Various

“ How long have these waves been pounding on the shore? How old is the sea? When did it begin, and what does it all mean? If you wait here a little while, you will observe that the waves are slowly coming nearer and nearer, or are moving off, leaving the beach bare. Taste the water. It is bitter and salt, like brine. These are strange things, and perhaps if you sit here by the water for a while, we may learn something of what they mean.
The world is like a splendid picture-book, full of stories more wonderful than any fairy tale. ”

“ The water is the great land builder, and these waves are the hammer with which it grinds and pounds the rocks into sand. The tides and currents shift the sand about, making new beaches where the birds gather to find their food, and children come to play. Day by day, summer and winter, the work goes on. The sea is never idle, never hurries, never stops. The beach to-day is different from yesterday. ”

“ The kettle of potatoes had been hung to the pole by a rope, which had burned slowly, until it broke, letting the potatoes, water, and kettle into the fire, deluging the half-roasted hen, and basting it with cinders, until it looked like a huge ball of mud. ”

“ The land sprang from the sea. These waves helped to build up the hills and rocks. The tides helped to carve out the continents. Nearly all the surface of the dry land was once dissolved in the sea, just as to-day we find salt dissolved in the sea-water.
Men who have studied the sea and the land feel sure that at one time, so long ago no one can imagine the number of years, the world was red-hot, and all the water hung in thick clouds of steam above the melting rocks. Showers of scalding rain fell on the glowing earth, and gathered in ponds and lakes of boiling water. ”

“ All that could be done was to wait a few moments, and Tim spent that time dancing around the ruins like a crazy Indian.
It was a horror-stricken party that stood around the drowned fire, watching the cooks as they fished up first the muddy hen, and then the potatoes, all looking very sorry for their plunge into the ashes.
"Now all you've got to do," said Bill Thompson, with the air of one who knew, "is to put the potatoes right back, an' wash the hen. They'll cook jest as well as ever, only it'll take a little longer, that's all." ”

“ One day, as Newton sat musing in his garden at his retired country home, an apple fell from a tree to the ground. A great idea at once arose in his mind, and he conceived the plan of the universe and of the law of gravitation, as it is called. He was the first to discover that famous law. He showed that the heavier body always attracts the lighter; that as the apple falls to the earth, so the earth is drawn toward the sun; that all the planets feel the law of gravitation, and that all the universe seems to obey one will. Newton soon became the most famous of living philosophers. ”

“ Ordinary horses are too large for Polo, even when the players are full-grown men, for the higher a player is from the ground, the more difficult it is for him to strike the ball. The smaller the pony, the better for the player; and it should be as gentle as a kitten, as quick as a flash, and as swift as a deer. The ponies generally used in New York and Newport are brought from Texas and Mexico, and, as most boys know, these animals do not unite all the good qualities of the Arabian steed. ”

“ Another fire was built, rocks were placed in such a way around it that the kettle could rest on them, the hen was put on another stick, and again the chances for dinner looked promising.
The food which had been spread out on the ground looked very tempting to the idle ones of that hungry party, and every now and then one would try to get a piece of pie or cake, until Tim, who was determined that no one should have anything to eat until all could be served, was almost at his wits' end to prevent them from making a perfect raid on the larder. ”

“ Some boys think that they can learn all that is essential about a branch or a study from their school text-books. On the contrary, the most that a text-book can do is to give outlines and arbitrary facts or lay down principles. A full and rounded scholarship implies a great deal of side study. The ambitious pupil will find something to bear on what he is learning in Harper's Young People, in the books he finds at a friend's house or in his father's library, and in the daily paper. ”

“ More than sixty Indian warriors, all in their war-paint, armed to the teeth with knives, revolvers, repeating rifles, of the best and latest patterns, and each carrying a long steel-headed Mexican lance. Not a bow or arrow or war-club among them. All such weapons belong to the old, old times, or to poor miserable second-rate Indians who can not buy anything better. The fierce and haughty Lipans and Comanches, and other warlike tribes, insist on being armed as well as the United States troops, and even better. ”

“ We have decided that it will be best to build the school-house on land of its own, and so we will make a deed of the land upon which it is to be built to that effect. We will teach the school, and do all as I have promised. If your kind hearts still wish to help, you can do so by sending me some old clothes, hats, hoods, shoes, shawls; dolls and toys—no matter if they are broken: they will be acceptable and lovely to these little ones, who have never owned a "store doll" in their lives. ”

“ Whichever side succeeds in driving it through the goal of its opponents is the victor. The games that are played on the Polo Grounds in the upper part of New York city are usually very pretty sights. They are attended almost always by a number of ladies and gentlemen of fashion, who drive out in four-horse coaches, and are shielded from the sun either by the stationary awning, or by bright-colored tents, often made of the finest materials. In the heat of the summer the Polo centre is changed from New York to Newport, where most of the players are gathered. ”

“ All travelling was done on horseback, and all business depended upon the skill and fidelity of the horsemen. A game that taught the dusky lads to be good horsemen was more than an amusement—it was a national blessing. Polo was for ages, and is still, the national game of these districts. The boys are hardly large enough to lay their hand on a pony's back before they learn to play Polo. The English in India have taken up the game, but even with their superior ponies and equipments they can not vanquish the natives in a friendly contest with the ball and mallet. ”

“ Sometimes, however, a young member of the party appears mounted upon a Shetland pony, a shining, bright-eyed little animal, as gentle as it is beautiful. These ponies are scarce, and often expensive; but it will be good news to some of the boys to hear that a gentleman has recently stocked a farm with them in Westchester County, only a few miles from New York, and that he intends to raise hundreds of them for sale.
The Polo costume is a very bright one, generally consisting of a colored shirt, tight-fitting cloth pantaloons, and gaiters, with the small cap that is well known as a "Polo cap." ”

