Produced by Annie R. McGuire
[Illustration: HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE]
* * * * *
VOL. III.--NO. 149. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. PRICE FOUR
CENTS.
Tuesday, September 5, 1882. Copyright, 1882, by HARPER & BROTHERS. $1.50
per Year, in Advance.
* * * * *
[Illustration: "TOO HOT!"--DRAWN BY JESSIE SHEPHERD.]
THE BURIAL OF THE OLD FLAG.
BY MARY A. BARR.
There is not in all the north countrie,
Nor yet on the Humber line,
A town with a prouder record than
Newcastle-upon-the-Tyne.
Roman eagles have kept its walls;
Saxon, and Dane, and Scot
Have left the glamour of noble deeds,
With their names on this fair spot.
From the reign of William Rufus,
The monarchs of every line
Had a grace for loyal Newcastle,
The city upon the Tyne.
By the Nuns' Gate, and up Pilgrim Street,
What pageants have held their way!
But in seventeen hundred and sixty-three,
One lovely morn in May,
There was a sight in bonnie Newcastle!
Oh, that I had been there!
To hear the call of the trumpeters
Thrilling the clear spring air,
To hear the roar of the cannon,
And the drummer's gathering beat,
And the eager hum of the multitudes
Waiting upon the street.
Just at noon was a tender hush,
And a funeral march was heard;
With arms reversed and colors tied,
Came the men of the Twenty-third.
And Lennox, their noble leader, bore
The shreds of a faded flag,
The battle-flag of the regiment,
Shot to a glorious rag;
Shot into shreds upon its staff,
Torn in a hundred fights,
From the torrid plains of India
To the cold Canadian heights.
There was not an inch of bunting left;
How could it float again
Over the faithful regiment
It never had led in vain?
And oh, the hands that had carried it!
It was not cloth and wood;
It stood for a century's heroes,
And was crimson with their blood;
It stood for a century's comrades.
They could not cast it away,
And so with a soldier's honors
They were burying it that day.
In the famous old North Humber fort,
Where the Roman legions trod,
With the roar of cannon and roll of drums
They laid it under the sod.
But it wasn't a tattered flag alone
They buried with tender pride;
It was every faithful companion
That under the flag had died.
It was honor, courage, and loyalty
That thrilled that mighty throng
Standing bare-headed and silent as
The old flag passed along.
So when the grasses had covered it,
There was a joyful strain;
And the soldiers, stirred to a noble thought,
Marched proudly home again.
The citizens went to their shops once more,
The collier went to his mine;
The shepherd went to the broomy hills,
And the sailor to the Tyne;
But men and women and children felt
That it had been well to be
Just for an hour or two face to face
With honor and loyalty.
NOTE.--In May, 1763, the soldiers of the Twenty-third Regiment of
the British army buried with military honors at Newcastle-on-Tyne
the regimental flag, which had been torn to shreds at the battle of
Minden.
A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE.
BY ALLAN FORMAN.
One rainy day, as the children were amusing themselves by ransacking
their uncle Harry's closets, Tom pulled his hand out suddenly from the
back part of a deep drawer, and shouted triumphantly, "Preserves!" at
the same time holding out a large glass jar for inspection. A cry of
disgust followed, for instead of preserves there was nothing in the
bottle but a strange-looking animal floating in some brown liquid.
"Pah! It's a horrid bug," said Alice, turning up her nose in disgust.
"'Tain't," contradicted Charlie, regardless of his grammar. "It's a
tarantula."
"And what is that but a bug?" replied Alice.
"It's a spider," said Charlie. "You ask Uncle Harry if it isn't."
In the mean time Tom and Alice had taken the jar over to the desk where
Uncle Harry was writing.
"What is this, Uncle Harry?" said Alice.
"It is a tarantula. I brought it home from California with me."
"I told you so!" exclaimed Charlie, from the closet.
"It is a kind of spider, and one of the largest that lives in this
country. They don't make webs like ordinary spiders, but dig a hole in
the ground and line it with a sort of silky web like the cocoon of a
silk-worm. Their hole is about six inches deep, and is closed by a funny
little trap-door made of the same silky lining, and covered on the
outside with sticks and gravel so cleverly that one can rarely find a
tarantula's burrow unless you see him going in; and even if you do see
him going in, it is very difficult to get him to come out, as he pulls
his trap-door shut after him, and holds it tight from the inside."
"If he don't build a web, how does he catch flies and things?" inquired
Charlie.
"He jumps after them. A lively tarantula can jump from three to five
feet, and when he once catches hold of any kind of a bug or small bird
with those great hairy legs, it has but little chance to get away."
"Is their bite really so poisonous?" asked Alice, eying the jar rather
timidly, as if she was afraid the terrible insect would get away.
"That question is a hard one to answer. Some people who have lived in
countries where they are common claim that it is only fatal in a few
cases, while others seem to think it is deadly poison."
"What are you laughing at, Uncle Harry?" demanded Charlie.
