Southern literary gazette. (Charleston, S.C.) 1850-1852, December 27, 1851, Image 1

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A £ A ffi iL £ Ait 0 B U fi 1‘ £ B K'B iiil'illlAi'OlliU fMI AM'S ASB 1 HIM CIS* A'MB T 0 B: : ;; & y i>. (.. £; • j* TERMS, $2,00 PER ANNUM, IN ADVANCE. cDrigitial For th Southern Literary Gazette. THE CURSE OF THE EXILE. RAUMF.KT FROM ▲ POEM CALLED “THE EXILE. ’ om the Mae. of a young Southern l'oet at Seventeen ] >oom\i by my country!—ln that rush of feeling That follows hard upon the evil done,— fth every passion roused, and mad, and reel ing, Beneath the agony I may not ahun, I steer my bark to seek a favouring sun, er foreign wilds and ocean wastes to roam, Seeking the favour I have never won, ’ I found not in my native home, •e front hate and wrong, perchance a crueller doom ! )eath!—Yet death itself were nonght to npared with grief in hopes and promise fled: justify the curse I pour on thee, country,—yet not mine ; since I have fled, tortures at thy hands; whom thou hast bred, vere in mockery of my birth, to blight; •reed to boul’s denial ; fenceless head, st mine eyes had opened on the light, which was dark to me, a dawn begun in night. me, ye mountains! Forest winds be still, lile now I speak my deadly malison ’ ye, with a curse that may not kill, t strengthen for new woes, oach day be gun ; ron be all your fields, fruition shun pastures,—may your hope beneath the sky w hollow with vain promise—be the sun warms all other climes your enemy,— plant, and flower, and fruit, with hope and rapture, die. rn ot shame to me hast thou been known shameless in thy people. Thou hast stood, art, yet unperforming ; slow to own, i worth of others; yet, in active blood, v base stagnating ; with the sluggard’s mood, ; escape occasion, ’till no more, j chance was left thee to be great or good ; lense of shame sufficient to deplore, t no virtuous pride to conquer and restore! • - he true sign of ruin to a race, ndertakes no march, and, day'by day, *‘9 in camp, or with the laggard’s pace, Iks sentry o’er possessions that decay ; tined with sensible waste, to fleet away;— e first secret of continued power, • ie continued conquest ;—all our swav itic •• i low o and lofty if. * oe U’ f- -sh will* f*wift ye..ia, har my curse, •> the Fate’s decreed, ’ - - - i*‘genng life in tears, u shame and bitter bondage—with a need, have not soul to satisfy by deed ; lling and groping, with sufficient sense, consciousness of shame, and with a greed, hungers still for noble recompense, y not ask, or hope, and look for. Heaven knows whence ! ihere be, within thy hollow bones, soul of promise ; —if the vigorous growth, ne greet spirit, shall, within thy domes die a better prospect of fresh youth ; that the seed within thy fields he sow’th, swell with better being, and restore i life and greatness thou hast lost by 10th ;— be my curse that thou shalt be no more— •vagiog seas above, and let there be no shore! m the young promise in its dawning hour, >nge me ; —and avenge the noble hearts, ihainelewnew, thy long perverted power,; w punished with oblivion and base arts, ‘undjng with bitter wrong, and cruel darta i ln R the generous hope, the noble aim, i Ibe thou could’at not love, in acorn de parts,— jxile from a land of siu and shame, with the very love that honour'd might reclaim. tho waters whelm not this ba9e land, ortuiie cruelly admit to life, dill reluctant at nty fierce demand, is not the unsparing and relentless knife, it the land of never steepteaa strife ; or ‘gainst brother mar perpetual w-age, uir bones with all earth's miseries grow rife; t slaughter youth, and wither, —age with age, de with Hyen hate, nor hate their wrath assuage. te gaunt stranger fatten on thy soil, ierc thou hast basely sacrificed thine own; ; y they strove to save thee, by fond toil, id love and manhood ; —they we left un known, driven abroad, all desolate, to tnoan ; ’till thou feel’st their loss !—'till thou art taught, loy might have saved them !—O’er fhia knowledge groan, •les, unpitied, with the vulture Thought, wing in bigot brains, which all the evil wrought. a prat’st of Freedom. Would’st assert thy claim, o the benign reality! Thy sons, i oil them, —are tlioy freemea 1 Lo 1 the shame, hat through successive generations runs ! rhold them as they pass.’ The censor shuns, strong pollution of each presence now : nd he whose father's name was Honour’s once ! leas'd with shame, he bares his felon brow, 1 walks unloathed by those, too low to loathe the low. EPITAPH. FOR a DISEASED FOETMESTER. e lies a bard, whose wretched verses ran lark oblivion faster than the man ; Death took pity on hi* haplesa lot, 1 now both rhyme* and author ar* forgot. SDHIH MMMi? m i cDrigittul inks. For the Southern Literary Gazette. THE BACHELOR UNCLE, A CHRISTMAS STORY. BY SEM SOUTHLAND. CHAPTER I. “Oh, dear me! dear me!” cried Phoebe Sherwood, wringing her hands, as she passed nervously up and down the spacious garret allotted to her as a school-room, in the disorderly mansion of Mrs. John Smith, of Linkertown. “Dear me! dear me! what am I to do with such a set of noisy, disobe dient, unmanageable children 1 Such c lamour, Much confusion, .rA nurelomt ness; 1 never saw such children in my life.” As she ceased speaking, her eye fell upon a letter lying open on her desk— a nicely penned, neatly sealed letter, sadly in contrast with every thing in its vicinity—the tidy, pretty young school-mistress excepted. “Ah! my own dear quiet home,” sighed the poor girl, the tears stream ing from her eyes as she took up her mother’s letter for the third time, and began to read it over. “How little 1 thought, when I was leaving you, that 1 was coming to such a scene as this and blinded by her tears, she put the letter down again, and turned towards a window, which opened upou a yard of extraordinary dimensions, and not very remarkable for its beauty or cleanliness. In Mr. John Smith’s extensive lot, the out-houses were in groups, huddled together like pigs on a cold frosty day, and the yard, with its tumble-down fences, and “sloppy” puddles, might have been not inaptly compared to a somewhat sizeable “stybut beyond the precincts of this wide spread do main, was a neat little cottage, em bowered among trees, at sight of which,poor Phoebe’s tears flowed afresh, and coursed down her cheeks with re newed vigour. “Oh! my dear, dear home !” she sobbed again and again, “oh! if could only go back to you, my gen’ kind mother, my sweet little sist my nice auiet Ht.i-. wm, with y p <•■■■ 4 ■ -wn g.iv •” at . . ’i' f; C( - Utu iiul, duu weeping, tried tc that it bore some resemblance own loved home. Her tearful soliloquy was interruj ed by an in-burst of all the children, who came tearing in after their usual fashion, tumbling one upon another, and knocking over chairs, tables and inkstands, without any mercy. ‘"Miss Sherwood!” cried one, “1 want my hat!” “Miss Sherwood!” cried another, “where is my hall ?” “Miss Sherwood!” cried a third, “Jack has knocked the ink all over my new hooks.” Miss Sherwood gazed out upon the home-like little oottage, and the tears poured down in torrents. “What is she crying about 1” whis pered one to another. Their riot hushed for an instant at ■ the sight of sorrow, but as nobody seemed to know, they simultaneously | concluded to decamp; one pounced upon a whip, another upon his ball, and so they all made off, except lit tle fair-haired blue-eyed Lizzie, who remained standing silent in wonder and sympathy. “Don’t cry, Phoebe,” she said at length, going up to her youthful gov erness, and twining her arms gently around her, “Christmas is coming soon, and you will go home then. We won’t be such had children any more, dry your eyes, we will study so hard and do all you tell us. Please don’t cry any more,” and finding all her efforts at comforting her Irieiid unavailing, she lost heart and began to cry too. “What the mischief are you two crying about?” exclaimed Lizzie’s bach elor uncle, standing all amazed in the door-way. “Why, Miss Sherwood, Pm astonished at you ! You actually—” and quite at a loss for a word exactly expressive of the feeling which the sight elicited in his breast, he drew a long breath, and ejaculated—“surprise me.” Phoebe dashed away her tears, and laughed like one ashamed at being caught in some very foolish act, and little Lizzie, seeing nothing better to do, laughed too, and looked from one to the other, as if she did not know whether to continue laughing or cry ing. “Well, this