People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 July 1895 — Page 3

MR. WIGGLESWORTH.

man, leading a tall sorrel horse into the yard. “What—what is it, Ellery?” she asked, in a ini Id wonderment. “What is It?” echoed Mr. Wigglesworth, smartly, “it’s a horse, of course. Wha’ dye s’pose it was—a boiled dinner? Thought the pian was leading a farm mortgage, did’t you?” ’ “And did you get it for me?” chirped Mrs. Wlgglesworth, clapping her hands. “Oh, how good of you, Ellery, to remember that it was my birthday!” So she kissed her husband on his whiskers—women love to kiss their husbands on their whiskers—and, putting an apron over her head, v she followed him out of doors, v The tall sorrel horse had his nose in the air and was wrinkling his lips back over his forehead in a peculiar fashion. Now and then he Would thrust one foot out toward the horizon in an impromptu way, and look disappointed when the red-faced man turned out to be elsewhere. “Where’ll I put him?” asked the redfaced man. He also had a hoarse voice that rumbled, and at the sound of which the tall horse would stand up in the air till he felt the red-faced man’s fat form at the end of the halter, and then he would come down again, reaching for the red-faced man as he did so, but, unfortunately, missing him again. After some trouble the animal was got into a stall fn the little stable and the red-faced man went away, while the hired girl came out and gathered up the lineful of clothes that had been cast down and stepped on. “You see, it is this way,” Mr. Wigglesworth explained, as they were eating supper. “I thought it would be a good thing for you to have a horse this spring and get outdoors more. So I went to a man I know and told him just what I wanted, and he’s sent up just the thing—a woman’s driving horse—one that a child can handle. Quite a surprise, wasn’t it?” he added, with the pride that a man takes in doing a thing without consulting his wife. “Oh, it’s too delightful for anything!” cooed Mrs. Wlgglesworth. “But do you think I can drive him? Doesn’t he seem rather—er—tall? Not so awfully tall,” she hastened to add, noting her husband’s falling countenance, “but—but—just ” “Oh, yes, of course," said Mr. Wlgglesworth, holding his knife and fork on end and addressing the .sideboard, “he’s too tall. I oughter thought of

“AND CHARGED OUT OF DOORS.”

that. Might have looked around and found one with short legs, so the hired girl could go over him with the carpetsweeper. That’s the kind of horse for us!” They talked the matter over at length after supper. Mr. Wigglesworth said he was going to take care of the animal himself, as what he needed in the spring anyway was exercise, to work the accumulated sluggishness of winter out of his blood —out of Mr. Wigglesworth’s blood. Mrs. Wigglesworth said she was going to learn to put the bridle on him—onto the horse —without standing on a chair, and afternoons, she said, she would drive around by the office and bring her husband home to supper, for she knew how tired he must be after a hard 1 day’s work. There was considerable pawing around in the stable during the night. “Don’t you think you best take the lantern and go and see if everything is all right?” Mrs. Wigglesworth suggested. “Perhaps his blanket has slipped off.” “Well, it'll stay slipped off for all of me,” said her husband. “Want me td go out and get stepped on, don’t ye? Think it would be a good idea to stir up his pillow and put a hot-water bottle to his feet, I s’pose. Guess he’s used to sleeping alone. Probably he’s, having strange dreams, first time in a new stable, so.” This conceit so amused Mr. Wigglesworth that he lay awake a long time laughing at it. But early in the morning, just as the first rays of dawn were slanting downward over Sawyer’s barn, there was a succession of tremendous noises that called Mr. Wigglesworth hastily from bed. and.,he rushed, half dressed, toward the stable. When Mrs. Wigglesworth, soon after, got there, her blood froze with horror at the sight that met her gaze. The tall sorrel horse had his two front legs over the edge of the stall, and with his neck stretched to tlje farthest limits of the halter wa§ making frantic gestures toward Mr. Wigglesworth. who had climbed hastily onto a large feed-box in the corner, and was convulsively clinging to the wall, with a look on his face that his wife had never seen there before. "Oh, Ellery!” she screamed, with a woman’s ready presence of mind; “comi Away instantly!” . . “Come away!” shouted Mr - Wigglesworth, making himself still flatter against the the sorrel horse essayed another g/ab and tore off one of his suspenders. “Oh, of course—-that's it —that’s all I want to do—just wave my hand to the conductor and get aboard, and ring two bells and go ahead!