"I was thinking of the most horrible night I ever experienced," replied
his uncle. "You know," he continued, "while I was in the West I spent
some two weeks camping out in the mountains with a party of four young
men. We had an old cabin, where we slept at night, and we spent our days
delightfully, fishing, hunting, geologizing, and botanizing. We had not
been in camp long before we discovered a tarantula village not far from
our cabin, and we all determined to catch some specimens to take home
with us. At first we had considerable trouble in catching them; they
were so lively and so ugly that we always ended in killing them in
self-defense. At last a brilliant member of the party discovered that by
placing a wide-mouthed bottle over the mouth of the tarantula's burrow,
and then thumping on the ground around it, the animal would crawl out
into the bottle, and the captor could turn the bottle over, clap a piece
of board over the top, and secure his prisoner. As soon as the discovery
was made known, all the old pickle jars were called into requisition,
and as the former occupants of the cabin had left a number, we were soon
lucky, or unlucky, enough to have about twenty-five large specimens. We
covered the jars with bits of shingle, and set them on a shelf which
was nailed to one side of the cabin. Everything went well, and we
determined that as soon as we had leisure we would kill them with
chloroform, and preserve them in spirits as that one is. But one night,
after we had all got comfortably settled for sleep, one of the party
thought that he was thirsty, so rising carefully from his bunk, he
groped his way over to the corner, under the shelf, where the water-pail
stood; he had his drink, and forgetting the existence of the shelf,
raised his head. Crash! down came the rotten old shelf, and down came
the jars with the tarantulas in them. The party heard the fall, and like
one man sprang from their beds and rushed for the door, but before they
had got half-way across the floor they remembered that the tarantulas
were loose, and they stopped; a moment more and it was too late. We were
all afraid to move, for fear that we would put our feet on a tarantula;
so there we stood, as if turned into statues. In a short time our
positions became strained and cramped, but we did not dare to change
them. Our nerves became excited, and we imagined that we could feel them
crawling up our backs and walking over our bare feet. The minutes seemed
lengthened to hours, and the hours seemed months. At last the day began
to break, but we had manufactured curtains out of old newspapers, that
we might sleep undisturbed by the light. Oh, how we bemoaned our
laziness! Finally it grew light enough to see, and we carefully opened
the door and went out. One of the party went back into the cabin and got
our clothes, and after examining them carefully we dressed ourselves."
"And nobody was bitten?" said Alice, with a sigh of relief.
"No," replied her uncle, rising from his chair as the supper-bell rang;
"but I don't think I ever was so badly scared before or since."
PLANTS AND ANIMALS--THEIR DIFFERENCE.
BY MRS. S. B. HERRICK.
[Illustration: FIG. 1.]
[Illustration: FIG. 1_a_.]
If the question were put to you suddenly, "What is the difference
between a plant and an animal?" how do you think you would answer? Stop
a minute, and think. Do not be satisfied with saying that a plant has
leaves, and an animal has not. Look deeper, and answer more
thoughtfully. There are many plants which have no leaves, nor roots, nor
flowers, and there are some animals which seem to have all these things
(Figs. 1 and 1_a_). In some cases they are so much alike (Figs. 2 and 3)
that it has taken the most careful study to decide whether they are
plants or animals.
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--ANIMAL.]
[Illustration: FIG. 3.--VEGETABLE.]
Look up into the bright blue sky, and then down at the solid earth
beneath your feet--you do not find any difficulty in telling, without
taking a moment to think, which is sky and which is earth; but if you
are so happy as to live in the wide open country, or near the sea, or on
a lofty hill, look off and off and off until you see only the delicate
blue haze, like smoke, which divides the heavens from the earth. You can
often see the same thing by looking from the upper windows of a high
house. You will find that many and many a time you can not tell which is
earth and which is air.
[Illustration: FIG. 4.]
Just so it is in the world of nature. You may look at a group of cows
standing under the trees, or watch the merry little grasshoppers
skipping about in the weeds, or catch a bee at his early drink in a
morning-glory bell, and you would laugh if anybody asked you if you
could tell the animal from the plant. But get far enough away from these
common things, and study the animals and plants that need your
microscope to see them, and you would find things so much alike that you
could not tell which was which. Many of these plants have no roots nor
leaves, no flowers nor seed, and many of the animals have no heads nor
legs, no eyes, nor mouths, nor stomachs. In Fig. 4, _a_ is a plant, and
_b_ is an animal. Now how do you suppose anybody knows this? People who
study these things do not _guess_--they _know_. The real difference lies
in what these tiny little creatures do, not at all how they are formed.
About three-fourths of all the kinds of sea-weed, for instance, are
found to be animal--not one animal, but a colony. The other fourth are
vegetables. All these used to be considered vegetables; so did the
sponge and the coral and the sea-anemones, and they are all now known to
be animals. Every time you play the game of "Twenty Questions" you have
to think and decide whether the particular thing you have chosen is
"animal, vegetable, or mineral." Have you any notion what makes the real
difference between them?
I imagine that, sooner or later, you will think and say the difference
is that animals can move and plants can not. That will be a very
sensible conclusion if you do come to it, though not a correct one, for
plants do move, some of them very much as animals do; others, and the
greater number, in another way; which all seems very wonderful, and
which I want to talk over next time.
What makes the real, deep-down difference is this: Plants can live on
mineral matters alone, on earth and water and air, and these things they
can change into their own flesh and blood, their stems and sap and
fruit. Animals can only live on what the plants have already turned from
dead into living material. We need water--that is a mineral--and salt
and air, which are minerals too, if we are to keep alive and well. But
we can not live on these things alone: we should soon die if we had no
food; and all really nourishing food, all that keeps our blood warm and
makes us grow, has once been vegetable. Not one bird, or fish, or
animal, not one single human being, could ever have lived on this earth,
in the air, or in the water, if the plants had not come first, and
prepared the earth for us to live in.
