A BEE STORY BY BRICKTOP. I HAD an improved back yard. I went through a seed store and bought a sample of everything that would grow in this climate. The result was a perfect tangle of flowers and things, from an overgrown sunflower to a forget-me-not. Mrs. Bricktop is very proud of our garden, and while gushing over it the other morning, a happy thought worked its way under her back hair: "What a delightful thing it would be to have a hive of bees, and raise our own honey, as well as everything else!" I have always thought that woman inspired ever since she convinced me that I couldn't do better than to marry her. This was an original, bold idea; a happy thought. I promised her a hive of bees, and went to business with a lighter heart, and firmer belief in the genuineness of home comforts and amusements.

I bought a hive of honey-bees and brought it home with me that very night. It was one of those patent hydrostatic, back-action hives, in which the bees have peculiar accommodations and all the modern improvements. It was a nice little hive, none of your old-fashioned barn-size affairs. It even had windows in it, so that the bees could look out and see what was going on, and enjoy themselves. Both myself and Mrs. B. were delighted; and before dark I arranged a stand for the hive in the garden, and opened the bay-windows so that the bees could take an early start and get to business by sunrise next morning. Mrs. B. called me honey several times during the evening; and such sweet dreams as we

had!

We intended to be up early next morning to see how our little birds took to our flowers; but a good half-hour before we probably should have done so we were awakened by the unearthly yells of a cat. Mrs. B. leaped from her downy couch, exclaiming, "What can be the matter with our yellow Billy?" The yells of anguish convinced us that something more than ordinary was the matter with him, and so we hurried into our toilets. We rushed out into our back yard, and, oh, what a sight met our astonished gaze! The sight consisted of a yellow cat that appeared to be doing its best to make a pin-wheel of itself. He was rolling over

and over in the grass, bounding up and down, anon darting through the bushes and foliage, standing on his head, and then trying to drive his tail into the ground, and all the while keeping up the most confounded yowling that was ever heard.

"The cat is mad," said Mrs. B., affrighted. "Why shouldn't he be? the bees are stinging him," said I, comprehending the trouble. Mrs. B. flew to the rescue of her cat, and the cat flew at her. So did the bees. One of them drove his drill into her nose, another vaccinated her on the chin, while another began to lay out his work near her eye. Then she howled, and began to act almost as bad as the cat. It was quite an animated scene. She cried murder, and the neighbors looked out from their back windows and cried out for the police, and asked where the fire was. This being a trifle too much, I threw a towel over my head and rushed to her rescue. In doing so, I ran over and knocked her down, trod upon the cat, and made matters no better. Mrs. B. is no child on a wrestle, and she soon had me under her, and was tenderly stamping down the garden-walk with my head, using my ears for handles. Then I yelled, and some of the bees came to her assistance, and stung me all over the face.

In the mean time the neighbors were shouting, and getting awfully excited over the show, while our servant, supposing us fighting, opened the basement door and admitted a policeman, who at once proceeded to go between man and wife. The bees hadn't got at Mrs. B.'s tongue yet, and she proceeded to show the policeman that I had abused her in the most shameful manner, and that I had bought a hive of bees on purpose to torment her into the grave. I tried to explain; but just then a bee stung the officer on the nose, and he understood it all in less than a minute. He got mad and actually lost his temper. He rubbed his nose and did some official cussing. But as this didn't help matters any, he drew his club and proceeded to demolish that patent beehive. The bees failed to recognize his badge of office, and just swarmed on him. They stung him wherever he had no clothing, and in some places where he did have it. Then he howled, and commenced acting after the manner of the cat and its mistress. He rolled on the ground for a moment, and then got up and made

TAM O'SHANTER.

A TALE.

"Of Brownyis and of Bogillis full is this Buke." -GAWIN DOUGLAS.

(Edinburgh Ed., 1793.)

[ROBERT BURNS, the great lyric poet of Scotland, was born 25th January, 1759, in a small cottage near Ayr. His father, then a nursery gardener, and afterwards the occupant of a small farm, had to struggle all his life with poverty and misfortune, but made every exertion to give his children a good education; and the young poet enjoyed an amount of instruction and miscellaneous reading which, to those unacquainted with the habits of the Scottish peasantry, would seem incompatible with the straitened circumstances and early toil which were his lot. About his sixteenth year, he began composing verses in the Scottish dialect, which attracted notice in the vicinity, and extended the circle of his acquaintance; and thus he became exposed to temptations which, acting on an extremely sociable and passionate disposition, broke in upon the previous sobriety and correctness of his life. A small farm, on which he had entered with his brother in 1781, proved far from a prosperous undertaking; and being harassed and imbittered by other misfortunes--the result of imprudence-he resolved to leave his native land, and go to Jamaica. Partly to procure the means of paying his passage, he published a collection of his poems at Kilmarnock in 1786. The reception these met with was highly favor

able, and his genius was recognized in quarters where he had not looked for notice. While preparing to embark, he received a letter encouraging him to go to Edinburgh, and issue a new edition. This was the turning point of his life. During his stay in the Scottish

