby's Foot

was perfect (perhaps yours is), but even perfect feet get tired, and
nothing takes out the tired aches like Pond's Extract.

Avoid substitutes; accept genuine only, with, buff wrapper and yellow
label.

POND'S EXTRACT CO., 76 Fifth Ave., New York.




Postage Stamps, &c.




[Illustration]

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

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




=50= var., all dif., 5c.; 12 var. Heligoland, 15c.; 6 var. Italy, 1858
to 1862, 5c.; 3 var. Hanover, 5c.; 35 var. C. American, 50c. Agents
wanted.

F. W. MILLER, 904 Olive St., St. Louis, Mo.




=100= all different, China, etc., 10c.; 5 Saxony, 10c.; 40 Spain, 40c.;
6 Tunis, 14c.; 10 U. S. Revenues, 10c. Agts. wtd., 50% com.; '95 list
free.

CRITTENDEN & BORGMAN CO., Detroit. Mich.




=100= varieties Chili, Japan, etc., 10 cts.; list free.

CARL YOUNG, 72 First Place, Brooklyn, N. Y.




=5= VAR. FREE to all sending for my approval sheets at 50% dis. =C. B.
ANTISDALE=, Palmyra, N. J.




[Illustration]

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

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




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




[Illustration]

HARPER'S PERIODICALS.

Per Year:

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

       *       *       *       *       *

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

       *       *       *       *       *

HARPER & BROTHERS, Franklin Square, N. Y.




Round Table Chapters.


No. 720.--The Nathan Hale Chapter, of Philadelphia. Pa. Blair Baker,
Thomas Bleint, Howard B. Rote. Section E, No. 5, Girard College,
Philadelphia.

No. 721.--The Rugby Chapter, of New York city. Officers are N. J. Spiro,
W. W. Gleason, H. F. Small. Other members are R. Mantell, N. Marluff,
F. B. Engler, H. C. Moore, R. Heather, L. Peabody. Chapter address,
H. F. Small, 54 West 85th Street.

No. 722.--The King Arthur Chapter, of Urbana, Ill. Its color is white,
and its emblem white rose and clover. Marjorie Forbes and Ethel Ricker,
Urbana.

No. 723.--The Thespis Dramatic Chapter, of Chicago, Ill. Lola Lewis,
Laura Welch. Other members are Marie Rosenfield, Eleanor Lydon. Chapter
address, 4454 Oakenwald Avenue.

No. 724.--The John Burroughs Chapter, of Winsted, Conn. Elizabeth
Kennard, Ruth E. Whiting. Other members are Mabel Churchill, Grace A.
Smith, Grace and Mary Kennard. It is a natural history Chapter, and
devotes spare moments to the study of birds, trees, and flowers. Ruth E.
Whiting, Winsted.

No. 725.--The Lincoln Chapter, of Glasgow, Mont. Roy E. Hall, Wallace
Kelleson. John Sherry; Walter Fryburg, Glasgow.

No. 726.--The Margaret Sangster Chapter, of Germania, N. J. Augusta
Guenther, Christine and Julia Gaupp; Christine Gaupp, Germania.

No. 727.--The Frances H. Burnett Chapter, of Minneapolis, Minn. It is
organized for the encouragement of goodly fellowship and improvement. It
desires to communicate with Knights and Ladies of the Round Table living
in Minneapolis. Its officers are Fred H. Stevens, Lottie Kluge, Myrtle
Jones; Florence Kimball, 3600 Bloomington Avenue.




Lovers of Play Journalism.


Odd, isn't it, how everybody loves to see what he writes in print? The
oldest editor in America is not free from this vanity, or whatever one
may call it. So young persons who play at making small papers are in
good company. Besides, they are engaged in what affords them experience
they can get in no other way. Three excellent amateur papers reach the
Table: the _Amateur Collector_, R. T. Hale and F. W. Beale, editors and
publishers, 23 Federal Street, Newburyport, Mass.; _Our Young People_,
Robinson Bros. & Co., Box 255, Brunswick, Me.; and the _Little Magnet_,
Louis O. Brosie, editor, 3405 Butler Street, Pittsburg, Pa. All three
are splendid examples of the editor's and printer's "arts." Here are
some members who are interested in journalism, want sample copies, and
can contribute morsels: Waldemar Young, 174 C Street, Salt Lake City,
Utah; J. T. Delano, Jun., 12 White Street, Newport R. I.; James F.
Bowen, 36 St. James Avenue, Boston, Mass.; and Samuel T. Bush, 1104 East
15th Street, East Oakland, Cal.

