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 I UNITED STATES OF AMRRICA.J 
 
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Just Published, 
 
 A now Book, uniform with this Yolume, and 
 lUuRtrated, entitled 
 
 Nonsense, 
 
 "BRICK" POMIKROY. 
 
 *j(.* These books are sold everywhere^ and will be sent by mail, 
 POSTAGE FREE, on receipt of price, $1.50, 
 
 G. 1¥. Carleton & Co., Publisl&ers, 
 New York. 
 
-3«'^^' 
 
 SENSE, 
 
 OR 
 
 Satnrilay-iiiglit Mnsings anl ThoniMM Paiiers. 
 
 "yyu^tcA^^yndiic^ BY 
 
 "BKICK" POMEROY 
 
 (Editor of the La Orosse, Wis., Democrat.) 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY J. U. HOWARD. 
 
 ^. 
 
 ,-- ' NEW YOEK : 
 G. W, Carle ton & Co., Ptib lis hers, 
 LONDON: S. LOW, SON & CO. 
 
 MDCCCLXVIII. 
 

 Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1868, by 
 
 G. W. CARLETON & CO., 
 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
 
 Southern District of New York. 
 
 The New York Printing Company, 
 81, 83, and 85 Centre Street y 
 New York. 
 
tBcbitatioxu 
 
 To men who have souls — 
 
 To young men of ambition — 
 
 To those who have hearts — 
 
 To all who would be better and happier — 
 
 To my earnest friends everywhere — 
 
 THIS, MY FIRST VOLUME, 
 
 |s most respettf«Ug bebkateb bg t^z §ittl|(rr, 
 
 M. M. POMEROY. 
 
 I 
 
 La Crossb, Wis., 186T. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 OHAPTEE PAGB 
 
 I.— A Few Remarks about the Eoad of Life 9 
 
 IL— The Magic Artist 19 
 
 III.— In which People are Spoken to Sensibly 82 
 
 IV.— In which Little Boys and Big Boys are Told to Think 88 
 
 V. — A Letter from Home '. 45 
 
 VI. — We Reason Together on Success 61 
 
 VII.— Saturday Night 53 
 
 VIII. — In which Easy Lessons are Given Out 68 
 
 IX.— The Evening Star 70 
 
 X.— In which Disappointment is Favorably Mentioned 77 
 
 XI. — "Wherein Common-Sense is Entitative 85 
 
 XII. — In which we Speak about Pluck 91 
 
 XIII.— Knitting 97 
 
 XIV.— We Walk in the Cold, and Pity where Others Condemn . . 103 
 
 XV. — Wh«rein the Use of Eyes is Looked Over 110 
 
 XVI.— In which we Find Smiles among Tears 119 
 
 XVII.— A Short Talk about how to Get Along 126 
 
 XVIIL— Fireside Musings 182 
 
 XIX.— In which we Speak of the Roads, the Hearth and Fender 138 
 
 XX.— Sunday Night 147 
 
 XXI. — In which we Travel on Dangerous Ground 150 
 
 XXII.— About Twigs and their Early Bending 159 
 
 XXIII.— In which a Hard Word is Used 168 
 
 XXIV.— Musings at the End of the Week 173 
 
 XXV.— In which Post-Mortem Processions are Spoken of 178 
 
 XXVI.-Pictures 185 
 
 XXVII.— We Wonder why Wonders will never Cease ! 192 
 
 XXVIII.— Wherein the Use of Money is Spoken of 198 
 
 XXIX.— For Married Men, and their Wives 205 
 
 XXX. — Boys and Apprentices are Spoken of and to 212 
 
 XXXI.— My Boy is Counselled to Mind his own Business 219 
 
 XXXII.— We Speak of Something that Concerns Somebody 225 
 
 XXXIII.— We Converse on how Men may Succeed 232 
 
 XXXIV.— We Talk of Things we ought not to Talk of 233 
 
 XXXV.— We find Where to Look for Happiness 248 
 
 XXXVI.— Another Week Gone 249 
 
 XXXVII.— Happy New Year 257 
 
 XXXVIIL-Saturday Night 267 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 I DO not understand it ! 
 
 Who of us does ? 
 
 Do you ? 
 
 There is something so much beyond human reasoning in this life, 
 that one hardly dares to stop thinking long enough to think I It 
 is so terrible to be lost I And there is so much, and yet so little, 
 that who of us has the courage to step, even in thought, beyond 
 the present. So many have gone before, yet they tell us nothing, 
 and we play like children waiting the boll I 
 
 It seems as though we could make the path to the school-room 
 door an easier one to walk in if we would. If we but took half the 
 pains to shun the brambles and ugly points we take to run upon 
 them, how easy would be the road f And thus it is that we at 
 night loosen the curtains, tone the light, draw the easy-chair to 
 hearth and fender, forget the world, and run the pen, line upon 
 line, doing to others as wo would have thena do by us. 
 
 Who cares for any of us ? 
 
 No one I 
 
 Do we care for ourselves ? 
 
 Nol 
 
 And yet we do. We all look for the pearls of time, half dark, 
 half light, as Hk sends them to us for such purpose as we will — 
 days we save or lose. Let us not condemn the day till we have 
 seen its sunset — let those who read these pages not condemn 
 till the pages have all been turned. Life is but acts. Books 
 are but leaves. All in all, and thus the summing. 
 
 Looking backward, we see a winding path, reaching back into 
 a narrow labyrinth of uncertainty — now opening wider and wider 
 into a plain of beauty and hours of happiness as we journey on 
 the Road to Life, never fearing the reward, never holding back a 
 step, lest it be the one that marks our mile-stone ! We see in 
 
8 Preface. 
 
 the path behind us a poor boy alone, struggh'ng with fate, trials, 
 poverty, and life's temptations, with no one to aid him kindly. 
 To be sure, hands were outreached ; but they often were cold, 
 and the words spoken lacked earnest meaning. 
 
 "We have often hungered for some one who knew the road to 
 walk with us, and teach us how to give vigor to step, and some- 
 thing more than a tiresome aim to life. We have often wished 
 for some one to do by us as we will do by them ; so we sit quiet- 
 ly by the table, and with never a thought of wrong, but a heart 
 full of love to all — be they the boys like Valter, our young 
 companion, who listens as we talk of life — men like ourself, who 
 may, and may not, think of thoughts which run from brain to 
 pen-point as we write, or those of either sex whose dark hours, 
 whose sad hours — whose longing hours have been many, yet 
 whose days have been bright, and would have been more so if 
 those who make the world had done by them as we would have 
 done by them. 
 
 So do not throw this little volume down lightly. 
 
 It will do you no harm. 
 
 It assumes no dictation. 
 
 It is not a refrigerator to congeal and keep within you the 
 legacy of sin we inherited. 
 
 It is simply the honest, home-like talk of a walker on life's 
 road, to be read by the youth who need friends — by the middle- 
 aged who have none too many — by the ones who do and who 
 do not see more of their loved ones by the hearth and fender — 
 by those who would be happy, yet in the bustle of life have no 
 time to ask of those who have not been in such haste to travel 
 the road Valter and us set out to walk. 
 
 M. M. POMEROY. 
 
 Sanctum of " Democeat," La Crosse, Wis., 186T. 
 
" As you are a boy, so will you be a man, Valter. The 
 golden crop cannot be garnered till after the grain has 
 been sown." — Puye 9. 
 
Sense 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 A Few Remarks about the Road of Life. 
 
 lALTEK, my boy, we are walking 
 
 along. The road turns now to 
 
 the right, then to the left. It is 
 
 not altogether smooth, yet we can 
 
 pick our way along and not stumble if we heed 
 
 where we set our feet. There are brambles 
 
 thick set along the road— their points stand 
 
 ready to lacerate all who would force their 
 
 way through without regard for proper paths. 
 1* 
 
10 A Few Memories about the Road of Life, 
 
 And there are others on this same road — some 
 are old with- us — more are young with you. 
 
 It is useless, Yalter, to ask where tliey are go- 
 ing, when we know not where we are bound to. 
 All we have to do, my boy, is to walk on — and 
 on — and on. The road will end somewhere. It 
 will lead us by many beautiful places, and past 
 many treacherous grounds. It will lead us by 
 churches — cradles — hearses — weddings — happy 
 homes — broken hearts tossed high on limbs of 
 loveless trees — old people and young people — 
 weddings and funerals. It will lead us, my boy, 
 up steep paths where none but the bold dare 
 tread, to summits from which we can look down 
 upon the world at labor, or it will lead us down 
 slippery places, into life's swamps, from whose 
 miry depths it will be very hard to retrace our 
 steps. 
 
 The road opens — it narrows. Its sides con- 
 verge or diverge as we look. It leads to a broad 
 plain where men are brothers and heart beats 
 
A Few Remarhs about the Road of Life. 11 
 
 true to heart, and where the sunlight of God's 
 wondrous love germinates love and spiritual fra- 
 grance, or into little, narrow prison-houses of 
 mind, dank and lonesome. 
 
 It is but a step from one end of this road to 
 the other, Yalter— yet it is a hard road to walk. 
 The priest and christening are back of us, my boy. 
 The cradle is small, Yalter, but there is always 
 more room in it than in the largest coffin. The 
 minister baptizes you in the morning— he mar- 
 ries you at noon — he reads a funeral sermon at 
 night — and is ready for the morrow. The road 
 ends. You fall out by the way violently, or walk 
 out and on the broad plain at the end of the road 
 quietly. 
 
 There are flowers and beauties on the road, but 
 few of us see them, my boy. There are hidden 
 beauties which must be sought out— there are 
 countless bowers behind the brambles— there are 
 mossy banks at the foot of many of these old 
 oaks, where friends can sit and be happy. We 
 
12 A Few Rema/rks about the Road of Life. 
 
 run from the cradle to the grave, reaching for 
 some hand in the distance — stepping to gain a 
 foothold on some vessel far out at sea, swiftly fly- 
 ing still farther from us. Life is in living. Death 
 is not in dying. Life is not the dazzling sun, 
 but the countless stars which twinkle and flash — 
 God's diamonds that they are. The sun is not 
 beautiful, though it be grand. Far more beauty 
 in the pleiades. Life is in the little acts — the 
 good intentions — the purity of our motives. 
 Death is the memory we leave behind us for 
 others. 
 
 But few of our hopes are ever realized, Valter. 
 It is in fancy that we revel in love and find hap- 
 piness in places here and there. How the dreams 
 recede! The lips are not so sweet forever as 
 once. The heart is at times something besides 
 a harmonious harp. The song of love dies out, 
 and there sweep over the soul storms of passion, 
 dark shadows driven by fierce blasts, old memo- 
 ries dragging their slow lengths like wounded 
 
A Few Bemarks about the Road of Life. 13 
 
 sunbeams, to keep pace with us to the grave. 
 The cloud is not solid, and he who would ride 
 thereon must first become immortal. And we 
 make our own immortality, Yalter. 
 
 Labor for happiness. The marble palace is not 
 always the bower of love. The rustling silk does 
 not always herald affection. Wealth is not riches 
 more than old age is experience. By the humble 
 cottage-fire is happiness. The hand of the hon- 
 est laborer, calloused though it be, is softer than 
 many a palm kid touched to-day. The smile 
 that beams on the face of the occupant of that 
 little cabin hidden by the woods, as his little ones 
 run to meet him when the labors of the day are 
 over, is truer and has more of God's sunshine in 
 it than a thousand peals of laughter from gas-lit 
 halls and sumptuous parlors. The loftiest tree 
 does not bear the sweetest fruit. The highest 
 bough is not the most secure home for the bird 
 that sings our sorrows away. The hand of a poor 
 man, Yalter, is the hand of an honest one — the 
 
14 A Few Rema/rhs about the Road of Life. 
 
 heart of a poor man, my boy, is the safest shelter 
 in time of storm — the tongue of the laborer, no 
 matter how broken or what its language, is gen- 
 erally the tongue of truth, and its rhythm more 
 in unison with heavenly harmony than most of 
 us dream of. Tears come from the poor man's 
 heart. Smiles come therefrom also, and they are 
 true and warm. 
 
 In a little while the end of the road will open 
 before us. A sudden turn or gentle winding will 
 reveal our home. Then we lie down as others 
 have before us, on the right or left as we shall 
 choose. And the man who prayed at our chris- 
 tening will preach at our burial. The birds we 
 see overhead will sing as sweetly as now, and rear 
 their young with the same care. The sun will 
 laugh, the stars will smile, the zephyrs play among 
 the boughs — the leaves will dance over our graves 
 — the rain patter upon our earthly roof as if in 
 mockery, and weeds or flowers spring into life 
 and perfume as we shall take seeds with us into 
 
A Few Remarks about the Road of Life. 15 
 
 the grave. And those who now laugh with us 
 will laugh without us. A few tears will be shed, 
 and the fountains of grief ^vill then be dried up. 
 The sun will shine as usual. The morn, and the 
 noon, and the night will come. The lips we have 
 kissed, others will kiss. The hand we have clasp- 
 ed, another will hold — the heart we have nestled 
 in wdll open for another, and the wondrous links 
 in the chain of life will still be as complete as 
 though we had never been. The eyes which now 
 in love answer back wdll soon smile to cheer an- 
 other heart. The books and things we love will 
 be thrown aside — the hopes we had in childhood 
 will fade like shadows — the loves of riper years 
 will be comforted after we are gone home — the 
 hearth and fender now our own mil be another's. 
 The cloud of grief may briug a storm — a tempest, 
 but storms and tempests will pass away, and the 
 places of eai'th that now know you, Yalter, will 
 know you only through your good or evil deeds, 
 and the name you leave behind. The w^orld will 
 
16 A Few JEtemarks about the Road of Life. 
 
 exist long after we are gone. The road will be 
 travelled long after our footprints are forgotten. 
 
 Then, Yalter, my boy, let us mellow the mould 
 all we can. Every good act is a flower which 
 will beautify our final home. Every good deed 
 is an evergreen which will mark our resting- 
 place. Every good intention is a bird which will 
 sing the harmony of love over our grave. Every 
 pure motive will be a screen to beat back the hot 
 sun of calumny, and every friend we are true to 
 will be a witness for us when the hour comes 
 when we shall want them. 
 
 Do not stop, my boy, to pick up that crooked 
 stick by the roadside. Step over it. Let it lie. 
 It is a dirty, vulgar stick we will admit, but do 
 not disturb it. Let it remain where it is, and 
 soon the green grass will grow up around it — 
 the violet and dandelion will bloom beside it — 
 the wild rose will reach its tiny arms over it 
 and wave its perfumed breatii back and forth, 
 filling the air with the aroma of innocence. Let 
 
A Few Remarks about the Road of Life. 17 
 
 it lie. Some people hurl ugly sticks without an 
 object. Thej^do not hurl them to clear the road, 
 but to cause some one else to stumble. To pull 
 one out from its half-hidden place, is to pull up 
 the plants which are weaving the mantle of 
 forgetfulness over its deformities, and leave an 
 ugly scar on the green sward beneath which 
 we must some day rest. Hurl it where you 
 will — into the river, and it floats on to lodge 
 somewhere. Hurl it to the right or left and it 
 falls to the earth — breaking down innocent 
 grass, mangling tender flowers, breaking the 
 life out of stamen, leaf, and pistil — destroying 
 beauty which should be spared for other pur- 
 poses. Let the crooked acts — the gnarled 
 sticks lie where they fell, Yalter. The plants 
 will soon hide them — they will decay and 
 give new life through God's changes, to 
 please and beautify. All through the grass — 
 on either side the road are twigs, sticks, and 
 broken limbs. "Walk on, Yalter, and over them. 
 
18 A Few Remarks about the Road of Life. 
 
 If any one has stumbled and fallen, help him 
 up gently and pass on before a (frowd gathers. 
 Open your eyes — open your heart — expand 
 your ideas and be more of a man. Be true 
 to your word — to yourself. Do by others as 
 you would have them do by you, and this 
 becomes a pleasant road in which to walk, 
 Valter, my boy. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 The Magic Artist. 
 
 HE spirits and fairies held liigh carni- 
 val in front of the house last night, 
 and this morning the windows pre- 
 sented the most beautiful sight I 
 ever beheld. While those indoors were slewing, 
 winter had set its spring patterns for summer 
 work, and how delicate were the touches and 
 tracings of its magic pencil ! One window, in 
 particular, presented the most beautiful sight I 
 ever saw. It seemed as though a convention of 
 angel artists had been summoned by the d}dng 
 Winter-king, and, by the light of the aurora 
 
20 The Magic Artist. 
 
 horealis^ had made him a picture of such magic 
 beauty, that no one could look upon it without 
 feeKng to do him homage. There were the bold, 
 heavy strokes of some rough old frost-spirit who 
 delighted in making mountains, rocks, cascades, 
 and deep ravines. There stood the work of less 
 dashing artists, delighting in the production of 
 plains, rivers, oceans, and deserts. Then there 
 were panes filled with forests deep and dark — 
 with woods rivalling the famed Bois de Boulogne 
 — with prairies and deserts stretching off into the 
 distance, till lost in touches so dehcate that the 
 breath of a spirit even, must drive the work away. 
 There were sketches by gentler artists, of birds, 
 of plants, of flowers, and a thousand beautiful 
 fancies. There were the choicest, most delicate 
 embroideries, rivalling the finest Honiton, so 
 neatly woven, of so fine a texture, and of such 
 handsome patterns that it seemed as if the wed- 
 ding lace and bridal veils of angels had been 
 stolen from their heavenly wardrobe, and placed 
 
The Magic ArUst 31 
 
 on the window before me to teach man his utter 
 insignificance. 
 
 The entire panorama of sea — of earth — of air 
 — of Heaven and of Eternity, lay spread out 
 there, and countless thousands of more beautiful 
 pictures were presented than artist ever saw in 
 his most golden dreams. Cities, teaming with 
 life ; streets filled with horses, carriages, and pe- 
 destrians, crossing, passing, and repassing each 
 other; blocks of stores, in the windows of which 
 could be seen all that makes up the wardrobe of 
 the most fashionable lady or gentleman, or the 
 coarser habiliments of poverty. There were 
 blocks of tenement-houses, the roofs broken in and 
 walls toppling — the doors unhinged and windows 
 shattered — leaning and nodding toward each 
 other as if mocking at the misery of their inmates ! 
 
 There were cities silent and deserted, with bat- 
 tered walls, crumbling houses, ruined churches 
 and streets, looking silent, and filled with rubbish. 
 There were cities filled with handsome residences, 
 
22 The Magic Artist 
 
 splendid parks in which were fountains — churches 
 built after a score of architectural designs, the 
 spires losing themselves in the midst of countless 
 glittering stars, each pointing to heaven as the 
 source of inspiration. Groups of people — flocks 
 of birds — of water-fowl, and herds of horses were 
 to be seen. There were trees growing up straight 
 and handsome, the upper limbs heavy with foliage 
 — trees gnarled and tvristed as is the life of the 
 friendless — trees laden with tropical fruits — trees 
 in whose branches could be seen beautiful " feath- 
 ered" birds — trees under which could be seen 
 lovers fondly reclining — trees in which serpents 
 were writhing and swinging from branch to 
 branch, and trees beneath which were groups 
 of cattle, apparently enjoying the shade a capri- 
 cious puff of wind had thrown from the thick- 
 ly woven branches ! Oh, how beautiful ! 
 
 Mountains reared their lofty summits till the 
 highest peaks seemed lost in the antechamber of 
 heaven, and adown whose sides hung frozen cas- 
 
The Magic Artist. 23 
 
 cades. There were towers rivalling Bunker 
 Hill, the Washington Monument, the leaning 
 tower of Pisa, or the tower of Babel ! There 
 were plains on which deer, wild horses, cattle, and 
 buffalo roamed and raced and sported in all their 
 native freedom. Flower gardens had been culti- 
 vated there, so perfect that on the different varie- 
 ty of shrubs and plants could be seen leaves, 
 stems, flowers, and buds, with humming-birds and 
 butterflies lightly hovering thereon. There were 
 forests interlaced with walks, and filled in with 
 tangled thickets, from which protruded heads of 
 wild boars, of tigers, of hyenas, of toads, of ser- 
 pents, and of devils ! There were little water- 
 falls leaping from rock to rock, or pouring over 
 abrupt cliff's, losing themselves in the spray 
 which fell on the tree-tops below, or rising in a 
 cloud of stars, glittering like diamonds 'neath 
 the rays of the rising sun ! 
 
 Then came lakes and oceans on whose bosoms 
 could be seen ships sailing smoothly along, or 
 
24 Tke Magic Artist. 
 
 plunging madly over the rolHng waves before a 
 howling tempest! There were rivers covered 
 with various craft, along whose banks walked 
 students with their books, philosophers with their 
 thoughts, speculators with their plans, hypocrites 
 with their promises, children with their play- 
 mates, lovers with their hopes : and dancing, 
 grinning devils following after, overtaking here 
 and there a poor victim who had been aban- 
 doned. There were rivers lying between 
 banks lined with bending grass, or lofty trees, 
 and bluffs reaching so high that it seemed as if 
 their tops were piercing the doom of heaven. 
 Groups by the fireside — ^bands of angels — crowds 
 of spirits interweaving and interlacing with each 
 other, were pictured out with the greatest ac- 
 curacy. 
 
 There were solitary farm-houses, silent grave- 
 yards, lonely chambers, and deserted prisons ; 
 there was a battle-field, on which could be seen 
 soldiers engaged in deadly strife with weapons 
 
The Magic Artist. 25 
 
 flashing in the sun — warriors, on foot and mount- 
 ed, rushing hither and thither— horses, madly 
 phmging over the forms of the dead and dying — 
 groups of soldiers bearing off a wounded com- 
 rade — officers leading their forlorn hopes— sol- 
 diers kneeling in prayer; writhing in agony; 
 engaged in hand-to-hand conflict, and standing 
 sentinel on the outpost — squads of men beside 
 cannon, in front of which lay wreaths of dead 
 or wounded — officers' tents — regiments of men 
 not yet called into action. Over this field hov- 
 ered ravens and angels, while on it could be 
 seen women guarding and nursing those dearer 
 to them than life itself. 
 
 Every artist from the spirit-world must have 
 been engaged here last night. There were im- 
 plements and machines of all kinds. A printing- 
 press standing beside a guillotine— a cradle be- 
 neath a gallows— a violin and case of surgical 
 instruments lay side by side on a card-table— a 
 
 cannon on which was a pipe of peace, stood boldlv 
 
 2 
 
26 The Magic Artist. 
 
 forth— a broadsword and quill pen hung suspend- 
 ed from the same hook — a pleasure carriage and 
 an artillery wagon stood ready for use, while in 
 the distance was a railroad on which was a train 
 made up of cars, stages, high-back cutters, wheel- 
 barrows, stone-boats, Chinese ploughs, arid Indian 
 dug-outs ! And each was perfect, as though 
 these were the patterns from which everything 
 of the kind had been fashioned. 
 
 There were crowded ball-rooms — picnic par- 
 ties roaming through grottos, and resting in 
 sylvan-like retreats and hidden trysting-places. 
 There were preachers holding forth to crowded 
 audiences, composed of bareheaded men and 
 veiled women. There were farm scenes and city 
 scenes. There were sportsmen on the plain in 
 full pursuit of buffalo — soldiers on horses chasing 
 flying Indians — hunters in the forest standing 
 beside a tree, or kneeling behind a log, waiting 
 the approach of a deer, seen in the distance, 
 snuffing danger from afar ! Everything that man 
 
The Magic Artist. 27 
 
 could think of was here, so beautifully designed, 
 so boldly commenced, so lightly finished, so per- 
 fect and so varied, that it seemed as if the whole 
 panorama of eternity had been spread before 
 those who chose to witness the magnificent dis- 
 play. There were libraries filled with books 
 —carriages filled with people— stores filled with 
 goods— the air filled with birds— faces of men, 
 women, and children, filled with joy, hope, fear, 
 love, hate, doubt, sorrow, anguish, remorse, and 
 despair— heavens filled with angels, firmaments 
 studded with stars, each scene glistening, flashing, 
 and glittering under the rays of the morning sun 
 with a far greater brilliancy than ever shone from 
 pearl or diamond ! Beautiful and mysterious ! 
 * * * * jf ^ 
 
 I have just been in to look at the window again, 
 and such a change ! My stars have all disappear- 
 ed ; the delicate tracings making the foliage of 
 the forests have all melted down. The beautiful 
 plants are stripped of their leaves and flowers, 
 
28 TJie Magic Artist. 
 
 and look more like straws, broken and twisted 
 into a thousand ngly shapes ! The pretty little 
 humming-birds and butterflies have all melted 
 and are not to be seen ! The birds, that looked 
 so beautiful half-hidden among the leaves of the 
 trees, are flown, and the little twigs on which 
 they sat have melted ofl" one by one, till all the 
 pretty branches are gone ! The lovers are gone 
 from their trysting-places, and the little mounds 
 on which they sat, surrounded by flowers, have 
 been transformed into wet, cold graves! The 
 beautiful pines, from the drooping boughs of 
 which hung such beautiful snow draperies a few 
 moments since, have been breathed on by a pass- 
 ing breeze, and now stand there, gnarled and 
 twisted trunks, devoid of beauty or interest. 
 The splendid embroidery is not to be seen ; but 
 where it was so artistically draped and elegantly 
 displayed, hangs something that looks like a 
 shroud! The crowded room in which an 
 hour since so many were dancing, has grown 
 
The Magic Artist. 
 
 29 
 
 larger, but the dancers have departed! Where 
 the orchestra was, is now a coffin, with but one 
 solitary mourner kneeling by its side, her head 
 bent in weeping, her feet bathed in tears t God 
 bless the solitary one, wherever she may be ! The 
 pretty walks and borders in the Bois de Boulogne 
 have given place to sloppy gutters, down which 
 the molten frost is coursing ! The mountains are 
 dwindling down— the plains on which BO many 
 buffalo were seen, are still there, but oh! how 
 changed ! The ships have gone to the bottom 
 of the lakes and oceans, while the oceans are also 
 disappearing ! The river that looked so beauti- 
 ful an hour since is still to be seen, but it is now 
 the river of death! Its swelling waters have 
 flooded the flowery banks-have swept down 
 the little craft that floated so securely there not 
 long since, and are now climbing and washing up 
 against the sides of the bluffs ! The battle-field 
 has been drowned in tears, and all that remains 
 of its glittering soldiery, and thirst for glory, is a 
 
30 Hie Magic Artist 
 
 blank. The spires have gone from the churches — 
 the cities have been drowned out — the streets are 
 little Holland canals — the deer and hunter have 
 sunk into the earth — the crowd that walked by 
 the river bank have all gone, and the whole scene 
 has changed ! 
 
 The railroad has been taken up, and the train 
 of cars has given way for a hearse in which is a 
 coffin ! All the happiness I saw there an hour 
 since has fled, and nothing now is left but tears 
 and panes! The little cascades, rivulets, and 
 brooklets have run into a lake, in which I can 
 see a few mounds covered by fiends, leaping and 
 grinning at the general ruin ! The angels have 
 departed, but all over the window are the tears 
 they shed at the fall of my miniature world ! 
 The tree so laden with fruit has been trimmed of 
 its branches till it resembles a man who has lost 
 his friends, and from whom hope has fled — a 
 twisted, ugly, deformed trunk, fast settling into 
 the general destruction. 
 
 * * * ^ * * 
 
The MagiG Artist. 31 
 
 Kow all is gone ! trees, plants, birds, angels, 
 demons, rivers, animals, ships, implements, men, 
 cities, deserts, mountains — all — all have melted— 
 a few tears being all that is left of what was 
 once so beautiful. Like some men who by one 
 action can sweep out a life of honor and happi- 
 ness, so has nature, in one hour, swept away the 
 labor of an entire night, leaving us but the les- 
 son to enjoy the beautiful while it is with us, and 
 that when the ball-room of her life gives way for 
 the room of weeping, we may merit the tears of 
 at least a solitary mom-ner. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 In which People are spoken to Sensibly. 
 
 |H ! my boy, the:e is not one in a thou- 
 sand thinks of it — not one in two 
 thousand can remember the lesson 
 after it is taught him or her. Look 
 over the world of nations or of individuals. They 
 who do the best are they who mind their own 
 business. God did not make man double-bar- 
 relled. 1^0 man can well attend to the business 
 which concerns himself and that which concerns 
 another. If his brain is afflicted with strabismus, 
 somebody must suffer. From the cradle to the 
 grave the same lesson is daily given. Mind your 
 
People are spohen to Sensibly. 33 
 
 business, Yalter, my boy. Keep the rubbish 
 cleared from before your own door. What is the 
 sense of kicking up a row over what concerns you 
 no more than gravestones or their letters concern 
 the dead ? 
 
 If a man insults you personally, resent it. If 
 he wrongs a friend, stand up for that friend as he 
 would for you. But do not go snooping around, 
 prying with pointed nose into what affects you 
 not. Whose business is it if this neighbor drives 
 a black horse, that neighbor a white one, and your 
 other neighbor goes on foot like a monarch over 
 his own will ! Does it aifect you if such a man is 
 another's friend or his enemy? It is not your 
 province to harness into quarrels not your own, 
 lest in time you have so many on hand there 
 will be no time to attend to them. 
 
 They who are rich are they who mind their 
 
 own business. Find a happy man or woman, and 
 
 the affairs of another trouble them but little. 
 
