great red whortleberries, that got tangled about his feet and tripped him up, so that he fell headlong over two old men with crutches and spilled all the berries from his basket. Then he was alone in the woods, and great fierce dogs chased him, while he could not run at all for flocks of chickens that kept getting in his way, till, at last, a drove of pigs chased the dogs away, at which he did not feel at all surprised. One never is surprised, you know, at the most unnatural things happening in dreams. At length he saw a grey cloud, which grew white and clear, till it parted in the centre, showing a most lovely woman. Her face was that of the girl at the farm-house gate, only far more beautiful than any he had ever seen before. She held out to him a little box, upon which was written, in blue and silver letters-"The Reward of Kindness."

As he took it, he heard the sound of sweet music, and, looking about him, saw that it came from a company of robins singing in the trees beside him; but the red of their breasts seemed turned to pure gold, and their wings were flashing with gems brighter than dew-drops in the sunlight. He turned to open his box, when, suddenly, a great light almost blinded him, and, putting up his hands to shade his eyes, he awoke. The moon was shining softly in at the window, and he lay a long time awake, thinking of the dream-lady, and wishing he could have seen what was in the box before waking.

At last he slept again, and only woke when the sun was far up in the sky, and the birds had left off singing for the more prosy work of hunting their breakfasts. He was too lame and ill, from the cold he had taken, to rise either that day or the next. The third morning he was surprised, on going to the window, to see the carriage of their most wealthy neighbour standing at the gate, and still more so when his mother told him, with a more cheerful look than she had worn since his father's death, that he was wanted below. Mr. Burns had with him a happy-looking, neatly-dressed old gentleman, who claimed to be the one to whom Jem had given all his dinner two days before.

"And," said Mr. Burns, "he is my father, who, not prospering in business, resolved to try a new country, while I remained at home. But, lately, there were sad fortunes for him, and he set off for England, without writing, to find me. It was a long journey across the sea for one so feeble, and, soon after landing, he lost all his money; so he was forced to beg his bread, and hardly would he have reached me but for your kindness; and I have, from all who know you, the good account I expected from that act. "Your friend who owns the large dog," continued he, with a smile, "tells me you have a great regard for the welfare of animals. Now, I have many sheep and cattle, beside various sorts of poultry, and every year I lose some from the carelessness of those who tend them. I am sure you would care well for them, and if you will take that place, you shall have a pound a month, besides a good home, and every spring

three fine lambs from the flock. Your mother has promised to come, too, and mind the dairy and farm-house."

Jem was almost too happy to speak. His fondest hopes were realized. Here was the nice home for his mother and the work for himself. And here we will leave him, only saying that the kindness of heart which had won him friends, never failed to keep them, neither did he ever forget that all our good gifts are from God.

EASY LESSONS.

BY PHOEBE CARY.

Come, little children, come with me,
Where the winds are singing merrily,

As they toss the crimson clover;
We'll walk on the hills and by the brooks,
And I'll show you stories in prettier books
Than the ones you are poring over.

Do you think you could learn to sing a song,
Though you drummed, and hummed it all day long,
Till hands and brains were aching,
That would match the clear, untutored notes
That drop from the pretty, tender throats
Of birds, when the day is breaking?

Did you ever read, on any page,
Though written with all the wisdom of age,
And all the truth of preaching,
Any lesson that taught you so plain
Content with your humble work and gain,
As the golden bee is teaching?

For see, as she floats on her airy wings,
How she sings and works, and works and sings,
Showing us clearly what to do
Never stopping nor staying;
To make of duty a pleasure, too,

And to make our work but playing.

Do you suppose that a book can tell
Maxims of prudence, half so well

As the little ant, who is telling
To man, as she patiently goes and comes,
Bearing her precious grains and crumbs,

How want is kept from the dwelling?
Whatever a story can teach to you
Of the good a little thing may do,

The hidden brook is showing,
Because of its banks, so fresh and green,
Whose quiet way is only seen
And the flowers beside it growing.

If we go where the golden lily grows,
Where, clothed in raiment fine, she glows
And ponder over each precious leaf,
Like a king in all his glory,
We shall find there, written bright and brief,
The words of a wondrous story.