HERE it is!” gleefully cried Mr. Wlgglesworth, running to the window. Mrs. Wigglesworth followed in a flutter. It was her birthday, and she’d been hoping since morning that her husband would remember it. She saw a fat, red-faced

Wouldn’t have thought If you hadn’t—wow!” and he fetched another shriek as the sorrel stretched the halter an added Inch and snorted a cupful of foam down Mr. Wigglesworth’s .neck. - “What ye standing there for?” he yelled. “Don’t ye see I can’t move without losing my life and all I’ve got on?” “What shall I do!” wailed his wife, wringing her hands. “Do? Why get an axe and chop his blamed head off! Go and get a wood mger and bore a hole in him somewhere, and see if that won’t take his attention! Go!—” Mrs. Wigglesworth was a woman who could be roused to momentous situations. She came down from the stairs and waved her apron gently. “Shoo!” she said to the sorrel horse. “That’s it!” her husband cried, “that’s the way to shoe a horse!” and ghastly as the humor seemed to be, he found himself smiling at it. But his wonder redoubled when the sorrel horse, after looking at Mrs. Wigglesworth for a moment with a surprised air, slipped demurely down from the edge of the stall and began scratching his neck reflectively on the manger. “There you are,” said Mrs. Xyigglesworth, climbing down from the box and cautiously approaching the stall. The animal had his eyes closed, and Mr. Wigglesworth, as he took hold of,the halter, remembering his suspender, cpuld not forbear giving It a vicious little jerk. What followed Mrs. Wigglesworth explained to the doctors. The tall sorrel, she said, when he felt the jerk, seemed to turn and shot a hasty but astonished look at her husband. Mr. Wlgglesworth’s hands appeared to be glued to the halter, she said, for when the sorrel stood up on his hind legs and walked out of the stall, Mr. Wigglesworth came with him, swinging back and forth like the pendulum to a clock, only faster. When the sorrel got out on the barn floor, he looked around for Mrs. Wlgglesworth, but failing to discover her, at first, he performed a few complicated dance movements, such as a circus horse makes, leaving portions of Mr. Wigglesworth’s clothing and cuticle upon the studding and rafters of the st-able as he went along. Then he put his hands around that gentleman and charged out of doors. The hired girl had just time to look over her shoulder and see the procession coming, and then drop her clothes basket and crawl under the stoop. When the sorrel horse came down again, missing the hired girl by an inch, he put his off hind foot through the clothes basket and bore it away with him. It made one of the best items of news the local papers ever had, and even got copied into a city dally with cuts. People coming out of their houses would see Mr. Wlgglesworth every few minutes going into the air, and then coming down again, closely followed by the sorrel horse, 1 with his leg thrust through the basket, and accumulating mud which ever, and anon he would shake off upon the bystanders as he went hustling past. Half an hour later Mr. Wigglesworth climbed slowly up the stoop, a fragment of the halter, apparently forgotten, showing in his hand. “My darling, darting Ellery?” sobbed his wife, with a pale face, tdttering forward. “Don’t ye fall on me!” warned Mr. Wigglesworth, the passionate lines <fti his face growing deeper; “don’t ye come whining around here asking for any more family horses warranted to stand without hitching! The kind of family horse you want is a gentle, long-eared donkey, and blamed if I don’t wish you’d got one before you ever saw me!” And in explaining it afterward to the woman across the way, Mrs. Wlgglesworth said: “It did seem queer that Ellery should lay it all onto her, when the horse was just as much of a surprise to her as it was to anybody especially Mr. Wigglesworth.”

