MY SISTER'S GRAPES.

TOBY TYLER

ABOUT JACK FROST

HOW A SAILOR RODE WITH THE CZAR.

A WONDERFUL RAILROAD.

MILDRED'S BARGAIN.

EMBROIDERY FOR GIRLS.

Banner: Harper's Young People

Vol. II.—No. 59. | Published by HARPER & BROTHERS, New York. | Price Four Cents.
Tuesday, December 14, 1880. | Copyright, 1880, by Harper & Brothers. | $1.50 per Year, in Advance.

MY SISTER'S GRAPES.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "JOHN HALIFAX, GENTLEMAN."

Perhaps you might not think Uncle Dick a "gentleman"—Aunt Emma did not, I know, though she kept her mind to herself, being his brother's widow, and the prudent mother of many children. Uncle Dick lived with them; that is, if he could be said to live anywhere, being always on the move, never liking to stay long in one place, and somewhat restless-minded, as those are who have passed all their life in rambling about the world. A "rolling stone" he certainly was, though he could scarcely be said to have gathered no moss, as he had amassed two fortunes, one after the other: having lost the first, he was now enjoying the second in his own harmless but rather eccentric way.

I doubt if Aunt Emma really liked him, yet she was always very civil to him, her chief complaint being that he never would "take his position in the world"; that is, he avoided her balls, made himself scarce at her dinner parties, and no persuasion could ever induce him to exhibit his long, thin, gaunt figure, his brown hands and face, in evening clothes. What a "guy" he would have looked in them! as we boys always agreed, and sympathized with him, and not with Aunt Emma. But in his own costume we admired him immensely. His shooting-jacket, Knickerbockers, and Panama hat were to us the perfection of comfort and elegance.

As to his cleverness, that also was a disputed point with some folk. But we had never any doubt at all. And perhaps we were right. "A fool and his money are soon parted," says the proverb. But when they part to meet again—that is, when a man can bear the loss of one fortune, and set to work to make another—the chances are (without any exaggerated Mammon-worship I say it) that he is not a fool.

"Yes, I have really made two fortunes," said Uncle Dick, as we sat beguiling a sunshiny day, when the fish refused to bite, by plying him with innumerable questions, till at last he "rose" like a trout at a fly. "How old was I when I lost the first one? Well, about twenty-five. Yes, I remember it happened on my birthday, Michaelmas-day."

"Happened all in one day?" some of us inquired.

"Ay, in a day, an hour, a minute," said Uncle Dick, with his peculiar smile, half sad, half droll, as if he saw at once all the fun and all the pathos of life. "And now I remember it was not in the day, but in the middle of the night. I went to sleep a rich man; by daylight I was a beggar. Any more questions, boys?"

Of course we rained them upon him by the dozen. He sat composedly, watching his float swim down the stream, and answered none for ever so long: Uncle Dick had, when he chose, an unlimited capacity for silence.

"Yes," he said at length, "it was one night in the middle of the Atlantic on the deck of a sinking ship. There's a saying, boys, about gaining the whole world and losing one's own soul. Well, I gained then my soul, though I lost my fortune. And it was all through my sister's grapes."

Now Uncle Dick was in the habit of talking nonsense—at least Aunt Emma considered it such. In his long solitude he was accustomed to let his thoughts run underground, as it were, for a good while, when they would suddenly crop up again, and he would make a remark, apropos of nothing, which greatly puzzled matter-of-fact people, or those who liked elegant small-talk, of which he had absolutely none.

"Your sister's grapes?" repeated one of us, with great astonishment. "Then you had a sister? Where is she now?"

Uncle Dick looked up at the blue sky—intensely blue it was that day, as deep and measureless as infinity. "Where is she? I don't know: I wish I did. But He knows, and I shall find out some time." Then he added, briefly, "My sister Lily died of consumption when she was fifteen, and I about ten years old."

"And what about her grapes? Is it a story—a true story?"

"Quite true to me, though all might not believe it. Some might even laugh at it, and I don't like to be laughed at. No I don't mind; it can't harm me. I'll tell you, boys, if you like to hear. It may be a good lesson for some of you."

We did not much care for "lessons," but we liked a story; so we begged Uncle Dick to tell us this one from the very beginning.

"No, not from the beginning, which could benefit neither you nor me," said Uncle Dick, gravely. "I'll take up my tale from the point I mentioned, when I found myself at midnight on the deck of the Colorado Australian steamer, bound for London, fast going down. And she went down."

"You with her?"

"Not exactly, or how could I be here sitting quietly fishing? which seems odd when I think of the hurly-burly of that night. It had come quite suddenly after a long spell of fair weather, which we found so dull that we began drinking, smoking, gambling, and even fighting now and then; for we were a rough lot, mostly 'diggers' who, like myself, had worked a 'claim,' or half a claim, at Ballarat—worked it so well that they soon found they had made a fortune, so determined to go to Europe and spend it.

"I thought I would do the same. I was quite young, yet I had amassed as much money as many a poor fellow—a clergyman, or a soldier, or an author—can scrape together in a lifetime; and I wanted to spend it in seeing life. Hitherto I had seen nothing at all—in civilization, that is. I never had the least bit of 'fun,' until I ran away from home seven years before; and very little fun after, for it was all hard work. Now, having been so lucky as to make my fortune, I meant to use it in enjoying myself.

"I had never enjoyed home very much. My people, good as they were, were rather dull, or at least I thought them so. They always bothered me about 'duty,' till I hated the very sound of the word. They called my fun mischief; my mischief they considered a crime; so I slipped away from them, and after a letter or two I gradually let them go, or fancied they were letting me go, and forgot almost their very existence. I might have been a waif and stray drifted ashore from the sea or dropped from the clouds, so little did I feel as if I had any one belonging to me. My relations, even my parents, had all melted out of my mind; for weeks I sometimes never once thought of them—never remembered that I had a father, or mother, or brothers. Lily had been my only sister, and she died."

Uncle Dick stopped a moment, then continued:

"I don't wish, boys, to put myself forward as worse than I was, or better. People find their own level pretty well in this world. It's no good either to puff yourself up as a saint, or go about crying yourself down as a miserable sinner. In either case you think a great deal too much about yourself, which is as harmful a thing as can happen to any man.

"Certainly I was no worse than my neighbors, and no better. I liked everybody, and most people liked me. I troubled nobody, and nobody troubled me. I meant to go on that principle when I got back into civilization, to spend my money, and have my fling. Possibly I might run down to see 'the old folks at home,' whom we diggers were rather fond of singing about; but we seldom thought about them. At least I never did, and they formed no part of my motive for coming to England. I came simply and solely to amuse myself.

"I had just turned in with the rest—not drunk, as a good many of us were that night, but 'merry.' One hour after, we turned out, and stood facing one another—and facing death. A sudden hurricane had risen; one of our masts had gone overboard; we had sprung a leak; and work as we might at the pumps, the Captain said he believed we should sink or go to pieces before morning. He had been drunk too, which perhaps accounted for our disaster, in a good sound ship and the safe open sea; but he was sober enough now. He did his best, and when hope was over, said he should 'go to the bottom with his ship.' And he went. I took his watch to his widow: he gave it me before he jumped overboard, poor fellow.

"Well, boys, what was I going to tell you? I forget," said Uncle Dick, drawing his long brown hand across his forehead. "Oh, about the ship Colorado going down, and all the poor wretches fighting for their lives in the boats—or out of them, which was about an equal chance. We could just see one another in the starlight or the white gleam of the waves—groups of struggling men (happily there was not a woman on board), some paralyzed and silent, others shrieking with terror, some sobbing and praying, others only cursing: for heaven, which we all were straight going to—or hoped to go—seemed to be the last thing we ever thought of. We only thought of life, dear life—our own lives—nobody else's.

"People say that a shipwreck brings out human nature in all its brutality: 'every man for himself, and God—no, not God, but the devil—for us all.' I found it so. To see those men, old, young, and middle-aged, some clothed, some half-naked, but all clinging to their bags, full of nuggets, which they had tied round their waists or held in their hands, eager to save themselves and their gold, and utterly reckless of everything and everybody else—it was horrible! Gradually it dawned upon some of the feebler among them that they would hardly save themselves, to say nothing of their money. Then they no longer tried to hide it, but frantically offered a quarter, a half, two-thirds, of their gold to any one who would help them. But in vain—utterly in vain.

"For me, I was a young fellow—young and strong. I had never faced death before, and it felt—well, sad and strange. I was not exactly frightened, but I was awed. I turned from the selfish, brutal, cowardly wretches around me; they had shown themselves in their true colors, and I was disgusted at myself for having put up with them so long. I didn't like even to go to the bottom with such a miserable lot. In truth, it felt hard enough to go to the bottom at all.

"The biggest of my nuggets I always carried in a belt round my waist, but the rest of my 'fortune' was in my bag. Most of us carried these bags, and tried to get with them into the boats, which was impossible. So some had to let them go overboard, but others, shrieking and praying, refused to be parted from their 'luggage,' as they called it. They were not parted, for both soon went to the bottom together. I was not inclined for that exactly, and so, after a few minutes' thought, I left my bag behind."

