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Too Late.
What silences we keep year after year,
With tnose who are most near, to as and
,lear!
We hve beside each other . day . , by day, ,
And speak of myriad things, but seldom
say
The full, sweet word that lies just in our
reft'-h.
Beneath the commonplace of common
speech.
Then out of sight and out of reach they go—
Those lose, familiar friends who loved us
80 ;
And sitting in the shadows they have left,
Alone with lonliness. and sore bereft,
Ve lhint with vain regret ot some fond
word,
That onee we might have said, and they have
heard.
For weak and poor, the love that we ex
'
pressed
Now seems beside the sad, sweet, unex
pressed,
And slight the deeds we did to those un¬
done,
And small the service spent, to treasure
won.
And undeserved the praise for word or deed,
That should have overflowed the simple
need.
This is the cruel fault of life—to be
Full visioned only when the ministry
Of death has been fulfilled, and in the
place
Of some dear presence, is but an empty
space.
What recollected services can then
(live consolation for the “might have been?”
—Norah Perry.
OUR CuUNTRY COUSIN »
This is how it all happened: My
two sisters, the fashionable Misses
Hey mo nr, toward the end of a certain
summer having been the round of all
the old summer reports and tiring of
the lust ouo, suddenly remembered
that somewhere in the rural districts
in the interior of the State they pos¬
sessed some cousins of more or less
nearness or distance.
As a last resort, in order to over¬
come the ennui that was gradually
taking possession of them, they de¬
cided to settle (lowu upon these
cousins for tho remaining days of the
late summer aud the heated period of
the autumn.
With them to decide was to act, so
with almost unfashionable alacrity—
and my sisters were sticklers for
fashion, too—letters were despatched
to the suddenly remembered cousins
and the answer to them awaited with
breathless impatience.
They came at last, bearing the most
cordial invitation for my sisters to
follow their inclinations and come up
into the country at their earliest con*
venience.
To say that my sisters jumped at
the chance would bo wholly mislead¬
ing ; my sisters never jumped at any¬
thing; they wore entirely too elegant
for that.
But with surprising haste they an¬
swered, informing their hostesses
when they would arrive, and then ou
the heels of the letters swept up into
the country, bag, bandbox and bag
gage.
Letters told us bow they found tbe
cousins, a charming widow aud her
daughter, with a flue old place, and,
what blessed it, real country hospital¬
ity. The widow was set down as a
person who had seen something of life
and the daughter was voted nice,
though a trifle old fashioned.
As lather and I were very busy in
town that summer we did not join
the ladies in the country, but merely
took a week’s fishing at one of our
favorite haunts and went right back
to work again, so it was not until
early October, when the girls came
back to town, brown as berries and
full of the pleasures of their trip, that
I received a regular detailed descrip¬
tion of my cousin ^Harriet and her
daughter Alice.
And from the description I gathered
that the young lady was a person who
would do very well—for the country.
Indeed, my sisters gave me very
plainly to understand that our cousin,
Alice Seymour, would not shine under
the city’s lamps.
In a few days after their return
there was nothing new to tell either
oi their trip or of their entertainers
aud 1 heard no more of my couutry
cousins until one day in earlv winter,
when the female portion of the house¬
hold was thrown into sudden conster¬
nation . the arrival of a letter from
Mi's. Harriet Seymour, iu which she
informed my sisters and their mater
aul parent that she would iike to have
her daughter spenu a month in town
with them.
There were sundry other remarks of
a pleasant and personal nature in the
letter, but they were hardly noticed
in the all obscuring importance of the
desire expressed.
Sister Florence came to me with in
dignation written in every feature.
“To think,’’she exclaimed, “Cousin
Alice wants to come here!”
“Well, why shouidh’t she?" I
ag j £e( j
t . Why shouldn’t she?” echoed Flor
enee. “Why, it simply can’t be
done.”
i • Why not?”
My sister did not deign to answer
me, but swept away iu great indigna¬
tion.
It was Caroline next who expressed
to me how awful the idea’ was, I ex
pressed my entire inability to see its
awful ness, and was told by my sister
that men didn’t understand these
things at all.
“I understand, I think,” said I,
“that you accejit the hospitality of
people whoso kindness you are unwill¬
ing to return,” and Caroline left me
in disgust.
Then mother whispered to me con
fidentially that she couldn’t see how
she was going to avoid having that
girl come, and was entirely amazed
when I asked why she should wish to
avoid it.
