"A SWEETER REVENGE."

"You

THE Coffin was a plain one, -no flowers on its top, no lining of rose-white satin for the pale brow, no smooth ribbons about the coarse shroud. The brown hair was laid decently back, but there was no crimped cap, with its neat tie beneath the chin. "I want to see my mother," sobbed a poor child, as the city undertaker screwed down the top. can't get out of the way, boy! Why don't somebody take the brat away?"-"Only let me see her one minute," cried the hapless orphan, clutching the side of the charity box And as he gazed into that rough face tears streamed down the cheek on which no childish bloom ever lingered Oh, it was pitiful to hear him cry, "Only once! let me see my . mother only once!" Brutally the hard-hearted monster struck the boy away, so that he reeled with the blow. a moment the boy stood panting with grief and rage, his blue eyes expanded, his lips sprang apart; a fire glittered through his tears as he raised his puny arm, and with a most unchildish accent screamed, "When I am a man I'll kill you for that!" A coffin and a heap of earth was between the mother and her poor forsaken child; a monument stronger than granite built in his boy-heart to the memory of a heartless deed.

For

"Does any

The court-house was crowded to suffocation. one appear as this man's counsel?" asked the judge. There was silence when he finished, until, with lips tightly pressed together, a look of strange recognition blended with haughty reserve upon his handsome features, a young man, a stranger, stepped forward to plead for the erring and the friendless. The splendor of his genius entranced - convinced. The man who could not find a friend was acquitted. "May God bless you, sir! I cannot.". -"I want no thanks," replied the stranger, with icy coldness. "I-I believe you are unknown to me.' -"Man, I will refresh your memory. Twenty years ago you struck a broken-hearted boy away from his poor mother's coffin: I was that poor, miserable boy."-"Have you rescued me, then, to take my life? "No; I have a sweeter revenge: I have saved the life of a man whose brutal deed has rankled in my breast for twenty years. Go, and remember the tears of a friendless child."

The man bowed his head in shame, and went out from the presence of a magnanimity as grand to him as incomprehensible; and the noble lawyer felt God's smile in his soul forever after.

THE FARMER'S STORY.

You see that tree over yonder, with branches long an' wide, Underneath which, from the sunlight, the cattle seek to hide; An' the railroad close beside it, with that long train o' cars Crawlin' along like a serpent over the iron bars?

Well, a year ago last summer, one mornin' in July,

I was hayin' in the medder, an' spreadin' the grass to dry;
Willie, our youngest, was playin' under that self-same tree,
A-buildin' sticks into houses, as busy as busy could be.

I left him playin' as usual, an' labored to an' fro
A-spreadin' the grass before me as fast as I could go;
But sudden I heard a whistle, such as an engine makes
When there is somethin' the trouble, an' warns the use o'
brakes.

I instantly thought o' Willie, an' looked along the track; An' there with his hair a-streamin', an' hangin' down his back,

An' his little arms a-swingin', an' shoutin' at every breath, He stood a-facin' the engine in the very jaws of death.

Had that picture been on paper, 'twere well enough to see,
But seeing that picture in earnest with me didn't agree;
For when I looked upon it my eyes seemed all a blur,
An' I felt like a man in the stocks who couldn't hardly stir.

But while I stood there tremblin' an' paralyzed with fear,
Thinkin' more thoughts in a second than I could write in a

year,

I saw the cab window open, an' a man, athletic an' tall, Shot out with somethin' the quickness of a well-sent cannonball.

Over the boiler he clambered, an' round the smokin' stack. Until he reached the cow-catcher that runs close to the

track;

But the moment that he grasped it he stood as firm as steel, With the courage of a martyr who dies upon the wheel.

So just as that durned engine, greedy for prey as a shark, Went sweepin' after its victim like bullets after a mark, That engineer leaned forward, an' reached his hand ahead; But whiz went the engine by me, an' down went my heart like lead.

I never warn't much at prayin'

swear;

never warn't much at a

But if ever I felt like prayin' 'twas while I was standin'

there.

"God save Willie!" I shouted; "Save Willie!" I shouted

again,

Then jumped the fence like a squirrel, an' bounded after the train.