"How much was there in it?" some one asked.

"I don't know exactly, but I guess" (Uncle Dick still used a Yankee phrase now and then) "somewhere about seven or eight thousand pounds."

We boys drew a long breath. "What a lot of money! And it all went to the bottom of the sea?"

"Yes, but as the Bible says, 'What will not a man give in exchange for his soul?' or his life—for my soul troubled me mighty little just then. I hardly knew I had one till I lost my money; so you see it was a good riddance perhaps."

We stared. Uncle Dick talked so very oddly sometimes! And then we begged him to continue his story.

"Well, I was standing waiting my turn to jump into the boat—the last boat, for two had been filled and swamped. Being young, it seemed but right to let the older fellows go first; and, besides, I wanted to stick by the Captain as long as I could. He, I told you, determined to stick by his ship, and went down with her. He had just given me his watch, and his last message to his wife, and I was trying, as I said, to keep quiet, with all my wits about me. For all that, I seemed to be half dreaming, or as if I saw myself like another person, and felt rather sorry for myself to be drowned on my twenty-fifth birthday—drowned just when I had made my fortune, and was going home to spend it.

"Home! the word even had not crossed my lips or my mind for years. As I said it, or thought it—I can't remember which—all of a sudden I seemed to hear my mother's voice, clear and distinct through all the noise of the storm. And, boys, what do you think she said? Nothing wonderful, nothing strange. Only, 'Richard, how could you take your sister's grapes?'

"It flashed upon me like lightning: something that happened when I was only ten years old, and yet I remembered it as if it happened yesterday. I saw myself—young wretch!—with the bunch of grapes in my hand, and my mother, with her grave, sad eyes, as, passing through the dressing-room into my sister's bedroom, she caught me in the act of stealing them. I could hear almost through the open door poor Lily's short feeble cough: she died two days after. The grapes had been sent her by some friend. She had so many friends! I knew where they were kept; I had climbed up to the shelf and eaten them all.

"Many a selfish thing had I done, both before I left home and afterward: why should this little thing, long forgotten, come back now? Perhaps because I was never punished for it. My mother, who at any other time might have boxed my ears, or taken me to father to be whipped, did nothing, said nothing except those few words of sad reproach, 'How could you take your sister's grapes?'

"I heard them through the horrible tumult of the winds and waves, and poor souls struggling for life. My life—what had I made of it? If I went to the bottom of the sea, I and all my money, who would miss me? who would care? Hardly even my mother. If she ever heard of my death to-night, she might drop a tear or two, but nothing like the tears she shed over my sister, who in her short life had been everybody's comfort and joy, while I—

"'Mother!' I cried out, as if she could hear me these many thousand miles off—'mother, forgive me, and I'll never do it any more!'

"I had not said this when I was ten years old, and took the grapes, but I said it, sobbed it, at twenty-five, when the 'it' implied many a selfishness, many a sin, that my mother never knew. Yet the mere saying of it seemed to relieve me, and when directly afterward some one called out from the boat, 'Jump in, Dick; now's your turn,' I jumped in to take my chance of life with the rest.

"It was given me. I was among the eighteen that held on till we were picked up—almost skin and bone, and one of us raving mad from thirst—by a homeward-bound ship, and landed safely in England. No, boys, don't question me. I won't tell you about that time; I can't."

It was not often Uncle Dick said, "I can't"; indeed, it was one of his queer sayings that "can't" was a word no honest or brave lad ought to have in his dictionary. We turned away our eyes from him—he seemed not to like being looked at—and were silent.

"Well, I landed, and found myself walking London streets—not the rich, healthy, jolly young fellow who had come to have his fling there, but a poor shattered wretch almost in rags, and just a bag of bones. All that remained of my fortune were the few nuggets which I had sewed into my belt. I turned them, not without some difficulty, into food and clothing of the commonest kind, to make my money last as long as I could. I did not want to come home quite a beggar: if I had been, I should certainly never have come home at all.

"By mere chance—for I had altogether forgotten times and seasons—the day I came home was a Christmas morning. The bells were ringing, and all the good folk going to church—my mother, too, of course. We met at the garden gate. She did not know me, not the least in the world, but just bowed, thinking it was a stranger coming to call, till I said, 'Mother!' And then—

"Well, boys, that's neither here nor there. It's a commonplace saying, but one can't hear it too often, or remember it too well, that whatever else we have, we never can have but one mother. If she's a good one, make the most of her; if a middling one, put up with her; if a bad one, let her alone, and hold your tongue. You know whether I have any need to hold my tongue about your grandmother.

"But I can't talk about her, or about that Christmas-day. We did not go to church, and I doubt if we ate much Christmas dinner; but we talked and talked straight on up to ten o'clock at night, when she put me to bed, and tucked me in just as if I had been a little baby. Oh, how pleasant it was to sleep in sheets again—clean, fresh sheets—and have one's mother settling the pillow, and taking away the candle!

"My room happened to be that very dressing-room behind the nursery where Lily died: I could see the shelf where the grapes had stood, and the chair I climbed to reach them. With a sort of childish awe I recalled everything.

"'Mother,' I said, catching her by the gown, as she said good-night and kissed me, 'tell me one thing. What were you doing on my last birthday? that is, if you remember it at all?'

"She smiled: as if mothers could forget their boys' birthdays, even such scapegrace boys as I had been! Then a very grave look came into her face.

"'I was clearing out this room, turning it into a bedroom for any stray bachelor, little thinking the first would be you, Richard; but I did think of you, and, to tell you the truth, I was thinking of something very naughty you once did—here, in this very room.'"

"'And you said, over again, How could I take my sister's grapes? I heard it, mother—heard it in the middle of the Atlantic.' Then I told her the whole story.

"Now, boys, I ask nobody to believe it, but she believed it—to the day of her death. It made her happy to believe it, to think that in some mysterious way she had helped to save me, as mothers never know how or when some word of theirs may save their wandering sons.

"For I was a wanderer still: I staid with her only a month, while my nuggets lasted; then I worked my way back to Australia, and began again in the same way, and yet a new way—new in one thing, at least, that on every Sunday of my life I wrote home to my mother. And when at length I came home, too late for her, alas! it was, I hope, not quite too late for the rest of you. Bad is the best, maybe, but I've tried to do my best."

"Oh, Uncle Dick!"—for he had been as good as a father to some of us—sent us to school and to college, and, what we liked a great deal better, taken us fishing and shooting, and given us all sorts of fun.

"So, boys," said he, smiling at our demonstrations of affection—and yet he liked to be loved, we were sure of that—"you have a sneaking kindness for me, after all. And you don't think me altogether a villain, even though I did take my sister's grapes?"

Note.—It may interest readers to know that this incident is really "founded on fact"—one of those inexplicable facts that one sometimes meets with in real life, which are stranger than anything we authors invent for our "stories."

"I DON'T WANT A SWITCH IN MY 'TOCKING, SANTA CAUS."

[Begun in No. 58 of Harper's Young People, December 7.]

TOBY TYLER;

OR, TEN WEEKS WITH A CIRCUS.

BY JAMES OTIS.

Chapter II.

TOBY RUNS AWAY FROM HOME.

Toby could scarcely restrain himself at the prospect of this golden future that had so suddenly opened before him. He tried to express his gratitude, but could only do so by evincing his willingness to commence work at once.

"No, no, that won't do," said Mr. Lord, cautiously. "If your uncle Daniel should see you working here, he might mistrust something, and then you couldn't get away."

"I don't believe he'd try to stop me," said Toby, confidently; "for he's told me lots of times that it was a sorry day for him when he found me."

"We won't take any chances, my son," was the reply, in a very benevolent tone, as he patted Toby on the head, and at the same time handed him a piece of pasteboard. "There's a ticket for the circus, and you come around to see me about ten o'clock to-night. I'll put you on one of the wagons, and by to-morrow morning your uncle Daniel will have hard work to find you."

If Toby had followed his inclinations, the chances are that he would have fallen on his knees, and kissed Mr. Lord's hands in the excess of his gratitude. But not knowing exactly how such a show of thankfulness might be received, he contented himself by repeatedly promising that he would be punctual to the time and place appointed.

He would have loitered in the vicinity of the candy stand in order that he might gain some insight into the business; but Mr. Lord advised that he remain away, lest his uncle Daniel should see him, and suspect where he had gone when he was missed in the morning.

As Toby walked around the circus grounds, whereon was so much to attract his attention, he could not prevent himself from assuming an air of proprietorship. His interest in all that was going on was redoubled, and in his anxiety that everything should be done correctly and in the proper order he actually, and perhaps for the first time in his life, forgot that he was hungry. He was really to travel with a circus, to become a part, as it were, of the whole, and to be able to see its many wonderful and beautiful attractions every day.