These are "sure enough" fairies that are forever working their wonders
for us. The roots, like elves, grope down in the earth, and gather its
treasures; the leaves stretch out into the air, and gather its riches,
and out of what they have collected they weave the beautiful flowers and
delicious fruits and golden grain.
I should like to make very clear just the way they do this: it is very
wonderful and beautiful to study how they work their spells. First, the
root, as we have seen before, with its little helmet, bores its way down
into the earth. If it finds no water or damp earth it soon wilts and
dies, but if it finds a wet place it begins to soak up moisture. Besides
the water, it sucks up all the parts of the earth that are dissolved in
the water. The water it _must_ have, and it will manage to live awhile
on that alone, as Dr. Tanner did, but it can not live so very long. Poor
ground means ground that has little or no plant food in it.
You know, if you ever did any gardening work, that you can stick a
cutting of geranium or begonia into pure sand that has no nourishment at
all in it, and that if you keep it well watered the cutting will strike
out roots and bear leaves. This is, in fact, the best way to start
cuttings, for mould is a little apt to rot the stem, but the sand
preserves it. After a while the baby plant is tired of doing nothing but
sucking, and cries for some stronger food. Then you must put it into
rich earth, still giving it plenty of water. The roots, like the baby's
stomach, will at first be satisfied with a very milk-and-watery diet,
but after a while it must have a strengthening soup.
The roots bring the plant a good deal, but the leaves are the principal
feeders. You remember, perhaps, reading about the millions of little
mouths the plant has all over its leaves. These mouths bring both food
to nourish and air to sustain the plant. A fish keeps itself alive by
sucking the water it lives in all the while through its gills. It gets
out of the water whatever it needs--air and some food. The plants are
like fishes; their water is the great ocean of air that lies on the
surface of the earth. They draw it in through their mouths, take out of
it all they need, and then breathe the rest out again.
[Illustration: FIG. 5.]
[Illustration: FIG. 6.]
In Fig. 5 you see a piece of a liverwort leaf cut down through the
mouth, and in Fig. 6 another kind, a blue-flag (_l l_, lips; _h h_,
hollow of the mouth).
Air is a curious mixture. It is a gas made of several gases stirred
together as you stir tea and milk and sugar. One of these gases is
called oxygen (don't be afraid of the hard names); that is what keeps us
alive. I won't give you the name of the next, because it is only used,
like the milk, to weaken the tea. The third is a very disagreeable and
dangerous gas, called _carbonic acid gas_. It is this last that makes
your head ache in a crowded room or car. This is what you hear of every
now and then as _choke-damp_, which suffocates people down in mines and
deep wells. It is this which comes from burning charcoal, and makes it
sure death to burn it in a closed room. There is very little of this
dangerous stuff even in close air. Carbonic acid gas, though so
poisonous, is made up of two things, which are very good and perfectly
harmless when they are separated--carbon and the life-giving oxygen.
Carbon is coal, or something like coal. United together, these two
harmless things make a dreadfully dangerous one, just as innocent
saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal unite to form the deadly gunpowder.
Now notice how beautifully plants and animals are made to live together
and help each other. Animals breathe in the air, and help themselves to
the oxygen which keeps them alive, but breathe out the deadly carbonic
acid gas. Plants breathing the air separate by some wonderful power of
their own the carbonic acid gas into carbon and oxygen, help themselves
to the carbon, and breathe out the oxygen. What plants consume we throw
away as useless, and what plants breathe out sustains our life. That is
the reason why the country is apt to be so much more healthy than the
city. The air that is poisoned by people and fires becomes purified by
plants.
Unlike the fairies of the story-book, who do all their good deeds by
night, these little plant fairies work only by the light. The sun is
their master, and his first ray is their call from sleep. They set to
work in a minute, separating the dangerous carbonic acid gas into carbon
and oxygen; and while they use the carbon and grow by it as you do by
your food, they are giving back the sweet pure oxygen to the air. All
day long they are at their good work; but when the sun sinks behind the
hills, they do not need any sunset gun to tell them their time of rest
has come. They drop work at once, and drop their fairy ways; they begin
right away to behave as the animals do--to breathe in oxygen and breathe
out the hateful carbonic acid. That is the reason it is not healthy to
sleep in a room with flowers at night, though they are so good to have
in the daytime.
We owe our lives to the plants--the food we eat, the pure air we
breathe, as well as much of the rain that falls from heaven. They are
ministering angels, and the loving, tender heavenly Father has appointed
them their work to do--to beautify the earth and purify the air under
the guidance of the glorious sun, which He has created, and which He
keeps in its appointed path.
THE CRUISE OF THE CANOE CLUB.[1]
[1] Begun in No. 146, HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE.
BY W. L. ALDEN,
AUTHOR OF "THE MORAL PIRATES," "THE CRUISE OF THE 'GHOST,'" ETC., ETC.
CHAPTER IV.
From the books they had read, Harry and Joe had learned exactly what to
do in case of capsizing under sail, and had often discussed the matter.
"When I capsize," Harry would say, "I shall pull the masts out of her,
and she'll then right of her own accord. Then I shall unship the rudder,
put my hands on the stern-post, and raise myself up so that I can
straddle the deck, and gradually work my way along until I can get into
the cockpit. After that I shall bail her out, step the masts, and sail
on again." Nothing could be easier than to describe this plan while
sitting in a comfortable room on shore, but to carry it out in a rough
sea was a different affair.