is a pretty piece of bu siness,” continued Mr. Reuben Smith, seating himself like a school-boy on one of the long benches in front of the teacher’s desk. “Two young ladies up in an old dusty garret, crying ready to break their hearts, instead of being out in the glorious sunshine, singing ! with the birds ; it is enough to turn a i tender hearted man distracted, put on | your bonnets this minute, and come out for a ride over the hills.” Phosbe smiled and thanked him, but said she had a letter to answer, and would rather defer her walk to the evening. “Oh! cotne along,” ejaculated the bluff gentleman. “Crying never did anybody any good yet, put up that letter, I don’t know what makes peo ple write such doleful letters, they on ly make young ladies sentimental.— Are you coming or not 1 ?” Phoebe smiled again, but took up her pen to begin writing, and the wor thy bachelor saw that the case was hopeless. Muttering between his teeth, “conlbuud it, these woman are all as obstinate as ,” tie departed, car rying little Lizzie along with him. “What is Miss Sherwood crying about, Lizzie ?” he asked as they step ped out from the lower story into the street, there being but a single step between the solid clay and the draw ing-room carpet. “I don’t know,” said Lizzie, inno cently, “unless it is that we are all so dirty, and noisy, and careless.” “The mischief,” ejaculated the bach elor uncle, stopping short, and looking down at his own unblacked boots.— “Miss Sherwood, thinks we are all dir ty, and noisy, and careless, does she?” “1 expert so,” said Lizzie, looking unusually demure, “she is all the time trying to keep things straight, and no body will help her.” “Poor thing,” ejaculated her uncle. “She scolds us children all day long,” pursued Lizzie, “that is, she does’nt scold exactly , but she almost scolds, and she seems as if she does’nt want to scold either , and so she says: “ ‘Jack, I wonder if you hadn’t bet ter put all your books in one pile,’ and Jack say? — “ ‘They’ll get along very well where they are,’ and with that he sails the wet sponge at Billy’s head, and clears out ; and then Miss Sherwood says— “ ‘Billy, 1 want you to go to mom Betty and ask her to comb your head.’ “ ‘Bless you, said Billy, Hi aint been ’ know when, anil it would si t do it, it’s no go.’ n if she tries to talk him 1 1 begins to turn somersets, can’t hear her.” wr: .-uimmca trie eu ncle again, “she has a nice I don’t wonder the poor g jtting thin.” hen,” continued Lizzie, whose ies seemed all enlisted on the her teacher, “she tries to get nom Betty to clean the candle-sticks, and the andirons, and mom Betty grumbles and says, ‘She nebber see such petiekilar folks in her life,’ and looks cross for a whole week after wards.” “Confound her!” exclaimed the old bachelor, “and what do you do, Liz zie?” “Why, I tear all my dresses climb ing persimmon trees, and she gets them all and mends them up up, just as if I was her own little sister, and theu when 1 come in with them all torn to pieces again, she holds up her hands and looks so sorrowful.” “You ought to be ashamed of your selves, every one of you!” exclaimed the uncle, his sympathy for the in structess all at once changing into an ger at the pupils. “I’d like to know why you can’t do what she tells you, and not be turning everything upside down with your capers ! There is Jack crossing the street now, with one shoe off and the rim half torn off from his hat. Confound me! if I ever saw such a careless, dirty family.” “But uncle,” said Lizzie, her love of mischief and impudence wakened up by the old bachelor’s sudden outbreak, “wliat is the reason that you always go out at elbows, and never have any buttons on your shirts? There you nave got a great rusty pm stuck in your bosom now, and one ot your wristbands is hanging out from under your sleeve, as if the pin had dropped out. You don’t do any better than the rest of us.” “Hem!” coughed the old bachelor, “1 oelieve you are right, my dear, I’ll attend to the matter at once. Hello, there!” called he to a woman who, with a huge basket of clothes on her head, was trudging away towards the Smith mansion. “Sally, come this way. Arc those my clothes in that basket ?” “Yes, sir,” said Sally, looking some what provoked