Even the very tent ropes had acquired a new interest for him, and the faces of the men at work seemed suddenly to have become those of friends. How hard it was for him to walk around unconcernedly; and how especially hard to prevent his feet from straying toward that tempting display of dainties which he was to sell to those who came to see and enjoy, and who would look at him with wonder and curiosity! It was very hard not to be allowed to tell his playmates of his wonderfully good fortune; but silence meant success, and he locked his secret in his bosom, not even daring to talk with any one he knew lest he should betray himself by some incautious word.

He did not go home to dinner that day, and once or twice he felt impelled to walk past the candy stand, giving a mysterious shake of the head at the proprietor as he did so. The afternoon performance passed off as usual to all of the spectators save Toby. He imagined that each one of the performers knew that he was about to join them; and even as he passed the cage containing the monkeys he fancied that one particularly old one knew all about his intention of running away.

Of course it was necessary for him to go home at the close of the afternoon's performance, in order to get one or two valuable articles of his own—such as a boat, a kite, and a pair of skates—and in order that his actions might not seem suspicious. Before he left the grounds, however, he stole slyly around to the candy stand, and informed Mr. Job Lord, in a very hoarse whisper, that he would be on hand at the time appointed.

Mr. Lord patted him on the head, gave him two large sticks of candy, and what was more kind and surprising, considering the fact that he wore glasses, and was cross-eyed, he winked at Toby. A wink from Mr. Lord must have been intended to convey a great deal, because, owing to the defect in his eyes, it required no little exertion, and even then could not be considered as a really first-class wink.

That wink, distorted as it was, gladdened Toby's heart immensely, and took away nearly all the sting of the scolding with which Uncle Daniel greeted him when he reached home.

That night, despite the fact that he was going to travel with the circus, despite the fact that his home was not a happy or cheerful one, Toby was not in a pleasant frame of mind. He began to feel for the first time that he was doing wrong; and as he gazed at Uncle Daniel's stern, forbidding-looking face it seemed to have changed somewhat from its severity, and caused a great lump of something to come up in his throat as he thought that perhaps he should never see it again. Just then one or two kind words would have prevented him from running away, bright as the prospect of circus life appeared.

It was almost impossible for him to eat anything, and this very surprising state of affairs attracted the attention of Uncle Daniel.

"Bless my heart! what ails the boy?" asked the old man, as he peered over his glasses at Toby's well-filled plate, which was usually emptied so quickly. "Are ye sick, Toby, or what is the matter with ye?"

"No, I hain't sick," said Toby, with a sigh; "but I've been to the circus, an' I got a good deal to eat."

"Oho, you spent that cent I give ye, eh, an' got so much that it made ye sick?"

Toby thought of the six pea-nuts which he had bought with the penny Uncle Daniel had given him; and, amidst all his homesickness, he could not help wondering if Uncle Daniel ever made himself sick with only six pea-nuts when he was a boy.

As no one paid any further attention to Toby, he pushed back his plate, arose from the table, and went with a heavy heart to attend to his regular evening chores. The cow, the hens, and even the pigs, came in for a share of his unusually kind attention; and as he fed them all, the big tears rolled down his cheeks, as he thought that perhaps never again would he see any of them. These dumb animals had all been Toby's confidants; he had poured out his griefs in their ears, and fancied, when the world or Uncle Daniel had used him unusually hard, that they sympathized with him. Now he was leaving them forever, and as he locked the stable door, he could hear the sounds of music coming from the direction of the circus grounds, and he was angry at it because it represented that which was taking him away from his home, even though it was not as pleasant as it might have been.

Still, he had no thought of breaking the engagement which he had made. He went to his room, made a bundle of his worldly possessions, and crept out of the back door, down the road to the circus.

Mr. Lord saw him as soon as he arrived on the grounds, and as he passed another ticket to Toby, he took his bundle from him, saying as he did so, "I'll pack up your bundle with my things, and then you'll be sure not to lose it. Don't you want some candy?"

Toby shook his head; he had just discovered that there was possibly some connection between his heart and his stomach, for his grief at leaving home had taken from him all desire for good things. It is also more than possible that Mr. Lord had had experience enough with boys to know that they might be homesick on the eve of starting to travel with a circus; and in order to make sure that Toby would keep to his engagement he was unusually kind.

That evening was the longest Toby ever knew. He wandered from one cage of animals to another; then to see the performance in the ring, and back again to the animals, in the vain hope of passing the time pleasantly. But it was of no use; that lump in his throat would remain there, and the thoughts of what he was about to do would trouble him severely. The performance failed to interest him, and the animals did not attract until he had visited the monkey cage for the third or fourth time. Then he fancied that the same venerable monkey who had looked so knowing in the afternoon was gazing at him with a sadness which could only have come from a thorough knowledge of all the grief and doubt that was in his heart.

TOBY AND HIS NEW FRIEND—Drawn by W. A. Rogers.

There was no one around the cages, and Toby got just as near to the iron bars as possible. No sooner had he flattened his little pug-nose against the iron than the aged monkey came down from the ring in which he had been swinging, and, seating himself directly in front of Toby's face, looked at him most compassionately.

It would not have surprised the boy just then if the animal had spoken; but as he did not, Toby did the next best thing, and spoke to him.

"I s'pose you remember that you saw me this afternoon, an' somebody told you that I was goin' to join the circus, didn't they?"

The monkey made no reply, though Toby fancied that he winked an affirmative answer; and he looked so sympathetic that he continued, confidentially:

"Well, I'm the same feller, an' I don't mind telling you that I'm awfully sorry I promised that candy man I'd go with him. Do you know that I came near crying at the supper table to-night; an' Uncle Dan'l looked real good an' nice, though I never thought so before. I wish I wasn't goin', after all, 'cause it don't seem a bit like a good time now; but I s'pose I must, 'cause I promised to, an' 'cause the candy man has got all my things."

The big tears had begun to roll down Toby's cheeks, and as he ceased speaking the monkey reached out one little paw, which Toby took as earnestly as if it had been done purposely to console him.

"You're real good, you are," continued Toby; "an' I hope I shall see you real often, for it seems to me now, when there hain't any folks around, as if you was the only friend I've got in this great big world. It's awful when a feller feels the way I do, an' when he don't seem to want anything to eat. Now if you'll stick to me, I'll stick to you, an' then it won't be half so bad when we feel this way."

During this speech Toby had still clung to the little brown paw, which the monkey now withdrew, and continued to gaze into the boy's face.

"The fellers all say I don't amount to anything," sobbed Toby, "an' Uncle Dan'l says I don't, an' I s'pose they know; but I tell you I feel just as bad, now that I'm goin' away from them all, as if I was as good as any of them."

At this moment Toby saw Mr. Lord enter the tent, and he knew that the summons to start was about to be given.

"Good-by," he said to the monkey, as he vainly tried to take him by the hand again; "remember what I've told you, an' don't forget that Toby Tyler is feelin' worse to-night than if he was twice as big an' twice as good."

Mr. Lord had come to summon him away, and he now told Toby that he would show him with which man he was to ride that night.

Toby looked another good-by at the venerable monkey, who was watching him closely, and then followed his employer out of the tent, among the ropes and poles and general confusion attendant upon the removal of a circus from one place to another.

[to be continued.]

CAMBRIDGE SERIES

OF

INFORMATION CARDS FOR SCHOOLS.[1]

No. 4.—About Jack Frost.

BY W. J. ROLFE, A.M.

With the single exception of water, all substances expand, or become larger, when heated, and contract, or become smaller, when cooled. This is seen in metals better than in most other bodies. An iron ball which when cold will just pass through a certain ring will not do so after being put in boiling water. The tires of carriage wheels before being put on are heated in a fire, in order that their contraction in cooling may make them bind more tightly. On a railroad a little space is left between the ends of the rails to allow them to expand. If this were not done, their lengthening in hot weather would bend them outward or inward, so that they would not be exactly parallel, and this might be the cause of serious accidents. It has been proved that Bunker Hill Monument—a granite pile 220 feet high—is bent to one side by the expanding of the opposite side when the sun shines upon it; and similar changes must take place in every tower, or steeple, or other tall structure exposed to the sun's rays.

The least change in the temperature of any material produces a change in its size, though not in its weight; and if one part is heated or cooled more than another, the shape of the whole must be somewhat altered.

Water contracts until it is cooled down to 40 degrees Fahrenheit—that is, 40 degrees of our common thermometers, or 8 degrees above the freezing-point—and then it expands until it freezes. This is a wise provision of nature. If water kept on contracting with cold, it would begin to freeze at the bottom, where the coldest portions of it would settle by their weight, and this would go on until it was all frozen, so that in winter our lakes and rivers would become solid masses of ice. This would kill all fishes and other animals in the water, and all the heat of summer would not suffice to liquefy these great bodies of ice. As it is, the water begins to freeze at the surface, and the layer of ice keeps the water below it from freezing; for though the ice is itself cold, a wall of it will keep out the cold as well as a wall of stone or brick.