 It is none of your business if the minister 
 2* 
 
84 Pecyple a/re spoken to Sensibly. 
 
 kisses one of the sisters, or one of the sisters thus 
 salutes the minister. It cannot affect you, when a 
 man you know calls on a girl you don't know, or 
 on one you do. What if there is kissing behind the 
 door — in tunnels, and when the night is dark, at 
 the vestibule of the church, or over the gate ! 
 Would you not do the same if the chance were of- 
 fered ? If a man is making money, is it any of your 
 business, provided he does it honestly ? There are 
 a thousand things coming up every day, in which 
 people have no heart. Yet they meddle therewith, 
 as if life or death hung in the balances. Stand 
 up straight. Look to yourself. Do not be an 
 echo. Have a mind of your own or do not take a 
 position. You cannot control heaven or earth, nor 
 the occupants of either. Man was born of God. 
 Each has his rights, as have you. Don't pry. 
 Don't meddle. Don't make a fool of yourself 
 by laying out work you can't do. Go on about 
 your own business, and let others do the same. 
 If a man is in trouble, help him out. Do not 
 
People are spoken to Sensibly. 35 
 
 help him in. God laiows, my boy, life rims to 
 trouble, as clouds do to storms, or gardens to 
 weeds. Try it a week, and see how much light- 
 er the spirit-load when Saturday night comes. 
 I^ever go out of the way to make a fool of your- 
 self, or to make others miserable. There is need 
 of men of sense now. There always will be need 
 of such. Do not sit gazing out of the window to 
 see what chance there is in the vicinity to raise 
 a row. If you have nothing else to do, go to 
 sleep. Where God makes hearts, man cannot 
 alter the actions of others. Some will laugh— 
 some will weep — some will mourn. Don't wor- 
 ry. It is better to close the eyes at times 
 than to keep them open. Sometimes, my 
 boy, people see too much, and when on the 
 witness-stand embarrass themselves more than 
 others. Don't be envious — or jealous. Don't 
 be governed by spite. Don't believe all that 
 people tell you. There is many a one, my boy, 
 who would make a fool of you. There are thou- 
 
36 People are spoken to SensiUy. 
 
 sands of silly stones told which had their origin 
 in idle and lying brains. Don't circulate them. 
 Don't belieA'C them when told of yourself unless 
 they are true. Be what your friends think you 
 are — avoid being what your enemies say you are, 
 and be happy. Keep your own heart right. 
 Mind your own business and let that of others 
 alone. Do not dig in the ground to find the 
 seed of the pointed thorn that scratches you. 
 Time spent in that manner is lost. Go on. 
 Keep a stiff upper lip — live to please your own 
 heart. ]^o other rests with you in the grave. 
 No other keeps you company in that grand city 
 where each minds his own business. The city 
 of the dead is one of peace and quietness. There, 
 no one interferes with the affairs of his neighbor. 
 There, no petty strifes, quarrels, and bickerings 
 annoy or trouble. What a lesson those silent 
 mounds give. There, each is king over his own 
 tenement, and there is no trouble, because each 
 minds his own business. And Yalter, my boy, 
 
People are spol^sn to Sensibly. 37 
 
 the world would be thus peaceable if each man 
 and woman in it would learn a lesson. Try it for 
 awhile. Look down into your own heart, my boy. 
 See if there does not arise each day many a 
 chance to breed trouble by meddling with or 
 peddling rumors — many a chance to avoid it by 
 going yom* way with closer mouth. Each man 
 owes it to himself to make not only himself but 
 others happy — no way can it be done so well 
 and surely as by minding your own business. 
 Remember this, my boy, and your circle of 
 friends will grow larger and your heart lighter, 
 as the invisible pages are turned which bring 
 you nearer to the solving of the great riddle, the 
 key of which is so-called death. 
 
CHAPTER lY. 
 
 In which Little Boys and Big Boys are told 
 TO Think. 
 
 |ALTEE-, my boy, do you ever pause 
 to think ? If not, you are at fault, 
 when there is bo much to think 
 of. There are millions of ideas yet 
 to be born. There are millions of years yet to 
 live. It may not be on this earth, but we shall 
 live somewhere. The grave is the lock which 
 must be opened before we touch or enjoy the 
 treasures beyond its dark keeping — before we 
 go to the punishments or rewards we plan for 
 in this world. And there is much to think of 
 which concerns this life. As you are a boy, so 
 
Little Boys and Big Boys told to Thinlc. 39 
 
 will you be a man, Yalter. The golden crop 
 cannot be garnered till after the grain has been 
 sown. The impression cannot be read till after 
 the type is set in order. And the errors show 
 in the proof. You cannot be a man unless in 
 boyhood you decide to be one. People seldom 
 blunder on success as a blind pig falls into a well. 
 Luck is nothing more than effort well directed. 
 Stones do not of themselves turn up as you pass 
 by to reveal the wealth hidden under them. 
 Men do not often succeed by chance. This world 
 was not made by chance. It was made. Men are 
 made. It takes years to make them. In all sorts 
 of trials, all kinds of troubles — under many try- 
 ing circumstances the lessons of life are learned. 
 If you would succeed as a man, you must try to 
 excel as a boy. Think ! That is the word. Think 
 that a rowdy boy makes a loafer. Think that an 
 idle boy makes a blackguard. Think that a care- 
 less boy makes a poor man. Think that a poor 
 man is a slave. Think what others have done, 
 
40 Little Boys and Big Boys told to Think, 
 
 and that it is in your power to do still better if 
 you will. Think that you will some day be a 
 man, and called on to take an active part in life's 
 battles. You will either lead or be led. It lies 
 in you to decide which. Wrinkles creep over 
 the face never to go off. Habits silently but 
 surely creep into your spirit, and you cannot 
 get rid of them. You will some day be a man. 
 Think whether you will be a voter all your life, 
 or be voted for. Think whether you will please 
 those who bid, or bid those you please. Think 
 whether you will be a fretful, disagreeable old 
 man whom every one will wish dead, or a respected 
 old gentleman whose grave will be watered with 
 tears — whose kind words and smiles will be miss- 
 ed — whose precepts or examples will be loved 
 and copied. Think of all these things, my boy. 
 
 It is easy to be poor man. All you have to do 
 is to work hard and never think. Work hard 
 and spend foolishly at card-table and in nonsense. 
 Marry in haste and repent at leisure. 
 
" Think whether you will be a voter all your Ufe, or be 
 voted lor." — Page 40. 
 
Little Bm/s and Big Boys told to Thinh. 41 
 
 Slide down hill, and walk back drawing your 
 sled after yon. If yon are poor, run in debt. 
 Keep poor — a slave to every man. If yon have 
 a wife and are in debt, keep a hired girl. If in 
 debt with nothing to do, keep two servant-girls. 
 If very poor and in debt, keep two servant-girls 
 and a dog. Keep up style. Fish for fools — bait 
 the hook with the biggest one and you will catch 
 them sure. If you owe a man, cheat him out of 
 the debt. If you can borrow instead of earning, 
 do so. Keep borrowing. Pry into all that con- 
 cerns you not. Tell all you know. Teach every 
 one to dislike you. Act out nature and be a hog, 
 or think a little and be a man. Life is a show. 
 You can have a hard seat or a cushioned one. 
 The first investment for a ticket decides the 
 matter. 
 
 The man who never thinks is a fool. His life 
 is like midnight dreams — ^morn comes and they 
 are gone. Death comes and the game is over. 
 Fortune does not teaze men to shake her hand. 
 
4:2 Little Boys and Big Boys told to Think. 
 
 A good opjDortunity never waits. If you are not 
 ready, some one else will be. The wheel goes 
 round — the car moves on — if you do not occupy 
 the seat, some one else will. It will not be long 
 before you will be a man, Yalter. Then, what 
 will you do ? Whose brains will you use ? Do 
 you intend to work all day for just what will last 
 you all night, or have you an idea for the future ? 
 Are you doing your best? If not, why not? 
 Think of these things, my boy. Look for bad 
 examples. Shun them. Look for good examples. 
 Imitate them. When you see a man fail, be 
 assured there was a reason. Think and search it 
 out. If he succeeds, learn his secret and foUow 
 it. If a man has friends, think how he made 
 them. All friends are made. Relations grow. 
 Friends we make for ourselves. We make them 
 and we love them. Enemies are as necessary 
 to success as vinegar to pickles. They are the 
 long oars, which in sturdy hands shoot the 
 boat, deep though it be laden, far out and 
 
Little Boys amd Big Boys told to ThinTc. 43 
 
 clear over the foaming breakers into a smooth 
 sea beyond. 
 
 Do not be a h}^ocrite, my boy. 'Better be a 
 thief — a robber. Play yom- hand open. Never 
 wear spectacles to deceive folks. Never profess 
 to do what you do not. Do not be afraid of 
 what others may say — people will talk. Fools 
 will turn grindstones for others to sharpen 
 scythes upon, and fools will talk of that which 
 does not concern them, of what they cannot effect 
 — of that which is none of their business. Think 
 for yourself. Advise with your own heart. Do 
 as best pleases you. Satisfy one man first. Do 
 not promise over a thousand pups out of one 
 litter. He may be a mean man who would not 
 promise a pup to a friend, but he is a meaner 
 man who promises more than he can perform. 
 Do not take four passengers in a wagon intended 
 for but two. Do not try to please everybody 
 and please none. Few people care for you. 
 Fear is stronger than love. But few people will 
 
44 Little Boys and Big Boys told to ThimJc. 
 
 love you. Society thinks you are an orange to 
 be squeezed for its benefit. Think how few 
 people care for Myou. en seldom work except 
 for pay. People are generally friends only while 
 they can lap from your saucer. They eat the 
 corn and throw the cob away. 
 
CHAPTER Y. 
 
 A Letter from Home. 
 
 HE post-mark has a famili ar look. The 
 chirography speaks before the en- 
 velope is torn off of a letter from 
 home — the dear old home by the 
 brook side many hundred miles away. With eager, 
 trembling hand the welcome token is drawn from 
 its office-marked wrapper, and then how the 
 half-stilled heart drinks the contents! From a 
 mother, or one who in childhood's days filled the 
 place of the loved and dead. Each line breathes 
 the spirit of love, care, friendship, and affection so 
 deeply gi-aven on the tablets of memory. And 
 
4:6 A Letter from Home. 
 
 how visions of the old home come crowding up ! 
 The store-house of the past opens to the inner 
 rooms, and down the long aisles of yearly events 
 there looms up pictures varied, sad, joyous, and 
 cherished. "We read on, and back to the scenes 
 of childhood the soul rushes like a dove let loose 
 from tangled snare. We see the old house. ITo 
 palace half so loved. The little yard with here 
 and there a bunch of flowers. The old well into 
 whose depths so oft we gazed as lovers do into 
 each other's eyes. The moss- covered bucket with 
 rusty bands. The little spring in the milk-house. 
 The rows of pans on the rustic bench. The 
 chamber with its well-filled rooms. The parlor 
 kept sacred for company. The table at whose 
 head her of the kind heart and gentle eye so well 
 presided. How large a freight is there on the . 
 return trip of memory! The garden with its 
 plants and weeds — its scattered tools and little 
 beds. Out into the old barn. There is the hay- 
 mow where oft we romped with dog and play- 
 
A Letter from Home. 47 
 
 mates — the red fanning-mill in whose mysterious 
 depths were eggs and nests — the broken-tined 
 pitchfork — the partly toothed rake — the bent- 
 edged scoop — ^the old-fashioned flail, and hunts 
 under closely packed sheaves for rats and mice. 
 Who does not love a letter from home ? A pic- 
 ture of the past — a key to the million of pictures ! 
 The little old bookcase with the dog-eared vol- 
 umes quaint and brown. The hated churn in the 
 cellar. The loft where erst t]ie rattling nuts told 
 of foraging youngsters. The apple-bins and bar- 
 rels in the cellar. The wagon-house with that 
 old-style buggy — ^its high back — its small forward 
 and large hind wheels long since obsolete — the 
 old house-dog — the sheep with tinkling bell, 
 heard on the distant hillside — the berry patch 
 wherein us youngsters romped and hunted amid 
 briers and with scratched hands for red-caps and 
 blackberries. The little stream which sang all 
 the night and whistled over pebbly beds all the 
 day. How we loved to catch therefrom the strug- 
 
4:8 A Letter from Home. 
 
 gling prize. And then the school-house where 
 oft and oft the falling book or slate has called the 
 dreamer back to his work — where childish loves 
 and jealousies were ripened by a glance or buried 
 with a word. How memory comes with her 
 many offerings ! Pen fails ; words run together as 
 drops of water. Like flowers in one's lap, there 
 is a pile of pictures. There come a thousand 
 fond recollections. The young sweethearts — the 
 struggles for stolen kisses — the dreams of life 
 never realized. The longings and sighings for 
 the future to open its wonderful doors still faster 
 and faster. 
 
 And the years come like sentinels, each bring- 
 ing a mile-post. Children grown into youths. 
 One by one they leave the loved hearth-stone — 
 one by one new faces come and go. There is a 
 marriage here — a funeral there. "Which party 
 goes to misery, and which to happiness, none but 
 God knows ! The chances are even ! The family 
 circle is broken. In the front room — whose still- 
 
A Letter from Home. 49 
 
 ness is heavy and terrible with dread — lie one 
 after another who have changed before us ! The 
 silent step — the careful breathing — the low whis- 
 per as the sheet is turned back to show the once 
 warm lips now cold and blue in death. The 
 wondering if we too must die — the crowd of 
 mourners — the slow ride to the grave — the hol- 
 low rattle upon the coffin — all come before us 
 like a panorama in detail. 
 
 And then, other changes. And, still, other 
 changes. Each bringing a new picture, some- 
 times golden-lined — oftener black like the storm- 
 cloud which bursts, and growls, and mutters, then 
 rolls its uglv self away to reveal the clear ceru- 
 lean beyond. 
 
 Letters from home! God bless them. Who 
 would be without them ? Who would refuse or 
 neglect to write them. When the heart is sad 
 they bring gladness — when all the future and all 
 the present look like midnight, the past comes up, 
 and, conning over the stored pictures, the heart 
 
60 A Letter from Home. 
 
 forgets its weariness and wakes to new life — to 
 new hope — to newer love — to stronger faith — to 
 braver courage. A letter from home ! More 
 precious than gold — more prized than hopes, for 
 it takes us back to happy hours, and renews the 
 strength for the future. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 We Reason Together on Success. 
 
 I ALTER, my hoj, the great object of 
 life is success. 'No one works for 
 failure, though men often fall short 
 of their aims or get off the train of 
 events a long way before reaching the station. 
 In the silent hours of night — in the lonely 
 and dreamy hours of day, an active brain of 
 earnest man is ever plaiming some new road to 
 success — some route as yet unexplored. Life is 
 often spent in study, and down to the narrow 
 mansion passes all a man's hopes before he is 
 ready to rest from labor. There are many ways 
 
62 We Reason Together on Success. 
 
 to succeed, my boy, and very many ways to fail. 
 In love or business, in the mighty struggle for 
 wealth or power, there are many lessons to be 
 learned. And, my boy, we have books on medi- 
 cine, religion, horse-doctoring, curing hams, mak- 
 ing farms, railroading, cotton-growing, raising 
 strawberries, necromancy, banking, and a thou- 
 sand other things. These tell us how to do 
 almost everything — still people fail. There is 
 something WTong. A leak in talent exists some- 
 where. 
 
 Yet it seems as though eYQvj one could suc- 
 ceed. No one starts out in life with other in- 
 tentions ; but, my boy, the road becomes too 
 long at the other end for many a brave youth 
 — for many a stout-hearted man. There are 
 little lessons to be learned. There are small 
 wheels to machinery as well as large ones. Life 
 is a complicated invention. Little things are 
 many times overlooked till too late. We notice 
 the man without looking at his eyes. We see 
 
We Reason Together on Success. 63 
 
 the dollar without looking at the penny. "We 
 fail, mj boy, for the lack of some little pin 
 or connection passed by as worthless. Every 
 failure in life has a starting-point, as every tree 
 which breaks had first to bend; as every river 
 was first a spring. Let us look out for the 
 small items ; larger ones will take care of them- 
 selves. 
 
 God, in His wisdom, gave us different ideas. 
 If we had all been made alike — if each had 
 the same tastes, this world would have been 
 like a fine-toothed comb. We should have 
 built houses alike, worn clothes alike, and been 
 like a basket of eggs on general principles. 
 Then every man would have loved the same 
 woman — and what a row that one thing would 
 have kicked up ! All other women would have 
 been jealous ; all the men would have been 
 fighting; the one woman would be poisoned 
 or slandered to death by her sex — the men 
 would kill each other off in battle on her 
 
64 We Reason Together on Success. 
 
 account, and a nation of old maids would be 
 left desolate. 
 
 There is a way, Yalter, my boy, to do every- 
 thing. First open shop. Make up your mind 
 what to do. Then shun the bridges others fell 
 through. If you promise to do a thing, do it. 
 If you do a man a kindness, do it with a pleas- 
 ant face. A little vinegar will spoil much 
 cream. Do not speak harshly and coldly after 
 doing a kindness. A clap of thunder will 
 cm-die milk, and nothing will ever make it 
 sweet again. Do not ask for favors till you 
 have earned them or can give security that 
 you will do so. If you have a friend, stick to 
 him. If you owe a man, do not wait to be 
 dunned, but settle as though it were the pleas- 
 ure it should be, and is, to honest men. If 
 in business, do not wait to settle till there 
 will be a balance coming to you; others may 
 need money more than you. Be a little more 
 prompt than your word. If you are to pay a 
 
We Reason Together on Success. 55 
 
 man, do it before night, as night is the next 
 day. If you are in hard luck, never whine; 
 never give up and let the battle go on with- 
 out you. Get up and work the harder. The 
 contents of a letter are not generally known 
 until it is opened. Do not wear a sour face. 
 People are afraid of such, and well they may 
 be. If you are laboring for another, do by 
 him as you would by yourself, only a little 
 more so. If others are laboring for you, take 
 an interest in them. The ivy was not in- 
 tended to support the oak. Men do not like 
 to work for nothing. Never promise an apple 
 when you cannot give even a seed. 
 
 And another thing, my boy. Do not be in 
 haste to quit. Many a girl would have said 
 " Yes ! " in another minute ; many a nut would 
 have cracked had you hit it once more. Many a 
 tough stick of wood have we split by " one more 
 blow." Many a mark has been hit by one more 
 shot. Many a dollar has been collected by going 
 
56 We JReason Together on Sitccess. 
 
 for it once more. Many a fast friend has been 
 made by one more kind word. Many a tear has 
 been stopped by one more fond kiss. Many a 
 home has been made happy by the spending 
 therein one more hour each night with the loved 
 one or ones awaiting your coming. Do not be 
 in too great a hurry, Yalter, my boy. If young, 
 you can wait ; if old, haste may take you hence 
 too quick. Wait on others, then take your time. 
 The river grows larger the farther it runs, and 
 love grows stronger the longer it waits. There 
 are years to come after this. If not, Httle mat- 
 ter who is ahead now. Do your duty, my boy. 
 Keep your own heart ready for the race, or ready 
 to go HOME. Deal honorably with all. Do not 
 have too many confidants. A secret which re- 
 quires two or more to hold it, is the very devil 
 once it breaks loose. 
 
 A little word in kindness spoken, a pleasant 
 greeting, often makes a friend who lasts for life. 
 When the heart is light, a cold word makes it 
 
We Reason Together on Success. 57 
 
 sick. When weary with care and trouble, a kind 
 word or some trifling act sheds God's own sun- 
 shine in it. Most people have good memories. 
 They forget a kindness, but seldom forget an 
 injury or unkind word. A quail alights, you 
 can see where — but who can tell where it will 
 rise ? So with kind words or cruel ones. If you 
 cannot do a person a favor, tell him so frankly, 
 and in such a way that he will not have ground 
 for offence. If you cannot help a man, never 
 promise him. Then he knows where to find you, 
 and has respect for you. And above all, never 
 be too stingy to be honest. When a liberal man 
 dies, people are sorry ; when a miser goes hence, 
 people are indifferent. 
 
 The way to success is easy enough, if we only 
 look sharp to the future and despise not the small 
 things of life. And these small things, my boy, 
 make the muckle for all of us. 
 
 3* 
 
CHAPTER YII. 
 
 Saturday Night. 
 
 IjSTE by one the days go out. Satur- 
 day night comes. 
 
 One by one the hopes go out. 
 Eternity comes. Like hailstones 
 the days drop from the clouds of time, to fall 
 cold and dreary into the fathomless past. Each 
 day is a life — is a history. The hopes of the 
 morning are tears by night — the air-castles of 
 Monday are the graves of Saturday night, alas, 
 too oft! God gives us sun, life, rain, health, 
 friends, and that which is more blessed than all, 
 golden Hope. All the rest desert us ; but Hope, 
 
Saturday Night. 59 
 
 twin Bister of Immortality, .is ours through the 
 week — into and beyond Saturday night — into 
 the grave, to bear us dry and happy through the 
 Stygian flood and on to God. Blessed be Hope, 
 and blessed be the nights which call us to kneel 
 at. her altar. Changes have come during the 
 interim between this and last Saturday night. 
 Many a mound in the church-yard or cemetery 
 marks God's bruises on the desolate human heart. 
 Many a heart-joy has been dipped in sadness. 
 Many a dress which one week since was white 
 is now of the deepest mourning. Some mourn. 
 Some wear mourning while the heart rejoices. 
 Some there are w^hose hearts are darker than the 
 grave, for the lamp of love is broken, and the joy 
 of years has gone home. Scarlet buds and som- 
 bre blossoms. Such is life. 
 
 ! Who of us all are nearer heaven than one week 
 since ? Who of us have laid up treasures above ? 
 Who of us have mellowed the earth in which all 
 must rest ? The account is for or against us ! We 
 
60 Saturday Night, 
 
 all thought and vowed one week since to do 
 right, but alas for temptation ! All of us have 
 argued with the subtle reasoner — few of us have 
 come off victorious. Prayers have been uttered 
 since last Saturday night. Curses have been in- 
 voked. The record has been perfectly kept, and 
 some day it will be opened to our eyes. Let us 
 rest from labor and renew our vows. By the 
 family fireside — by the family altar — ^by the cot 
 and the couch there is much to do this night. 
 Look back down the dark lane. See what wrecks 
 are there strewn. Hopes which have died. 
 Promises badly broken. Good intentions and 
 noble resolutions lie bleeding and torn as far 
 back as the eye can reach. Hard words lie 
 where soft ones would have been better. There 
 are disappointments and betrayals, bitter words 
 and wicked acts strewn thick over the groimd. 
 Euins — ^ruins — ruins! Here and there a fra- 
 grant flower lifts its silent voice and rears its 
 pearly leaf to gladden the debris around. Here 
 
Saturday Night. dl 
 
 and there a blossom — here and there, but too far 
 apart, can be seen the beautiful in strange con- 
 trast with the ruins and wrecks. Life is a dark 
 lane. Would to God there were more flowers 
 and fewer ruins ! Would there were more loves 
 and fewer hates. More white and less red. 
 
 How the changes come over us ! What gave 
 joy is now a pile of ashes ! The lips we loved 
 to kiss a week since, now have no nectar ! The 
 hand which once thrilled in rapture at the slight 
 touch of love, now forgets to answer back ! 
 The eye has grown cold or worse than indiffer- 
 ent ! Who is to blame % Some one. And why ? , 
 N"one but God can tell truly ! As the sun goes 
 down and the Sabbath rises, let us strive again I 
 Mother ! clasp still closer to your heart the pledge 
 you now caress, for God may want it back be- 
 fore another Saturday night is yours. The pet 
 you kissed and caressed one week ago, haa 
 been taken away — who will go next ! Deal 
 gently with those who have erred. Heaven 
 
62 Saturday Night, 
 
 is forgiving. God is love. Strive to be happy. 
 Let kind words, good wishes, and liberahty of 
 sentiment, expand all our hearts this night, for 
 they are blessed influences — none too plenty. 
 
 If you have a friend, draw him closer to your 
 heart. (If you have a life in your keeping, do by 
 it as you would be done by Pause ere you do 
 evil. Think of the reward there is for those who 
 resist temptation — for those who love.) Look 
 back. Listen ! A little, prattling voice, now 
 stilled in death I — a mother's gentle tones, per- 
 haps well-nigh forgotten ! — a sister's plaintive 
 eye is calling you to happiness ! Look over the 
 past — the blessed memories — the mementos of 
 the heart — and tell us if you are not glad that 
 heaven is nearer by one more Saturday Kight. 
 
CHAPTEK YIII. 
 
 In which Easy Lessons are Given Out. 
 
 HEEE are a thousand things yet to 
 learn, my boy. Life is a school, and 
 most of us study on hard benches 
 till the final dismissal comes, learn- 
 ing but to forget. One lesson is this, Yalter. 
 Learn to be a man — not a sneak. Do not be a 
 counterfeit of somebody who is but a chapter of 
 baseness. Hold your head high. No matter if your 
 spoon be of horn instead of gold— your stockings 
 wool instead of silk— your shoes of wood instead 
 of leather. Strive to be a man. Do as you 
 agree to, or give a truthful reason. Man was 
 
64 Easy Lessons are Given Out. 
 
 never made to fear his fellow. God is the only 
 one outside your own heart to whom you must 
 render a balance sheet with your winding one. 
 If you promise, keep faith. If you pledge, by all 
 means fulfil. Never go about the streets as a 
 sheep cur sneaks h6me toward morning. Be a 
 man. Give your reason. Take no one's foot- 
 ings, but run up the column for yourself. If you 
 wish a favor, Yalter, my boy, ask for it like a 
 man, frankly and honestly. Do not whine, and 
 dodge, and chip around the edges, but go straight 
 to the centre at once. If you have aught against 
 a man, out with it. Never stab in the dark — do 
 not crawl from bud to blossom — from blossom to 
 fruit of life, like a snake in the grass, making 
 others shudder at your approach and leaving a 
 track of slimy scandal to mark your route to 
 death. Form an opinion. A ^vrong one is better 
 than none, for it can be changed. Learn to rely 
 on your own ideas. Learn to think and act for 
 yourself, as though you were born to give and 
 
Easy Lessons are Given Out. 65 
 
 others to follow advice. Always shake a rattle- 
 box before purchasing, and study the sense of an 
 idea before you fall in with it. Many a deep 
 chasm is bridged by the thinnest and rottenest 
 of planks. Always keep something back. A 
 nest-egg answers a twofold purpose. !Never tell 
 all you know at once. Do not squander all your 
 earnings, my boy, for paupers are never buried in 
 beds of roses. 
 
 When all is still — after night has pinned with 
 golden studs her curtain of beauty, pause and 
 think. Look well to the road you have already 
 passed — look close to the road and its different 
 branches as it appears before you. In the great 
 walk of life few men retrace their steps, as the 
 journey is tedious, and the road full of scoff- 
 ers. Be very certain you are in the right one, 
 my boy. Success is a thorny path. Its points 
 and brambles were left on purpose to deter those 
 who are not brave from continued skirmishes 
 with fortune's pickets. None but men of pluck 
 
66 Easy Lessons cure Given Out. 
 
 deserve success, as " none but the brave deserve 
 the fair." Boy or man, strive for the golden 
 future. Earn and enjoy. It is all of life to live, 
 but it is not all of death to die. Look into your 
 own heart when all is still. Look over accounts 
 carefully and see who is getting the most credit 
 — you or the devil. Strike out all the bad 
 thoughts which climb over the heart-wall and 
 take root within. Plant anew the little seeds of 
 love and noble-hearted kindness which shed a 
 perfume around the dying bed and make a grate- 
 ful shade in which to have the final struggle with 
 death. Never do in the night what you would be 
 ashamed of in the daytime. Do not go ahead 
 with your lips and hold back with your heart. 
 Speak the truth, Yalter. Who are you afraid 
 of? Learn to be a man among men, and to be a 
 man of honor. Such men never want for friends. 
 Look about you. Take warning from others. 
 There are lessons for the eye as well as for the 
 ear. See how many scores there are whose heads 
 
Edsy Lessons are Griven Out. 67 
 
 are as large — whose foreheads are as high — 
 whose eyes are as far apart as jour own, but who 
 wrecked on their own actions years since, and are 
 fast breaking to pieces with no one to lend a 
 hand to save. It takes but a little to lose a repu- 
 tation. It takes years to acquire a good one. 
 When you see a mean act, set it up as a finger- 
 post. Shun it. When you see or hear of a good, 
 a noble deed, emulate it. If not on a large 
 scale, do it on a small one. The widow's mite 
 was more precious than gold from the rich. 
 When you see a man doing well in business, take 
 lessons from him. Stick to your friends. Never 
 throw off one of them. They are worse than 
 broken stones to walk over when once wronged. 
 Fish with a long pole, my boy. Throw boldly 
 into the stream, and throw beyond your fellows. 
 Deep water holds the larger fish. Form a pur- 
 pose. Make up your mind to be something. If 
 you cannot sing a song, tell a story or make a 
 fire. If you cannot drive the horses, you can 
 
68 Easy Lessons are Given Out 
 
 give them water; if you cannot paint a coach, 
 yon can grease an axle. If yon cannot hatch 
 chickens, you can at least put the eggs in the 
 nest. 
 
