[Illustration: CLEARING OUT A NARROW STREET IN POMPEII.]

You might, however, remain upon the spot a long time and never find
out that there was a city there. All around you would see groves and
vineyards, and cultivated fields and villas. For the city is beneath
your feet. Under the vineyards and orchards are temples filled with
statues, houses with furniture, pictures, and all homelike things.
Nothing is wanting there but life. For Pompeii is a buried city, and
fully two-thirds of it has not yet been excavated.

But a short walk from this place will bring you to the spot where
excavations have been made, and about one-third of the ancient city
lies once more under the light of heaven. It is doubtful whether you
can see it when you get to it for the mounds of ashes and rubbish
piled around. But, clambering over these, you will pay forty cents for
admission, and pass through a turnstile into a street where you will
see long rows of ruined houses, and empty shops, and broken temples,
and niches which have contained statues of heathen gods and goddesses.
As you wander about you will come across laborers busily employed in
clearing away rubbish in obstructed streets. It is a very lively
scene, as you can see in the picture. Men are digging zealously into
the heaps of earth and rubbish, and filling baskets which the
bare-footed peasant-girls carry to the cars at a little distance. A
railroad has been built expressly to carry away the earth. The cars
are drawn by mules. The girls prefer carrying their baskets on their
heads. The men have to dig carefully, for there is no knowing when
they may come across some rare and valuable work of art.

The excavations are conducted in this manner. Among the trees, and in
the cultivated fields there can be traced little hillocks, which are
pretty regular in form and size. These indicate the blocks of houses
in the buried city, and, of course, the streets run between them.
After the land is bought from the owners, these streets are carefully
marked out, the vines are cleared away, the trees cut down, and the
digging out of these streets is commenced from the top. The work is
carried on pretty steadily at present, but it is only within the last
few years that it has been conducted with any degree of enterprise and
skill.

[Illustration: A CLEARED STREET IN POMPEII.]

Let us leave this rubbish, and go into a street that has already been
cleared. The first thing you will observe is that it is very narrow.
It is evidently not intended for a fashionable drive. But few of the
streets are any wider than this one. The greatest width of a street in
Pompeii is seven yards, and some are only two and a half yards,
sidewalks and all. The middle of the street is paved with blocks of
lava. The sidewalks are raised, and it is evident the owners of the
houses were allowed to put any pavement they pleased in front of
their dwellings. In one place you will see handsome stone flags the
next pavement may be nothing but soil beaten down, while the next will
be costly marble.

The upper stories of the houses are in ruins. It is probable,
therefore, that they were built of wood, while the lower stories,
being of stone, still remain. They had few windows on the street, as
the Pompeiians preferred that these should look out on an inner square
or court. To the right of the picture is a small monument, and in the
left-hand corner is a fountain, or rather the stone slabs that once
enclosed a fountain.

As we walk slowly up the solitary street, we think of the busy,
restless feet that trod these very stones eighteen hundred years ago.
Our minds go back to the year of our Lord 79, when there was high
carnival in the little city of Pompeii, with its thirty thousand
people, when the town was filled with strangers who had come to the
great show; at the time of an election, when politicians were scheming
and working to get themselves or their friends into power; when gayly
dressed crowds thronged the streets on their way to the amphitheatre
to see the gladiatorial fight; when there was feasting and revelry in
every house; when merchants were exulting in the midst of thriving
trade; when the pagan temples were hung with garlands and filled with
gifts; when the slaves were at work in the mills, the kitchens, and
the baths; when the gladiators were fighting the wild beasts of the
arena--then it was that a swift destruction swept over the city and
buried it in a silence that lasted for centuries.

Vesuvius, the volcano so near them, but which had been silent so many
years that they had ceased to dread it, suddenly woke into activity,
and threw out of its summit a torrent of burning lava and ashes, and
in a few short hours buried the two cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii
so completely that two centuries after no one could tell the precise
place where they had stood, and men built houses and cultivated farms
over the spot, never dreaming that cities lay beneath them.

[Illustration: THE ATRIUM IN THE HOUSE OF PANSA RESTORED.]

But here we are at the house of Pansa. Let us go in. We do not wait
for any invitation from the owner, for he left it nearly two thousand
years ago, and his descendants, if he have any, are totally ignorant
of their illustrious descent. First we enter a large hall called the
Atrium. You can see from the magnificence of this apartment in what
style the rich Pompeiians lived. The floor is paved in black and white
mosaic, with a marble basin in the centre. The doors opening from
this hall conduct us to smaller apartments, two reception rooms, a
parlor, the library, and six diminutive bedrooms, only large enough to
contain a bedstead, and with no window. It must have been the fashion
to sleep with open doors, or the sleepers must inevitably have been
suffocated.

At the end of the Atrium you see a large court with a fountain in the
middle. This was called the Peristyle. Around it was a portico with
columns. To the left were three bedchambers and the kitchen, and to
the right three bedchambers and the dining-room. Behind the Peristyle
was a grand saloon, and back of this the garden. The upper stories of
this house have entirely disappeared. This is a spacious house, but
there are some in the city more beautifully decorated, with paintings
and mosaics.