The force with which water expands in freezing is almost irresistible. The freezing of half a gill of water in a confined space will lift a weight of several tons. A thick iron bomb-shell filled with water will be split open by the freezing of the liquid as it would be by a charge of gunpowder. In winter the water-pipes in our houses are often burst by the freezing of their contents. In some parts of England advantage is taken of this property of water in the slate quarries. Large blocks of slate are placed where the rain will fall upon their edges. The water works its way between the layers, freezes, and splits the mass into thin plates.

Jack Frost has done a good deal of this rock-splitting on his own account. A large part of the soil of our world has been made by the freezing of water in the cracks and crevices of rocks. Mountains have thus been rent asunder and pulverized, and the work goes on every winter. And after the soil has been formed, it is broken up and crumbled by the action of frosts and thaws. Jack Frost is a good helper to the ploughman and the farmer.

He works also on a grander scale than this. In many parts of the earth, as you know, there are great rivers of ice called glaciers. They not only look like rivers, but they flow like them, though so slowly that we can not see the motion. In the course of a year they move only a few hundred feet, but with mighty force, grinding the sides and bottom of the valley as they go, breaking off huge masses of rock, and bearing them along, together with smaller stones, earth, and mud. Thus they are gradually tearing down the hills and filling up the valleys.

Ages ago vast glaciers swept in this way over a large portion of the Northern hemisphere, and in many places we can see how they ground and scratched the sides of mountains and surfaces of rocks on their way. The big stones known as "bowlders" that abound in many parts of the country were brought and dropped by these moving masses of ice, and in some cases we can tell just where they came from, perhaps hundreds of miles away.

On the other hand, some of Jack Frost's work is of the minutest and most delicate sort. With what exquisite patterns in ice he adorns the glass of our windows in winter! All that fine tracery is made up of tiny crystals, the lines and angles of which are more exact than a jeweller could cut them on a gem. Every snow-flake is a mass of such crystals, of many forms, yet all variations of one pattern. Let the flakes fall upon a piece of dark cloth, and you can sometimes see with the naked eye that they are regular six-pointed stars, but with a common magnifying-glass you can examine them much better. All ice is composed of these crystals closely packed together; and if a sunbeam is allowed to shine through a piece of it, the melting of the crystals makes the interior look as if it were studded with lovely little transparent flowers with six petals. In Russia a palace was once built of ice, and all the furniture and decorations were of the same material. It was very wonderful and very beautiful, but not so wonderful or so beautiful as the natural structure of the ice itself.

The change from water to ice is a familiar one to us, but to the ignorant natives of the tropics it seems almost like a miracle. It is only within a few years that ice has been imported into these tropical countries, and at first it was as great a curiosity as solid mercury or quicksilver would be here. This liquid metal, which is used in thermometers, does not freeze in our country, except very rarely in the coldest weather of the extreme north; but in the arctic regions this often occurs, and the solid mercury can be hammered and wrought like silver. Spoons might be made of it, but they would instantly melt if put into ice-cold water.

A FORECASTLE YARN.

HOW A SAILOR RODE WITH THE CZAR.

A FORECASTLE YARN.

BY DAVID KER.

"The queerest scrape as ever I got into," said old Jack Hawkins, "was when I was quite a young chap, makin' my fourth voyage to Rooshia. That's a queer place, mates, if you like! and the lingo's as queer as the country. I'd larned to talk it a bit by the time I'm tellin' on, for one of our crew was a Rooshian, and I picked it up from him. But I tell ye, 'twas as tough a job as shapin' yer course in a fog, with no sun to take a hobservation by. When you want to say 'Thank you,' you've got to sing out 'Blackguard are you,' which don't sound purlite nohow. Then they call a speech a 'wretch,' and a visitor a 'ghost' (the last sort o' visitor I should like), and instead of 'Indeed!' they say 'Sam Daly'; and some o' their own names are things like 'Comb-his-hair-off,' and 'Blow-my-nose-off.'[2]

"Altogether it's a queer, twistified kind o' lingo, jist what you might expect from foreign lubbers. What riled me most when I fust went over was that everybody kep' on callin' me a mattrass, and I'd punched two or three fellers' heads for it afore I found out that 'mattrass' [matross] is their word for a sailor. Jist think o' that, now!

"I can remember as well as if 'twas only yesterday what an outlandish place St. Petersburg seemed when I fust set foot in it. Coachmen in blue frocks and red sashes, nurses with pasteboard crowns on, church towers plated with gold, policemen with swords by their sides, house porters rigged out in sheep-skin, wooden houses painted green and yeller—fact, there was no end to the queer sights all about. And when I got to know their talk a bit, it seemed quite as outlandish to hear 'em call each other 'John the son of Peter,' or 'Paul the son of James,' 'stead o' handlin' one another's names ship-shape.

"And then, again, talk o' bein' thick! why, this here plank 'ud be a joke to 'em. If one of our frigates was to be stuck all over with Rooshians' heads, she wouldn't want no armor-platin'! Now I'll jist tell yer a thing as I seed with my own eyes, and you can believe it or not, as you like. One day when we was a-lying in the river alongside o' the Ostroff Quay, our old man calls up a Rooshian lad that used to do odd jobs for him, and gives him two twenty-kopeck pieces (which are much the same as an English sixpence, or a 'Merican dime), tellin' him one on 'em's to go for bread, and t'other for 'baccy—which was all plain sailing enough, one would think.

"Well, away goes Dmitri, and doesn't come back. So then the old man he sings out for me, and he says, 'Hawkins,' says he, 'just go and see what's gone with Dmitri. I'll be bound the young dog has made a mess of that job.'

"So off I goes to the shop where we used to buy our things, and right at the very door I comes upon Mr. Dmitri, scratchin' his head, and lookin' as if he'd clean lost what few wits he ever had.

"Says I to him, 'Hollo, mate, what's up?'

"Says he, 'What ever am I to do? I've gone and mixed the two pieces, and now I don't know which was the one for the bread, and which was the one for the 'baccy.'[3]

"But I must coil up the slack o' my yarn, or I'll never git it all in; so now to tell yer 'bout that scrape o' mine.

"Right on the river-bank, near the Hadmiralty Building, there's a stattey of Peter the Great, put up by the Hempress Catherine 'bout a hundred years ago; and a real grand affair it is—for Rooshia. It stands on a big block o' gray granite, as was dragged all the way from Finland o' purpose. Peter's on a rearin' horse, pointin' across the river to where he fust began buildin' the town; and there's a sarpent crumpled up under his horse's feet, in sign of his ridin' the high horse over the heathenish ways o' the country.

"Well, I was passin' this stattey one night, comin' back from a jollification with some o' my chums, when (I don't know how it was) it came into my head all to once what a joke it 'ud be to climb up and sit upon the horse. So I scrambles over the railin', and up I goes.

"It was no easy job climbin' over the slippery granite, I can tell yer; but presently I got hold o' the sarpent's tail, and then o' the horse's, and worked my way up as if I was climbin' the shrouds. The horse's hind-quarters was a ticklish bit, but I managed it somehow, and there I sat, cheek by jowl with old Peter, as snug as you please.

"But it warn't quite so snug in another minute or two; for a cold wind came sweepin' up from the river, and with that and the cold metal I was sittin' on, my very teeth rattled in my head. Time to be gittin' down agin, thinks I.

"Jist then I diskivered that 'git down' was easier said nor done. I couldn't turn round, and I couldn't see where to put my feet without it; and as for slidin' down at haphazard, 'tain't likely I'd try that, with a five-and-twenty foot fall 'tween me and the pavement. Fact, I was in a regular fix; and afore I could make up my mind what to do, I heerd the tramp of a police patrol. Jist as they passed one fellow shouted, 'Hollo!' and they all stopped. I kept mum, hopin' they hadn't seen me; when what must I do but give a sneeze fit to wake the whole town!

"'I thought so,' cries the chap. 'Come down, you fellow, come down directly.'

"'All very fine sayin' come down,' says I, 'but how the dickens am I to do it?'

"'He must be an Englishman,' says one. 'Ivan, go for a ladder.'

"The ladder came, and up scrambled two fellows, and hauled me down like a sack o' flour. I was too numbed by this time to show fight, even if it had been any good; so the fellers jist marched me straight off to the watch-house, and locked me up for the night.

"Next mornin' I was had up afore the Judge; and when the old chap sees me, he says, with a grin, 'Aha! Angliski matross' [an English sailor], as if that was quite enough to account for whatever I might have done. When he'd heard the charge he axed if I spoke Rooshian, and finding I did, arter a fashion, he told me to spin my yarn. So I paid it out pretty much as you have it now.

"At every word I said the old fellow rubbed his hands and chuckled like anythin'; and the minute I'd done, he jist lay back in his chair, and laughed as if he'd bust all to bits.

"'Well,' says he, wipin' his eyes, 'that's the best story I've heard this year, or my name's not Phillipoff. But you really must not play such tricks here, my man; so I'll fine you five rubles [$3.75], and mind you don't do it again.'

"'Five rubles!' says I; 'that's a pretty high fare for a ten minutes' ride.'

"'Can't be helped,' says he: 'if you will ride with the Czar, you must expect to pay first-class fare.'