R. C. Megrue asks what it costs to start and run a small paper. That
depends on how large it is, and whether you have a press of your own.
The cost is considerable per copy if you go to a regular
printing-office, because the edition is rarely above two or three
hundred copies. The charge in one case we know of was $7 per hundred.
Will not R. T. Hale kindly give us a morsel on the subject? Louis O.
Brosie and Clement F. or Arthur L. Robinson may give us morsels too.
Please tell the Table about the cost, size, and mention some of the
other difficulties. Never mind the fun of the thing. Pleasures take care
of themselves.




What a Copyright Is.


A copyright, dear sir Harry, is a legal right to a copy. Suppose you and
your friend Delano, four doors away, should publish a book that proved
as popular as--well, let us say _Trilby_, or _Ben-Hur_, or _Uncle Tom's
Cabin_ did. If you send out a few copies and put upon them no legal
proprietary mark, other persons seeing the demand could and would take
your work, make copies of it, sell them, pocket the money, and give you
nothing for what perhaps cost you a great deal of effort. If, however,
you observe the legal forms, and your book proves saleable, other
persons are prevented from making additional copies. Those who want
copies must buy them from you. The legal form is very simple. Before you
publish the book, paper, print, or whatever it is, you mail two copies
to the Librarian of Congress, Washington, with $1. He returns to you a
paper, duly signed, setting forth the fact that for a certain number of
years that article belongs to you. You state this fact on each copy
published, and then the profit is yours, and the law protects you in it.




Some South African Birds.


     Following the example of other members of the Round Table, I
     thought I would write and tell you about some of our birds.

     My brothers and I have just been talking about the blue hawk. It
     is not a particularly large bird, and is grayish-blue in color. It
     is comparatively harmless, its chief prey being rats and mice. Its
     nest looks like a pile of sticks roughly laid together, but at the
     bottom of the nest it is very soft. This is the description my
     little cousin gives of its eggs: "If you were to take a pure white
     egg and rub it all over with blood, leaving a few white specks, it
     would be just like a blue-hawk's egg." In shape it is round, and
     the color is really a dirty red. The bird's call sounds very much
     like that of a cross fretful baby.

     Another peculiar bird here is the hammerhop. It is a large brown
     bird, and has a crest upon its head which looks like a hammer,
     hence the name. It preys upon the frogs. It makes a tremendous
     nest in the shape of a hut on the top of a high rock. I am told
     that it plasters the nest on the inside.

     One of our prettiest birds is the gilded cuckoo or diedrich. The
     color of its back is green, and looks as if a lot of bronze dust
     had been sprinkled on it. Its breast is white spotted with brown.
     Like other cuckoos, it lays its eggs in other birds' nests. The
     color of the eggs is pure white. It has a very musical
     call--"dee-dee-dee-diedrich."

     The aasvogel is a species of vulture. It is of a dirty white
     color, and has no feathers at all on its neck. Almost as soon as
     an animal dies the sky is darkened by aasvogels flying to prey
     upon the body. The leader or king perches upon it first, while his
     followers sit round waiting until he is finished. He claims the
     eyes as his portion, as a rule. As soon as he has satisfied his
     hunger he flies away, leaving his followers to have their share.
     The aasvogel builds his nest of sticks on the top of some
     inaccessible krautz (precipice). The eggs are white, I believe,
     spotted with brown. I would like to correspond with Ladies of the
     Round Table in different parts of the world.

  ISMA FINCHAM.
  ROYDON, QUEENSTOWN, CAPE COLONY, SOUTH AFRICA.




Do Your Rabbits Ever Drink?


     Mr. Chase says rabbits drink. I think there are two sides to that
     question. I know a boy who has a dozen rabbits and not one ever
     drinks. I have two and neither ever drink. Another friend had two
     that he kept seven years. They drank milk, and, at rare times,
     water. I believe that rabbits can be trained either way. What is
     the experience of others?

  VICTOR R. GAGE.
  VINELAND.




A Florida Gopher.


     A Florida gopher is very different from those we read about as
     living out West. In shape and size he is nearly like a common
     fresh-water turtle, with this difference; he lives on land. The
     gopher has a very hard shell covering his entire body except the
     head and feet. His front feet are nearly like a turtle's, with
     four or five claws, but very hard. They must of necessity be hard,
     for this animal burrows very deep in this hard, clay ground. His
     hind feet are round, with a flat bottom, four to five claws on
     each, evidently made for pushing when walking or burrowing. They
     look like a miniature elephant's foot.

     His head is also very much like a turtle's. When alarmed he draws
     his head and feet into his shell and remains quiet. He is a very
     peaceful animal. I have never known one to bite anybody nor
     anything else. The gopher lives in the ground, burrowing a
     molelike passage several hundred feet long. There is no use trying
     to dig for one. It would take a week of the hardest kind of work
     to reach the bottom of his tunnel.

