SUPPLEMENT TO THE AUCKLAND EVENING STAR.

THE SNUFF-COLOUED SUIT.

into the room and began arranging for the

funeral,

I scarcely know how it hanpaned, but a •timber must have fallen and struck me on the head.

The first thing that I realised after it was that I was straight and still on something hard, and when I tried to move myself and speak, I found it impossible to do so. I con cluded that I must be in some tight, dark place, for I could not see *. in fact I soon learned that, though perfectly conscious, I could do nothing but hear. A door opened and footsteps approached ; and I felt a cloth taken from my face, and a voice, which I recognised as that of Mr. Jones, the father of my wife that was to be, said :

" He hasn't changed much," and his com panion, whose voice I knew to be that of the village undertaker, Hopkins by name, said lightly :

"Better looking dead than alive. How does Jerusha feel about it ? Take on

much ?"

" Oh, no, she had her eye on another fellow anyhow, and a better match too, excepting the money part. Though I had nothing against Ben, only he didn't know much, and was about the homeliest man I ever knew. Such a mouth ! why it really seemed as though he was going to swallow knife, plate and all, when he opened it at dinner."

"Well," said the cheerful voice of Hop kins, "he'll never open his mouth again." And then he proceeded to measure me for my coffin, for it seemed that I was dead, or they thought I was, which was all the same to the greedy pocket of the undertaker. 1 had helird of undertakers who always whistled joyfully when they got a measure, but I never believed it before. But that man actually whistled * a subdued dancing tune while he measured me, and it seemed to me that three or four icicles were rollin" down my back to the music of his whistle.

His duty done, they covered my face again and left me to my own reflections, whioh not particularly comforting, although I had often heard it remarked that meditation wa._ good for the soul, and this was the best chance I had ever had of trying it. An hour must have passed when the door again opened, and two persons came whis pering along to where I lay, and the voice of my promised wife fell upon my ear. "I dread to look at him, Bob .he was so Mortal homely, alive, he must be frightful, .____. .^"id." I ground my teeth in imagination, as I rememembered how often she had gone into raptures, or pretended to, over my noble brow and expressive mouth; and how she had often declared that if I were taken away from her she woulH surely pine away and die. One of them raised the cloth, and I knew they were looking at me. Bob was her second cousin, and I knew he was that " other fellow " whom her father had men tioned. " Seems to me you don't feel very bad about, his dying, 'Rusha," remarked Bob, meditatively. "Well, to tell the truth," said my dear betrothed, "I don't care very much about it. If he had lived I should have married him, because he was rich, and father wanted me to ; but I was getting about sick of my bargain, for I knew I should always be ashamed of him, he looked so much like a baboon. " But you loved him," remarked Bob. " No, I didn't ! My affections were wasted long ago upon one who never returned my love." And my fast fading idol sighed heavily. They had covered my face by this time, and were standing a few steps from where I lay. "About how long ago 'Rusha?" asked Bob. " A year or such a matter," with another deep sigh, which ended in a fit of sneezing. "About the time I went away?" inter rogated the cautious Bob, coughing a little. " Well yes, some'res near," assented my dear affianced. "Now Jerusha, you don't mean to insinu ate that I " " I don't mean to insinuate anything, Bob Smith !" and the angelic sweetness of her voice was somewhat sharpened. " Now, see here, 'Rusha, I've loved you ever since you were knee-high to a gopher, but I thought when you came home that you was sweet on that other chap ; but I swan I believe you liked me all the time ! " "Oh Bob !" said my was-to-be, in a gush ing sort of way. " Mine own Jerusha ?" remarked Bob. Then I heard a subdued rush, accompanied by violent lip explosions. T tried to kick, or grate my teeth, or do something to relieve my outraged feelings, but not a kick nor a grate could I raise. It was an awful fix to be in, but I had to stand it, or lay it, so I laid still and let 'em alone until they got tired of it, and then went out, and I was again left to my own pleasant reflections. Night came, and so did a lot of young fellows with their girls, to sit up with me 3 and they had a jolly time of it, although it was against my principles to enjoy it on so solemn an occasion. It "seemed an age until morning, but it came at last and they went away. .'_ I heard them say I was to be buried that day, at 2 o'clock, and I was beginning to feel decidedly ■"^haky, when Jerusha and her mother came

'"Rusha," said her mother, here is that snuff-coloured suit of poor Ben's ; of course he will never have any more use for clothes, so just put them away among your carpet rags ; they'.ll make a splendid stripe."