"'All right,' says I, 'here's the money; but the next time I ride with the Czar I'll git out afore they come round for the tickets.'"

A WONDERFUL RAILROAD.

BY F. E. FRYATT.

"Oh, children, I have made such a wonderful discovery this afternoon on my shopping tour!" said Miss Thornton, laying off her bonnet and seal-skin, as she addressed an eager group of youngsters.

"What is it? what is it?—do tell us!" chorussed all the little Thorntons, gathering excitedly around her.

"Yes—wait a moment. Here, Nell, take my things up stairs; Harry, shoulder these packages, and go with her, and Bert will stir up the fire, while Edith runs down stairs and tells Bridget to serve dinner precisely at seven. Then we'll have my travels' history."

A little later, as they all sat before the blazing grate, with the red fire-light flickering on their faces, Miss Thornton commenced in a serious manner: "Once upon a time, just about a year ago, a benevolent gentleman was walking through one of the busiest thoroughfares in our city. It was Christmas-eve, and very late, when he saw twenty or thirty little girls and boys hurrying out of a great shop famous for its Christmas toys and gift counters of every description. The poor young things looked so pale and thin, and there was such a haggard expression on their small faces, that a strange pain filled his heart, and a longing to help these little cash boys and girls set him to thinking.

"The gentleman had two wee darlings of his own; he knew they were at this very moment tucked away, rosy and warm, in their snowy bed in the nursery, and he wished these tired young folks were as happily placed.

"'Shameful!' said he to himself; 'every one of you ought to have been in bed four hours ago. Something ought to be done—something shall be!'

"Just by the merest chance I went into that very store this afternoon, and what do you think I saw? The tiniest, prettiest little railroad you could imagine."

"A toy railroad?" queried Bert.

"Not at all; a veritable railroad running all around the store, filled with freight, passengers, and—money."

"Oh, aunty, 'upon your word and honor,' honest, now, was it a real true railroad with cars on it?" cried Harry.

"Yes, it is a real, wide-awake, lively, business, working road, as true as I sit here."

"Oh!" chorussed all the little Thorntons, in amazement.

"What made it go?" asked Harry.

"Who were the passengers?" chimed in Nellie.

"Could I ride on it, aunty?" asked Bert.

"Anyway, I should think it would run over folks, or trip them up," suggested Edith.

"Come, now, if you will give me 'elbow room,' and not crowd so, I'll tell you everything I saw, and explain it as clearly as possible," said Miss Thornton, smiling at the children's eager curiosity. "One day last year I went to that same store to purchase a bonnet; the place was thronged with customers at every counter; the floor-walkers were shouting, the girl clerks screaming 'C-a-a-sh!' 'Che-ck!' cash-girls and cash-boys with little baskets were running in every direction, calling out their numbers in reply. Such a jostling, crowding, noisy place I was never in."

"Well?" said Harry, with an air of deep interest.

"To-day I was very pleasantly surprised to find it as quiet and orderly as one could wish; just as many customers, to be sure, but none of the dreadful noise and confusion of last year—and all owing to this wonderful little railroad."

"Do tell us all about it, aunty," begged Harry, forgetting he was interrupting.

"Well, I heard a soft humming noise somewhere overhead, and looking up, there were a dozen or more little cars with polished wheels running on tracks that shone like silver. Each car was about eight inches long, just big enough for a couple of fairies to ride in. They were the cutest little things, and ran along their shining roads like magic; no horses, pulleys, nor wires to draw them. Some of them went right to the dépôt without stopping; others stopped at their stations just as the big 'elevated' cars do."

"I've guessed it: they went by steam," shouted Bert, triumphantly.

"No, not by steam," said Aunt Elinor.

"Then they're wound up like my mouse clock," cried Harry.

"No, it isn't that."

"I mean to go there and find out," said Bert.

"Some of these cars had curious wire cages hanging beneath them. A dozen of these were running along at full speed to their stations. I ought to tell you just here that the odd little 'cubby-house' where the cashier receives and changes money is the place where these cars take on and deposit their passengers and freight. The double track commences at the north, and sweeps around the store till it comes to the south end of the box which serves as the dépôt. This railway, made of bright steel, is just high enough from the floor to let a tall man pass under without knocking his hat off. These little cages reminded me of the car of a balloon, they swung along so airily. But what do you think? There was an ugly black bear in one of them. He looked ferocious enough to eat one, and his eyes fairly glittered as he rode past me. In the next car was a solemn baby-elephant, with immense ears, funny twinkling little eyes, and a very respectable trunk. Then came a pair of jumping-jacks, a savings-bank, two monkeys, a woolly dog, and some lop-eared rabbits, and these were followed by a company of wooden soldiers, some more elephants, two gray cats, and a sedate-looking parrot. The animals kept coming, till I made up my mind to find out the Noah's ark where they were coming from. I hadn't far to go before I found myself in one of the toy departments, in the midst of which stood a great fat jolly old Santa Claus loaded down with Christmas toys, and all powdered with snow. 'Oho!' thought I, 'my merry old saint, I've found you out: you're the president of this new railroad.' He must have read my thoughts, or else I fancied he gave me a knowing wink out of one of his blue eyes, as much as to say, 'Don't tell the children.'"

"Oh, Aunt Elinor, but you have told us already," screamed Nell, with delight.

"Well, well, after watching another menagerie embark on the railroad, I followed the crowd into the next department. Oh, Nell, you and Edith would have clapped hands for joy: it was like a glimpse into fairy-land—dolls here, dolls there, dolls everywhere. As for the railroad, it was crowded, up-trains and down-trains."

"Oh, aunty, tell us how they were dressed!" cried Edith.

"One was a bride. I begged the clerk to stop the little car, and let me have a good look at her ladyship. She wore a lovely princesse robe of cream-colored satin, trimmed with lace and pearl-bead fringe; an exquisite veil and a wreath of orange blossoms covered her golden curls. In another car sat a very pretty little lady, with a real seal-skin hat, cloak, and muff, and diamond earrings; her cheeks were as red as roses. A baby doll in a long white dress sat in front of her."

"Oh, aunty, a baby doll, without any hair on its head, and only two teeth like Min's?"

"Yes, Nell; and, by-the-way, it didn't look unlike our Min: the same little round eyes and pudgy nose—yes, and the two teeth exactly like hers."

"All this time, Aunt Elinor, you haven't told us what made the cars go, and what stops them," said Edith, thoughtfully.

"What a forgetful aunty I am! This is the way it is done. Harry Thornton wants to buy a dog; he has a fifty-cent piece; he stops at a toy counter over which is marked Station D, and selects a nice black-and-tan—"

"No, a Newfoundland, aunty."

"Well, a Newfoundland. He hands fifty cents to the young woman clerk. What does she do? She takes the car down off the track, using a long-handled contrivance like a fork to do it. She places Mr. Doggy—Carlo, if you please—in the lower wire cage, the money and her cash-book in the top car; then places the car and its baggage on the down-town track, and away it rushes. You see, one end of the track is higher than the other, making a gentle descent, down which the little car glides. A young lad hands Mr. Carlo over to the wrapping clerk, and in a second or two, all wrapped from top to toe in tissue-paper, he makes his appearance in car D, bound on the up-town track for Station D. He makes the trip in ten seconds."

"But what makes him stop just at Station D?" inquires Harry.

"A small steel peg under the car, called a brake, is fixed just where it will fit in a notch on the steel road, and every station car is provided with one."

"I know it now," exclaimed Edith. "It was the benevolent gentleman who said in the beginning of your story that the cash boys and girls ought to have been in bed hours ago. He was the one who invented it—the railroad, I mean. Who was he, aunty?"

"I am sorry I can not tell you his name; but he is a very bashful person," replied Aunt Elinor.

"I'll tell you who it is," shouted Harry, with an air of triumph: "it's old Santa Claus. Hurrah for old Santa Claus!"

"Some one's Santa Claus, undoubtedly, little man; but whose?—that is the question."

[Begun in Young People No. 58, December 7.]

MILDRED'S BARGAIN.

A Story for Girls.

BY MRS. JOHN LILLIE.

Chapter II.

A clamor of young voices greeted Mildred's entrance into the tiny hall of the cottage. Three small boys and a girl of nine caught hold of the elder sister.

"Oh, Milly, do hurry tea!" and, "Oh, Milly, who came up to the gate?" and, "Oh, mamma said Milly was to go at once to her. She is in the parlor."

Mildred kissed each little face, and then, disengaging herself from them, pushed open the parlor door, while the children scampered off to assist the one old servant in her preparations for the evening meal.

Mrs. Lee was lying on the parlor sofa when her daughter entered, while near her stood a tall, hard-featured woman, who was displaying an open bundle of silks and laces, shawls and ribbons. The glittering array was spread all about the poor widow, who glanced at her eldest daughter with a mixture of hope and perplexity. Mrs. Lee was one of those women who take everything in life from a despondent point of view. She had begun her married life a fresh, pretty girl who had known very little real care or sorrow, but with no mental or spiritual force to meet even the trifling ups and downs of existence. She loved her children dearly, but in them she saw only so many additional causes for worry. When her husband died she had turned almost instinctively to Mildred as a sort of guide and counsellor, and the young girl had grown accustomed to be the controlling influence at home.

