up the far side of the street, calm-faced and dignified, as if this howling November north-easter were a beautiful June morning. Him he summoned. "Here's Peter'll no' speak to you about his cough. He must have some of your drugs, doctor." The doctor called the unwilling cobbler from his last, and after a brief examination, he said: "No, I don't think there will be any need for drugs, Mr. Smith; if you, Peter, will use a gargle to get rid of a trifling local inflammation. Less lapstone dust and less snuff, Peter, and warm water three times a day," said the doctor, succinctly, and proceeded on his rounds. As the minister went out, Peter looked up with a queer twinkle in his eye. "Maister Smith," he said, "gin water be sae needful for the inside o' a cobbler's thrapple, maybe I was wrang in thinkin' that it wasna as necessary for the ootside o' a minister!" "Then we'll say no more about it, Peter," said the minister, smiling, as he closed the door. "Mind your gargle!" When the minister got to his study, he never stopped even to wipe his feet, and when the mistress followed to remonstrate, she found him putting his sermon in the fire. The minister's text on the following Sabbath morning was an old one, but it was no old sermon that the Arkland folk got that day. The text was, "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Nanse Kissock was there, and did not go home hungry; John Scott had come down from the muirs, and had something better than physic to take back to his ailing wife; Peter M' Robert sat in his corner looking cleaner than he had done within the memory of man-also he never coughed once; no less than eight different folk came in to tell blind Mary Carment about the sermon. But none except the minister knew who it was that had been praying for him. A WEIRD WARBLE.-H. CHANCE Newton. I sauntered lately through the street They murmured this mysterious dirge: I stopped, for horror chilled my blood, And so aside these boys I called At this sad fate of William Jones. "His accident that you record I trust had not a fatal end? Maybe he lieth in some ward, Where doctors do his hurts attend? If so, go visit him; and oft With cheering accents soothe his pain." CASEY AT THE BAT. There was ease in Casey's manner as he stepped into his place; There was pride in Casey's bearing, and a smile on Casey's face. And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat, No stranger in the crowd could doubt 'twas Casey at the bat. Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt, Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt. Then while the New York pitcher ground the ball into his hip, Defiance gleamed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip. And now the leather-covered sphere came hurling through the air, And Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there. Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped"That aint my style," said Casey. "Strike one," the umpire said. From the benches, black with people, there went up a muf fled roar, Like the beating of storm waves on a stern and distant shore. "Kill him! Kill the umpire!" shouted some one on the stand. And it's likely they'd have killed him had not Casey raised a hand. With a smile of Christian charity great Casey's visage shone; He stilled the rising tumult, he bade the game go on: He signaled to Sir Timothy, once more the spheroid flew; But Casey still ignored it, and the umpire said, “Strike two.” "Fraud!" cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered "Fraud!" But one scornful look from Casey and the audience was awed. They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain, And they knew that Casey wouldn't let that ball go by again. The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clinched in hate; He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate. Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright. The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light. And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout: But there is no joy in Bungtown-mighty Casey has struck out. A CITY TALE.-ALFRED H. MILES. I heard a story the other day, and I've shaped it into a rhyme, With the few simple thoughts that occurred to me as I listened to it at the time. 'Tis only a childish incident, but it taught a lesson to me; And you know the greatest of teachers taught with a baby upon His knee. It happened, you know, in that dingy part at the eastern end of the town, Where sickened humanity loses its heart, and nature seems always to frown; Where the black smuts fall from the chimneys tall, and the engines of toil never rest, And it's only in dreams that they think of the beams that shine in the golden west. Mid the twilight gloom of an upper room, like flowers laid out in a row Ere the gardener Death bound them into a wreath for the Bride of the King, you know, Some children were lying and tossing and sighing, and nightly there passed away A baby's soul from the world's control to the regions of endless day. On one little bed lay an aching head, that heaved to and fro on the pillow, Like a tiny boat on the waves afloat, when stirred by the angry billow; And his shining eyes seem to peer through the skies, just as lamps on a good ship's breast Seem to look, as they shine through the mist and the brine, for a haven of safety and rest. He was only a wild, neglected child, a waif in the city grim, Whose mother was dead, the nurses said, and whose father cared nothing for him; And the pain that he bore, he bore it alone, for no one had taught him to pray, Though at times in a dream he would say he had seen 8 land that was far away." And they heard him talking one afternoon (so one of the nurses said) Of an angel of light who came down in the night, and passed at the foot of his bed; And his little voice trembled, his little frame shook, as he said in words broken and slow, "He goes to the other boys' beds every time, but he never comes near little Joe. "I wonder, suppose if I turn down the clothes, and watch till he comes by-and-by, If I beckoned him near, would he come to me here?" and be finished his words with a sigh. But a smile came over his pale, wan face at this thought of his fancy born, And he longed for the night with the feverish might that he'd hitherto longed for the dawn. The shades of evening deepened fast o'er the city's soot and grime, Till there boomed over all, from the bell of St. Paul, the old day's funeral chime; And the new day breaking, the good nurse, waking, arose with the twilight gray, And passed down the room, mid its slackening gloom, to the spot where the little boy lay. And she started, amazed, and then lingered and gazed, for a wondrous sight met her view, Which brought tears to her eyes, of joy and surprise, as well it might bring them to you: A little hand reaching in action beseeching, a figure half raised in a bed, Two little eyes closing as softly reposing, and all of it stiffened and dead. For the Angel of light had come down in the night, and passed up the ward, to and fro, Till the beckoning finger had caused him to linger at the bedside of poor little Joe; And before he could mutter the prayer he would utter, the small silken cord had been riven, And the angel had said, as he turned from the bed," Of such is the kingdom of heaven." |