“Why, It would never do in the
world, Hubert,” said my mother.
“I love the girl as well as any one
can, but yon know that the country
and city are so different.”
“Is my cousin a lady?” I asked.
“To be sure,” said my mother,
“but”-
“Is she an idiot?”
“Why, certainly not, but”-
“Can she tell a truin of cars from a
hansom?”
“Hubert!”
“Well, then, I can’t see why it’s
going to be such a terrible thing to
bring her to the city.”
My mother left me with tho parting
assurance that men never could ap¬
preciate such dilliculties.
But, after studying it, they could
find no way but to allow the girl to
come, and come she did.
The girls wanted to send a servant
to meet her, but I insisted on going
myself, so Florence went with me.
I could hardly believe that the
dainty little lady in the gray travel¬
ing suit, who answered my sister’s
greeting with a quiet smile, was the
objectionable country cousin, She
was a lady all over from her charming
hat to her pretty little walking boots.
She was so pretty that as I looked
at my sister I began to understand
the point of objection which the com¬
ing of my cousin had raised.
Now, while I do not believe in love
at first Right, I must confess that a
strange fancy for this quiet little girl
took immediate possession of me, and
as the days passed it grew. What
else could be expected of any obstinate
young fellow, anyway, when his
mother and sister opposed him?
So I found myself loving Alice Sey¬
mour. But iu this I was not alone ;
several other young fellows seemed to
share my feelings, and it made me
uneasy.
Her manners were so perfect, and
yet she said and did much quaint aud
unstudied thiugs that a man couldn’t
help being attracted to her. She was
not conventional, but she possessed a
natural dignity that was greater than
convention could give. As Bevurly
Bridges said, she was one of nature’s
noblewomen.
Confouud the fellow, he always had
tho trick of turning a neat phrase.
Well, like a blind man, I went on
seeing nothing about me, until one
day I came upon my little cousin
looking very dolorous. She was alone
in the parlor, and she looked as if <«he
had been weeping.
I was all up in arms in a moment
to know who had offended her, but
she hesitated a long time before she
told me falteringly that she had grown
to believe that my sisters did not
want her there, aud that she was go¬
ing home.
Somehow I steeled myself to say:
“I do not want you here, either.”
She raised her tear stained face to
me—I had forgotten to tell yon that
she was freckled—just about a dozen
bewitching ones placed where they
would do the most good. I saw sur
prise in her look, but before she
could speak I kissed her aud
pared: “Let ns make a little homo ot
our own, dearest, and”—
Oh, pshaw, a fellow can’t tell about
these things, yon know, but she was
willing, and I was happy.
When my sisters were informed
they acted very well, kissed us and
feigned a great deal of enthusiasm.
I thought at first it was all pre¬
tended, and I never understood until
later.
Both of my sisters are now mar¬
ried.—Chicago News.
A New Kind of Club.
The Broken Plate Club is a curious
little association or brotherhood, with
headquarters in a small village in the
Department of the Nord, France.
Several years ago a party of manu¬
facturers and merchants were dining
together when by chance a plate rolled
from the table, fell into the fireplace
and broke. Strangely enough, the
number of pieces corresponded ex¬
actly with the number of diners.
Upon this circumstance a society was
formed to include only those then and
there present aud to terminate finally
on the death of the last member. To
each man was assigned a piece of the
broken plate.
The men meet and dine each year,
and though no deaths have occurred
as yet in the little association, the un¬
written law reads that when each
member dies his piece shall be handed
over to the president, who, one by
one, shall fasten the fragments to¬
gether. When every member save
one has passed away, that man shall
add his final bit to the plate, cement¬
ing it firmly in, and. shall have it
buried.—New York World.
A Timid Giraffe.
It is very curious how timid these
creatures are about certain sounds.
Noisy sounds, like a man walking by
with'hob nailed boots, it does not no¬
tice, but a lady coming in with hardly
more sound than the mere rustling of
her dress, makes it stare with pricked
ears and eyes distended. We remem¬
ber well after the terrible explosion
of gunpowder on a barge on the neigh¬
boring canal, asking the keepers of
the giraffes of that day how they had
taken it, and he said he was surprised
how very little notice they took at
all. They jumped to their feet, but
almost at once lay down again when
they found nothing had happened.
