LOCKPORT, NEW YORK._Harper's Young People, May 23, 1882 An Illustrated Weekly

I have never seen any letters from this city, so I thought that I

would write to you. I like the stories very much, especially "The

Little Dolls' Dressmaker." Last evening we tried the game of

Anagrams, and found it very amusing. My pet is a great big

Newfoundland shepherd dog, and his name is Rob Roy. One day some

one rang the front-door bell, and on going to the door we found it

to be Rob. He does it quite often now. I am almost thirteen years

of age. I send a puzzle to you. Good-by.

ADA M. F.

The puzzle is a clever one, and will duly appear. Thank you.

* * * * *

NORTH ADAMS, MASSACHUSETTS.

I live in a small town two miles from North Adams; it is a nice

place to live. The north branch of the Hoosac River runs behind my

house, and in summer we fish there, and it is fine fun to catch

trout and suckers. My father and uncle run a woollen mill, and

sometimes I go down to the mill and pack the goods in boxes to be

sent off. My sister Amy and I ride to school every morning, and

home again every night. We have a nice place to slide in winter,

but not a very nice place to skate. I go down on the south branch

of the Hoosac, where all the boys of North Adams go.

KELLER B.

The next time you catch a splendid big trout, you must send the

Postmistress word. I am glad you work as well as play.

* * * * *

REYNOLDSVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA.

I am a little girl nine years old. I have two sisters--Bessie the

oldest, Tirzah the youngest. We used to live in Philadelphia, but

we came to Reynoldsville last summer. We had no pets in the city,

but we have a good many here. Bessie has a canary, Tirzah a cat,

and I have a dog. I had a dove, but it flew away. There was a

beautiful Maltese cat here when we came, and she has a darling

little kitten. My papa is superintendent of a saw-mill, and he

often takes us to the mill. We have ten horses, which we ride from

the watering-trough to the stable almost every evening. A swing is

put up for us in the barn. The other day we went to the woods for

wild flowers, and we found violets, anemones, wild phlox, and a

flower that looked just like mamma's dyletra, only it was white.

M. LOUISE N.

I think the three little sisters have a merry life. I hope they will

study botany, and learn to what classes of plants the beautiful wild

flowers they gather belong.

* * * * *

OSWEGO, NEW YORK.

I live in Oswego, which is on Lake Ontario, and in summer I go

fishing on the Oswego River, and catch lots of fish. My papa has a

yacht and row-boats, and is teaching me to row. I have a stamp

album with over two thousand stamps. Last summer I went to the

Thousand Islands, and had a lovely time. We reached Cape Vincent

about six o'clock; there took a steamer to Alexandria Bay. The

islands were beautifully illuminated. I went to the Indian camp,

and saw them make canoes and baskets. I have two canary-birds, and

a dog named Fritz. I have a large garden, with all kinds of

flowers. I liked "Toby Tyler" and "Tim and Tip," and am glad Mr.

Otis is going to write another story. I have been to New York

twice, and like to ride on the elevated railroad.

L. W. M.

I do not wonder you enjoy riding on the elevated railroad. Sometimes, as

I sit in one of the cars, and am whisked along so fast past the windows

and over the roofs, I think of the old fairy stories. The enchanted

carpet used to transport its owner from place to place in a moment; and

these railroads, so high in the air, are very much like enchanted

carpets in their effect; only the power which moves them is steam, and

we might never have known the wonderful things steam can do if a

bright-eyed boy named James Watt had not long ago sat and watched the

spout of his mother's tea-kettle.

* * * * *

SOUTH SCITGATE, RHODE ISLAND.

I am a little girl nine years old. I live with my grandpa and

grandma in the country. They are over seventy years old. I try and

help grandma about the house. My papa and mamma live in Providence,

which is thirteen miles from here. My papa is a photographer. I had

a great many pretty things Christmas, but I think the most of my

doll. Her name is Flossie. She has very light hair, and her eyes

will shut. She is dressed in baby clothes, like a real live baby. I

have six other dolls, but they are old ones. I had a canary-bird

named Topsy, but the cat killed it one day. I put it in a box, and

buried it in the yard. I have a stone at the head of the grave, and

I keep it decorated with flowers.

Mamma has come out to see me, and is writing this letter for me. I

can write some, but I live a mile from school, and only go in the

summer. I have no brothers or sisters, so I have to get along with

pets. I have two bantam hens; they lay little eggs, and I eat them

all. Grandpa has a large farm, and we have hens, geese, cows, and a

horse named Dan. I have been out to-day, and got a large bunch of

trailing arbutus for mamma to take to the city with her. Mamma has

sent me HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE over a year. I think "Toby Tyler,"

"Tim and Tip," and "Cruise of the 'Ghost'" are splendid, but the

letters in Our Post-office Box from the little boys and girls I do

love so much! I don't see many from Rhode Island, and I do hope our

dear Postmistress will publish mine. I hope it is not too long.

Good-by.

EVA T. P.

How glad I am that the dear old people have a bright little

granddaughter to live with them, and be their sunbeam!

* * * * *

ROCHELLE, ILLINOIS.