 And never fret. Take things coolly. .Do not 
 get mad at the very moment of all others when 
 you should hold your temper. Do not be in too 
 great a hm-ry. Judgment-Day will not be till 
 your name is called and you answer to it. Did 
 you ever think of that ? ^N'o matter of how little 
 importance or how indefinite you are, the show 
 will not be opened until you are duly cared for 
 and seated. Green fruit makes people sick. Ill- 
 gotten gains are green fruit. Never bite at the 
 bare hook. Do not jump into all sorts of traps, 
 dead falls, and snatch-holes, merely to please some 
 one who delights in torture. Never go in bath- 
 ing merely to give some shore-walker a chance 
 to steal your clothes. Do not make love to a 
 girl just to hear her sigh as she lays her head 
 against your watch-pocket. Don't kiss babies 
 
Ecisy Lessons are Given Out. 69 
 
 merely to please the mother ; nor would it be 
 advisable, Yalter, to kiss the mother to please 
 the baby, for the husband might be looking from 
 around some corner. There are several things 
 you should not do. Do not believe that keeping 
 a canary makes of a woman a lady. Do not be- 
 lieve that every girl who smiles on you is in love 
 with you. Girls smile on a fellow as roosters 
 crow — because others do. Do not be in too great 
 haste to marry. Thin ice never keeps. A few 
 years of happiness is better than several years of 
 misery. Do not give to every one who asks. 
 Some men, like rat-traps — never give back. 
 Don't make up your mind that you know every- 
 thing, for there is much of value not yet win- 
 nowed from the chaff of passing events. But 
 keep your eyes open and the point of your gun 
 well up. Better shoot over than under. Better 
 a curve than a slant. 
 
CHAPTEE IX. 
 
 The Evening Star. 
 
 I ERE, by the blazing fire, while the 
 bitter cold wind goes howling, 
 shrieking by, is room for many a 
 friend I could name, who never 
 will sit around on the wide hearth as of yore. 
 I have been out in the wind and cold five 
 hours — five short hours — sleigh-riding. The 
 flecks on the jet-black coat of my horse, the long 
 frosted* whiskers he sported, the creaking of the 
 snow, the deserted look of the farm-houses we 
 passed, the haste with which kind hands opened 
 the door on returning, tell me it is cold without ; 
 but I did not feel it. Two of us were out riding. 
 
The JEvenmg Star. 71 
 
 A fast horse, warm plank for the feet, warm 
 robes, merrj bells, warm hearts, handsome cutter, 
 and smooth road never yet froze a man in five 
 hours, nor do I believe they ever will. 
 
 We went out into the country by the old 
 church, the little school-house, the old cider-mill, 
 the country store and the post-ofiice, the smithy's 
 shop, and into the broad yard where often we 
 have driven out and in. Fifteen years since we 
 rode out from that wide-opening gate, and, if you 
 like, I will tell you of that ride. 
 
 It was a clear moonlight night — clear and 
 cold. There was a party of us. We had no bells 
 other than the rustic lelles, whose beauty has 
 never been surpassed. We had no superabund- 
 ance of wolf-skin robes — we had no lio:ht- 
 running cutter or extra-fast horse, as to-day ; 
 but we had six warm hearts. Oh ! it was fan 
 — sleigh-riding in those days ! A long sleigh- 
 box on two bobs, straw enough to make the 
 hearts of half-a-dozen poor ianiilies glad — and 
 
72 The Evening Star. 
 
 down in there we all sat. There were boys and 
 girls fifteen years since — now there are young 
 men and young ladies. How cosily we nestled 
 together in that old sleigh ! How cosily each 
 boy's arm encircled one. How the heart shot 
 out its feelers to clasp itself around and protect 
 that one — ^loved more than others. How the 
 heart warms, expands, and rises into the throat 
 now as that old picture is called up ! Away we 
 went ! Some one said as we started, " Be care- 
 ful, boys, and don't upset," but little heed was 
 paid to. the caution. How cold the night was 
 fifteen years since ! Perhaps you remember it — 
 it seems as if you must remember. Nestled to- 
 gether in that good old sleigh, how we glided 
 over the beaten track, and how our hearts glided 
 into (mother beaten track ! Then, when the cheeks 
 of those we loved grew cold, we used to warm 
 them — ^no matter how. Then, fifteen years since, 
 lest others would hear the kindly spoken thanks, 
 we took them from the lips of the speaker, and 
 
The Emning Star. T3 
 
 closer drew the loved form. It was cold, but we 
 felt it not ! On by the same houses as to-day we 
 sped, and on sped our hearts, linking each to the 
 other. How we laughed, as a sudden jolt would 
 throw us all together ! How we laughed as the 
 foot-balls came pelting our faces, and drew the 
 hoods together and looked in to see if any one 
 was hurt! It was fifteen years ago that sleigh- 
 rides were worth taking, but that day has gone by. 
 Then the snow was deeper — the roads smoother 
 —the horses faster— the girls prettier— the boys 
 better — and the nights shorter — than now. 
 
 Then we rode up to the little grave-yard, where 
 a few brown stones— no marble in those days- 
 marked the last resting-places of those who had 
 gone before us. We rode past the old church, 
 where the congregation used to join in songs of 
 praise. We stopped and talked among ourselves 
 —six of us— who should first go into that yard 
 never to retura. Still closer were the loved ones 
 drawn, and still wanner beat the hearts beneath 
 
74 The Evening Star. 
 
 GUI' homesjpmi suit of gray. We had laughed and 
 talked on the way out, fifteen years ago, and as 
 the team stood there bj that silent grave-yard, 
 and a light cloud drifted over the moon, so did 
 a cloud drift over our hearts. 
 
 * ^ * -x- * * 
 
 A year after that time, another party visited 
 the little grave-yard. One of the six was going 
 home. The sun shone forth coldly, as does the 
 affection of some we call friends — to mock the 
 scene. We went slower, fourteen years ago, than 
 we did fifteen, but there were more of us. One 
 of the six was riding alone, and no warm cheek 
 could drive the cold from hers. The road was as 
 smooth, but we drove more carefully. We passed 
 the church without stopping — on to the little 
 yard beyond. An open gate — a dark spot be- 
 yond — a silent gathering about a grave — tears 
 and sobs — a prayer — uncovered heads — a lower- 
 ing of one of the six where no one could take the 
 wishes of her heart from lips closed forever — a 
 
The Evening Sta/r. 75 
 
 dull, heavy, rattling sound — a benediction — a re- 
 turn. 
 
 * * * -Jt -3^ * 
 
 Fourteen years since, we drove home on that 
 road slower than to-day — and fourteen years 
 since, as night came on before home was reached 
 a star arose in the east. Then I knew the soul 
 of one I loved had gone home to God, and as 
 pure a pearl as the sun ever saw had been set in 
 a glorious crown. 
 
 The sun has set many times since, but that 
 star has never gone down. The sun has set 
 in coldness — in warmth — ^in most glorious splen- 
 dor — and even shut itself out from us for days 
 together; but I always see that star, and it is 
 always the same as was the soul of her who felt 
 no more fear, when called home, than when 
 riding in that old family sleigh fifteen years 
 since. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Still there ! I have been out to look upon 
 
76 
 
 The Evening Star. 
 
 it, and now, as fifteen years since, that star is 
 just above the hill, as bright as ever — and the 
 church is the same — and the old preacher the 
 same — and the night the same — and the sky 
 the same — and my heart the same, but too sad 
 to write more. 
 
CHAPTEE X. 
 
 In which Disappointment is Favorably Mentioned. 
 
 I HEY went out in darkness, Yalter. 
 And life is often thus. 
 
 " Wlio went out in darkness ? " 
 The sparks, my boj. Standing 
 on the hurricane deck, we saw from the tall 
 chimneys, thousands of golden, living, warm, and 
 earnest sparks leaving the dark mouths of those 
 huge iron lungs, and joyously riding the breeze. 
 They came into the world as man comes — they 
 rode to then- eternity just which way the breeze 
 drove them, as man rides — each by itself. From 
 the clear and calm depths of the water over 
 
78 BisappoinPment Favorably Mentioned. 
 
 which we glided, there came a counterpart — a 
 wife for every spark wafted off frora above us. 
 Mirrored in its glassy surface — seeming as they 
 floated to be romping children of the stars ; up 
 from the deep reflection came the golden shadows. 
 Borne down by their own weight, to meet their 
 brides, sank the burning sparks — closer and 
 closer — nearer and yet nearer came substance 
 and shadow — the real and the ideal. They met 
 as lovers meet, midway 'twixt heaven's reflection 
 and heaven itself — a kiss — a low, speaking kiss 
 — a wedding of Life mth Hope — and into the 
 dark water ; borne on to a common eternity ; a 
 cmder floated — the spark was dead, and the swift- 
 darting reflection was gone forever. And, my 
 boy, as the spark wedded on the " river of death " 
 and died, so do we all. We float, as it were, idly 
 over the terrible reality — some reflection of our 
 own heart meets us — an intervalic kiss — a wed- 
 ding even in death, and lifeless float loved and 
 loving on to the broad Hereafter. Stand on the 
 
•' Many a loved child has divided its sweet kiss— half to 
 the earnest mother who brought it here from God— half 
 to the waiting angel who took it UoMK:'—Pcfge 79. 
 
Diswppointmsnt Favorably Mentioned. 79 
 
 steamer's deck at midnight, my boy, and see the 
 breeze-riding sparks wed their golden reflections 
 in disappointment. Watch one darting shadow 
 — learn a lesson. 
 
 So do you and us, Yalter. The rose of antici- 
 pation often rests at last in the ashes of sad real- 
 ity. Disappointment is our common lot. Many 
 an egg fails to mother a bird. Many a flower dies 
 while yet a bud, as promising as the plump form 
 of youth. Full many a golden cloud has drifted 
 into the dark homes of unborn storms and dis- 
 appeared as do the castles of dreamers. Many a 
 loved child has divided its sweet kiss — half to 
 the earnest mother who brought it here from 
 God — half to the waiting angel who took it home 
 to a heaven of joy, there in the spirit-land to 
 wait and bless with the fruition of angelic love the 
 tired heart it fled from— to dry forever the tearful 
 eyes of maternal fondness. From the coffin of 
 disappointment often rise golden realizations, as 
 beautiful butterflies are born of ugly caterpillars. 
 
80 Disappointment FoAiorahly Mentioned, 
 
 Many a man has before now dived deep into 
 the sea of business or matrimonial life, but no 
 pearls rewarded his dangerous risk. Hearts have 
 wedded shadows — have wedded icebergs — have 
 wedded sorrow — have wedded anguish ; the chil- 
 dren of each being disappointment. Millions of 
 meteors flash athwart the distant sky, and leave 
 but space. Many a man is ])y Time shot into 
 Eternity, the target of lifj not penetrated in its 
 remotest corner. Thousands of flowers are 
 crushed under the foot of man and die alone. It 
 is disappointment — but next season^ the life-hold- 
 ing root sends into the world a bud which blos- 
 soms with such fragrance that invisible spirits 
 protect it. The disappointment of last year is 
 the blessing of the present. The soul of the 
 plant turned back to renewed effort and richer 
 rewards, and the pearly blossoms came again to 
 deck the bride or vigil the corpse. 
 
 This world is full of disappointments, my boy ; 
 and it is overflowing with stern realities. Wishes 
 
Disajppointment Favorably Mentioned. 81 
 
 are born in our hearts and their children beget 
 disappointments as the wind begets moans. 
 Some are for good — some evil. Time alone 
 can tell. Go back on memoric paths, and see 
 how often disappointment has brought disappoint- 
 ment ! Many a time has the heart of childhood 
 wept over sorrow which proved the chrysalis of 
 happiness. Many a tear-wet pillow at night has 
 been the resting-place of joy in the morning. 
 Many a cavern of sadness has been the ante- 
 chamber to happiness richer than dreams ever 
 brought us, Yalter. Many a fit of sickness has 
 been the renewing of Life's great policy, and 
 from many a grave has there gone into the world 
 again, a freed and loving heart, trembling within 
 its own silence with the sight of some distant 
 dove bringing a new lease of life — a chapter of 
 joys, with sorrows and repinings omitted. Many 
 a cold wind has blown away the heart miasma, 
 though its blasts piped right merrily for a time, 
 and we trembled at the storm whicji brought us 
 
 4* 
 
82 Diswppointment Fa/vorahly Mentioned. 
 
 the sun. We are all born to trouble, Yalter, my 
 boy. In every heart is a safe — God knows where 
 the key is. In every heart is some secret of life 
 or death. In the life of every man, morn, noon, 
 and night are marked with disappointment. It 
 is the grave of events from w^hich spring and 
 grow vigorous deeds. Peace follows war, as 
 shadows follow the sun. The thicker the ice, 
 the deeper must have been the water. The 
 longer lasts the winter, the more rapidly comes 
 the sun which starts anew the frozen cuiTent. 
 Disappointments are the lessons of life. They 
 are its dark backgrounds which set forth the 
 most lasting and beautiful pictures. Life is a 
 forest. In it, are dead trees and living ones. 
 The one give shade — let us rest under their pro- 
 tecting branches. Sorrow makes the heart bet- 
 ter. Disappointments renew our love. The 
 impeded river stops not forever, but finds a new 
 current, and like the flashing of His anger, rushes 
 on with new force. Wliat if von have been dis- 
 
Disappointment Favorably Mentioned. 83 
 
 appointed? Others have been. All may look 
 cold to-day — it will not so look to-morrow. 
 Often, my boy, the deepest sorrows have brought 
 the choicest blessings — the sickness of Hope 
 proved the convalescence of Joy. Many a ghost 
 has proved a shadow — many a dreaded lake, the 
 suspended mirage — many a mountain but a bank 
 of fog. Do not sit in the cold, my boy. Rest 
 only where happiness or success is beside you. 
 The grave is but the reception-room to heaven, 
 dreary though it seem. Life often ends in disap- 
 pointment, but it can end in happiness. Do not 
 stop to regret the past. Let the dead bury the 
 dead — look ahead — to future scenes. Sorrow is 
 sent to make us purer — trouble to make us better 
 — disappointment to increase our bravery. Never 
 give up. I^Tever say fail ! Kever be discour- 
 aged. Failure is the servant and success the 
 child of effort. Look up. Look to the future — of 
 this life ; of the coming one. Your heart may be 
 the cemetery of a thousand disappointments — 
 
84: Disofpjpomtment Favorably Mentioned. 
 
 there is room yet for leafy-boughed success to 
 spring from and around every grave ; making 
 the blessed futm-e a labyrinth of bowers — a wil- 
 derness of joy — an ocean of prosperity — a heaven 
 of heartfelt bliss. 
 
i^^^P^^:^ 
 
 mm: 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Wherein-Common-Sense is Entitativb. 
 
 [ALTER, my boy, it is a good thing 
 there are none. 
 "None— what?" 
 Windows to the lieart, my boy. 
 Little do we know what prompts man to action. 
 The grass comes nodding and kissing — ^now bent 
 low with tears — then standing proudly erect — 
 carpeting the earth with loveliness. The tiny 
 sprouts are much like the human heart. Each 
 blade has its own mission — its own dewy tears to 
 shake off — its own handsome green to make 
 itself beautiful. When one shoot is cut down, 
 
86 Common- Sense Entitat/ive. 
 
 another one springs forth — in time, and no other 
 blade waits its growth. It is so, my boy, with 
 the hnman heart. Kone of us know why one is 
 happy and another miserable. It is well we do 
 not. It is a good thing we have no windows, for 
 then we should be so busy looking in upon the 
 secrets and sorrows of others, that our own would 
 be opened to the world, as the clouds are thrown 
 out in relief by the glorious sunset. We all have 
 aims. All have motives. All have causes for 
 joy — for tears — for smiles — for sobs — ^for hopes — 
 for actions. What if the causes are not published 
 — none the less do they exist. 
 
 There is not a heart, my boy, but has its inner 
 chamber, the key of which has been given to God. 
 There is not a heart but has its grave of hopes, 
 although the foliage of time may have hidden it 
 from the world, and almost from our own sight. 
 Many a one you and we condemn God pities — 
 many we pity He condemns. Let us have common 
 sense, my boy, and attend to our own matters. IN^o 
 
Common-Sense Entitative. 87 
 
 one cares for another's trouble. The only headache 
 we are sorrj^ for, is the one on our own shoulders. 
 The only wound we really care for, is that which 
 pains our mother's child. People never care for 
 other people. As boys whistle when passing a 
 grave-yard in the night, so do men talk of others 
 to hide their own troubles. It is true, my boy, 
 that when you and we do well, others are jealous, 
 or envious. 
 
 Be liberal, my boy. If not with money, with 
 kindness. Little do you know why the heart of 
 yonder man is sad. God knows, and that will 
 do. People will seldom inquire into another's 
 troubles, with good motives. The world hunts 
 for sorrows as boys hunt the garret for balls to 
 knock about and see them bound. If you have a 
 ball and do not wish it knocked — ^keep it out of 
 sight. That, Yalter, my boy, is true philosophy. 
 If you have trouble — fight it. If you don't 
 kill it, it will kill you. Life is short. Be a man, 
 and leave the rest to futurity. Praise that 
 
88 Common-Sense EntitaUve. 
 
 which is good. Kone of us are perfect. What 
 one does to-day another does to-morrow. Had 
 you been in his or her place, you might, my 
 boy, have done even worse. 
 
 The world moves by day as well as by night. 
 It moves while we are happy and while we are 
 miserable, just the same. Let us have common- 
 sense enough to be happy while we can, and 
 not bother our heads or hearts with that which 
 concerns us not except to do good. Give an opin- 
 ion when it is asked. This world is badly mixed, 
 my boy. When so many come rushing in to see 
 the show or hear the concert, even "reserved 
 seats " contain queer crowds. Tickets get mixed. 
 People are huddled together regardless of pro- 
 priety, and many are glad when the show is out. 
 If all the big and little people in the world could 
 be hived, and Avhen they thought no one was 
 looking, you and we could peep in and see — what 
 a sight ! Ii all our hearts were to be opened at 
 noon, many a suicide would be chronicled at half- 
 
Common-Sense Entitative. 89 
 
 past eleven — many a one would change his name 
 at half-past twelve. Go slow, my boy. Do not 
 form an opinion as you would fall out of bed. If a 
 bridge carries you safe over, it is a good one. If 
 it lets you fall through, do not lose time in cub- 
 ing it, but try another. If riding in the cars be 
 dangerous and you cannot take the risk, go afoot. 
 If -the wagon rides roughly, jump out and walk. 
 If riding in a ship makes you sea-sick, stay at 
 home. If a friend did not treat you well the first 
 time you called, you are a very foolish Yalter, 
 my boy, to visit him again. If tobacco makes you 
 sick, eject it, and do not give others spasms by 
 making wiy faces. If the coat does not fit you, 
 get one that will, or go without. Do not fret, and 
 bother, and woriy, and stew, and grumble, and 
 find fault, and haggle, and whine over your hard 
 luck, but go in your shirt-sleeves. If the weather 
 be cold, exercise. If it be warm, who wants a 
 coat? 
 
 Don't be inquiring into other people's affairs 
 
90 ComrnKm-Sense Entitative. 
 
 at all — much less when you have affairs of your 
 own. If you have business, attend to it. If you 
 have none, the business of others should not con- 
 cern you. If you cannot take a trick, throw 
 up your hand — if fish will not bite, look for an- 
 other stream, or quit that kind of sport. 
 
^^^^^^^m&:: 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 In which we Speak about Pluck. 
 
 |ALTER, my boy, what do you con- 
 sider as God's best gift to man ? 
 " Woman, of course." 
 Well — that is very good ; but as 
 woman is never given to man without his win- 
 ning her, there is something else. 
 "Money?" 
 
 Ko, my boy — the root of evil is hardly a 
 good gift, as it is the source of more misery 
 and trouble than happiness. 
 "Good looks?" 
 Wrong again, my boy. Good looks, as the 
 
92 We Speak about Pluck. 
 
 world speaks, fade, wither, and die. Handsome 
 infants seldoln make handsome adults — time 
 works too many changes. The inner beanty of 
 the soul which shines and radiates as trouble 
 and sorrow gather around the heart, is seldom 
 seen by the world. But there is a gift which 
 is always noticed. And that bestowment is 
 Pluck. Give us that, and all else follows. With 
 a brave heart none need fail. What if you fall 
 once, twice, twenty, or a hundred times ? Pluck 
 will pick you up, and each time nerve your heart 
 for a greater effort. Life is a succession of hills 
 and valleys. They rise before us, my boy, in all 
 matters of existence. In love, wealth, ambition, 
 success or power, it is up here — down yonder. 
 Look around and see for yourself who it is 
 that succeeds. Not the timid one, who at 
 sight of the first obstacle in his path loses heart 
 and yields the game. ISTot the man whose nerve 
 will not keep his upper lip and under jaw in 
 place. Not the man who gives up on the first 
 
We Speak about Phtch. 93 
 
 trial. These men do not succeed. Success often 
 sports with a man as a shy trout plays with the 
 hook of the angler. Keep cool— be steady— stick 
 to a regular business, and soon the nibble will 
 end in a snapping bite, and you will land the 
 wary prize safely at your feet. 
 
 Pluck will do anything, my boy. It will win 
 the girl you love. Not in itself, perhaps, but it 
 will give you the qualities she admires. Women 
 seldom wed men— they wed ideas. Pluck will 
 fill your pockets with gold— but that is not the 
 object of life. It will carve your way to emi- 
 nence, and encircle you with friends who will pile 
 the sod over your grave in sorrow — the heartfelt 
 Bigh, telling, in eloquence beyond expression, the 
 love they bore you. Keep a stiff upper lip, my 
 boy. Failure is the rule— success the exception. 
 A million men walk boldly up to the great 
 object of life— and then have not the courage 
 to take hold of it. A million others fail because 
 the way seems so long— or the road is too rough. 
 
94t We Bpedk about Pluck. 
 
 Others fail for fear they will not succeed. This 
 life is a school, my boy. There are many lessons 
 to learn. We have each a thousand objects — 
 nine hundred too many — and flit from one to 
 another, as the humming-bird dashes from bud 
 to flower — and life is all frittered away before we 
 know it. Have a purpose. Take aim. Shoot 
 at something. Make a mark, if nothing but a 
 dent in the mud. If you cannot run up the hill, 
 climb it. If you cannot reach the top, go as 
 high as possible — then pass just one man more. 
 K you die — die game. If you sink, let it be in 
 deep water. If you reach for a flower, take the 
 best one. If you fail — ^get up like a man and 
 try again. Children cry and whimper — ^leave 
 off tears when you vote. 
 
 The road may be rough, my boy, but whoever 
 was made in the image of God should never say 
 any road was too rough. Brambles may beset 
 your path — ^make for the centre, as the hardest- 
 pointed ones are those on picket duty. If you 
 
We Speak about Pluck. 95 
 
 lack perseverance, have pluck to cultivate it. If 
 you lack money, have pluck to earn it. If you 
 lack credit, have pluck to be honest and to show 
 people that you deserve confidence. If you lack 
 position, have pluck to begin at the bottom of 
 the hill and work up. The apex is broad enough 
 for all who have the daring to struggle upward 
 to it — and so distant that few ever reach it. If 
 you lack decision of character, have pluck enough 
 to keep away from temptation. If you have no 
 umbrella, do not stand around in the rain. If 
 the monosyllable " no " is a good word to use — 
 have pluck to speak it plain and distinct. Never 
 choose the road that is the shortest, if the other 
 one is better. Never fail to satisfy your own 
 heart — others will be satisfied in time. 
 
 Straw men are never fit for anything except to 
 fool crows from a cornfield. The men who build 
 railroads, steamboats, factories, and cities, are 
 never cowards. The man who succeeds in any- 
 thing, is he who has pluck. And that little 
 
96 We Speak about Pluck, 
 
 word, my boy, has a powerful meaning. It signi- 
 fies something more than bull-dogism, and yoii 
 can study it out at leisure. Never despair. 
 A thousand dark and rainy mornings have ended 
 in the most glorious sunsets. Many an almost 
 impenetrable swamp has but stood sentry to a 
 golden land beyond. Many a cloud has passed 
 over, and left behind it a clear sky. Many a can- 
 non has been fired without a ball in it. Many a 
 mountain has proved but a mirage. Have a 
 heart for every fate. If in hard luck — it might be 
 harder. And then Yalter, my boy, you will suc- 
 ceed. Pluck is the genii whose resources are 
 limitless — whose power is magic. Pluck first — 
 luck afterward. With the first, all else will 
 follow. 
 

 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 Knitting. 
 
 )-DAY, I have been looking at a 
 knitting-machine. It is a mar- 
 vellous invention — able to knit a 
 stocking in four minutes ! I don't 
 like it. It is an infringement, and should not be 
 tolerated. Years ago, before gray hairs began 
 to show themselves on my head, there was 
 another knitting-machine I loved to watch. I 
 can look back the narrow lane of life and see it 
 now. I can see an old brown house, surrounded 
 by fruit-trees and lilacs. I can see in it, by the 
 old-fashioned hearth, which was warmer then 
 
98 Knittmg. 
 
 than now — even like the hearts of men — a fair 
 and good woman. I can see her sitting there of 
 a winter night, by the light of a pine knot, 
 winding yarn from the ball, and shaping it into 
 stockings, as we wind yarn from the ball of 
 life, and shape it into good or bad fitting 
 actions. Her needles used to click, click, click, 
 as regular as the beatings of a heart close by, 
 beside of mine, in another room. They were 
 happy days then. Life looked brighter then than 
 now. Her knitting was even as was her life ; and 
 warmer than the lamb's-wool stockings she knit, 
 was the heart that smiled — when to others that 
 were poor she gave. I nsed to sit in the adjoin- 
 ing room, Saturday nights, and sit there hours 
 after the good old lady had put up her knitting 
 for the night. Another sat beside me. We 
 listened to the click of the needles, to the 
 beating of our hearts, to the chirp of a cricket — 
 apt cricket — on the hearth ; and later in the 
 evening, to the wliistle of the whippoorwill in 
 
Knitting. 99 
 
 the grove below. We were knitting. We gazed 
 forth on nature, and talked of the present. We 
 sat hand in hand, and looked at the stars and 
 the future, and wondered why people were not 
 always happy. Earlier in the evening, before 
 the good old lady had quit work, softly indeed 
 must be the kiss, gently sealed on the pure 
 brow of her beside us, that she did not hear. 
 We were all happy then but her. Now in 
 heaven she is at rest, while the occupants of the 
 parlor in those days are longing for different and 
 whiter yarn to knit from than they have. 
 
 A marble slab— plain like his life, erect as was 
 his walk — overshadowed by a close-limbed wil- 
 low — as was his life by good deeds — its leaves 
 beating back the burning rays of the sun — as 
 his good actions had ever beat back calumny — 
 marked well the little spot in the garden, more 
 loved by the knitter than all other spots. Years 
 before, a warm heart beat in unison with her 
 own. Loving kisses were gently offered upon 
 
100 Knitting. 
 
 her brow to the shrine of love and goodness, but 
 now she stood in the front of her battle, alone. 
 Once in a while would she drop a stitch, but 
 oftener would she drop a tear, and the lip would 
 quiver as if shaken by the winds of the past. 
 At such times would I narrow, and knit the 
 threads of life closer ; and yet closer would I 
 draw that other heart to mine, wishing that some 
 day my grave might be wet with as sacred dew 
 as was the one in the garden. At times would 
 the old lady unravel several rounds from her 
 stocking, and at times would she unravel several 
 years from her work of life, and strewing them 
 about her feet, look them over, and then on 
 bended knee gaiher them up, and offer them to 
 the inspection of Him, above. Her work was 
 approved; and as she came in to say "good- 
 night," 1 know of two hearts that grew larger 
 and warmer. But one day she lingered too long 
 by the grave — ^the April air was too chill ; and 
 well was it that the visit was a long one, as it 
 
Knittmg. 101 
 
 was her last but one. When the heart is warm 
 cold winds, or cold actions either, strike it the 
 more severe, and the cold wind struck her. She 
 gave lip her knitting ; the ball of yarn and of 
 life were both used up at once, and her needles 
 were laid away simultaneously with her last 
 visit to the weeping willow. Always would her 
 ball unwind clear to the centre — yarn all the 
 way — no wad of paper, or chip, or walnut was 
 used to start it over. So with her life. No 
 black spot was found in the centre after she was 
 gone ; and not greener grows the willow to-day 
 than is the memory of that good woman. 
 
 Time flew slower then than now. A stocking 
 was not made in four minutes, as to-day. Hearts 
 were not as deeply located then as at present. 
 Life had more of sweet, and less of bitter, though 
 a bitter di'aught came ; and a score of years have 
 not taken from me the taste. Another form was 
 laid under the willow ; and all the bright spots I 
 had looked upon in the future, vanished, never to 
 
102 
 
 Knitting, 
 
 return. I would like to step back to those days, 
 but 'tis better to hasten on. The spmt-world is 
 large, and some one is ever waiting, inside the 
 golden gate, for the loved and left. I don't like 
 knitting. I don't like to see stockings turned off 
 by machinery the same as persons live and love. 
 
CHAPTEE XIY. 
 