that her rapid strides had been stopped. “I’m in a hurry, Mr. Smith. I never washed for such a family in my life, clothes upon clothes, and so dirty, too. Pshaw ! I can’t stand it another year, that I cant.” “The mischief!” exclaimed the bach elor, who, being principled against oaths and expletives in general, made one or two harmless ones do service for the whole catalogue. “Will you carry all those clothes back home, and I darn them all, do you hear ? And put I buttons on, and mind you! don't you CHARLESTON. SATURDAY, DEC. 27, 1851. ever let another shirt of mine come home without buttons , or 1M discharge you to a certainty !” “Psha! Mr. Smith, how you talk,” exclaimed the incensed matron, turn ing on her heel. “1 suppose you don’t know that I’ve got five children of my own to take care of, lot ’lone taking care of other peoples.” Something very much like an impre cation passed the bachelor’s lips, but lie smothered his wrath, and simply muttered, “who the mischief am I to get to keep them in order if she does not, plague take the woman.” That evening, much to the am°ze>- ment of Mr. Shear, draper and Mr. Uc <ben Smith orctrtf.fl eon -■ new suit of broadcloth ; at and the h ;se boy was hired to clear his boots uigi.i | ly to the brightest pitch os blackness. The children, too, were sui prised by a private lecture on neatness, obedience and order, together with the informa tion, that if they gave Miss Sherwood any more trouble, they were “to look out for squalls,” which announcement the juveniles greeted with peals of laughter, and a loud derisive “hurra!” Uncle Reuben made a dash at the ring leader, who slipped under the table and reappeared on the opposite side, vocif erating “hurra !” louder than before.— The youngsters clapped their hands at this, and Uncle Iteubtn concluded that the children and the washerwoman had both better be left to have their own way. “It is no use,” thought he, “they have had it all along, it is no use to begin ‘this time of day.’ ” CHAPTER 11. After Mr. Reuben Smilh and his lit tle niece left the school-room, Phoebe Sherwood wiped away her tears, and deliberately read one page of her moth er’s letter over and over again—it ran thus— “ You tell me, my dear child, that you despair of ever accomplishing what you have undertaken. That af ter three months of the most laborious exertion on your part, your pupils are more refractory, more noisy, and more careless, than ever; t hat your school room, spite of all your scolding, is a scene of endless and dire confusion, and that out of school hours, the whole house is a perfect Babel of discord, ore. which you nave not me siigmest control. I know it is not your own discomfort that you are lamenting, al though, very naturally, til this makes you sigh for home, more than perhaps you would do under happier circum stances. But it is not, as you seem to suppose, alogether homo-sickness which is oppressing you, it is the feeling that you are wasting your best energies, en during fatigue, and accomplishing noth ing, and could you but see that you were benelitting others, and contribu ting materially to their future welfare and usefulness, your own selfish regrets would very soon sink into apparent in significance. Now Cos me, the case does uot seem nearly so difficult as it does to you. You are young and in experienced, and when th ngs go wrong, you either get desponding, or you be gin to scold. Take m} word for it, scolding only adds to the confusion, and makes matters worse. You say that the children are amiable and affec tionate, but untutored and ungovern ed; well then, find your w r ay to their hearts, and bring all their good feelings into play. Try to make them neat and orderly, by showing them how much their carelessness throws upon their poor sick mother. Incite them to study, that they may improve be fore their father comes back, and be gin your lessons on industry by set ting them to work to make Christmas presents for their parents and for each other. It is a sin against humanity to resort to fault-finding and scolding, when gentleness, patience and love can accomplish what is to be done, far more effectually; aid even good hab its, and decorum, are dearly paid for, when they are purchased by the sacri fice of the kindly sensibilities of child hood, which invariably follows upon harsh or even irritating treatment. If you want to make these “warm-heart ed independent spoiled children” irri table, obstinate, and deceitful, scold them and find fault 1!’ you want to develope all the fine and general qual ities of their natures, expostulate if needs be, but bring every noble and unselfish motive to bear upon what is naturally good in their characters, and trust that, in time, their faults will give way before their growing virtues.— Above all, keep a gaurd upon yourself, and never forget to look above for strength, patience and wisdom.” Phoebe mused over her mother’s ad vice for a long tin e, and then, bury ing her face in her hands, prayed. She had scarcely begun to write her answer, when the dinner-bell rang, and the hubbub ascending from below, in formed her that the scuffle for chairs and plates had begun, She hastily put away her unfinished letter, and locking her desk as the only chanco for keeping things safe, proceeded dowr. to the basement story where her presence was sadly needed. “Mother! Jack has taken my seat,” cried Charley, in a tone of angry com plaint, as Miss Sherwood, in all the dignity and gentleness of her new re solves, entered the apartment. “Billy took mine, mother,” respond ed Jack, without stirring from the con tested place. “Well, 1 haven’t got any seat!” cried poor Billy, relinquishing his seat to Charley, with a doleful face. Miss Sherwood made room for Billy next, to her aml v,.ni-r>,,r,vl something !in i i ear 1 Inch caused bin- to look j | t i- a his aao'.l -rV sad, i- ue. , jA. .a. winle ,'C* ~ ok sonif x.--- t”- ; I mull breaking out. Billy whispered to ; Charley, and Charley whispered to Jack, and so the whisper went round, and the meal passed in comparative quiet, much to the gratification of the bachelor uncle, who had all at once become very nervous about the con duct of the family. Mrs. Smith, poor woman, had an anxious, sorrowful, careworn look, and well she might. Her whole life was spent in a perpetual effort to keep things straight, and not knowing how to set about, everything she did seem ed only to increase the prevailing dis order and confusion. Her husband had left her some time before the opening of our story, to go to Califor nia in search of wealth, which he, in his ignorance, concluded would cer tainly remedy all the evils of a mis managed household. T'or a time he had written home regularly and hope fully, but of late, his letters had been scarce, and news had reached tile vil lage of the illness and death of sever al of those who had left in company with him. Poor Mrs. Smith held out very well as long as there was a pros pect of his returning safe and sound, but when week after week passed with out his writing, and when Christmas approached without bringing any news of him, her heart sank within her, and time after time she wept and sighed, “oh! how I wish I had never let him go.” Sometimes she reproached her self with not having made his home more comfortable ; conscience told her that their means were already fully ■ • t.i —4 j H y w ‘ r perous neighbour, and that, if she had managed things properly, there would have been no necessity for his going away, and so poor Mrs. Smith became sick and nervous, and then things in stead of growing better, grew worse and worse. Meanwhile, the husband’s brother, finding the seven children run ning wild, proposed a govemness, and volunteered to pay her salary, and Phoebe Sherwood was transplanted all at once from her peaceful, orderly country home, into the tumble down, rackrent, village mansion occupied by the “John Smiths.” The afternoon of the cry in the school-room, Mr. Reuben Smith was seen “trapesing” across the “Court house square” to the barber’s shop, fol lowed by the whole troop of Smith boys, whose heads after undergoing a thorough “trimming” at the barber’s hand in the little back-room, reappear ed, one by one, at the front door, fol lowed last of all by uncle Reuben, who forthwith conducted them First to the shoe-maker’s and then to the “draper’s and tailor’s.” Phoebe, who happened to be at her chamber window at the time, watched them as they sped across the town — some out at elbows, and