Various

“ All the same, Miss Sophonisba was a pride and joy to any possessor, and Ethel felt a thrill of calm happiness at every fresh glance that was cast at their carriage as they drove quickly through the busy streets toward the Park. Hyde Park, you must know, is to London what the Central Park is to New York ”

“ And so, while little Nancy, washing potatoes for dinner, wondered who had got her mitten with the letter in it, Joe Harris, Adams Express Agent for Denver, was cramming the pair into his pocket. The next week a snow-squall with a gale and a half of wind swooped down on Denver with all fury, and the new agent's teeth chattered and his hands smarted as he stood waiting for the train that had just whistled; he pulled the heavy mittens out of his overcoat pocket, twitched them apart, and sticking his left hand into one of them, found the note. ”

“ And is it not still more wonderful that, while the children in the Sunday-schools of America should be studying their regular Bible lesson about Joseph's marriage, this great obelisk, that stood at the door of his father-in-law's house, should be lying in the street, at the door of one of our schools, on its way to the Central Park in New York?
But now we must tell you how this great obelisk came to be brought to this country. Obelisks are great curiosities. There are only a few large ones in the world. These all used to be in Egypt, and the Egyptians thought a great deal of them. ”

“ She is so good and so charming that the English people love her dearly; and all the gentlemen's hats came off in a minute, and all the ladies bowed, and everybody looked as pleased as possible. As for Ethel, she bowed so hard that she looked like a little Chinese Mandarin, and even jumped up to get another glimpse as they passed, for their own carriage was just turning out of the great Park gates to go home to Portland Place. Actually, for five minutes, she had forgotten her beloved doll ”

“ A happy time it is for me when the steamer from New York for South America arrives, and brings Young People. I pity the little correspondent who wrote in the Post-office Box about four feet of snow, for I believe it must be very cold there, although I have never seen snow yet. Here even now we have many blooming plants in our garden at Oasis, our beautiful country-seat, near Barranquilla.
I am nine years old. I have my own horse, a deer, and a little circus. ”

“ We have a bird named Dicky, and we have two gold-fishes, a pearl-fish, and a roach, which live in a large aquarium over a fernery. We each have a cat. Our cats are almost exactly alike, and are named Tabby-gray and Frolic. We took the names from Young People. We have two horses named Bonner and Charlie. Bonner is five years old, and Charlie is twenty-seven. Charlie is a remarkable horse. Two years ago he was very sick. We thought he was dying, and told a man to shoot him; but he said Charlie looked at him so intelligently that he could not do it. ”

“ Harper,—I'm in an awful situation that a boy by the name of Bellew got me into. He is one of the boys that writes stories and makes pictures for Young People, and I think you ought to know what kind of a boy he is. A little while ago he had a story in the Young People about imitation screw-heads, and how he used to make them, and what fun he had pasting them on his aunt's bureau. ”

“ I have no brothers or sisters except in heaven, and I am very lonely sometimes, and always so glad to see Young People.
Sadie B. N.
Poughkeepsie, New York.
I am a little girl eleven years old. I like Young People very much. I think the best story was "The Fair Persian," but I like them all more than I can tell.
I have ten dolls. The last one I got Christmas. Her name is Madame Arabella.
I am going to be an artist when I am old enough.
Addie W.
Brattleborough, Vermont. ”

“ This obelisk was at first erected by Thothmes III., one of the old Kings of Egypt, at Heliopolis, about 3600 years ago. It was taken from that place to Alexandria, where Cleopatra lived, not long after her death, by the Roman Emperor Augustus Cæsar, as a trophy of his victory over the Kings of Egypt, and it was called "Cleopatra's Needle," we suppose, merely in compliment to the late Queen.
Egypt is supposed to be the oldest nation in the world. The Kings used to be called Pharaohs, and many of them were very great and powerful. ”

“ CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLE. ABOUT TO BE ERECTED IN THE CENTRAL PARK, NEW YORK. BY REV. J. S. HOLME.
Cleopatra's Needle is not such a needle as we use to sew with: it is a great stone—sometimes called an obelisk—nearly seventy feet long, and about seven feet square at the base on which it stands. Its sides gradually taper from the bottom until at the top it ends in a small pointed four-sided pyramid. It is of red granite, and the sides are covered all over with pictures of birds, animals, and other things, cut into the stone. It is called a needle because it is so long and slender. ”

“ Now I don't eat enough to keep a chicken alive, an' yet I grow fatter an' fatter every day—don't I, Samuel?"
"Indeed you do, my love," said the skeleton, with a world of pride in his voice; "but you mustn't feel bad about it, for every pound you gain makes you worth just so much more to the show."
"Oh, I wasn't worryin'; I was only wonderin'; but we [Pg 183] must go, Samuel, for the poor child won't eat a bit while we are here. After you've eaten what there is there, bring the plate in to me," she said to Toby, as she took her lean husband by the arm and walked him off toward their own tent. ”

“ Ah, dear Young People, it is as hard to write of joy as of sorrow. Ethel's shriek rang through the house, and brought her papa, Sir Edward, from his billiards, and Lady Ponsonby from her drawing-room, in a tremendous hurry.
Norah went home happy in the possession of five dolls out of Ethel's twenty-three, and her good fortune did not stop there. Indeed, she had the greatest reason to bless the day when Miss Sophonisba Sylvia Plantagenet Tudor had her eventful fall from the Ponsonby carriage at Hyde Park Corner.
[Begun in Young People No. 58, December 7.] MILDRED'S BARGAIN. A Story for Girls. ”