 We Walk in the Cold, and Pity where OxHERa 
 Condemn. 
 
 |ALTEE, my boy, draw close the 
 garments and walk briskly, till we 
 reach some spot where the cold 
 wind whistles not so fiercely. It is 
 a cold— yes, a bitter cold morning. The smoke 
 hates to leave warm chimneys, and, my boy, 
 yon ^dll see that it actually refuses to leave 
 where there is no fire—waiting to be warmed ! 
 The little snow-birds sit on fences, and look 
 puffy-hke, as does a narrow-souled man sporting 
 a military uniform. How the foot wakens the 
 sleeping frost-king, and creaks with crispness 
 
104 We Pity where Others Condemn. 
 
 every time the quick-stepping foot rests on the 
 crumbling snow! On the windows of all the 
 houses, the workmen of Zero have worked with 
 subtle fingers, and left their delicate tracings. 
 Ah ! my boy, how feeble is man — ^how ignorant — 
 how weak ! It is cold, my boy, very cold. 
 
 Did you ever stop to realize how little love 
 there is in this great world of ours ? People never 
 care for others half as mucli as they pretend to. 
 Even in summer they are very cold, with blood 
 at fever heat. Their hearts will freeze spirits! 
 "We have a few friends, but never love them half 
 as much as we ought, or profess to. "When we 
 pick the berries from a bush, how qaick we leave 
 it ! Perhaps the warm sun and blessed light may 
 ripen other berries there, and then how we scram- 
 ble for them, no matter what other beautiful 
 shrubs, prettily growing, are trampled to death ! 
 People are too selfish — too cold. Yet such is na- 
 ture ; and there is, perhaps, but little use in war- 
 ring against it. 
 
We Pity where Others Condemn. 105 
 
 Now Yalter, my boy, did you ever notice how 
 soon some people will leave their best friends 
 when in trouble ? And how they will slander, 
 abuse, and libel the unfortunate, lest some one 
 should think they were once friends ? If a man 
 fails in business, through misfortune, how people 
 shun him! If a strong man is tempted more 
 than he can bear, and falls, how few friends who 
 will encourage him to rise again ! Society is a 
 queer god. It is a very hollow, deceitful thing. 
 Yet we all follow its dictation, as slaves follow 
 a master they both dread and despise. If a girl 
 falls, how her sex — ^her angelic sex even — desert 
 her, and let hunger, disease, and death take her 
 hence, unwept and uncared for save by those 
 who are like her, carrying the hell of wanton 
 dissipation forever within their cruelly wronged 
 hearts. No matter how dearly we once professed 
 to love, too often the least breath of trouble will 
 drive us all from where once was happiness, and 
 
 the heart will grow, oh ! so cold ! If a person is 
 
 5* 
 
106 We Pity where Others Condemn. 
 
 going on foot, people seldom care to be company 
 through the journey ; but if he rides in a car- 
 riage better than our own, we are very willing to 
 sit beside him. 
 
 " Don't like such friends ! " 
 
 Well, Yalter, my boy, such are too often the 
 only friends we have. Few are the hearts which 
 will stand the pressure of misfortune. Few are 
 the friends who will stick like a brother till life 
 has gone hence — few are the hearts which sym- 
 pathize with the sorrow of those they once pro- 
 fessed to — perhaps did — love. Few are the men 
 or women who cannot be bought away, or bribed 
 away from those they once said they would share 
 the last dollar with, or, if called upon, to lay 
 down life for. Once in a while, such a person 
 is found. We know those whom trial only 
 strengthens, whom trouble only helps, whom 
 sorrow only makes more loving — more willing — 
 more generous — more noble — more kind and 
 good. But there are few, and only those whose 
 
We Pity where Others Condemn. 107 
 
 hearts have suft'ered more cruel pangs than the 
 world knew of — whose life had become darkened 
 — whose heart, long lost, had at last been found 
 by one who could love, cherish, and, without 
 jealousy or mistrust, appreciate the love it gave, 
 the sacredness of its devotion — the strength of 
 its purpose, and who would know how true it 
 beat in unison with kindred feeling. 
 
 The style of the world, my boy, is to hitch on 
 to those who are going np — to cut loose from 
 those going down. It is fashionable to desert 
 persons when misfortune has overtaken them — 
 when others are deserting them, even without 
 cause — to hit the under man in the fight. If 
 trouble, sorrow, remorse, or affliction have so- 
 bered a man's face, or dressed him in coarser 
 clothes, everybody shuns him, because a cold, 
 heartless, hollow, unfeeling world claps its hands 
 and urges on the chase. Yes, my boy, there is 
 more in this world that is cold than the weather. 
 
 In heaven, they say, everybody loves. IsTot 
 
108 We Pity where Others Condemn. 
 
 as the bridegroom loves his bride — as the warm- 
 hearted girl whose eyes are deeper than the 
 azure of heaven — whose heart is wrapt up in, 
 and lives only for one she worships — ^not as the 
 libertine loves — not as the depraved and unfeel- 
 ing love, but as the infant loves the mother on 
 whose heart its delicate ear listens for the coun- 
 ter-ticking of its own life — as we love the good 
 and noble here below. Yalter, my boy, that is 
 a blessed Hope then. Even if eternity is to 
 be devoted to labor, it will be too short, if 
 love be the reward. And, my boy, how great 
 and wondrous the change before many are fit 
 to enter there! Many Christians, as they call 
 themselves, are not prepared for such bliss. 
 They may profess before men — may deceive 
 some with their long faces, but they are too 
 cold to ever know the happiness in store for 
 those whose hearts are ever warm and generous. 
 Biting frost is disagreeable, my boy, but there 
 is something colder. We may feel cold toward 
 
We Pity where Others Condemn. 109 
 
 some — who can help destiny? The severest 
 frost is that of the heart, and how desolate the 
 blight where hope has fled — where love has 
 gone ! Yet, my boy, there is happiness in learn- 
 ing who are false— who are true friends. But- 
 terflies leave the jessamine when its flowers 
 begin to fall, but the little wren builds her nest 
 underneath, and beneath its shelter rears her 
 young, nor leaves it until ready for another 
 home far away. 
 
CHAPTER XY. 
 
 Wherein the Use or Eyes is Looked Over. 
 
 |ALTER, my boy, the road we are 
 travelling day after day, to and 
 from our regular place of business, 
 is one so well known that a blind 
 man could walk it — if he only knew all the 
 crooks, turns, broken planks, holes, and dangers 
 therein. But there is another road, my boy, 
 to walk safely over which needs eyes. E^ot dead 
 eyes, covered by carelessness as plants are covered 
 by newspapers and other sheets to guard them 
 against frost, but live eyes, which register as fast 
 as the impression is received. There is the 
 
The Use of Eyes Looked Over. IH 
 
 physical walk through life and the spiritual walk 
 to eternity. Not one man in twenty knows what 
 his eyes were made for. Optics are like trotting 
 horses — the best-trained ones get over the most 
 ground. The vision of some people points in- 
 wardly, no matter where it starts from. One 
 man walks heedlessly along and stumbles from a 
 steamboat. Another jumps from one car to an- 
 other, and, because he could not see danger, 
 foolishly becomes a candidate for a hearse and 
 sextonical orders. Another man walks along 
 the road — stubs his toe, and then picks himself 
 up, looking very foolish and afraid some one saw 
 his downfall. A lady with silk and satin well 
 arranged and displayed on her fair form, is so 
 intent on winning eyeshots from some loaferish 
 crowd that she runs against dry-goods boxes, 
 rubs against door jambs or awning posts, and 
 rends her di-ess or daubs its smooth folds with 
 close-sticking paint. Another person, my boy, 
 is always late at the cars — late at church — ^late 
 
112 The Use of Eyes Looked Over. 
 
 everywhere, because he does not see how time 
 flies. 
 
 Eyes were given us for a wise purpose. "We 
 have two of them. That means sometliing, my 
 boy. And they have an outer reflection and an 
 inner one. Your eyes are young yet. They 
 will bear much training. Teach them what to 
 do, my boy, and well will they perform. Not 
 that you must speak of all they see or what they 
 gather in. The little brain-pictures they photo- 
 graph wiU, if preserved, make an abundant stock 
 in trade for any person. Eyes are wealth to one 
 who has learned his trade. 
 
 And there is much to see with the inner eye. 
 We will walk along slow, and learn. You, Yal- 
 ter, my boy, may see the pictures we have saved. 
 
 The man who is always late at business never 
 wiU be wealthy unless by accident. The woman 
 who hangs invisible weights to her chin when- 
 ever talking to her husband — whose welcoming 
 smiles are convex, with acidulated edges, never 
 
The Use of Eyes Looked Over. 113 
 
 adds over-much to her store of happiness. "Well 
 trained eyes see much of this. They see wives 
 smiling on every one, except their husbands. 
 This is a sad picture — with more of misery for a 
 background than the world, with all its smart- 
 ness, ever sees. And, my boy, there are men 
 whose laughs, songs, jests, and anecdotes are 
 given liberally outside their family. Good eyes 
 will see the reason — poor eyes will not notice — 
 medium eyes will wonder at the fact. And there 
 are men who go on from year to year, betraying 
 confidence — selling friends — dishonoring trusts 
 reposed in them — abusing the sacred ties of 
 friendship — swindling their own hearts — blunt- 
 ing and wearing down the fine edges of con- 
 science — ^liberally planting death or disease in 
 their frames — retrograding from the goal of lofty 
 ambition and honorable purpose. Their eyes 
 only see to-day — to-morrow is beyond the scope 
 of their vision. And, my boy, there are eyes of 
 men which fall in love with small feet — with red 
 
114 The Use of Eyes Looked Over. 
 
 cheeks — with a certain colored eye — with a cur. 
 or ringlet — with a style of dancing — ^witji a 
 machine-made smile — with a white neck or with 
 hills of snow, summit-finished with living vio- 
 lets. All these things in themselves are vanities, 
 my boy. The purchase made for one of these 
 beauties wears like plaster-of-Paris statuary — 
 soft, hollow — light, and certain to turn a dingy 
 shade. Small feet may be cut oif by car^ or dis- 
 torted with rheumatic pains. Red cheeks may 
 thank French saucers, severe pinching, drugs, or 
 disease, for an existence. The fancy eye, unless 
 the heaven-born love-light burns well and steady 
 therein, is more dreaded to look upon than a 
 battle-field. The curl which electrified you, as it 
 fell down upon your face, or just touched your 
 neck by accident, may have been made by bar- 
 bers' tongs, or may be driven away by fever. 
 People do not always dance, my boy. Machine 
 Bmiles are like Barlow knives — fit for children 
 only. The white neck married by gas-light may 
 
The Use of Eyes Looked Over, 115 
 
 show better in two hours after the ceremony on 
 a colored cloth than on the beautiful veins so 
 freshly playing under the skin below. The lit- 
 tle hills of snow may be colder than' Alpine gla- 
 ciers — may disappear like articles in the hands 
 of a magician, or friendship when adversity 
 comes, or from causes which follow effect, and 
 the violets thereon will become, like paper 
 flowers, misshapen and odorless. All these single 
 pictures, which catch the glance of surface-seek- 
 ing eyes, make poor anchors to drag on, while 
 riding out the dark hours of life. 
 
 And, Yalter, my boy, there are eyes of women 
 which look not beyond the shade of their lashes 
 
 ^which but glance at the column of figures 
 
 without noticing the footings. And the footings 
 of figures and the footings of life are much the 
 same. Large or small, as set in proper places. 
 These eyes see only a nice pair of whiskers — a 
 soft hand— a neat instep— a curly head of hair 
 — a gold watch and seal — a swaggering gait— 
 
116 The Use of Eyes Looked Over. 
 
 a broadclotli case ftdl of style. And, my boy, 
 wedlock gives good women whose greatest fault 
 is poor eyes, to these men — as you and us for 
 want of better places hang our coats on dead 
 limbs, our hat on the door-knob, our watch 
 on a gimlet bored into the wall, or throw a vest 
 on a bunch of thistles. 
 
 We all have a long walk ahead. A very 
 long walk, my boy, and you nor us know just 
 when the gate will open and we shall step forth. 
 And, my boy, light will be our dress — few the 
 suits. And as we walk down the path which 
 leads from the shore of the dark river, how 
 much will we see which now escapes observa- 
 tion ! The road walked in life will be walked 
 again, and thousands of little things now un- 
 noticed will stand forth like sentinels. And, my 
 boy, you and us will wonder why our eyes never 
 beheld their index fingers, guiding right or left. 
 Plain will they be then. Large will grow our 
 eyes as that new path is walked; its beauties 
 
The Use of Eyes Looked Over. 117 
 
 and deformities now unnoticed, made manifest 
 — each knoll of sorrow, or bower of happiness, 
 marked by sighs or thrills of joy, forgotten, un- 
 noticed, or uncared for. 
 
 As we walk down that path, the eye will drink 
 in the whole of God's scenery thickly studded 
 with man's actions ; and the black smoke of 
 regret will too often smother out the incense 
 of happy memories. 
 
 Then, many a man will see where his bark 
 of happiness was wrecked, and wonder why he 
 did not use his eyes before. There will be mil- 
 lions of reefs, rocks, and shoals to be seen, over 
 and by which we all have run. Men will see 
 the skeletons of their hopes of happiness hang- 
 ing exposed to every wind — to every remark — 
 to every eye. They will hang on cold snow- 
 hills — on waving curls — on diamond-girted fingers 
 — on red cheeks — on hollow accomphshments ; 
 traps set in life by deceit, to catch victims for 
 remorse. The wine-cup and wassail bowl will 
 
118 The Use of Eyes Looked Over, 
 
 lie thick along that path, and in each will be 
 the anchored skeleton of some manly heart — 
 some noble soul. You and us, my boy, will 
 then see on what hollow and worthless reeds 
 we have leaned for suppoi't — on what cold 
 hearts we have some time or other laid our 
 hopes — on what uncongenial spirits we have 
 lavished affection. We shall see, my boy, where 
 often in life we failed — we shall see warning 
 posts now unnoticed, but none the less there. 
 Yes, Yalter, my boy, that day will be a busy 
 one for the eyes, and happy will be he who 
 looks well about him here. There is so much 
 work to do. All not done in the forenoon must 
 be done in the afternoon. There will be new 
 mating and unmating then ; new aims and new 
 objects, for we shall see aright. 
 
 Let you and us, my boy, no matter how others 
 use their eyes, keep ours open while awake, and 
 day by day learn what they were given us for. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 In which we find Smiles among Tears, and Hap- 
 piness WHERE WE HAD NOT LOOKED FOR IT. 
 
 [EOPLE never know how to be happy, 
 my boy. There is not one of God's 
 living images but has anchored in 
 his heart a boat which braves out, 
 and tosses upon life's rough sea, waiting, as it 
 rocks and pitches, for a full freight of happiness 
 at some future day. That is the failure, Yalter. 
 "We ever look ahead for some day, when care, 
 trouble, and sorrow shall be banished. That day 
 will never come on earth, my boy. We may look 
 ahead — the morrow may be golden — till the mor- 
 row comes. As we walk along this road, away 
 
120 Smiles among Terns. 
 
 from the dusty city, you and us can talk quietly 
 over these matters. "We can talk of little things 
 unnoticed by those who are in great haste to 
 finish this book for one they know not of. 
 
 The tree which spreads its branches out as a 
 mother holds her hands to the tottling infant, 
 seeming to ask us to be seated under its leaves, 
 looks inviting, but its trunk is covered with bugs 
 and ants. The beautiful green leaf, which toys 
 with the evening breeze, bears on its under sur- 
 face insect cities which will hasten its fall. The 
 limb above us is half decayed, though the foliage 
 thereon is yet green and fresh. The little white 
 stone at our feet, is the roof for ugly worms and 
 beetles. The rose which laughs at its escape 
 from yonder hedge — the rose which looks so 
 sweet, has in its centre leaves a score of little 
 bugs. The lovely dahlia, so beautiful in its deli- 
 cately tinted hues, is without fragrance. The 
 handsome oil painting, on close examination 
 seems like a daub, made by amateur hands. The 
 
'' * * * As a lover hangs by one hand over the 
 banister, to kiss the hps so sweet to \\\m:'—Page 121. 
 
Smiles among Terns. 121 
 
 crimson cloud seemingly hanging from heaven 
 
 to kiss earth, as a lover hangs by one hand over 
 
 the bannister to kiss the lips'so sweet to him, are 
 
 not different from the morning banks of fog, 
 
 only as reflecting the sun's rays. The pearly 
 
 stream singing by us is often roiled, and its bed 
 
 is the home of reptiles. The finest hair of your 
 
 head, my boy, is in reality like the cylinder to a 
 
 thrashing-machine. The mysterious photograph, 
 
 on close inspection, reveals all the imperfections 
 
 on the face of the setter. The rustling silk has 
 
 yawning stitches to mar its beauty. The wished- 
 
 for country has its dark side — the thronged city 
 
 knows more misery than pen or tongue can 
 
 tell. 
 
 On everything, my boy, the destroyer has set 
 
 his seal. There is nothing perfect. Still we can 
 
 make the most of what we have. We can walk 
 
 along through life— passing by the dark scenes — 
 
 lingering to-day by those of beauty, of joy and 
 
 love. If to-morrow brings others, well and good. 
 6 
 
122 Smiles wmong Tears, 
 
 If not, the happiness we find to-day is clear gain. 
 We must learn to take the bitter with the sweet. 
 Eoses grow on brambles. Flowers of beauty and 
 fragrance spring from the most neglected places. 
 There is joy a^nd happiness everywhere, if we do 
 not look for too much at a time. Some of these 
 evenings, Yalter, you and us will sit quietly 
 down, and by ourselves have a picture of happi- 
 ness. Not now, my boy, but very soon. 
 
 The morning sun is the most pleasant. Its 
 hot, mid-day beams are not what we want. Full 
 rays of happiness bring more misery along than 
 we can endure. Let us be thankful for what we 
 have, and all will be well. Enjoy the present — 
 hope for the future. The hour may look dark — 
 there is light beyond. Be happy while you can. 
 When in the house, do not put your head out of 
 the window, to see how hard the blast is piping. 
 Keep still, and thank God you are safe for a mo- 
 ment— if no longer. Borrow no trouble. It will 
 be left at your door as fast as you wish to use it. 
 
seniles among Teo/rs. 123 
 
 The iceman calls in the morning, and leaves the 
 cold crystal, in small or large cakes, as yon use. 
 Time leaves cakes, chunks, and blocks of trouble 
 in the same way. Daily he leaves them. Ice is 
 not colder — ice will not melt quicker, if you but 
 leave it out of doors. If you have no use for 
 trouble, do not go or send out for it, my boy. 
 Let it lie and melt. Lie and melt is a good idea, 
 Yalter. Let it waste itself in the ground — and 
 in time, green will be the grass, rich and varied 
 the flowers which will spring forth to be culled 
 by your own hands. 
 
 Every man is monarch in his own heart. In 
 his own castle, the king can be safe — in his hut, 
 the occupant can bar the door, and none but bid- 
 den guests can enter. So can you and us do, my 
 boy, with the door of our hearts. Admit none 
 but friends — shut out trouble and be happy. 
 We get the strength of tea by steeping, so do we 
 feel the nightmare of sorrow by brooding and 
 worrying over trouble, either real or imaginary. 
 
124 Smiles a/mong Tea/rs. 
 
 Grief seldom kills — true friends never desert 
 yon. Leeches quit when they have sucked their 
 fill of blood. So, many friends desert you when 
 they know your troubles. If you would ride safe, 
 be your own driver. Never trust the reins with 
 another. Then you can go singing on your way, 
 and be happy. If you wish one to ride with you, 
 ask not the first you overtake, except you know 
 who it is. Perhaps you will wish to ride alone. 
 Better go a thousand miles to find a friend than 
 take in one who is not. 
 
 Look around, my boy. Look ahead to the 
 work of Kfe, with heart and nerve. Then all 
 troubles vanish. Look back, and you will see a 
 thousand incidents in life — now sacred to memory 
 — then uncared for and almost unnoticed. They 
 were moments of happiness studding the dome 
 of life, as the golden-headed bolts stud the floor 
 of God above us, and glisten in mysterious tremor 
 while we sleep. We pass them daily, little heed- 
 ing the fact, as the traveller passes parallels of 
 
Smiles among Tears. 125 
 
 the meridian — to look back and see them far 
 in the past. We can look back and see how- 
 much we have missed in not knowing which 
 were our happy moments — and, my boy, we can 
 also in retrospect wonder and wonder how little 
 troubles could have worried us so in the days 
 or hours thereof. 
 
 The trouble is, my boy — we think every one is 
 happier than ourselves — more comforts by the 
 family hearth than we enjoy ; while the truth is 
 that not one in ten are as happy as ourselves, or 
 get through the world with as little trouble. 
 The breeze might have been a hurricane — the 
 shower a hailstorm. The friends we at times 
 lose were never good ones, or they would not 
 fall oiF as do rose leaves, themselves worthless, 
 while the pod with the germ of so many beauti- 
 ful flowers remains. Yalter, just think, now, if 
 you are not much happier than you thought you 
 were. 
 

 CHAPTEE XYII. 
 
 A Short Talk about how to Get Along. 
 
 |T always was and ever will be so. 
 Life is tlie same unceasing battle 
 to-day as it was yesterday, and, 
 my boy, there is not the least bit 
 of use in allowing youi'self to be discouraged. 
 The darkest hour is just before day, in business 
 as in time. 
 
 There is always a silence, thick and oppressive, 
 before a storm — a deathly stillness before a clap 
 of thunder. There are times when the heart 
 malaria sickens the whole man, and thought flies 
 wild like a loosened kite. Every person will 
 
A Sho7't Talk about how to Get Along. 127 
 
 have blue hours. Serve them as a dog serves 
 drops of water — shake them off. Eun, walk, or 
 crawl into the sunshine, and be happy. 
 
 It does not take much, Yalter, my boy, to 
 make a man rich. Gold will not do it. Bank 
 stock will not do. Property stolen from the 
 poor, ignorant, and unfortunate of earth will never 
 bring a competency. Happiness never rides in 
 such a carriage. Man can do anything. If you 
 want a fortune, labor for it. If you wish influ- 
 ence, there is but one way to get it. If you wish 
 to lead, show your qualities. Do not be in a 
 hurry. Leaders never drive. He who drives is 
 in the rear. Success may seem a long distance 
 ahead, but labor, wrapped in perseverance, will 
 do everything. 
 
 Look around us, Yalter, my boy, and see the 
 rich earth — the carpet He gave all His crea- 
 tures to walk on — the laughing, leaping, singing 
 brook, which lover-like kisses the lips of its guide, 
 and runs joyously on, sparkling and dancing 
 
128 A Short Talk about how to Get Along. 
 
 for joy at the good it has done. See the deep 
 woods — ^listen to the sounds of happy life therein 
 — listen to the beautiful birds as they sing of 
 love — look at the numberless flowers, sentinels of 
 beauty — follow the deep shadows till they are 
 lost in your own heart — look up — up — up, beyond 
 the leafy roof, into the deep blue of heaven. 
 Stand on the sea-shore — observe the millions of 
 shells, once homes for wondrous life — watch the 
 waves as they bring their white-capped offerings 
 to your very feet — hear the sea-spirit sullenly 
 moaning down the shore, and then think. 
 
 God made all these. He fashioned the perfect 
 dome and riveted it with myriads of golden bolts. 
 In the night you can see them. All this He 
 made out of nothing. He was never discour- 
 aged. We are made in his image — all that he 
 made is given us. Then why should we fail? 
 Do not expect to centre the mark every time. 
 Never worry if failure dares dispute the way. 
 The strongest guards are always before the rich- 
 
A Short Talk about how to Get Along. 129 
 
 est cities. The most difficult locks protect the 
 richest treasures. 
 
 Labor will win. The rose does not spring from 
 chaos to the bosom of the bride. The ivy does 
 not twine itself around the oak as the lightning 
 writes its name around its shaggy sides. The 
 modest four-o'clock, and the blushing morning- 
 glory do not open their beauty to the world as a 
 man opens his eyes after a hurried sleep. The 
 golden grain does not spring from the earth as 
 the Indian arrow flies from its tensioned bow — • 
 but, like man, takes its allotted time. The girl 
 you love will not say " yes " as a toad catches 
 flies, the first time you ask her to share your life 
 and lot — the ice does not melt as powder flashes 
 - — the sun does not set as a candle drops into a 
 well. 
 
 Take time, my boy. Don't hurry too fast. Go 
 slow, especially till you know the road, or be- 
 come acquainted with your team. Be careful. 
 
 Mark the rough, dangerous places you have 
 6* 
 
130 A Short Talk about how to Get Along. 
 
 passed, and shun them hereafter. One feather 
 will not break a camel's back — bnt it will help. 
 It is easy to succeed if you but will it. Make up 
 your mind, and persevere. Mind your own busi- 
 ness, Yalter, and then, my boy, you are happy. 
 Don't stop to club whiffets — don't stop to retail 
 gossip — don't stop to tell your secrets — but go 
 on, minding your own business, leaving the 
 question of reward, life, happiness, and heaven, 
 with God. 
 
 And remember, Yalter, my boy, that no one 
 cares for you, on general principles. You are a 
 good orange so long as society's children can 
 squeeze juice out of you — no longer. People 
 never care for your troubles — they have enough 
 of their own. People are willing to give every 
 one's property but their own. So with secrets. 
 They will let yours loose, and keep theirs in the 
 stable. And they always keep the nicest fruiu 
 for home consumption — giving the poor that 
 which they will not use themselves. And, 
 
A Short Talk about how to Get Along. 131 
 
 Yalter, my boy, that is much the way they give 
 advice — and while you eat, they laugh at your 
 poverty and are disgusted with your appetite. 
 
 Men sport with another's sorrows or troubles 
 as a cat plays with a mouse — only sorry when 
 death puts an end to the torment. Men care for 
 you, my boy, as they care for a horse that kicks. 
 If he lets fly, quick and sharp, they keep clear 
 of his heels. 
 
 Remember, my boy, man is a perfect machine. 
 He is ready for life and its duties. God made us 
 all correct. And His machines are not the ones 
 to fail. Keep your pluck. Hold up your nerve. 
 If others don't care for you, you are a double- 
 headed fool to care for them. Help yourself— 
 light your own lamp — make your own position — 
 shoot your own gun — look out for yourself and 
 keep a clear conscience — be independent, then 
 let the world howl, laugh, or whine, as it pleases. 
 
CHAPTER XYIII. 
 
 Fireside Musings, 
 
 HERE is a great white counterpane 
 of snow on the ground this Satur- 
 day night. God's charity, covering 
 a multitude of sins ! Would that 
 human charity w^ould do thus — would whiten 
 over the little bunnocks and ridges of life which 
 can be removed from one place only to rise again 
 in another ! The week just passed has been a 
 short one. Too short for many a one to settle 
 with himself, yet he has gone home. How time 
 flies ! Has it always passed thus rapidly ? If all 
 the Saturday nights God has ever given us were 
 
Fireside Musvngs. 133 
 
 before us, what an array of crime would be seen ! 
 Yet the day comes when they will all loom up with 
 tlieir debits and credits to curse or bless. Do you 
 ever pause to think, reader ? If so, pause again. 
 If not, begin now. Draw your chair to the fire. 
 Turn the light so that it will not hurt your eyes. 
 Pull the curtain down at the corners. Listen ! 
 A footstep on the creaking snow. Some laborer 
 going to his loved ones. Weary and heart- 
 tired — may God warm his little home with love ! 
 Look back over the past week. It is not far. A 
 room with seven folding doors ! Open all of 
 them. Turn the rooms into a hall — look down 
 its short walls and see in memory the pictm-es 
 you have hung thereon. Another footstep ! 
 How the boot creaks as the snow is crunched 
 beneath its weight ! . Listen ! A lighter step. 
 Some wife who is hastening home to greet her 
 husband with the marketing for the morrow. 
 Tired man. He sits and rests with Httle hands 
 in his whiskers — little eyes peering into his — 
 
134 Fireside Musings. 
 
 little heads on either shoulder — stars which rank 
 him a major-general in the service of life ! Hold 
 them closer — ^kiss them fondly to-night. Who 
 but God knows which one wiU be in shroud, 
 coffin, or grave ere another Saturday night comes 
 round ? 
 
 Another step ! The other way ! Some hus- 
 band with heart full of ruined hopes going to 
 revel at the beer table. Some foolish youth, 
 swift stepping by, anxious to join the revel. 
 Pitied husband. It was not thus a few years 
 since. Who is to blame ? Let us, who know not 
 the cares and shadows of the heart, do not that 
 w^hich God has forbidden. Let us not condemn. 
 He will reward and He will punish. The step 
 dies away. Around the corner. So her hope 
 dies away. So his heart-thoughts have died out. 
 Why will he leave the home fireside this Sat- 
 urday, over all others ? Home once had charms. 
 The eye now so indifferent, once lit its way to 
 his very soul. The lips now cold, except in 
 
Fireside Musvngs. 135 
 
 petulancy, once put their full richness up to revel 
 in the loved kiss. The tongue, which now 
 speaks but to chide, once knew no language but 
 that of love. It was many Saturday nights ago, 
 perhaps — ^but it was once. Why go to-night? 
 Is there not some little corner in the heart where 
 the old love — the old hope — the old pleasure 
 lingers ? Must you go to-night ? Once you 
 would not have left for an hour. Who has 
 poisoned the feast? Who has bittered the 
 spring ? Talk it over this Saturday night. See 
 who has shrouded the Pet and buried the Dar- 
 ling of years agone. Go not elsewhere for hap- 
 piness. It is not to be found in the wine-cup. 
 The glass of poison does not contain it. The 
 allurements of the gaming-table give no happi- 
 ness. Eest this night. If you still love, sit 
 beside each other — eye to eye, at times — hand 
 upon or in hand, at times. Read to her or him 
 you love. Eead this little chapter. It is kindly 
 meant, even for those who differ from us. Look 
 
136 Fireside Musings, 
 
 back and see how much happier you have been 
 than you might have been — ^how much happier 
 you might have been than you are. Do not 
 blame. Do not chill the rivulet into an icicle. 
 
