I ask." Now in a firmer tone, "But this

I say, she shall not go, nor stay, against

Her will." The stranger starts. "How say you, miss ?" The maiden rises to her feet; her face

Is pale, her hazel eyes are wet. “O sir,”

Her voice is sweet and clear, "there are some debts
Which money cannot pay; and such a debt

I owe that aged man. You say you know
I am the one you seek, can prove it by
This locket and the name it bears; I grant
You that. Your story of my mother's life,
Her illness, her insanity, her flight

And unknown fate, until you learned it here;
My father's grief, his search of years, his last
Request, his death, may all be true; and though
Within my heart a something whispers that
It is but partly true, I also grant

You that; and once again refuse to leave
One who has more than father been to me;
And could my spirit mother speak, I know
She'd bless her child for being true. While life
Is mine, dear guardian, these hands are yours."
The cobbler clasps her in his arms. "God bless
You, Marion," he sobs. The stranger bows;
His dark eyes gleam, and with the single word,
"Enough!" he passes from their sight.

The fierce,
Wild tempest passing o'er may rend the waves
To foamy shreds, but having past, leave not
A trace upon the tranquil sea; so clouds
Of grim adversity are followed oft

By sunny days of prosperous bliss. Once more
Within the cobbler's home the calm

Routine of peaceful life holds sway. The old
Affection, though, seems stronger grown; for she,
Sweet Marion, still closer clings to him,

Her aged guardian, and in the shop
Oft sits and sews, or talks the time away
Till candle-light.

But with the autumn comes
A change. The maid has lost her sprightly air;
She mopes about, or stands and gazes far
Beyond her vision's range; again, she starts
And calls to forms unseen; she seldom smiles.

The cobbler sometimes leaves his bench with stealth
And watches her, as silently she plucks

The dead sprays from her marigolds, or wreathes
A garland bright of dahlias, in their strip
Of garden. Now, in weird soliloquy

He hears her speak: “O mother, were you mad?
Am I insane? What! money buy my love?
I cannot help but think the stranger was
My own-No, no!-Ah, Guardy! there you are!
I see you peeping there!" And so the days
Now come and go within their home.

"Tis morn.

The town of Lynn is all astir. The pale
And horror-stricken people stand in groups.
The history of twenty years ago

Repeats itself. The dripping form, still fair

In death, of Marion is borne along

The street. Found drowned; and that is all they know.
The cobbler could not live in gloom; his bright,
Warm sunshine gone, he drooped away and died.

Sigh not, weep not for Marion. What you
Have heard was acted years and years ago,

And all the actors long have slept. Weep not
For Marion, but rather give your tears
And charity to those who live and lack
A mother's love; the erring desolate,
Who perish for a kindly word.

THE POETRY OF SCIENCE.-HERBERT SPENCER.

Science is necessary not only for the most successful production, but also for the full appreciation of the fine arts. In what consists the greater ability of a man than of a child to perceive the beauties of a picture, unless it is in his more extended knowledge of those truths in nature or life which the picture renders? How happens the cultivated gentleman to enjoy a fine poem so much more than a boor does, if it is not because his wider acquaintance with objects and actions enables him to see in the poem much that the boor cannot see?

Not only does science underlie sculpture, painting, music, poetry, but science is itself poetic. The current opinion that science and poetry are opposed is a delusion. On the contrary science opens up realms of poetry where to the unscientific all is a blank. Those engaged in scientific researches constantly show us that they realize not less vividly, but more vividly, than others, the poetry of their subjects.

