"Oh, what a beautiful lily! I must have it ;" and she looked up quickly at her soldier cousin.

But the bank was steep, and not at all safe, and he did not much like the look of it.

"You don't offer to get it for me," she pouted. He looked down into the stagnant water lying blackly below.

"It's rather a dangerous undertaking," he said. She tossed her head saucily.

"What! you don't mean to say you are afraid?" she questioned.

Of course he was, for who that could not swim would care to risk his life for so small an object? But he was not brave enough to say so, and the girl, possessed with the spirit of contradiction, turned pettishly from him:

He hesitated.

"If you really want it," he began, but she caught him up.

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No, I don't really want it now I see you are so much afraid."

She could have bitten her tongue off for her foolish speech the next moment, but it was too late. Those last slighting words had been enough. Thoughts of common sense and prudence vanished, for though he saw the folly of it he was not proof against the lash of a woman's tongue.

Another moment he was half way down the bank, the next, as might have been expected, his foot slipped, and with a great splash he disappeared under the dark water.

Annie gave a great cry as she saw the danger, and kneeling down, dug one hand into the ground, while with the other she clutched at his hand as he rose half insensible, but the strain was too great, and she, too, over-balanced herself and fell headlong into the water.

A pleasant situation. It seemed that two lives would be sacrificed for the sake of an idle word.

But Annie's loud shriek had been heard, and as the thought of her folly was passing through her mind she felt a rough strong hand grasping her arm. A country labourer who had been gathering wood within a little distance had heard the cry and had run to the place, and clinging with one arm to the trunk of a tree dragged the foolish couple safely out of their peril,

It was more than a week before they were quite well again; and during that time Annie learnt to hold her tongue, and Ralph to resolve that that was the last time he'd risk his neck for the sake of an idle sneer.

FLORA WOOTTON.

ORI

When next I sought the well-known height,
A Summer's wealth lay heaped around,
The Sun-god's magic touch had crowned
The fields with flowers and living light;
And, blue beneath the bluer skies,

Old Ocean lay entranced and still;
The gulls came floating round the hill-
The white sail never met my eyes.

'Twas Autumn; and the reaper's blade

Was busy in the shaking corn,

And through the stubble-fields forlorn The landrail, brazen-throated, played. The berries, ruby-tinted, hung

Where petals once had caught the dew; Beyond, white sails were on the blue, But his came not that group among.

Then Winter frowned; and one wild night,
I climbed the cliff with hurried feet,
For, through the storm and driving sleet,
The well-known sail had caught my sight;
I saw it gleam above the foam,

And then the black prow dipped and fell; The night closed o'er the heaving swellAnd thus the missing boat came home.

It seems but yesterday, and yet,

Since that dark eve, long years have fled, My hopes like primrose-flowers are dead, And Life's bright sun in darkness set. Yet thrice a year I climb the steep,

And hear strange voices in the gale; And when the winter storms prevail I sit at home, and watch, and weep.

HORAGE G. GROSER.

BUTTING A SNOWDRIFT.

RDERING one of his Persians to make his camels retire about 200 yards, the Kurd called twenty of the best mounted of the villagers to his side; then, striking his horse and shouting wildly, he galloped along the track, and charged the drift. In a second or two nothing could be seen but the head of the rider; his steed was entirely hidden from our view. After a few struggles the man backed the animal out of the snow, having made a hole in it some twenty feet long by four wide. The next horseman rode at the place like the first. Each Kurd followed in succession. They finally forced a passage. This was a wild sight to witness-these Kurds in their quaint head-dresses, and on strong, fine-looking horses of Turcoman breed, many of them quite sixteen hands high, charging the snowdrift, yelling and invoking Allah; the Persians, phlegmatic and still, seemingly not caring a straw about the matter; the lieutenant encouraging the Kurds by cries and gesticulations.

JP in the hay-loft among the sweet scented hay sat Robin, Jenny, and Mark. They had come up there one bright summer's day to have a quiet, confidential talk, because their father was writing in the dining-room, and their mother and aunt working in the drawing-room, and, outside, the sun was making it too hot for any creatures but the bees.

It was Saturday afternoon, when the three of them were richer by threepence each than they were in the morning. Three threepences make ninepence by the multiplication table, and as last week's savings had been hoarded up, in spite of brandy-balls and the like, two ninepences made one and sixpence. "Now we can buy them," said Mark, lolling back in the hay, while Jenny kicked her basket away from her to show her glee.

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"I hope they won't be gone," said Robin They were two such beauties, and I wouldn't put a pair of common ones in our new hutch if somebody gave us them for nothing."

"Nor would I," said Mark, "while we have the money to buy good ones for ourselves."

"Only," broke in Jenny, "we are not sure that father will let us go to Dick Allen. Father says he is not a good sort of boy, and perhaps the rabbits take after him."

The boys laughed, and hoped better things. Last week Robin had gone down to the village, and seen the two which struck his fancy. One was brown and the other white, but quite out of the ordinary brown and white. These rabbits were large and tender-skinned creatures. Their eyes were

soft in colour, their ears long and silky, and their whole bearing of no common order.

Robin inquired the price, and learned that eighteenpence would buy them. Jenny was promised the pleasure of feeding them while the boys were at school, if she would contribute funds for two weeks, and this bait was sufficient to out-glorify a doll's hat, which was in a shop-window in Mundham at the price of sixpence.

The threepences were collected. The sun, meanwhile went down, and so did the children. Their father was still writing letters in the dining-room when his sons entered, and requested a small audience with him. He was quite willing for them to buy rabbits, as they had the money. But his face darkened at the name of Dick Allen, and he asked if there were no other rabbits to be bought in Mundham.

"Not such beauties!" said Robin. You never saw any like them in your life, father, nor has Dick. He says you couldn't get them at the price anywhere else."

