demics do, and within three months it will be just waltzing through this land like a whirlwind! and whoever it touches can make his will, and contract for his funeral. Well, you can't cure it, you know, but you can prevent it. How? Turnips! that's it! Turnips and water! Nothing like it in the world. Old McDowells says, just fill yourself up two or three times a day, and you can snap your fingers at the plague. Sh!-keep mum, but just you confine yourself to that diet and you are all right. I wouldn't have old McDowells know that I told you for anything he would never speak to me again. Take some more water, Washington-the more water you drink, the better. Here, let me give you some more of the turnips. No, no, no; now, I insist. There, now; absorb those, they're mighty sustaining--brimful of nutriment—all the medical books say so; just eat from four to seven good-sized turnips at a meal, and drink from a pint and a half to a quart of water, and then just sit around a couple of hours and let them ferment. You'll feel like a fighting-cock next day."

Fifteen or twenty minutes later the Colonel's tongue was still chattering away-he had pilcd several future fortunes out of several incipient "operations" which he had blundered into within the past week, and was now soaring along through some brilliant expectations, born of late promising experiments upon the lacking ingredient of the eye-water. And at such a time Washington ought to have been a rapt, enthusiastic listener, but he was not, for two matters disturbed his mind and distracted his attention. One was, that he discovered, to his confusion and shame, that in allowing himself to be helped a second time to the turnips, he had robbed those hungry children. He had not needed the dreadful

"fruit," and had not wanted it; and when he saw the pathetic sorrow in their faces when they asked for more and there was no more to give them, he hated himself for his stupidity, and pitied the famishing young things with all his heart. The other matter that disturbed him was the dire inflation that had begun in his stomach. It grew and grew, it became more and more insupportable. Evidently the turnips were "fermenting." He forced himself to sit still as long as he could, but his anguish conquered him at last.

He rose, in the midst of the Colonel's talk, and excused himself on the plea of a previous engagement. The Colonel followed him to the door, promising, over and over again, that he would use his influence to get some of the Early Malcolms for him, and insisting that he should not be such a stranger, but come and take potluck with him every chance he got. Washington was glad enough to get away and feel free again. He immediately bent his steps toward home.

DRIFTING.

MY soul to-day

Is far away,

Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;

My wingéd boat

A bird afloat,

Swims round the purple peaks remote:

Round purple peaks

It sails, and seeks

Blue inlets and their crystal creeks,

Where high rocks throw,
Through deeps below,

A duplicated golden glow.

Far, vague, and dim,
The mountains swim;

While on Vesuvius' misty brim,

With outstretched hands,

The gray smoke stands

O'erlooking the volcanic lands.

Here Ischia smiles

O'er liquid miles;

And yonder, bluest of the isles,

Calm Capri waits,

Her sapphire gates

Beguiling to her bright estates.

I heed not, if

My rippling skiff

Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff;With dreamful eyes

My spirit lies

Under the walls of Paradise.

Under the walls

Where swells and falls

The Bay's deep breast at intervals
At peace I lie,

Blown softly by,

A cloud upon this liquid sky.

The day, so mild,

Is Heaven's own child,

With Earth and Ocean reconciled;

The airs I feel

Around me steal

Are murmuring to the murmuring keel.

Over the rail

My hand I trail

Within the shadow of the sail;
A joy intense,

The cooling sense

Glides down my drowsy indolence.

With dreamful eyes

My spirit lies

Where Summer sings and never dies,— O'erveiled with vines,

She glows and shines

Among her future oil and wines.

Her children, hid

The cliffs amid,

Are gamboling with the gamboling kid; Or down the walls,

With tipsy calls,

Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.

The fisher's child,

With tresses wild,

Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled,

With glowing lips

Sings as she skips,

Or gazes at the far-off ships.

Yon deep bark goes

Where Traffic blows,

From lands of sun to lands of snows;

THE LAW OF DEATH.

THE song of Kilvany. Fairest she

In all the land of Savatthe.

She had one child, as sweet and gay,
And dear to her as the light of day.
She was so young and he so fair,

The same bright eyes, and the same dark hair.
To see them by the blossomy way,

They seemed two children at their play.

There came a death-dart from the sky,
Kilvany saw her darling die.

The glimmering shades his eyes invades,
Out of his cheeks the red bloom fades;