I was let up finally, when a powerful large Sesesher came up and embraced me, and to show that he had no hard feelin's agin me, put his nose into my mouth. I returned the compliment by placin' my stummick suddenly agin his right foot, when he kindly made a spittoon of his able-bodied face. Actooated by a desire to see whether the Sesesher had been vaxinated, I then fastened my teeth onto his left sleeve, and tore it to the shoulder. We then vilently bunted our heads together for a few minits, danced round a little, and sot down in a mud-puddle. We riz to our feet agin, and by a sudden and adroit movement I placed my left eye agin the Sesesher's fist. Saw stars and other loom inaries. Got down on the ground to see if he had drop suthin'.

I riz, and we embraced agin. Soonly I sent home a sledge-hammer blow on Sesesher's whisky orifice, which started 33 ov his grinders on a voyage down his throat, while he planted his left mawler in my baskit. I also re ceived a slight crack on the jugoolar. By another dexterous movmint I got Sesesher's cokonut in the Court of Chancery, and played sooperbly on his nob. A man in a cockt hat then cum up, and sed he felt as though an apology was due to me. The crowd had taken me for another man.

I was rid on a rale the next day, a bunch of blazin' firecrackers bein' tied to my coat tales. It was a fine spectycal in a dramatic pint of view, but I didn't enjoy it. I had other adventurs of a startlin' kind, but why continner? why lasserate the public boozum with these here things? Suffysit to say I got across Mason and Dixie's line safe at larst.

AFTER THE BATTLE.

The drums are all muffled, the bugles are still;
There's a pause in the valley, a halt on the hill;
And bearers of standards swerve back with a thrill
Where sheaves of the dead bar the way;
For a great field is reaped, heaven's garners to fill,
And stern Death holds his harvest to-day.

There's a voice in the wind like a spirit's low cry;
'Tis the muster-roll sounding-and who shall reply

For those whose wan faces glare white to the sky,

With eyes fixed so steadfast and dimly,

As they wait the last trump, which they may not defy.
Whose hands clutch the sword-hilt so grimly.

The brave heads late lifted are solemnly bowed,
As the riderless chargers stand quivering and cowed;
As the burial requiem is chanted aloud,

The groans of the death-stricken drowning,
While victory looks on like a queen pale and proud
Who awaits till the morning her crowning.

There is no mocking blazon, as clay sinks to clay;
The vain pomps of peace-time are all swept away
In the terrible face of the dread battle-day;
Nor coffins nor shroudings are here;

Only relics that lay where thickest the fray,-
A rent casque and a headless spear.

Far away, tramp on tramp, sounds the march of the foe,
Like a storm-wave retreating, spent, fitful and slow;
With sound like their spirits that faint as they go
By the red-glowing river, whose waters

Shall darken with sorrow the land where they flow,
To the eyes of her desolate daughters.

They are fled-they are gone; but oh! not as they came;
In the pride of those numbers they staked on the game,
Never more shall they stand in the vanguard of fame,
Never lift the stained sword which they drew;
Nevermore shall they boast of a glorious name,

Never march with the leal and the true.

Where the wreck of our legions lay stranded and torn,
They stole on our ranks in the mist of the morn;
Like the giant of Gaza, their strength it was shorn
Ere those mists have rolled up to the sky;

From the flash of the steel a new day-break seemed born,
As we sprang up to conquer or die.

The tumult is silenced; the death lots are cast,
And the heroes of battle are slumbering their last:
Do you dream of yon pale form that rode on the blast?
Would ye see it once more, O ye brave!

Yes the broad road to honor is red where ye passed,
And of glory ye asked-but a grave!

CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE

ALFRED TENNYSON.

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!” he said.
Into the valley of death,
Rode the six hundred.

"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldiers knew
Some one had blundered.
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of death,
Rode the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them,

Volleyed and thundered;

Stormed at with shot and shell,

Boldly they rode and well:

Into the jaws of death,

Into the mouth of hell,

Rode the six hundred.

Flashed all their sabers bare,
Flashed as they turned in air,
Sab'ring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while

All the world wondered;

Plunged in the battery smoke,
Right through the line they broke:

Cossack and Russian

Reeled from the saber-stroke,

Shattered and sundered.

Then they rode back-but not,

Not the six hundred.

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them,

Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well,
Came through the jaws of death,
Back from the mouth of hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

When can their glory fade?
Oh, the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred!

THE CURSE OF REGULUS.

The palaces and domes of Carthage were burning with the splendors of noon, and the blue waves of her harbor were rolling and gleaming in the gorgeous sunlight. An attentive ear could catch a low murmur, sounding from the centre of the city, which seemed like the moaning of the wind before a tempest. And well it might. The whole people of Carthage, startled, astounded by the report that Regulus had returned, were pouring, a mighty tide, into the great square before the Senate House. There were mothers in that throng, whose captive sons were groaning in Roman fetters; maidens, whose lovers were dying in the distant dungeons of Rome; gray-haired men and matrons, whom Roman steel had made childless; men, who were seeing their country's life crushed out by Roman power; and with wild voices, cursing and groaning, the vast throng gave vent to the rage, the hate, the anguish of long years.

Calm and unmoved as the marble walls around him, stood Regulus, the Roman! He stretched his arm over the surging crowd with a gesture as proudly imperious, as though he stood at the head of his own gleaming cohorts. Before that silent command the tumult ceased, the half-uttered execra

tion died upon the lip; so intense was the silence, that the clank of the captive's brazen manacles smote sharp on every ear, as he thus addressed them:

"Ye doubtless thought, judging of Roman virtue by your own, that I would break my plighted faith, rather than by returning, and leaving your sons and brothers to rot in Roman dungeons, to meet your vengeance. Well, I could give reasons for this return, foolish and inexplicable as it seems to you; I could speak of yearnings after iumortality; of those eternal principles in whose pure light a patriot's death is glorious, a thing to be desired; but, by great Jove! I should debase myself to dwell on such high themes to you. If the bright blood which feeds my heart were like the slimy ooze that stagnates in your veins, I should have remained at Rome, saved my life and broken my oath. If, then, you ask, why I have come back, to let you work your will on this poor body which I esteem but as the rags that cover it-enough reply for you, it is because I am a Roman! As such, here in your very capital I defy you! What I have done, ye never can undo; what ye may do, I care not. Since first my young arm knew how to wield a Roman sword, have I not routed your armies, burned your towns, and dragged your generals at my chariot wheels? And do ye now expect to see me cower and whine with dread of Carthaginian vengeance? Compared to that fierce mental strife which my heart has just passed through at Rome, the piercing of this flesh, the rending of these sinews, would be but sport to me.

"Venerable senators, with trembling voices and outstretched hands, besought me to return no more to Carthage. The generous people, with loud wailing, and wildly-tossing gestures, bade me stay. The voice of a beloved motherher withered hands beating her breast, her gray hairs streaming in the wind, tears flowing down her furrowed cheeks, praying me not to leave her in her lonely and helpless old age-is still sounding in my ears. Compared to anguish like this, the paltry torments you have in store is as the murmur of the meadow brook to the wild tumult of the mountain storm. Go! bring your threatened tortures! The woes I see impending over this fated city will be enough to sweeten death, though every nerve should tingle with its agony. I die-but mine shall be the triumph, yours the untold des