MY DEAR C,

Political excitement has been great this last month in Paris, and all the animosity of partyspirit has been roused to the highest pitch at the prospect of the fall of the Temporal Power, which all seemed to think inevitable, both friends and enemies; for few thought that the Emperor would risk a second expedition to Rome. However, the French are again the guardians of the Vatican and Garibaldi a prisoner. The atrocious words of the general who commands the expedition, General de Failly, in his despatch: "The Chassepot gun has done wonders"-Le fusil Chassepot a fait merveille-continue to be commented on with great disgust by the liberal party, as well they may one would think that the general was rendering an account of the trial of a new gun at Vincenne, where the aim is a target, and not of a carnage of fellowcreatures. But the clerical party is not satisfied with Napoleon III., in spite of his care for the Pope; they want him to re-establish the old order of things, and divide Italy as before. It was noised abroad that such were his intentions, and some had even given the kingdom of Naples to Prince Napoleon. Maybe that menaces to that effect have been the cause of Victor-Emmanuel's conduct. I think how the Italians must love the French! We are wondering how the Emperor will get us out of Rome again. As for the projected conference, we have not much faith in its realization, and none in its settling the Roman question. The Imperial speech, at the opening of Parliament the other day, has made us for a while heedless of all except turning and twisting the words of the speech about in every way, to see what we can make out of them. The quiet citizens see in it sure indications of peace, the restless and ambitious decided warlike intentions, and delight in comparing certain passages in the King of Prussia's address to his Lords and Commons with certain expressions of his Majesty of France. Several speeches are expected from our great orators in the coming discussions in the Corps Legislatif. There is expected to be an alteration in the laws of the press. Monsieur Emile Olivier, tired of waiting for his place of Minister of State, intends returning to his old party, with proofs in hand that he might have been Minister had he chosen to submit to certain ties in his acts. Idle tongues say that Mr. Rouher permitted himself to smile at a Privy Council, after a speech of her Majesty Eugenie, which highly offended the lady, as she has pretensions to understand public affairs-while people in general think she is more competent to judge and regulate the colour and length of her dresses. And àpropos of dress, you will not, perhaps, be sorry to know that the Empress wore a white satin one at the opening of the Chambres, figured with laurel.

leaves and trimmed with velvet carmélite, a maroon velvet sash, covered with a Marie Antoinette fichu in black lace, a white bonnet trimmed with the same colour as the trimming of the dress, with an aigrette of diamonds elegantly placed on one side. She was lovelyso the men say. The Princess Matilda had a yellow satin-dress and jacket trimmed with sable-the beautiful dark sable we call here zibeline; "The Princess Murat," a pearl-gray dress, completely covered with Alençon lace; so you see there was both winter and summer, and I very much fear that "Your Bohemian" is too sanguine in his hopes when he relies on the Society in Vienna for putting down long dresses; for these Imperial ladies' trains were as long as ever, and the ladies in London will follow our fashions and not those of Vienna, without they have very pretty feet to show-that may alter the case. Strange to say, it is an Austrian lady (the Princess de Metternich) that draws the most quantity of silk behind her in Paris, as well as invents the greatest eccentricities in female attire and female manners.

Talking of Austria, I think of all the monarchs that visited our Exhibition the Emperor of Austria was the most amiable, and the most cordially-received by the Parisians. Was it in remembrance of the fate of Maximilian? I think that had a great weight in our sympathies for the young monarch, and wherever he went he was hailed with enthusiasm. At the great markets, les halles centrales, the women loaded him with bouquets and their finest fruit. He thanked them, and said that the flowers he would keep for himself, but that the fruit should be sent to Vienna to the Empress, which was very graceful of him. One day at the Exhibition a little girl, anxious to get a glimpse of his Majesty, pushed through the crowd, exclaiming, "Which is the Emperor of Austria?" François Joseph heard her, and took her up in his arms, and said "This is the Emperor," and, smiling, gave her a kiss. Several similar anecdotes are told of him, and I confess they are much more edifying than those told of the monarchs and sons of monarchs that visited us at the commencement of the season. It seems he very much admired Paris, and paid Monsieur Hausmann several compliments on his clever metamorphosis of the once narrow-streeted dirty capital, and also pointed out other improvements that might be wrought. "For instance," said he one day at the Exhibition, when in front of the Trocaders, last year a picturesque rocky eminence, and now a monotonous smooth grassy lawn, "it seems to me that Nature ought to have placed a hill there in front of us: it would render the scenery so much more picturesque. I wonder, Monsieur le Prefet, you did not try to correct Nature there." The Prefet bit his lipg and said nothing: he had spent thousande in

two in a week. The Univers published a letter the other day of the Bishop of Nimes, in which the prelate begged the faithful to send in their offerings to the holy father, and to pray for the temporal power. The Débats remarks that that reminds one of Cromwell's address to his soldiers" Put your faith in God, and keep your powder dry." I thought Sir Charies Napier the author of those words, with this difference, that the Bishop of Nimes asks for the offerings first and the prayers after—as if he had more faith in the former than in the latter. That is what I call malicious of the Débats.

