her desire to assure herself that the corners were empty. Then she flung herself back into bed, trembling with fright and wondering at her own courage. Surely now she could feel safe and get to sleep. Burrowing deep into the pillows she began a favorite game of colors, which consisted of rubbing her eyes until patterns of bright hues could be seen in kaleidoscopic rapidity and variety. But to-night no pleasing combinations diverted her thoughts,- only glowing spots unpleasantly suggestive of wild eyes,- perhaps wolves or tigers.

She sat up in bed in new terror, and stood straining her eyes around the room. Out on the porch the hammock creaked mysteriously. Was it possible that a bear had stealthily climbed up from the woods and was even now hiding under its fringed hangings? Only yesterday she had laughed to scorn such a suggestion from Pet, informing him that bears lived far away— at the North Pole, in fact and never could come near their cottage. But what did it matter now if he couldn't come, so long as he might be there! She turned her eyes fearfully from the hammock, and found new cause for terror in the blackness around her. Curious noises, faint as a dream; queer shapeless shadows tormented her with their vagueness. From side to side she tossed, fearing to see some hideous Thing by her bedside or to feel an unknown touch on her back. Why! oh, why had the Menagerie Book fascinated her with its painted pictures! At the very thought of the yellow tiger a shiver ran down her back. His eyes were fiercely glowing, his teeth ready to snap,-and-yes, he surely must be under her bed. At this dreadful idea Mother's Girl could lie still no longer. Quivering with fear, feeling the wild teeth closing upon her, she slipped out of bed, and fled from the room, tumbling down with a great sigh of relief at the top of the stairs. Inexpressibly comforting was the reflected flicker of the candle from Pet's room downstairs; behind, her own doorway gaped black and mysterious. It seemed impossible that she had ever dared to lie quietly, far within its gloom.

But now Nurse was being called to supper and the light grew dim, and retreated down the hall. "Good-night," called Pet,a shameless confession of fear which Mother's Girl could never understand. “Good-night," echoed Nurse, and again his small and wavering voice hailed after her. Then all the house grew silent and dark. Then mysterious noises and shadowy figures

once more crowded around the child crouched at the top of the stairs, ghostly flapping of shades, faint footsteps, sudden draughts of wind, shuddering fear of being overwhelmed by some unknown terror. Vivid and more vivid grew her dread of the tiger, until at last she fancied that he had come out from under her bed and was even now approaching her. In the dark! - shaggy mane!- cruel eyes gleaming!-o-oh!—and with a cry she sprang down the stairs and stumbled wildly towards Pet's little crib.

The touch of his small hot hands quieted her throbbing nerves, and quickly reminded her that her reputation must be kept intact.

"Are you afraid, Pet?" she queried indulgently, as she pushed aside his doll, and crept into its place beside him.

"Yes," he whispered, gratefully clinging to her hand, "I cyosed de shutters dat de bears touldn't yook in, but 'fraid an' how."

"There's a tiger under my bed!" announced Mother's Girl impressively, "-and-and,-I thought I'd come down and see how you were.'

Pet took the statement with calm belief. He never questioned any adventure or marvel that befell his big sister.

"How'd he yook?" he inquired with interest, without a doubt that she had examined the monster closely and calmly.

"He had large, shining eyes," boasted Mother's Girl, unconsciously utilizing the pictures in the Menagerie Book for her description," and he looked all big and hairy with clawy paws, and white teeth that scrunched, so," she suited her actions to her words, but stopped suddenly, her heart beginuing to beat in new alarm. "He may be coming down-stairs now," she whispered. 'Perhaps he's heard us talking."

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They lay huddled together in the darkness, and all at once Pet began to cry. "I'm 'fraid, I'm 'fraid," he moaned, and clung to Mother's Girl.

"I'll take care of you," she said stoutly, though her voice quavered, and the dining-room in the other house suddenly seemed very far away.

"Perhaps,-perhaps we'd better get up." They jumped hastily over the railings of the crib, and Pet, with his doll in his arms, trailed down the hall after his sister, and out onto the porch. The moon bathed the whole valley in brilliant light, and

seemed to forbid the tiger to emerge from the dark interior. Both the children sat down on the steps, and sighed with tremulous relief. Over in the other house the guests were assembled, and the rosy lamps shed a circle of light through the open windows. Slowly Pet and Mother's Girl, in nighties and with bare feet, dragged over the grass, until they could hear the "clink, clink" of the dishes, the many-tuned hum of conversation, and bursts of laughter that floated out on the quiet night. They knelt down amongst the flowers in the misty moonlight, and felt secure at last from the awful clutch of the tiger. Pet pillowed his curls happily on his sister's lap, and fell fast asleep, while Mother's Girl nodded over him.