some slip shod, and thought in her own mind they were about as shabby a set, as she would care to see—uncle included —but spite of their rusty clothes, and shaggy locks, their kind won her’s, and her eyes followed them, no tingevery skip and bound, and brighten ing at every merry trick and prank. ”yy nat a pity they are uii ~ wue less,” thought she, “they really are an amiable, interesting family.” Whit was her surprise to see them returning about supper time, clad in full new suits, and limping in shoes that wtre entirely too tight for them. The uncle, too, had bought anew beaver,and had been otherwise brushed up, although still out at elbows, and not us yet decorated with the usual compliment of buttons. Phoebe admired the metamorphosis not a little, and made her comments accordingly, but she little dreamed that she had had a hand in it, until lit tle Lizzie let the cat out of the bag by narratiig some weeks afterwards her dialogue with her uncle. CHAPTER 111. The text morning, at the usual time, Miss Sherwood rang the bell for school, but as usual, none of the children obeyed the summons. “I must go down after them,” she said, after waiting patiently for sever al minutes, and accordingly she de scended the long staircase, and running out of the back-door, seized hold of Billy, who, quite uumindful of school hours, was racing an unfortunate little pig across the yard. “Let me go ! let me go!” screamed Billy, getting perfectly desperate at being stopped in his career. “Let me go, or I’ll bite you !” ,‘But, Billy,” said Miss Sherwood, with difficulty retaining her hold, “it is time to go to school.” “I’m not going !” cried Billy, strug gling furiously, “there, now !” he ex claimed, as the unlucky pig crawled under the garden fence, and got in among the turnips and cabbages.— “There ! now you see the pig has got , “rough the hole already, and I just uted to catch him by the tail L” :uul ■ set up a ery of auger aud disap iitment. •• vv’ho’s that making such a fuss out there ?” stormed uncle Reuben, coming all at once from the front room. “Go to your lessons at once, sir, or I’ll get at you with a sharp stick!” Billy replied by sailing a raw Irish potato at him, aud then making a dash, slipped by, and ran up the stairs to wards the school-room, whooping and hurraing as he went. “Confound such children!” exclaim ed the bachelor uncle. “Excuse me, Miss Sherwood, I’ll go and look the rest up, and send them to you in short order.” And Phoebe, quite delighted at ob taining such a powerful auxiliary, re turned with a light heart to herschool rooin, whither she was soon followed by her boisterous pupils. “Keep quiet here, all of you !” ex claimed the uncle, bringing up the rear. “Now, Miss Sherwood, if these children give you any more trouble, you are just to call me, that is all, and as for you, you young scape-graces, if Miss Sherwood has to call me, you look out for yourselves.” The children expressed their under standing of the threat, by opening their eyes at him and making faces. “Very well, you’ll see,” said their uncle, shaking his head at them, and then turned on his heel to conceal the laugh which had all along been twink ling in his eye. “I’m coming up here again,” said he, putting his head back into the door-way, “to see how you say your lessons, and those that don t Kiivrt vhcti o, aiiau'b Rate “HUT titftlier. Now go to work and study.” The last two sentences he managed to utter in such a dictatorial voice, that the children half believed him, and be gan to hunt up their books with more than usual assiduity. “Children, come here,” said Phoebe, gathering them around her, as she seated herself on a low stool near the lire place, “I want to tell you a story before we open school.” The children came closer up to her, some kneeling and some standing, and she began her impromptu narrative. “Once upon a time there was a fath er who loved his children very much. He did everything he could to make them happy, and would sooner go with out the comforts of life himself, than that his children should want anything. Their mother, too, loved them dearly, and worked day and night for them. Long after they were all sound asleep, she would sit up at night, and make clothes for them, and when Christmas came, she would make them all sorts of nice cake and candy, and their fath er would fill their stockings with pretty toys and fire-works.” “That is just like our father and mother,” said Jack. “Is it, indeed !” said Phoebe, quite surprised. “ Well, the mother and father that 1 am telling you about, had very good, affectionate children, but then k unfortunately, they were very thoughtless, and very often did things that grieved their parents very much; they wouldn’t learn their lessons, but wanted to ploj’ all :.