"My darling," Mrs. Lee exclaimed, as Mildred came up to her side, "do explain to this—lady that I don't want any of her things. Indeed, madam, we can't buy any of them;" and Mrs. Lee turned her face rather fretfully from her troublesome visitor.

Mildred gave the peddler a grave look of rebuke, but she said, civilly enough: "Please bring your things into the next room; I will talk to you there. My mother is not well enough to be disturbed."

The woman had very quickly measured Mildred's power. Moreover, she fancied she detected in the slim, pretty young girl a more promising customer than the wearied, faded lady on the sofa; so she was by no means unwilling to gather up her things and follow Mildred into the little room which served as dining and school room, where her mother's piano, the children's books, and her own sewing-machine were kept.

"Now, miss," began the woman at once, shaking out some of her most brilliant wares, "do just have a look—not to buy unless it suits ye, but just to see what's pretty. Now here's just the thing would do you for your life—a gray silk you couldn't match in all Milltown; and cheap—as cheap—"

"No, thank you," said Mildred, coldly, turning away from the dazzling offer. "I shall be so glad if you'll put up your things. I'm tired, and the children want their tea."

"Well, well," said the woman, with a coarse affectation of good-humor, "it'll take me a minute or two; but first just cast your eye over that bit of silk—gray's your color; you're just pink and white and soft enough for it, and it's only thirty dollars for twenty yards—enough to make a dress now, and a jacket next spring. And I'll tell you how I manage with young ladies like you: I take easy pay—weekly installments, don't you see? But law! it's so little at a time—only fifty cents a week—keeps me waiting more'n a year; and you may say you get a year's wear out of your dress for nothing."

"I am very sorry," said Milly, still persistent; "I do not want the dress. I must take off my things. I am just up from the store."

"The store!" echoed the woman, eying her sharply. "Mr. Hardman's, I suppose? Yes, you're just the kind of pretty, genteel young figure they like to get. Now I dare say you are in the mantle department."

MILDRED'S TEMPTATION—Drawn by Jessie Curtis Shepherd.

"Some part of the day," said Milly, shortly. The woman was busy tying up her parcel, folding the gray silk so that its sheen caught Milly's eye perpetually. It was a pretty silk, the young girl thought. Oh, why couldn't she have just such a dress to wear at Miss Jenner's party, instead of her old, often-washed white muslin! But Milly resolutely shut such a wild ambition out of her mind, and tried to look uninterested while the woman continued:

"Why, you must be earning at least five or six dollars a week down to Hardman's. He's good pay, I know. Fifty cents wouldn't be much. Well, well," she added, turning the pretty silk back and forth in shining ripples, "I'll find an easy sale for this anywheres: only I must say, as a friend, you're making a mistake."

A half-pang of regret shot through Milly's mind as the woman tied up the last article in her parcel, and the gray silk disappeared from view. During the busy occupations of the evening her mind kept recurring to the peddler's visit and her tempting offer. Before she went to bed she had made a rapid calculation of how long it would take her to save the required sum out of her earnings. It took nearly all she and her mother could earn to feed the four hungry little mouths as well as their own, and to keep a respectable roof over their heads.

"Still," argued Milly, "I work so hard, why shouldn't I have at least fifty cents a week for my clothes, and such a good silk, too! And to look well at Miss Jenner's!"

Visions of an impossible future, in which Miss Jenner would adopt all her little brothers and sisters, filled Mildred's mind, completely shutting out the fact that girlish vanity was at the root of her desire to possess the gray silk. Unfortunately Mildred had never been accustomed to go with her little perplexities to her mother, and so it did not now occur to her to seek any advice. Mrs. Lee was always "too tired" or too "blue" to be "bothered," and while Mildred had learned a habit of self-restraint and reserve, the younger children looked to her for every suggestion, so that Milly felt quite capable of governing her own actions when she was allowed to govern theirs. By the time the young girl awoke, she had, as she thought, reasoned herself into a belief that the most foolish mistake of her life was in letting that gray silk slip out of her possession. The sight of her limp old muslin in the wardrobe did not lessen this regret, nor did her mother's bemoaning at breakfast that "Milly would look a fright at Miss Jenner's party" help matters in the least.

"If you could only at least look like your father's daughter," sighed Mrs. Lee, "no knowing what might come of it."

Milly echoed these words over and again as she walked down to the store, varying them with her own unwise reflections. She was a little late, and received a half-sneering reprimand from "Mr. Tom" as she passed him at the desk. It was her duty to go to the mantle department, which was in a sort of L off the main part of the store. Milly, after hurriedly laying aside her things, turned toward the cloak-room. No other sales-woman was in it, but there, seated at the side, an expression of vulgar audacity on her face, was the peddler of last night!

[to be continued.]

EMBROIDERY FOR GIRLS.

BY SUSAN HAYES WARD.

No. III.

Fig. 10.

The Pilgrim women who sailed in the Mayflower brought with them the very old stitch, a magnified view of which is given in Fig. 11. I have seen a picture wrought by one of these same Pilgrim Mothers—rows of houses and trees something like this (you could any of you draw better), with a meeting-house in the middle; but the houses and trees were a marvel of crewel-work, the background of silk, all in this ancient stitch, which is also found in old Persian and Turkish embroidery. I know an old lady who has used it from her childhood, who calls it "pocket-book" stitch; it is really a kind of "fagotting," and there are remnants of old petticoats and curtains still to be found in out-of-the-way country towns of New England, exquisitely worked in this most economical of stitches, which, for convenience, I shall call the New England stitch. Turn the work over and you will see how economical the stitch is: all the wool, except just enough at the outline to catch in the stuff, shows on the upper side. By pushing your needle first toward you and then from you, as seen in Fig. 10, you get that pretty twisted look which you see very much enlarged in Fig. 11. The Janina stitch, as given in Harper's Bazar, November 6, seems to be an imitation of this, though much inferior in effect and ease of working.

Fig. 11.

Fig. 13.

The design here given (Fig. 12) is suitable for a tidy, bureau-cover, curtain, or mantel lambrequin. For a bureau-cover take nice Russia crash, allow twelve inches to hang over each side, besides enough for fringe. Three flowers like the two in Fig. 12 are enough for crash of ordinary width. Trace off the pattern on a piece of paper, repeat the left-hand flower at X, stopping at R, and omitting the spray marked S. You can finish off the stem at R with Fig. 13 if you prefer. When your pattern is all ready on the paper, trace it on the crash, in the middle of the twelve inches, according to directions in No. II. This figure, designed expressly for the girls who read these articles, can be worked according to the directions for color given below, in New England stitch, or in three shades of one color, in either New England or stem stitch, following the same gradations of color.

A genuinely old design used one hundred and fifty years ago will be sent to the girl under sixteen who first reports having finished the embroidery of Fig. 12, according to directions, in New England stitch.

COLORS.

A, very light yellow-green; B and C, darker shades; a, very light salmon pink; b and c, darker shades; l, light yellow; n, old gold; m, an intermediate shade of yellow.

Every other flower might be worked in old blues.

Fig. 12.

The readers of Young People, whose letters give assurance of the pleasure and instruction they have received from the paper during the past year, will doubtless be glad to put others in the way of sharing in their enjoyment. This they can most easily do by speaking of the paper to their friends and acquaintances, showing them copies of it, and advising them to subscribe for the new volume. By thus extending its circulation they will be working for their own interest; because the larger the list of subscribers is, the better able the publishers will be to increase the beauty and attractiveness of the paper.

The next issue of Harper's Young People will be a beautiful Christmas number. The serial stories and the Post-office Box will be omitted, and the entire contents will be suited to the holiday season. There will be a charming Christmas story, entitled "How It All Happened," by Miss Alcott, with illustrations by Jessie Curtis Shepherd; "When the Clock Struck Twelve," a play for Christmas-eve, by Edgar Fawcett; a beautiful double-page Christmas picture by Thomas Nast; music; and other pretty things to please our young readers. The number will be inclosed in a special cover, designed by W. A. Rogers, and printed in dark red ink.

We must again call the attention of our correspondents to the fact that the Post-office Box can not be made a medium for buying or selling curiosities, stamps, or articles of any kind. Neither can we print requests for the address of any correspondent.

The requests for exchange should be made as short as possible. We can not publish lists of eggs, stamps, minerals, and other things; but would advise boys and girls to make out a neat list of the articles they have to exchange, and those they desire in return, and have copies always ready to send in answer to the letters they receive.

Requests for exchange are often accompanied by lengthy conditions, but we can not make room to print them, and shall invariably leave them for the exchangers to settle among themselves. In sending specimens great care should always be taken to mark them distinctly, and to state the locality from whence they came, otherwise the recipient may become the possessor of some valuable curiosity, and be unaware of its character.