Now that particular suit of clothes was just the neatest one I ever owned, arm-holes, collars, wristbands, buttons, all just the thing, and my blood boilel to hear them talk so coolly of using them for stripes in a rag carpet. They kept on talking as they swept dusted and cleaned up the room.

"Bob says he will take the Martin farm to work this year," said Jerusha, cheerfully, " and as soon as weave married we shall go to housekeeping in that little cottage close to the road. Now I must get my carpet done, just as soon as possible, for I want it in that nice little front room. These duds of Ben's will make out enough rags, I guess. His folks live so far away, they will raver en quire about his clothes. Now, if it wasn't for the looks of it, we co.ild ask old mother Smith about colouring yellow ; she's sure to be here to-day."

I was getting very mad now, indeed. I felt that the crisis was near, and that I should either die or explode, if they did not let my snuff-coloured suit alone. Jerusha picked them up —I knew it, for I heard the buckles and buttons j ir^gle—and made for the door. I tried to shake my fist and yell at her, but all in vain. I laid there, out wardly as quiet as a lamb, inwardly boiling with wratb. It wa3 too much : the deepest trance could not have held out against the loss of that suit. With a powerful eJort I sprang up and screamed. Jerusha dropped my clothes and her mother the duster, and fled from the room and the house, never stopping till they reached Dr. Brown's acroso the street. With difficulty I managed to get my clothes. I had just got them fairly on, when Mrs. Jones and her daughter, fol lowed by a numerous company of men, wo men and children, came peering cautiously into the room. I sat on my board and looked at them. Such a scared looking crowd was enough to amu_e an owl, so I laughed. I knew it was unbecoming, but I couldn't have helped it if they had chucked me into my coffin—which the undeitaker was just then carrying past the window—and buried me the next minute. I laughed until I jarred the chair out from under one end of the board, and down I went with a crash. Then the doctor ventured into the room, saying, rather dubiously : '.' So you are not dead yet, Ben ? " "Well, no, not exactly," I replied; "sorry to disappoint my friends about the funeral, however." " Yes," he said, rather absently, "bad, rather —that is—ahem.!" " Fooled out of that snuff-coloured stripe !" I thought, as I looked at Jerusha. " Go and speak with him," said her father, in a stage whisper. "He's got the stamps, and you had better marry him after all." They began to gather around me and con gratulate me on my escape. I noticed that they cried a great deal more now than they did when I was dead. Jerusha came and hung around my neck, snivelling desperately I gave her a not over gentle push, and told her to wait next time till I was safely buried before she set her heart on my old clothes. "0, I am so glad!" she said sweetly, without appearing to notice what I said about the clothes —" that v are not dead, Benny dear." My heart seemed all withered and broken to see you lying all cold and white. I wept bitterly over your pale face, my bel&ved." "Yes," I replied, "I heard you and Bob taking on terribly. It was a lucky die for me." " Could you hear ?" she gasped. "I rather think I could—some," I replied. She looked toward the door, but it was crowded full, so she made a dive for the open window, and went through it like a deer. She shut herself up in the smoke house, and would not come out until after I had left the house. Bob would not fulfil his promise of mar riage with his cousin, because she tried to make up with me again ; so she is living a life of single blessedness. While I am writing, my' wife is cutting up my snuff-coloured clothes to make a stripe in I

a new carpet for our front room.

A BENEDICTION.

He held her hand one minute in his own ; Murmered through parted lips, "God help you, sweet; " Left her alone ; and in her vacant place The twilight stole with soft and noiseless feet.

