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quinces, an' Dan'l jest stood there jabbin' both hands in to it way up to the elbow, and scatterin' the sweetness over the worl'. I jest threw out my arms an' legs like a frog in a mill-pond, an' swum through the ocean of sweet sass an' honey thet wuz sloshin' all about me. I div down to the bottom, an' brought up hundred thousand dollar pearls in my mouth, an' splashed about like & crazy lunatic in a sea of glory.

W'en Dan'l smiled it seemed ez if the sun hed been whitewashed with a mixture of melted gold, silver, jasper, saffire, emerald, chrysolite an' stuff, sich ez St. John seen on the foundations of the new Jerusalem; it seemed ez if the sun had been whitewashed with these things, an' then smiled on the earth jest like a lovesick feller onto his best gal. W'en Dan'l frowned the sun grew ez black ez a black ink spot on a black cat hidin' in a coal bin on a dark night. Hope lef the worl' an' went on an everlastin' vacation; the bottom tumbled outer natur, an' I jest opened my mouth an' bawled like a baby. An' I jest kep' on bawlin' until Dan'l smiled agin, we'n I wuz so happy an' light thet I could hev walked on the air without bustin' through the crust, clear from here way up to the north star.

"Wall, bimeby Dan'l got excited. He threw out his right han' an' pulled the mornin' star from the bosom of the sky; he threw out his left han' an' snatched the trailin' robes from the sunset an' flapped them over the cattle shed. He threw up his head an' the sun dodged ; he stamped his foot an' the earth trembled; and the prize hog give a gasp an' dropped dead. Dan'l's eyes now looked like two suns in two universes; and if he only shet them once, we knew that darkness would cover the face of the deep, an' the world would roam about in the dark parsture of the universe like a stray cow, an' git lost. Oh, them eyes! them eyes! they'll shine into my soul after the sun goes out, an' after the stars have dropped like loose buttons from the jacket of the sky. "But still Dan'l kep' on.

Thet son of thunder stood

there surrounded by punkins, and I verily believe the angels bent over the railin's of heaven an' listened to him; an' I only wonder thet they didn't lose their balance an' come a-fallin' down an' sprawl out like celestial lummuxes before his feet. They might hev for all I know. We shouldn't hev noticed 'em. We wouldn't hev paid any attention to an earthquake or an Odd Fell'rs purcession. If Gabrul had blown his trumpet right then an' there, an' tooted until he wuz red in the face, we wouldn't hev heerd it any more than we could hev heerd a watch tick in a biler factory. Gabrul himself would hev dropped his horn an' stood an' listened to Dan'l. We couldn't see nothin' but Dan'l, we couldn't hear nothin' but Dan'l, an',-well, there warn't nothin' but Dan'l. He filled up the whole bushel basket of the universe an' then spilled over onto the floor.

"W'en Dan'l stopped, I wanted to die; an' I almost wish I hed, for I hain't heerd a decent speech sence his day, an' I never expect to agin until I hear Dan'l spoutin' from the platforms of paradise."

OH, FOR A MAN!-M. C. HUNGERFORD.

"Oh, for a man!" the clear voice sang,
And through the church the echo rang.
"Oh, for a man!" she sang again,
How could such sweetness plead in vain?
The bad boys grinned across the aisles,
The deacon's frowns were changed to smiles,
The singer's cheek turned deepest pink
At bass and tenor's wicked wink.

The girls that bore the alto part
Then took the strain with all their heart:
"Oh, for a man, a man, a man-"
And then the full-voiced choir began

To sing with all their might and main
The finis to the girl's refrain:
"Oh, for a mansion in the skies,
A man-a mansion in the skies"

FROM THE IRON GATE.-ROBERT C. V. MEYERS.

Written expressly for this Collection.

Where shall I go?

How strange it seems,—
How strange the noises of the busy streets,
How strange the faces hurrying by me, and
How strange seem I once more at liberty!
Liberty! Nay, this is the prison life

To have but will to drive me where to go,
To have the whole world mine and in the world
Have none to claim me.

Is the world mine? Ah,
That only is ours that owns us, and the world
Disowns me, scans me with a look of scorn.