metropolis, he associated with all that was eminent in

letters, rank, and fashion, and his conversational powers excited little less admiration than his poetry. The profits of the publication were considerable, and enabled him to take the farm of Ellisland, near Dumfries, where he settled in 1788, having publicly ratified his marriage with Jean Armour. With his farm he conjoined the office of an exciseman; but, after three or four years, he was obliged to give up farming, and from that time lived in Dumfries, dependent on his salary from the excise, which, at first only £50, never rose above £70. The striking contrasts in the lot of the rich and the poor with which his residence in Edinburgh had impressed him, made him hail the French revolution with enthusiasm; and some imprudent expressions of his having been reported to the authorities, destroyed his prospects of promotion in the service, and only the interference of an influential friend prevented him from losing his office. Such was then the terror of innovation, and the hatred of everything like liberal opinions, that many of

the better classes, who had feted tne poet, now shunned the "Jacobin," as they stigmatized him. Imbittered by what he felt to be injustice, he recklessly allowed those habits of dissipation to grow upon him which made the more respectable of all classes look coldly on him; and the remorse thus occasioned in his calmer moments aggravated that tendency to melancholy which the gloom and toil of his early years had probably implanted in his constitution. Broken in health, he died 21st of July, 1796.]

[In order to facilitate the reading of Burns, for those unfamiliar with the Scottish dialect, we have, where necessary, placed the English equivalent in note form at the bottom of the page.]

[This is a west of Scotland legend embellished by Genius-no other poem in our language displays such a variety of power in the same number of lines. "In the inimitable tale of Tam O'Shanter," says Scott, "Burns has left us evidence of his ability to combine the ludicrous with the awful. No poet, with the exception of Shakespeare, ever possessed the power of exciting the most varied and discordant emotions with such rapid transitions."]

When 1 chapman billies leave the street,
And 2 drouthy neibors, neibors meet;
As market days are wearing late,
An' folk begin to tak the gate;
While we sit bowsing at the nappy,
An' getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps, and styles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Where sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warni.

This truth fand honest TAM O'SHANTER,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter:
(Auld Ayr, whom ne'er a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonnie lasses).

O Tam! had'st thou but been sae wise,
As taen thy ain wife Kate's advice!
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A bletherin, blusterin, drunken blellum;
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was na sober;
That ilka melder wi' the Miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;
That ev'ry naig was ca'd a shoe on
The Smith and thee gat roarin fou on;
That at the L-d's house, ev'n on Sunday,
Thou drank wi' Kirton Jean till Monday.
She prophesied, that, late or soon,
Thou wad be found, deep drown'd in Doon,
Or catch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk,
By Alloway's auld, haunted kirk.

Ah, gentle dames! it gars me 1 greet, To think how mony counsels sweet, How mony lengthen'd, sage advices, The husband frae the wife despises!

But to our tale:-Ae market-night,
Tam had got planted unco right,
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely,
Wi' reaming 2 swats, that drank divinely;
And at his elbow, Souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, 3drouthy crony:
Tam lo'ed him like a very brither;
They had been fou for weeks thegither.
The night drave on wi' sangs an' clatter;
And ay the ale was growing better:
The Landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wi' favors secret, sweet and precious:
The Souter tauld his queerest stories;
The Landlord's laugh was ready chorus:
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.

Care, mad to see a man sae happy,
E'en drown'd himsel amang the nappy.
As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure,
The minutes wing'd their way wi' pleasure:
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious!

But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You seize the flow'r, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment white-then melts forever;
Or like the Borealis race,

That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbow's lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.

Nae man can tether time nor tide,
The hour approaches Tam maun ride-
That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane,
That dreary hour Tam mounts his beast in;
And sic a night he took the road in,
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in.

Whiles glow'ring round wi' prudent cares,
Lest bogles catch him unawares;
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,
Where ghaists and 5houlets nightly cry.

By this time he was cross the ford,
Where in the snaw the chapman "smoor'd;
And past the birks and 'meikle stane,
Where drunken Charlie brak's neck-bane;
And thro' the whins, and by the cairn,
Where hunters fand the murder'd bairn,
And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Where Mungo's mither hang'd hersel.
Before him Doon pours all his floods,
The doubling storm roars thro' the woods,
The lightnings flash frae pole to pole,
Near and more near the thunders roll,
When, glimmering thro' the groaning trees,
Kirk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze,

Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing,
And loud resounded mirth and dancing.

Inspiring bold John Barleycorn!
What dangers thou canst make us scorn!
Wi' tippenny, we fear nae evil;
Wi' usquebae, we'll face the devil!

The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's noddle,
Fair play, he car'd na deils a 10 boddle;
But Maggie stood, right sair astonish'd,
Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd,
She ventur'd forward on the light;
And, wow! Tam saw an unco sight!

Warlocks and witches in a dance:
Nae cotillon, brent new frae France,
But horn-pipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels,
Put life and mettle in their heels.
A winnock-bunker in the east,
There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast;
A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large,
To gie them music was his charge:
He screw'd the pipes and gart them skirl,
Till roof and rafters a' did dirl.
Coffins stood round, like open presses,
That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses;
And (by some devilish cantraip sleight)
Each in its cauld hand held a light,
By which heroic Tam was able
To note upon the haly table,

A murderer's banes, in gibbet-airns;

Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd bairrs;
A thief, new-cutted frae a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape;
Five tomahawks, wi' blude red-rusted;
Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted;
A garter, which a babe had strangled;
A knife a father's throat had mangled,

Ale.

4 Sometimes.