He passed away through dewy garden paths, Flooded with waves of ..moonlight, weird and white, And mystic scent of leaf-veiled lilac bloom, Wafting its incense to the soul of night.

Betweeen the setting and the rising sun, Adrift her spirit wandered till the day Woke the new story of a life begun Out of the grave of one that slipped away.

A twilight life, of gentle thought and deed, Of selfless purpose, and reliant prayer ; A spirit moving in the misty light ■ Of springtide perfume on the evening air.

Standing alone, her life was doubly blest By this dead love, and love of sorrow born Till tender death sang all her soul to rest, And merged spring twilight in the summer morn. -

An Ohio Sheriff felt a good deal of embarassment on having to take to the penetentiary a man who had been con victed of voting for him three times.

CORA'S DELUSION.

Cora Depeyster pined for a prince. Not a common prince like the snuffy old Bussian we used to see on Broadway, wearing a greasy fur collar and long overcoat, eating garlic and drinking brandy three times diurnally, and growling at everything Ameri can in the most detestable English. No thing of the kind.

She pined for a prince such as we read about in the little old sentimental novels that amused our fathers and mothers in the flower of their youth ; a Thaddeus of War saw, all talent, and pallor, and tenderness, and musical voice, and fine, rolling eyes, and pedigree, and that sort of thing.

For my part, I don't believe in such princes. The Prince of Wales isn't one of that species, and I'm afraid the' breed has gone out with the fine old sentimental novels. Nothing else, however, would suit Miss Cora Depeyster. Being not totally uulike other fair, damsels of twenty or thereabout, she desired to experiment upon the state matrimonial, and had plenty of opportunities, but common clay would not do. A prince she must have, or single she would remain.

Now a real good writer of sentimental stories could create such a being especially for the emergency, and, after the customary amount of tantalization through the medium

of an obstinate parent or what not, marry off Miss Cora and her prince in the most satisfactory style. But I never was good at sentimental creation. I must write about people 1 know and see. lam sorry for the Coras. - I've seen lots of them ; but what sort of princes did they marry ? One now pours tea for a sharp-nosed, red-haired life insurance agent. Another is the spouse of a strapping farmer who sits with hat on and ea*s in hi 3 shirt-sleeves. Another wedded a subdued German who plays second clarionet in a cheap orchestra, and his to move monthly because he can't pay his rent. Still another, but the catalogue grows melancholy. Thus with all the Coras. They go on pining for princes that never come ; marrying all sorts of people instead, and, dying, give way to a fresh race of Co;a_, who follow in their mamma's footsteps with a disregard of ex perience that savors of the sublime.

One of the sweetest of watering-places is Happy Valley. It is romantic and comfoit able at once. There is delightful bathing, rowing, sailing, and fishing in the lake itself, and the shady groves that line its shores are cooljand green and mysterious, and suggestive of dryads and nymphs and fairies and things. That is, if you happen to be of a poetic turn' of mind ; if not, they only suggest flirta tions. I will not further expiate upon the delights of Happy Valley, lest it should be fancied that I have lots for sale in the vicinity, whereas I have none anywhere—not even a burial lot; and that, I believe, is the com mon lot of all. Neither did Cora Depeyster have any real estate to dispose of; but she thought just as. I do, and passed much of the time every summer in the fair demesnes that lie smilingly adjacent to the Happy Valley Pavilion.

Notwithstanding the round of pleasures in which she every summer toek a promin ent part, she could not stifle her inward and continuous yearnings for the music of a princely voice, the glance of devotion from princely eyes, the touch of a princely hand in the dance, and the sweet envy of all maidens who had to go princeless through life. She sighed a great deal, and began to think the great world a cold, hard, un romantic sort of arrangement.

Of course, you and I know better. I never wrote a romance yet half so wonderful as the simplest life would make were it truly told. It seems easy, but you try it once.

