says to the man with the stick, 'Why don't you let John alone? Me and him are going to marry, and if you kill him, I'll never speak to you as long as I live,' or words like them, and so the man he give it up, and both of them hunted up a preacher and were married and lived happy ever afterward. Beautiful story, is n't it? A good wife she made him, too, I'll bet, if she was a little copper-colored. And don't she look just lovely in that picture? But Smith appears kinder sick, evidently thinks his goose is cooked, and I don't wonder, with that Modoc swooping down on him with such a discouraging club. And now we come to-to ah-to-Putnam --General Putnam:--he fought in the war, too; and one day a lot of 'em caught him when he was off his guard, and they tied him flat on his back on a horse and then licked the horse like the very mischief. And what does that horse do but go pitching down about four hundred stone steps in front of the house, with General Putnam lying there nearly skeered to death. Leastways the publisher said somehow that way, and I oncet read about it myself. But he came out safe, and I reckon sold the horse and made a pretty good thing of it. What surprises me is he did n't break his neck, but maybe it was a mule, for they 're pretty sure footed, you know. Surprising what some of these men have gone through, ain't it? Turn over a couple of leaves. That's General Jackson. My father shook hands with him once. He was a fighter, I know. He fit down in New Orleans. Broke up the rebel Legislature, and then when the Ku Kluxes got after him he fought 'em behind cotton breastworks and licked 'em 'til they could n't stand. They say he was terrific when he got real mad. Hit straight from the shoulder and fetched his man every time. Andrew, his fust name was; and look how his hair stands up. And then, here's John Adams and Daniel Boone and two or three pirates, and a whole lot more pictures, so you see it's cheap as dirt. Lemme have your name, won't you?"

Max Adeler.

BY TELEPHONE.

When the young ladies who were spending the summer at the Seaside Hotel, at Sandy Beach, resolved to get up a fair, they had no heartier helper than Mr. Samuel Brassy, a young gentleman recently graduated from Columbia College. He was alert, energetic, ingenious, and untiring; and when at last the fair was opened, the young ladies declared that they did not know what they should have done without him.

Mr. Samuel Brassy was on friendly, if not familiar, terms with Mrs. Martin, her charges, the three Miss Pettitoes, and her niece, Miss Bessie Martin. Toward the three Miss Pettitoes he was kind, but to Miss Bessie Martin he was devoted. He hovered about her as though he had words of deepest import trembling on his tongue; but when he sat beside her on the piazza, or danced with her in the Virginia Reel of a Saturday night, or walked to church with her of a Sunday morning, he found that he had nothing to say for himself.

Miss Martin treated him as she treated other young men. She allowed him to assist her in the organization of a post-. office department in the fair, of which she was to be postmistress. At Sam Brassy's suggestion the post-office had been arranged as the public pay-station for the Seaside Hotel Telephone Co. He had set up a toy telephone in the post-office with a line extending to a summer-house, about two hundred feet from the hotel. Any person paying twenty-five cents at the post-office was entitled to go to the summer-house and hold a conversation by wire. The questions which a casual converser might choose to put were answered promptly and pointedly, for Bessie Martin was a quick-witted and keen-sighted girl.

So it happened that the telephone was a captivating novelty, and Miss Bessie's conversation charmed many a quarter into the box.

Sam himself was constant in his attendance at the postoffice. He did not seem altogether pleased at the continual use of the telephone. As the evening wore on, a shadow of resolution deepened on his face. About ten o'clock the ballroom began to empty, as the crowd gathered in the diningroom, where the drawing of the grand prize was to take place. A subscription had been opened for a pair of handsome

vases which Mr. Martin had presented, and every subscriber had been given a numbered ticket; and now, on the last evening of the fair, there was to be a "casting of lots" to discover to whom the vases might belong. The interest in the result was so intense that most of the ladies who had stalls abandoned them for a while and deserted to the dining-room. Then Mr. Samuel Brassy stepped up to the window of the post-office.

66 Are you going to see the drawing of the prize, Miss Bessie?"

"No; I shall stick to my post."

"That's all right, then here's my quarter."

So saying he placed the coin before her, and then he hurried away. Miss Bessie Martin was left alone in the

corner of the ball-room. She was counting up her gains, when the telephone bell rang sharply. Before she could put the money down and go to the instrument, there came a second impatient ting-a-ling.

66

Somebody seems to be in a hurry," she said, as she took her station before the box and held the receiver to her ear. "Hello! hello! Oh, it's you, is it, Mr. Brassy?"

*********

"Yes; I wondered why you ran off so suddenly."

* *******

"You have paid your quarter and you can talk just two minutes."

*******

"Of course, I did not mean that. You ought to know me better."

*****

"What did you say?”

*******

"Not lately."

**

"Yes, she had on a blue dress, and I thought she looked like a fright; did n't you?"

"There's nobody here at all.”

*******

"Yes, I'm all alone. There is n't a creature in sight."

*******

"I love secrets! Tell me."

********

"Tell me now."

*****

"Why can't you tell me now? I'm just dying to know."

*****

"No, there is n't anybody here at all-nobody-nobody."

*********

"How poetic you are to-night."

"But I really must have time to think."

****

"No, no, no! I can't give you an answer right away."

******

"Well, if you must—you can ask Auntie—”

*******

"Yes, yes, I'm all alone still."

*****

66

Good-bye, Sam!"

*********

Miss Bessie Martin turned away from the instrument with

a flush on her cheek and a light in her eye. Just then Mr. Samuel Brassy rushed in through the open door, flew across the ball-room, and disappeared within the post-office. A minute later a throng of people began to pour back from the dining-room, and there were frequent calls for " Sam and "Mr. Brassy."

With heightened color and ill-concealed excitement, Mr. Samuel Brassy came out of the post-office. He found himself face to face with Mr. Martin, who held out his hand and cried, "I congratulate you, Sam." "How-how did you know anything about it?" Before Mr. Martin could reply, Mr. Harry Brackett and the three Miss Pettitoes came forward. Mr. Brackett bore in his arms the pair of vases. Then Mr. Brassy knew why Mr. Martin had congratulated him. "You have won the prize," cried Harry Brackett. "I have for a fact," Sam Brassy answered, looking at Miss Bessie Martin.

Anonymous.

BOUNDING THE UNITED STATES.

Among the legends of our late Civil War, there is a story of a dinner-party, given by the Americans residing in Paris, at which were propounded sundry toasts, concerning not so much the past and present as the expected glories of the great American nation. In the general character of these toasts, geographical considerations were very prominent, and the principal fact which seemed to occupy the minds of the speakers was the unprecedented bigness of our country.

66

"Here's to the United States!" said the first speaker,"bounded on the north by British America, on the south by the Gulf of Mexico, on the east by the Atlantic, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean!" "But," said the second speaker, "this is far too limited a view of the subject, and, in assigning our boundaries, we must look to the great and glorious future, which is prescribed for us by the manifest destiny of the Anglo-Saxon race. Here's to the United States!. bounded on the north by the North Pole, on the south by the South Pole, on the east by the rising, and on the west by the setting, sun!"

Emphatic applause greeted the aspiring prophecy. But