Harry was not at all frightened when he found himself in the water, and
he instantly swam clear of the canoe to avoid becoming entangled in her
rigging. He then proceeded to unship the masts and the rudder, and when
this was done, tried to climb in over the stern. He found that it was
quite impossible. No sooner would he get astride of the stern than the
canoe would roll and throw him into the water again. After half a dozen
attempts he gave it up, and swimming to the side of the canoe, managed
to throw himself across the cockpit. This was the way in which Charley
Smith had climbed into his canoe the day before, and to Harry's great
surprise--for no such method of climbing into a canoe had been mentioned
in any of the books he had read--it proved successful.
Of course the deck of the canoe was now level with the water, which
washed in and out of her with every sea that struck her. Harry seized
the empty tin can which he used as a bailer, and which was made fast to
one of the timbers of the canoe with a line to prevent it from floating
away, but he could not make any headway in bailing her out. The water
washed into her just as fast as he could throw it out again, and he
began to think that he should have to paddle the canoe ashore full of
water. This would have been hard work, for with so much water in her she
was tremendously heavy and unwieldy; but after getting her head up to
the wind with his paddle, he found that less water washed into her, and
after long and steady work, he succeeded in bailing most of it out.
[Illustration: NOT SO EASY AS IT LOOKS.]
Meanwhile Charley, whose help Harry had declined, because he felt so
sure that he could get out of his difficulty by following the plan that
he had learned from books on canoeing, was trying to help Joe. At first
Joe thought it was a good joke to be capsized. His Lord Ross
lateen-sail, with its boom and yard, had floated clear of the canoe of
its own accord, and as the only spar left standing was a mast about two
feet high, she ought to have righted. But Joe had forgotten to lash his
sand-bag to the keelson, and the result was that whenever he touched the
canoe she would roll completely over, and come up on the other side. Joe
could neither climb in over the stern nor throw himself across the deck,
and every attempt he made resulted in securing for him a fresh ducking.
Charley tried to help him by holding on to the capsized canoe, but he
could not keep it right side up; and as Joe soon began to show signs of
becoming exhausted, Charley was about to insist that he should hang on
to the stern of the _Midnight_, and allow himself to be towed ashore,
when Tom in the _Twilight_ arrived on the scene.
Tom had seen the _Dawn_ and the _Sunshine_ capsize, and was far enough
to leeward to have time to take in his sail before the squall reached
him. It therefore did him no harm, and he paddled up against the wind to
help his friends. It took him some time to reach the _Dawn_, for it blew
so hard that when one blade of the paddle was in the water, he could
hardly force the other blade against the wind. Before the cruise was
over he learned that by turning one blade at right angles to the
other--for the two blades of a paddle are joined together by a ferrule
in the middle--he could paddle against a head-wind with much less labor.
The _Twilight_, being an undecked "Rice Lake" canoe, could easily carry
two persons, and, with the help of Charley and Tom, Joe climbed into
her. Charley then picked up the floating sail of the _Dawn_, made her
painter fast to his own stern, and started under paddle for the shore.
It was not a light task to tow the water-logged canoe, but both the sea
and the wind helped him, and he landed by the time that the other boys
had got the camp fire started and the coffee nearly ready.
"Well," said Harry, "I've learned how to get into a canoe to-day. If I'd
stuck to the rule, and tried to get in over the stern, I should be out
in the lake yet."
"I'm going to write to the London _Field_ and get it to print my new
rule about capsizing," said Joe.
"What's that?" asked Charley. "To turn somersaults in the water? That
was what you were doing all the time until Tom came up."
"That was for exercise, and had nothing to do with my rule, which is,
'Always have a fellow in a "Rice Lake" canoe to pick you up.'"
"All your trouble came from forgetting to lash your ballast bag,"
remarked Harry. "I hope it will teach you a lesson."
"That's a proper remark for a Commodore who wants to enforce
discipline," cried Charley; "but I insist that the trouble came from
carrying too much sail."
"The sail would have been all right if it hadn't been for the wind,"
replied Harry.
"And the wind wouldn't have done us any harm if we hadn't been on the
lake," added Joe.
"Boys, attention!" cried Harry. "Captain Charles Smith is hereby
appointed sailing-master of this fleet, and will be obeyed and respected
accordingly, or, at any rate, as much as he can make us obey and respect
him. Anyhow, it will be his duty to tell us how much sail to carry, and
how to manage the canoes under sail."
"This is the second day of the cruise," remarked Joe, an hour later, as
he crept into his blankets, "and I have been wet but once. There is
something wrong about it, for on our other cruises I was always wet
through once every day. However, I'll hope for the best."
In the middle of the night Joe had reason to feel more satisfied. It
began to rain. As his rubber blanket was wet, and in that state seemed
hotter than ever, Joe could not sleep under the shelter of it, and, as
on the previous night, went to sleep with nothing over him but his
woollen blanket. His head was underneath the deck, and as the rain began
to fall very gently, it did not awaken him until his blanket was
thoroughly wet.
He roused himself, and sat up. He was startled to see a figure wrapped
in a rubber blanket sitting on his deck. "Who's there?" he asked,
suddenly. "Sing out, or I'll shoot!"
