Various

“ The craze for "high art decorations" had spread from the great city centres to the country town of Atwood, where Silvia's parents lived. Of course every one understands that "high art" becomes very much diluted in its country progress, and when it appears in out-of-the-way places, where the people are neither wealthy nor well read, it is apt to degenerate into very low art, indeed. ”

“ An impartial observer would be apt to think that Dickens was right, and that the system cannot be the best one that fits a man to commit more crimes, or which made poor Langheimer unable to find a home in society outside of a jail.
The American people are only beginning to learn that the use of prisons is to reform wicked men as well as to punish them. ”

“ No matter how or where the blow was aimed, a movement of Pomp's paw, quick as a flash of lightning, knocked it aside, and he stood good-humoredly waiting for more.
"Once in a while," said the one-eyed hostler, resting from the exercise and leaning on the bar, while Pomp retired to his pole, "there's a bear of this species that's vicious and blood-thirsty. Generally, you let them alone and they'll let you alone. They won't run from you maybe, but they won't go out of their way to pick a quarrel. They don't swagger round with a chip on their shoulder lookin' for some fool to knock it off." ”

“ If young men would at least refrain from the use of tobacco until after the age of twenty-five, they would probably never acquire the habit of using it; or, if they did, it would not gain so secure or deadly a hold upon them, because their constitutions would be better able to resist it.
There is no temptation to young girls in tobacco, but the use of narcotics, anodynes, "drops" and chloral, to which many woman are becoming addicted, is even more perilous to body and mind. ”

“ In summer the swamp would have been unhealthy and dangerous to life; but in winter, with the mud and water-holes frozen solidly, it was a warm, comfortable location, for it lay in a great valley, inclosed by high mountain ridges, that were covered by dense growths of pine and spruce. It fairly seemed as if the great fires which we built every afternoon warmed up the whole swamp.
Our smoke would often almost hide the sun when the weather was calm. Very little wind at any time found its way into our sheltered valley. The winter fortunately was a mild one. ”

“ Chubby didn't feel a bit like laughing at this, but said again, very loudly, "Pig, Pig, PIG!"
Mamma heard her from the other room then, and she called out, "Come in here to me, Fanny; I want to look at your tongue." Fanny kicked up her heels and ran in to her mamma, and stuck out her little coral-tinted tongue. "Wha' fo', mamma?" she asked, thinking perhaps some little sweet pellets might follow. ”

“ The owner of a drove of cattle that stops to feed in front of your land, or a drove of pigs which root up the soil, is responsible to you at law, as much as if they did the same thing inside the fence. ”

“ When he recovered his sight, Silvia had left the store, and the people at the counter were gazing with wide-open eyes on the scene.
"What did you say to Miss Morden, that she flew off in such a rage?" asked a tall, gaunt, spectacled old maid,–Miss James,–who was the terror of the town for her ill-natured gossip and interfering ways.
"Upon my word, ma'am, I said nothing insulting," replied the angered clerk. "Miss Silvia asked for a spittoon, and I showed her one. Of course people do not want spittoons unless they use tobacco, do they? ”

“ Once mankind saw nothing in mineral coal but a kind of black stone, and the person who first found out by accident that it would burn, and talked of it as fuel, was laughed at. Now it is not only our most useful fuel, but its products are used largely in the arts. ”

“ The one-eyed hostler made a motion to the beast, who immediately climbed the pole, and looked at us from the cross-piece at the top.
"A bear," said the one-eyed hostler, turning his quid again, "is the best-hearted, knowin'est critter that goes on all-fours. I'm speakin' of our native black bear, you understand. The brown bear aint half so respectable, and the grizzly is one of the ugliest brutes in creation. Come down here, Pomp!" ”

“ In Canada an American observer is struck by the close connection between political and social affairs; a union that is probably caused by the fact, that "society" is there formed by men, while in the United States it is almost, if not wholly, formed by women. ”