PRETTY FAIR

At Stage Robbing, But No Good as Business Men. “Yes, ‘Buck’ English was always my friend,” remarked Judge Lawler when the Nana stage robbery and the wounded desperado were under discussion, says the Philadelphia Item. “He was a pretty fair robber, but no business man. I remember one of his first ventures in a business way. A couple of Germans were running a butcher shop in Lake county and making money hand over fist. ‘Buck’ English and ' his brother Charlie purchased the business and soOn the stock commenced to suffer. One day a rancher met ‘Buck’ on the road and inquired: “ ‘Have you seen anything of that cow of mine?’ “ ‘What kind of a cow?’ “ ‘Red, with a white blaize and one horn gone.’ “ ‘The one Sleeper raised and sold Faught, and he sold to that carpenter at Middletown? ! asked ‘Buck.’ “ ‘Yes, that’s the one.’ “ ‘Say, Jim, we butchered her about a week ago. She was the fattest beef I ever saw. If I’d a known she was yours I wouldn’t have killed her without lettin’ you know. Good-by, Jim.’ “That’s all Jim ever got for his cow. A few weeks later the English boys were closed out. They had lost every cent of their Capital. ‘Buck’ came to me and said: ‘I can’t understand this at all. Those Dutchmen bought all their stock and paid their bills when they came due and made money. We stole all our stock, never paid a bill, and still we lose. It’s too much for me. I guess I’m no business man.’ I suppose his failure in business enterprises drove him into questionable pursuits.”

Horses and Earthquakes.

It is a well-known fact, says the Mascot, that horses can hear sounds that are not perceptible' to human ears. For days previous to- the great earthquake in the Riviera the horses of that locality showed every symptom of fear, which continued without change of character, unless it was in the direction of greater frenzy, till the fury of the jp-eat convulsion broke forth. Not until a few seconds, however, before the earth began to tremble did human beings hear the subterranean rumblings. One writer from, the scene says that in bis opinion the horses knew that t,he quake was. op the way from seventy-two to one hundred hours before their masters heard or felt the first jar. -

Where Coral Is Found.

Coral, both'white and red. Is found on the Florida coast.

THE PEOPLE S PILOT, RENSSELAER, IND., THURSDAY, JULY 11. 1895.

FOURTEENTH GUEST.

was going to the Globe theater, where he was to play a flute obligato with the regular orchestra, he would have been much surprised if any hint of a new calamity in his ru,n-down fortunes could have been then and there foretold. He certainly thought he had taxed the ingenuity of adverse fate to its utmost, and he had enough misery on hand to last a lifetime. But the misfortune awaiting him was of a grotesque turn, and quite unlike the others, which were the commonplace ones of illness, poverty and bad luck in everything he undertook.

Now, there is no refinement of cruelty equal in its pangs to the grip of poverty upon a sensitive nature that cannot borrow and will not beg; the poverty that is “genteel” in well-brushed garments, polished by the friction of time; of lean and hungry look, because never sufficiently fed; with pride perched like a sentinel on the threshold, keeping out the hag Charity, who comes to extol her»elf in a labored account of details in the lives of want. To this class of the genteel poor belonged Prof. Smythe, who, as he stepped along carefully In his frayed entourage, would have been ridiculous if he had not been pathetto. And, poor man, he did not know that he was either. He had hidden his poverty ostrich-wise, and never dreamed that he was attracting attention to it. Besides that, being a gentleiqan by birth, instinct and education, he attached no dishonor to his low estate. He was not the only man who had not made a financial success of life. As he walked along in the shrinking, depressed fashion that had become natural to him through habitude with misfortune, he was aware of the sudden opening of a door in a handsome residence he was passing, and a flood of orange light beaming across his path. At the same time a man in evening; dress ran lightly down the steps, seized him by the arm and said briskly; “My dear sir, excuse me, but would you do me a great favor?” Prof. Smythe forgot to draw Into his shell, so sudden was this attack. He stood still, like the wedding guest in the “Ancient Mariner," but finally stammered his need of haste and the occasion of it. “I will pay you twice as much and you will have nothing to do but make yourself agreeable. It will be a great ac-

“MY DEAR SIR. EXCUSE ME.”

