"Catch him-catch him-catch him."

"Sure ye'd bether not, for I haven't got a cint wid me or I'd lave it in yer jackets. What's the use of staling all a man has whin he has jist nothing at all at all? Bad luck to ye

for bothering me so."

About this time the frog concert was in full tune, and the hoarse chorus so alarmed Pat that he took to his heels, for he was now sober enough to run. Reaching his home, two miles distant from the scene of his encounter with the "highwaymin" who held such a long parley with him, he gave a graphic history of his grievance. Soon it was noised about the neighborhood that Patrick O'Rouke had been waylaid and abused by a drunken set of vagabonds, whose headquarters were near a meadow on the banks of the Black River; but the fear of the citizens subsided when they discovered that Pat had been out on a bender, and could not distinguish a frog from a friend or an enemy.

THE SIGN OF DISTRESS.

'Twas a wild, dreary night, in cheerless December; 'Twas a night only lit by a meteor's gleam;

Twas a night, of that night I distinctly remember,—
That my soul journeyed forth on the wings of a dream.
That dream found me happy, by tried friends surrounded,
Enjoying with rapture the comforts of wealth;

My cup overflowing with blessings unbounded,
My heart fully charged from the fountains of health.

That dream left me wretched, by friendship forsaken,
Dejected, despairing, and wrapped in dismay;
By poverty, sickness, and ruin o'ertaken,

To every temptation and passion a prey;
Devoid of an end or an aim, I then wandered
O'er highway and by-way and lone wilderness;
On the past and the present and future I pondered,
But pride bade me tender no sign of distress.

In frenzy the wine cup I instantly quaffed at,

And habit and time made me quaff to excess; But heated by wine, like a madman, I laughed at The thought of e'er giving the sign of distress; But wine sank me lower by lying pretenses,

It tattered my raiment and furrowed my face, It palsied my sinews and pilfered my senses, And forced me to proffer a sign of distress.

I reeled to a chapel, where churchmen were kneeling,
And asking their Savior poor sinners to bless;
My claim I presented--the door of that chapel
Was slammed in my face at the sign of distress;
I strolled to the priest, to the servant of Heaven,
And sued for relief with wild eagerness;
He prayed that my sins might at last be forgiven,
And thought he had answered my sign of distress.

I staggered at last to the home of my mother, Believing my prayers there would meet with success But father and mother and sister and brother

Disowned me, and taunted my sign of distress.

I lay down to die, a stranger drew nigh me,
A spotless white lambskin adorning his dress;
My eye caught the emblem, and ere he passed by me,
I
gave, as before, the sign of distress.

With godlike emotion that messenger hastens

To grasp me, and whisper, "My brother, I bless
The hour of my life when I learned of the Masons
To give and to answer your sign of distress."
Let a sign of distress by a craftsman be given,
And though priceless to me is eternity's bliss,
May my name never enter the records of Heaven
Should I fail to acknowledge that-sign of distress.

THE MYSTERY OF LIFE IN CHRIST.
MRS. E. PRENTISS.

I walk along the crowded streets, and mark
The eager, anxious faces;

Wondering what this man seeks, what that heart craves
In earthly places.

Do I want any thing that they are wanting?
Is each of them my brother?

Could we hold fellowship, speak heart to heart,
Each to the other?

Nay, but I know not! only this I know,
That sometimes merely crossing

Another's path, where life's tumultuous waves
Are ever tossing,

He, as he passes, whispers in mine ear
One magic sentence only,

And in the awful loneliness of crowds
I am not lonely.

Ah, what a life is theirs who live in Christ;
How vast the mystery!

Reaching in height to heaven, and in its depth
The unfathomed sea.

FREEDOM AND PATRIOTISM.-ORVILLE DEWEY.