“ Are you talking of Silvia?"
Gentle Mrs. Morden's face was pale as she turned her startled eyes on her visitor.
"Who else? Don't you think it a disgrace for a girl to use tobacco? and that's what Sil does, and goes and buys a spittoon before the whole town! I'd tobacco her! But everybody knows it by this time, and whether she gives it up or not, people will keep on thinking she uses it. ”

“ There is no wood in the world from which such quantities of ashes can be secured; and that is the reason, I suppose, why the tree is called ash. Nor is there another tree whose ashes make so strong a lye. It was for this reason that we came here to make "salts."
We brought up on our raft twenty old flour-barrels, to be used as leach-tubs. These were set up in a semi-circle round our boiling-place, which was a long stone "arch." A pole and lumber-shed served us as a camp. ”

“ A lady in the United States, as a rule, makes her social position. If she has the qualities of a society leader, she becomes one, independent of her husband's position, unless that should be exceptionally bad. ”

“ To have planted her flags in every quarter of the globe, to be able to say that she is the mistress of an empire "upon which the sun never sets," to have ports in every sea, and fortresses on every continent, are surely things of which the little islands of Britain may well be proud. ”

“ Sometimes, under the cover of night, he walks abroad to take an airing and note the changes that thirty years have wrought, but an ever-active conscience makes him shun the light of day and the faces of men, and he walks apart, a stranger in the midst of those among whom he has always lived. ”

“ It is strange what a distance the smell of burned bones and scraps will be carried to the noses of carnivorous beasts. A hunter in the woods better not burn such refuse unless he wants to draw dangerous game about him. It may be a wild opinion, but I haven't a doubt that the odor of those bones drew wolves twenty-five miles off to us that night. ”

“ There were great hollows that looked like caves on one hand, and precipitous banks on the other; little bursts of sound, coming upon one suddenly, of miners talking or laughing below the mule tracks; patient mules, laboring on in the darkness; patient or impatient men, toiling from morning till night; even women denied the fair sunshine of the outer world. ”

“ A young girl, when she marries, accepts the place and station in society which her husband has always occupied. Social circles are graded entirely upon an official basis. A woman may have lived a life of retirement and obscurity until the day her husband is appointed or elected to some high office, when she at once comes prominently forward, and has an acknowledged place in fashionable society. ”

“ CUSPADORES.
There is probably no human weakness that awakens more derisive contempt than a false assumption of superior knowledge. The vanity of young people frequently leads them into ludicrous positions, and sometimes even into serious difficulties, through a pretence of knowing things of which they are really ignorant. The experience of one of my young friends is a case in point.
Silvia Morden is a girl of sixteen. She is both bright and pretty. ”

“ That's what a bear does. He likes everything, and a good deal of it. He can't live on suckin' his paws all winter, neither. That's a foolish notion."
"Do you mean to say a bear doesn't hibernate?" I asked.
"He hibernates,–yes. I believe that's what they call it," replied the one-eyed hostler. "He lies curled up kind o' torpid sometimes in winter; but what he really lives on then is his fat.
"Fat is fuel, so ter speak. He lays it up in the fall, and burns it out the the winter. He goes into his cold-weather quarters plump, and comes out lean ”

“ Nobody's children have a right to pick up the apples under your trees, although the same stand wholly outside of your fence.
No private person has a right to cut or lop off the limbs of your trees in order to move his old barn or other buildings along the highway, and no traveller can hitch his horse to your trees in the sidewalk without being liable, if he gnaws the bark or otherwise injures them. ”

“ If we all could bring our absolute, simple faith in Him into our daily lives, what a solid foundation we would lay under all change of fortune, disease, or of circumstance! We should have then a house indeed founded on a rock. ”

“ He and the boys rushed out with pitchforks, a gun and a lantern. They knew what the trouble was, or soon found out.
"A huge black bear had broken down the side of the pen; he had seized a fat porker, and was actually lugging him off in his arms! The pig was kicking and squealing, but the bear had him fast. He did not seem at all inclined to give up his prey, even when attacked. He looked sullen and ugly; but a few jabs from a pitchfork, and a shot in the shoulder, convinced him that he was making a mistake.
"He dropped the pig, and got away before my uncle could load up for another shot. ”