I have been guilty, I have paid the price
Of guilt, so far as man's law sets the price
For doing that which mars the even course
Of literal right laid down by literal man.
I took a life-if that be called a life
That festers what it touches, if that be called
Life that kills where it goes, if that be called
Life that trips innocence and sends it down
The groove of pleasure to the pit of pain.

That life touched me, touched more than me, touched one
I loved clear up to heaven, till there drooped
A tender lily on a crushed stalk-aye,
Stole her from me and made her song of life
Sad music, harmony with the frets of tone
Jangled, misplaced from any perfect chord.
I stopped the life after it stopped hers
And sent it shivering and despairing out
To find forgiveness in an aching dark
Filled with keen voices of despairs that try
To find a way where no way is but in
The knowledge of despair for despair, and
A blind uplooking for a punctured hand
That will sometime whitely roll up the dark
And lead all sorrows past the way of blame.
Thus am I guilty, thus have I paid the price,
And thus to-day they tell me I am-free!
Where shall I go?

There is no one to care
For me in all the world, there is no place

That waits me, not a human heart that beats
The quicklier for the thought that I am I.
That life I took has more companionship
Than mine; in infinitude of woe

It yet may learn itself and grieve and find
The ultimate truth that sifts the good from bad;
I merely stopped it in its earthly way
Toward further sin,-merely helped it on
To betterance of its dull accounting with
A never swerving, just eternity.

I only am the lonely one-maybe
She he killed is with him, showing him
The way to aspiration, teaching him,

There in the aching dark, the prayer that lights
About the punctured hands that sometime shall
Uproll the dark and lead the sorrows through.
My darkness is with me in all the light
And health of day, my despair this

Cold freedom granted me by laws of men.
Where shall I go?

Oh, for a single one
I did not quite neglect because she came
And let me love her!

Nay, there is not one

My freedom is my sentence to be served

For ruin of all love but that I felt

For her who scorned me for that other man.

No one, no one-ah, who then touched my arm?

What! was it you, old woman with gray hair?
For years you've lived beside my prison wall,
Only to be near me?-you prayed every day

you knew

For me, watched for my coming out, have followed me
From the iron gate that turned me on the world
After it had turned for years the world from me?
You knew me years ago when I was young?
You knew me as a babe, a handsome boy
With arrogant will?-you loved me, and
The time would come when in the world you'd be
The key to the only love in all my world,
The love that lights the world this blessed day,
The love that warms a heart that beats for me
And has beat thus since I was born a habe;
The love that minds not slight but still enduro
The love neglect kills not but stands between

Blame and the sad forgetfulness of it?

Who are you? Speak! I know, and do not know.
What!-tears upon your wrinkled face-for me?
Who are you? Speak!

Oh, now I know. I know "Tis one that I forgot for years and years.

Hold me! hold me! hold me! I am but
A child once more in love like yours-oh, heaven!
The light has come, and I am free indeed,
And for the first time know what love is, and
The meaning of God's love, how he forgives,
And see the punctured hands uproll the dark
To lead sad sorrows through.

Ah, lead me on,

My mother, lead me, lead me with thy love,
Thy old arm round me, thy tears upon my lips.

THE LIGHT IN THE WINDOW.
PATIENCE ORIEL.

"Will Santa Claus come to-night, mother?" asked little Steenie, drawing his stool close to his mother's chair, and resting his curly head on her knee. The mother's face was very sad, as she stooped over and kissed the bright eyes upturned to hers.

"And if he does not, Steenie, little man, can we not wait till next Christmas? You know how the snow has drifted on the plain, and hidden the road; you know how dark it is now; he may not come to-night, dear."

"Come here to the window, Steenie," said Ev, who stood flattening his nose against the cold pane.

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The two boys peered out into the darkness, where even the white snow which was piled and drifted in the yard and against the fences of the corrals was now hidden. Steenie," said Ev, so low that mother, sitting by the fire darning their little socks, the big tears rolling down her cheeks and dropping upon her work, and father, who was so ill and now lay asleep on the bed in the corner, could not hear; "Steenie," he said, his child's heart fee!