"And I am sure he is not so bad as folks say," continued Mark. "He has a bad name, and so everybody hangs him. But we need not chum with him because we buy his rabbits."

"Well, well, ask your mother," said the father. "I don't care for you to be on speaking terms with that lad; but your mother knows what is best; go to her."

The deputation proceeded to the drawing-room, where Jenny was before them. Mrs. Ross had already heard the tale, and showed a mother's enthusiasm for rabbits. But Dick Allen was a

N N

stumbling-block to her likewise. He was supposed not to be honest, and, unfortunately, his face looked as suspicious as his character was supposed to be. Mrs. Blake knew that the acquaintance was not likely to end with the barter of rabbits, for people in country-places are too much thrown in one another's ways to transact the smallest piece of business without a remembrance to make them friendly afterwards. Besides, Dick Allen was thought to be a taking boy, especially to young people. He knew all the secrets of the woods: where the sweetest flowers grew, where the fish waited to be caught, where the nests could most easily be climbed to, where the moles burrowed, how the squirrels might be trapped. But these things which he learnt by wandering about, often the live-long night, were not his only accomplishments; there were others which gave him a bad name, and Mrs. Blake looked at her sons and hesitated.

Then she thought of a plan to satisfy anybody who was capable of satisfaction.

"I will send William into the village," she said, "to tell Allen that he may bring up the rabbits this evening."

"Now, mother," said Mark, in an aggrieved tone, "that won't be half the fun. That will be just like having them sent us, and not buying them ourselves." "And we shan't keep the money either," said Robin.

"And Dick has the cunningest squirrel to show us too," said Mark ; he said he would let us look at all his live creatures when we went there."

"Well, my dear lads, that's not a recommendation to me," said Mrs. Blake, in her kind, sprightly manner. "Your father and I want to keep you out of the way of Dick Allen, as you very well know."

"As if we would let him teach us anything bad!" said Mark.

"Ah, my boy!" remarked his mother.

"And he's a very good sort," said Robin. "You've no idea how kind he is to his animals; he just loves them and coddles them up like you do baby."

"I am glad to hear it," said Mrs. Blake. "But he is known to associate with bad boys, who are some of them thieves, and all are lazy good-for-nothings. Then, it is not much to be kind to animals, if he is unkind to his mother and his poor little sister. He lets his mother keep him, and he beats the poor child shamefully. Come, boys, you know that for yourselves."

Mark and Robin were silent.

"Your father," continued Mrs. Blake, "tried to help Allen for his poor mother's sake. We had him up here, while you were at school last term, to clean the knives and boots, but we were continually missing things, and one evening his mother came up in great distress, because she had found two silver spoons in his pocket marked with our initials. We did not prosecute him, as his mother begged us to have mercy on him once more, and since she had convicted him, we let him off. He went away to Mr. Dudley's farm, and we hoped he was doing well. But I am afraid by his being at home once more, he has been up to mischief again. No, indeed, I can't have you going to him, but if you like, William shall bring the rabbits here."

The boys did not like that at all, and went away

very sulky, and not inclined to be civil to Jenny, who tried to comfort them. Mr. Blake, when he came into the drawing-room for a cup of tea, found her beside her mother looking pitiful, less on account of the rabbits than because her brothers were having a solemn conference, and would not admit her to it. Girls, they thought, were all very well to give their money, but not their opinion.

Mr. Blake heard all the story again from her, yet did not offer to trust the boys with Allen, and presently he went away, and Jenny was sent by her mother to pick some flowers for the dinner-table. She was bending over the flower-bed, which was separated from the road by a thick hedge, when she heard her name gently called, and, looking up, saw a poor woman, whom she recognised as Dick Allen's mother.

"Miss Jenny," she said, "I'm in a sight of trouble with my boy. There's a gentleman wants to buy his two beautifullest rabbits, and we almost starving for want of bread. And he won't part with them, because he says he's promised them, but he won't tell me who, 'cause he says that's forcing the other gents to buy. I'm a'most out of my mind with him. gave a guess that maybe the young gentlemen here might have wanted them, as I see them talking together a few days ago. My boy's as obstinate as a donkey, tho' he's a good boy now and then, when the fit takes him."

But I

"I know all about it," said Jenny. "Come in and talk to mamma." The two mothers had a long talk, and presently Jenny went down to the village, with Mrs. Allen carrying a large basket. She brought back the rabbits with her and put them in the new hutch, and when the boys found them there they were so lost in admiration that Dick Allen was for a time forgotten.

But when they wanted to know the secret of the transaction, Jenny was ready to tell it."

"He can't be so bad, though," said Mark. And as Mr. Blake came by just then, he called out, "Allen knows how to keep his word, father; he wouldn't sell, nor tell who he'd promised them to, and his mother was starving."

This was not very easy to make out at first sight, but, when it was explained, Mr. Blake looked thoughtful. There seemed something erratically fine and good in the bad boy, after all. But the days passed on, and more pressing matters intervened, until Dick was brought uppermost again by a message asking Mr. Blake to go and see him, for he was ill, and to all appearance seriously so. Mr. Blake was the hardest-worked surgeon in Mundham, partly because he never refused a poor patient, but attended him as unremittingly as a rich one. He found Dick sickening for typhoid fever, and came home with the news and a solemn face, lest this case might be the harbinger of many more.

Such a calamity was, however, averted, and Mrs. Blake did as much good as the doctor, by carrying nourishing food to the sick lad. Jenny always covered the basket with flowers and the boys sent news of the rabbits, so that Dick found himself in different surroundings to any he had known before. Mrs. Blake took with her, also, good words, fitly spoken, that sounded doubly weighty when poor Dick lay between life and death-a hand stretched