“ Fred declared he would never try again, but Jim, more persevering, decided to heat the plate a little, and see what happened. He passed it gently over the spirit-lamp flame, when, to his great relief, the cloud vanished, and the picture re-appeared, increased in brightness, and covered with a coating thick enough to protect it from scratches.
These boys had many other mishaps and disappointments before they became skillful enough to be sure of obtaining a good picture. ”

“ I have a little sister named Julia, but when she commenced to talk she called herself Jupi, and we all call her so. Mamma says we ought to spell it joujou, which is the French word for plaything.
We like Young People so much we can hardly wait for it to come. ”

“ He's a great eater, Samuel is," she added, in a burst of confidence, "an' it's a wonder to me what he does with it all sometimes."
"Is he?" exclaimed Toby, quickly. "How funny that is! for I'm an awful eater. Why, Uncle Dan'l used to say that I ate twice as much as I ought to, an' it never made me any bigger. I wonder what's the reason?"
"I declare I don't know," said the fat woman, thoughtfully, "an' I've wondered at it time an' time again. Some folks is made that way, an' some folks is made different. ”

“ Job Lord and his precious partner Jacobs did say you shouldn't have any supper; an' I've brought you a picture of Samuel an' me. We sell 'em for ten cents apiece, but I'm going to give them to you, because I like the looks of you."
Toby was quite overcome with the presents, and seemed at a loss how to thank her for them. He attempted to speak, couldn't get the words out at first, and then he said, as he put the two photographs in the same pocket with his money: "You're awful good to me, an' when I get to be a man I'll give you lots of things. ”

“ Little Nancy had been bound out to Miss Roxana only about a year when John Jackson's letter reached Bassett. Miss Roxy was getting old; rheumatism had laid hold of her, and she could not hobble up and down hill to the village any longer: so she resolved to take a young girl into her house to wait on her.
"'Twon't cost a great deal," she said to herself. "There's the gardin a'n't half planted; she can drop potaters as well as a man, and hill 'em up too ”

“ I go to school and Sunday-school, and have my music lessons to practice, but I always find time to read my Young People. I went to the country this summer, and had a splendid time. I went boat-riding on the Shenandoah River. I am eleven years old.
Eleanor E. A.
Detroit, Michigan.
I have a little dog. His name is Prince. He sleeps with me. He weighs four and one-half pounds. ”

“ We have taken Young People ever since the first number, and we all like it. I have two brothers and two sisters. Christmas my brother had the book called Old Times in the Colonies for a present. There are the same stories in it that were in Young People, and a great many more. ”

“ Wonder ef she'd git wind on't, and go to makin' mittins herself?—she beats all to question folks up. I'll tell her I'm a-goin' to teach Nance to knit; and so I be: 'ta'n't no lie. I will teach her to knit an' help on the mittins. It'll be suthin for her to do nights, 'stead of readin' all the newspaper scraps she can pick up."
Nancy Peck was Miss Roxy's bound girl; the old lady lived alone in a small brown house on a hill-side far above Bassett; a grass-grown track ran by the house, through the woods that clothed the hill-top, over and away into the heart of the Green Mountains. ”

“ Travers says it is stiffer and uglier than any of the Pilgrim fathers. But father thinks everything of that chair and never lets anybody sit in it except the minister. I took a piece of soap, just as that Bellew used to, and if his name is Billy why don't he learn how to spell it that's what I'd like to know, and made what looked like a tremendous crack in the chair. Then I pasted the screw-heads on the chair, and it looked exactly as if somebody had broken it and tried to mend it. ”

“ He will also be kind enough to receive and forward my answers to correspondents.
If any young readers would like to know more of my country, I will send another letter.
Judith Wolff, care of Mr. D. A. De Lima,
68 William Street, New York City.
Passaic Bridge, New Jersey.
I like Young People very much. Papa bought me the first volume bound. I have two kitties; one is white, the other is black. We call them Romeo and Juliet, because they are so loving; they always go to sleep with their paws around each other's necks.
Winnie V.
I like Young People very much. ”

“ We shall always be glad to receive reports of anything interesting which may occur at their meetings, and also occasionally to print simple and safe experiments, which we doubt not will be of interest to many of our young readers. ”

“ Tucker, as they drove along; "there wa'n't no other gal there. She's real small, but Miss Simons says she's spry an' handy, and she ha'n't got nobody belongin' to her, so's't I sha'n't be pestered with folks a-comin' round."
In six months little Nancy had become so useful that she was formally bound out to the old lady, and now she went to school in summer half a day, and had learned to read and write tolerably. She was very lonesome in that solitary house. There were children at the poor-house whom she played with, tended, and loved, but Miss Roxy had not even a cat ”

“ Killed by Fright.—Many an illness is caused simply by imagination, and those of us who go about our work with calmness and confidence are much more likely to escape disease than others who are filled with apprehension should infection come within a hundred miles of them. ”

“ Mildred stood still in the wild storm, putting her hand to her head, and even trying to remember where she was going. Suddenly a thought occurred to her. She would go to Miss Jenner's, and tell her the whole story. "But not where I got the money," the poor child thought, with a moan. Half driven along by the heavy snow-storm, Milly turned her steps toward Lane Street. There was the [Pg 189] beautiful brick house, its trees veiled in white; but, oh! to her delight, Milly saw the curtains of Miss Jenner's room drawn back. She must be better, if not well again. ”

“ Tom. "Circumstances are dead against you."
Mildred stood up, putting out one trembling hand as though she would implore some consideration. She thought of her mother lying ill at home; of all the miseries of the past few weeks. It made her head dizzy, and she sank back into her chair, while Tom continued:
"Now I know all about it, Miss Lee, as you'll see. You bought a gray silk dress of a peddler; the girls all saw it; and you didn't know how you were to pay for it. You got awfully hard up Wednesday for money—twenty-two dollars—and you tried to borrow it of father. ”