He descended, a little stiffly, I thought, and greeted me cordially, with affable dignity. His manner somehow implied that it was I who had been away.

He insisted on my coming into his front yard and sitting down on the bench by the house, while he condescendingly and courteously inquired after the health of his old friends and neighbors. I stayed until supper was announced. The Colonel was always the soul of hospitality; but on this occasion he did not ask me to join him. And I reflected, as I went away, that although he had punctiliously insisted on my sitting down, the Colonel had remained standing during our somewhat protracted conversation.

1 Published by permission of Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

And if ever the "Prairie Belle" took fire,

A thousand times he swore,

He'd hold her nozzle agin the bank

Till the last soul got ashore.

All boats has their day on the Mississip,
And her day come at last,-

The "Movastar was a better boat,

But the "Belle" she wouldn't be passed. And so she come tearin' along that nightThe oldest craft on the line

With a nigger squat on her safety valve,

And her furnace crammed, rosin and pine.

The fire bust out as she clared the bar,
And burnt a hole in the night,

And quick as a flash she turned, and made

For that willer bank on the right.

There was runnin' and cursin', but Jim yelled out,

Over all the infernal roar,

"I'll hold her nozzle agin the bank

Till the last galoot's ashore."

Through the hot, black breath of the burnin' boat
Jim Bludso's voice was heard,

And they all had trust in his cussedness,
And knowed he would keep his word.
And, sure's you're born, they all got off
Afore the smokestacks fell, -

THE ARMENIAN HORRORS.1

BY WILLIAM WATSON.

(From "The Purple East.")

[1856-.]

NEVER, O craven England, nevermore
Prate thou of generous effort, righteous aim!
Betrayer of a People, know thy shame!

Summer hath passed, and Autumn's threshing floor

Been winnowed; Winter at Armenia's door

Snarls like a wolf; and still the sword and flame

Sleep not; thou only sleepest; and the same

Cry unto heaven ascends as heretofore;

And the red stream thou mightst have stanched yet runs; And o'er the earth there sounds no trumpet's tone

To shake the ignoble torpor of thy sons;

But with indifferent eyes they watch, and see
Hell's regent sitting yonder, propped by thee,
Abdul the Damned, on his infernal throne.

You in high places; you that drive the steeds
Of empire; you that say unto our hosts
"Go thither," and they go; and from our coasts
Bid sail the squadrons, and they sail, their deeds
Shaking the world: lo! from the land that pleads
For mercy where no mercy is, the ghosts
Look in upon you faltering at your posts-
Upbraid you parleying while a People bleeds
To death. What stays the thunder in your hand?
A fear for England? Can her pillared fame
Only on faith forsworn securely stand?

On faith forsworn that murders babes and men?
Are such the terms of glory's tenure? Then
Fall her accursed greatness, in God's name!
Heaped in their ghastly graves they lie, the breeze
Sickening o'er fields where others vainly wait
For burial; and the butchers keep high state

In silken palaces of perfumed ease.

The panther of the desert, matched with these,
Is pitiful; beside their lust and hate,

Fire and plague wind are compassionate,

1 By permission of Mr. John Lane. (Fcap. 8vo. Price 1s. net.)