"You can't shoot with a jackknife or a tin bailer, so I'm not much
afraid of you," was the reply.
"Oh, it's you, Tom, is it?" said Joe, much relieved.
"My canoe's half full of water, so I came out into the rain to get dry."
"Couldn't you keep the rain out of the canoe with the rubber blanket?"
"The canoe is fourteen feet long, and hasn't any deck, and the blanket
is six feet long. I had the blanket hung over the paddle, but of course
the rain came in at the ends of the canoe."
"Well, I'm pretty wet, for I didn't cover my canoe at all. What'll we
do?"
"Sit here till it lets up, I suppose," replied Tom. "It must stop
raining some time."
"I've got a better plan than that. Is your rubber blanket dry inside?
Mine isn't."
"Yes, it's dry enough."
"Let's put it on the ground to lie on, and use my rubber blanket for a
tent. We can put it over a ridge-pole about two feet from the ground,
and stake the edges down."
"What will we do for blankets? It's too cold to sleep without them."
"We can each borrow one from Harry and Charley. They've got two apiece,
and can spare one of them."
Joe's plan was evidently the only one to be adopted; and so the two boys
pitched their little rubber tent, borrowed two blankets, and crept under
shelter. They were decidedly wet, but they lay close together, and
managed to keep warm. In the morning they woke up, rested and
comfortable, to find a bright sun shining and their clothes dried by the
heat of their bodies. Neither had taken the slightest cold, although
they had run what was undoubtedly a serious risk, in spite of the fact
that one does not easily take cold when camping out.
As they were enjoying their breakfast, the canoeists naturally talked
over the events of the previous day and night. Harry had been kept
perfectly dry by his canoe tent, one side of which he had left open, so
as to have plenty of fresh air; and Charley had also been well protected
from the rain by his rubber blanket, hung in the usual way over the
paddle, although he had been far too warm to be comfortable.
"I'm tired of suffocating under that rubber blanket of mine, and I've
invented a new way of covering the canoe at night, which will leave me a
little air to breathe. I'll explain it to you when we camp to-night,
Joe."
"I'm glad to hear it, for I've made up my mind that I'd rather be rained
on than take a Turkish bath all night long under that suffocating
blanket."
"Will your new plan work on my canoe?" asked Tom.
"No; nothing will keep that 'Rice Lake' bath-tub of yours dry in a rain
unless you deck her over."
"Now that we've had a chance to try our sails, which rig do you like
best, Sailing-master?" asked Harry.
"That lateen-rig that Joe has," replied Charley. "He can set his sail
and take it in while the rest of us are trying to find our halyards. Did
you see how the whole concern--spars and sail--floated free of the canoe
of their own accord the moment she capsized?"
"That's so; but then my big balance-lug holds more wind than Joe's
sail."
"It held too much yesterday. It's a first-rate rig for racing, but it
isn't anything like as handy as the lateen for cruising; neither is my
standing-lug. I tried to get it down in a hurry yesterday, and the
halyards jammed, and I couldn't get it down for two or three minutes."
"I can get my leg-of-mutton in easy enough," remarked Tom, "but I can't
get the mast out of the step unless the water's perfectly smooth, and I
don't believe I could then without going ashore."
"Now, Commodore," said Charley, "if you'll give the order to start, I'll
give the order to carry all sail. The breeze is light and the water is
smooth, and we ought to run down to the end of the lake by noon."
The little fleet made a beautiful appearance as it cruised down the lake
under full sail. The breeze was westerly, which fact enabled the canoes
to carry their after-sails--technically known as "dandies"--to much
advantage. When running directly before the wind the "dandy" is
sometimes a dangerous sail, as it is apt to make the canoe broach to;
but with a wind from any other direction than dead aft it is a very
useful sail.
The canoes sailed faster than they had sailed the day before, because
there was no rough sea to check their headway. They reached Magog at
noon, and went to look at the dam which crosses the Magog River a few
rods from the lake, and wondered how they were ever to get through the
rapids below it.
There was a place where the canoes could be lowered one by one over the
breast of the dam, but the rapids, which extended from below the dam for
nearly a quarter of a mile, were very uninviting to a timid canoeist.
The water did not seem to be more than three or four feet deep, but it
was very swift, and full of rocks. "You boys can't never run them rapids
in them boats," said a man who came to look at the canoes.
The boys did not like to be daunted by their first rapid, and as there
did not seem to be much risk of drowning, they decided to take the
chances of getting the canoes through it safely. Harry gave the order to
lash everything fast in the canoes that could be washed overboard, and
he prepared to lead the way in the _Sunshine_.
It was magnificent sport shooting down the rapid like an arrow. The
canoes drove through two or three waves which washed the decks. Harry's
and Charley's canoes each struck once while in the rapid, but in each
case only the keel struck the rock, and the current dragged the canoes
safely over it. Every one was delighted with the way his canoe had
acted, and with the skill with which he had avoided this or that rock,
or had discovered the best channel just at the right moment. In their
excitement they let the canoes float gently down the stream, until they
suddenly discovered another rapid at the beginning of a sharp bend in
the river just ahead of them.
It was nothing like as fierce in appearance as the first rapid, and as
Harry led the way, the others followed close after him, one behind the
other, fancying that they could run the rapid without the least trouble.