Though there was no prince among the Pavilion boarders, there was a poet. Arthur Bayne was there. It was barely possible that Cora might have fallen in love with him ; there is something very fine and hy falutin—pardon the expression—in a young lady's idea of a poet. But then Arthur Bayne was altogether different from her ideal. He knew the world too well to believe in its hallowness. He had found it, in fact, a very round, hard, and stubborn sort of thing. I notice that men who have really been shaken up a bit in the merry-go round we call life, are not apt to preserve the outside show of sentimentalism to any extent. We all start off, some time or other, with our long hair, our turn-down collars, our stable suits, our brigand hats, and our little hidden sorrows; but when we have cut our eye teeth, and learned some thing about other folks trouble, we always come back to reason, to plain neckties, to stove-pipe hats, and the barber.

Arthur was too much matter of fact for Cora, and she too sentimental for him from any hymeneal point of view, and yet they somehow became very excellent and very intimate friends. One evening they sat on the shore of the little lake together. Cora was gazing at the moon, of course. She was one of that kind. She had been telling Arthur what kind of a hero she had imagined for her heart history, and described the prince with his melting eyes and musical voice, his generous nature and magnificent air, his mild, melancholy and inexhaustible affection, his irreproachable morals and aristocratic birth. Arthur listened with doe gravity until she had finished.

"Why don't you take me?" he asked.

1"I am not very rich, but then poverty is romantic. I can't play the guitar, but I know a fellow who is splendid on the banjo. As for a fine antique family, my father was 'Mr Bajne, son of old Bayne; I believe he never went to State Prison." "Now, Arthur, you are too bad; you make fun of everything." "Well, to be serious, child, you'll never find your prince." " And why not." "Because they don't make 'em. Most men are tolerably human, and humanity is not perfection. If a man has no other small vices, he is sure to chew tobacco, write poetry, or keep a dog. We are fair, but frail we men." " Ah, Mr Bayne, what a world it is. I wish there might be some place where one might go and hide and dream in peace." " There is; and lam going there now. refer to my bed." The next morning the belles of Happy Valley were in a twitter. The late train the nigU before had brought a new young ■ man, and young men were not a drug at the Pavilion. The newcomer had taken the finest suite in the establishment, and a great pile of trunks, with his initials, stood in the vesti bule, where they were jealously regarded by the other young men, heart-broken with the consciousness of possessing but a single trunk, and that perhaps a small one. When ib became known that the unknown was really on the piazza smoking a cigar, all sorts of diplomatic maneuvering were resorted to get a fair sight of him on the part of the young ladies. Cora Depeyster denounced it a piece of ill-breeding in others. As for her self, she only stood at the window which commanded the piazza, and scrutinised him through an opera-glass.

Montgomery Smythe—for such was the name which appeared on the reg;ster—in three days time found himself a favouritel with the ladies. He was of the conventional type of magnificence—the black-haired, black eyed, red-cheeked style, with smal f.e . dyed mou.tache,|jand eye-glasses. In the matter of scarfs and neckties, with the jswelled pins thereto devoted, he was truly gorgeous. If a man has the least taint of vulgarity, let him beware of his neck. Too much thoracic decoration ruins one.

A great change came over Cora. She was sad and gay by fits ; irritable, changeable, and incomprehensible. There is no use wasting words about it. She was in love. Her priuce had come.

As the days wore on thi*. regal person developed. He gave suppers in his room to the young bloods, and organised picnic parties in the woods thereabout, which made the belles Of the Pavilion quite miser able with happiness. To Cora's intense delight he made her in some sort the central figure in these last charming affairs, and held profound consultations with her con cerning the details. They thus became associated in a certain degree before the public eye, and when rumour whispered an engagement, Oora did little more than blush and stammer a denial that sounded ever so much like a confirmation.

She gave herself up to a sort of blind adoration of Montgomery Smythe. She made a prince of him at first, and put all her trust in him afterwards. He told her of his ancient family ; of his father, Judge Dewey, twice United States Senator, and son of Commodore Smythe of Revolutionary fame, and brother of Governor Smythe, of one of the colonies under George 111. He talked of the magnificent old country-seat his father had left him, with its picture-gallery £ull of the portraits of the old worthies just mentioned, andjtheirjwives ; all uniforms and brocades and gold braid and laces; of the long drawing-rooms, the]'grand dining-hall, the library, the grounds—all in true, baronial style, till Cora, rich and luxuriously reared as she was, began to look up to him as being of an altogether different and higher sphere.