 Good wife, do not let him go. Make home 
 happy for your own sake. Give him love for 
 love — ^kiss for kiss— confidence for confidence. 
 Be to him as you were when you won him. Call 
 back the glance, the word, the old caress — ^the 
 electric touch, and sit down together to bless God 
 that you have each other to love and live for. 
 Let new resolves be born to-night. They may 
 die before another one comes around, but give 
 them birth. God sent us here to be happy. 
 We live to make ourselves miserable. God 
 gave us Saturday night for love and reflec- 
 tion. He gave us the^ Sabbath for rest. He 
 gave us six days for labor. And you, brother 
 reader — comrade in life's battle, must you go 
 from the home you have ? It may not be 
 quite pleasant, but can you not help make 
 
Fireside Musings, 137 
 
 it so? Save your earnings. Save your heart. 
 Save your manhood. Keep faith with yourself. 
 Give this night to rest — to-morrow for worship, 
 and give to God a heartfelt blessing for the mer- 
 cies you have, for some Saturday Night will be 
 your last! 
 
CHAPTEK XIX. 
 
 In which we Speak of the Roads, the Hearth 
 AND Fender. 
 
 ROUND the mountains — over hills 
 — across plains more wearisome 
 than toil in their monotony — 
 through forests, deep, dark, and dis- 
 mal — by pleasant homes and many-tongued 
 groves — now smooth with turf-lined border — then 
 rough and rugged with jagged rocks and rolling 
 boulders, this roads winds its way. It ends some- 
 where, my boy — not up a tree ; not on the brink 
 of a yawning chasm ; not in some grand, awful 
 and majestic ocean, whose wondrous depths 
 nothing but the Omnipotent can fathom ; not in 
 
The Roads, the Hearth and Fender. 139 
 
 little narrow, grave-like crevices. Yet it ends, 
 mj boy. !N"ot abruptly and in a trackless blank, 
 but, merging into some other road — the two be- 
 coming one — the identity of each is lost, and 
 this, in turn, loses itself in still another — each 
 one more beaten and travelled than the one we 
 now are on. Yalter, this road is typical of life. 
 There are in man's brief existence cross-roads — 
 hopes running into ours — our hopes and plans 
 running into others — all forming a spider-like 
 web of events, reaching far and wide. As the 
 idle boy loosens one thread of the line web of the 
 morning spider, from some stake or bush — so 
 does time and fate loosen a friend here — a friend 
 there — but the falHng thi-eads catch on other 
 points, and the beautiful web is upheld, repaired, 
 and enlarged. 
 
 And, my boy, when life is over, it is not over. 
 The track becomes a path — the path a byway ; 
 the byway a lane ; the lane a road ; the road a 
 street. The road of life does not end in a grove 
 
140 The Boads, the Hearth and Fender, 
 
 — it does not lose itself in the top of some bluff 
 — in some dark chasm — ^but merges into and 
 weds another life. More busy yet than this. We 
 step from the path into the road — ^the path we so 
 hated to leave — it is done in a moment, and we 
 are amazed at the beauties bordering our new 
 walk, and wonder that we wept to think others 
 had reached its smoother track before us, or that 
 we could dread to enter the road this little one 
 leads into. 
 
 The road of life is one of trials, my boy. Few 
 can walk without tripping or stumbling. Few 
 are they who can walk and not weary — who seek 
 not the shady side for the rest it gives. Why 
 you and us walk, ao one can tell. Why others 
 travel, you and us do not know. The cars, boats, 
 and stages are well filled — people have business 
 in the city — aims as varied as the mackerel-back 
 Bky of autumn — each car, an archipelago of 
 ideas, wonderful, inexplicable, and mysterious. 
 
 Man is like a trunk riding in a full baggage- 
 
The Roads, the Hea/rth a/)id Fender. 141 
 
 car. The outside does not surely indicate the 
 contents. The check is not always evidence of its 
 destination — there are so many changes. Side by 
 side we journey on, the humble satchel filled with 
 valuable papers between two large trunks filled 
 with stolen goods — the worn russet-covered valise 
 cheek by jowl with the elegantly sacked store- 
 house of fashion. We see the trunks in the car — 
 who claims them, you nor us, Yalter, cannot tell. 
 And few of us know how to walk this road — 
 or any other one. We go rattling along like a 
 pauper cart — ^hub-hitting as do omnibuses in 
 Broadway — striking posts and corners, jolting 
 and smashing the delicate machinery of life, or 
 wearing it out with too great friction. We 
 travel too fast. We look so far ahead that we 
 tumble. In the future the present is lost. Man 
 never knows how he lives. Ambition is a cruel 
 reinsman — up hill and down it drives the tired 
 servant with stinging lash. Wealth is never 
 won. The child is never satisfied with two ap- 
 
142 The Roads, the Hearth and Fender. 
 
 pies in its tiny hand, but in grasping three, loses 
 all. Revenge is sweet, but no one can ride with 
 it long. Love is the most unreasonable motive, 
 because it stops for neither ditch nor hedge. 
 
 Home is a good master, for the pay is good — in- 
 terest prompt. Before we die let us look in upon 
 one, my boy, and see if it is well to hasten on too 
 fast. The hearth and fender look beautiful to 
 the gentle. Ambition, even when gratified, can- 
 not soothe pain or stiU the throbbing temple. 
 Wealth never satisfies the heart. Fame is like 
 the crumbling frosting to bridal cake — hard to 
 make — easily broken. If there was a skylight 
 in our final house, so that we could see who 
 laughed and who wept when the sexton spat on 
 his hands, grasped the shovel, and rattled in on 
 our sonorous roof the first sod or mass of frozen 
 dirt and stones — or if there were windows, so we 
 could see who followed after with sad hearts, 
 there would be satisfaction in death — but no. 
 Words are cheap — they conceal one's thoughts 
 
The Roads, the Hearth and Fender. 143 
 
 Men call us friends — for fun. They use us as 
 hunters do rifles — ^when gone, get another. 
 
 "We pick up much rubbish as we look along 
 through life, my boy — we learn much not worth 
 learning — we cut the leaves to many a book of no 
 benefit — we carry many a pile of slag thinking it 
 to be virgin ore. We coil for use many a rope 
 of sand. 
 
 But there is a light to life for all. There is a 
 cushioned seat if we but use it. 
 
 By the Hearth and Fender. 
 
 When the toil is over, there you can enter. 
 Some one heart from all of God's has run into 
 your own, and side by side you sit and dream of 
 the golden future. How like heaven are the 
 Home bowers lining our path into the road be- 
 yond. The world may have all the day been 
 cheerless — the cares of business may have been 
 like the dew — ^the keen word, ungrateful act, or 
 marked neglect may have cut to the heart — ^there 
 is still one place left — Home. 
 
144 Tlie Eoads, the HeoHh cmd Fender. 
 
 Yalter, my boy, it is a pleasant picture. The 
 clanking gate opens the eyelids of some one with- 
 in — the footstep on the walk falls on the ear like 
 pleasant memories — the hand-touched door-knob 
 stills for a moment the heart in waiting ; the 
 well-known presence felt by love lightens the 
 load of the day — the word — the kiss — the gentle 
 clasp — the lovelit glance revealing to each other 
 treasures the world knows not of — ^the gentle 
 drawing to your breast of the heart which so 
 loves you — the sigh of relief as the heaven is 
 reached — the kiss of love; more eloquent than 
 words, more fervent than heat. These indicate a 
 chapter in Life's great Book, but few ever read 
 it. 
 
 Home is the place, my boy. ITot the sem- 
 blance — ^but the reality as God intended it. 
 
 When the labor of a long day is over, how 
 blessed it is to have a hearth and fender ! The 
 blast may howl without — casements may rattle — 
 wagons may rumble — bells may jingle — dogs may 
 
The Roads, the Hearth arid Fender. 145 
 
 bay at the cold moon — those you hate may plot 
 
 for your ruin — the tempest may rage in fury; 
 
 who cares? The labor of the day is over. Some 
 
 one has kissed the last sorrow away. Some lips 
 
 have thawed the frozen heart — some gentle hand 
 
 has cleared from you the clouds of care which for 
 
 hours have hung so dark and sombre over the 
 
 heart. Some one, dearer than life to you, has 
 
 nestled by your side, or sits in your lap with one 
 
 arm around yom- neck ; her soft cheek with 
 
 electric touch setting your face in a tremor — eye 
 
 looking home into mystic depths — happy! who 
 
 cares for the world? Who cares for brambles 
 
 lining the road ? 
 
 The past pictures are one by one brought up — 
 
 the future is bravely looked into— the present is 
 
 improved. New life for the morrow is given. 
 
 New hope for the futm-e is yours. New wishes 
 
 are bom unto you. The hours of evening glide 
 
 on. The heart all your own is gladdened by 
 
 your loving presence. The minutes drop off like 
 7 
 
146 The Boads^ the Hearth and Fender. 
 
 stitclies from, knitting-needles — lives run still 
 closer in together, and yon are happy. 
 
 And yet, Yalter, with all these golden bless- 
 ings to reward life, there are those who weary of 
 existence and plunge over the deep precipice in- 
 stead of following the road to its end ; and there 
 are those who see in the beautiful border of the 
 daily road nothing but hate, envy, jealousy, and 
 mistrust — who would die by the road, when it is 
 so easy to reach the heabth and fendee. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Sunday Night. 
 
 0-DAY is Saturday — to-night is 
 Saturday night — to-morrow will 
 be Sunday — after to-morrow is 
 dead, and laid out in its- black 
 shroud, with the stars to guard and watch, 
 Sunday night will come. Fix up the parlor 
 — kindle the fire there early, so that the room 
 will be warm — fill the lamp to the brim — 
 see that the blinds or curtains are a fit — place 
 the chairs at regular intervals about the room, 
 like pickets — smooth the silken hair over the 
 brow, and wait. A step ! Ah ! my little girl — 
 
148 Sunday Night. 
 
 you know whose step ! The heart trembles like 
 a little bird — the eye wanders from object to ob- 
 ject — and then to your own dear self. A rap on 
 the door — a timid little rap ! And you preterid 
 not to hear it, though if it were made with a 
 feather you would have heard it ! Another rap — 
 ah! by "hard" listening, you distinguish the 
 sound. Singular ! And how surprised you are, 
 to be sure! Never dreamed of his coming! 
 Take care, little one ! Eyes talk louder than do 
 lips ! The parlor looks cheery. Two of the 
 pickets are called in from the sides of the room. 
 Of course your guest must be entertained. Time 
 flies — the clock in the other room ticks away the 
 moments — ^its hands slowly crawl up as if to peer 
 over the door — the fire burns and crackles in its 
 prison — the old folks file off to bed, to wonder 
 what you are talking about, and to think of their 
 sparking days — the clock talks its take-ca/re I 
 take-care ! take-care ! — now loud, then low — but 
 your lips will meet and linger on the brink of 
 
Sunday Night. 149 
 
 love's fountain. The times are hard. The lamp 
 wastes oil. What a pretext for economy ! Its 
 flame is turned down. Of course you cannot see 
 as plain till the chairs come closer together. 
 Hark ! The faithful old clock, with its hands 
 over its face so as not to see, says ''Hake-care^'' 
 but the hands will wander — the lips will meet — 
 the eyes will go down into each other's mystic 
 depths, lit by the purest of diamonds; and you 
 wish that time did not fly so fast ! The wood- 
 box is empty ! The solid glass has drank down 
 the oil most wonderfully — the wick looks as if 
 drenched in poverty — the murky morn peeps in 
 through the crevices — you wonder where the 
 hours have fled. Listen ! The old clock says 
 louder than ever, " tcike-care^'^ " take-care^'' but 
 again do you sip nectar from the ruby oval cup — 
 your hands and eyes speak what the lips have not 
 time to^ and out on the old ocean of time floats 
 Sunday night ! 
 
Ml^M^^& 
 
 B'^^'Mmm 
 
 [M^msi 
 
 mm^M 
 
 ^^^m 
 
 CHAPTEE XXI. 
 
 In which we Travel on Dangerous Ground. 
 
 [ALTER, my boy, take hold of my 
 arm, and let us walk slowly, and 
 speak very carefully, for fear that 
 passers-by may hear. 
 " They will hear no good of themselves ! " 
 Well, my boy, some of them would not, and 
 some w^ould. We will have to walk slowly, as 
 the people are too slovenly to clear the snow 
 from the walks in front of their houses, and it 
 is dangerous to travel, except in the " horse- 
 walk." 
 
 You are now, Yalter, my boy, almost old 
 
We Travel on Da7igerou8 Ground. 151 
 
 enough to marry. The nights are long, and it is 
 pleasant to sit beside one yon love, and to gaze 
 into her soul-warming eyes — ^looking at the pic- 
 ture-gallery of the future. To love a girl, my 
 boy, is a good thing, and God speed you in all 
 such enterprises of the heart. But, my boy, look 
 out. There is a " Jack for every Jill"— be sure 
 you have the right heart, or better you had never 
 known love. It is so easy to be miserable. Be 
 careful, my boy, where your heart leads you to. 
 You never can force a heart to love — ^love once 
 lost never returns. Prayers, tears, entreaties, 
 kindness, never will bring back the holy pleasure 
 you once knew, if the current has changed. 
 
 If you are looking for a wife, Yalter, my boy, 
 you want a woman. You want to find one who 
 will be a friend. One whose tears will mingle 
 with your own — who will smile when you smile 
 
 who will love you, oh ! so dearly. There are 
 
 plenty of pretty flowers which give no odor. 
 They will never pay for making into a bouquet. 
 
152 We Tra/vel on Dangerous Ground. 
 
 There are humble little plants, growing low 
 under hedges and beside little cottage-walls, 
 which will yield a rich and lasting fragrance. 
 These are the flowers to cull, and these repay the 
 trouble of love culture. It is easy to let your 
 heart run out — hard to reel it in. Be careful 
 where it runs to. 
 
 If you go to see a girl, go with good inten- 
 tions or stay away. And go to hone but the 
 good ones. Avoid coquettes — they are heartless 
 and cold. There is a little girl in the house 
 we have just passed. Monday night a fellow 
 visits her. He sits on the sofa and talks non- 
 sense till midnight — takes a kiss at the door and 
 leaves. Tuesday night another chap calls — the 
 parlor is again in use till the "wee sma' hour 
 ayont the twal," and side by side they sit — 
 his hand playing with the corner of her apron- 
 string — his toe just touching the little slipper 
 so prettily peeping out from her dress — his 
 words those leading to love. At last he leaves, 
 
We Travel on Dcmgeroiis Grownd. 153 
 
 and his tobacco-stained lips have left their foul 
 imprint on her cheek. Wednesday night an- 
 other fellow calls. These are all nice young 
 men of course — ^they visit the girl to make love 
 to her. He sits beside her — his head half ly- 
 ing on her shoulders — ^his hand playing with 
 the ring on her finger — at tunes playfully bit- 
 ing the stray curls which fall so gloriously over 
 her pretty neck. Late in the night he leaves, 
 and promises to call again. Thursday night 
 another lover calls. The parlor is lighted up — 
 the sofa is in use — ^her head rests on his shoul- 
 der — his arm is around her waist just as it is 
 in these girl-ruining waltzes, where each liber- 
 tine is allowed by polite society to hug every 
 man's wife till the blood is frenzied. They 
 talk low and forget what they say. He plays 
 witli the bows of her neck-tie — bites her finger 
 nails in sport — tells her he is in love, and at 
 past midnight the filthy fumes of gin can be 
 tasted from her lips. Friday night another fel- 
 
154 We Travel an Dangerous Ground. 
 
 low goes to make love. He sits on the sofa — 
 leaving room enough at the other end for a 
 boy's coffin — ^he takes both her hands in his 
 own — ^he holds her head close to his heart — ^he 
 kisses over and over again the lips which should 
 be sacred to some one — he clasps her about the 
 waist and tells her he loves — ^he kisses her over 
 and over again, and leaves for home to be sa- 
 luted on his way by every chanticleer in the 
 neighborhood. 
 
 IS'ow, Yalter, my boy, it is your turn Saturday 
 night. That was the arrangement — go and 
 teach your heart to love, enter the arena and 
 bear off the prize. 
 
 " No, sir — I have got through ! " 
 
 Right, Yalter, my boy. Such a girl is not the 
 girl to make a good wife of. It is time lost to 
 win what you will wear with regret. The girl 
 who really loves — whose heart is that of a true 
 woman, wants no crowd of lovers. If she loves 
 but one, she is wronging hereelf to tempt the 
 
We Travel on Dangerous Ground. 155 
 
 others — ^if she loves all, she can love none truly. 
 If you wish to be happy, Yalter, my boy, keep 
 clear of such decoys. She may love, but it is 
 not of that kind which will last over the rough 
 road to the grave ; and in after years the prize 
 you have won from so many competitors will not 
 be as dear to you as when urged on by pride 
 and ambition to win beauty and not good- 
 ness. 
 
 Let us tell you, my boy, who to win if you 
 look for heaven on earth. Find some one whose 
 tastes are like your own. The hearts of those 
 who love will never be false — you will not have 
 to woo to win. If you have found such a one, 
 my boy, guard her with love — if not, wait till the 
 throbbing heart and the eye answering eye, even 
 the first time you meet, tells the story. Find one 
 who loves you. Find one you can love, if all the 
 world despise — ^find one your heart tells you is 
 worthy, whom you will love — not because others 
 do, but because she is the one you have always 
 
156 We Travel on Dangerous Grovmd. 
 
 looked for — find the ideal of your dreams and 
 childish fancies, and be happy. 
 
 Yalter, my boy, there are such girls. These 
 are those who will wait for one — ^who will live 
 for one — who would die for one they love. 
 They are not in the market for every one to 
 inspect. They want no variety of love — ^they ask 
 but for the heart that is true — the mind that is 
 pm-e. When you have found such a girl, you 
 have found a prize. Then, my boy, you will be 
 happy. Ko matter if poverty is yours — love will 
 share it. If sickness rests with you, love will 
 lessen pain. Then, my boy, you can visit that 
 girl, and talk over the future — can wa^t till the 
 happy day that shall before the world make you 
 her own protector, and give you a purpose to 
 live for. You can go at night when the labors 
 of the day are over, and how glad will be your 
 coming ! On the sofa — the lounge, or even on 
 the uncarpeted floor, you can sit for hours, and, 
 with no passion but holy love, talk over the 
 
We Travel on Dangerous Ground. 157 
 
 future, and bless the day you first met. Distant 
 may be the time when circumstances will en- 
 able you to take her to your own home — but 
 it will come. Then, my boy, you can sit by her 
 side, and the gently pressing hand — the softly 
 beaming eye — the deep look which speaks vol- 
 umes untold — the silent and pure kiss will nerve 
 you on to a nobler life — to greater exertion — to 
 purer aims. You will have no fear that others 
 will drink of the nectar you in bashfulness did 
 but sip — no fear that the secret wishes of your 
 heart, known only to her and God will ever be 
 made known — no fear that another will break 
 from the bush the rose you have so long watched 
 and cared for. 
 
 Such a girl — one who wants but a single lover 
 — but one to be the occupant of her inner heart, 
 is worth a heaven. Win her, and love her. If 
 you are poor and she will marry you, do it not, 
 until able to support her, as sickness may rob 
 your cupboard, but waiting can never break your 
 
158 We Tra/vel on Dangerous Groimd. 
 
 love. If joung, and she will wait, my boy, you 
 have a prize greater than the Kohinoor. If in 
 trouble and she still clings to you — weeps with 
 you — sympathizes with you — ^kisses the tears from 
 your eyes, and on bended knees you can together 
 — ^heart pressing to heart — both hearts reaching 
 up to God in prayer for His grace and blessings — 
 look the future fearlessly in the face and swear 
 to wait till the clouds lift ; then, Yalter, my boy, 
 you have found an angel who will make your 
 heart a paradise, and your life ever happy. 
 Hearts are often matched, my boy — sometimes 
 mated. And the car which carries all sorts of 
 freight, is not a good car for pleasure parties. 
 
CHAPTEK XXII. 
 
 About Twigs and their Early BENoma. 
 
 |ALTEK, my boy, it's a funny thing 
 — about the twig, we mean. 
 " I don't twig it ! " 
 Well, my boy — it is this : " Just 
 as the twig is bent, the tree is inclined." !N"o 
 matter whether it be a wooden twig, or a meat 
 one ; a sprig of shillalah or a sprig of humanity. 
 As you plant the corn, so will it grow, and it be- 
 hooves people to plant straight. Now can you 
 tell us, Yalter, my boy, how a father — a fond and 
 dear father, can expect his children to be amiable 
 in their dispositions, when he is as cross as the 
 
160 Twigs cmd their Ea/riy Bending, 
 
 gable end of a saw-horse whenever the house is 
 graced with his presence ? If the father swears, 
 can he expect his son to refrain from the use of 
 profanity ? If he is cross and peevish, finding 
 fault with everything and everybody, how can 
 he reasonably expect the twiglets of his family 
 to do differently ? Leaning against the shrub will 
 warp the tree, my boy. If the father keeps late 
 hours, and frequents places like Caesar's wife — 
 beyond suspicion — ^how can he blame the son for 
 following in the footsteps of his illustrious prede- 
 cessor ? If the father cannot control his temper, 
 is it right, my boy, to whip the child for learn- 
 ing his daily lesson but too well ? Little twigs 
 see things very close. While the large tree is 
 looking ahead over its neighbors ; over stumps, 
 rocks, creeks, valleys, and houses, the twig is 
 looking close along the ground, twisting and 
 bending about by every breeze, and prying into 
 the little crooks, angles, and crevices, and under 
 the leaves, stones, and bunches of flowers — ob- 
 
" Whatever the parent does is right in the eyes of the 
 child. Yet folks Avonder why their children show certain 
 traits of character as years settle upon them:'— Page 101. 
 
Twigs cmd their Ea/rly Bendvag. 161 
 
 serving a thousand things its loftier parent never 
 thinks of observing. If the father is a sloven, 
 how can the child be anything else, until new 
 ideas are born within him? If the father, on 
 entering the house, throws his hat, coat, muffler, 
 boots, and bundle in different directions, careless 
 of the labor he makes for others, how can the 
 child be chided for doing the same % 
 
 If the father is a church member, and, as is 
 too often the case, succeeds in overreaching his 
 neighbor, and boasts of it at the table — and the 
 tea-table is a funny place, my boy — how can he 
 expect his child to learn honesty, or to respect 
 professors of religion? Whatever the parent 
 does is right in the eyes of the child — yet, folks 
 wonder why their children show certain traits 
 of character, as years rapidly settle upon them. 
 The mother expects her daughter to be a lady 
 some day, but forgets to set an example. At the 
 table, or by the fireside, she indulges in uncalled- 
 for remarks about her neighbors, or throws out in 
 
162 Twigs and their Ea/rly Bending. 
 
 sinuatioDS against the character of those as good as 
 herself, and then expects her child to be a lady I 
 If the mother be untidy in her dress — allows dust 
 and dirt to accumulate on stands and behind 
 doors, how can she blame the daughter for fall- 
 ing into the same habit? If she washes the 
 dishes in cold or lukewarm watei*, without soap, 
 wipes them with a slowsy rag, and sets them 
 away so greasy that you can draw Solomon's tem- 
 ple or write the epitaph of a baby in the grease 
 on them with a fork tine, how in the name of 
 faith can she expect her daughter to be neat? 
 All these little things tell. These little twigs 
 are great institutions, my boy, and the wind 
 which sways the tree will affect the bush. Such 
 is the law of nature, my boy. Yet folks never 
 see it as they should. If the mother is a discreet 
 and sensible woman, the daughters will be the 
 same. If not, don't take chances on them, my 
 boy. If the father is a gentleman, the son will 
 be very apt to be much the same sort of a person, 
 
Twigs and their Early Bending. 163 
 
 and take pride in honoring the author of his 
 being." 
 
 There are a thousand little things, my boy, 
 which will make the boy into a loafer or a 
 man. There are a thousand little acts at home, 
 the influence of which will never die. As the 
 shadow reflects the image of the subject, either 
 lesser or greater, so will children reflect the 
 education of home ; and the lessons taught by 
 the fireside, or when kneeling by the side of a 
 loved mother, last till we are no more. If a 
 child is governed by kind words, so will its 
 life give evidence. If home is made pleasant, 
 the boy will have its sacred protection. If 
 everything around the family circle is built 
 loose and cross-grained, nothing but the power 
 of God, or great ambition, will spring the boy 
 back into the upright man. ISTo one is fit to 
 govern himself till he has been governed — no 
 one can govern others till he can govern him- 
 self. And, my boy, it is the short lessons which 
 
164 Twigs and their Early Bending. 
 
 we remember the longest. The home influ- 
 ences are seldom forgotten, and the lessons for 
 good or evil which you and us received in years 
 agone, when our minds were more susceptible 
 than now, will make or damn us, my boy. 
 Parents cannot be too careful of the little ones 
 given them. Their home lessons cannot be too 
 good. 
 
 If the parent thinks its own child perfect, 
 how much more must the child think of its 
 pai-ent, and how perfect in its eyes must be all 
 that parent does — how cherished the teachings, 
 how indelible the picture the eyes of youth 
 looked upon as correct! Yes, Yalter, my boy, 
 the twig is easily bent — but to straighten it is 
 quite another and more difficult matter ; and as 
 some of our readers are so easy to take hints, we 
 will leave the subject with them. 
 
 Now, Yalter, my boy, you and us are both 
 friends of the boys. They are to make our 
 future men. Those boys we see in the street? 
 
Twigs cmd their Early Bending. 165 
 
 late nights, running wild like pigs, will in 
 time be a part of society. If they have early 
 taught them habits of sobriety, of care, of self- 
 denial, of respect to others, they will make good 
 men, and honor the names of their parents. If 
 they are allowed to run loose until their habits 
 are set, no power except pride can save them. 
 And by-and-by the fathers of these boys will see 
 them either men taking an active, honorable, and 
 influential part in life, or they will see them 
 loafei-s, fit for nothing but to hold a chair down 
 in some saloon. And, Yalter, my boy, when 
 death comes for his own, and the gray-haired 
 man is laid down with his fathers, if his son who 
 is to bear his name henceforth comes to his bed- 
 side, erect in the vigor of manhood, upright in 
 character as in form, honest in heart, how easy 
 will be the dying hours of that father, for he will 
 know that the helpless ones left behind will 
 not suffer. But if the son is called from some 
 saloon, and comes in with unsteady gait, red. 
 
166 Twigs and their Eai'ly Bending, 
 
 watery eyes, thick tongue, and maudlin voice, 
 the picture will live with the aged man be- 
 yond the confines of the present, forever. 
 
 We like boys — the jovial, prompt-speaking, 
 bright-eyed, willing, gentlemanly boy, who is 
 early learning the true way to manhood. We 
 love boys who mind their own business, who seek 
 the society of good boys instead of bad ones, for 
 such make our great and good men. We love 
 the boy who is full of fun, but respects the feel- 
 ings of others, for he is already a gentleman. 
 But the boy who cares not how dirty his clothes, 
 or soiled his face ; who calls his father the " old 
 man^'' and the mother, on whose breast when an 
 infant he found rest and peace, the " old woman'*'* 
 — who openly in the street tells his father he is 
 a liar, and refuses to obey, is ticketed for a dis- 
 honored grave and dishonored memory. Parents, 
 look to these matters ! 
 
 To make men of boys, Yalter, my boy, it is 
 necessary they should be trained — not with a 
 
Twigs omd their Early Bendmg. 161 
 
 club, but by kind words, good examples, and 
 little switches. If parents stay at home, keep 
 good-natured, and make home pleasant, boys will 
 love to gather round the fireside. Let them get 
 papers and books and teach their children to 
 read— let them have games in the parlor, and be 
 welcomed with smiles. Make home attractive, 
 and boys will stay there — make it a sort of 
 quarrelling school, ornamented with unkind 
 words, and boys wiU soon go to the devil by a 
 more genial route. 
 

 um 
 
 CHAPTEE XXIII. 
 
 In which a Hard Word is Used. 
 
 |T seems very easy, but you and us 
 know better. There are a million 
 of people biding God's time, who 
 have been ruined by not being 
 able to speak it. There goes a hard-working 
 man. A wife and three children are dependent 
 upon his labor for bread. When he is sober he 
 is as nice a man as there is in the world, but at 
 times some careless chap who means well but is 
 forgetful, asks him to stop labor and go on a 
 spree. And then, Yalter, that little word of two 
 letters is so hard to pronounce, he cannot say it, 
 and — the rest is too sad to tell. 
 