Whoever will dip into Hugh Miller's works on geology, or read Mr. Lewes' "Seaside Studies," will perceive that science excites poetry rather than extinguishes it. And whoever will contemplate the life of Goethe will see that the poet and the man of science can co-exist in equal activity. Is it not, indeed, an absurd and almost a sacrilegious belief that the more a man studies nature the less he reveres it? Think you that a drop of water, which to the vulgar eye is but a drop of water, loses anything in the eye of the physicist who knows that its elements are held together by a force which, if suddenly liberated, would produce a flash of lightning? Think you that what is carelessly looked upon by the uninitiated as a mere snow-flake, does not suggest higher associations to one who has seen through a microscope the wondrously varied and elegant forms of snow-crystals? Think you that the rounded rock marked with parallel scratches calls up as much poetry in an ignorant mind as in the mind of a geologist, who knows that over this rock a glacier slid a million years ago? The truth is, that those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded. Whoever has not in youth collected plants and insects, knows not half the halo of interest which lanes and hedge-rows can assume. Whoever has not sought for fossils, has little idea of the poetical associations that surround the places where imbedded treasures were found. Whoever at the seaside has not had a microand an aquarium, has yet to learn what the highest

scope

pleasures of the seaside are. Sad, indeed, is it to see how men occupy themselves with trivialities, and are indifferent to the grandest phenomena-care not to understand the architecture of the heavens, but are deeply interested in some contemptible controversy about the intrigues of Mary Queen of Scots!-are learnedly critical over a Greek ode, and pass by without a glance that grand epic written by the finger of God upon the strata of the earth!

LARRIE O'DEE.-W. W. FINK.

Now the widow McGee,

And Larrie O'Dee,

Had two little cottages out on the green,

With just room enough for two pig-pens between.
The widow was young and the widow was fair,
With the brightest of eyes and the brownest of hair;
And it frequently chanced, when she came in the morn
With the swill for her pig, Larrie came with the corn.
And some of the ears that he tossed from his hand,
In the pen of the widow were certain to land.

One morning said he:

"Och! Misthress McGee,

It's a waste of good lumber, this runnin' two rigs,
Wid a fancy purtition betwane our two pigs!"
"Indade sur, it is!" answered Widow McGee,
With the sweetest of smiles upon Larrie O'Dee.
"And thin, it looks kind o' hard-hearted and mane,
Kapin' two friendly pigs so exsaidenly near
That whiniver one grunts the other can hear,
And yit kape a cruel purtition betwane.”

"Shwate Widow McGee,"

Answered Larrie O'Dee,

"If ye fale in your heart we are mane to the pigs,
Ain't we mane to ourselves to be runnin' two rigs?
Och! it made me heart ache whin I paped through the cracks
Of me shanty, lasht March, at yez shwingin' yer axe;

An' a bobbin' yer head an' a shtompin' yer fate,
Wid yer purty white hands jisht as red as a bate,

A-sphlittin' yer kindlin'-wood out in the shtorm, When one little shtove it would kape us both warm!"

"Now, piggy," said she;

"Larrie's courtin' o' me,

Wid his dilicate tinder allusions to you;

So now yez must tell me jisht what I must do:
For, if I'm to say yes, shtir the swill wid yer snout;
But if I'm to say no, ye must kape your nose out.
Now Larrie, for shame! to be bribin' a pig
By a-tossin' a handful of corn in its shwig!"
"Me darlint, the piggy says yes," answered he.
And that was the courtship of Larrie O'Dee.

-The Independent.

A BAD COLD.-H. ELLIOTT MCBRIDE.
Written expressly for this collection.

I cannot speak (coughs), I've got a cough,
I've got the sneezes, too. (Sneezes.)
I feel so bad (coughs), I've got a cough,
Now what am I to do? (Coughs.)

It isn't right to make me speak (coughs),
I've got an awful cough;

Why didn't they consider this? (Coughs.)
They should have let me off.

But as I'm here-there comes a sneeze

I guess I'll go ahead. (Coughs.)

Oh, what a cold! Another sneeze!
Is not my nose quite red?

-(Sneezes.)

(Sneezes.)

I came out here to make a speech- (Coughs.)
Oh, no; I came to sneeze (sneezes),

But if I hadn't come, my friends (coughs),
There would have been a breeze. (Sneezes.)

How can I speak with such a cough? (Coughs.)
I've got an awful cold;

I cannot speak-I'll sneeze my piece

Just see me now-behold!-(Sneezes very loud.)

Yes, that's the way,-I'll sneeze my piece;
And can't I do it well? (Sneezes.)

I feel-oh! oh!-(Sneezes.) I guess I'll go

And have a sneezing spell. (Sneezes loudly as he bows.)