When the rubbish was cleared out of this house, much of Pansa's costly
furniture was found to be in perfect preservation, and also the
statues. In the library were found a few books, not quite destroyed;
in the kitchen the coal was in the fire-places; and the kitchen
utensils of bronze and terra-cotta were in their proper places. Nearly
all of the valuable portable things found in Pompeii have been carried
away and placed in the museum at Naples.

This Pansa was candidate for the office of Г¦dile, or mayor of the
city, at the time of the eruption of Vesuvius. We know this from the
placards that were found posted in various parts of the city, and
which were as fresh and clean as on the day they were written. These
placards, or posters, were very numerous, and there seem to have been
a great many candidates for the various city offices; and it is very
evident, from the inscriptions on the houses, on the walls of public
buildings and the baths, that party feeling ran quite as high in this
luxurious city of ancient times as it does now in any city in America.
For these Pompeiians had no newspaper, and expressed their sentiments
on the walls, and they have consequently come down to us of the
present day.

These inscriptions not only related to politics, but referred often to
social and domestic matters, and, taken in connection with the
pictures of home scenes that were painted on the walls of the houses,
give us such accurate and vivid accounts of the people that it is easy
to imagine them all back in their places, and living the old life over
again. Pansa, and Paratus, and Sallust, and Diomed, and Julia, and
Sabina seem to be our own friends, with whom we have often visited the
Forum or the theatre, and gone home to dine.

That curious-looking pin with a Cupid on it is a lady's hair-pin. The
necklaces are in the form of serpents, which were favorite symbols
with the ancients. The stands of their tables, candelabra, &c., were
carved into grotesque or beautiful designs, and even the kitchen
utensils were made graceful with figures of exquisite workmanship, and
were sometimes fashioned out of silver.

Among the pretty things found in Pompeiian houses I will mention the
following:--

A bronze statuette of a Dancing Faun, with head and arms uplifted;
every muscle seems to be in motion, and the whole body dancing.
Another of a boy with head bent forward, and the whole body in the
attitude of listening. Then there is a fine group of statuary
representing the mighty Hercules holding a stag bent over his knee;
another of the beautiful Apollo with his lyre in his hand leaning
against a pillar. There are figures of huntsmen in full chase, and of
fishermen sitting patiently and quietly "waiting for a bite." A very
celebrated curiosity is the large urn or vase of blue glass, with
figures carved on it in half relief, in white. (For the ancients knew
how to carve glass.) These white figures look as if made of the finest
ivory instead of being carved in glass. They represent masks
enveloped in festoons of vine tendrils, loaded with clusters of
grapes, mingled with other foliage, on which birds are swinging,
children plucking grapes or treading them under foot, or blowing on
flutes, or tumbling over each other in frolicsome glee. This superb
urn, which is like nothing we have nowadays, is supposed to have been
intended to hold the ashes of the dead. For it was a custom of ancient
days to burn the bodies of the dead, and place the urns containing
their ashes in magnificent tombs.

[Illustration: ORNAMENTS FROM POMPEII.]

Instead of hanging pictures as we do, the Pompeiians generally had
them painted upon the smoothly prepared walls of their halls and
saloons. The ashes of Vesuvius preserved these paintings so well that,
when first exposed to the light, the coloring on them is fresh and
vivid, and every line and figure clear and distinct. But the sunlight
soon fades them. They are very beautiful, and teach us much about the
beliefs and customs of the old city.

Lovely and graceful as were these pictures, the floors of the houses
are much more wonderful. They are marvels of art. Not only are flowers
and running vines and complicated designs there laid in mosaics, but
pictures that startle with their life-like beauty. There are many of
these, but perhaps the finest of all is the one found in the same
house with the Dancing Faun. It represents a battle. A squadron of
victorious Greeks is rushing upon part of a Persian army. The latter
are turning to flee. Those around the vanquished Persian king think
only of their safety, but the king, with his hand extended towards his
dying general, turns his back upon his flying forces, and invites
death. Every figure in it seems to be in motion. You seem to hear the
noise of battle, and to see the rage, fear, triumph, and pity
expressed by the different faces. Think of such wonderful effects
being produced by putting together pieces of glass and marble, colored
enamel, and various stones! But, leaving all these beauties, and
descending to homely everyday life, we will go into a bakery. Here is
one in a good state of preservation.

[Illustration: DISCOVERIES OF LOAVES OF BREAD BAKED EIGHTEEN HUNDRED
YEARS AGO.]

It is a mill and bakery together. The Pompeiians sent their grain to
the baker, and he ground it into flour, and, making it into dough,
baked it and sent back loaves of bread. The mills look like huge
hour-glasses. They are made of two cone-shaped stones with the small
ends together. The upper one revolved, and crushed the grain between
the stones. They were worked sometimes by a slave, but oftenest by a
donkey. There is the trough for kneading the bread, the arched oven,
the cavity below for the ashes, the large vase for water with which to
sprinkle the crust and make it "shiny," and the pipe to carry off the
smoke. In one of these ovens were found eighty-one loaves, weighing a
pound each, whole, hard, and black, in the order in which they had
been placed on the 23d of November, 79. Suppose the baker who placed
them there had been told that eighteen hundred years would elapse
before they would be taken out!