“ Chapter XI. ONE COOK SPOILS THE BROTH.
The question of what was to make up the dinner bill of fare appeared to be an important one to all, and many were the suggestions made to the cooks. Some proposed that the work of raising the tent be intrusted to other hands, so that Bill and Tip could go out and bring in a deer or a bear; others thought the old hen should be killed at once, and served up as a roast; while one portion of the party seemed to think it Captain Jimmy's duty to get his ship under way, and go after some fish for a chowder. ”

“ We once had a cat named Malty, and we then had two kittens. Malty used to catch mice and rats and give them to the kittens. We thought her very nice. My father used to be a sea-captain. I have been as far South as St. Augustine, Florida. I have been to New York two or three times, but I never noticed the place where Young People is printed. I like the story of "Tim and Tip," and I think the stories of "Penelope," "Phil's Fairies," and "Toby Tyler" are splendid.
Florence E. S.
As my sister is writing a letter, I think I will do the same. ”

“ When the attention is duly called to it, it is wonderful how all sorts of things seem to come to your help in the special line of study you have adopted. If the C. Y.'s will notice this, they will be surprised to observe how many curious coincidences there are to aid progress when people are very earnestly bent on one pursuit. ”

“ This whole great country of fifty millions of people is in real mourning for his death, not because he was President, but because every one of the fifty millions has learned to honor and love the man for his noble character.
Mr. Garfield left five children, two others having died. We give portraits of the two elder boys and of the only girl. Mollie, who is a bright, winning lass of about thirteen years, has come to be the pet of the whole American people. On the very day of his death Mr. Garfield asked especially to have Mollie sit with him, and he and she talked together until he grew drowsy. ”

“ I am ten years old. I go to school, and a gentleman by the name of Mr. Woodruff is our teacher. I am in geography, and we are studying map-drawing; our lesson to-day is the construction lines of Asia. I can hardly wait for Tuesday to come to bring us our dear Young People. This summer, when we were at my uncle's, their birds got away. They were out in a storm. They expected to find them dead, but they recovered them next day, safe and sound.
Lillian R. S.
Brooklyn, New York. ”

“ Boys often do such mischievous things, when they do not really mean to be cruel. They should remember that "evil is wrought by want of thought," and that the gentlest boys are usually the manliest.
Tunkhannock, Pennsylvania.
I have never written a letter to Our Post-office Box, because I have been afraid they would laugh at me. But I see so many little letters that I am venturing at last. My papa is a printer, and once worked in New York, and I would dearly love to live there, because there are so many grand things I could learn in school, and music too. The girls tell you about their pets. ”

“ Sir Isaac Newton is the greatest of modern philosophers and mechanics. When he was born, December 25, 1642, three months after his father's death, he was so small and feeble that no one supposed he would live a day; but the weak infant grew to be a healthy, robust man, who lived until he was eighty-four years old. He began to invent or contrive machines and to show his taste for mechanics in early childhood. ”

“ They did not foresee a long period of war, in which great glory should be gained by the hero, and during which impassioned orators should place themselves in jeopardy while defending the King, thus earning the laurel of fame. ”

“ I don't mean you shall go back of the mountains again, Steve. You must wait patiently, but the time'll come. I tell you what, my boy, when you find yourself crossing the Arizona deserts and mountains all alone you'll be right glad you can ride and shoot and hunt and find your own way. It's all Indian knowledge, but it's wonderfully useful when you have to take care of yourself in an Indian country. ”

“ Do you know that in India there are hospitals and asylums for aged and sick animals, where the greatest care is taken of and the highest honors are paid to them? Yet human life is not highly valued in some of the old lands where they are so tender of the lower orders of creation. ”

“ But Tim and Bobby did not allow any of these remarks to trouble them; they were the legally elected cooks, and they proposed to do the work in their own way.
"We'll get the dinner," said Tim, with some dignity, "an' after it's done, if you fellers don't like it, you can cook one to suit yourselves."
But the cooks did listen to what Bill had to say, since he was one of the high officials, and he was strongly in favor of making the first dinner in camp a "big" one, even going so far as to propose in all earnestness that the hen be killed. ”

“ He and Bobby selected from the cooked provisions enough in the way of pies and cake to make twice as large a party feel very uncomfortable. They spread this feast at one side of the fire, where it would be out of the way of the smoke, and Tim was trying to calculate how it would be possible to cut an apple pie in eleven pieces, and have them all of equal size, when a sound as of water thrown on fire, accompanied by a cry of dismay from Bill Thompson, caused him to start violently. ”

“ In olden times—a hundred years ago, for instance—in every household there would be a spinning-wheel and a loom, and part of the regular work of the daughters of the house was to spin, weave, bleach, dye, and prepare the garments of the family. To be a spinster was to be an important member of the community. ”

“ An Indian Story. BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD. Chapter II.
id you say, Murray, there were any higher mountains higher than these?"
"Higher'n these? Why, Steve, the mountains we crossed, away back there just this side of the Texas border, were twice as high, some of then."
"These are big enough. Are there any higher mountains in the world than ours? Did you ever see any?"
"I've seen some of them. I've heard it said the tallest are in India. South America can beat us. I've seen the Andes." ”

“ This author says that wild elephants do very little harm, and show good dispositions, not attacking you unless you disturb them; but an elephant which has once been tamed, and after that relapses into a wild state, is very dangerous indeed. He acts as if he hated mankind, and had been made bitter by his dwelling with them; and so the natives call such a fellow a "rogue" elephant. ”