One day they took a walk in the grove in the rear of the Pavilion. It was the closing up of the season, and the next day there was to be a general exodus of the Happy Valley boarders to their homes. Cora felt that the decisive moment had arrived; and it had. The hitherto pent-up devotion of Mont gomery Smythe found vent at last in a declaration and a proposition. He vowed his love in a perfectly princely style, and haying been accepted with a good many blushes and tears, just as is the case in all well-written novels, he informed her that letters just received from his confidential agent in Europe, compelled him to start im mediately for Paris, and urged her to marry him at once, without waiting to go through the form of asking the permission of her granisire or consulting her friends. Was he not Montgomery Smythe ? and who could possibly objeot to sach an alliance ?

It is very possible that Cora might have consented, so infatuated was she with her prince ; but she had read that the regular thing was to demand time for consideration, so.she postponed her decision, which really was already made, until evening.

gAs they reached the piazza, he lazily tap ping his glossy boots With his bamboo, and she very tremulous, and very happy, a thick set, pock-marked individual, with black, heavy whiskers and a glazed cap, came down the steps, and, nodding to Smythe, said: .■-•..-

I" I'd like to say a private word to you,

younginan,"

Montgomery Smythe suddenly stopped tapping his boot, and, turning pale, looked sharply at *he stranger. A slight vibration of that person's eyelid, made him turn still paler, and, without a word, he walked several steps away from the Pavilion. The stout man then slowly drew a large pocket book from his breast, favoured Symthe with a view of certain documents therein con tained, immediately after which he said aloud: " You're my prisoner, sir, in the name of the law." Cora felt like fainting, but her curiosity was more than a match for her weakness. Smy the looked .towards her, laughed a little gasping laugh, and tried to say that the ridiculous mistake could be easily ex plained. "Let this person expkia it, then," said Cora, trembling all over. "Why, you Bee, Miss," said the stout man, "I'm a detective officer, and I've been laying for this young gentleman for some time. I have his photograph here, Miss, if you'd like to see it." And he produced a carte-de-visite, the very twin of one Cora had but that moment stowed away among her treasures. "There ain't any mistake about him, is there ?" said the detective grimly. "But for what—for what is he -is -13 he arrested ?" faltered the poor girl. "Why, Miss, "you see he left California too suddenly, with all the spare cash of the proprietor ef the Pacific Hotel-$30,000— and a matter of _5000 more in jewelry belonging to the boarders of the house." "But Mr. Smythe-" "Smythe ! that ain't his name, Miss, he's plain Bill Higgins, fancy bar-keeper of the Pacific. I'm very sorry for you, Miss. I don't suppose you had auy idea who you were with. Good morning." She looked at Montgomery Smythe, but he did not raise his eyes, nor open his mouth. } Plainly the detective had told the truth. She turned to the hotel. Happily the whole affair had escaped notice.

Montgomery Smythe was already on his way to the depot, arm in arm with the stout man, and as they turned a bend in the road Cora took a last sad farewell look at her prince. The shock made her seriously ill, and when she recovered, the nonsense was pretty thoroughly washed out.

Arthur Bayne was not the man to triumph over the fall of any one. On the contrary, he was too generous, and when people began to make remarks about this unfottunate episode in Cora's existence, he married her himself, to shnt their mouths.

HOW TO SPELL SHAKESPEARE'S NAME.