•, -- J would tear their clothes, and kick out their shoes, and shoot at their hats, and throw stones at the window-sashes; and then they would run through the house with their hare, dirty feet, and their poor mother and father were all the time working to keep things straight, hut could’nt succeed. So after a while the mother was taken sick, and they all thought she was going to die. The doctor said she had worked too hard, and that it was work that was killing her, and the children began to cry be cause they remembered how much trouble they had given her, and how often she had worked until late at night to mepd the clothes which they had been so careless about. They remem bered how often they had made a noise and disturbed her when she had head ache, and they remembered how hard she had tried to teach them all that was right, and they wouldn’t learn, and so they cried, and said, ‘Oh ! if our dear, dear mother gets well again, we will try and do what she tells us,’ and so they did. She got well after a while, and her children never forgot how they felt when they thought they had killed her, they studied when FOURTH * *>,—KO. 35 WHOLE ; school , ci n : t t to tear , - . ; . i,c and thi . i ,■’ :•• • w> :1; in . v den, ar ■ ’ an” ke; ‘ the cat h •• . n . 1 h did all -i.- lie. ?Vlic. i* i instead : . ■(••t forgot, hen i nrsti , . < cr • . ing, ti ork. with” i'-ir parents ‘ “... aboa* it. and ma nice j little presents. They were not very great j • • . 1 . rents’ l dren hi. ; u..;le tie! and “i ‘ n Christn e.n;.<. w re ,i'.so La - py.” “Hui rememl • - - make a in > ponderi fully ini ‘ “Wh mas pre from hit “Yes, lated th - i.f i. “We on’t ’a (■! U school,” “and ’ - i want to w-ii..: ; ri-t. must sti :y y i:r !<• to say t ■ pens so a ■ ‘ 1 i-i t]’ read th “ was silently CHAPTER (\. “Any wood?” asked Mr. Reuben Smith, en tering the school-room about mid-day with a formidable club in his hand. “No, indeed,” said Phoebe, ST ;, irr’ as she caught sight of the huge \ “I think I can dispense with y thority for the present. Go o° wall your lesson, Lizzie. \\ hat is a “A noun,” said Lizzie, hesitating, “what is a noun ?” “Yes, what is a noun? Come, Liz zie, you have been a week learning this lesson, now tel! me, what is a noun ? Don’t be so slow.” ,‘Now, if you hurry me, I can’t say it,” cried Lizzie, who really was trying her very best. “A noun —a noun is the name of any person —is that it ?” “Yes.” “Place?” “Y*” “Or thing ?” “Yes,” said Phcebe, quite satisfied. “Now, Lizzie, tell me what sort of a noun ‘girl’ is.” “Common,” said Lizzie, after consid erable thought. “Very well—why ?” “Because,” said Lizzie, doubtfully', “there is a plenty of ’em.” The bachelor uncle at this, threw himself on one of the benches, drop ped his stick, and laughed outright, when Billy began to “hurrrah” but stopped. The school-mistress laughed at first too, but afterwards said grave ly— “No, my dear, ‘girl is common’ be cause it is a general name.” “1 don’t see any sense in that, ’ said Lizzie, looking puzzled. Her teacher looked somewhat puzzled too, and hav ing already explained it two or three times, concluded after a moment’s thought not to try it again. “What sort of noun is Mary?” said she interrogatively. “Common,” replied Lizzie, confi dently. “No, it is not common.” “Why, la!” exclaimed Lizzie, “how can you make that out, when almost all of my acquaintances are named Mary ?” Here there was a fresh outbreak from the chief magistrate, and Miss Sherwood seeing no probability of keeping any thing like order over the grammar lesson, concluded to try Geo graphy. Unluckily, however, Lizzie’s geography lesson was all about the nirspticres, which she could not by any means be made to understand. Miss Sherwood