being rapidly piled. "You see the salt hay don't belong to nobody in particular, an' if we left this lying here, any one that came along would help himself. It's going to be taken down shore to where the wagons come for clams, an' the team 'll be there to meet it and carry it up to the barn-yard." "Come, children," shouted grandpa; "hay's all in!"

"How shall I get up there?" said Lotty, looking up to the great stack, which had sunk the scow almost to the water's edge.

"I'll show you," said grandpa; and, lifting her in his arms, he tossed her up right into the pile, and Harry after her.

"Paul, you're almost too big," said he, "but we must play you 're little on account of your toe"; and Paul found himself suddenly heels over head in the hay, followed by Polly and Nathan, and then by grandpa himself, and Jack and Jimmy and Michael and the other man, while the scow, almost too heavily loaded to be managed, floated slowly down the creek, and out to the open bay, smooth as glass under the hot July sun. It was only a very little way to the bluff where the road came down; the great hay-wagon was waiting; and, after grandpa had jumped the children to the shore, they stood and watched the men pitch the grass from the scow, and debated whether they had better ride home on the hay or walk down the shore and see the fyke emptied. Polly had seen fykes all her life, and even Lotty was inclined to think a ride more desirable; so the two little girls were lifted to the very top of the load again, and Harry, who had changed his mind a dozen times, took a place beside them, while Paul walked down shore with the other boys.

"There's no use in emptying the fyke to-night," said Jack, after they had gone a little way; "father won't go to Shrewsbury till to-morrow morning anyway, so 't they ought to stay in it to keep fresh. Hurry back, boys, and we'll all have a ride on the hay."

The wagon was up the bluff, and creaking through the sandy road, when they caught up with it, red and out of breath.

"Up with you, young ones!" said grandpa, who was walking; and all "swarmed up" the sides and in among the others. Such a ride home! The ruts were very deep, and the heavy load swayed sometimes as if determined to go over, while Lotty and Polly gave little screams, and then tried to look as if they never had thought of such a thing. Grandma Green had a great basket of peaches ready for all the hot, tired people; and the children sat down under the trees in the front yard with their share, and ate and talked till the great red sun went down into the sea, and the Ben boys and Polly started for home.

Harry and Lotty went to bed, determined to wake up very early, and go down with Paul to see the fyke emptied; but when five o'clock next morning came, they were still sleeping so soundly that nurse said they must not be wakened, and Paul went down alone. Jimmy and Nathan had finished breakfast, and came running as they saw Jack and Paul coming from opposite directions. Jack rolled up his trousers and waded out.

"You had better do like me, if you want to see the fun," he said to Paul; and Paul, after a moment's hesitation, as he remembered the crab of yesterday, kicked off his shoes, and followed.

"Hold the basket, will you?" said Jack, as he untied the gathered end. "Here they are, all in a heap, pointing their noses to deep water every one of 'em. Porgies? no sir, plenty o' you any day without the trouble o' setting a fyke," and he slid each porgy back to the water. "Week-fish? that's good; an' sea-bass, two of 'em, and rock-fish, and a heap o' plaices. O, this is a pretty good haul!- worth a dollar and a half, I'll bet."

"'T won't take long to earn the boat, — will it?" said Jimmy. "I'm going over to Long Point for blue-fish to sell; maybe we 'll make up the seven dollars by the end o' the week. What have you got in that wheelbarrow up there, Jack?"

"Clams," said Jack, as, after re-tying the fyke, he started for home. “I dug 'em this morning. You see, I want all the money I can get, 'cause Cap'n Brown's had an offer a'ready for the surf-boat, an' the man that wants it says he'll give eight dollars, rather than do without it. The Cap'n says he 'll wait a week for me, an' this fyke 's got to do the business. Come on, Paul, if you 've a mind to go home my way."

"I guess not," said Paul, whose face wore a very knowing look, and he dashed off toward Squire Green's before any one could ask the reason why. What he was in such a hurry for, you may some time find out; and, till then, good by.

Helen C. Weeks.

THER

"SOMEBODY."

'HERE's a meddlesome "Somebody" going about, And playing his pranks, but we can't find him out; He's up stairs and down stairs from morning till night, And always in mischief, but never in sight.

The rogues I have read of in song or in tale
Are caught at the end, and conducted to jail ;
But "Somebody's" tracks are all covered so well
He never has seen the inside of a cell.

Our young folks at home, at all seasons and times,
Are rehearsing the roll of "Somebody's" crimes ;
Or, fast as their feet and their tongues can well run,
Come to tell the last deed the sly scamp has done.

"Somebody' has taken my knife," one will say ; "Somebody' has carried my pencil away";

"Somebody' has gone and thrown down all the blocks"; "Somebody' ate up all the cakes in the box."

It is "Somebody" breaks all the pitchers and plates,
And hides the boys' sleds, and runs off with their skates,
And turns on the water, and tumbles the beds,

And steals all the pins, and melts all the dolls' heads.

One night a dull sound like the thump of a head
Announced that one youngster was out of his bed;
And he said, half asleep, when asked what it meant,
"Somebody' is pushing me out of the tent!"

666

Now, if these high crimes of "Somebody" don't cease,
We must summon in the detective police;

And they, in their wisdom, at once will make known,
The culprit belongs to no house but our own.