For one hundred and fifty years critics have disputed over the correct way to spell the name of Shakespeare. The Troy Times thinks that the reason that the Bard of Avon induced Juliet to inquire " What's in a name ?" was for the purpose of discovering the correct orthography ©f his own name, and says that in'some of the earlier editions of Shakespeare it reads " What's in his name ?" The spelling of Shakespeare's name has been an orthographical puzzle that critics for a century and a-half have laboured over. Stevens, Drake, Dr. Johnson, Reed, Hazlitt, Chateaubriand, Lamartine, Ulrich, and Bodenstedt spell the name * with ten letters, thus : Shakepeare ; Chidworth, Mason, Heath, Lord Campbell, White, Gui zot, and Horn insist on eleven letters, thus : Shakespeare ; while still others, though less in number and ability, declare for only nine letters, thus : Shakspeare. William ought to have known how to spell his own name, and, as he wrote it, Shakspeare, we are in clined to give him the benefit of the ten letters as he placed tnem.

FEMININE RIVALRIES.

A woman writes in the Boston Globe : " One day, on the trip up, when reading a magazine my attention was attracted by the glitter of a gold bracelet, which, look where I would, flashed bafore my eyes, and further scrutiny revealed the fact that the the young lady who wore it was particularly anxious that I should be attracted by it, and, to further her design, began cutting the leaves of her maga zine with a silver fruit-knife. For the pur pose of shewing her that I was not particu larly dazzled, in fact, that there was another such in the world, I took a gold pencil from my pocket and marked a passage in my book, for my bracelet was equal to hers. Observ ing that fact she drew off her left glove and carefully arranged her veil that I might not fail to see the heavily chased ring which en circled her finger. I could "go her one better" here; so, taking off my (glove, I drew down the blind, flashing a rare topaz and solitaire diamond before her appreciative eyes. Sfie saw, and quickly pulling off her other "glove, displayed a splendid cluster diamond and a gigantic amethyst. I was slightly nonplussed, but, as she wore no ear rings, I felt that after all I wa3 even with her. At that instant she drew an elegant little watch from her belt, which she studied attentively two whole minutes, holding it up in full view, then turned to me as if to say, 'Well, go on.' I had done my best and could not answer the challenge, but thought mournfully of my poor little locket in a drawer at home, with one side all jammed in. When, at last, the aggravating creature took a jewel-case from her sachel and held up a lovely coral set, turning it this way, and to exhibit all its beauties, furtively glancing at me to be sure that I observed, I was utterly vanquished, completely routed, and so greatly absorbed in my book that. I did not see a thing."

THE WIFE WHO IS A BAD MANAGER.

What a picture for " those about to marry" is thus given in the Saturday Review of a wife who is a bad manager :—" Her dress is always stained with the droppings of her teacup, and she has no intermediate state between untidiness and finery. She puts on her best clothes for a morning walk, and keeps nothing for her visiting days'. She forgets her gloves or her card case till she has arrived at the hall dcor, and when they are brought the gloves always want buttons, and there are no cards in the case. A drive in a cab involves a fight about the fare, and she brushes the muddy wheel with her dress | in getting out. She expects her servants to ' do everything without instruction-), and us ually speaks to them as 'wretches.' While she exacts obsequious respect from them, she talks before them of their shortcomings. She gives them needless trouble by her laziness or carelessness, and, while she does nothing for their comfort, expects them to study her's constantly. She will thoughtlessly ring them up to the top of the house to put on the coals which are in the scuttle beside her chair, and will heedlessly send them on three or four errands when a little forethought on her part would have made one enough. She never interests herself in their welfare, hardly knows their names, never spares them when they are ill, or thinks of how she may save them trouble. Their wages are always in arrear, and she habitually .tempts their honesty by leaving her purse or her letters lying about, and yet frequently sus pects them without cause. She charges them with theft and untruthfulness on the smallest grounds, and constantly fancies that they are peeping through the keyhole or listening behind the door. She is indignant when they give hern notice, and refuses them a char acter when she finds that they cannot compel her to give them one. She expects them both to be up before her in the morning, and also|to sit up late fot her at nighb. If she is ill they must attend her like nurses, rise to her call at all hours of the night, and work for her in every respect as if they loved her."

BEAUTY OF NO AGE.