explained and illustra ted until she was tired, but it was all midnight to Lizzie, at last, in despair, she took up an apple which lay upon her desk. “Now Lizzie,” she said, “suppose 1 was to cut this apple in halves.” “Well, then my dear,” said Lizzie, quite weary of the subject, and forget ting all her sober resolves for the time, “You would eat one half and 1 would eat the other , and so there would he an end of it.” Her baffled instructress dropped the miniature globe, and raised her hands in hopeless dismay', looking at her pu pil so reproachfully, that Lizzie’s levi ty departed on the instant. “Now I’hcebe,” she exclaimed,throw ing herself into her teacher’s lap, and clasping her tight around the neck, “it is no use to look at poor Lizzie so— you know the poor girl never learned any thing in her life, and how can you expect her to learn all at once. Kiss me now, and mark me a first rate les son, and I’ll learn it better another time.” What could poor Phoebe do ? The j bachelor un.'le went down sta: I ;eg and PI ’.e rang the b jco s. Ami uov the t idreu, • ‘done tem ikably well I* * I them) ip;ang trot’ their - , “now for Christmas “Don’t you wjo i iam r fcv.t ?” a 1 | from her th.v | hardly 10-- I l' !i ’ “N-. 1 . • t > anu ‘ ke U P <> n ! <.*■* morning, in it was on try toil et table, with pits .I .. - or it.— Now, Lizzie, yon could make on* like “Oh, yes’” *.claimed Liv,., “that is just the tiling, but will you show me how’ to make it ?” Miss Sherwood nodded assent, and drew out a nett'd bag. this h, ; very small and fine, , “but if it was netted of i .in i in J some buckskin at the > it ui make a beautiffll bird hag.” “And I could make one for father,” cried Jack, “hurrah for thatj!” “Charley, you are a little fellow,” continued Phoebe, “but 1 think you could manage to make a mop-handle and 1 could easily show you Low to make the mop.” And so on she went, finding some thing to stir up the energies of each one, so that, before school hours came they were all fairly interested, and on ly anxious to sat right w work. It was agreed that they were all to meet in the school-room for an hour after din ner every day,and that Miss Sherwood was to superintend their manufactures. On the third afternoon of their la bours, they were surprised by a visit trom their uncle Reuben, who came up to see what was making the children so good all at once, and was so delight ed at finding out what they were at, that he presented them with a dollar apiece, to be spent in whatever they wanted for carrying on their opera tions. “Let us give mother a surprise !” cried little Lizzie, clapping both hands ou her mouth as if to keep in the won derful revelation. “I wonder if that is’nt just what we are going to do,” said Billy, scorn fully. “Gh !” said Lizzie, “but this is a big surprise, the others are only little sur prises. Suppose we take down the shabby drawing room curtains, and put up new ones. 1 saw such pretty curtain calico at Mr. Bell’s store. Oh! what a nice idea V and she jumped up and down in her glee. “ Capital! ’ exclaimed her uncle, “and 1 vote for anew papering, and getting mom lsetty to clean the bras ses and rub the furniture. We will have to entrap somebody into shaking the carpet, 1 judge! 1 w ouldn’t un dertake the job myself, or be in the neighbourhood for a good round sum. Here, Miss Sherwood,” he continued, handing her a bank note, “I commis sion you to improve things to the best of your ability, and if funds give out, ! just call on me.” So saying, he departed, leaving the young girl quite amazed at his thought ■ fulness and generosity. 1 CHAPTER V. Christinas was coming nearer and nearer, and the presents were almost all completed, but alas ! the father of ; the family had not yet been heard from, and heavier and heavier grew the heart of the sorrowing w ife. So taken up was s’ -th 1 axiety about her husba- .. ’ of preparing for C . from her mind, and il • . .1 r few days before that ‘.me, t.-t a petition from her children surprised her ruto remembering that she had not sent ‘ the city, as was her custom. f claus to fill the stock’ dren’s petition let them *• int*-’ . uo humo ed . ery thing, acced tot Aithout a moment itat.o, -ad moved into the “strange room”—an apartment which open