Half-way down Harry's canoe struck on a rock, swung broad-side to the
current, and hung there. Tom was so close behind him that he could not
alter his course, and so ran straight into the _Sunshine_ with a
terrible crash. The _Dawn_ and the _Twilight_ instantly followed, and as
the four canoes thus piled together keeled over and spilled their
occupants into the river, it began to look as if the rapid had
determined to make the irreverent young canoeists respect it.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
HOW BILLY WENT UP IN THE WORLD.
BY ANNETTE NOBLE.
Part II.
It was a spring evening, so very fair that even Billy Knox had taste
enough to be pleased with the robins, the hedges, and the May blossoms.
He was halting on his way home, under the tree into which he had fallen
eight months before. The balloon was not there; its owner had it back
long ago.
That Billy had a home is to be accounted for in this way: The evening
after Peter, the tailor, took him in to supper, he remained overnight,
and after breakfast he went out and milked the cow. He walked to the
woods and chopped fuel enough for a week. Then he staid to dinner.
During the afternoon he found three cents in what was left of his
trousers pocket, and he put that at once into the family treasury. In
the days that followed he haunted the next town, a larger one than
Langham. Whenever he earned anything he returned with it to the red
house with the sunflowers, where, without any talk about it, he came at
last to consider himself at home. He brought in as much as he ate. He
amused little Ben, and made his life much more exciting. Peter did not
care how long he staid so that he paid his way.
On this particular evening Billy seemed in the highest spirits. He
leaped up joyously and hung from the branches of the tree. He was
prancing about like a colt, when down the lane came a man, but not
Peter. This time it was Squire Ellery, who owned the house in which
Peter lived. He was a hard-working, quiet-appearing farmer, respected by
everybody.
"I ain't going to do it," exclaimed the boy, hastily.
"What are you going to do instead?" asked the man. "Are you going to
grow up a loafer and turn out a tramp?"
"No; I have got something prime on hand that suits me exactly."
"What is it?"
"Well," began Billy, "you know the Annerly Minstrel Troupe, don't you?"
"Yes, I know of them."
"They stay in the town all winter, but summers they go travelling around
the country. I have been helping them for nothing lately--odd jobs off
and on--and they like me. Once when the 'end-man' was sick I took his
place at the last minute, and I made so much fun that the manager said
he would take me along this summer and make a crack performer of me. He
will give me some clothes, and when I get valuable to him he will pay me
well. Ain't that something like?"
"Yes, Billy Knox, it is something like--something like a monkey, more
like a fool--for you to smut your face, to tell silly jokes, to grin and
giggle and dress up in petticoats at night, that you may learn to swear
and drink and gamble by day. That is what it is like exactly."
The farmer laid his hard hand on the boy's red head, but his voice was
soft as he said, kindly: "Take more time to think it all over, Billy.
Remember, I promise to feed, clothe, and send you to school winters, and
when you get valuable to me I will also pay you wages. Your work will be
hoeing corn and potatoes instead of braying like a donkey or thrumming
on a banjo; but you will respect yourself a good deal more. It will be
better to wash the sweat of honest labor off your face than to be
smearing it into a blackamoor's. I will help you make a man of yourself
if you are only willing and ready, Billy."
The boy thought of dull days in the fields, with oxen for companions;
then of foot-lights, gay music, and laughter. He rubbed his boots on the
grass and muttered, "Much obliged, Mr. Ellery, but I ain't ready for
_that_, nor willing either, in your way of doing it."
"Very well; I have said all I am going to say. I shall never ask you
again."
Billy trudged home rather soberly. He opened the cottage door a little
later, and at his footfall Ben sprang from the pantry and stood
anxiously watching his pockets. Billy knew exactly what it meant. Ben
had gone to the cupboard, "And when he got there the cupboard was bare."
This had often happened of late. Billy pulled out of one pocket a few
slices of bacon, and out of another a tiny paper of tea, saying:
"Granny, I have got you some to-night--tea, granny."
"Oh yes. When you were in your cradle, I told my husband you would live
to take care of me."
"She thinks you are father," stuttered Ben, as he got out the
frying-pan. Soon the whole place was filled with the welcome odor of
bacon and tea. Billy cut some bread, and seizing granny's chair, pushed
it to the table. He stared at her while she asked her blessing, and idly
watched the sunbeams in the rusty lace of her old cap. When she opened
her eyes, which were as blue as a baby's, she added, tenderly: "God
bless you, dear. You brought us a good supper."
It was seldom that she spoke so coherently, but a bit of a prayer often
seemed to clear for a moment her mind, as a precious drop might act in
some unsettled mixture.
"What if granny should not have any supper some night when I am gone?"
was the thought that rushed into the boy's mind, and into his eyes came
tears. His heart was touched by the thought. What preachers and teachers
and offers of help had never been able to effect, the trustful gratitude
of a feeble little old woman had accomplished. He choked, spluttered,
and pretended he had swallowed the tea the wrong way. Then he did like
unto sinners the world over--he tried to harden his heart again. He
reflected that this was Peter's home and Peter's mother. It was Peter's
business to support his own family. It was Billy's business to rise in
the world.
After supper he made ready for certain exercises very common in the
cabin of late--exercises which he considered likely to improve him in
his chosen "profession." He pushed granny's chair back into the
chimney-corner, and waited until she dozed before he exclaimed, "Come,
Ben!"
[Illustration: BILLY AND BEN REHEARSING.]