“But,” he said, “if I was at night
time to creep along that gallery in
my sooks, they would be so scared that
I believe they would dash themselves
to bits. ” They fear the lurking foe,
and a big bang scares them less than a
faint, rustling sound. They are in
that very deerlike. —Leisure Hour.
Not That Kind.
Au English writer would abolish the
honeymoon, insisting that it spoils
many a promising marriage by weary¬
ing the young couple one of the
other. There are not a few old
couples left who would suggest an in¬
definite extention of the honeymoon
rather than the abolition, having
found that closer acquaintance opens up
depths of affection undreamt of on the
wedding journey. The subject recalls
the reply of a homesick soldier to
General Thomas. The General met
the man’s request for his second fur¬
lough in a single year with the remark
that he himself hadn’t been home in a
year and a half. “That’s all right for
you, General,” retorted the homesick
man, “but me au’ my wife ain’t that
kind.—Midland Monthly.
Too Much Civilization.
Civilization, says au exchange has
demoralized the Samoans, They have
taken a fancy for the large men-of
war’s boats, for which they have dis¬
carded their canoes, and iu which
they row about from village to village,
discussing politics and neglecting
their crops. To build the boats they
have mortgaged their laud, and in¬
stead of making an attempt to raise
money to pay their creditors they
spend their time playing cricket for
stakes consisting of pigs or kegs of
salt beef.
The Only Chance.
“Do you think,” said Chappie,
“that a gentleman ought to speak to
his barber when he meets him on the
street?
“Certainly,” said Briggs. “It is
about the only chaDce he has to get a
word in.”—Indianapolis Journal,
VOLCANIC CHAIN.
A South Pacific Region That
Covered With Volcanoes.
Most Destructive and Terrible
Any in the World.
The bay of Naples and Sicily are
small and insignificant volcano dis¬
tricts beside the northern peninsula
of the island or Celebes, just to the
east of Borneo, in the South Pacific
Ocean. Veruvius and Etna are of
little moment in comparison with the
volcanic chain that studs this island
region, flanked by its hills and heaps
of lava and ashes. One or the other of
the volcanos in this great chain is
continually belching forth, throwing
up, if not streams of lava and great
stones, then fluid clay that is blue,
gray and red.
The Douda, 9,000 feet in height,
and the Sapoetan, 6,000 feet high, are
the two great volcanoes of the dis¬
trict, and each of them has been in
eruption several times during the past
century. Were it not a sparsely set¬
tled country the loss of life would be
terrible there. But there is no Pom¬
peii to be destroyed. The inhabi¬
tants, wild and savage natives, live far
away from the volcanoes and quite
out of the reach of their torrents.
K lab at, or “Two Summits,” an¬
other terrible volcano, is marked by
a great lake in its crater, and not far
away is the Doewa Soedara, or “Two
Sisters;” still another is the Lakon,
which local tradition says is inhabited
by an evil spirit, and from which
there came a fearful eruption 50 years
ago, which devastated the entire dis¬
trict.
All the islands around this northern
end of Celebes are volcanic. The
Archicapelago that runs up to the
Philippine Islands, to the north, is
dotted with active mouths of fire, im¬
portant among which is the superb
pyramidal volcano Aboe (which,being
translated, means ‘fashes”), and Gu
nova Awn, which in all probability
has been the most destructive volcano
the world has ever known.
Thousands of the inhabitants of
Celebes, in 1812, in 1856 and iu 1871,
were buried beneath the stream of hot
ashes and lava that came in molten
sheets and utterly overwhelmed them.
All these islands are nevertheless a
paradise in the luxuriance of their
vegetation and the multiplicity of
their animal life. In them the virgin
forests have never felt the touch of the
axe.
Holland owns these islands now,
having made provinces of them when
she gained a foothold iu the far East.
Of Malay and Alfooroos race are the
people, the more civilized population
of the coast being Malay, the savage
tribes of the interior Alfooroos.
There are many tribes in Celebes,
some of Philippine origin, others of
Papuan. The Bougis tribe is yet
another of the dominant population,
savages strong and skilful and with¬
out the possibility of civilization in
them.
These fellows the Dutch Govern¬
ment have essayed to train as soldiers,
because of their strength and power
of legs and arms, but the attempt
proved unsuccessful because of the
Bougis disposition to “run amuck”
whenever excited by driuk or gam¬
bling. When in that state they be¬
come wild and frenzied, aud stab, bit
and thrust until they are knocked
down and bound. The only way the
Dutch policemen of Celebes can cap¬
ture them is by using a sort of fork
which keeps them at a distance. It
takes two or three policemen to cap¬
ture a single Bougis.