It came to a standstill at last, an' from it went up a cheer,
An' quickly comin' to meet me I saw the engineer:
In his arms he held up Willie, as chipper an' as gay
As the moment that I left him under the tree at play.

I was so overcome with joy, it was hard for me to speak;
I couldn't hardly thank him, my tongue it was so weak;
But after I'd stopped a little, I walked up straight and square,
And hugged that feller closer than any grizzly bear.

So after the scene was over I invited him to call
At our cottage in the holler, an' see us each an' all.

So he called on us one evenin'; but, when he entered the door, I saw he was young an' han'some, - what I hadn't seen before.

An' Mary Jane, our daughter, noticed it quick as I,

For she kinder played the 'possum, an' watched him on the

sly;

An' I saw when she looked at him, an' he looked down at her,

They were shootin' private glances of a deadly character.

So at som'at in the evenin', when talk was gettin' slack,
An' I'd asked a heap o' questions that wasn't answered back,
I sorter rose up slowly, an' to Nancy slyly said,

I guessed we wasn't wanted, an' had better go to bed.

Well, it ended in a weddin', as you might well suppose;
For one mornin' Jane came to me, as blushin' as a rose,
An' asked if I was "willin' that"— but quick came to a
pause;

So I, surmisin' the question, quickly answered that I was.

So instead of losin' Willie, we lost our Mary Jane;

But it better be through wedlock than under the wheels of a train:

For he was a smart young feller, straight as an arrow, an' tall; But Jane was fully his ekal, although her figure was small.

To-day I saw some swaddlin' clothes that Willie used to

wear,

All washed an' ironed for somethin', an' hangin' on a chair; But when I asked about 'em, my wife looked up so queer, That I quickly changed the subject, an' didn't interfere.

But I've told you how our Willie was saved from under the train,

An' how in the end it cost us the loss o' Mary Jane;
An' now, to finish the story, atween just you and I, –
If I'm not grandfather yet, I may be by an' by.

PADDY O'RAFTHER.

DAVID HILL.

PADDY, in want of a dinner one day,
Credit all gone, and no money to pay,
Stole from a priest a fat pullet, they say,
And went to confession just afther.

"Your riv'rince," says Paddy, "I stole a fat hen.”

"What, what!" says the priest, "at your owld thricks

again?

Faith, you'd rather be staalin' than sayin' amen,

Paddy O'Rafther!"

"Sure you wouldn't be angry," says Pat, "if you That the best of intintions I had in my view; For I stole it to make it a present to you,

And you can absolve me afther."

knew

"Do you think," says the priest, "I'd partake of your theft? Of your seven small senses you must be bereft :

You're the biggest blackguard that I know, right or left,

Paddy O'Rafther."

"Then what shall I do with the pullet," says Pat,

"If your riv'rince won't take it? By this and by that,
I don't know no more than a dog or a cat

What your riv'rince would have me be afther."
"Why, then," says his rev'rence, "you sin-blinded owl,
Give back to the man that you stole from, his fowl;
For, if you do not, 'twill be worse for your sowl,

Paddy O'Rafther.”

Says Paddy, "I asked him to take it 'tis thrue
As this minit I'm talkin', your riv'rince, to you;
But he wouldn't resaive it, so what can I do?"

Says Paddy, nigh chokin' with laughther.

66 By my throth," says the priest, "but the case is absthruse: If he won't take his hen, why, the man is a goose. "Tis not the first time my advice was no use,

Paddy O'Rafther.

"But, for sake of your sowl, I would sthrongly advise To some one in want you would give your supplies, Some widow or orphan, with tears in their eyes;

And then you may come to me afther.”

So Paddy went off to the brisk Widow Hoy;
And the pullet, between them, was eaten with joy.
And, says she, "'Pon my word, you're the cleverest boy,
Paddy O'Rafther."

Then Paddy went back to the priest the next day,
And told him the fowl he had given away

To a poor lonely widow, in want and dismay,
The loss of her spouse weeping afther.

"Well, now," says the priest, "I'll absolve you, my lad,
For repentantly making the best of the bad,
In feeding the hungry and cheering the sad,

Paddy O'Rafther."

SAMUEL LOVER