Poor Ben! his face grew more mournful than ever. It was no longer any
fun for him, but he patiently consented, and arranged the stage
"properties." He tied on his own and Billy's black masks and their stiff
paper collars, wishing much that his own did not so savagely cut his
poor little ears. He then sat meekly down at the end of the semicircle
of seats, and solemnly got off all the laboriously learned jokes that
his stammering tongue could compass. He surrendered himself to Billy in
a waltz that made every lock of his lint-white hair fly out straight,
and which finally left him breathless under the table legs.
Well, after Ben had been, with some changes of costume, a giraffe, a
Zulu, a Broadway belle, and a propounder of conundrums, he became so
incapable of being anything else but a tired little boy that Billy
relented, and let him lie on the ragged old lounge. In the quiet that
followed, the older boy's brain began to work upon a question that
worried him much. Should he go on a farm, or should he follow his own
fascinating plan? He waked up Ben, and told, in a most engaging way, of
the wonderful minstrel career which opened before him, and he reported
Squire Ellery's offer, but not his words of disapproval. Now Ben, who
was but eight years old, had his own thoughts, and all the more of them
that he gave so few away in words.
"If it was me," said little Ben, promptly, if somewhat sleepily, "I
would rather be out in the sunlight making th-th-things gr-gr-grow.
Wheat fields are so pretty, and I like ca-ca-cattle. They always seem to
know me if I co-co-come near them. I never would dance until I got dizzy
if I could help it. I think it is si-si-silly; it ain't being a man."
Billy gazed at Ben, somewhat surprised. Here were words almost like
Squire Ellery's coming as if they were quoted from out of this
Hop-o'-my-Thumb.
"Ben," he said, "you don't really know anything about minstrel shows.
Some day I will take you to the regular thing."
"I would rather stay here and read to granny. I should be afraid."
"Stay, then, you little coward!" said Billy, roughly.
Granny dozed and snored softly; the lean cat sprang into Ben's arms, and
they slept peacefully together; while Billy walked the room, and peered
out of the window-panes. He half decided that he would go to the farmer
in the morning. Then he half decided he never would go. At last granny
awoke, and said, "Bring the Book and read good words; we have had enough
of this day."
Ben would not wake up. He really could not do so after his hard evening
exercises; and when Billy shook him, the cat took Ben's part, and
scratched Billy resentfully.
"Well, I would as soon read as to hear him stutter over it," said the
older boy, getting the Bible, the cover of which had been bright and
fresh when granny had been so herself. Now it was as nearly out of its
binding as was her soul.
"'The children of Ephraim, being armed, and carrying bows, turned back
in the day of battle,'" read Billy, just where he opened the Book. Then
he asked, "Wouldn't they fight?"
"Able but not willing to do what a body ought to do. I don't remember
about the fighting. Perhaps it was only to endure something. Now I will
go to bed," said granny, forgetting that Billy had read but one verse.
When he was left alone, he sat and pondered on those children of Ephraim
until Peter tumbled into the house in his usual state. Then he let Ben
sleep on, and he himself helped the tailor to bed, doing it with much
less ceremony than the latter approved of.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
[Illustration: MORNING AND EVENING.--DRAWN BY MARY A. LATHBURY.]
BADMINTON.
BY SHERWOOD RYSE.
It is first cousin to lawn tennis, and it is so like lawn tennis that
any one would guess that the two games were closely related. Perhaps
most boys and girls would say that Badminton is a slow game, and very
childish; and, compared with lawn tennis, perhaps it is. But although it
is by no means so robust a game, and requires not nearly so much skill
as its cousin, it has many advantages. Lawn tennis is an out-door game,
and demands a great deal of space and the best possible light; otherwise
it gets sulky. Badminton, on the other hand, can put up with a small
space and a moderately good light. Being, as we have said, less robust
than the other game, wind does not agree with it. Nevertheless, in still
weather it can be played out-of-doors, and in-doors in all weathers.
The small space required is a great advantage that Badminton enjoys. A
large part of the population of this great country lives in city houses,
whose back yards are perhaps fifty feet long and only half as wide. Not
much in the way of games can be done in a city back yard; yet one can
play Badminton there. What if it be planted with posts on which the
laundress stretches her clothes-line? So much the better. We shall want
those posts, if they are conveniently placed, for we have a net to
spread. This should be fastened to the posts so that the top of it is
five feet from the ground, and a net (or a strip of calico) two feet
wide, and as long as the distance between the posts, will be quite large
enough.
The court may be marked out with whitening or chalk, and should measure
about twenty feet by fifteen on each side of the net. At a distance of
five feet from the net, on each side, the service lines are drawn, and
then the court is complete.
The implements of the game are merely battledores and shuttlecocks. Very
babyish, you will say. But if you can once overcome your pride, and
condescend to use such playthings, you will find that the game is not
nearly so babyish as you may think it. The battledores should be good
ones, strong and heavy, and strung either with catgut, like a tennis
racket, or with string. The shuttlecock is greatly improved by being
made heavy. Those sold in stores especially for Badminton are already
made heavy enough, but the ordinary toy shuttlecocks require a little, a
very little, melted lead poured into a hole in the cork. As the lead
cools and hardens, the cork closes around it, and holds it tight.
The rules of Badminton are very much like those of lawn tennis, except
that every stroke must be "volleyed"--that is, the shuttlecock must be
struck before it touches the ground, for of course it will not bound.
