'Certainly," replied the president; "don't. The sacred laws should understand, you see it-that white thing there?" "Strike a match and let's look at it," said Philpott. The leader went up the steps, followed by the club. He struck a match. Then every member of the club saw a placard upon which was written in large letters the legend, "THIS HOUSE FOR RENT." The shock was so great that for a moment nobody spoke; then Philpott said softly, By George, they have moved!" The man at the window then observed, "She heard you were coming boys, and she packed up and fled; she has gone into the country for the summer. Probably she will never come back until she hears that you have disbanded." But must not, at his pleasure, change. The chair of justice is the throne; Who takes it, bows to higher laws; When in the east the glorious sun Spreads o'er the earth the light of day, Nor wonder at his light or way: If the club had followed its impulses, it The startled world looks on amazed, would have reduced that man to mincemeat at once. But it walked sadly away, and each man went to his own home. At the next meeting a by-law was adopted providing that no serenade should be undertaken unless an understanding should first be had with the person to whom the compliment was offered. MAX ADELER. ONLY WHAT I OUGHT TO BE. FROM THE PORTUGUESE OF DOM PEDRO, EX-EMPEROR IF I am pious, clement, just, I am only what I ought to be; The sceptre is a mighty trust, A great responsibility; And he who rules with faithful hand, And each one watches it with fear. I, likewise, if I always give To vice and virtue their rewards, No one his thanks to me accords. Or wrongly do, or leave undone, With depth of thought and breadth of try the easiest of application. One escapes range, from prison and the galleys: there is no escape from the tomb, and a man is soon dead. It is not so in the kingdom of Greece, and the application of capital punishment was impossible there till 1847. The government sought for an executioner in the country it found none. It had two or three brought from abroad: it saw them massacred by the people. It thought of making use of soldiers as executioners: the Senate did not allow it. At last they found a man sufficiently starved to lend his hand to the sad work of human justice. This wretched man lives alone, far from Athens, in a fortress where he is guarded by soldiers. He is brought in a vessel clandestinely the evening before the execution; he is hastily reconducted as soon as he has performed his work; before, during and after the exercise of his functions soldiers surround him to protect his life. When the minister of justice was fortunate enough to find an executioner, there were in the prisons thirty or forty under sentence of death who were patiently waiting for their turn. These arrears were liquidated one way or other. The guillotine is erected at a few paces from Athens, at the entrance of the Grotto of the Nymphs. The scaffold is of the height of a man, and the horror of the spectacle is increased by it: it seems to the spectators that they have only to stretch out their hands to stay the knife, and they feel as if they were accomplices in shedding blood. But that which adds to the interest of this legal tragedy is that the patient defends his life. The law ordains. that he shall walk freely to punishment, and that his hands shall not be bound. Now, greater part of those that are sentenced the HAPPINESS AND ADMIRATION. FROM A LETTER TO A FRIEND. T is said we must read to gain knowledge and we must gain knowledge to make us happy and be admired. Mere jargon! Is there any such thing as happiness in this world? No. And, as for admiration, I am sure the man who powders most, perfumes most, embroiders most and talks most nonsense is most admired. Though, to be candid, there are some who have too much good sense to esteem such monkey-like animals, in whose formation "the tailors and barbers halves." go MAN. THOMAS JEFFERSON. A SONG OF THE TROUBADOURS. WRITTEN BY RICHARD I. OF ENGLAND DURING HIS IMPRISON- wretched captive of his Much for myself I feel, yet, ah! still more That no compassion from my subjects prison speaks Unless with pain and bit terness of soul, fortune can control. Where now is each ally, each baron, friend, Whose face I ne'er beheld without a smile? Will none his sovereign to redeem expend The smallest portion of his treasures vile? Though none may blush that near two tedious years Without relief my bondage has endured, Yet know, my English, Norman, Gascon, peers, Not one of you should thus remain im mured: The meanest subject of my wide domains, Had I been free, a ransom should have found. I mean not to reproach you with my chains, Yet still I wear them on a foreign ground. Too true it is-so selfish human race "Nor dead nor captive friend or kindred find," Since here I pine in bondage and disgrace For lack of gold my fetters to unbind; flows: What can from infamy their names restore If while a prisoner death my eyes should close? But small is my surprise, though great my grief, To find, in spite of all his solemn vows, My lands are ravaged by the Gallic chief, While none my cause has courage to espouse. Though lofty towers obscure the cheerful day, Yet through the dungeon's melancholy gloom Kind Hope in gentle whispers seems to say, "Perpetual thraldom is not yet thy doom.' Ye dear companions of my happy days, Of Chail and Pensavin, aloud declare Throughout the earth in everlasting lays My foes against me wage inglorious war. Oh, tell them, too, that ne'er among my crimes Did breach of faith, deceit or fraud appear That infamy will brand to latest times The insults I receive while captive here. Know, all ye men of Anjou and Touraine, And every bachelor knight robust and brave, That duty now and love alike are vain friend to save; your Remote from consolation here I lie, your Nor leaves you aught but pity to bestow. RICHARD CŒUR DE LION. THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. THE I. HE drawbridge dropped with a surly And through the dark arch a charger sprang, wall Who begged with his hand and moaned as he sate, And a loathing over Sir Launfal came; The sunshine went out of his soul with a thrill, The flesh 'neath his armor 'gan shrink And midway its leap his heart stood still. For this man, so foul and bent of stature, So he tossed him a piece of gold in scorn. The leper raised not the gold from the dust: "Better to me the poor man's crust, Though I turn me empty from his door; In his siege of three hundred summers long, He gives nothing but worthless gold strong, And, binding them all in one blazing sheaf, mail, To seek in all climes for the Holy Grail. It was morning on hill and stream and tree, Rebuffed the gifts of the sunshine free And gloomed by itself apart; The season brimmed all other things up As Sir Launfal made morn through the dark- He was ware of a leper crouched by the same, Who gives from a sense of duty; That thread of the all-sustaining Beauty alms: The heart outstretches its eager palms, II. THERE was never a leaf on bush or tree, spun; The leper, lank as the rain-blanched bone, A single crow on the tree-top bleak sun. Again it was morning, but shrunk and In the desolate horror of his disease. shade, And Sir Launfal said, "I behold in thee And to thy life were not denied The wounds in the hands and feet and side.— Then the soul of the leper stood up in his eyes And looked at Sir Launfal, and straight way he Remembered in what a haughtier guise He had flung an alms to leprosie When he girt his young life up in gilded mail And set forth in search of the Holy Grail. The heart within him was ashes and dust; He parted in twain his single crust, He broke the ice on the streamlet's brink, And gave the leper to eat and drink. 'Twas a mouldy crust of coarse brown bread, 'Twas water out of a wooden bowl, Yet with fine wheaten bread was the leper fed, And 'twas red wine he drank with his thirsty soul. As Sir Launfal mused with a downcast face And with its own self like an infant played, A light shone round about the place; |