God has stamped upon our very humanity this impress of freedom. It is the unchartered prerogative of human na、 ture. A soul ceases to be a soul, in proportion as it ceases to be free. Strip it of this, and you strip it of one of its essential and characteristic attributes. It is this that draws the footsteps of the wild Indian to his wide and boundless desert-paths, and makes him prefer them to the gay saloons and soft carpets of sumptuous palaces. It is this that makes it so difficult to bring him within the pale of artificial civiliza tion. Our roving tribes are perishing—a sad and solemn sacrifice upon the altar of their wild freedom. They come among us, and look with childish wonder upon the perfection of our arts, and the splendor of our habitations; they submit with ennui and weariness, for a few days, to our burdensome forms and restraints; and then turn their faces to their forest homes, and resolve to push those homes onward till they sink in the Pacific waves, rather than not be free.

It is thus that every people is attached to its country, just in proportion as it is free. No matter if that country be in the rocky fastnesses of Switzerland, amidst the snows of Tartary, or on the most barren and lonely island-shore; no matter if that country be so poor as to force away its chil dren to other and richer lands, for employment and sustenance; yet when the songs of those free homes chance to fall upon the exile's ear, no soft and ravishing airs that wait upon the timid feastings of Asiatic opulence ever thrilled the heart with such mingled rapture and agony as those simple tones. Sad mementos might they be of poverty and want and toil; yet it was enough that they were mementos of happy freedom. And more than once has it been necessary to forbid by military orders, in the armies of the Swiss mercenaries, the singing of their native songs.

And such an attachment, do I believe, is found in our own people, to their native country. It is the country of the free; and that single consideration compensates for the want of many advantages which other countries possess over us. And glad am I that it opens wide its hospitable gates to many a noble but persecuted citizen, from the dungeons of Austria and Italy, and the imprisoning castles and citadels of Poland. Here may they find rest, as they surely find sympathy, though it is saddened with many bitter remembrances!

Yes, let me be free; let me go and come at my own will; let me do business and make journeys, without a vexatious police or insolent soldiery to watch my steps; let me think and do and speak what I please, subject to no limit but that which is set by the common weal; subject to no law but that which conscience binds upon me; and I will bless my country, and love its most rugged rocks and its most barren soil.

I have seen my countrymen, and have been with them a fellow-wanderer, in other lands; and little did I see or feel to warrant the apprehension, sometimes expressed, that foreign travel would weaken our patriotic attachments. One sigh for home-home, arose from all hearts. And why, from palaces and courts-why, from galleries of the arts, where the marble softens into life, and painting sheds an almost living presence of beauty around it-why, from the moun

tain's awful brow, and the lovely valleys and lakes touched with the sunset hues of old romance-why, from those venerable and touching ruins to which our very heart growswhy, from all these scenes, were they looking beyond the swellings of the Atlantic wave, to a dearer and holier spot of earth —their own, own country? Doubtless, it was, in part, because it is their country. But it was also, as every one's experience will testify, because they knew that there was no oppression, no pitiful exaction of petty tyranny; because that there, they knew, was no accredited and irresistible religious domination; because that there, they knew, they should not meet the odious soldier at every corner, nor swarms of imploring beggars, the victims of misrule; that there, no curse causeless did fall, and no blight, worse than plague and pestilence, did descend amidst the pure dews of heaven; because, in fine, that there, they knew, was liberty-upon all the green hills, and amidst all the peaceful valleys-liberty, the wall of fire around the humblest home,-the crown of glory, studded with her ever-blazing stars,upon the proudest mansion!

My friends, upon our own homes that blessing rests, that guardian care and glorious crown; and when we return to those homes, and so long as we dwell in them-so long as no oppressor's foot invades their thresholds, let us bless them, and hallow them as the homes of freedom! Let us make them too the homes of a nobler freedom-of freedom from vice, from evil, from passion-from every corrupting bondage of the soul.

THE QUAKER AND THE ROBBER.—SAmuel Lover.

A traveler wended the wilds among,

With a purse of gold and a silver tongue;

His hat it was broad, and all drab were his clothes,
For he hated high colors-except on his nose;

And he met with a lady, the story goes.

The damsel she cast him a merry blink,

And the traveler was nothing loth, I think!