commodatlon and I shall never forget it. I can see by your appearance that you are a gentleman—consider me a friend and accept my offer.” “But what Service is required of me?” asked the professor, who had had a vague idea that a grand piano had suddenly gone wrong. ."Why, you see, I am giving a dinner to some friends. It is all on the table, and we have just discovered that there are 13 of us; that would never do at all. Now if you will dine with us you shall be well paid for your services, and I dare say you will be in time for your flute solo at the theater, as you can be excused when you desire. You will, come? Thanks. The professor followed his host in a state of absolute subjection, as if he might have been hypnotized; but the fact was that the poor man had not broken his fast since morning, and the delicious aroma of the dinner coming through the open door proved irresistible. He gave his name in a whisper, was handed over to a servant, who took him upstairs into a guest chamber, helped him to remove his shabby overcoat, and whisked oft his best suit with a silver handled brush, taking Its threadbare glint for dust. It was well he was engaged to play, otherwise he would not have been in evening dress. He was beginning to enjoy the little comedy in which he was himself an actor. There was no introduction. His host motioned him to a seat between the maiden lady and a severe matron who turned her silken back on him to talk to her neighbor on the other side. The professor’s pride did not once assert itself. He was masquerading—that was all. But fate had not done with Professor Smythe. The consomme had a dash of champagne in it, and new life was Infused into the veins of this professional dinerout. The fish and game and pate that followed were all triumphs of the culinary art. and the hungry man cloyed the edge of his appetite, not by the bare imagination of a feast, but by the feast itself. It was no feast of the Barmecide either, for the viands were actual, and the wine was not a pretense, but a. de-. Ilghtful vintage, served in cut-glass lets. The poor professor felt like saying to his neighbor, "pinch me’” for it was like a dream Or an illusion rather than a reality.- - But the striking of the clock reminded him that he had been there an hour, and as he had broken the spell of the unlucky 13, be ventured to excuse himself and. rose stiffly from his place and bowed bimself out of the room. He. vtfas followed by a servant, who handed him an envelope with the com-,

, T has been said that it is always the unexpected that happens, and that to be prepared for emergencies one must be both a philosopher and a fatalist. As Prof. Smythe, musician, piano tuner and general utility man —in a musical way—

ipttments of the gentleman with whom be had just dined. Not for worlds would he have opened it, though it was unsealed, before the man, but he accepted it graciously and went upstairs to get his hat and overcoat unattended. A number of handsomely appointed chambers were on the upper hall, and the professor glanced into each as he passed on his way to the particular guest-chamber where he had left his belongings. Perhaps he was a trifle overcome by sherry and other beverages, but he thought the room had been darkened and that he was right. He stood a moment in the doorway and looked cautiously in, peering about at the luxury, but at the same time noting that it was not the dressing-room for which he was looking. Before he could step back and turn down the corridor again, the unexpected happened. He received a sudden and violent push from behind, whicfy flung him forward out of the doorway into the room, the door was ‘instantly locked upon him, and he was a prisoner. “Smythe luck!” said the poor man as he tried in vain to open the door, and knew by the rumpus he could hear outside that the house was in a statfe of excitement; “I suppose they will think I was trying to steal something.” Then a frightened thought took possession of him, which caused cold drops of anguish to stand out on his gaunt cheeks. Did they suspect him ? Had he been observed? He opened the envelope tn his hand; it containd a flve-dollar note. That was generous, and he was sure his host had suspected nothing, but the mere thought of the situation in which he was placed drove him to the verge of distraction. And to add to his terror, he heard the alarmed household coming upstairs, and the next moment the door of his room was opened, and his host, backed by all the male guests, stood in the open doorway. “What are you doing here?” was the first question his host propounded; “tell the truth now as you would hope for mercy.” “I came here to get my hat and coat,” said the professor, the dignity of ail the Smythes since Mount Ararat in his thin, rasping tones. “A likely story. Turn your pockets Inside out,” commanded the host. “I refuse to do it.” ’ “Then I will send for the police. I was willing to give you a chance, but if you refuse to be searched, you are guilty.” “I am not a thief.” I do not know. Your aotions are very suspicious. You can explain matters to the chief of police. There must be reasons why you refuse to be searched; if you are honest, you can have nothing to conceal." “Walt!” cried the unfortunate professor, “I came here to-night <t your earnest solicitations to do you a service, kind you trap me as if I were a burglar.” “You are caught prowling in a distant part of my house—you refuse to be searched—an Innocent man would be glad to clear his name from suspicion —how do I know what valuables you have secreted about you?” A hollow laugh rang through the room. Was it possible the bold intruder dared to laugh at them. It was the laugh of despair, and as such it smote upon the heart of the host, Who looked troubled and perplexed. His enforced guest saw the look, and it suggested a line of action to him. “Send those men away,” he said, pointing to the group of alarmed guests crowding in at the door. He was glad the women had remained below stairs, and not come to gaze upon his discomfiture. He did not know that they were locked up in fear and trembling in a distant parlor. "We won’t go,” chorused the group; "he may want to murder you." “I don’t think he will,” said the host, who was really soft-hearted. “I’ll trust him, and you fellows can go to the ladies. I’ll call if I need help.” They went, rather glad to be out of it, and the two men, left together, eyed each other, one waiting for the other to speak. They were exactly opposite In appearance, one rosy and rubicund, the other thin and anxious—a meager travesty on a successful man. “I refused to let you search me,” said the professor slowly, “because—oh, my God, how can I acknowledge it—l am a thief!”