A Hard Word Used, 169 
 
 And, Yalter, my boy, here comes a man who 
 once was rich. He had friends; and money; 
 and a loving family; and position; and influ- 
 ence; and self-respect; and integrity; and a 
 future of usefulness before him. But, my boy, 
 he don't look like it now. He was elected to an 
 important office. He forgot the lessons his good 
 mother taught him, and was asked by designing 
 politicians to sell his vote to a party of swindlers ; 
 he could not for the life of him give articulation 
 to that little word, and so he fell. 
 
 And here, Yalter, is a young man. Just like 
 you and us, my boy. He has wit, sense, educa- 
 tion, intelligence, friends, ambition, and is loved. 
 He has a knowledge of the world, acquired by 
 mixing with its people, and seeing with his own 
 eyes its shades and sunbeams. He has ambition 
 — and the same field in which to win honor, fame, 
 and distinction as had Franklin, Fulton, Morse, 
 and a host of others who have lived honorable 
 
 lives and now occupy honoi'ed graves. He is 
 
 8 
 
ITO A Hard Word Used. 
 
 naturally smart, but, Yalterj my boy, as lie meets 
 us, do you see the excess of moisture in his eye — 
 the little puffy ridge under it — the gradual turn- 
 ing of the beautiful corners of the mouth his 
 mother so loved to kiss — the nervous, convulsive 
 twitching of the hands ? These, my boy, tell a 
 sad tale — of early shipwi'eck — of disease — of pre- 
 mature death — of neglected and squandered gifts. 
 He became what he is, because he could not 
 think of that little word, till too late ; and unless 
 he thinks of it soon, it will be useless for him 
 ever to try to do so. 
 
 And, Yalter, my boy, here comes another man, 
 whose nature is good — whose disposition is kind 
 — whose wife loves him, but alas, Yalter, he is 
 not the man she married. Before the wed- 
 ding, he was all attention — now he is so very 
 clever, that no matter who asks him to go to 
 some place of resort, even to the neglect of 
 one whose smiles are worth more to his heart 
 than is all else — whose happiness adds but to 
 
A Ea/rd Word Used. 171 
 
 his own — ^he leaves his familj circle till mid- 
 night or later, and the heart that once knew 
 and loved him so well, is growing cold to him 
 forever. He is a good fellow — clever — tells a 
 capital story — ^makes a funny face, but, Yalter, 
 my boy, he can't say that little word, even for 
 his own benefit. 
 
 And, my boy, how much better if teachers 
 would educate children of tender and riper 
 years to say "no" at times. ISTot in a short, 
 cold-iron — ^pipe-stem — bombshell style, but in a 
 nimble, meaning way. If women, when sitting 
 together and gossiping over the short comings or 
 long goings of their neighbors not in earshot — 
 would refrain from lying to and about each 
 other — ^from trying to injure the characters of 
 others as good as themselves — would in their 
 hearts say, " :No, I'll not do this thing," the world 
 would be better ofi*. And, Yalter, when tempted 
 to give the sharp word — the cross look — the 
 sulky toss of the head — the imkind remark — the 
 
172 A Hard Word Used. 
 
 word that wounds — ^the glance that brings sorrow 
 to those we love — how much better if we could 
 mentally, if no other way, say " no." I^ever say 
 it, my boy, when prompted to do a good deed — 
 when called upon to relieve the distressed — 
 when asked to extend aid to those who are 
 worthy — when prompted by your better nature 
 to be kind ; but when asked to take chances in 
 the lottery of life which for reward only brings 
 tears, sorrow, remorse, pain, guilt, and unhappi- 
 ness, then with thoughts on the better angel 
 who guards the door of your heart, no matter 
 how great the effort, plainly and determinedly 
 say " NO." It is a hard word, Yalter, my boy, 
 but it is one worth studying. 
 
CHAPTEE XXIY. 
 
 Musings at the End of the Week. 
 
 |:^OTHEE drop in Time's bucket ! 
 Another wave rolling in toward 
 the shore of Eternity! Another 
 chapter in the book of life ! An- 
 other echo down the valley of Events ! Saturday 
 night! Look back over the leaves of the seven- 
 volume book, closed never more to be opened 
 this side the Great Unknown. Do you ever 
 think, gentle reader, that each Saturday night 
 closes the book for or against you ? The week is 
 God's Journal. The year is His Ledger. Death 
 is His balance sheet, Debtor and Creditor ! The 
 
174 Musings at the End of the Week. 
 
 week just laid in the "lap of ages" will unseal 
 itself for your joy or your sorrow, as you alone 
 have itemized the accounts. None of us have 
 been perfect. Few of us dave done as we would 
 that others would do by us. It is too late to 
 recall the past, but not too late to pattern the 
 fiiture. Against some one, your hate has been 
 strengthened. Your hate ! Yain and deceptive 
 word. How the grave mocks at your enmity 
 against the soul it shelters. Of what use is it to 
 hate each other ? Surely life is not made pleas- 
 anter thereby. We are all but creatures. Mere 
 leaves, borne to the earth by the breezes of time. 
 Some fall sooner than others — but all of us fall. 
 Leaf and thistle-do^vn go by as merrily ! They 
 could not do otherwise. And what more is man ? 
 Saturday night ! How many a kiss has been 
 given — ^how many a curse — how many a caress — ■ 
 how many a look of hate — how many a kind word 
 — how many a promise has been broken — how 
 many a heart has been wrecked — how many a soul 
 
Musings at the End of the Week. 175 
 
 lost — ^how many a loved one lowered to the narrow 
 chamber — ^how many a babe has gone from earth 
 to heaven — how many a little crib or cradle stands 
 silent now which last Saturday night held rarest 
 of all the treasures of the heart ! A week is a life. 
 A week is a history. A week marks events of 
 sorrow or of gladness, which people never heed. 
 
 Go home to your family, man of business. 
 Go home to your heart, erring wanderer. Go 
 home to the cheer which awaits you, wronged 
 waif on life's breakers. Go home to those you 
 love, man of toil, and give one night to the joys 
 and comforts fast flying by. Leave your books 
 with complex figures — your dirty shop — your 
 busy store. Rest with those you love ; for God 
 alone knows what next Saturday night will bring 
 to you. Forget the world of care and the battles 
 with life which have furrowed the week. Draw 
 close about the family hearth. Gaze into the eyes 
 of the heart-treasures God has given you. Be 
 happy. Forgive those who have wronged you. 
 
176 Musings at the End of the Week, 
 
 Shut from the heart, if but for one hour only, the 
 corroding cares of life. The week to come will 
 bring changes. The week just past has done so. 
 How many a grave stands between this and last 
 Saturday night ! How many a heart is bitter 
 to-night, which a week since was flushed and 
 joyous ? He is dead ! She is dead ! He is lost ! 
 She is lost! l^ew loves hav^e come — old ones 
 are gone. Hearts once Fad are now joyous. 
 Hearts once joyous are now steeped in bitterness. 
 Saturday night ! Go home to those you watch 
 over. Leave the wine-cup — the poisoned glass 
 — the carousing table — the room of revelry — 
 the glances of tempters — the habitation of vice 
 and profligacy, and for once, rest by your own 
 friends, and gladden the hearts of those who, to 
 your shame be it said, have for so many Satur- 
 day nights awaited your coming in sadness, in 
 tears and silence. Go home to those you love ; 
 and as you bask in the loved presences, and 
 meet to return the loved embraces of your 
 
Musings at the End of the Week. 177 
 
 heart's pets, strive to be a better man and to 
 bless God for giving His weary cbildren so dear 
 a stepping-stone in the river to the Eternal, as 
 Satuedat night. 
 
 8* 
 
CHAPTEK XXY. 
 
 In which Post-Mortem Processions are 
 Spoken op. 
 
 |STEI]N"G of carriages, Yalter, my boy, 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 In your eye, Yalter, too often. 
 Boil it down — thrash it out — win- 
 now it over — bag it up, deduct the commission, 
 and the grand object of life is the post-mortenn 
 picture of a string of carriages. How it worries 
 all of us ! Whenever a good man, a bad man, or 
 an indifferent man goes hence in a box, we look 
 to the procession following him home — or to the 
 threshold, and feel a touch of regret lest our pro- 
 cession will be a link or two shorter. This is a 
 queer world, my boy. People care not for the 
 
Post-Mortem Processions. 179 
 
 living, while the dead are like incubated egg- 
 shells. The rifle-ball speeds on its way, and if 
 death follows its flight, the marksman watching 
 its passage laughs in glee. If a man makes his 
 mark only in the grave, society smiles a sweet 
 little smile, and is happy. 
 
 In Hindostan people are honest. The proof 
 is in the fact that hired mourners follow men to 
 the grave. Tears are worth their five tekels each. 
 A bunch of hair, the size of a small trellett of as- 
 paragus, pulled fresh from the head of the profes- 
 sional brine-spiller, costs ten rupees. That is the 
 country, my boy. That is the Edenic Garden of 
 honesty, where funeralic elongations of the face 
 are over with as soon as the initial clod bounces 
 down with its hollow thump on the flat roof of 
 the quiet tenant. This is a queer world, my boy. 
 Men attend funerals as a matter of compliment. 
 Not that the dead man will repay the little 
 courtesy, but with the hope that such politeness 
 will impress others with the style. 
 
180 Post-Mortem Processions. 
 
 This is a quiet lane, Yalter. Life is a lane, 
 but not as quiet. While that funeral procession 
 passed, you and us stood with uncovered heads. 
 In France — wicked France, as they tell us — even 
 the peasants pay this mark of respect to those 
 who have only caught the notes of angelic choirs 
 before them. Here, people do no such thin 
 foolishness. It was a long procession, ray boy. 
 Longer than will wind along after you or us. 
 Did you mark the look of those who followed ? 
 Noted you the manner in which the man with 
 the bay horse toyed his whalebone among the 
 weeds by the roadside, as if driving in from the 
 races ? And the two men in the next carriage — 
 how they eyed the widow! The woman mar- 
 ried for money, my boy. She got what she 
 wanted. The poor fellow riding on his back, 
 married for beauty. Oil and water. He died. 
 She is free. Business, Yalter — business is the 
 word. 
 
 And the next carriage is a political debat- 
 
Post-Mortem Processimis. 181 
 
 mg school. The occupants speak low— the de- 
 ceased had held an office— the grave will soon 
 hold him— worms will open his heart into little 
 worm-parlors— his veins will be canals— his once 
 teeming brain will be a city of corruption- 
 like all cities— the reptiles will feast on the of- 
 fice he left for greedy, sordid ghouls to feed 
 and fatten upon. When a man is measured up, 
 my boy, he doesn't amount to as much as a bale 
 of rags. But his body— his brain, is the work- 
 shop from whence cometh beautiful machinery 
 which will run for years after the shop is re- 
 moved—or it is a mass of slag, boiled out by fire 
 from the ore of humanity, tramwayed through 
 life by the hand of fate. Side by side, lovers 
 whispering joy — eye telling eye volumes too 
 condensed for words. They are not mourning. 
 The children of him who has hoed his row and 
 left the weeds for his widow, mourn— to think 
 the property to be divided is not larger. Political 
 enemies ride in the procession, glad to think one 
 
182 Post-Mortem Processions. 
 
 object hateful to them is removed. Everybody 
 goes to a funeral — except those who truly mourn. 
 Mourning machinery would pay . 
 
 Yalter, we have seen at home — after the pro- 
 cession had turned the corner, more anguish 
 than all the mourners felt — we have known 
 hearts that could not, for fear of what the world 
 would say, go down into the watei*s of bitterness 
 never to rise again. Secret and mysterious. 
 Hid behind hedges — springing forth unseen by 
 all save God, on the banks of the quiet stream, 
 have bloomed flowers the world never knew of 
 — but they bloomed, and died — and lived agai/n. 
 Deep in the aisles of nature — nestling under the 
 mighty pines — trembling at the roar of the grand 
 old forest — unseen and uncared for by the 
 world, flowers have blossomed — have died when 
 the storm was born and the tree which sheltered 
 them so long, bowed in submission to His 
 breath. Many a ball passes beyond the target 
 and wounds deeper than time can heal — ^yet 
 
Po8t-Mortem Pr^ocessions. 183 
 
 people but look at the mark. There is moum- 
 ing, my boy, where we look for indifference — 
 there is indifference where we look for tears. 
 
 Life is a curiosity shop — a pawnbroker's office 
 — a medley of truth and falsehood. Men whistle 
 on the streets — but they can never tell what tune ! 
 Others look at their watches, but in a minute 
 after, in answer to the inquiry of a friend, can- 
 not tell the time of day. Men write foolish let- 
 ters, which, like Banquo's ghost, trouble them 
 ever after. Some make promises whose children 
 are regrets. They make friends whose teeth are 
 outside their lips — who bite oftener than they 
 kiss. Men are queer folks, Yalter. 
 
 You and us, my boy, have much to learn. 
 Death but takes the ticket we have spent our 
 lives in making change for; and the show we 
 attend beyond the vestibule will be in the pit or 
 gallery, as we choose now. We live for nothing 
 but appearances — anxious only to make the line 
 of carriages appear as long as possible, but 
 
184 Post-Mortem Processions. 
 
 seldom know how to do it. Death comes to you 
 and ns — we are by the grave-yard " gobbled up " 
 — ^the air which surrounds us gently comes to- 
 gether — ^no one cares for us then, except a few ; 
 yet, Yalter, we spend our lives trying to please 
 the multitude who know not our hearts nor will 
 honor our memory. What a bubble we live on, 
 my boy ! 
 

 CHAPTER XXYI. 
 
 Pictures. — ^Picture First. 
 
 HE clock over the bar points to half- 
 past eleven — within thirty minutes 
 of midnight. Being in a city, the 
 clock points yet to an early hour, 
 but out by the little forty-by-eighty feet farms — 
 out from the places of idle resort, that clock 
 would point to a very late hour. Since tea-time, 
 at a table four men have been sitting. Four 
 mugs of ale — four gin cocktails — four cigars — 
 four rum-punches — four brandy-smashes — four 
 cigars — four mint-juleps — four whiskey-skins — 
 four brandy-straights have been brought to that 
 
186 Pictures. 
 
 table since the sun bade us " good-night ! " Full 
 glasses to the table — empty ones back! The 
 room has grown smoky — thick and foul. The 
 hard chairs have become tired! The lamp be- 
 gins to blush at the coarse stories told, in which 
 the holy name of woman has been so often and 
 profanely mixed. The brains grow dull — a 
 weary morning approaches ! 
 
 " Cut ! " 
 
 " Let me shuffle first ! " 
 
 " Spades trump ! " 
 
 "Pass!" 
 
 " Pass ! " 
 
 " By ! " 
 
 " I'll take it up — ^bar-tender, another cocktail 
 —stiff! " 
 
 " "Well, boys, another rub on you ! It's only 
 twelve — let's have another rip ! " 
 
 " Well, cut the papes I Clubs trump I " 
 
 " Assist I " 
 
Piotv/res. 18T 
 
 " Play her alone — let her scoot ! " 
 
 "Well, you made it — another brandy with 
 sugar ! " 
 
 " Kub apiece again ! Let's saw for the ci- 
 gars!" 
 
 "Stuck again — just my luck. Bar-tender, 
 what's the pop ? " 
 
 "Five rubs on you — ^five fortys — two dollai's. 
 Ten shillings on you ! Dollar and twenty on 
 you — ^two dollars on you — all right — take a cigar, 
 gents, and call again ! " 
 
 Picture Second. 
 
 " Eight o'clock, and he is not here yet ! How 
 dreary this little room does seem, and I am so 
 lonesome ! Ten o'clock ! How I wish he would 
 come. It's so lonely here with the children 
 asleep ! Once, he loved to stay with me, but 
 now, alas ! Twelve o'clock, and I am so tired. 
 I cannot sleep ! My heart aches and grows sad 
 — I'm growing old, perhaps — ^maybe my face is 
 
188 Pictures. 
 
 not as fair as once, but my heart is as warm, 
 though it is often sad. 
 
 " One o'clock ! "What charms can he find in 
 that foul-scented room — by that dirty table, cut- 
 ting and dealing those greasy cards — ^filling him- 
 self with poison — tainting his breath — ^ruining 
 his mind — undermining his constitution — plant- 
 ing seeds of disease — squandering his money — 
 clouded with smoke — tired with excitement ! Is 
 this happiness — is this life — is this our mission ? 
 Is this the realization of childhood's dreams? 
 Oh ! I am so tired of life — so weary of waiting 
 and watching, that were it not for my babes I 
 would go unbidden into the holy presence of 
 my God ! Morn comes, but not he." 
 
 "Has papa come?" 
 
 "No, my little pet — ^pa has not come — ^lie 
 still!" 
 
 " If hot tears could add beauty to my face, 
 none would be so handsome as I ! But why will 
 he not come ? Mv eyes grow dim, my heart is 
 
Pictures. 189 
 
 in my throat — ah ! I hear his footfall — weak and 
 unsteady ! " 
 
 PICTURE THIRD. 
 
 "Do you go down town to-night, my 
 pet?" 
 
 "No, darling. I have labored enough to- 
 day. Why should I flee from home — from hap- 
 piness, from thee ? Life is full short to love — 
 too short to squander. I love the photograph 
 of my heart too well. No, darling — my heart 
 is here — here let me keep it company." 
 
 It is a pleasant room, but not a large one. 
 Night has gently closed the windows of day, and 
 set the golden seals as watchers over us. By an 
 open window they sit, his head recHning on her 
 breast; their hands linked together; their lips 
 often wedded to each other, their souls going out 
 together in the dim twilight, far into God's own 
 future of love, and their lives so sweetly and 
 calmly blending into the one that brings a happy 
 
190 Pictures. 
 
 reuniting in the beautiful spirit-world. Softly 
 and lowly they talk over the past, and of the 
 future — thanking God that they are man and 
 wife — happy — hajppy — happy. How her arms 
 encircle his neck — ^how his arm clasps her heart 
 to his own ! With what holy love, for it is God's 
 love, do they rest palm in palm — read their hearts 
 by magic touch — study in beaming eyes the 
 book of love — and from lips warm and red with 
 life, slowly and gently take renewal seals of love 
 and happiness! Many yesterdays have placed 
 themselves as sentries between them and their 
 wedding-day, but love has made no abatement. 
 The day sentries have stepped one by one in, 
 crowding that day back, and them on toward 
 eternity, but love has been with them ever. No 
 need of saloons to make the hours pass pleas- 
 antly, for where the heart is anchored there will 
 be the world whose sun never sets, and at home 
 will be found all the charms man can ask for. 
 The heart never tires of one it loves. Each mo- 
 
Pictures. 1^1 
 
 ment is as the one just past, only more precious. 
 Heaven is within a man's own house if his idol 
 be there, and his heart be true to its vows and 
 manhood. 
 
CHAPTER XXYII. 
 
 We Wonder why Wonders will never Cease ! 
 
 lALTER, mj boy, it is cold this 
 morning. The snow, in fine par- 
 ticles, is sifting down on the just 
 as well as the unjust. Draw your 
 muffler close around your mouth — for a close 
 mouth is a sign of a wise head. 
 
 "And a laughing man indicates an honest 
 one!" 
 
 Well, Yalter, my boy, that is the theory. But 
 hasten on. It is yet early. All around you can 
 see the white smoke going heavenward. It goes 
 up, my boy, just as pretty — it curls as gracefully 
 
Wmiders wiU never Cease! 193 
 
 — ^it floats off into the boundless air — it ascends 
 as high toward the thi'one of God from the hum- 
 ble cabin of the laboring man, as from the tall 
 chimney of the banker. Those columns of smoke 
 are the morning freight-trains, carrying from 
 earth to heaven the good and the evil thoughts 
 of those who now, as we proceed to work, are 
 gathering around their family hearths. And do 
 you know, Yalter, that at times it seems as if 
 we could tell from the smoke of the chimneys, 
 whether the ones who warm by the fire from 
 which it rises are happy or miserable ? 
 
 "How?" 
 
 Well, Yalter, my boy, you notice, as we walk 
 along, that from the little cabins of the Irish and 
 German laborers — from the neat cottage of the 
 honest working-man, the smoke rises more stead- 
 ily — more clearly — more regularly than from 
 other dwellings. So with their lives — their hopes 
 — ^their wishes — their daily walk and conversa- 
 tion. Now look over there. That high, tucked- 
 9 
 
194 Wonders will never Cease! 
 
 up chimney sends forth a whiffling, curly, un 
 steady, puflfy-like cohimn, resembling a cork- 
 screw. It darts hither and yon. Can you see 
 no resemblance there to the lives of those sleep- 
 ing beneath its shadow, while a servant is cook- 
 ing the morning repast ? 
 
 " The higher it is the more it flirts and 
 whiffles ! " 
 
 That's it, Yalter. On the tree of life, the 
 higher you sit, the more unsteady are the 
 branches ! The bird in the topmost bough of 
 the elm under which we are passing, when the 
 wind blows, sits not half so steady as the one 
 farther down. So with the tree of life. The 
 higher one goes, the more he is tempted — the 
 more the world buffets and storms about him ; 
 and. unless his hold be firm — unless his heart 
 know what integrity means, sooner or later he 
 will fall. And, Yalter, my boy, the higher you 
 climb, the more care you should take to hold on ! 
 But, Yalter, let us go in from- the snow and 
 
Wonders will never Cease! 195 
 
 storm. It is too much like the hearts of many 
 we call our friends. 
 
 Ah ! this is nice ! So warm and pleasant 
 Let us sit by the window and see others 
 walk. Do you see that man, and that other 
 man? 
 
 " Yes, but what of them ? " 
 
 They are like other men, 'tis true, but they are 
 not perfect. One is a father. He has three girls, 
 all grown to womanhood. They are good girls 
 — each one of them fit to make any honest, 
 honorable man hapjiy for life. The other man 
 has a wife— a lady she is, too. They claim to be 
 gentlemen— dress like gentlemen, bow to us like 
 gentlemen, and gracefully salute us with the 
 curving arm, as do gentlemen. But, Yalter, my 
 boy, if you should hear them in saloons— in 
 bar-rooms, in little knots, in stores— everywhere ; 
 relating for the amusement of a dirty-minded 
 crowd, stories, anecdotes, experiences, and lies, 
 in which the holy and loved name of woman 
 
196 Wonders will never Cease! 
 
 was so indecently mixed that you would term 
 them, not gentlemen, but loafers. 
 
 How it sounds for gentlemen to get together 
 and relate indecent stories by the hour ! They 
 are suitable persons to talk about women's 
 " talking societies " ! How they must respect 
 women — how they must love the pure and 
 innocent, to laugh until they cry, for hours to- 
 gether, over the coarse jest and low remark 1 
 Yalter, my boy, God made man the strongest, to 
 protect woman. Not alone by his strength, but 
 by his silence. Not alone by force of arms, but 
 the respect he should teach others to have for the 
 sex who make life desirable. We look on our 
 mothers, or on their memory, as sacred. We 
 look on our wives, also, as sacred — on our daugh- 
 ters as pure and innocent. The true gentleman 
 never speaks of woman, Yalter, as other than 
 she should be spoken of ; and those who gather 
 in cozy places to make her the subject of low 
 remark and vulgar wit, make themselves less 
 
Wonders will never Cease! 197 
 
 happy than they would be, did they not by their 
 words and thoughts rob virtue of its sacredness 
 
 and by their conversation tend to make woman 
 
 but a living piece of flesh, instead of the kind 
 and precious creature of love — of goodness — of 
 kind wishes and happy influences. And now, '*^, 
 Yalter, remember, that the true gentleman never 
 speaks lightly of the one who gave him being, 
 nor of her sex. 
 
 !\ 
 
f^4«jsefe5fe^ 
 
 I 
 
 CHAPTEK XXYIII. 
 
 Wherein the Use of Money is Spoken of. 
 
 |ALTER, my boy, you cannot eat it ; 
 it is not drinkable ; clothing cannot 
 be made of it, yet you and us toil 
 and worry year after year. 
 "What for?" 
 
 " What for ? " Money, to be sure. All there 
 is in the world would be a goodly fortune, but 
 my boy, it is not worth its cost. That is, for it- 
 self. Once in a while, ray boy, a man gets 
 enough, as he does of love, or any other passion, 
 but the majority labor and save, and starve, 
 and study deprivations, and go through life as an 
 
The Use of Money is SpoJcen of. 199 
 
 argument penetrates a fanatic, to get something 
 to jingle while the devil is checking his bag- 
 
 Money is a good thing ; but then, my boy, not 
 one in a hundred knows how to use it. There is 
 happiness in it, if we know how to find it. 
 Burying it in farms for poor men to dig out for 
 us is not a good way. Hoarding twenty-five-cent 
 pieces in a dirty stocking is no way to enlarge 
 the heart. Carrying it folded in a belt around 
 you is no sensible way. In God's heaven are 
 many stars, but not more than there are ways to 
 use money well and wisely. 
 
 Be liberal. Be a man — ^not a skinflint. If 
 you have a talent, my boy, let it benefit some one. 
 Give others the benefit of your light. Do not, 
 because you are rich, allow your heart to become 
 coated over with base metal. It takes but a 
 little to support life — it takes but a little more to 
 live well — and but a little more to live in good 
 style. All beyond this had better be put to some 
 
200 The Use of Money is Spoken of. 
 
 good purpose. Don't be covetous, Yalter, my 
 boy. What if some old hunks are rich! Hot 
 metal is, to our mind, a severe bed. Dispense 
 the favors of life as you go. Help others and 
 be happy. 
 
 What sense is there in carrying a big trunk 
 to the depot — and there allowing it to remain ? 
 What evidence of wisdom is it to carry wealth to 
 the grave — and then leave it ? Where the streets 
 are paved vrith gold, what little a man would get 
 in this world, would be swept into the garbage 
 pile. To be sure, you may die rich. That is, 
 the editor who for a dollar and fifty cents writes 
 your obituary in common style — for ^\e dollars 
 makes you a philosopher, and for ten makes you 
 a Croesus, will say you died rich, if a fortune was 
 left for relatives to fight over. The ties of con- 
 sanguinity, Yalter, my boy, are regulated by the 
 size of the oak chest. If the father is rich, you 
 and us call him the old gentleman. If he is poor, 
 we say " the old man." There is just as much 
 
The Use of Money is Spohen of. 201 
 
 difference in things as in persons, and some peo 
 pie know it. 
 
 We are rich, mj boy, in our hearts — not in 
 our breeches pockets. Ooffins have no money- 
 drawers, and if they had, it is too dark to make 
 change down there. We shall be rich in the next 
 world, or we shall be poor. And that is the 
 world we are striving for. The papers say a man 
 died rich. The Book above does not say so. 
 There is nothing to his credit there, and he will 
 have many debts to pay in the hereafter. 
 The papers say he died poor. That means, 
 here below, that when the administrator held 
 his convention, there were causes but no ef- 
 fects. He died poor, and there were no law- 
 suits to hallow his memory. And the world 
 pitied him. And the cows eat the grass and 
 weeds from his grave, for he was poor. And the 
 little hillock over which the lonesome sexton 
 wiped the perspiration from a tired brow, like a 
 
 dissolving view, became a little hollow. Yes, 
 
 9* 
 
202 The Use of Money is Spolcen of. 
 
 Yalter, my boy, he died poor. That is — he was 
 not in debt ! 
 
 But in the other world, he is in good credit. 
 He did not care to deposit in a land where the 
 banks break twice a year, or pay in depreciated 
 currency. And so he sent his fortune ahead — 
 not all at once, as sailors iire a broadside, but a 
 little at a time. He laid up treasure in heaven. 
 Some of it was sent by a poor widow-woman, 
 whose shanty down the road was no better than 
 advice, to comfort her. A poor boy, without 
 means to start in life and become a man before 
 death, took to heaven an instalment for the man 
 who died poor. And the sun reflected some of 
 it right into the windows of heaven from the 
 roof of an orphan asylum. And that poor old 
 man, neglected and deserted by all save strangers, 
 took a little Home with him. And the little 
 which saved a friend from ruin, went there.. 
 Little by little — day after day, it accumulated. 
 On the rising prayer of the lone widow — by the 
 
The Use of Money is Spoken of. 203 
 
 grateful thought of the starving orphan — by the 
 ideas of the scholar, little by little, none the less 
 sure, every dollar others thought was wasted on 
 earth, went to heaven and brought to him a 
 greater interest than ten per cent, a month in 
 advance. 
 
 You and us never know who die poor. ITone 
 can tell the human heart, or where its treasures 
 are. Riches are good, if we use them rightly. 
 An idea will do to circulate — so will money. 
 The circle is growing smaller and smaller, my 
 boy. In a few days, we can stand in the centre 
 and touch its farthest side. Then, Yalter, the 
 heart which is crusted over with gold pieces, as 
 shingles are put on a house, will go down into 
 the horrible darkness feeling so sad, and so lonely, 
 that even " He died rich" will seem like a bitter 
 mockery to us. Do good, my boy. That is the 
 .secret of life. Everything gives freely of its 
 treasure but man, and everything else is happy. 
 Cut the chain of care in twain, and let the sun of 
 
204 The Use of Money is SpoJcen of. 
 
 generosity find your heart. Don't take your 
 j^ money along, but send it ahead — and remember, 
 Yalter, my boy, you will keep it company some 
 day. So be careful where you send it. 
 
CHAPTEE XXIX. 
 
 For Married Men, and their Wives, 
 
 HY do so many persons frequent 
 saloons and other places of resort 
 nights?" 
 