Having wandered about the city, and looked at all the streets,
monuments, and dwellings, and having seen very much more than I have
here described--the Forum, or Town Hall, the theatres, baths, stores,
temples, the street where the tombs are--and having looked at the rude
cross carved on a wall, showing that the religion of Christ had
penetrated to this Pagan city--having examined all these, you will
visit the amphitheatre.

To do this we must leave the part of the city that has interested us
so much, and, passing once more through the vineyards and orchards
that still cover a large portion of the city, descend again into a
sort of ravine, where we will find the amphitheatre. It was quite as
the end of the city, next to the wall. It is a circus. The large open
space in the centre was called the arena. Here there were fierce and
bloody fights; wild beasts fought with each other, or with men trained
to the business and called gladiators, and these gladiators often
fought with each other--all for the amusement of the people, who were
never satisfied unless a quantity of blood was shed, and many were
killed. This arena was covered with sand, and a ditch filled with
water separated it from the seats.

The seats arose from this arena, tier above tier. There were three
divisions of them, separating the rich from the middle class, and
these again from the slaves. It was well arranged for the comfort of
the audience, having wide aisles and plenty of places of exit. The
whole was covered with an awning. In the wall around the arena are the
holes where thick iron bars were inserted as a precaution against the
bounds of the panthers. To the right of the principal entrance are two
square rooms with gratings where the wild beasts were kept. This
amphitheatre would hold twenty thousand persons!

[Illustration: THE AMPHITHEATRE OF POMPEII.]

We visit this place last because it was while the amphitheatre was
crowded with people intent upon the bloody spectacle; while wild
beasts, and men more cruel than the beasts, were fighting together,
and spectators less pitiful than either were greedily enjoying it,
that suddenly the ground trembled violently. This perhaps was not
perceived in the circus, on account of the excitement all were in, and
the noise that was going on in the arena. But it was soon followed by
a whirlwind of ashes, and lurid flashes of flame darted across the
sky. The beasts were instantly tamed, and cowered down in abject
terror, and the gladiators, for the first time in their lives, grew
pale with fear. Then the startled crowd within the vast building heard
from the streets the fearful cry: "Vesuvius is on fire!" In an instant
the spectacle is forgotten; the terrified crowd rush out of the
building, and happy is it for them that the architects have provided
so many places of exit. Some fled towards the sea, and some to the
open country. Those who reached the ships were saved, but woe to those
who went to their homes to collect their valuables to take with them,
or who took refuge under cover in the cellars.

After the rain of ashes came a shower of blazing stones, which fell
uninterruptedly, setting fire to all parts of the city and blocking up
the streets with burning masses. And then a fresh storm of ashes
sweeping down would partly smother the flames, but, blocking up the
doorways, would stifle those within the houses. And to add to the
horror, the volumes of smoke that poured from the mountain caused a
darkness deeper than night to settle on the doomed city, through which
the people groped their way, except when lighted by the burning
houses. What horror and confusion in the streets! Friends seeking each
other with faces of utter despair; the groans of the dying mingled
with the crash of falling buildings; the pelting of the fiery stones;
the shrieks of women and children; the terrific peals of thunder.

So ended the day, and the dreadful scene went on far into the night.
In a few hours the silence of death fell upon the city. The ashes
continued to pour steadily down upon it, and drifting into every
crevice of the buildings, and settling like a closely-fitting shroud
around the thousands and thousands of dead bodies, preserved all that
the flames had spared for the eyes of the curious who should live
centuries after. And a gray ashy hill blotted out Pompeii from the
sight of that generation.

Hundreds of skeletons have already been found, and their expressive
attitudes tell us the story of their death. We know of the pitiful
avarice and vanity of many of the rich ladies who went to their homes
to save their jewels, and fell with them clutched tightly in their
hands. One woman in the house of the Faun was loaded with jewels, and
had died in the vain effort to hold up with her outstretched arms the
ceiling that was crushing down upon her. But women were not the only
ones who showed an avaricious disposition in the midst of the thunders
and flames of Vesuvius. Men had tried to carry off their money, and
the delay had cost them their lives, and they were buried in the ashes
with the coins they so highly valued. Diomed, one of the richest men
of Pompeii, abandoned his wife and daughters and was fleeing with a
bag of silver when he was stifled in front of his garden by noxious
vapors. In the cellar of his house were found the corpses of seventeen
women and children.

A priest was discovered in the temple of Isis, holding fast to an axe
with which he had cut his way through two walls, and died at the
third. In a shop two lovers had died in each other's arms. A woman
carrying a baby had sought refuge in a tomb, but the ashes had walled
them tightly in. A soldier died bravely at his post, erect before a
city gate, one hand on his spear and the other on his mouth, as if to
keep from breathing the stifling gases.

Thus perished in a short time over thirty thousand citizens and
strangers in the city of Pompeii, now a city under the ground.




THE COACHMAN.

[Illustration]


When a boy sees a coachman driving two showy, high-stepping horses
along the street, or, better still, over a level country road, with
his long whip curling in the air, which whip he now and then flirts so
as to make a sharp, cracking noise over the horses' heads, and
occasionally brings down with a light flick upon the flanks of the
right or left horse,--the carriage, shining with varnish and plate,
rolling along swiftly and smoothly,--the little boy is apt to think
that coachman must be a very happy mortal.