     He comes out every day about noon for his meals. He eats grass,
     weeds, clover, etc., for his regular meals; but when he finds a
     farm with pease, beans, and other vegetables, unless he is
     discovered in time he will do a great deal of damage, for he eats
     such things voraciously. In raising their young the female lays
     from five to six eggs in the dirt she has thrown out when digging
     her tunnel. She buries them, and in a few weeks hatches out a
     great number of the cutest little things you ever saw. They do not
     stay with their mother, but go immediately to forming a little
     burrow for themselves, which is from five to six feet deep. They
     can live a long time without any food whatever. Their flesh is
     also eatable, tasting somewhat like chicken. May I write again?

  HARRY R. WHITCOMB.
  UMATILLA, FLA.

Certainly you may write again.




Blackberries Nearly the Year Round.

     Down here we have a great variety of fruit. We have blackberries
     nearly all the year round. They commence in March and last until
     about the end of November. All are what we call wild in the
     States. Indians peddle them in big baskets on their backs. They
     are a great deal smaller than yours, and can only be eaten when
     cooked. I would like to exchange Mexican postage and revenue
     stamps with some Knights of the Round Table.

  ROBERT L. MILLER, JUN.
  P. O. Box 319, MEXICO CITY, MEXICO.




Mounting Paper Money.


A California member asks how to fix paper money so that it may be
examined without having to take it out of envelopes each time. There are
two ways of mounting your specimens. The first and most difficult is to
take very stiff paper and make a leaf with an opening of the exact size,
like the opening in a photograph album leaf. Mucilage the tiniest edge
all around, and press till thoroughly dry.

The other way is to cover the four corners, but this prevents the back
from being seen. An ideal way would be to have two specimens--one to
mount one side front, the other the other side. Rare manuscripts are
mounted according to the first method, and then the heavy albumlike
leaves are bound into a book.




Want Corner.


Do you live in Chateaugay, N. Y.? Please favor Blanche French, West
Dedham, Mass., with some account of the place, its size, location, and
any interesting information. She will be most grateful. Hubert B.
Stephens is the new secretary of the Bollman Chapter, and his address is
Box 274, Sharpsburg, Pa. It is a corresponding, stamp, and botany club
with ten-cent fee and five-cent dues. Of course it wants to hear from
anybody interested. S. J. Tucker, 2818 Mary Street, Pittsburg, Pa.,
wants to find old copies of _Notes and Queries_. Have you any? He will
reward you if you write him.

The Benjamin Harrison Chapter, of Lee, Mass., wants suggestions how to
make its meetings interesting. It also wants correspondents. Won't you
write? Ernest A. Chaplin, Somerset East, Cape Colony, South Africa,
writes to the Table: "There is a beautiful mountain just outside our
town, and on it a place called 'Rabbit Rock.'" Sir Ernest says he
collects stamps, and has many rare ones to trade.

The fee for admission to the Thaddeus Stevens Chapter, 910 North Broad
Street, Philadelphia, is ten cents, and it wants members, both resident
and non-resident. By mistake we announced the fee as $1. The Sylvia
Chapter was prompt to give us the asked-for facts about it. Its
president is Mary B. Yohn, 5813 Jackson Street, Wissinoming,
Philadelphia; secretary, A. Grace Owen. One of its members, Harriett O.
<DW12>, wants to trade flowers. Address care the president. Will the
Sylvia's president tell us how its meetings are made interesting? We
wish to publish the information.




[Illustration: Ivory Soap]

You have noticed the disagreeable odor of clothes just from the wash.
That's the soap. Cheap soaps do not rinse out. Ivory Soap rinses
readily, leaving the clothes sweet, clean and white.

THE PROCTER & GAMBLE CO., CIN'TI.




[Illustration]

CHILDREN GROW

healthy--grow happy--grow rosy cheeked and bright eyed, on Hires'
Rootbeer. This great health-giving temperance drink should be kept in
every home. It will benefit and delight every member of the family from
the baby up, and prove a most delicious thirst satisfying beverage for
callers. It's good all the time--morning, noon and night. Get the
genuine

HIRES' Rootbeer

A 25 cent package makes 5 gallons. Sold everywhere.

The Chas. E. Hires Co., Philadelphia.




MONARCH

King of all Bicycles.

[Illustration]

TRADE-MARK.

Five Styles. Weights, 18 to 25 Pounds.

Prices, $85 and $100.

MONARCH CYCLE CO.

Factory and Main Office, Lake and Halsted Sts., Chicago.

Eastern Branch: 79 Reade St. & 97 Chambers St., N.Y.

The C. F. GUYON CO., Ltd., Managers.