I am a little girl ten years old. I have a piano, and I take music

lessons. I like "Mr. Stubbs's Brother." I always read the

Post-office Box, and enjoy it. I have a large box full of

advertising cards. I see that some of the children tell about their

pets, so I will tell you about my cat. I keep his catnip in the

table drawer, and when he wants it he goes on top of the table and

smells in the drawer, so some one opens it for him, and he gets in,

takes the catnip in his paws, jumps out, and goes over on the

lounge and eats it.

I hope you will publish this, because I wrote one before, and it

was not published. I have been in the grove, and I found some

bloodroots and other flowers.

GRACE G.

What a sensible cat! Do you take medicine as willingly as he does? But

then a little girl who goes to the grove and gathers wild flowers, and

lives out-doors in the fresh air as much as she can, does not often need

catnip or any other herb.

* * * * *

I am a little girl eleven years old. I live in the city of Buffalo,

which is on Lake Erie. There is a fort near the lake, and sometimes

in summer I go out there and to the parks with some of my

playmates, and have a nice time. There is a large hill at the fort

too, and I think it is fun to run down it. I go to school, and am

in the Third Reader, and study intellectual and practical

arithmetic, spelling, geography, language lessons, and German. Can

the editor speak German? If he can, and will write me a letter, I

will answer it. My grandma sends me HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, and I

think it is a very nice paper for children, and my mamma and papa

think so too. For pets we have a dog, a cat, and three little

kittens, which are now trying to get out of the basket and run

around. I am collecting picture cards, and have over nine hundred.

If any little boy or girl would like to exchange with me, please

address,

HELEN M. SISSON,

183 Maryland St., Buffalo, N. Y.

Helen has so much more time than the editor of YOUNG PEOPLE, that the

better way will be for her to send her German letter, and let us see how

well she can write in that language, which we are very glad she is

studying. What a number of lessons our little nine, ten, and eleven year

old friends have to learn, to be sure! And the queerest thing about it,

dears, is that, no matter how old we may grow, we shall still have

lessons to learn, and some of them harder than those you find in your

Third Readers and language lessons.

* * * * *

AWAY FROM HOME.--Children, how would you like to have been passengers on

the British steamer _Glamorgan_, which arrived in Boston Harbor on the

morning of the 1st of May? She reported that on April 25, latitude 46°

20', longitude 42° 30', she passed an iceberg fully five hundred feet

high. On the iceberg were a number of polar bears. Now please take your

maps, and trace the route by which these travellers must have come from

the arctic seas to reach the part of the Atlantic where the

_Glamorgan_'s passengers saw them. Where is latitude 46° 20', and

longitude 42° 30'? Whose little finger will point to it first? But the

GLAMORGAN's adventures were not ended. On April 26 she ran into a field

of ice, and steaming along its southern edge, she passed one hundred

large icebergs, on which were polar bears and seals, taking their ease

quite comfortably. I wonder what the polar bears thought of the strange

world into which they were drifting southward, poor things?

* * * * *

C. Y. P. R. U.

OUR LITTLE POETS' CORNER.--We group together several bits of verse

received from little poets. The first is written by a dear child who has

only seen eight summers:

SUMMER.

Summer is near, O summer is near;

Winter leaves with a good-by cheer;

The grasses sprout,

And the trees bloom out--

Summer is near, O summer is near.

The birdies do sing, O the birdies do sing!

And so loud the merry bells ring!

For summer brings

Such beautiful things;

Summer is near, O summer is near!

DAISY SEVERANCE, Middlebury, Vt.

The author of "Thistle-Down" is only eleven, and her little poem is very

sweet too:

THISTLE-DOWN.

Over the fields of waving corn,

Over the hill-tops brown.

Sailing along in fairy grace,

Floateth the thistle-down.

Flying past the meadows bare,

Catching on grasses brown,

Like airy films from cobwebs torn,

Floateth the thistle-down.

Drifting past the old oak-tree,

Drifting past the town;

Further than any eye can see,

Floateth the thistle-down.

On the blue of the sky afloat,

A dainty craft is this seedling brown,

Manned by the loveliest fairy crew,

Guiding the thistle-down.

Fairy forms in sunbeams dressed,

With rainbow hues caught down.

Sailing away in their elfin glee.

They guide the thistle-down.

ELIZABETH MORTON BOYCE, Chicago, Ill.

Dora, whose rhyme about the streamlet is quite merry and musical, is

also eleven:

THE STREAMLET.

How lovely is the little stream

That babbles on and on

Through many a field and woodland too

This little stream has gone.

There by the stream the sun looks down,

And the many sunbeams play,

Oh, happy are the breezy woods

On that sweet summer day!

And just before it joins the lake--

Nor does it miss it ever--

This little stream another meets,

And they go on together.

In its mossy bed the streamlet

Glides on through valleys low,

In sweet contentment flowing

Where the lovely flowers blow.

The glowing sun fades out of sight,

The moon and stars appear,

All is silent now, and quiet,

For the shades of night are near.

But the stream is onward gliding,

Never does it pause to rest,

Gliding onward, onward swiftly,

To seek the lake's deep breast.

DORA CUMMING, Newport, Ky.