If the man on the carriage-box sees the boy looking at him with so
much admiration, he will probably throw him a jolly little laugh and a
friendly nod, and, gathering up the reins and drawing them in tightly
so as to arch the horses' necks and make them look prouder and more
stately than before, he will give a loud crack with his curling
whip-lash, and the horses will start off at a rapid trot, and the
carriage will sweep around a curve in the road so gracefully that the
boy's heart will be filled with envy--not of the persons in the
carriage--oh, no! riding in a close carriage is a very tame and dull
affair; but he will envy the driver. An ambition springs up in his
mind at that instant. Of all things in the world he would rather be a
coachman! That shall be his business when he grows up to be a man. And
the chances are that when he goes home he tells his father so.

But if the little boy, instead of lying tucked in his warm bed, should
be set down at twelve o'clock at night upon the pavement in front of
that great house with the tall lamps on the steps, he would see this
same coachman under conditions that he would not envy at all.

The empty carriage is close to the curb-stone, with the door swinging
open as if to urge the owners to hurry and take possession. The
high-stepping trotters are covered with blankets to protect them from
the piercing cold, and, with their heads drooping, are either asleep
or wondering why they are not put into the stable to take their
night's rest; and the coachman is dancing about on the pavement to
keep his feet warm--not by any means a merry kind of dance, although
he moves about pretty briskly. He has taken off his gloves, for they
seem to make his hands colder, and now he has thrust one hand into his
pocket and is blowing on the other with all his might. His whip, that
curled so defiantly in the air, is now pushed under his arm, and the
lash is trailing, limp and draggled, on the stones. He is warmly clad,
and his great-coat has three capes, but all cannot put sufficient heat
into his body, for it is a bitter cold night, and the wind comes
howling down the street as if it would like to bite off everybody's
ears and noses. It shakes the leafless branches of the trees until
they all seem to be moaning and groaning together. The moon is just
rising over the church, and the coachman is standing right in a broad
patch of its light. But moonlight, though very beautiful when you are
where you can comfortably admire it, never warmed anybody yet. And so
the poor coachman gets no good out of that.

There is a party in the great house. The boy is standing where he can
only see the lower steps and the tall lamps, but the coachman can see
that it is lighted from garret to cellar. He knows that it is warm as
summer in there. There are stands of flowers all the way up the
stairways, baskets of them are swinging from the ceilings, and vines
are trailing over the walls.

Who in there could ever guess how bleak and cold it is outside! Ladies
in shimmering silks and satins, and glittering with jewels, are
flitting about the halls, and floating up and down the rooms in
graceful dances, to the sound of music that only comes out to the
coachman in fitful bursts.

He has amused himself watching all this during part of the evening,
but now he is looking in at the side-light of the door to see if there
are any signs of the breaking up of the party, or if those he is to
take home are ready to go away. He is getting very impatient, and let
us hope they will soon come out and relieve him.




GEYSERS, AND HOW THEY WORK.

[Illustration: THE GRAND GEYSER OF ICELAND.]


Geysers, or fountains of hot water or mud, are found in several parts
of the world. Iceland possesses the grandest one, but in California
there are a great many of these natural hot fountains, most of which
throw forth mud as well as water. Some of the American Geysers are
terrible things to behold. They are generally found near each other,
in particular localities, and any one wandering about among them sees
in one place a great pool full of black bubbling contents, so hot that
an egg thrown in the spring will be boiled in a minute or two; there
he sees another spring throwing up boiling mud a few feet in the air;
there another one, quiet now, but which may at any time burst out and
send its hot contents high above the heads of the spectators; here a
great hole in the ground, out of which constantly issues a column of
steam, and everywhere are cracks and crevices in the earth, out of
which come little jets of steam, and which give the idea that it would
not require a very heavy blow to break in, at any point, the crust of
the earth, and let the adventurous traveller drop down into the
boiling mass below.

In Iceland the Geysers are not quite so terrible in their aspect as
those in California, but they are bad enough. Their contents are
generally water, some hot and bubbling, and some hot and still; while
the Great Geyser, the grandest work of the kind in the world, bursts
forth at times with great violence, sending jets of hot water hundreds
of feet into the air.

These wonderful hot springs, wherever they have been found, have
excited the greatest attention and interest, in travellers and
scientific men, and their workings have been explained somewhat in
this way:--

Water having gradually accumulated in vast underground crevices and
cavities, is heated by the fires, which, in volcanic regions, are not
very far from the surface of the earth. If there is a channel or tube
from the reservoir to the surface, the water will expand and rise
until it fills the basin which is generally found at the mouth of hot
springs. But the water beneath, being still further heated, will be
changed into steam, which will at times burst out with great force,
carrying with it a column of water high into the air. When this water
falls back into the basin it is much cooler, on account of its contact
with the air, and it cools the water in the basin, and also condenses
the steam in the tube or channel leading from the reservoir. The
spring is then quiet until enough steam is again formed to cause
another eruption. A celebrated German chemist named Bunsen
constructed an apparatus for the purpose of showing the operations of
Geysers. Here it is.

[Illustration: THE ARTIFICIAL GEYSER.]