Our puzzle contributors will please remember that a puzzle, in order to be accepted, must be not only good, but must have a solution not already used in Young People, and contain no slang, and no obsolete words. Read over your contributions and correct them carefully before sending them to Young People, as the misuse of a single letter spoils an otherwise excellent puzzle.

Montreal, Canada.

I am a little boy nine years old. I have been ill in bed for ten weeks, but now I am getting better.

I had a little dog named Bogey, but he bit a policeman, and we had to send him away.

We have lots of snow here now, and the sleigh-bells are tinkling all day. I wish I was well enough to have a snow-ball fight with the other boys. Now they have plenty of coasting and snow-shoeing and tobogganing, and it is great fun.

I can read all of Young People myself. I wish it would come oftener.

Bertie G.

New York City.

I want to tell the readers of Young People how to make a bran pudding for the Christmas dinner. It is the nicest kind of pudding. Select some little gifts, pretty or ridiculous, for each person expected. Wrap them neatly, and write upon each the name, and a few lines appropriate to the present and the receiver. Place them in a large tin pan, and cover them with dry clean bran. After all the other good things have been served, have this placed before papa, and he will take out each package with a spoon, and read the name and verse aloud. Shouts of laughter and expressions of delight greet each one as the parcels are opened. If mamma or aunty will help write the verses, they can be made very funny, and be a jolly ending to a Christmas dinner. It is a dessert very much better than plum-pudding for little folks.

Bessie Guyton.

Glasgow, Scotland.

I get Young People every week, and I am so pleased when it comes! I liked "The Moral Pirates" very much.

I have a brother a year younger than I am, and we each have a pet cat. His is all black except its paws, which are white, so we call it White Socks. Mine is all gray, and its name is Jenny. We have a very pretty little collie dog named Tyne.

I have four dolls, and a black doll for their nurse. I have never been to school. We have a governess. I like to read the letters in the Post-office Box very much, and I should like to know if I am the first little girl who has sent a letter from Scotland.

Peggie M.

The Post-office Box has received numbers of letters from Scottish lads and lassies.

Medford, Massachusetts.

I have taken Young People only a little while, and I like it so much I would be very sorry not to have it now. When my papa brings it home I take it to school, and my teacher reads it to the scholars. There are fifty in our school.

Howard L.

Hutchinson, Kansas.

We had a present of a pair of white mice. They had four little ones, but my sister killed one of them. The mice have red eyes and pink feet. The mother mouse is very kind to the little ones. She picks them up in her mouth as a cat does her kittens. They are not large enough to eat yet, but the big ones eat cookies and apples, and drink milk. We have a tin cage to keep them in.

I do not go to school. Mamma teaches my sister and me at home. I am eight years old.

Mary B. M.

Ottawa, Canada.

There are some very fine buildings in this city. The Parliament House and Departmental Buildings are situated on a beautiful hill about two hundred feet high. All three are built of marble. The ground, which is tastefully laid out with lawns and flower beds, is in the form of a square, with the Parliament House in the centre, and a Departmental Building on either side. From the rear of the Parliament House there is a fine view of the Chaudière Falls and the surrounding country.

A bridge joining the provinces of Quebec and Ontario has just been completed, which is the second largest bridge in the world.

Edward L.

Danville, Illinois.

I want to tell the Post-office Box of the fun I had this afternoon. We met at two o'clock, and went to the river. We coasted a long while on the large hills, then we went on the ice. The river is frozen hard, and the skaters took some of us riding on the ice. We had a splendid time. Afterward we went back to the hills, and built a large bonfire. The flames were about eight feet high, and we hurrahed and shouted. We went home about five o'clock.

I can not express in words how much I like Young People. The stories and pictures are elegant.

Will you please tell me which was the first railroad in the United States?

Colmore S.

The first railway in the United States was constructed in 1826 from the quarries of Quincy, Massachusetts, to the nearest tide-water. The cars were drawn by horses. The second American railroad was laid in 1827, from the coal mines of Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania, to the Lehigh River. With branches and turn-outs it was thirteen miles long. It was operated by gravity. Mules were used for drawing back the empty cars. The first passenger railway was the Baltimore and Ohio, fifteen miles of which were opened in 1830. During the first year the cars were drawn by horses, but in 1831 the first locomotive built in America was put on the track. It had an upright instead of a horizontal boiler. On its trial trip it drew an open car at the rate of eighteen miles an hour, from Baltimore to Ellicott's Mills. The next passenger line built was the Mohawk and Hudson, from Albany to Schenectady.

Fort Warren, Boston, Massachusetts.

I have taken Harper's Young People ever since No. 9, and I like it very much. I think "The Moral Pirates" and "Old Times in the Colonies" are the best stories.

We have a pet cat named Frisky, and she wears a very large ruffle around her neck, like Queen Elizabeth. We had two dogs, but we sent them away because there were too many about the Fort. Army posts are so dull, that we like to get all the pets we can.

Will you please tell me who first discovered the Antarctic Continent?

Chester Maxwell W.

The Antarctic Continent was discovered in January, 1840, by Captain Wilkes, of the United States navy, who was commander of an exploring expedition toward the south pole. He traced the coast for some distance, but was prevented from landing by the great masses of ice along the shore. In 1841, Sir James Ross, who commanded a British expedition, penetrated still farther south, and discovered Mount Erebus, which is the most southern volcano, so far as known, and which at the time of its discovery was throwing out smoke and flame. He also discovered Mount Terror, which is in appearance an extinct volcano.

Saratoga Springs, New York.

I shall be twelve years old next February. Willie W. and I got up a company of soldiers, and had a big parade in November. The Drum-Major was a boy very oddly dressed. The newspaper here said our parade made a smile on more faces than one. We do not expect to parade again until next summer; then, when all the city boys are up here, we will show them our regiment.

Nash R.

Newman, Georgia.

My uncle sends me Young People from Macon, and I like it so much! I am eight years old, but I have never been to school. My little cousin and I recite our lessons at home. I have a little pony named Dolly.

Freddie B.

Herman, Minnesota.

I have received so many letters from parties wishing to exchange for my petrified buffalo's tooth that I hardly know what to do. I only had two specimens. But I have sent a number that were not petrified. I hope the correspondents will see this letter, and know why they did not receive just what they expected. I can not answer all the letters I have received now, but will do so as soon as possible.

Theodore H. Patchen.

New Orleans, Louisiana.

For my winter sport I go to my uncle's sugar plantation, and see them make sugar. I have a pony and a colt up there, and have lots of fun.

Monroe V.

I would like to exchange a few Hot Springs diamonds, and also some seeds of the cotton-plant, for ocean curiosities, shells, or Indian relics. My pa procured these diamonds at the Hot Springs of Arkansas last summer.

Pa has a jug which was taken from a mound thirty feet high. There were trees growing on the mound three feet in diameter. I asked pa how old the jug was, and he said the Mound-Builders put it there four thousand years ago, more or less.

Annie Sidney Duffie,
Princeton, Arkansas.

My grandpa sends us Harper's Weekly and Young People, and papa says, "It is the best reading we could have for our little ones." We children hope never to miss a number of our dear Young People. We keep them all nice, and some time we will have them bound.

If all the little folks who read this paper could come out here, we could get them plenty of curiosities. The winters here are very quiet, but in the summer the town is full of strangers.

I have some pressed ferns and leaves I will send to any little folks who would like them.

Agnes, P. O. Box 19,
Forest Lake, Washington County, Minnesota.

The following exchanges are also offered by correspondents:

United States internal revenue stamps for United States and foreign postage stamps.

Charles E. Barbour,
150 Centre Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Flower seeds.

Gerty M. Lothrop,
Topsfield, Washington County, Maine.

Sea-shells and minerals.

Byron Huff,
P. O. Box 171, Newton Centre, Massachusetts.

Birds' eggs.

W. K. Post,
21 North Washington Square, New York City.

Brazilian, Canadian, and Cuban stamps for a solid piece of flint the size of an egg.

William Naldrett,
501 East Eleventh Street, New York City.

Postage stamps.

Tommie Samuels,
Care of G. W. Newman & Co.,
Emporia, Kansas.

Pressed ferns for autumn leaves or moss.

H. P. G., P. O. Box 1138,
Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minnesota.

Minerals and stamps for minerals and feathers.

Hallie Crenshaw,
Care of Postmaster, Marengo, Iowa County, Iowa.

French and English coins.

W. B. Shober, Cumberland, Maryland.

Postage stamps.

H. C. Pearson,
Fishersville, Merrimac Co., New Hampshire.

Postage stamps.

F. W. Treadway,
169 Jennings Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio.

Postage stamps and postmarks.

Charles Carter,
P. O. Box 1167, Titusville, Pennsylvania.

Shells and quartz for minerals.

Maggie Creswick,
2912 Clark Avenue, St. Louis, Missouri.

United States postmarks and pieces of the Washington Monument for foreign stamps, shells, coins, minerals, or relics.

Mabel A. J. Cornish,
310 First Street, S. E., Washington, D. C.