A whiter says: History is full of the accounts of the fascinations of woman who were no longer young. Thus Helen of Troy was over forty when she perpetrated the most famous elopement on record, and as the siege of Troy lasted a deef.de, she could not have been very juvenile when the ill fortune of Paris restored her to her husband, who is reported to have re ceived her with unquestioning love and gratitude. Pericles wedded the courtesan Aspasia when she was thirty-six, and yet she alterwa? ds, for thirty years or more, wielded an undiminished repiitatfon for beauty. Cleopatra was past thirty when Antony fell under her spell, which never lessened until her death, nearly ten years after; and Livia was thirty-three when she won the heart of Augustus, over whom she maintained her ascendancy io the last. Turning to more modern history, where it is possible to verify dates more accurately, we have the extraordinary Diana de Poicters who was thirty-six when Henry II (then Duke of Orleans and just half her ace) became attached to her ; and she was held as the first lady, and most beautiful woman at court, up to the period of the monarch's death, and of the accesion to power of Catherine of Medicis. Anne of Austria was thirty-eight when she was described as the handsomest Queen of Europe, and when Buckingham and Richelieu were her jealous admirers. Ninon de I'H.nclos, the most celebrated wit and beauty of her day, was the idol of three generations of the golden youth of France, and she was seventy-two when the Abbe de Bernis fell in love with her. Louis XIV wedded Madame de Main tenon when she was forty-three years of age. Catherine II of Russia was thirty three when she seized the empire of Russia and captivated the dashing young General Orloff. Up to the time of her death (at sixty-seven)«she seems to have retained the same bewitching powers, for the lamentations were heartfelt among all those who had ever known her per sonally.

DEPARTMENTAL MARRIAGES.

The Washington correspondent of the Louisville " Courier-Journal " writes : "There is a ludicrous aspect sometimes to the department clerk's life. He actually has the audacity sometimes to fall in love and perpetrate matrimony with some girl no better than off himself. She, too, has been in the department, and she grows so weary of the monotony of her life, and there is something so sweet in the whisperings of love, that she forgets prudence, and, after pinching herself for months, she saves enough of her salary for a silk dress and a few bits of finery, and has the " eclat" of a wedding. Time flies very rapidly, and you can scarcely realize that it is a year since the event when you met the once jaunty girl—now a rather sickly-looking woman, who, with the now faded silk skirt and napless velvet sleeveless jacket, is trundling a baby-car riage along the street. The baby is a darling and the poor young mother has utilised many of those garments that she spent so many hours of the night making for herself, when she was to be married, for the baby's use. A dainty blue afghan covers the little cherub, and this is the only way that mother and child can get an airing, for a nurse is out of the question with their small salary. That poor little mother finds life very hard, for what can be harder than to have to have the sole care of an infant both day and night ? There is no one to offer, even for an hour or two, to relieve the poor, tired mother. And then they must be content-with such poor, common lodgings, such insufficient food and such uncongenial society. She now looks with envy upon her late companions as they wend their way to the departments, the work there now seems so light and pleasant. How nice it was to have money of her own; no matter how little it was, yet it was her own, and she managed to dress and look nicely all the time. Then too, she occasionally had an invitation to some place of amusement; but now, even though she were asked, she could not leave the baby. Does she wish

there was no baby ? Oh no ; far from it. That baby is the most precious object in life, and she would not part with it for a kingdom."

THE LATEST IN WATCHES.

A Correspondent of the London Hornet says : Let me tell you of a few new watches which are to be the fashion next year, and which I saw in their manufactured and unmanufactured state, at Geneva, not many days ago. The great style of the moment is the Louis XV watch, both for ladies and gentlemen. These, in their ornamentations, are imitated from those which were in favor at the court of France's Sardanapalus. They certainly are most exquisite in workmanship, and I doubb whether any courtier of the reign of Louis XV ever wore so beautiful a jewel as these watches which are now made. They find immense favour already in Bussia, and form part of almost every bridal corheille, as it is the custom at St. Petersburgh for a fiance.to present a watch to hi 3 fiance either on or before the wedding day. I was much interested in looking at the rows of Louis XV watches, and seven-lires watches no bigger than an English sixpence, and another little marvel called the "zodiac" which is the last novelty of the houT, and as I am told that it hat not yet made its appearance in England, I will give our ladies a prime by describing it. Firstly, you must imagine a Jittle jewelled bell, which may be hung round the neck as a locket if wished. Under the locket hangs a crystal globe. If you wish to see the hour, you lake the bell in your banes, turning the crystal globe up wards ; then the globe also turns, and dis closes the f.ice of the watch, which resembles in shape a "zodiac," according to its name. It is wound up by a little flower at one side of the bell covering. Nothing can be more perfect, nor prettier, than this little gem, and its cost is only 150 francs !—£6.