Cause for Alarm.
“Smith is walking around to-day
as if he were stepping ou eggs.”
4 i He needs to.”
“What ails him?”
“Why, last night after he had gone
to bed he remembered that he should
have taken some quinine capsules.
He got up in the dark aud took ’em.
This morning he discovered that he
had swallowed three 22-caliber re¬
volver catridges!”
William Ludlam White of Jamaica,
N. Y., who will be fifteen years of
age j n October, is eight feet three
j uc i Jes tall aud weighs 262 nounds.
A Curious House Builder
Joseph Ober.one of the most'
trie persons who lived eceei
ever who i
passed all his life at Frankton T
dropped dead with n J
heart disease a
nights ago. Twenty-five years
the fall of 1870, he eS’h a? o
of large began the
a two-story house on the 1
ou which his old frame house
atory affair, a
was situated. As he want,
it on the same site, he proceeded
build around the i
old house, i a vbi
he continued to live. He had to
for his living, and *
penter, decided being a f a i r
to do his own wor
His services were in such demand
he w r as able to work th
on his own hon
only at irregular intervals, and tj
house made slow progress. He fi
got the main part na i]
up to the square,,,
raised part of the rafters. The J
went slowly ‘ V( ^
by with no appreciab
progress. The inner siding was nail,
on in some places, and the sheetii
on the rafters on one side. Hewou
make changes and tear down sectioi
and put up others until the h ouse
sented remarkable p
a appearance.
The little house is still i n th e corn
of the unfinished big one, and i
the n
family have live d. Matters ke
on in the same way, and year by
he added to the ye
finishing more building, nevi
any part of it. It i 8 a hug
ramshackle pile of houses, one on to
of the other, only the rafters, u:
sightly boards and other scaffoldi
presenting themselves to view. T
house has become quite a landmark
,
all over the country, and every one
acquainted with the history of ti
wonderful pile. At the time of h:
death the old man was still at work o
the building.—Chicago Inter-Oceai
Rocking Chairs for Health.
“I love it, I love it, and who shal
dare,” asked the late Miss Eliza Cool
in a moment of inspiration, armchair?] “tochidl
me for loving that old
Whether the article of furniture all tj
which the poetess was so much
tached was a rocking chair there is nl
means of discovering. If it was, sh
certainly would not have been chid
den for loving it by the French doe)
tor who has just discovered in rock
ing chairs a new and potent agencl
for good. The gentle and
oscillations of these chairs have, ii
appears, * ‘a wonderful effect in stimufl
lating the gastro-intestinal peristal
sis. ” If your disgestion is sluggish!
and. you suffer from “atony of tlia
stomach,” all you need to do is td
rock yourself for half an hour or sq
at a time, and all be well. Make the
experiment the next time you feel
that your gastro-intestinal peristalsid
wants stimulating. The doctor who
proclaims this new and very simple!
cure for dyspepsia must be either a
a benefactor to whom thousands of
his fellows will be grateful or a parti
ner in a rocking chair manufactory.!
I wonder which?—St. Paul’s.
A Curious Crab.
One of the most singular-looking
creatures that ever walked the earth
or “swam the waters under the earth”
is the world-famous man-faced crab of
Japan. Its body is hardly an inch in
length, yet the head is fitted with h
face which is the perfect counterpara
of that of a Chinese coolie—a veritable!
missing link, with eyes, nose an<
mouth all clearly'defined. This cnrioui
and uncanny creature, besides thi
great likeness it bears to a human he
ing in the face, is provided with tw<
legs, which seem to grow from th
top) of its head and hang down ove
the sides of its face. Besides thesi
legs, two feelers, each about an ineia
in length, grow from the chin world of IiM tbej
animal, looking for all the
a forked beard, These man-facelj
crabs swarm in the inland sees ofj
Japan. — Public Opinion.
Valuable.
Mrs. Cumso (reading)—A butcher
in Indiana killed a cow and fouud
her stomach several hairpins, a thim*
ble, five screws and a $20 gold piece.
Mr. Cumso—That bears out exactly
what my Uncle Jim used to say.
“W’hat was that?”
“He always contended that
was money in cows. —Life.
Goggles are now supplied by
British admiralty to the officers anl
sailors serving on fast tordedo
ns the high speed has been found
be injurious to the eyes.