The other man started and moved toward the door. Then he waited. “I have stolen from you—here, let me show you, and you will know why I could have died easier than to have those people gloating over me. See here —and—here and here.” He took the valuables out of his pocket one by one. They made a strange exhibit as he piled them up on the table in front of him. They were a roll of dinner bread, a plate, a sweetbread rolled in a leaf of lettuce, a chicken breast, a bit of toasted bread, and, * caviare sandwich. He brought them out; to the last crumb, with a manner of one who lays his life on the altar of sacrifice.. “Great heavens, man, what does this mean?” asked the astonished host. “It means,” replied the other solemnly;, "that my sick wife and my little children are starving, and that I pilfered from my food at your table to give them, for my rent is overdue’, and the money I earned is already f ?rrt." “But what did you eat yourself?” “More than I have eaten for many a day. But now do with me what you will." “Would you mind putting these things back, into your pocket?” inquired his host vaguely. “Now come with me.” He took him by the arm and led him down stairs t and into the . presence of the shaking guests. “I—l made a bad mistake, my friends,” he said, “this gentleman has proved himself perfectly Innocent of any attempt at crime, and I must beg you to remain silent as to the events of this evening. He is under my protection from this time, and you will all agree with me that we are extremely sorry that such a mistake should have occurred.” Gt course they all agreed with the sentiments of their host, whatever they were, and Prof. Smythe was allowed to take his leave amid profuse apologies.

An Excusable Tip.

•‘‘ Bllkins—Seems to me the custom of lipping is spreading everywhere. It's outrageous. Wilklps—ln some cases it is excusable. “7' like to know in what cases?” “Well, you can’t get weighed without tipping t’ e beam, you know.”

LITTLE FRENCH MARY

the bridge. This house, small and lowstoried, with a bushy little garden in front, had beeft standing empty for several months. Usually when a house was left tenantless in Dulham it remained so and fell into decay, and, after some years, the ciiinamon rose bushes straggled into the cellar and the dutiful grass grew over the mound that covered the chimney bricks. Dulham was a quiet place, where the population dwindled steadily, though such citizens as remained had more and more reason to think it as pleasant as any country town in the world. Some of the old men who met* every day to talk over the town affairs were much interested in the newcomers. Uhey approved the course of the stronglooking young Canadian laborer, who had been quick to seize upon his opportunity; one or two of them had already engaged him to make their gardens and to do odd jobs, and were pleased with his willingness and quickness. He had come afoot one day from a neighboring town, where he and his wife had been made ill by bad drainage and factory work, and saw the little house, and asked the postmaster if there were any work to be had out of doors that spring in Dulham. Being assured of his prospects, he reappeared with his pale, bright-eyed wife and little daughter the very next day but one. This startling promptness had given time for but few persons to hear the news of a new neighbor, and as one after another came over the bridge and along the road there were many questions asked. The house seemed to have new life looking out of its nnall-paned windows; there were clean white curtains, and china dogs on the chimney sills, and a blue smoke in the chimney—the spring sun was shining in at the wide open door. There was a chilly east wind on an April day, and the Iderly men were gathered Inside the postoffice, which was also the chief grocery and dry goods store. Each was in his favorite armchair and thepe was the excuse of a morning fire in the box stove to make them form again into the close group that was usually broken up at the approach of summer weather. Old Captaih Weathers was talking about Alexis, the newcomer (they did not try to pronounce his last name), and was saying for the third or fourth time that the more work you set for the Frenchman the better pleased he seemed to be. “Helped ’em to lay a carpet yesterday at our house, neat as wax,” said the captain, with approval. “Made the garden in the front yard so it hasn’t looked so well for years. We’re all going to find him very handy; he’H have plenty to do among us all summer. Seems to know what you want the minute you p’lnt, for he can't make out very well With his English. I used to be able to talk considerable French in my early