[Illustration]

CARD PRINTER =FREE=

Sets any name in one minute; prints 500 cards an hour. YOU can make
money with it. A font of pretty type, also Indelible Ink, Type Holder,
Pads and Tweezers. Best Linen Marker; worth $1.00. Sample mailed FREE
for 10c. stamps for postage on outfit and large catalogue of 1000
Bargains.

R. H. Ingersoll & Bro. 65 Cortlandt St. N.Y. City




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




[Illustration: The =KOMBI= Camera--$3.50]

[Illustration]

Carry in pocket. Takes 25 perfect pictures in one loading--re-loading
costs 20c. Ask your dealer for it, or send for free booklet "All About
the Kombi."

ALFRED C. KEMPER,

Branches: London, Berlin. 132-134 Lake Street, Chicago




=DEAFNESS & HEAD NOISES CURED= by my =INVISIBLE= Tubular Cushions. Have
helped more to good =HEAR=ing than all other devices combined. Whispers
=HEAR=d. Help ears as glasses do eyes. =F. Hiscox=, 853 B'dway, N.Y.
Book of proofs =FREE=




[Illustration]

The Eight Numbers of the Franklin Square Song Collection contain

1600

of the Choicest Old and New Songs and Hymns in the Wide World.

Fifty Cents per Number in paper; Sixty Cents in substantial Board
binding; One Dollar in Cloth. The Eight Numbers also bound in two
volumes at $3.00 each. Address Harper & Brothers, New York.

[Illustration]




THE TRICK BICYCLE-RIDER AND THE OBSTINATE BULL-DOG.


[Illustration]

  Though well he rides and does the trick,
  The bull-dog's pace he finds too quick;

[Illustration]

  On yonder limb he'll get a hold,
  And leave the bull-dog in the cold.

[Illustration]

  He swings himself high in the air,
  And takes his bicycle up there;

[Illustration]

  Then with his pump he'll downward slip,
  And let the bull-dog get a grip.

[Illustration]

  The bull-dog never will let go.
  Though he's pumped full of air, and so

[Illustration]

  When he's as full as he can be,
  The next thing happens as you see.




HELPFUL HINTS FOR BICYCLISTS.


1. A good bicyclist is careful of his roads, therefore when taking a
header be careful not to hit the road too hard with your forehead. You
might make a dent in the pavement.

2. In falling off your wheel do not fall on both sides at once. Failure
to observe this rule will result in dividing you against yourself.

3. Always be courteous. If a trolley-car has the right of way over the
track do not dispute with it. A boy in Massachusetts who broke this rule
broke his right arm and his cyclometer at the same time.

4. Be cautious. In riding from New York to Brooklyn keep to the
driveway. Don't try to wheel over the suspension-cable. Yon might slip
and fall into the smoke-stack of a passing ferry-boat.

5. Keep your lamp lit when riding at night. The boy who thought he was
safe because he had a parlor-match in his pocket came home with a spoke
in his wheel that didn't belong there.

6. Do not be rough with ice-carts and furniture trucks. If you must run
into one of them do it as gently and tenderly as if it were a
baby-carriage.

7. A merciful rider is merciful to his wheel, so do not force a bicycle
beyond the point of its endurance, unless you want to walk back with
your wheel on your shoulders.

8. Keep cool. If in the course of a ride you find yourself in a tight
place, with a skittish horse to the left and a steep ravine to the
right, and a bull-dog directly to the fore, take ravine. You'll go into
it, anyhow, and if you take it alone without dragging the dog or the
horse after you your chances will be improved.

9. Never use spurs on the pneumatic tires of your wheel. The use of
spurs in this manner is likely to leave your bicycle in a winded
condition. Spurs are not comfortable, either, in case of a throw.

10. Do not be stubborn with a balky wheel. If the front wheel gets in a
rut going east, and the hind wheel in another going west, dismount and
argue the matter standing, unless you are tired, and want to lie down by
the road-side without making the effort to do so unassisted.




CHANGED HIS MIND.


  I didn't like to take my bath,
    Until one summer morning bright
  I made believe I was a whale,
    And now I think it's out o' sight.




A FACETIOUS VISITOR.


"See yat 'ittle boy over zare?" said Mabel. "Yat's my 'ittle buzzer, an'
his name is Nat."

"Indeed?" said the visitor. "Well, I think gnat is a very good name for
a buzzer."




A SINGULAR DRESS.


"My big brother belongs to the Seventh Regiment," said little Nell,
proudly, "an', my, how noble he looks when he's all dressed up in his
unicorn!"




A LOST TUNE.


  I've heard a German band play tunes,
    I've heard 'most every other thing;
  But one tune I have never heard,
    Is that which boiling kettles sing.





End of Project Gutenberg's Harper's Round Table, June 11, 1895, by Various

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