Then should it turn out, after all, to be true,
That our young folks themselves are "Somebody" too,
How queer it would look, if we saw them all go
Marched off to the station-house, six in a row!

William Allen Butler.

"W

PUSSY AND EMILY MATURE.

HAT has become of Pussy Willow? Is n't that story ever going to be finished? Nothing about it last month, nothing about it this month. It's too bad!"

Some such voices have reached our ears, away, away, far off down in the sunny land of Florida, where we fell asleep in an orange-grove, and only dreamed that there were yet such things as cold winds, snow-storms, hail, and ice existing.

Two of our little friends have sent urgent messages to awaken us out of our sleep. One nice little blue-eyed friend modestly begs to know when Pussy Willow will be finished; and one brown-eyed little puss assumes more decided ground, and threatens us terribly, that, if Pussy Willow is n't finished before we go North, she will not kiss us when we meet. That would be frightful; we actually wake up, open both eyes, and begin to think Where are we now? Not in the moon, it appears; not in the enchanted land, — though we have seen strange sights here. While you poor Northern people have been having snow-storm after snow-storm, and the fires have been kept going, and the furnaces roaring red-hot in the cellars, we, down here, have been sitting out under trees, watching the coming and going of the ivory buds and blossoms of the orange and lemon trees.

All around us in the different yards the great oleander-trees have borne aloft their crowns of bright crimson blossoms, looking like full-blown roses, and the pomegranate has flowered out in brilliant scarlet dyes, while redbirds every morning have wakened us, singing, "What cheer! what cheer!' and the mocking-birds have sung to us like every other bird you can think of. Some days the jays have kept the trees all alive with their chatter, and sometimes a cloud of bright green paroquets have come flying over, - so green that they could scarcely be distinguished from the trees. Whole tribes of wild flowers in the woods have come and are gone since we have been here, and yet the woods are full now.

Early in February the trees in the woods were all wreathed into garlands with the bright yellow jessamine, which hung its golden bells full of violet perfume in long festoons. These passed away as March came in with orange and lemon blossoms, and then in the moist spots in the woods sprang up pure silver-white lilies, whose buds were tinted with the most beautiful pink, like the rosy inside of a sea-shell; and purple glycine flowers, and scarlet honeysuckle, and two kinds of trumpet-flowered bignonia began to wreathe the trees of the forest together.

As to the flowers that have been blooming, their number is bewildering. They have kept us looking and wondering and exclaiming, and making flower vases, ever since we have been here. Can you wonder that among all these new, bright, strange scenes the cold, frozen North was awhile forgotten, and that it seemed pleasanter to wander and gather flowers and sit under

1

trees and eat oranges from off them, while yet they were pearly with blossoms, than to be going on with any story whatsoever?

To do ourselves justice, we must tell you that we wrote you all about it once, and our manuscript was lost by a most strange accident. You must know that we are living in a little cottage on the banks of the great St. John's River, which, where we are, is six miles wide, so that the opposite shores are blue in the distance. The principal way in which this little village, named Mandarin, communicates with the world is by steamboats, which pass and repass four or five times a week. There used to be a long wharf built out into the river to the deep-water channel, where the steamboats pass; but in war time about half of the passage-way out to this wharf was destroyed, so that the mail-bag has now to be sent out in a boat.

Well, a short time ago, we wrote all about Pussy Willow, and finished her history, and did it up, and directed it to Ticknor and Fields, and put it into our mail-bag. But, just as the time came to get the bag out to the wharf, there came up a thunder-storm with a tremendous gale of wind, and the little mail-bag was seized by the wind, and carried sheer off the wharf into the water; and the waves were running so high, and the wind was making such a commotion, that there was no such thing as dragging for it till next day, and then dragging did no good. There it lies at the bottom of the St. John's River, this diverting and edifying history of Pussy Willow, along with forty letters, the half-weekly mail of the village of Mandarin.

For the life of us we can't help wondering what will become of them all. There is a pretty lively and intelligent population of people under the blue waters of the St. John's, who will probably, first or last, have the discussion of it; but their opinions will be rather of a scaly nature, and will never be known to us. There is the lordly Dr. Alligator, who, though his mouth opens like an old-fashioned snuff-box, and his backbone runs down to a long scaly point, nevertheless is an honest, respectable old fellow in his way. I think he will probably have the first opening of that mail-bag, which he will manage with one decided chaw; and then I fancy he will abandon it in disgust, after the manner of newspapers and critics generally, when they come across what has no particular relation to their own tastes and fancies.

---

These fellows are fish with sharp teeth, which they use One of them gets hold of

"Pshaw!" I hear the old Doctor say, "what tough stuff! No savor, decidedly a poor, watery performance. Well, if this is what those tribes on shore make much of, they are welcome to it," - and away he swims. Then will come up a whole host of gar-fish. long bills on the ends of their noses, armed with on any and every thing that comes in their way. the history of Pussy Willow, chews it up, and swallows it. There was ever so much excellent advice in it,- quantities of considerations for good little girls; and this unappreciative gar-fish swims off with them all in his stomach, and I question if he is a whit the wiser or better thereby. Ten to one he complains to Mrs. Gar that "that trash lies so heavy in his stomach that you will never catch him having anything to do with such stupid, heavy productions from on shore again." I doubt whether any of them ever get