A BRIGHT LITTLE FIGURE STOOD LOOKING IN.

days when I sailed from southern ports to Havre and Bordeaux, but I. don't seem to recall It now very well. He’d have made a smart sailor, Alexis would; quick an’ willing.” “They say Canada French ain’t spoke the same anyway,” began the captain’s devoted friend, Ezra Spooner, by way of assurance, when the store door opened and a bright little figure stood looking in. All the gray-headed men turned that way, and every one of them smiled. “Come right in, dear,” said the kindhearted old captain* They saw a charming little creature about six years old, who smiled back again from under her neat bit of a hat; she wore a pink dress that made her look still more like a flower, and she said “Bonjour” prettily jo the gentlemen as she passed. Henry Staples, the storekeeper and postmaster; rose behind the counter to serve this customer as if she had been a queen, and took from her hand the letter she brought, with the amount of its postage folded up in a warm bit of newspaper. The captain and fils friends looked on with admiration.

“Give her a piece of candy—no, give It to me an’ I ’ll give it to her,” said the captain eagerly, reaching for his cane and leaving his chair with more than Usual agility and everybody Idoked on while he took a striped stick of peppermint from the storekeeper and offered It gallantly. There was something in the way this favor was accepted that savored of the French court and made every man in the store a lover. The child not only made a quaint bow before she reached out her hand with childish eagerness for the unexpected delight, but she stepped forward and kissed the captain. There was a murmur of delight at this charming courtesy; not a man there would not have liked to find some excuse, for walking away with her, aiid there was a general sigh as she shut the door behind her and looked back through the glass with a parting smile. “That's little French Mary, Alexis’ little girl,” Said the storekeeper, eager to pro. laim his advantage of previous aequ nntance. “She came here yesterday and did an errand for her mother a-' ni e as a grown person could." “I never saw a little creatur’ with prettier ways,” said the captain, blushing and lapping his cane on the‘floor. This first appearance of the little foreigner on an April day was like the coming of a young queen to her kingdom. She reigned all summer over every heart in Dulham—not a face bux

HE town of Dulham was not used to seeing foreigners of any sort, or to hearing their voices in the streets, so that it was in some sense a matter of public interest when a Canadian family was reported to have come to the white house by

wore Its smiles when French Mary came down the street, not a mother who did not say to her children that she wished they had such pretty manners, and kept their frocks as neat. The child danced and sang like a fairy, and condescended to all childish games, and yet, best of all for her friends, seemed to see no difference between young and old. She sometimes followed Captain Weathers home, and discreetly dined or took tea with him and his housekeeper, an honored guest; on rainy days she might be found in the shoemaker’s shop or the blacksmith’s, watching them at their work; smiling much, but speaking little, and teaching as much French as she learned English. To this day in Dulham, people laugh and repeat her strange foreign words and phrases. Alexis, the father, was steady at his work of gardening and haying; Marie, the elder, his wife, washed and ironed and sewed and swept, and was a helper in many households; now and then on Sunday they set off early in tfie morning and walked to the manufacturing town whence they had come, to go to mass; at the end of the summer, when they felt prosperous, they sometimes hired a horse and wagon and drove there with the child between them. Dulham village was the brighter and better for their presence and the few old-fashioned houses that knew them treasured them, and French Mary reigned over her kingdom with no revolt or disaffection to the summer's end. She seemed to fulfill all the duties of her childish life by some exquisite instinct and infallible sense of fitness and propriety.