La Signora Patti is not pleased to be married so often by the press, and her brother-in-law gets angry about it, and yet she has always very eligible husbands given her: the last was the Marquis de Caux, Chamberlain to the Emperor, and one of the best dancers of the cotillon we

have, which is not a little merit in our days. The Prince Imperial is to follow the classes of the public colleges. He is not to go to college, but the professor is to go to the Palace and give him the lesson he has just given to his pupils. An imperial carriage is sent to fetch the professor and take him back every day, besides which he has a tutor to be always with him. He is in what we call the seventh class-that in which most children of his age first enter. He will change his professor every year, as is the rule in our public schools.

Monsieur Renan is on the eve of publishing a new work ("St. Paul"). Another Minister of State of the late King Louis Philippe (the Count Duchâtel) was carried to his last home the other day. Monsieur Guizot pronounced a speech over his coffin before it was carried from the church to the railroad for the family vault somewhere in the country.—Adieu, S. A.

THE NEW COOKERY Book. By Annie Bowman. (London: Routledge, Broadway, Ludgate; 416 Broome-street, New York.)-Of cooking there is no end, consequently no limit to the making of cookery-books. We say making advisedly and of forethought, for, as far as our experience goes (and it is rather varied and of mature existence), originality would be the rarest of all ingredients in them. Each one appears to borrow its foundation from another, and the novelty consists chiefly in variations of approved modes-some skilful and practical, others fussily complicated and impracticable in an ordinary way, as well as expensive in the preparation. Francatelli, for example, sumptuous and elegant, is as much too fine for daily use as a certain "Cheap Cookery-book" before me is plain, in every sense of that term, though also the work of a professor. The former deals too much with elaborate processes-proper enough for the feasts of princes, merchants, or otherwise, but out of place for family dinners; his garnishes cost more than the meat, and his dishes are nothing without Hall-stamped silver skewers, stuck, like flags on a twelfth-cake, into the transformed objects of his art. Mrs. Bowman deals not in such vain-glories. If her five hundred and ninety pages of receipts are not, in the virgin sense of the word, new, they are so delicately and skilfully reorganized, improved, and refined, that she bears her own testimony to the truth of Berchoux' phrase, "Je vais mettre au rang des beaux arts celui de la cuisine," which makes the motto of her book, and does her best to prove it. We once, in the course of our experience, met with a "cook-book," as our American cousins call such volumes, which (not being a manual for vegetarians), actually had not a single receipt for the cooking of animal

food, save fish and the materials for madedishes-an oversight particularly distressing in a beef-eating country, and which we can imagine the public revenged by not requiring a second edition. One-third, at least, of the present volume is dedicated to this important branch of the author's subject, and the directions are given with a clearness and intelligence that ensure, with ordinary care, a well-dressed and elegant dinner. Cookery being an art, mere copyists cannot attain to its perfection; but good copies from good masters are worth having; and hence, with the aid of this volume, every mistress of a family can provide her cook with valuable rules for her observance, and, if necessary, with recipes which 66 preserve the flavour of the meat, and at the same time render it agreeable to the taste, sight, and smell, easy of digestion, and nourishing to the system." What more could Francatelli effect, or Kitchener himself desire? Well may our author exclaim, of the ordinary directions of cookery-books:

What can be expected to be the result of such directions as salt," or sugar; thus leaving the whole nicety of the a squeeze of lemon," or "good deal of point of success to the caprice of the cook's palate? As well might a musical performer change some passage of the music of a composer, and thereby destroy the whole harmony, as a cook alter a condiment or leave it out, or throw in more water and thereby ruin the tried recipe of good artists; yet still declaring she did it "by the book."

On the inviolability of the directions hang all the "law and the profits" of cookery; if they are tampered with, false and imperfect indeed must be the result. No wonder that we never thought very highly of our mothers' "chickens as at Pontac's," when milk was substituted for cream and the sweet almonds wholly left ont

We find no similar receipt of Mrs. Bowman's, but cannot help thinking that, if carried out in its integrity, it would be found in harmony with the palates of persons of taste. Here is the one that comes nearest a very neat recipe for "Rabbit à la Poulette," in the excellence of which we have full faith:

Cut up a young rabbit and soak it an hour in water; lay it in the stewpan, with half-a-dozen mushrooms, a bunch of parsley, a teaspoonful of salt, half as much pepper, and two blades of mace; pour over a pint of consommé, and stew gently for half-anhour. Then take out the rabbit, strain the sauce, reduce it a little over the fire, add a glass of white wine and two tablespoonfuls of thick cream; put in the rabbit, and heat over the fire, without boiling, for a quarter-of-an-hour. Serve in the sauce, with sliced

lemon.