“ At Christmas the hall looks like a large bazaar, being then filled with the most costly and beautiful tables, with a large Christmas tree in the centre and objects all around the sides of the hall full of presents for the household and visitors. ”

“ Aunt Sally was a small, tidy body, with a bright English face of the best type, straight as an arrow, and with an eye that meant business.
"Them miners is a hard set," she said, as she bustled about us, getting bread and coffee. "You see, there's so many nations mixed. There's Irish, and German, and Swiss, and patience knows what else, and they get among themselves if they think things don't go right, and talk and talk, and git discontented and ugly. ”

“ As soon as Vet spoke, Ed and I both knew there must be other wolves howling. It made us feel almost frightened, there, in the dead of night, for we soon found that the creatures were drawing together and coming nearer, large numbers of them. Ed loaded the gun again.
"But what good will that do if there's a pack of 'em?" Vet exclaimed.
If we had had a log camp with a door, we shouldn't have felt uneasy; but our open shed would not afford us safety. There was no time to be lost, for the wolves were racing and scurrying about the swamp, not half a mile away. ”

“ If he leaves such things outside his fence, and within the limits of the highway, as actually laid out, though some distance from the traveled path, and a traveller runs into them in the night and is injured, the owner is not only liable to him for private damages, but may also be indicted and fined for obstructing a public highway.
And if he has a fence or wall along the highway, he must place it all on his land, and not half on the road, as in case of division fences between neighbors. ”

“ The boy had often been told that if he strayed into the woods with his brother a bear might carry them off, and she charged him again that forenoon not to go away from the house; but he was an enterprising little fellow, and when the sun shone so pleasant, and the woods looked so inviting, he wasn't one to be afraid of bears. ”

“ Manners are the shadows of virtues; the momentary display of those qualities which our fellow-creatures love and respect. If we strive to become, then, what we strive to appear, manners may often be rendered useful guides to the performance of our duties. ”

“ We both peered sharply, but it was so dark that we could see nothing.
"It's the mate to that old bear, I guess," Ed whispered. "He's lonely, and wants company."
"More likely he has smelled the fat," said I, "and intends to steal it."
"Perhaps so," said Ed. "I thought we should draw some beast or other to us. Sh! I believe I can see him. Keep still! I'll teach him not to steal from his neighbors."
Ed reached for the gun, which at night always lay loaded at the head of our bunk. ”

“ Tipsy braves can't follow a trail worth a cent.
"Not very long after that a woman in a neighboring settlement heard her children scream one day in the woods near the house. She rushed out, and saw a bear actually lugging off her youngest.
"She was a sickly, feeble sort of woman, but such a sight was enough to give her the strength and courage of a man. She ran and caught up an axe. Luckily she had a big dog. They two went at the bear. ”

“ Chubby Wubby sobbed over and over again, "Never no more, mamma," and Aunt Gussie and Annie were very glad to say they would not like to have their darling punished "this time," and Aunt Gussie whispered to little Fanny's mamma, "I feel half to blame myself, for I suppose she thinks if I call her a name, she may call me one," and after that day little Fanny never called anybody "Pig," and Aunt Gussie stopped calling Fanny "Chubby Wubby."
G. de B.
For the Companion. ”

“ I run.'
"She caught him up and hurried with him into the woods. She begged him to show her where he was with his little brother when the bear came along. He pointed out two or three places. In one of them the earth was soft. There were fresh tracks crossing it,–bear tracks. There was no doubt about it.
"It was a terrible situation for a poor woman. Whether to follow the bear and try to recover her child, or go at once for her husband, or alarm the neighbors, what to do with Johnny meanwhile,–all that would have been hard enough for her to decide even if she had had her wits about her. ”