One September morning, after the first frost, the captain and his friends were sitting in the store with the door shut. The captain was the last comer. "I’ve got bad news.” he said, and they all turned toward him, apprehensive and forewarned. "Alexis says he’s going right away,” (regret was mingled with the joy of having a piece of news to tell). "Yes, Alexis is going away; he's packing up now, and has spoken for Foster’s hay cart to move his stuff to the railroad." "What makes him so foolish?” said Mr. Spooner. "He says his folks expect him tn Canada; he's got an aunt livin’ there that owns a good house and farm and she’s gettln’ old and wants to have him settled at home to take care of her.” "I’ve heard these French folks only desire to get aforehand a little, and then they go right back where they come from,” said some one, with an air of disapproval. "HO says he’H send another man hero; he knows somebody that will bo glad of the chance, but I don’t seem to like the idea so well,” said Captain Weathers, doubtfully. "We’ve got used to Alexis and his wife they know now where we keep everything and have got to be so handy. Strange they don’t know when they’re well off. I suppose It’s natural they should want to be with their own folks. Then there’s the little girl.”

At this moment the store door was opened and French Mary cams In. She was dressed in her best and her eyes Were shining. "I go to Canada In ze cars!” she announced, joyfully, and came dancing down between the two long counters toward her regretful friends; they had never seen her so charming.

Argument and regret were impossible —the forebodings of the elderly men and their experience of life were of no use at that moment, a gleam of youth and hope was theirs by sympathy Instead. A child’s pleasure In a journey moves the dullest heart; the captain was the first to find some means of expression. “Give me some o’ that best candy for her," he commanded the storekeeper. “No, take a bigger piece of paper, and tie It up well.” “Ain’t she dressed a little thlh?" said gruff Mr. Spooner, anxiously, and for his part he pointed the storekeeper to a small plaid shawl that hung overhead, and stooped to wrap It himself about the little shoulders.

“I must get the little girl something, too,” said the minister, who was a grandfather and had just come In for his mail. “What do you like best, my dear?” and French Mary pointed shyly, but with Instant decision, at a blue silk parasol, with a white handle, which wag somewhat the worse for having been openly displayed all summer. The minister bought it with pleasure, like * country boy at a fair, and put it into her hand. French Mary kissed the minister with rapture, and gave him her hand to shake, then she put down the parasol and ran and climbed into the old captain’s lap and hugged him with both arms tight around his neck. She thought for a moment whether she should klsa Ezra Spooner or not, but happily she did not decide against it, and said ap affectionate good-by to him and all the rest. Mr. Staples himself came out from behind the counter to say farewell and bestow some raisins. They all followed 'her to the door and stood watching while she tucked her bundles undqr her arm and raised the new parasol and walked away down the street In the chilly autumn morning. She had taken her French gayety and charm and all her childish sweetness and dignl* • away with her. Little French Mary had gone Fate had pluced her like a flower out of their lives. She did not turn back, but when she was half way home she bega'n to run, and the new shawl was given gayly to the breeze. The captain sighed. I wish the little girl well,” he said, and turned away. shall miss her, but she doesn’t know what, parting is. I hope she'll please them just as well hv Canada.”

Elevator Knees.

A woman who made her initial attempt recently to ride a. wheel was discouraged to find that her knees seemed stiff and very quickly tired of the effort to work the pedals. Speaking to her physician about it be told her she was undoubtedly affected with what Is known as the "elevator knee." This was a hitherto unknown malady to her, but it has been referred to before in public prints, and is a recognized affection not uncommon with those whose life in a "lift" apartment house almost does away with the use of the knee muscles exercised in going up and down stairs.

Just What Scared Him.

She (on the yacht)—Pshaw!, you're afraid of th* storm.. He (frankly)—l ; am*’ She—Why don’t you go below, then? He—Why, that’s just 1 where I'm afraid of going —Truth.

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