 Well, my boy, there are several 
 reasons. Many frequent such places, but scarcely 
 two from the same motive. The young men go 
 there because they want fun. Married ones go to 
 drown trouble. The old ones go because they 
 have grown into the habit and cannot remain 
 away. 
 
 There are times, my boy, when the heart is 
 very sad — when every leaf of its inner book is 
 
206 Married Men^ cmd tJieir Wwes. 
 
 bitterness. There are men who have wives — 
 who have dwelling-houses — yet who have no 
 homes. Men are not divine. Humanity is the 
 substance from which sorrow's picture is taken. 
 Weary with the labor of the day — tired of the 
 perpetual round of toil and never-ending drudg- 
 ery, many a time the heart of a brave man goes 
 down under the waves of trouble, and there is 
 hardly a glimmer of light in his horizon of days 
 or years. He goes home to meet his wife. He 
 opens the gate and steps within the little enclos- 
 ure which should contain his heart's treasure and 
 the joy of his life. He ascends the steps. He 
 turns the knob or lifts the latch. He is in the 
 once hoped-for Avish of his life. There is no 
 smile of welcome for him, but plenty for othei*s. 
 The marital fortune is made ! The world is cold, 
 ^y t)oy. It is a grave moulded in ice — more 
 inhospitable than though it were in an arctic 
 iceberg. 
 
 Men hunger for love. Men yearn for the kind- 
 
Ma/rried Men^ cmd their Wwes. 207 
 
 ness and aifection which in dreams they have 
 seen, and when they go to the well and no water 
 is there, the heart becomes as lead and the spirit 
 like the black wings of death. 
 
 But few of us, Yalter, are really happy. There 
 is a source of power in every piece of mechanism. 
 There is a cause for joy or for grief in every 
 heart. The world may not know it — it is 
 no business of the world's what it is, but it is 
 there. Men see the smiles their hearts crave, 
 budding only for them, but full blossoming for 
 others, and hell itself is paradise compared with 
 th6 poignancy of sorrow which takes the soul 
 captive. The prize they hoped for is not always 
 there. The kind words they have waited till 
 night for — have walked in weariness for — is not 
 there when wanted. The sun wliich was in 
 thought to have driven the sombre gloom fi'om 
 the soul had no light or warmth for the one who 
 needed it more than all the world beside. 
 
 The world never sympathizes — never feels for 
 
208 Mmried Men^ cmd their Wwes, 
 
 sorrow, but, like tlie prickly vine, sends its points 
 into every heart to wound and torture, then gloat 
 over the pain it has caused. 
 
 It is the lack of home sympathy that drives 
 men to places they would not otherwise frequent, 
 my boy. It is the lack of the relying love they 
 hunger for which makes the world endurable. 
 It is the fact that when all looks dark to them, 
 there is no home — ^no constancy of love — no firm 
 anchor to the heart on which their ship can drag 
 for an horn' till the storm is kissed or soothed 
 away. 
 
 We cannot, every one, be all in all to each 
 other. There is but one God for us, my boy. 
 There is never 1 ut one heart which seems like 
 heaven. There are never but one pair of arms 
 which can shield the sensitive heart from sorrow 
 — there is never but one voice whose low melo- 
 dies can enchant the spirit and rescue the weary 
 soul from the gloomy captor in whose keeping it 
 is for the time. And, my boy, when that hope 
 
Married Men^ and their Wives. 209 
 
 fails — when the last harbor the storm-tossed voy- 
 ager makes for is closed against him, or so 
 crowded with others that there is no room for 
 him, the darkness of midnight is noon — the howl- 
 ings of the hurricane are zephyrs — the angry 
 flashes of God's lightning but love-glances — the 
 goadings of sorrowing despair the white arms of 
 love by comparison. 
 
 "We blame people too much. But few of us 
 pity. Too many censure where they should keep 
 silent if they cannot sympathize. It is not for us 
 to censure — God does that. It is for us, my boy, 
 to love and be true in heart. It is for us to dis- 
 pel all the gloom we can. In the spring-time 
 how carefully is the ground prepared for the seed 
 or plant; and be it fruit or flower, every mo- 
 ment's care and attention given it repays the 
 kind hand and loving eye with its choicest 
 riches in proportion to the love, care, and labor 
 bestowed on it. 
 
 "We cannot love too much if we love well. 
 
210 Married Men^ and their Wives. 
 
 Heaven is love, and surely we cannot take too 
 earnest lessons in the principles thereof. And, 
 my boy, when you see a man away from his 
 home — seeking elsewhere, not for pleasure, but 
 for that in which sorrow can be drowned, deal 
 not with him in thought too harshly. God 
 knows he suffers enough, else the friends would 
 be his earthly paradise and the vexations of the 
 day which by night are harvested in a pile of 
 trouble in his heart would be chased away by the 
 love he needs to strengthen him for the morrow's 
 toil. Men will not be long absent from those 
 they love. It is not in nature. If they are ab- 
 sent from choice, how desolate must be their 
 hearts — ^how tear-calling their thoughts ! 
 
 Men care too little for their wives. Wives 
 care too little for their husbands. The heart 
 that was once won is not kept. The pleasures 
 of the chase have drowned out the enjoyment of 
 the possession — the market once made, the win- 
 dow is emptied of its attractions. 
 
Married Men^ and their Wives. 211 
 
 And so we live on, my boy. The hills of hap- 
 piness vanish into thin air — driven away by our 
 own acts, and the plain over which we daily 
 walk becomes a desert of arid thought — a road 
 filled with dead-falls, for the reason that we are 
 too busy performing for dead-heads in prefer- 
 ence to paying patrons. There are a few in 
 life who have learned the secret in the last sen- 
 tence, and they are happy. Outside attractions 
 dazzle not their eyes or lure their hearts — out- 
 side threats have no terrors, and loved and loving 
 they go on to eternity in happiness. 
 
^HB^K^S^^^^i^^^^^^H^^^^Ni 
 
 >v-^^ 
 
 sp 
 
 CHAPTEK XXX. 
 In which Boys and Apprentices are Spoken of 
 
 AND TO. 
 
 I ALTER, my boy, there is no doubt 
 but that you started in life as many 
 other boys start, with a desire 
 at some future day to be a man. 
 That, my boy, is a good target to shoot at, but 
 somehow or other lots of boys miss by shooting 
 too quick. Much good powder is wasted by such 
 foolishness — much game is flushed and flown by 
 over-eagerness. You have just started out on 
 the road of life. It is a hard one to travel. 
 You and us, my boy, have both passed by several 
 
Apprentices are Spoken of. 213 
 
 annual mile-stones — we have passed by the most 
 — ^have seen the most joy and sadness — ^the most 
 success and failure as yet, my boy. 
 
 You are learning a trade. That is a good 
 thing to have — it is better than gold — ^brings a 
 larger premium. But to bring a premium, the 
 trade must be perfect — no plated-silver affair. 
 When you go to learn a trade, do so with a de- 
 termination to win. Make up your mind what 
 you will be, and be it. Do not whiffle around, 
 but hold your upper lip close down, and labor for 
 the future. Determine in your mind to be a 
 good workman, or let the job out. A botch is 
 not only a disgrace to his profession, but he is a 
 disgrace to himself and a mighty poor advertise- 
 ment for his father. 
 
 Bide your time, 
 Learn to wait. 
 
 Learn to labor — 
 Trust in fate. 
 
214 Apprentices are Spoken of. 
 
 Ever honest — 
 Keep your pluck. 
 
 Ever faithful- 
 Trust in luck. 
 
 It is easy to succeed if you but will it. Have 
 pluck and patience. Look out for the interests 
 of your employer — thus you will learn to look 
 out for your own. Keep an eye out, and do not 
 wait to be told everything. Kemember. That 
 is a big word, my boy, in the dictionary of 
 success. Act as though you wished to learn, 
 and some one — no matter who, will show you 
 how. Learning a trade is different from eating 
 mush and milk. Mechanical education does not 
 slip down without chewing. If you have an 
 errand to do, do not move as if you were training 
 a sloth, but start off like a boy with some life. 
 Acquire the habit of activity, if you have it not. 
 Look about you. See how the best workman in 
 the shop does — copy from him. 
 
 And, Yalter, my boy, learn to do things well. 
 
Apprentices a/re Spoken of. 215 
 
 Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing 
 well. IN'ever slight your work — never. Every 
 job you do* is a sign. Poor signs are useless for 
 good. If you have done a job in ten minutes, try 
 and see if you cannot do the next one in nine. 
 But, my boy, never be in too great haste. Too 
 many boys spoil a lifetime, by not having 
 patience. They work at a trade until they see 
 about one- half of its mysteries, then strike for 
 higher wages. 
 
 We hate a Rat. 
 
 A rat, my boy, is the mechanic who has half 
 leai'ned his trade, and then works at half regular 
 wages. Such folks are poor eggs. We see them 
 every day — men who are to their professions 
 what a wart is on the hand — a three-legged chair 
 at a prayer-meeting — a lame horse in an elope- 
 ment. If you undertake to learn, do it. Learn 
 well, or not at all. Be a workman or a corpse — 
 do not, for your own sake, be a botch, only able 
 to earn half wages, and never able to keep a 
 
216 AjfyprerUices are Spoken of. 
 
 situation longer than it takes a goose to hatch a 
 family. A poor hand among good ones is worse 
 off than the fifth calf. For the sake of a year's 
 time, do not lose the entire future. When learn- 
 ing a trade, my boy, don't move like a rusty 
 watch. Act as if your interest and the interest 
 of your employer were the same. Employers 
 will not willingly lose good employes. Be honest 
 and faithful. There is the secret of success, my 
 boy, and that is the great thing lacking with too 
 many. And, Yalter, my boy, never get above 
 your business, nor take style too thick. 
 
 Never leave the table hungry if there is enough 
 to eat. It spoils the day for labor. Never leave 
 a girl half sparked. Some amateur will com- 
 mence where you left off, and away goes your 
 sweetness on the deserted heir. Never chop a 
 stick of wood half into and then leave it — never 
 draw a bucket of water half-way out of a well 
 and then let it back — never half learn a trade. 
 All such transactions are labor lost, and show 
 
Ajpprentices are Spoken of. 217 
 
 very thin brains. If you play, play for " keeps," 
 
 in such matters. If you are aiming to be 
 
 a man, be one, or quit. If you are learning a 
 
 trade or profession, learn the whole of it. When 
 
 you commence being man, it is time you left 
 
 off being boy, to a certain extent. It looks 
 
 bad to pick the raisins out of pies and leave the 
 
 rest, but that is not so indicative of a platter-head 
 
 as to see one of these half-hatched mechanics or 
 
 professors, not able to do a job of work without 
 
 an instructor. 
 
 Good mechanics are the props of society. 
 
 They are those who stuck to their trades until 
 
 they learned them. Poor ones are living 
 
 nuisances — and they are the rats who quit in 
 
 boyhood from over-smartness. Go slow and sure, 
 
 my boy — ^that is the only safe way. People 
 
 always speak well of a boy who minds his own 
 
 business — who is willing to work, and who seems 
 
 disposed to be somebody in time. This is a 
 
 queer world — many people are watching us, my 
 
 10 
 
218 Ajpjprentices are Spoken of. 
 
 boy, and help often comes when and from where 
 we least expect it. Confidence is the safe in 
 which men often deposit rich treasures, and as 
 you and us, my boy, prove worthy, so will we be 
 rewarded. And, Yalter, since the day God look- 
 ed upon the work of His six days and said He 
 was well pleased, man has had the fullest liberty 
 to exult over his success. God used those words 
 for some purpose, and if He felt a pleasure in 
 saying what He had done, how much it prom- 
 ises for all who build a monument, be it high or 
 low, and from its summit themselves behold the 
 crowd following along in the path they have 
 carved out, or climbing the steps they have care- 
 fully erected ! There is a rich reward in success, 
 which none but those who strive can ever enjoy. 
 
«L«Mi 
 
 ^^^m^^m^-^^ 
 
 ^j^mi^ 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 Wherein my Boy is counselled to Mind his own 
 Business. 
 
 HE great trouble is, my boy, that 
 people pay more attention to the 
 affairs of others than to their own. 
 Man's head is not double-barrelled 
 like a shot-gun. God gave every man a head of 
 his own, and he who attends to his own business 
 has enough to keep him busy forever. People 
 are like wasps. Society is a sugar-barrel with 
 the sweetness taken out. Meddlers go buzzing 
 and bunting their heads againgt the soured sides. 
 There are thousands who know nothing of their 
 own business, but know all about the concerns of 
 
220 Minding one^s own Business. 
 
 their neighbors. We all despise such folks, yet 
 fall into their errors. We say they are fools — 
 and they are, my boy — and yet adopt their 
 peculiarities. Each man has a duty — it is 
 to himself, and through himself he benefits 
 others. 
 
 Tearing another's character to pieces will not 
 help ours. Pointing out the weeds in your yard 
 will not make the weeds in our yard more beau- 
 tiful. Censuring others publicly for faults we 
 are guilty of privately, will make us no better, 
 nor ever elevate society to a higher plane than is 
 now occupied by it. 
 
 There is no perfection on earth, Yalter. The 
 rainbow is but a part. The day is half night. 
 The sun gives the shade. The deeper the water 
 the more beautiful the reflection — but it is not 
 the more perfect. There is no picture without a 
 background. What we condemn in others are 
 the faults to be found in our own hearts. Where 
 others have failed in part, you and us might have 
 
Minding one's own Business. 221 
 
 failed totally. Every street is full 5f filtli. 
 Every fence is full of nails. Tear the boards or 
 pickets off, and the rusty heads protrude to rend 
 the beautiful garments which in turn cover men- 
 tal deformity. The white cottage and the brown 
 mansion hide trouble from the world. If walls 
 could speak, thousands who now listen would 
 stop their ears in anguish. If the whole truth of 
 each of our lives was known, few are there living 
 who would not seek a strange land. If each act 
 of life was engraven on the forehead, thick veils 
 would be worn by men and women, and their 
 dying requests would be to refrain from lifting 
 or removing them. 
 
 People talk, my boy, and know not whereof 
 they speak. They retail slanders and scandal, to 
 show how foul is the dish most palatable to 
 them. Let you and us, my boy, walk straight 
 along. The path is narrow. Brambles border 
 our road on either side. If we do not stop to 
 rest on their points, little will they molest us. 
 
222 Minding ones own Business. 
 
 Let us each miud om* owu business, and you nor 
 us will ever be out of employ. * * 
 
 Did you notice the guide-board we just passed, 
 Yalter, my boy ? For years has it stood there, 
 truthfully pointing the way. !No harm has it 
 ever done. Some wanton fool, from a kicking 
 old gun, sent a charge of shot, marring, pepper- 
 ing, and scarring its truthful face. As fools with 
 loaded guns passed, unable to find game, each 
 one let fly one or both barrels, to see if he could 
 not add a few black marks to the honest board. 
 There was no cause for this wantonness. Make 
 the comparison, my boy. Many a man — many 
 an honored woman — ^has stood for years, the tar- 
 get of slander, yet swerved not from the strict 
 line of right and honor. It seems, my boy, as if 
 every prominent object, animate or inanimate, 
 must be the mark for fools to fire at. 
 
 There is a secret in everything. We cannot 
 tell why the wind blows, why the snow falls, 
 why God exists, why eternity is endless, why 
 
" As fools with loaded guns passed, unable to find game, 
 each one let fly one or both barrels, to see if he could not 
 add a few black marks to the honest board."— Parye 222. 
 
Minding one's own Business. 223 
 
 frost locks and heat unlocks the bountiful store- 
 house of Nature ; whv man came on earth, why 
 he leaves it ; why birds are hatched and babies 
 are born, why flowers bloom and trees decay, 
 why water flows and earth is firm, why night is 
 dark and day is light, why vice follows civiliza- 
 tion as a child followeth its mother, why death 
 follows disease, why strife follows anger or love 
 follows friendship, why disgust often follows in- 
 diiference and revenge follows insult, why old 
 age follows manhood, success exertion, want 
 prodigality, or hope follows fear ; why man does 
 this or fails to do that. It is enough for us, my 
 boy, to know that these things are so. There is 
 a secret reason for every action, a secret chamber 
 in every heart ; and we should thank God that 
 we have even the ability to mind our own busi- 
 ness, whether others do or not. 
 
 And remember, as we walk along through life, 
 that random shots are never counted, and that 
 the targets oftenest fired at are the most promi- 
 
224 Molding one's own Business. 
 
 nent ones. Remember this, and that he who 
 minds his o'^n business builds a wall about him- 
 self which no shafts can penetrate ; and remem- 
 bering this, one secret of success and happiness 
 is yours, my boy. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 In which we Speak of Something that Concerns 
 Somebody. 
 
 |ALTEE, my boy, never drive a set- 
 ting hen from her nest. Kever pull 
 up a plant that is growing, in or- 
 der to see why it does not grow 
 faster. Let well enough alone. Some flowers 
 bloom earlier than others — but, my boy, it is not 
 the early fruit that lasts the longest. A quick 
 word is less terrible than nurtured anger. The 
 snow that melts as it falls is not the snow which 
 freezes the child and man. A man seldom knows 
 when he is well off. The disposition of the heart 
 
 is to err — to wander — to worry over lesser evils, 
 10* 
 
226 Something that Concerns So^nebody. 
 
 till at last it is wedded to the very troubles it 
 hoped to avoid. If you have a good thing, stick 
 to it. Do not let go of a cord to grasp a cable. 
 So long as the cord holds, it is all you want. If 
 you are near the earth, and the cord breaks, you 
 will not be greatly injured by the fall. If far 
 above, the risk of catching the cable is equal to 
 that of the breaking of the cord. 
 
 If your home is happy, stick to it. If your 
 heart be right now, keep it so. If you have one 
 true friend, cling to him or her. Many a man 
 and woman have hosts of false friends. If you 
 have a plan that promises success, work it out. 
 If you know one heart that is true to you, do not 
 lose the love therein by act or word — ^by sin of 
 omission or commission. Do not move away from 
 trouble merely because it exists. If you cannot 
 conquer it on your own grounds, you cannot 
 elsewhere. To fly is to fear ; to fear is to court 
 defeat ; to court defeat is to be unworthy a good 
 name. 
 
Something that Concerns Somebody. 227 
 
 In love or business it is the same. The sun- 
 glass burns into the hardest wood in time — only 
 hold it steadily. You may see in a friend that 
 which is not quite right. Would your next 
 friend be more perfect ? You may have failures 
 in business — would a new battle with strangers 
 be better for you ? You may lose a few friends — 
 are not the ones who are tried and true of more 
 account than all the world ? If your bed rests 
 you, it is a good one, even though coarse and 
 plain. It may not suit others — but if it suits you, 
 keep it. Do not throw away a dime because it 
 is not a dollar. The dollar, when gained, may 
 be bogus ; and if the dime supplies your wants, 
 what more ? Prove that which you love. If it 
 has served you well, do not part with it. If not, 
 let it go without a murmur. There is a mate for 
 everything but despair. The flowers peep out 
 from behind rocks — they lift their dewy faces to 
 the light, and nod to each other. The tiniest one 
 that blooms is as fragrant as the largest, in pro 
 
228 Something that Concerns Somebody, 
 
 portion, and often more fragrant. The drop 
 falling in the river vreds its mate, and passes 
 on. The breeze from the bower, bearing away 
 the zephyr, is content with its choice. The ivy, 
 clinging to the oak, is satisfied — for the oak will 
 surely uphold in every storm. The willow bends 
 low to toy with the bird — each to the other a 
 friend. The grass stoops to kiss the stream — it 
 kisses it again and again — it pillows itself on the 
 icy shroud in winter — it retires from the world in 
 January, and drinks from its hidden life in happi- 
 ness — ^it throws its points of love far over and 
 into the rippling wavelet in summer again, and 
 each lives in the other constantly. The stream 
 gives life to the blade — the blade shields its pet 
 ripple from the glare of the sun, as the love of a 
 true woman shields and protects the heart of him 
 chosen beneath the trysting-tree, from all his fel- 
 lows. Remove the plant, and the laugh of the 
 rill dies by evaporation — its voice will never be 
 heard in the great roar of the sea — turn aside the 
 
Something that Concerns Somebody. 229 
 
 stream, and the blade withers and sinks in sor- 
 row to the earth. 
 
 Have jou one friend ? How many there are 
 who have none ! Is that one friend true ? 
 AVhat more is necessary ? Heaven has but one 
 GrOD. The year has but one summer. Life is 
 not all vernal. The watch has but one main- 
 spring. The voice has but one echo. Life hath 
 but one death. The needle points to but one 
 l^orth. The heart will live in such happiness 
 that the world may well envy it, if it basks in 
 the spiritual sunshine of one counterpart. Wait. 
 Have patience. The dimes will be dollars, if 
 not by growth, by premium ! The shadow which 
 is at your feet now is moving steadily away 
 from you. The great resting-place is drawing 
 nigh. Do not risk a certainty for an uncer- 
 tainty. 
 
 Look about you, my boy, and see if there be 
 not many others in worse plight than yoursell*. 
 Your home may not be a palace, but it is a 
 
230 Something that Concerns Somebody. 
 
 home. What more do you want ? Learn to 
 love that which you have. Learn to bide your 
 time. There is a day for every night. If there 
 are six months of darkness, six months of light 
 are sure to follow ! Be a man. Deserve success. 
 Be true to your heart and to your word — ^be true 
 to your friends and to your purpose. This is the 
 great secret of life. How few know it, my boy ! 
 What if the world laughs at you ? Does the 
 world have terrors for you? Are you not the 
 equal of your fellow ? God alone rewards. The 
 teacher, not the scholars like yourself, is the one 
 who punishes. 
 
 Learn to succeed in great things by succeeding 
 in little ones. Learn to be happy in well-doing. 
 Study to make a bower in but one place in the 
 wilderness. Plant your roses and ivies in but 
 one place — water them — care for them — watch 
 them — think of them — protect them, and never 
 will you lack for a dear resting-place. Wait. 
 Go slow. Learn the road. Study life. See 
 
Smnething that Concerns Somebody. 231 
 
 Low few of God's children succeed, see how few 
 are happy. See how few are contented. Con- 
 tentment is the anchor of life. Ambition the 
 spur. When the storm comes, seek shelter. 
 When all is pleasant, beautify your home with- 
 out. When the heart of her or him you love is 
 sad, chase the gloom away — smother it in kisses 
 or care. When the heart is glad, rejoice with it, 
 and revel in the sunshine you have helped create ! 
 Haste is not speed. The glare of the sun is not 
 as sweet as the evening zephyr. The queen is 
 not happier than the cottager. The desert is not 
 as attractive as the oasis. The ocean is grand, 
 but a home by the rivulet is dearer, my boy. 
 
CHAPTEK XXXIII. 
 
 We Converse on how Men may Succeed. 
 
 XTER, my boj, do you realize that 
 each year the grave is nearer you 
 than ever before — that unless you 
 are active, the season of life will 
 close before even half your self-allotted contract 
 will have been performed, unless, like too many 
 people, you have no aim — no hope — no ambition 
 beyond picking your teeth after dinner? Half 
 of the world — yes, Yalter, more than half — ^go to 
 the reception-room of eternity without any ob- 
 ject in life — as drift-wood floats down the stream, 
 guided by the current, and lodging against the 
 
How Men may Sv^ceed. 233 
 
 first obstruction. And what is drift-wood, my 
 boy ? Once in a while a good stick of timber is 
 found therein, but it is generally more work to 
 haul it out, clean off the sand and mud, than it is 
 worth; and more time and tools are spoiled in 
 making it into what you wish than the stick will 
 ever bring, even in an active market. 
 
 Have a purpose, my boy. Live for something. 
 Make up your mind what you will be, and come 
 up to the mark, or die in the attempt. This is a 
 land where there is no stint to ambition. All 
 have an equal chance. Blood tells— pluck wins 
 — honor and integrity well directed will scale the 
 highest rock, and bear a heavy load to its top. 
 Do not start off in life without knowing where 
 you are going. Load for the game you are hunt- 
 ing. It is as easy to be a man as a mouse. It 
 is as easy to have friends as enemies — it is easier 
 to have both than to go through life like a tar- 
 bucket under a wagon, bumping over stumps, or 
 swinging right and left, without a will of your 
 
234 How Men may Succeed. 
 
 own. Every one can be something. There is 
 enough to do. There are forests to fell — rivers 
 to explore — cities to build — railroads to construct 
 — inventions yet to be studied out — ideas to ad- 
 vance — men to convert — countries to conquer — 
 women to love — offices to be filled — w:ealth and 
 position to acquire — a name to win — a heaven to 
 reach. Yes, my boy, there is lots of work to do, 
 and you and us must do our share. 
 
 The world is wide, and its owner is God. If 
 you wish to be somebody, " pitch in." The brave 
 always have friends. Where there is a will 
 there is a way. Where others have gone you can 
 go. And, Yalter, my boy, if the old track don't 
 suit — make a new one — somebody will walk it. 
 Success is never obtained in a country like this, 
 without effort. If you fail once, try it again. 
 If you fall down, get up aga'n. If it is dark, 
 strike a light. If ^''ou are in the shade, move 
 around, for if there is a shade on one side, there 
 is sunshine on the other ! 
 
H(yw Men ma/y Succeed. 235 
 
 If your seat is too hard to sit on, stand up. 
 If a rock rises before you, roll it away, blast it, 
 or climb over it. It takes longer to skin an ele- 
 phant than a mouse — ^but the skin is worth some- 
 thing. Never be content with doing what 
 another has done — excel him. If an enemy 
 gets in your way, knock him down, or push him 
 aside. Deserve success, and it will come. The 
 boy is not born a man. The sun does not rise 
 like a rocket, or go down like a bullet fired from 
 a gun. Slowly but surely, it makes its rounds, 
 and never tires. It is as easy to be a leader as a 
 wheel-horse, and you are then always the first in 
 town. If the job be long, the pay will be greater 
 — ^if the task be hard, the more competent you 
 must be to do it. 
 
 And then, my boy, always be honorable. 
 Keep your word or give a good excuse. If you 
 owe a man, pay him, if it takes all you have. If 
 you cannot pay — ^you can say so at once. Do to 
 others as you would be done by. Punish en- 
 
How Men may Succeed, 
 
 emies and reward friends. If jou do not punish 
 enemies, no one will fiear you — if you fail to 
 reward friends, we pity the selfishness of your 
 heart. If you make a promise, keep it. If 
 others betray you, teach them better ; but on no 
 provocation become a betrayer. If you have a 
 secret, keep it closely^ — if it is the secret of an- 
 other, watch it even more closely than your own. 
 There can be no excuse for a betrayal of con- 
 fidence — no apology that can be sufficient. If 
 you are in hard luck, wear it out. If you can 
 help a friend, always do it, if he is worthy — if 
 you cannot, do not insult him in the manner of 
 refusal. A little word, act, or look, when the 
 heart is sore, lingers as does the fragrance of the 
 rose long after the vase is broken. If you are 
 right, maintain it. If wrong, never be ashamed 
 to own it. Keep your head above water, no 
 matter how deep the stream or swift the current 
 — somebody will help you. Do not grumble, 
 fret, or whine. Dogs whine. It is as easy to be 
 
How Men ma/y Succeed. 237 
 
 cheerful as to snarl, and a good-natured man 
 always makes the handsomest corpse. 
 
 Do not change your business every time you 
 have the blues — change is not always beneficial. 
 If you have been cheated, do not, to get even, 
 cheat some one else. If you have made a bad 
 bargain — do not stop trading, but try to make a 
 better one next time. If you get into a scrape, 
 extricate yourself, and look closer next time — 
 never be caught twice in the same trap. People 
 may forgive errors, but they have no sympathy 
 for fools. If you wish to be a leader — always go 
 ahead — and remember that the smoother the 
 route you select, the less complaining there will 
 be among your followers ; and above all, Yalter, 
 my boy, no matter what the circumstances, never 
 be the first to desert your friends. Be honest 
 and faithful — God and good fortune will never 
 desert you long. 
 

 CHAPTEK XXXIV 
 
 We Talk of Things we ought not to Talk of. 
 
 |ALTEE, my boy, it is late to-night. 
 We have been out in the cold a 
 long distance, and have passed 
 many dwellings. And, my boy, 
 do you remember the neat white house, just by 
 where we met the fancy dog with his pretty 
 blanket ? 
 
 " What, the house where the folks were quar- 
 relling ? " 
 
 Take care, my boy, that is not it ! You speak 
 too plainly! That was not quarrelling — only 
 the good wife scolding. That is her way. She 
 C'.annot help being sharp with her tongue, no 
 
Things we ought not to Talk of. 239 
 
 more than a lame horse can help limping. A 
 few years since, when she was led to the altar, a 
 blushing bride, she never thought of such a thing. 
 She was a sweetheart then. She wanted a hus- 
 band. She got one — a good man, but like all 
 people, with some faults. And do you know, 
 Yalter, my boy, that God never made but one 
 perfect ! She loved her husband, but the trouble 
 was, when one was vexed — the other became more 
 so, and the kisses soon changed to tart words, and 
 the heart became crusted over with a sort of dead 
 feeling, as the pail of water, when the night is 
 cold, grows a coat of ice. 
 