You see that the two fires in the engraving--one lower and larger than
the other, because the heat of the earth increases as we get farther
from the surface--will heat the water in the iron tube very much as
water is heated in a real Geyser; and when steam enough is formed, a
column of hot water is thrown out of the basin. The great subterranean
reservoir is not imitated in this apparatus, but the action is the
same as if the tube arose from an iron vessel. There is a great deal
in Bunsen's description of this contrivance, in regard to the
difference in the temperature of the water in that part of the tube
between the two fires, and that in the upper portion, which explains
the intermittent character of the eruptions of a Geyser, but it is not
necessary for us to go into all his details.

When we know that under a Geyser the water is boiling in a great
reservoir which communicates with the surface by a natural tube or
spout, we need not wonder that occasionally a volume of steam bursts
forth, sending a column of water far into the air.




A GIANT PUFF-BALL.

[Illustration]


I suppose you have all seen puff-balls, which grow in the fields like
mushrooms and toadstools, but I am quite sure that you never saw
anything of the kind quite so large as that one in the picture. And
yet that engraving was made from a drawing from the puff-ball itself.
So we need not suppose that there is anything fanciful about it.

The vegetable in question is a kind of _fungi_ called the Giganti
Lycoperdon, and it attains its enormous size in one night! It springs
from a seed so small that you could not see it, and grows, while you
are asleep, to be bigger, perhaps, than you are yourself!

Think of that! How would you like to plant the whole garden, some
afternoon, with that kind of seed? Would not your father and mother,
and everybody else, be astounded when they woke up and saw a couple of
hundred of those things, as big as barrels, filling up every bed!

They would certainly think it was the most astonishing crop they had
ever seen, and there might be people who would suppose that fairies or
magicians had been about.

The great trouble about such a crop would be that it would be good for
nothing.

I cannot imagine what any one would do with a barnful of Lycoperdons.

But it would be wonderfully interesting to watch the growth of such a
_fungus_. You could see it grow. In one night you could see its whole
life, from almost nothing at all to that enormous ball in the picture.
Nature could hardly show us a more astonishing sight than that.




TICKLED BY A STRAW.

[Illustration]


    From his dreams of tops and marbles,
      Where the soaring kites he saw,
    Is that little urchin wakened,
      Tickled by a wheaten straw.

    How do you suppose he likes it,
      Young one with annoying paw?
    If I only were your mother,
      I'd tickle you with birchen straw.

    Soon enough, from pleasant dreaming,
      You'll be wakened by the law,
    Which provides for every vision
      Some sort of provoking straw.

    In dreams of play, or hope, or loving,
      When plans of happiness you draw,
    Underneath _your_ nose may wiggle
      Life's most aggravating straw




THE LIGHT IN THE CASTLE.


On a high hill, in a lonely part of Europe, there stood a ruined
castle. No one lived there, for the windows were destitute of glass;
there were but few planks left of the floors; the roof was gone; and
the doors had long ago rotted off their hinges. So that any persons
who should take up their residence in this castle would be exposed to
the rain, when there was a storm; to the wind, when it blew; and to
robbers, if they should come; besides running the risk of breaking
their necks by falling between the rafters, every time they attempted
to walk about the house.

It was a very solemn, lonely, and desolate castle, and for many and
many a year no human being had been known to set foot inside of it.

It was about ten o'clock of a summer night that Hubert Flamry and his
sister Hulda were returning to their home from an errand to a distant
village, where they had been belated. Their path led them quite near
to the ruined castle, but they did not trouble themselves at all on
this account, for they had often passed it, both by night and day. But
to-night they had scarcely caught sight of the venerable structure
when Hubert started back, and, seizing his sister's arm, exclaimed:

"Look, Hulda! look! A light in the castle!"

Little Hulda looked quickly in the direction in which her brother was
pointing, and, sure enough, there was a light moving about the castle
as if some one was inside, carrying a lantern from room to room. The
children stopped and stood almost motionless.

"What can it be, Hubert?" whispered Hulda.

"I don't know," said he. "It may be a man, but he could not walk where
there are no floors. I'm afraid it's a ghost."

"Would a ghost have to carry a light to see by?" asked Hulda.

"I don't know," said Hubert, trembling in both his knees, "but I think
he is coming out."

It did seem as if the individual with the light was about to leave the
castle. At one moment he would be seen near one of the lower windows,
and then he would pass along on the outside of the walls, and directly
Hubert and Hulda both made up their minds that he was coming down the
hill.

"Had we better run?" said Hulda.

"No," replied her brother. "Let's hide in the bushes."

So they hid.

In a few minutes Hubert grasped his sister by the shoulder. He was
trembling so much that the bushes shook as if there was a wind.

"Hulda!" he whispered, "he's walking along the brook, right on top of
the water!"

"Is he coming this way?" said Hulda, who had wrapped her head in her
apron.

"Right straight!" cried Hubert. "Give me your hand, Hulda!" And,
without another word, the boy and girl burst out of the bushes and ran
away like rabbits.

When Hulda, breathless, fell down on the grass, Hubert also stopped
and looked behind him. They were near the edge of the brook, and
there, coming right down the middle of the stream, was the light which
had so frightened them.

"Oh-h! Bother!" said Hubert.