* * * * *

Who would like to perform this amusing trick, which is called Water

Bewitched?

Take an ordinary dinner plate, and fill it with water; then produce a

small empty phial, and assure the company that you are wizard enough to

pour water through the solid bottom. Having declared that the phial must

be _perfectly_ dry when the experiment is performed (if you are asked

why, you may say to open the pores of the glass), thrust a stick into

it, and hold it to the fire until it is very hot--too hot to hold. Then

stand it, without delay, mouth downward in the plate of water. Then pour

a tea-spoonful of water on the bottom of the phial, as if you meant to

fill it that way, and every time you do this the phial will become more

and more filled with water; and as this apparently takes place every

time you pour water on the bottom, it will have every appearance of

having passed through the solid glass. Of course the water really rises

from the plate by what is called capillary attraction.

* * * * *

We would call the attention of the C. Y. P. R. U. this week to "Some

Diamond Stories," and to the account of Commander De Long and his

terrible death among the ice-fields of the North, as told by Sherwood

Ryse under the title of "The Victims of the Arctic Seas." Then Aunt

Marjorie Precept has some wise advice to give about "Picnics."

* * * * *

PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.

No. 1.

CONUNDRUMS.

1. Why is the letter J like the end of spring?

2. What is the most useful letter to a deaf old lady?

3. When may a chair be said to dislike you?

4. When is a window like a star?

5. Why is corn like a rose-bush?

6. Why is an egg like a colt?

* * * * *

No. 2.

CHARADE.

When sharp and blustering is my first,

And all are under cover,

Before the cheerful fireside sit

My second and her lover.

EMPIRE CITY.

* * * * *

No. 3.

FOUR DIAMONDS.

1.--1. A letter. 2. Fiery. 3. Virtuous. 4. To brown. 5. A letter.

2.--1. A letter. 2. Evening. 3. A happening. 4. Conclusion. 5. A letter.

3.--1. In pitch. 2. An adverb. 3. Ability. 4. A number. 5. In run.

XYZ.

4.--1. In salt. 2. To rise above. 3. Strength-giving. 4. A hollow. 5. In

custard.

HELEN S. H.

* * * * *

No. 4.

TWO WORD SQUARES.

1.--1. An arrow. 2. To respect. 3. A part of the body. 4. Sheep-pens. 5.

A ringlet.

EMPIRE CITY.

2.--1. A bird. 2. A bird. 3. To turn from. 4. Part of the body. 5. To

come in.

HELEN S. H.

* * * * *

ANSWERS TO PUZZLES IN No. 131.

No. 1.

L U X E M B U R G

S I B E R I A

S A L E M

O B I

B U G

F A R O E

R O A N O K E

T E N N E S S E E

U C A I A R Y

M O C H A

L E E

T A Y

C O N G O

C O R D O V A

No. 2.

Boston. Rhododendron. Nightingale.

No. 3.

C M

A R T M A Y

C R E A M M A Y O R

T A R Y O U

M R

* * * * *

Correct answers to puzzles have been received from Annie J. Thomas,

"Columbia," "American," Helen S. Herzig, Walter Morell, W. C., Frank

Smith, Rogers Campe, Elsie O., Lulu Beck, Emily Dean, Maggie Walker,

Florence Meserole, Jennie Strong, Claude Ramsay, McVey Grove, Kitty and

Josie, E. H. D., Charles Morrison, Nelson Metcalf, Bessie T.,

"Lodestar," George P. Taggart, Florence H. Chambers, Florence, Mabel,

and Annie, B. J. Lautz, Florence Cox, Willie Jones, Mary H. Hobart,

William A. Lewis, and Edgar Seeman.

* * * * *

[_For Exchanges, see 2d and 3d pages of cover._]

[Illustration: THE PLAYMATES.]

CHARACTERS; OR, WHO AM I?

Somebody once said, "There is no royal road to knowledge." We will admit

the fact as a general proposition, but now and then affairs can be so

arranged that a bit of information can be fixed in the mind, and a fair

amount of fun be had through the same means.

The following game is admirably adapted to a party of school-fellows who

have been reading and studying from the same books. It could be made to

answer all the purposes of the review of certain branches, and it is not

at all impossible that teachers of good judgment could be found who

would approve of giving a little time to it during school-hours.

One of the party is sent out of the room; some well-known hero, or

equally well-known character from a book, like Dickens's novels or

Shakspeare's plays, is selected, and when the absentee returns to the

assembly, he or she is greeted as the person fixed upon, and he must

reply in such a manner as to bring out more information as to the

character he has unconsciously assumed.

Suppose the game has commenced, and when the player enters the room he

is thus accosted:

"Your military ardor must have been very great, and you had a very

adventurous spirit, when you left your home in England, and set out with

a determination of fighting the Turks."

"Yes, I was always very fond of adventures."

"Well, you had plenty of them; and when you were taken prisoner, and

sold to the Bashaw, your mistress, to whom he presented you, felt so

much sympathy and affection for you that you were sent to her brother,

but he not being so well pleased with you, treated you cruelly."

"He did; and although I suffered much from his treatment, I suffered