There is another mode of dressing this game, which our author apparently knows not, with which a Frenchwoman initiated us in '48, and which we have pleasure in bestowing on our readers: Take a young plump and white rabbit, cut it up, and carefully wash it, and lay it in lukewarm salt-and-water for an hour; then

drain the pieces, and have ready a seasoning of pepper, salt, a few buds of sweet marjorum, common thyme, and winter-savoury, and a little mace. Pound these to a powder; take also a few rashers of bacon cut in small pieces; lay, in a deep earthenware pan (with a cover), some of the rabbit, and strew on it a little of the seasoning, then a layer of bacon, and so on alternately till the pan is nearly full. Pour in some strong stock, or good gravy, sufficient to cover it; tie down the lid with paper, and set it in the oven for an hour; then take out the rabbit, strain the gravy, add a glass of white wine, or a wineglass of good ale; thicken with two teaspoonfuls of corn-flour; return the rabbit to the gravy, and place the stew-pan where it may become thoroughly hot, but without boiling. We venture to predict that an increase in the number of rabbits sold would immediately follow upon the use of one or other of the above admirable modes of cooking them. Mrs. Bowman exhibits great niceness without extravagance in her receipts; their combinations are set before her readers in the clearest language, so that there is no mistaking the proper quantity of ingredients, or the proper manner of manipulating them. There are seventeen directions for the dressing of cod-fish-after all, a small number out of a hundred and fifty receipts for cooking fish. Those for pies, puddings, dessert-dishes, cakes, &c., are proportionately numerous, and all excellent of their kind. The soups are sufficiently various; nor is there any lack of sauces. The author has also paid due attention to those healthful, delicious, and important adjuncts of the tablevegetables, which are too often carelessly prepared by servants. The receipts here given may well account for the adherence of its members to vegetarianism-the potato monopolises sixteen paragraphs descriptive of as many ways of serving it. In addition, Mrs. Bowman

has given a list of "Maigre-dishes for Lent," any one of which would render fasting anything but a mortification. The list of entrées and entremets forms also a very useful feature of the book, for which the publishers have also done their best. It is printed with charmingly clear type, on toned paper, and is sprinkled with illustrations of cooking utensils, poultry, &c.: in brief, we have seldom seen a work on cookery better arranged, or in which more pains has been taken to render the receipts easy of comprehension and manipulation, and their results satisfactory to the most fastidious appetite.

THE LIFE-BOAT: a Journal of the National Life-boat Institution; No. 66.-As long as that element which, like a generous but capricious friend, loads us with benefits, and at

the same time lacerates our affections in its savage mood-destroys its hundreds of lives in our narrow seas-so long, let us hope, will this or some kindred institution be maintained to do battle on the part of humanity, and to cry its ceaseless beneficence. Every additional "Give, give," in the name and for the sake of station and new life-boat is an added arm to this noble service, which is the only temporal means that can be counted on, to come between the crews of disabled and drowning ships upon our coasts. When we learn, from the report half the National Life-boat Institution has, by before us, that during "the last year-and-aits life-boats and other means, contributed to the saving of 1,600 lives, in addition to bringing destruction," we feel sure that the appeal made to ports of safety 46 vessels from threatened through the deeply-interesting pages of the journal, rather by the records of Life-boat services, than by dwelling on the danger as their crews pass through to save, will be sufficient to make this glorious charity remembered at a period when peace and good-will towards men incline each Christian heart to acts of mercy and benevolence.

We regret that our want of space precludes our giving a summary of the statistics of the wreck-register, many of which are importantly interesting. We are apt to wonder that, with increased intelligence, higher skill, and advanced science, the loss by shipwreck, instead of diminishing, appears yearly on the increase, forgetting that our ship-building progresses in an equal ratio to our house-building, and that maritime disasters are in proportion. Thus the number of ships lost in 1866 is in excess of 1865 by 277. The register for 1866 gives the total number of 2,289 vessels lost or damaged. Of these 1,961 are known to have been ships belonging to Great Britain and its dependencies, and 1,409 out of the number were employed in our own coasting-trade. Amongst colliers the number of wrecks amounted to 855, and many of these vessels are said to have been lost from unseaworthiness alone. Rotten and badly-found, these wretched tubs put to sea in a condition that leaves them a prey to the first foul weather. "There is only one thing," observes the writer of the re