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*

Why, what is that, looking like a white rabbit, over among the flower-beds ?" exclaimed the hostess, when at last the guests. arose from the table, and strolled out upon the piazza.

"Why! what! I do déclare! Pet and how did you ever, ever come here, Mother's own girl?" she cried in tender surprise as she lifted the sleeping children from the dewy grass. Pet, his shining curls all damp, and his face still rosy with sweet sleep, did not lift his heavy lashes, but Mother's Girl was wide awake at once. "He wanted me," she murmured, gazing fearfully around the circle of astonished faces. And then the overwhelming terror of the evening flashed back to her memory; and throwing her arms around the dear mother that clasped her, the secret of many months came forth in a burst of tears.

"I was so afraid! so afraid! mamma," she sobbed.

ELEANOR ADLER.

THERE CAME TWO RAVENS

There came two ravens to carry me away,
And they flew, and they flew, the livelong day.
One took me by the head, and one by the feet,

And that, I thought, was not quite meet.

One tickled all my face with the brushing of his wings,

But that was scarcely the heaviest of things.

The other pecked and snatched at my foot all day,

As they carried me away, and carried me away.

They carried me across from the shore to the sea;
And that was a sorrow and a fear to me.

They carried me across from the sea unto the shore;
And myself was aweary and my heart was sore.
They carried me across from the day to the night,
And it was strange to me when I could not see the light.
They carried me across from the night unto the day,
And I had forgotten how to sing and to pray.

They lit upon a pine-tree, and the tree it was high;
On a bare bald mountain that wore against the sky.
And they tangled my feet in the needles of the pine,
And they gave me cones for bread, and the bitter pitch for wine.
And they swung me up and down till I cracked the brittle sky;
And I had forgotten how to think or to cry.

The sun came so close that I should have been afraid,
He was like a smelting furnace, so hot and so red.

The stars came so close that I might have caught them down,
They were sharp, but they shone like great jewels in a crown.

And the two ravens sat in the dark pine-tree,

And they jeered and they mocked and they screamed at me.
And I had forgotten how to sing or to pray,

And I had forgotten if it were night or day.

The pine pitch smeared my mouth, and the cones I could not eat, And the needles pricked and wove round my head and my feet.

And there I might have stayed till it came my time to die,
But an Angel out of Heaven went flying quickly by.
And he blew upon my feet, and he blew upon my head,
And "Wherefore lie you here?" were the words that he said.

And I fell a thousand fathoms, and I flew a thousand miles,
And I feared as I flew for the two ravens' wiles;

But the Angel went behind, like a goodly wind at dawn,
And he carried me across to my own fields of corn!

He carried me across from the night unto the day,
And then I remembered, and began to sing and pray.
He carried me across from the sea unto the shore,
And when I saw the earth I blessed him even more.
He carried me across, and he left me, and he went
Like a fog that dissolves, like a wind that is spent.

And I walked upon my feet to my own cottage door,
And there were the children playing on the floor,
And there was my wife, and she only smiled and said,

"How you're late from the field! How much hay have you made?"
And I kissed her and I looked at the clock on the shelf,

And then I remembered that I was myself!

And I had not been away an hour but only four,

And the shadows of the trees touched the crack on the floor.

But I did not tell my wife how they carried me away,
From the shore to the sea, from the night to the day.
I did not tell my wife how I swung against the sky,
And how I forgot to laugh or to cry.

I did not tell my wife how I drank the pitch of pine,
But I sucked the ripe grapes that grew on the vine.
I did not tell my wife of the Angel from the sky,
But I shall remember until the day I die.

There came two ravens to carry me away.

If you call it but a dream, what am I to say you nay?

FANNIE STEARNS DAVIS.

THE ART OF BEING INTERESTED

Self-improvement! Self-culture! These are by-words of an age in which men, who are already leading lives sufficiently strenuous to over-draw their accounts in the national bank of nervous energy, are seeking eagerly for breadth of view, through extent of knowledge. They are words suggestive of wearisome sight-seeing in galleries of famous pictures; arduous searching for names of innocent birds and flowers; a feverish haste to be master of current events; a laborious reading of many books in the making of which there is no end. Culture, as an aim, and reading, seeing, and searching, as factors in its attainment we all agree in commending; but the wearisome, arduous, feverish, laborious means we judge unworthy of its object, and beg leave to plead in its stead for the simple art of being interested.

There is a principle of pedagogy which the lay mind may be permitted to express in this way: train the child's attention by taking as your point of departure an object which the child knows and enjoys. It is a principle which finds its application in children of advanced years-among those seekers of self-cult