"What?" asked poor little Hulda, looking up from the ground.

"Why, it's only a Jack-o'-lantern!" said Hubert. "Let's go home,
Hulda."

As they were hurrying along the path to their home, Hubert seemed very
much provoked, and he said to his sister:

[Illustration]

"Hulda, it was very foolish for you to be frightened at such a thing
as that."

"Me?" said Hulda, opening her eyes very wide, "I guess you were just
as much frightened as I was."

"You might have known that no real person would be wandering about the
castle at night, and a ghost couldn't carry anything, for his fingers
are all smoke."

"You ought to have known that too, I should say, Mr. Hubert," answered
Hulda.

"And then, I don't believe the light was in the castle at all. It was
just bobbing about between us and the castle, and we thought it was
inside. You ought to have thought of that, Hulda."

"Me!" exclaimed little Hulda, her eyes almost as big as two silver
dollars.

It always seems to me a great pity that there should be such boys as
Hubert Flamry.




THE OAK TREE.

[Illustration]


I really don't know which liked the great oak best, Harry or his
grandfather. Harry was a sturdy little fellow, seven years old, and
could play ball, and fly kites, and all such things, when he had
anybody to play with. But his father's house was a long distance from
the village, and so he did not often have playmates, and it is poor
sport to play marbles or ball by one's self. He did sometimes roll his
hoop or fly his kite when alone, but he would soon get tired, and
then, if it was a clear day, he would most likely say:

"Grandpa, don't you want to go to the big oak?"

And Grandpa would answer:

"Of course, child, we will go. I am always glad to give you that
pleasure."

This he said, but everybody knew he liked to go for his own pleasure
too. So Harry would bring Grandpa his cane and hat, and away they
would go down the crooked path through the field. When they got to the
draw-bars, Harry took them down for his Grandpa to pass through, and
then put them carefully up again, so that the cows should not get out
of the pasture. And, when this was done, there they were at the
oak-tree.

This was a very large tree, indeed, and its branches extended over the
road quite to the opposite side. Right at the foot of the tree was a
clear, cold spring, from which a little brook trickled, and lost
itself in the grass. A dipper was fastened to a projecting root above
the spring, that thirsty travellers might drink. The road by the side
of which the oak stood was a very public one, for it led to a city
twenty miles away. So a great many persons passed the tree, and
stopped at the spring to drink. And that was the reason why little
Harry and his Grandpa were so fond of going there. It was really quite
a lively place. Carriages would bowl along, all glittering with plate
and glass, and with drivers in livery; market wagons would rattle by
with geese squawking, ducks quacking, and pigs squealing; horsemen
would gallop past on splendid horses; hay wagons would creak slowly
by, drawn by great oxen; and, best of all, the stage would dash
furiously up, with the horses in a swinging trot, and the driver
cracking his whip, and the bright red stage swaying from side to side.

It generally happened that somebody in the stage wanted a drink from
the spring, and Harry would take the cup handed out of the window, and
dip it full of the cold, sparkling water, and then there would be a
few minutes of friendly chat.

But the most of the talk was with the foot-passengers. The old man sat
on a bench in the cool shade, and the child would run about and play
until some one came along. Then he would march up to the tree and
stand with his hands in his pockets to hear what was said, very often
having a good deal to say himself. Sometimes these people would stay a
long time under the shade of the tree, and there were so many
different people, and they had so many different kinds of things to
say, that Harry thought it was like hearing a book read, only a great
deal better.

At one time it would be a soldier, who had wonderful things to tell of
the battles he had fought. Another day it would be a sailor, who,
while smoking his pipe, would talk about the trackless deserts of
burning sands; and of the groves of cinnamon, and all sweet spices,
where bright-colored parrots are found; and of the great storms at
sea, when the waves dashed ships to pieces. Another time a foreigner
would have much to say about the strange people and customs of other
lands; and sometimes they talked in a strange language, and could not
be understood, and that was very amusing.

The organ-grinders were the best, for they would play such beautiful
tunes, and perhaps there would be children who would tinkle their
tambourines, and sing the songs that the girls sing in Italy when they
tread out the grapes for wine. And sometimes there would be--oh, joy!
a monkey! And then what fun Harry would have!

And sometimes there were poor men and women, tired and sick, who had
nothing to say but what was sad.

Occasionally an artist would stop under the tree. He would have a
great many of his sketches with him, which he would show to Harry and
Grandpa. And then he would go off to a distance, and make a picture of
the splendid oak, with the old man and child under it, and perhaps he
would put into it some poor woman with her baby, who happened to be
there, and some poor girl drinking out of the spring. And Harry and
Grandpa always thought this better than any of the other pictures he
showed them.

[Illustration]




THE SEA-SIDE.


The ocean is so wonderful itself, that it invests with some of its
peculiar interest the very sands and rocks that lie upon its edges.
There is always something to see at the sea-side; whether you walk
along the lonely coast; go down among the fishermen, and their nets
and boats; or pass along the sands, lively with crowds of
many-colored bathers.

