There by the rocks on the breakers these sisters, hand in

hand,

Beheld once more that desperate man who struggled to reach the land.

"Twas only aid he wanted to help him across the wave,

But what are a couple of women with only a man to save? What are a couple of women? well, more than three craven

men

Who stood by the shore with chattering teeth, refusing to stir-and then

Off went the women's shawls, sir; in a second they're torn and rent,

Then knotting them into a rope of love, straight into the sea they went!

"Come back!" cried the lighthouse-keeper, "For God's sake, girls, come back!"

As they caught the waves on their foreheads, resisting the fierce attack.

"Come back!" moaned the gray-haired mother, as she stood by the angry sea,

"If the waves take you, my darlings, there's nobody left to me!"

"Come back!" said the three strong soldiers, who still stood faint and pale,

"You will drown if you face the breakers! you will fall if you brave the gale!"

"Come back!" said the girls, "we will not! go tell it to all the town,

We'll lose our lives, God willing, before that man shall drown!"

"Give one more knot to the shawls, Bess! give one strong clutch of your hand!

Just follow me, brave, to the shingle, and we'll bring him safe to land!

Wait for the next wave, darling! only a minute more, And I'll have him safe in my arms, dear, and we'll drag him to the shore."

Up to the arms in the water, fighting it breast to breast, They caught and saved a brother alive. God bless them!

you know the rest

Well, many a heart beat stronger, and many a tear was shed, And many a glass was tossed right off to "The Women of Mumbies Head!"

BLOWING BUBBLES.-EUGENE H. MUNDAY.

As I loitered through the village,
I saw children at their play,
Blowing bubbles in the sunshine
From a penny pipe of clay.
I had passed them with a greeting,
But their gladness charmed me so,
That I turned to watch the bubbles
Sailing through the summer's glow.
Though they seemed not half so brilliant
As in boyhood I had blown,
When the smallest of my bubbles
Held a rainbow of its own,
Yet my little friends grew merry
As each tinted, air-blown toy
Floated upward, and the baby
Clapped its chubby hands for joy.
And the girl--her arms outstretching,
As if begging them to stay-
Said, "I'm sorry, oh, so sorry,
They so quickly fade away!"
But her brother looked right manly
As he shouted with delight,

"It is easy, very easy,

To blow others just as bright!"

And he blew with such good fortune
That, before his task was done,
You might count a score of bubbles
Floating gaily in the sun.
Then her eyes with pleasure sparkled,
As the crystal phantoms played,

And she quite forgot her sorrow

That they each so quickly fade.

And she paused where I was resting
In the shadow of a yew,
And in tones of laughing wonder cried,
"Can't you blow bubbles, too?"
As I knew not how to answer,
There I left them at their play,
Blowing bubbles in the sunshine,
From a penny pipe of clay.

PRAYING FOR PAPA.

A man who had been walking for some time in the downward path, came out of his house and started down town for a night of carousal with some old companions he had promised to meet. His young wife had besought him with imploring eyes to spend the evening with her, and had reminded him of the time when evenings passed in her company were all too short. His little daughter had clung about his knees and coaxed in her pretty, wilful way for "papa" to tell her some bedtime stories, but habit was stronger than love for wife and child, and he eluded their tender questioning by the special sophistries the father of evil advances at such times from his credit fund, and went his way.

But when he was a few blocks distant from his home, he found that in changing his coat he had forgotten to remove his wallet, and he could not go out on a drinking bout without money, even though he knew his family needed it, and his wife was economizing every day more and more in order to make up his deficits, and he hurried back and crept softly past the windows of the little house, in order that he might steal in and obtain it without running the gauntlet of either questions or caresses.

But something stayed his feet; there was a fire in the grate within-for the night was chilly-and it lit up the little parlor and brought out in startling effects the pictures on the wall. But these were as nothing to the pictures on the hearth. There, in the soft glow of the firelight knelt his child at the mother's feet, its small hands clasped in prayer, its fair head bowed; and as its rosy lips whispered each word with distinctness, the father listened, spell-bound to the spot:

"Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep;

If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take."

Sweet petition! The man himself, who stood there

with bearded lips shut tightly together, had said that prayer once at his mother's knee. Where was that mother now? The sunset gates had long ago unbarred to let her through. But the child had not finished; he heard her say God bless mamma, papa, and my own self”—and there was a pause, and she lifted her troubled blue eyes to her mother's face.

66

"God bless papa," prompted the mother, softly. "God bless papa," lisped the little one.

"And-please send papa home sober"-he could not hear the mother as she said this, but the child followed in a clear, inspired tone:

'God-bless-papa-and-please--send—him—home

-sober. Amen."

Mother and child sprang to their feet in alarm when the door opened so suddenly, but they were not afraid when they saw who it was, returned so soon. That night, when little Mamie was being tucked up in bed after such a romp with papa, she said in the sleepiest and most contented of voices :

"Mamma, God answers most as quick as the telegraph, doesn't he?"

PROCRUSTES' BED.-CARLOTTA PERRY.

A long time ago lived Procrustes. The same
Was a dread and a terror wherever his name
Was heard, and his country was sorely afflicted
By the dreadful misdeeds to which he was addicted.
For he murdered and robbed in a horrible way!
Ah! he was a terror by night or by day,-
A terrible creature, a bold and a bad one,

And 'mong his bad habits he's said to have had one
That was worse than the rest and a cruelly sad one,
And you, when you hear it, will surely admit
That he had not the smallest good reason for it.

He had an idea, this very bad man,

That he was the only right pattern and plan
Of stature. That one who was taller than he,

Procrustes, or shorter, must certainly be

Too short or too tall. So he said: "Let me see-
For the illy-built man who is taller or shorter
I'll do what I can, for I feel that I orter.

"I've hit the idea. I'll have me a bed

That shall measure exactly my length from my head
To my feet, and the man who don't fit upon that
Must be a poor, miserable figure. That's flat.
And so, when they lack the proportions of beauty,
I must set them aright, for it's plainly my duty.
The man that's too short must be stretched till he'll fit,
And the man that's too long must be cut off a bit.
So I'll measure them all by this bed, and their height,
Where it differs from mine, I will quickly set right
In the way that I mention." You cannot but say
That this was a very original way

To settle the matter. No two men will be
Exactly the same in their stature. Ah! me,
But he was determined to make them agree.

And so, when his captives were fettered and brought
Into his stronghold, as quick as a thought

They were laid on that bed (he had wonderful strength),
To see if they were of the requisite length.

Such stretching, such sawing, such trimming! What pain Did they all have to bear, the right length to attain! "Here's a man that's too long. Cut him off!" with a shout. "Here's a man that's too short. Stretch him out! Stretch

him out!"

And when they arose from their beds, what a sight!

"Twould have made the heart ache to have seen their sad

plight;

For the worst of it was that, when all was done,

They were not at all like Procrustes, not one:

There was not one like to the other, and none

Was himself as he was intended to be;

As bad a state, surely, as one need to see.

How they hopped, how they limped, how they hobbled about,

The man who was lopped and the fellow stretched out.
Procrustes looked on, and he said: "Without doubt,
"Tis bad; but my height is just right to a thread,
And the man is all wrong who don't fit on that bed.