ling to yield her rights to such a big man as Esquire Thorne. One of the Aunt Marys of the world. There is a youth who is evidently making a great effort to extend himself to such proportions as would suit the dignity of a full-grown man. Shakspeare was a wise man! A child cries-just as it should be! What would this world be without cries and tears? And here is another resemblance. We have nothing to do in guiding this vehicle. The reins are in the hands of another, and we are, for the time being, entirely at his disposal; so there's One who guides the affairs of this world, independently of any acts of ours. Mother will like that thought, I am sure. But lo! one has come to his destination. So man has an appointed time on the earth, and the end will come-to some the road is longer, but every road has an end. He pays the debt of nature (in the form of a sixpence), and is gone. There is a vacant seat, but here comes some one to fill it. "One generation passeth away, and another cometh." Analogy perfect. And now our new-comer sits there just as if he had had the earliest and sole title, and even we have almost forgotten the face of the first occupant. The world exactly! Only a few weeks ago Dr. Maghtean died, and we all mourned, and said a man could never be found to fill his place, his death had made such a breach. Now Dr. Bardow is carrying his saddlebags, and half the people have forgotten that it was not always Dr. Bardow, and they are just as will

ing to take their certificate for leaving the world from Dr. Bardow as from Dr. Maghtean; and Dr. Bardow has forgotten, too, and thinks no more of those who were before him, or who shall be after him, than does the present subject of our reflections. And now they are dropping off, one by one. So goes the world, "Friend after friend departs," and if I don't depart soon from this stage, I shall be left the sole occupant again. Sure enough! I am all alone. Hope I shall not be left the last one in this world, for, as Jenny Lind said, "who would inhabit this world alone?" Hope at any rate my mother will stay and live with me. That will be a pleasing reflection for mother. I'll lay stress on that, for I shall wish to come to New York again. Stage stops. Well, I suppose I may say I've passed through the world, and the time of my departure is at hand, and I feel entirely ready to leave this moving scene. Hope I may be as willing to leave the world when my time comes. Poor, old stage, you will not always last. I see signs of decay even now, and I suppose the time will come when you will be good for nothing but fuel for the fire, and, so, as my good mother often remarks, this world is to be burned up at some future day. Oh! Shakspeare was a wise man. "This world is a stage," and a stage is this world.

WHERE winds blow pure and freely, And blossoms load the air,

And green trees wave their leafy boughs,

And all around looks fair,

I ply my daily labor,

And work till night has come;

And then return contented,

To rest myself at home.

How sweet unto the weary,

Is such unvexed repose,

When evening's length'ning shadows

Around our cottage close;

And with quiet in our bosoms,

We sit in twilight's shades, And watch the crimson radiance, As from the west it fades.

And then how fresh the slumber,
Which falls upon our eyes;
When night's clear dews are falling,
And stars are in the skies!
No feverish dreams affright us,

And make us start, and weep;
But trusting in God's kindly care,
We kindly sink to sleep.

And then ere morning flushes
Along the eastern skies,

We bless the care that watched us,
And, nerved to labor, rise.
We see the day-star fading,
We see the vapors glide,
Along the misty vales below
And up the mountain's side.

Again our hardy sinews

Are bent to manly toil,

Again we mow the waving grass,
Or plough the dewy soil.

And ever when our labors

For the day are past and done,
We sit before our cottage door,
And watch the setting sun.

Sown in darkness, or sown in light,
Sown in weakness, or sown in might,
Sown in meekness, or sown in wrath,

n the broad world-field or the shadowy path, Sure will the harvest be.

SPELLING THE DICTIONARY.

ROWNJOHN, our teach

er who wielded the hick

ory sceptre a while in the old brown schoolhouse on the corner, where the rudiments of learning were worked into my head, had a daily exercise in spelling some

what out of the common course. Each member of

our class selected from the dictionary any word he pleased, taking care to learn both how to spell it and how to define it. At the close of the ordinary spelling-lesson, the scholar who stood at the head of the class spelled the word he had selected, and then the next below gave the definition of it, if he could. If he could not, the word was passed down farther, till it came to some one able to tell its meaning. Whoever did this took his place in the class above as many as had failed. Then the second from the head spelled his word, and the definition of it was called for along down the line in a similar manner. And so on till all had given out their selections.

That was not a bad plan, was it? Many a worse thing may be done in school than learning the dictionary. Have you never heard how Daniel