But if there was nothing but the grand old ocean itself, it would be
enough. Whether it is calm and quiet, just rolling in steadily upon
the shore, in long lines of waves, which come sweeping and curling
upon the beach and then breaking, spread far out over the sand--or
whether the storm-waves, tossing high their lofty heads, come rushing
madly upon the coast, dashing themselves upon the sands and thundering
up against the rocks, the sea is grand!

What a tremendous thing an ocean is! Ever in powerful motion; so
wonderful and awful in its unknown depths, and stretching so far, far,
far away!

But, even on the coasts of this great ocean, our days seem all too
short, as we search among the rocks and in the little pools for the
curiosities of the sea-side. Here are shells, and shells, and
shells,--from the great conch, which you put up to your ear to hear
the sound of the sea within, to the tiny things which we find stored
away in little round cases, which are all fastened together in a
string, like the rattles of a snake.

In the shallow pools that have been left by the tide we may find a
crab or two, perhaps, some jelly-fish, star-fish, and those wonderful
living flowers, the sea-anemones. And then we will watch the great
gulls sweeping about in the air, and if we are lucky, we may see an
army of little fiddler-crabs marching along, each one with one claw in
the air. We may gather sea-side diamonds; we may, perhaps, go in and
bathe, and who can tell everything that we may do on the shores of the
grand old ocean!

[Illustration]

And if we ever get among the fishermen, then we are sure to have good
times of still another kind. Then we shall see the men who live by the
sea, and on the sea. We shall wander along the shore, and look at
their fishing-vessels, which seem so small when they are on the water,
but which loom up high above our heads when they are drawn up on the
shore--some with their clumsy-looking rudders hauled up out of
danger, and others with rudder and keel resting together on the rough
beach. Anchors, buoys, bits of chains, and hawsers lie about the
shore, while nets are hanging at the doors of the fishermen's
cottages, some hung up to dry and some hung up to mend.

Here we may often watch the fishermen putting out to sea in their
dirty, but strong, little vessels, which go bouncing away on the
waves, their big sails appearing so much too large for the boats that
it seems to us, every now and then, as if they must certainly topple
over. And then, at other times, we will see the fishermen returning,
and will be on the beach when the boats are drawn up on the sand, and
the fish, some white, some gray, some black, but all glittering and
smooth, are tumbled into baskets and carried up to the houses to be
salted down, or sent away fresh for the markets.

Then the gulls come circling about the scene, and the ducks that live
at the fishermen's houses come waddling down to see about any little
fishes that may be thrown away upon the sand; and men with tarpaulin
coats and flannel shirts sit on old anchors and lean up against the
boats, smoking short pipes while they talk about cod, and mackerel,
and mainsails and booms; and, best of all, the delightful sea-breeze
comes sweeping in, browning our cheeks, reddening our blood, and
giving us such a splendid appetite that even the fishermen themselves
could not throw us very far into the shade, at meal-times.

As for bathing in the sea, plunging into the surf, with the waves
breaking over your head and the water dashing and sparkling all about
you, I need not say much about that. I might as well try to describe
the pleasure of eating a saucer of strawberries-and-cream, and you
know I could not do it.

There are nations who never see the ocean, nor have anything to do
with it. They have not even a name for it.

They are to be pitied for many things, but for nothing more than this.




THE SICK PIKE.


There is no reason why a pike should not be sick. Everything that has
life is subject to illness, but it is very seldom that any fish has
the good sense and the good fortune of the pike that I am going to
tell you about.

This pike was a good-sized fellow, weighing about six pounds, and he
belonged to the Earl of Stamford, who lived near Durham, England. His
story was read by Dr. Warwick to the Literary and Philosophical
Society of Liverpool. I am particular about these authorities because
this story is a little out of the common run.

Dr. Warwick was walking by a lake, in the Earl's park, and the pike
was lying in the water near the shore, probably asleep. At any rate,
when it saw the doctor it made a sudden dart into deep water and
dashed its head against a sunken post. This accident seemed to give
the fish great pain, for it pitched and tossed about in the lake, and
finally rushed up to the surface and threw itself right out of the
water on to the bank.

The doctor now stooped to examine it, and to his surprise the fish
remained perfectly quiet in his hands. He found that the skull was
fractured and one eye was injured by the violence with which the fish
had struck the post. With a silver tooth-pick (he had not his
instruments with him) the doctor arranged the broken portion of the
pike's skull, and when the operation was completed he placed the fish
in the water. For a minute or two the Pike seemed satisfied, but then
it jumped out of the water on to the bank again. The doctor put the
fish back, but it jumped out again, and repeated this performance
several times. It seemed to know (and how, I am sure I have not the
least idea) that that man was a doctor, and it did not intend to
leave him until it had been properly treated--just as if it was one
of his best patients.

The doctor began to see that something more was expected of him, and
so he called a game-keeper to him, and with his assistance he put a
bandage around the pike's head.

[Illustration]

When this surgical operation had been completed the pike was put back
into the water, and this time it appeared perfectly satisfied, and
swam away.

The next day, as Dr. Warwick was sitting by the lake, the pike, with,
the bandage around its head, swam up and stuck its head out of the
water, near the doctor's feet. The good physician took up the fish,
examined the wound, and finding that it was getting on very well,
replaced the bandage and put Mr. Pike into the lake again.

This was a very grateful pike. After the excellent surgical treatment
it received from Dr. Warwick, it became very fond of him, and whenever
he walked by the side of the lake it would swim along by him, and
although it was quite shy and gloomy when other people came to the
waterside, it was always glad to see the doctor, and would come when
he whistled, and eat out of his hand.

I suppose in the whole ocean, and in all the rivers and lakes of the
world, there are not more than two or three fish as sensible and
grateful as this pike. In fact, it was very well for Dr. Warwick that
there were no more such on the Earl of Stamford's estate. A large
practice in the lake must soon have made a poor man of him, for I do
not suppose that even that sensible pike would have paid a doctor's
bill, if it had been presented to him.




TWO KINDS OF BLOSSOMS.

[Illustration]


When the winter has entirely gone, and there is not the slightest
vestige left of snow or ice; when the grass is beginning to be
beautifully green, and the crocuses and jonquils are thrusting their
pretty heads up out of the ground; when the sun is getting to be
quite warm and the breezes very pleasant, then is the time for
blossoms.

Then it is especially the time for apple-blossoms. Not that the peach
and the pear and the cherry trees do not fill their branches with pink
and white flowers, and make as lovely a spring opening as any
apple-trees in the land. Oh no! It is only because there are so many
apple-trees and so many apple-orchards, that the peaches and pears are
a little overlooked in blossom-time.

A sweet place is the apple-orchard, when the grass is green, the trees
are full of flowers, the air full of fragrance, and when every breeze
brings down the most beautiful showers of flowery snow.

And how beautiful and delicate is every individual flower! We are so
accustomed to looking at blossoms in the mass--at treesful and whole
orchardsful--that we are not apt to think that those great heaps of
pink and loveliness are composed of little flowers, each one perfect
in itself.

And not only is each blossom formed of the most beautiful white
petals, shaded with pink; not only does each one of them possess a
most pleasant and delicate perfume, but every one of these little
flowers--every one which comes to perfection, I mean--is but the
precursor of an apple. This one may be a Golden Pippin; that one which
looks just like it may be the forerunner of a Belle-flower; while the
little green speck at the bottom of this one may turn into a Russet,
with his sober coat.

The birds that are flying among the branches do not think much about
the apples that are to come, I reckon, and neither do the early
butterflies that flutter about, looking very much like falling
blossoms themselves. And, for that matter, we ourselves need not think
too much about the coming apple crop. We ought sometimes to think of
and enjoy beauty for its own sake, without reference to what it may do
in the future for our pockets and our stomachs.

There are other kinds of blossoms than apple-blossoms, or those of any
tree whatever. There are little flowers which bloom as well or better
in winter than in summer, and which are not, in fact, flowers at all.

These are ice-blossoms.

Perhaps you have never seen any of them, and I think it is very
likely, for they can only be formed and perceived by the means of
suitable instruments. And so here is a picture of some ice-blossoms.

[Illustration]

These curious formations, some of which appear like stars, others like
very simple blossoms, while others are very complex; and some of which
take the form of fern-leaves, are caused to appear in the centre of a
block of ice by means of concentrated rays of lights which are
directed through the ice by means of mirrors and lenses. Sometimes
they are observed by means of a magnifying-glass, and in other
experiments their images are thrown upon a white screen.

[Illustration]

We may consider these ice-flowers as very beautiful and very
wonderful, but they are not a whit more so than our little blossoms of
the apple-orchard.

The latter are more common, and have to produce apples, while the
ice-flowers are uncommon, and of no possible use.

That is the difference between them.




ABOUT GLASS.


Glass is so common and so cheap that we never think of being grateful
for it. But if we had lived a few centuries ago, when the richest
people had only wooden shutters to their windows, which, of course,
had to be closed whenever it was cold or stormy, making the house as
dark as night, and had then been placed in a house lighted by glass
windows, we would scarcely have found words to express our
thankfulness. It would have been like taking a man out of a dreary
prison and setting him in the bright world of God's blessed sunshine.
After a time men made small windows of stones that were partly
transparent; and then they used skins prepared something like
parchment, and finally they used sashes similar to ours, but in them
they put oiled paper. And when at last glass came into use, it was so
costly that very few were able to buy it, and they had it taken out of
the windows and stored carefully away when they went on a journey, as
people now store away pictures and silver-plate.

Now, when a boy wants a clear, white glass vial for any purpose, he
can buy it for five cents; and for a few pennies a little girl can buy
a large box of colored beads that will make her a necklace to go
several times around her neck, and bracelets besides. These her elder
sister regards with contempt; but there was a time when queens were
proud to wear such. The oldest article of glass manufacture in
existence is a bead. It has an inscription on it, but the writing,
instead of being in letters, is in tiny little pictures.

Here you see the bead, and the funny little pictures on it. The
pictures mean this: "The good Queen Ramaka, the loved of Athor,
protectress of Thebes." This Queen Ramaka was the wife of a king who
reigned in Thebes more than three thousand years ago, which is
certainly a very long time for a little glass bead to remain unbroken!
The great city of Thebes, where it was made, has been in ruins for
hundreds of years. No doubt this bead was part of a necklace that
Queen Ramaka wore, and esteemed as highly as ladies now value their
rubies. It was found in the ruins of Thebes by an Englishman.