The "server" must send his first ball so that if it were to fall to the
ground it would fall _beyond_ the service line of his opponent's court,
and not within it, as in lawn tennis. After the service it may be
returned to any part of the opponent's court, and kept up until one of
the players fails to return it over the net, or hits it so far that it
falls outside of the opponent's court.
The game is counted in the same manner as in lawn tennis--fifteen,
thirty, forty, game; with deuce and vantage, when the score is forty
all--and the one who first wins six games wins the set. Two, three, or
four persons can play at the same time.
With good players, it will frequently happen that the shuttlecock will
be kept in the air for several minutes without falling to the ground,
and it is interesting to keep count of the number of times that it is
thus returned over the net. At the same time it must be remembered that
the object of the game is to send the shuttlecock so that the opponent
can _not_ return it; hence it will be contrary to the spirit of the game
to encourage long rallies by purposely sending easy returns.
RIGHT THROUGH A BARN.
BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD.
"Rube," said Bun Gates, when they came together one day after breakfast,
"did you hear about Squire Cudworth's new barn?"
"Guess there isn't anything more to hear about it. Folks didn't talk of
anything else while he was putting it up. Father said it would hold
horses enough to run a livery-stable."
"That isn't it. I heard all about it at breakfast. The railroad's goin'
to run right through it."
"Right through the barn? I wish they'd run it through the academy, if
'twasn't for spoiling the green."
"It's cut Pop Simmons's orchard right in two, and they've tore away
Widow McCue's pig-pen, spite of all Felix and Biddy could do to stop
'em. Now it's the big barn."
"Biggest barn there ever was anywhere around here. It's just awful. Did
you ever see a railroad?"
"Only the streak they've made along where this one's going to come. I'll
tell you what father said, though."
"What did he say, Bun?"
"He said it was one of old Squire Cudworth's jokes. There was a quarrel
between him, and the railroad, and so he put the barn there to keep it
from coming through."
"It won't do it, Bun. A railroad'll go right through a hill and not half
try."
"Come on, Rube, we'll be late; but father says he guesses the railroad
didn't make anything very heavy out of the Squire's joke."
When the class in arithmetic was called up that fore-noon, Bun Gates and
Rube Hollenhouser went down to the foot of it, one after the other, for
the first time that academy term. When they got there and could have a
good look at each other's slates, they each knew what sort of a picture
the other could make of Squire Cudworth's big barn, with something full
of fire and smoke and steam smashing into it at both ends.
The afternoon wore away, a little at a time, until it was all gone, but
every boy they knew had heard of what was coming to Squire Cudworth's
barn by that time, and at least a dozen of them wanted to go and have a
look at it.
Squire Cudworth was standing at the corner of the barn, a very large,
fat, rosy-faced man, with his hands in his pockets, and he looked as if
he were waiting for something. He chuckled all over, and they could hear
him jingle the money in his pockets as he recognized the boys.
"That's the railroad, boys. Them's the ties, and some call 'em sleepers.
The rails are glued down on 'em. You'll see some men come along pretty
soon with great bundles of iron rails in one hand and pots of glue in
the other. They're 'most here now. By to-morrer night that barn of mine
won't be a safe place for hosses. It's awful, boys--jest awful!"
"How do you s'pose they'll get through the barn?" asked Bun.
"Can't say. I've kep' 'em off long as I could. That's what I'm here for
now. We don't need any railroad in Prome Centre. That's what I told 'em.
If they'd only dig the creek out good and deep, so it would be of some
use. They wouldn't, though, and I might as well have built my barn right
in the middle of the creek."
Every boy in the crowd was listening to him, but not one of them could
see what there was in it all that made the old Squire chuckle so. Three
or four asked,
"Does it go through on Friday?"
"Day after to-morrer, boys. I shall be out of breath by that time. Have
to go home and go to bed, and put all my hosses in the old barn up on
the hill. You'd all better be here then. Tell all the other boys. Have
'em all come." Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle, and the bunches of keys and
the small change jingled merrily, as if the Squire were making fun of
the railroad, or the boys, or of his misfortunes.
"We'll all be here," said Rube. "Boys, there'll be something worth
seeing, sure's you live."
They were most of them at one place or another along the track before
school next morning, and at the noon recess they compared notes of the
matters they had seen--men spiking down rails with big hammers, for
instance, instead of glue-pots. It was a great time for a lot of boys
who had never seen anything of the kind before, and Rube Hollenhouser
stirred up their envy a little. He said:
"Dolf Zimmerman's been on a railroad. He told me all about it. There was
an accident, too, and he'd have been killed as dead as a hammer if he'd
been there."
"Dolf Zimmerman!" exclaimed a fellow who lived away at the upper end of
the village. "Who cares for him? He's travelled, that's all. This
railroad of ours is going to run right through Cudworth's barn. I guess
he wouldn't want to be riding on it just then."
There was a general agreement with that opinion, but the boys who lived
at places below Zimmerman's store all found an errand in there before
the day was over. Some of them only bought a cent's worth of something,
and looked at Dolf, but three or four asked him questions right out, and
it was Felix McCue who got the most out of him. The Widow McCue never
traded at Zimmerman's, and it was a bold thing for Felix to walk in and
ask of Dolf over the counter,
"What's the price of yer bist Jayvy coffee?"
"Thirty-five cents a pound."