 " That is what makes folks miserable?" 
 Yes, Yalter, my boy, the dead feeling is what 
 does it ? The husband married his wife because 
 he loved her. He married that woman when a 
 girl, because he wanted a heart to confide in — a 
 bosom on which to rest his aching head when 
 weary with business — her soft hand to pet him — 
 her warm kisses to re-nerve him with new life — ■ 
 
240 Things we ought Twt to Talk, of, 
 
 her smiles to welcome him home — her look of 
 love when the heart was too happy to speak — ^her 
 prayer for him when tempted — ^her loved person 
 to care for, guard, and protect with the holy love 
 a true man feels. But, Yalter, my boy, the cold 
 word startled him. It was an ice-water bath 
 when warm with love, and his heart took in one 
 of its feelers. Then, when the next cross word 
 came, it was colder. His heart shrank back still 
 fm-ther. The dream of youth was not realized. 
 The treasure his heart had carried so long and far 
 to the bridal, melted little by little, as ice melts 
 in the summer sun, and his hopes ran out in such 
 little streams that they were all lost ! 
 
 ITow, my boy, he lives there in that white 
 house. She gives him more scoldings than 
 kisses, and he is waiting. Home is not pleasant 
 to either. He comes to its sacred portals late ^ 
 night, because other places are more inviting. 
 While away, he escapes the words which make 
 his heart sad, and over the maddening bowl 
 
Thmgs we ought not to Talk of. 241 
 
 loses sorrow in oblivious torpor. Neither are 
 happy— neither have the courage to start anew— 
 or to love each other and be happy again. He 
 married an angel— she was but a woman ! She 
 married a man— he was but human I 
 " This world don't amount to much." 
 That is so, in one sense, my boy— you and I 
 are but atoms— less than grains of sand. But 
 few, if any, really love us— we live a few years— 
 die-are buried to be got rid of-and the world 
 goes on as before. Those we loved forget us- 
 our hopes die with us— the labor of a life is lost 
 —the dream of youth is gradually stripped of 
 its beautiful visions— and we are dead. We may 
 live in white houses and not be happy. The one 
 we love, by unkind words may chill the heart 
 only too fondly her own. Woman was made to 
 love. That is her mission— her wealth— her 
 heaven. Man was made to protect— to love— to 
 cherish. His hand is hard and against every 
 man's. His heart grows cold and metallic as it 
 
24:2 Things we ought not to Talk of. 
 
 is knocked about from day to day — his head be- 
 comes wrinkled as trouble lights upon it. Yet 
 he labors on and is happy. All he wants is to 
 fully realize that he is working for some one. If 
 he is a selfisli man, he works for himself alone. 
 If he is really noble, he labors for one who re- 
 pays his labor by her love, and is happy. But, 
 my boy, when the one he worships allows her 
 lips to furnish tarts instead of kisses, his heart 
 loses courage. Woman never speaks harshly to 
 the one she loves, and man knows it. The man 
 never forgets himself and speaks in angry tones 
 to the chosen one from all the world, until love 
 has raised anchor and is ready to fly. 
 
CHAPTER XXXY. 
 
 We find Where to Look for Happiness. 
 
 |ALTEE, my boy, the old chap who 
 made adages said, that a contented 
 mind was a continual feast. He 
 was a very good adage-maker, but 
 his advice was much as would be that of a man 
 who might give you a safe full of money, and not 
 tell you how to unlock it. The chief end of man 
 is happiness. But very few men are happy, my 
 boy. That is, they are not happy to-day, but 
 expect the full measure of bliss to-morrow. To- 
 morrow is a great day, Yalter. One to-morrow 
 has more of fear or more of happiness than all 
 
244 Where to Look for Houppmeas. 
 
 the to-days ever almanacked. We all look for 
 happiness — not in the present, but in the future — 
 and, my boy, we are all wrong. Happiness 
 makes us enjoy hfe. We can all be happy if we 
 will. Care is the huge grindstone which wears 
 us away. The knife does not wear by use — it 
 is by grinding. Throw care and fretting to the 
 winds. Il^ow is the time to be happy. What is 
 the use of waiting till another day dawns % 
 
 " How can we help waiting ? " 
 
 Easy enough, my boy. Keep the heart right. 
 That is the first point. If you see a man in 
 trouble, help him oat, if you can. If not, do not 
 push him into deeper water. If you are tempted 
 to do a mean act, stop and think how it will be- 
 little you. If you see trouble, alleviate it. If 
 you see a man in danger, tell him of it. Plant 
 good seed — reap good crops. Be kind to others. 
 Follow the golden rule. Make up your mind to 
 be happy — the rest is easy enough. We have 
 but very little real trouble. Most of it is im- 
 
WJiere to Look for Hajypiness. 245 
 
 aginary. We become nervous and fretful, and 
 weeds of care overrun the garden of the heart, 
 where they should never be allowed to take 
 root. 
 
 JS'ow is the time to be happy. Think of the 
 blessings, not of the curses. Look on your 
 successes, not on your failures. Thousands fail 
 ' — any one can do that ; but to succeed requires 
 a man of pluck, muscle, and ambition. So long 
 as we have health we should be happy. And if 
 sick we might be worse off, my boy. If we have 
 but a dollar — we might have none. If but one 
 suit of clothes — we might be a hundred per cent, 
 worse off. If an eye has been lost by accident, 
 remember that the head might have gone, for 
 all you could do to prevent. If in battle, and 
 a cannon-ball just misses your head, think how 
 lucky that you were short. If it goes through 
 your heart, a lingering sickness and sorrowful 
 death-bed scene have been escaped. If you 
 have one friend left, that is better than to have 
 
246 Where to Look for Happiness, 
 
 none — if you have none, you will not be be- 
 trayed, or you can make friends. There is no 
 man so mean but some one will love him. Be 
 happy in tliinking of what you have — not in 
 what you want. Let envy go to the wind. 
 Think how much better off you are than a score 
 who started in lifo with you. Think how much 
 better off than you might be. Don't let trifles 
 worry you. Keep a stiff upper lip, and a close 
 lower one. The lower lip is the one you should 
 guard — it does the talking. 
 
 It is easy to be happy if ]^ou wish to be, my 
 boy. Gold watches — fast horses — iron fences — 
 monthly dividends — Brussels cai-pets — rosewood 
 doors — marble-top bureaus — eight-story houses — ■ 
 silver napkin-rings — squeaking shoes — poodle 
 dogs — wine suppers — palatial residences, and such 
 gewgaws, although nice to have, are not essential 
 to happiness. If you are single, my boy, you can 
 be happy in seeking some one to love you. But 
 do not be in too great haste to better your condi- 
 
Where to Looh for Hapj^iess. 247 
 
 tion. Go slow. You will see more of the 
 country — may like it better. A well-trained 
 mind — a kind heart, will make every one happy. 
 If you have not these things, cultivate them. 
 Make a little heaven in your heart and see how 
 nice it is. Do not care what others say of you. 
 If they flatter, try and come up to their mark of 
 adulation — if they condemn, give them no more 
 reason — if they censure wrongfully, it is a blessed 
 thing to know somebody besides yourself is in 
 error. Look around, my boy, and see if there is 
 not some little spot where you can plant a kind 
 word. It will bring forth a rich crop. See if 
 there is not some breeze passing which will 
 waft a kiss to one you love. See if there is 
 not a place vacant where you can hide a good 
 action. See if you cannot by word, look, or 
 deed, brighten the heart of some one more mis- 
 erable than yourself. Do these and be happy. 
 And all can do those little things. We are made 
 in the image of God, and surely, when He has 
 
248 Where to Look for Hajcypmess. 
 
 placed happiness here on earth, we ought to help 
 ourselves. Never care to look at the dark side 
 of a picture. If there is no bright side to it, 
 look on another one. If there is no bright side 
 to any of them, paint one, even if with a white- 
 wash brush. Make up your mind to be happy at 
 all events — to take trouble as it comes, and part 
 with it as it goes, and you will be fat and hearty 
 twenty-five years after your grouty neighbor has 
 put on his wooden overcoat. 
 
CHAPTEK XXXYI. 
 
 Another Week Gone. 
 
 |Y the light of the stars lay it away 
 
 in Time's grave. Another week— 
 
 another Saturday night — another 
 
 flake covering the past with its 
 
 mantle of forgetfnlness. Another balance-sheet 
 
 for or against lis. Another seed planted over 
 
 onr grave to bring forth a flower around which 
 
 beauty shall linger, or a gnarled tree under 
 
 which vermin shall gather. Saturday night is 
 
 the cream of the week. The stamp aflixed to 
 
 our weekly deeds. A stepping-stone in the bed 
 
 of the Great Kiver. It is a round in the lad- 
 II* 
 
250 Another Weeh Gone. 
 
 der leading to heaven or perdition. It is a tear 
 which washes away the storms of the week, or 
 burns its blistering way into the soul. 
 
 Let us rest to-night, weary toiler. Sit you 
 down and be happy. Leave your head at your 
 place of business, and bring your heart to the 
 hearth and fender. l!^ot your worldly heart, but 
 the one yet fresh in memory. Sit by the fire, be 
 it of coal or wood. What a battle life is ! How 
 few of us realize the warfare ! We hardly know 
 who our friends are. What a blessing that the 
 grave has no eyes ! How the hand of time closes 
 its grasp to-night, bearing its wondi'ous gathering 
 to God ! What a medley to present to Him ! 
 Good acts and bad acts. Old age and childhood. 
 Men, maids, and matrons — hopes, fears, promises 
 kept and broken, hates^ injuries, tears, sobs, sighs, 
 smiles, rejoicings, pain, pleasure, sin, and good- 
 ness, all woven together like a tangled skein 
 unravelled by a glance from that Wondrous Eye. 
 
 * * * The hill is steep — its sides 
 
Another Week Gone. 251 
 
 are rough to the feet, and its tracks dangerous. 
 Look back — down its slopes and juttings — over 
 the memories of the past and into the vault of 
 shadows wherein lie torn and bleeding the hopes 
 which led you through the lanes of childhood into 
 the broad road of life. Hope lives forever, but 
 her children die one by one ! Here and there 
 they di'op off as we toil upward to the great gate 
 whiere stands a sentry of our own choosing. 
 
 * « * Ygt there is much to live 
 for. Not for ourselves but for others. Human- 
 ity, in the integral, is but an infinitesimal sand, 
 not worth living for. But we can live for others. 
 Under a million roofs to-night, side by side sit- 
 ting, are young hearts fitting out their frail barks 
 for voyages on an ocean far more tempestuous 
 than ever was the billowy waste grandly rolling 
 its defiance between distant shores. Side by side 
 to-night all over the land lovers sit, thankful that 
 the labors of the week are ended, happy in turn- 
 ing and anticipating the apple the flavor of 
 
352 AnotJier Week Gone. 
 
 which is not yet fully known. Another down- 
 ward turn to the light. Closer and yet closer the 
 hearts as nearer come the chairs. The watch 
 within us lays its seconds away — making up its 
 bundle of shadows against another Saturday night. 
 
 * -sf * 'pj^g ggg^ q£ iifg |g smoothed by 
 
 love. Heart readings or attempts — ^lips meet — 
 the summit Is reached — the word is spoken — the 
 apple is plucked, and life dates, not from birth, 
 but from Saturday night. * * * 
 
 * * ^ How fruits differ in flavor ! 
 Some are luscious to the taste. Some are dry, 
 hard, tasteless, and unsatisfactory. Good to the 
 eye, but a little indescribable something makes 
 the beautiful apple but a cake of ashes. Life is 
 an apple which is long growing but soon decays. 
 Over the stepping-stones like this night, from the 
 cradle so far on the road to the grave, we have 
 carried our apple, waiting for a chance to eat it 
 alone instead of dividing it with those who in 
 turn would divide with us. 
 
Another Week Gone. 253 
 
 What is the influence that draws people into 
 themselves and away from others? Whence 
 comes the unseen hand that beckons hearts to 
 wander off in the byw^ays of solitude and live 
 within little castles of their own building — cells 
 of selfishness — instead of mixing with the crowd 
 hurrying on, anxious to reach — ^vhatf 
 
 Why not look over the past, and guide better 
 for the future from the resting-place given us by 
 the clicking of the reel which marks His seconds 
 — our weeks ? There is so much done which 
 ought not to have been done. So much left un- 
 done. Somehow • the thread of life is wound up 
 full of dirt and uneven places, no matter how- 
 straight and perfect we intend it to be. We reel 
 it too fast. Down in the heart is a hidden power. 
 Who of us all can solve the nnystery ? The heart 
 is not a golden cloud, but a wide reach of prairie 
 where grow some beautiful flowers — many deli- 
 cate grasses — numerous gnarled shrubs fit only 
 for ugly clubs, with here and there a fruit-bear- 
 
254 Another Week Gone. 
 
 ing tree — a well from which others can drink — 
 a bower where the weary can recline — a vine un- 
 der which loved ones can sit — a lofty, firmly root- 
 ed oak, from whose branches climbers can see 
 far out over the country — an occasional evergreen 
 which will recall us to the minds of those who 
 follow us from stone to stone on the way we 
 all are wending. 
 
 * * * Let us pull up the shrubs 
 which have no beauty — cultivate the flow- 
 ers which breathe forth no fragrance, and 
 plant the waste with vines — with trees which 
 bear good fruit — with oaks rising high and 
 strong, toying with the tempest and kissing the 
 clouds rolling over them — with evergreens which 
 shall mark our resting-place and cause others to 
 say that we did not live in vain. Some of us 
 can plant vines — some flowers — some tall trees — 
 some of us the apple which shall be an apple of 
 life — others the evergreen which shall keep the 
 sun and storms from the marble visiting-card we 
 
Another Week Gone, 255 
 
 invariably leave behind when going on the long 
 journey. * * * 
 
 But to-niglit and to-morrow. Eenew your 
 love and energies against the trials of the un- 
 known week. We would see all men happy. 
 There are a million homes in the land where 
 should be more happiness than there is, if men 
 would but break away from the vice-like influ- 
 ences which surround them. Look back from to- 
 night and then resolve for the future. Let the 
 rich be more generous to the poor, and the poor 
 be truer to themselves. There are too few 
 homes — too many pictureless walls in the land. 
 Eest to-night. Save the surplus earnings of the 
 week, hard-palmed, honest laborer, whose earnest 
 friend we are, no matter what tongue you speak, 
 or from what counti^ you came. 
 
 A thousand kind words might have been 
 spoken, but were not. A thousand little luxuries 
 might have been bought, but you would not thus 
 use your earnings. Into the cesspool of revelry 
 
256 Another Week Gone, 
 
 glides many a week of labor, leaving poverty, 
 want, sickness, and unhappiness where should be 
 love, plenty, and contentment. If for no one else, 
 be a man for your own sake. Do right for the 
 golden reward it always brings. Be a man. 
 Stand and let the crowd rush on to the breakers 
 which line the far shores of dissipation and care- 
 less expenditures. Begin the week with money 
 in your pocket — happiness in your heart — the 
 smiles of those around you — the good wishes of 
 friends — the glorious renewal of faith in life 
 which results from being a man. Then you will 
 enjoy many others as you should and will this 
 Sattjbday night. 
 
CHAPTER XXXYII. 
 
 Happy New Year. 
 
 T is midnight! Like a strange 
 dream, warped with troubles and 
 woofed with blood, the year eigh- 
 teen hundred and sixty-five has 
 vanished over the brink of the Great Preci- 
 pice and around the corner — the bend in the 
 stream of time — with merry bells we hear the 
 coming of the Happy 'New Year. Still clinging 
 to the bank while so many have gone by and 
 down forever, waiting for the wave which shall 
 unloose our hold, let us, in fancy, weave a man- 
 tle of silk from the dirty, blood-stained rags of 
 
258 Swp^y New Year. 
 
 the past, thrown aside as the annual tyrant 
 leaped into the pit of his own making, and let 
 us also moss-plant the bank whereon we sit 
 and wait for the leap to the echoless shore. 
 
 How like a strange di'eam ! How the shadows 
 of the past rise before us to warn or bless, as 
 we who live traced our acts on the hard steel 
 of memorj^s plate. Over the land there lies a 
 mantle of snow, white as the forgiveness of 
 God, as if lowered from the cerulean dome to 
 teach man that most beautiful of all lessons. 
 The snow covers the earth. The dark spots and 
 ugly places are hidden beneath the Great Man- 
 tle, and the IS^ew Year comes to us, clad in 
 the garment of peace once again. 
 
 Happy I^ew Yeae ! How unlike its prede- 
 cessor, which has left on the heart so many and 
 varied pictures of life, death, sorrow, and hap- 
 piness ! How many the changes one brief year 
 has wrojight! This is God's Saturday night — • 
 the closing of one of His weeks, with its mil- 
 
Happy New Yea/r. 259 
 
 lions of histories woven into a record for the 
 futm-e, from the gossamer of the present, as 
 it floated by like meaningless froth on foaming 
 billows. 
 
 One short year ! It seems but like yesterday 
 since we stood at the christening of the one 
 now dead, and on its threshold laid our varied 
 gifts — a bundle of plans, hopes, promises, and 
 expectations for that future so many are ever 
 dreading. 
 
 The lovers have forgotten the birthday of 
 the year now dead, and the hopes they in love 
 ushered in when the bells rang out the Happy 
 New Year. The bashful boy — the^ wooing man, 
 have stepped forth on the deck of the won- 
 drous boat. The blushing girl, with implicit 
 trust in plighted faith, careless of all save the 
 love of her chosen one, has become a bride. 
 Dark storms have howled down the aisles of her 
 heart — happy indeed if her shelter proved true. 
 There is a bravery in walking the plank — in 
 
260 Happy New Year. 
 
 leading a forlorn hope — in looking into the 
 month of a cannon — bnt there is no braver 
 act than for a trusting girl to cut loose from 
 the hallowed port of parental protection and, 
 relying on a simple " yes," launch her bark 
 .toward the shore of eternity in the search for 
 that happiness every heart craves — so few dis- 
 cover. 
 
 The bride has in the year just dead become 
 a widow, and with breaking heart gone into a 
 grave deeper and darker than the one wherein 
 rests her hopes. The groom has buried the one 
 chosen from all of God's millions. The father 
 has laid his darling boy beneath the sod — the 
 mother has prayed God to spare, for ever bo 
 brief a time, the loved one who is not lost. 
 The infant whose breath had hardly been given, 
 marks an angelic chrysalis in the cold grave- 
 yard, while the pretty playthings of the child 
 whose prattling and rompings gave joy to the 
 household are sacredly put out of sight, in some 
 
Happy New Year. 261 
 
 secluded spot, to call forth floods of tears when 
 none but grief and God are nigh. 
 
 Those who loved have been wronged— be- 
 trayed— forgotten vows have been kept or broken 
 as destiny moved its wand. Homes have been 
 made joyous and desolate during the reign of 
 the monarch for whose death no one thinks to 
 weep. Heart histories, to be read only in the 
 land of the leal, have been written. We have 
 locked many a secret in om* hearts— or given 
 them to the winds— men and women have been 
 lost and saved -hearts have become cold, 
 estranged and reckless, or made to know the 
 power of love and kindness since last we wished 
 those we met a Hajppt New Year. 
 
 There are pictures on memoric plates to- 
 night each will do well to recall. Who of us 
 have been true to our vows, our promises, our 
 loves, our manhood, ourselves ? God only knows. 
 The beautiful picture we began to paint one 
 year a^o is marred by too many blots and 
 
262 Hajyp}/ New Yewr. 
 
 punctures. There are too many stains on the 
 mantle of life — too many links missing in our 
 chain of good acts — too many weeds have grown 
 up and gone to seed, in the plat we intended 
 for flowers alone. 
 
 As God had wished us a Happy [N'ew Year 
 and thrown His mantle over the earth, covering 
 from sight the dark spots — the uneven places 
 — the crooked sticks, sharp-cutting stones, and 
 treacherous swamps, so let us who live throw 
 the mantle of forgiveness over all men and 
 stand erect before God and the world, thus 
 proving our title to true manhood. Let us 
 forgive those who have wronged us. It is not 
 worth while for us to hate when so few years 
 are given us for Ixme^ before we enter upon the 
 work of the future set apart for us. Let those 
 who have wronged us be forgiven — let our loves 
 and good intentions be strengthened, that our 
 hearts may be lighter and the bank we sit 
 on while waiting be beautified. Even brutes 
 
Sappy N&w Year. 263 
 
 forgive and forget — surely man can do as 
 much. 
 
 Not alone to the rich and prosperous — to 
 those who wrap in furs to keep the cold out — 
 in selfishness to keep the good in ; who ride in 
 luxurious coaches and display the labor of 
 others in jewelry and fine apparel ; — not alone 
 to those who sip of costly wines — who rest on 
 slumber- wooing couches — who sleep in em- 
 broidery — who revel in the delights wealth 
 brings — who sit on well-rugged hearth by plated 
 fenders, or feel the warm breath from glowing 
 furnace — not alone to those who lack not for 
 friends and enjoyment. 
 
 But to all. To the widow in her weeds — the 
 orphan in rags — the child of poverty whose rest 
 from toil never comes — to the noble-hearted 
 watcher by the couch of suifering as well as to 
 the sufferer wherever that sufferer may be — to 
 the lonely of heart — the wrecked voyager on the 
 terrible ocean of life — to the one who hungers 
 
264 I^<^PPy ^^^ Year. 
 
 for love — to the fallen and foi*saken, the betrayed 
 and wronged — the poor laborer whose hand is 
 hard, but whose heart is true and warm — to those 
 who sit by the home fire, be it ever so scant or 
 hmnble — to honest-hearted laborers and those 
 who mourn for loved ones lost in sickness or 
 slain in battle — to those whose hearts are sad 
 and whose joys are like dews of morning — to 
 the poor and lonely who are always floating by 
 upon the mystic river on whose bank we sit, do 
 we wish from an earnest heart, a Happy New 
 Yeah. 
 
 As the current rolls on may they land on green 
 banks instead of broken points of rocks, to be cut 
 and torn by the winds of adversity — amid fra- 
 grant groves beautified by the flowers of kind acts 
 instead of a golgotha of sunken hopes — on islands 
 ever green with love and aftection — beneath 
 spreading palms rather than on Arctic shores to 
 shiver in the gales of adversity, borne on the 
 wings of selfishness — with the living and loving 
 
Happy New Year, 265 
 
 ratlier than with those who are dead to that 
 which makes life happy. 
 
 Soon will the brink be reached, the last look to 
 the shore be given ; and as those who watch the 
 ripple turn away with a shudder to look again 
 and find us gone forever, may the momentum 
 given by a current strong and deep from good 
 actions and noble impulses, carry us to the calm 
 depth of an open sea, and not leave us impaled 
 on the points and jutting rocks of disappoint- 
 ment, which, covered with victims, mark the 
 dangerous shores which but line the current be- 
 yond safe for the true and the leal. 
 
 Look down the aisle. Throw open the blinds. 
 Let the sunlight of true manhood in upon our 
 hearts. Strive for the liberality which lifts man 
 to a higher plane, and let us go forth battling 
 with the army of cares with more of God and 
 less of selfishness in our hearts. 
 
 Hold the dear ones and the loved ones closer 
 
 to the heart — open the hand of charity and benev- 
 12 
 
266 
 
 Hajpjpy New Year, 
 
 olence, and wipe out the dark spots of tlie past 
 year with the good born from noble impulses of 
 the new year, that it may indeed be a happy and 
 a prosperous one. 
 
 ► 
 
CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 Saturday Night. 
 
 
 '^mm^ 
 
 NOTHEE. week has been called in. 
 Another seven-day net of provi- 
 dences has been reeled upon the 
 invisible, and its wondrous haul of 
 good deeds and bad pass in review before the 
 Power of powers, the Great Father of all. A 
 few more Saturday nights for us — perhaps no 
 more for many who will read this article — it 
 may be no more for the weary, hard, and tired 
 brain but for which this little summing up 
 would not be made. 
 
 It is good to rest, and we are glad to have one 
 
 K 
 
268 Saturday Night, 
 
 night of the week for review. One night in 
 which to look back at the hollowness of life — 
 one little season in which we can look at the 
 beautiful of it ; for there is beauty in it, though 
 the terrible to-morrow which promises more than 
 it brings, sadly hides the perfection of days, life, 
 and events. 
 
 Since last we sat by the desk to write thus out- 
 side of politics or business, there have been many 
 changes. Many a heart has been widowed, and 
 many a sad pillow in the final earthly home 
 marks where sleep the missed ones. Do you 
 know there is something very strange about 
 this life and death ? We do not see why people 
 so desii-e to live. From the cradle to the grave 
 it is but toil, labor, sorrow, disappointment, and 
 vexation. "Were it not that we look for to-mor- 
 row to bring us happiness, or next week or next 
 year to bring us comfort, there would be but 
 dark clouds over all of us. The days, the years, 
 are but the seconds and moments of God ! That 
 
SaturdoAf Night, 269 
 
 of time we prize so highly is of no moment to 
 Him, and yet liow we hang on the great pendu- 
 him with its fifty-two figm-es thereon, each like 
 this of which we write. 
 
 Death is not dreadful. It is but the sleeping 
 here, to waken there % It is but sinking to rest 
 in our office, when wearied with the labors of 
 the day, and waking at Iwme^ wherfe about us 
 will stand in the sunshine of God's wondrous 
 love the dear ones gone before to prepare the 
 parlor of Eternity for your use and our resting, 
 forever ! And who would fear to thus sleep- 
 to lay by the pen, to shove back from the desk 
 and say " Good-by, wearying labors, we part 
 forever" — to recline the head on back of cushion- 
 ed chair, to smile as our eyes see the loved ones 
 waiting, and to know that instead of walking we 
 are wafted silently and on wings of love lest we 
 waken before the glad surprise ! 
 
 "Working man and brother, we care not what 
 your language, or how much you differ from us 
 
► 
 
 270 Saturday Night 
 
 in opinion, to you we talk to-night. Opinions 
 are but opinions. We may be wrong, you may 
 be wrong — each of us may be wrong, for none 
 but God is right. You have a riglit to your 
 ideas — we have a right to ours, for they are all 
 born of a higher power, to be operated on by 
 acts, events, and arguments. But we would add 
 to your happiness, here. Another will care for 
 you in the Hereafter, as He will care for all of 
 us. You teach us by your daily example many 
 things. We see you nobly striving, and would 
 help you if such thing can be. 
 
 We all seek happiness. Let us see how it can 
 be had. You are tired. Then rest. Go home 
 and be with those who are with you and of you. 
 Throw your labor and dignity behind you. Open 
 your heart. Talk of the beauties of the past you 
 have seen, and congratulate yourselves that so 
 much misery which has befallen others has es- 
 caped you. Ko matter how hard your lot, some 
 one has a harder one. Think if there are not 
 
Saturday Night. 271 
 
 near you those you would on no account change 
 places with. 
 
 If you love, love more. If you hate, hate less. 
 Life is too short to spend in hating any one. 
 Why war against a mortal who is going the same 
 road with us ? Why not expand the flower of 
 life and happiness by learning to love, by teach- 
 ing those who are near and dear the beautiful 
 lesson ? Your hands may be hard, but your 
 hearts need not be. Your forms may be bent 
 or ugly, but do you not know that the most 
 beautiful flowers often grow in the most rugged, 
 unsheltered places ? The palace for care^the 
 cottage for love. Not that there is no love in 
 the mansion; but somehow if we are not very 
 careful, business wiU crowd all there is of beauty 
 out of the heart. This is why God has given 
 Sabbaths and Saturday nights, that we may 
 leave business in the office and have a heart- 
 cleaning. 
 
 Forgive, as you would be forgiven. Love, as 
 
 i 
 
► 
 
 272 Saturday Wight 
 
 you would be loved. Do as you would be done 
 by. Suppose you were a weary prisoner at 
 home, and tliink liow welcome would be the 
 coming of her you love, to be with you one 
 night, if not each night, and go by the places 
 of dissipation, of wickedness, where people would 
 not so congregate if they did not forget. If you 
 would have home happy, try to make it so. 
 Light the lamp of life and keep it filled with the 
 oil of love, care, affection, tenderness, and ca- 
 resses, that it may not go to sleep in the dark 
 when the work of Hfe is ended. Children often 
 fear to go to sleep in the dark, but there is 
 another sleep, and a more terrible darkness ! 
 Only this, and nothing more ! 
 
 Suppose we fall asleep in the ofiice this Satur- 
 day night, and, neglecting to have trimmed our 
 lamp, awaken to find but darkness and gloom, 
 and uncertainty. "We may find matches, but of 
 what avail if there be no oil ? We may die and 
 live again, but if there be no lamps of love to 
 
Saturday Night. 2T3 
 
 lighten our future, better that we lived, even in 
 sorrow. 
 
 Home can be happy if we make it so. Do not 
 expect to cull all the flowers. Do not, simply to 
 please yourself! We repeat— do not, simply to 
 please yourself, for therein lies the shroud of 
 happiness ! Give, as is given. Keep back the 
 bitter words. Others may be weary and bitter. 
 Words unspoken are never remembered ! 
 
 Go home to-night. If you would be happy, 
 go home. If there is no happiness there take 
 some, and kindle more. Save your earnings. 
 Beautify your resting-places. Keep your heart 
 warm and your brain steady. Save rather than 
 waste, for the days go by faster than we dream, 
 and want may overtake us, as it has others who 
 lost the week in the great whirlpool of Saturday 
 night. — " Bkick" Pomeroy. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 { 
 
} 
 
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