DANGER IN THE CIGAR.

Father Teask has a most unexpected ally in the cigar manufacturers of New York, who, with a candour quite incom prehensible, have given smokers notice that small-pox. yellow fever, or any other sort of pestilence may be lying perdu in those fragrant rolls of Havanna and Suf field seed leaf. For, they say, thousands of these cigars are made in tenement g houses, packed tight as bee-hives, where the same room serves for kitchen, living room, sleeping room and workshop, where malarial and contagious d.seases often riot and must infect the goods produced among them, and endanger the health . and even life of the consumers of such goods. And they severely blame the class of manufacturers who lease theso tenements for the making of cigars ; and urge the interference of the board of . health. These men may have been . driven to this exposure of the tricks of the trade in their open convention by the smitings of conscience over Trask tracts, bat whether that be so or not, it is un- , likely that they have said these things wantonly. That disease may be com municated by such means is true enough. The daughter of an English premier died of yellow fever, whose contagion was traced through a costly saddle on which she had ridden to the wretched cellar in a London slum, where the starving artisan' had made it. The similar way in which the misery of Jemmy Downs is linked . with the luxurious George will be recalled by every reader of Alton Locke. But notwithstanding these revelations, we do not expect to note a great falling off in the cigar trade hereabouts. And, to be sure there are none of these poison-breed ing tenement cigar factories in this city.

AFTER TWENTY YEARS.

A Wintee Night's Teagedy. Ik Decembeb, 1852, three young medical | students had a fresh "subject" brought to

them for dissection in Louisviile, Ken-

tucky. One of them, who seemed to be silently delegated to perform the opera tion, held in his hand a glittering knife., The others caught the corpse by the y shoulders and raised it to a sitting position. One of them held it there. The man with the knife began to cut at the base of the skull and around it. The other, placing his fingers on the bloody opening thus formed, pushed them for ward. The knife cut" clean, and in an instant the scalp was thrown forward uponthe face, exposing the bald skull, bespattered with blood. At this instant a tremour passed through the corpse; a second and a third succeeded; a wild shriek followed , and, with a cry of most j\ soul-curdling agony, the supposed dead man leaped from the table. The stu dents, affrighted to death, could only > huddle together in a corner and gaze at'^ the apparition. Shriek after shriek fbl- ~. lowed, and the sufferer tore the bleeding scalp from before his eyes and gazed y about him with frothing mouth and looks of demoniacal ferocity. When his eyes at last rested upon the students, he '; uttered a shriek more appalling than its predecessors, and. rushed upoi them. He seized upon the one who had held his body in position ; with a grip of iron he clutched his throat, and, with a giant's power, bore him to the floor. It was a question of life for the students or death for their assailant. The man who had the knife realised the situation uponthe. instant, plunged the knife to the hilt in . the heart of the unfortunate wretch.

With a horrible cry he sank down upon . the body of the half strangled student, j and in an instant a cold shiver that con-

■pulsed his frame, told that indeed he was a dead man. Now that the deed was done, the students looked at one another as if one and all were stupefied. Then, with the bloody knife above his head, the * man who had committed the act called upou hia companions to swear ah oath of- £jj eternal secresy then and there. With their left hands clasped together1 and their- -i right hands on high, the three men Swore eternal fidelity to each other in the great... __. and damning secret that must forever\ darken their career. This done, th« bodyy\ was again wrapped in a sack. A largo \ supply of combustible materials was then—^ concentrated in the room and the torch applied. Ere the flames had time to '