eulogy, as if to ask if he hadn't done pretty well. At this moment Mr. Hurst, who had been delegated to look after Julian, stepped up on the platform and whispered in the ear of the Boss,― "That young lunatic is determined to make his speech, and nothing I can say will stop him.” The great man smiled again his bull-terrier smile, nodded slowly, and observed that it was "all right. Mr. Hurst need give himself no further uneasiness." While a gentleman in another part of the hall, whom Julian knew slightly, rose to second his nomination with another little eulogy, the Boss beckoned to the chairman of the convention, who instantly inclined his ear toward him. No sooner had the seconder finished his remarks than the purport of these secret instructions was divulged. The chairman rapped his desk with his gavel, and, stepping to the front of the platform, said that, before putting the nomination of Mr. Burroughs to vote, he would ask the honorable gentleman, as a special favor, to take the chair for a moment, as he desired the privilege of adding a few words to the just encomiums already pronounced by his friends, the Honorable Patrick Mulligan and the Honorable Spencer McDuff. Julian, who was taken completely by surprise, thought that his ears were deceiving him, or that the chairman, for some reason, wished to make sport of him, or, perhaps, by underhand tactics, defeat his nomination; but when the request was twice repeated, and obviously with the friendliest intention, he saw no way of refusing, and, amid a storm of applause, he made his way to the platform, feeling dazed and dizzy, and inwardly fearful lest, in some way, he might make a fool of himself in this unaccustomed position. The Boss shook hands with him as he presented himself on the platform, and, turning to the audience, said, "I have the honor to prisint to the convention the Honorable Julian Burroughs, our next congressman for the th District." Here the applause broke forth anew, while Julian stood bowing and bowing, and finally, with flushed cheeks and burning ears, seated himself in the vacated chair. The late chairman, taking the floor, devoted himself for five minutes to the production of amiable fiction concerning the moral and intellectual merits of "the Honorable Julian Burroughs," his devotion to the cause of Ireland, and his sterling democratic sentiments. The call for the question was then raised, and the temporary chairman, without clearly perceiving that he was cutting himself off from making his speech of acceptance, was compelled to put his own nomination to vote and declare, amid much laughter, that it appeared to be unanimously carried. He was bound, however, in a few words, to thank the convention for the honor which it had conferred upon him; but just then the chairman returned and proceeded to the consideration of fresh nominations. It now dawned upon the novice in politics that he had been, in some mysterious way, outwitted, and that his chance of delivering his cherished speech was gone. He was not at all sure that there had been any design of bringing about this result, but that, nevertheless, it had been accomplished was beyond dispute. It was a most humiliating fact, not only because all his beautiful reform sentiment had been wasted, but because it gave him, for the first time in his life, a sense of insecurityof not quite knowing his bearings- and a suspicion of hidden pitfalls beneath his unwary feet. Was it possible that the Boss had received an inkling of what his speech contained? There was not a soul who had seen this speech except his father, and he was surely not capable of playing such a dastardly trick. He had, to be sure, rejected all the old gentleman's suggestions, and had laughed at the hollow, spread-eagle phrases which he had insisted upon as indispensable. It was more than likely that his father meant what he said when he prophesied his political ruin from such a speech; and, as he had set his heart upon seeing him in public life, was it not an imaginable possibility that he had made a confidant of the Boss? Julian was so interested in this speculation that he paid no heed to the further proceedings of the convention, and when, long after midnight, he found himself strolling up Broadway toward Madison Square, he was yet debating the pros and cons. For no sooner had he apparently settled the question than a new doubt put forth its ugly head and upset all his previous argument. It was a thorny path he was about to tread, and he was not sure but that it would be the part of wisdom to retrace his steps while there was yet time. THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER. BY FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. [1780-1843.] Он, say, can you see by the dawn's early light What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleamingWhose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight, O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming? And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there; Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave? On that shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep, As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses ? And where are the foes who so vauntingly swore That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion A home and a country should leave us no more? Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution. No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave; Oh, thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation! And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave |