6 a salmon brick, I should not have given him two thumbs on each hand, and I should have tried not to slue his right eye around so that he could see around the back of his head to his left ear. And Barker said, 'Oh, wouldn't you?' sarcastic, your honour. And I said, 'No, I wouldn't'; and I wouldn't have painted oak-leaves on a cherry-tree; and I wouldn't have left the spectator in doubt as to whether the figure off by the woods was a factory chimney, or a steamboat, or George Washington's father taking a smoke." "Which was it?" asked the magistrate. "I don't know. Nobody will ever know. So Barker asked me what I'd advise him to do. And I told him I thought his best chance was to abandon the Washington idea, and to fix the thing up somehow to represent The boy who stood on the burning deck,' I told him he might paint the grass red to represent the flames, and daub over the tree so's it would look like the mast, and pull George's foot to this side of the river so's it would rest somewhere on the burning deck, and maybe he might reconstruct the factory chimney or whatever it was, and make it the captain, while he could arrange the guinea-pig to do for the captain's dog." "Did he agree?" "He said the idea didn't strike him. So then I suggested that he might turn it into Columbus discovering America. Let George stand for Columbus, and the tree be turned into a native, and the hatchet made to answer for a flag, while the mountain in the background would answer for the rolling billows of the ocean. He said he'd be hanged if it should. So I mentioned that it might perhaps pass for the execution of Mary Queen of Scots, Put George in black for the headsman, bend over the tree and put a frock on it for Mary, let the hatchet stand, and work in the guineapig and the factory chimney as mourners. Just as I had got the words out of my mouth, Barker knocked me clean through the picture. My head tore out Washington's near leg, and my right foot carried away about four miles of the river. had it over and over on the floor for a while, and finally Barker whipped, I am going to take the law of him in the interests of justice and high art." So Barker was bound over, and Mr. Potts went down to the office of the Spy to write up his criticism, We Guides. From "Innocents Abroad," by Mark Twain. By kind permission of The guides in Genoa are delighted to secure an American party, because Americans so much wonder, and deal so much in sentiment and emotion before any relic of Columbus. Our guide there fidgeted about as if he had swallowed a spring mattress. He was full of animation-full of impatience. He said: "Come wis me, genteelmen !-come! I show you ze letter writing by Christopher Columbo!-write it himself!-write it wis his own hand!-come!" He took us to the municipal palace. After much impressive fumbling of keys and opening of locks, the stained and aged document was spread before us. The guide's eyes sparkled. He danced about us, and tapped the parchment with his finger, “What I tell you, genteelmen! Is it not so? See! handwriting Christopher Colombo !-write it himself!" We looked indifferent-unconcerned. The doctor examined the document very deliberately, during a painful pause. Then he said, without any show of interest : "Ah-Fergusson-what--what did you say was the name of the party who wrote this?" "Christopher Colombo! ze great Christopher Colombo!" Another deliberate examination. "Ah-did he write it himself, or-how?" "He write it himself!-Christopher Colombo! he's own handwriting, write it by himself!" Then the doctor laid the document down, and said :— "Why, I have seen boys in America only fourteen years old that could write better than that." "But zis is ze great Christo” saw. "I don't care who it is! It's the worst writing I ever Now you mustn't think you can impose on us because we are strangers. We are not fools, by a good deal. If you have got any specimens of penmanship of real merit, trot them out! and if you haven't, drive on !" We drove on. The guide was considerably shaken up, but he made one more venture. He had something which he He said : thought would overcome us, "Ah, genteelmen, you come wis me! I show you beautiful-oh, magnificent bust Christopher Colombo! splendid, grand, magnificent!" He brought us before the beautiful bust-for it was beautiful-and sprang back and struck an attitude :— "Ah, look, genteelmen !-beautiful, grand-bust Christopher Colombo!-beautiful bust, beautiful pedestal!" The doctor put up his eyeglass-procured for such occasions:: "Ah-what did you say this gentleman's name was?" Christopher Colombo! ze great Christopher Colombo!" "Christopher Colombo!-the great Christopher Colombo. Well, what did he do?" "Discover America!-discover America!" "Discover America. No-that statement will hardly wash. We are just from America ourselves. We heard nothing about it. Christopher Colombo-pleasant name-is-is he dead?" 66 'Oh, Corpo di Baccho !-three hundred year!" "What did he die of?" "I do not know!-I cannot tell." "Small-pox, think?" "I do not know, genteelmen !-I do not know what he die of !" "Measles, likely?" "Maybe maybe I do not know-I think he die of somethings." "Parents living?" "Im-posseeble !" "Ah-which is the bust and which is the pedestal ?" "Santa Marie !-zis ze bust !-zis ze pedestal !" "Ah, I see, I see-happy combination-very happy combination, indeed, Is-is this the first time this gentleman was ever on a bust?" That joke was lost on the foreigner; guides cannot master the subtleties of the American joke. We have made it interesting for this Roman guide. Yesterday we spent three or four hours in the Vatican again, that wonderful world of curiosities. We came very near expressing interest sometimes-even admiration; it was very hard to keep from it. We succeeded though. Nobody else ever did in the Vatican museums. The guide was bewildered, nonplussed. He walked his legs off, nearly, hunting up extraordinary things, and exhausted all his ingenuity on us, but it was a failure; we never showed any interest in anything. He had reserved what he considered to be his greatest wonder till the last-a royal Egyptian mummy, the best preserved in the world, perhaps. He took us there. He felt so sure, this time, that some of his old enthusiasm came back to him:— "See, genteelmen !-mummy! mummy!" The eyeglass came up as calmly, as deliberate as ever. 'Ah-Fergusson-what did I understand you to say the gentleman's name was?" "Name?-he got no name!-mummy!-'Gyptian mummy!" 66 Yes, yes. Born here?" "No! 'Gyptian mummy!" "Ah, just so. Frenchman I presume?" "No!not Frenchman, nor Roman !-born in Egypta!" "Born in Egypta. Never heard of Egypta before. Foreign locality, likely. Mummy-mummy! How calm he is-how self-possessed. Is, ah-is he dead?" "Dead! dead three thousan' year!" The doctor turned on him savagely : 'Here, now, what do you mean by such conduct as this? Playing us for Chinamen because we are strangers and trying to learn! Trying to impose your vile second hand carcases on us!-thunder and lightning, I've a notion to-to-if you've got a nice fresh corpse, fetch him out!-or, by George, we'll brain you!" We made it exceedingly interesting for this Frenchman. However, he has paid us back, partly, without knowing it. He came to the hotel this morning to ask if we were up, and he endeavoured, as well as he could, to describe us, so that the landlord would know which persons he meant. He finished with the casual remark that we were lunatics. (C) ELOQUENCE. The Wonders of Creation. About the time of the invention of the telescope, another instrument was formed which laid open a scene no less wonderful. This was the microscope. The one leads me to see a system in every star. The other leads me to see a world in every atom. The one taught me that this mighty globe, with the whole burden of its people and of its countries, is but a grain of sand on the high field of immensity. The other teaches me that every grain of sand may harbour within it the tribes and the families of a busy population. The one told me of the insignificance of the world I tread upon. The other redeems it from all its insignificance; for it tells me that in the leaves of every forest, and in the flowers of every garden, and in the waters of every rivulet, there are worlds teeming with life, and numberless as are the glories of the firmament. The one has suggested to me that beyond and above all that is visible to man, there may lie fields of creation which sweep immeasurably along, and carry the impress of the Almighty's hand to the remotest scenes of the universe. The other suggests to me, that within and beneath all that minuteness which the aided eye of man has been able to explore, there may lie a region of invisibles; and that could we draw aside the mysterious curtain which shrouds it from our senses, we might there see a theatre of as many wonders as astronomy has unfolded, a universe within the compass of a point so small as to elude all the powers of the microscope, but where the wonder-working God finds room for the exercise of all His attributes, where He can raise another mechanism of worlds, and fill and animate them all with the evidences of His glory. By the telescope we have discovered that no magnitude, however vast, is beyond the grasp of the Divinity. But by the microscope we have also discovered that no minuteness, however shrunk from the notice of the human eye, is beneath the condescension of His regard. Every addition to the powers of the one instrument extends the limit of His visible dominions. But by every addition to the powers of the other instrument, we see each part of them more crowded than before with the wonders of His unwearying hand. The one is constantly widening the circle of His territory. The other is as con |