A piece of rhinoceros skin for iron, lead, silver, or gold ore, or for petrifactions.

George L. Osgood, Jun.,
2 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Postage stamps and specimens of petrified wood for stamps. Old issues of United States and South American stamps especially desired.

J. R. Bedford,
5 Spencer Place, Fourth Avenue, New York City.

Postmarks for minerals, Indian relics, or curiosities of any kind.

William Bryant,
171 Clermont Avenue, Brooklyn, New York.

Postage stamps, stamped envelopes, and postal cards, especially with readers of Young People in foreign countries.

Edwin T. Cole,
804 Mahantongo Street, Pottsville, Pennsylvania.

Any natural product of Western New York for rice and cotton as taken from the field, or for the moss found on trees in the Southern States.

Clifton B. Gates,
Ellington, Chautauqua County, New York.

Sea-shells, postage stamps, and curiosities.

Peter Welch,
276 Bridge Street, Brooklyn, New York.

Rare stamps or minerals for foreign coins.

Sidonia Stien,
125 East Sixty-ninth Street, New York City.

Rare foreign and United States stamps for ocean curiosities and Indian relics.

John A. Muno,
Lock Box 68, Evanston, Cook County, Illinois.

United States War Department and foreign stamps for birds' eggs.

Joseph R. Haskin,
Fort Preble, Portland, Maine.

Fossils, gold, silver, and iron ore, and cocoons of the Atticus cecropia, for minerals, coins, fossils, Indian relics, or skulls of birds or animals.

Fletcher M. Noe,
165 N. Ala. Street, Indianapolis, Indiana.

Twenty-five foreign stamps or minerals for fossils and minerals.

Thomas W. Gilbert,
23 Park Row (Room 37), New York City.

Danish stamps and Chinese coin for any other foreign stamps or coin.

George C. Codding,
Petaluma, Sonoma County, California.

Postage stamps from Brazil, Hong-Kong, or Japan, for minerals.

E. G. Lathers,
P. O. Box 29, Pelhamville, New York.

Olive W. H.—We do not know. You would better write to some of our exchanges, or to some dealer in stamps.

Arthur N.—Write and ask your question of the correspondent herself. Her address was given in Young People No. 53.

Marguerite.—If you wish the cover, title-page, and index to Harper's Young People, Volume I., sent to you by mail, you must send forty-eight cents to the publishers. The amount will be received in clean, unused United States postage stamps of any denomination.

J. M.—A translation of the hieroglyphs on the New York Obelisk is given in the London Athenæum of March 13, 1880, which you will find at any of the large reading-rooms. The same translation is reprinted in a volume entitled The Obelisk and Freemasonry, published by J. W. Bouton, 706 Broadway, New York city.

"Subscriber," Radnor, Ohio.—All of Willson's School Readers are published by Messrs. Harper & Brothers. There are eight in the series. They run in regular order from the First to the Fifth, and there are besides three Intermediate Readers. We do not know to which one you refer.—We can not print your request for exchange, as you give no address.

O. W. S.—We can give you no information in regard to the offer you inquire about, as we never heard of it.

Fred W.—The subscription price of Harper's Monthly, Weekly, and Young People, to one address, for one year, is eight dollars and fifty cents.

F. F.—We can not tell you what to buy for your mother's Christmas present, for we do not know as well as you, who are near her, what kind of a present would please her the best. But we would advise you to think very carefully, and if you can remember any pretty thing she has expressed a wish for, or any little comfort which you suspect she has gone without in order that she might get something for you, try to give her that. Do not spend your money for a trinket, but get something pretty and useful at the same time, like a handsome work-basket or a soft worsted breakfast shawl, and every time mamma uses it she will be sure to remember her little girl's loving thoughtfulness much more tenderly than if you give her vases or other parlor ornaments which will be stood away on the mantel-piece.

W. S. Hutchinson, William L. Betton, G. A. J., and Others.—You can get a very good illustrated catalogue of postage stamps by sending twenty-five cents to Scott & Co., 146 Fulton Street, New York city.

Hattie Kerr.—If you keep your crabs well fed with bits of raw beef or raw fish, never allowing them to get hungry, they will be more likely to leave the other inhabitants of your aquarium in peace.

Helen E. V.—Parrakeets will eat all kinds of seeds. They like orange seeds very much. They will also eat fruit of all kinds, and sometimes will bite a bit of cracker like a parrot. You can also give them English walnuts for variety. In Cuba large flocks of parrakeets, ninety or a hundred birds together, often settle on the orange-trees, and make sad havoc with the ripe fruit, which they tear to pieces to find the seeds. They are especially fond of the Cuban sour orange, a fruit which is rarely brought to this country, and large numbers of these beautiful little birds may always be found around the wild orange-trees in the Cuban forests.

H. N.—The ribs of a canoe should lie parallel to the moulds.—A drawing or design may be enlarged by using a pantograph. It requires, however, some practice to make a neat drawing with one of these instruments.

Favors are acknowledged from May and Fannie Fairlamb, Harry Woolcott, Eugenia McGarrah, E. C. S., Anna Brown, Sadie D., Harry MacC., Mettie F., Kinney Offutt, Edith C., Theodore F. Bayles, Boyd Ramsey, Aimee Ruggles, Hattie F. Holcroft, Jennie Hughes, L. M. and E. Smith, Eddie Beeson, Fannie V. Cross, DuBois Carpenter, Tillie Strang, Fred, Mamie E. Thornton, Lucia C. Daniels, Marie R., Walter P. Hiles, Gerald M. Bliss, Lillie E. Brewster, George B. Donnelly, J. H. Shaw, Maggie Poindexter, Lillian A. Atkins, J. F. W.

Correct answers to puzzles are received from Annie M. W., Cal I. Forny, C. H. McB., Howard B. Lent.

PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.

No. 1.

HALF-SQUARE—(To Zelotes).

To listen to. To consume. A preposition. In mineralogy.

Mark Marcy.

No. 2.

RHOMBOID.

Across.—A wading bird. To prepare for publication. A tree. A metallic vein.

Down.—A letter. A verb. A girl's name. Part of a window. An adverb. A nickname. A letter.

Zelotes.

No. 3.

ENIGMA.

My first is in anger, but not in ire.
My second in stove, but not in fire.
My third is in dress, but not in cloak.
My fourth is in mist, but not in smoke.
My fifth is in earth, but not in soil.
My sixth is in puzzle, but not in foil.
My seventh is in lion, but not in beast.
My eighth is in festival, not in feast.
My ninth is in ocean, never at rest,
But not in the ships which toss on its breast.
Many have perished in seeking me,
And still I remain a mystery.

Owlet.

No. 4.

TRIPLE ACROSTIC.

An artery. Circular. A craze. Primals—part of the body. Centrals—to flow. Finals—a girl's name. Primals and finals combined, a fleet of war vessels.

Bolus.

No. 5.

DOUBLE ACROSTIC.

A French heroine. A saint. A French statesman and orator. A Greek orator. One of the nine Muses. A German poet. Primals and finals spell the name of a famous Roman.

Dame Durden.

No. 6.

EASY SQUARES.

1. First, a tribute. Second, to submit. Third, a sneering look. Fourth, a musical instrument.

C. I. F.

2. First, a wild animal. Second, otherwise. Third, a continent. Fourth, hindermost.

3. First, a means of cleanliness. Second, formerly. Third, exploits. Fourth, a plague.

J. B.

4. First, a grain. Second, a metal. Third, a small rope. Fourth, extremes.

Edith.

ANSWERS TO PUZZLES IN NO. 56.

No. 1.

1. Virginia creeper. 2. Flag. 3. Sage. 4. Dock. 5. Cowslips. 6. Egg-plant. 7. Pink. 8. Beech. 9. Yew. 10. Fir.

No. 2.

C | O | R | S | E
O | R | I | E | L
R | I | G | I | D
S | E | I | N | E
E | L | D | E | R

No. 3.

Charlemagne.

HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE.

Single Copies, 4 cents; One Subscription, one year, $1.50; Five Subscriptions, one year, $7.00—payable in advance, postage free.

The Volumes of Harper's Young People commence with the first Number in November of each year.

Subscriptions may begin with any Number. When no time is specified, it will be understood that the subscriber desires to commence with the Number issued after the receipt of the order.

Remittances should be made by Post-Office Money-Order or Draft, to avoid risk of loss.

Volume I., containing the first 52 Numbers, handsomely bound in illuminated cloth, $3.00, postage prepaid: Cover, title-page, and index for Volume I., 35 cents; postage, 13 cents additional.

HARPER & BROTHERS,
Franklin Square, N. Y.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] By special arrangement with the author, the cards contributed to this useful series, by W. J. Rolfe, A.M., formerly Head-Master of the Cambridge High School, will, for the present, first appear in Harper's Young People.

[2] For the benefit of Mr. Hawkins's readers it may be as well to state that the real words are "blagodareu," "retsch," "gosst," "f'samom dalay," "Komisâroff," "Lomonôsoff."—D. K.

[3] A fact.