A

THE AMERICAN FLAG.

HENRY WARD BEECHER.

THOUGHTFUL mind, when it sees a nation's flag, sees not the flag only, but the nation itself; and whatever may be its symbols, its insignia, he reads chiefly in the flag the government, the principles, the truths, the history, which belong to the nation that sets it forth.

When the French tricolor rolls out to the wind, we see France. When the new-found Italian flag is unfurled, we see resurrected Italy. When the other three-cornered Hungarian flag shall be lifted to the wind, we shall see in it the long-buried but never dead principles of Hungarian liberty. When the united crosses of St. Andrew and St. George on a fiery ground set forth the banner of Old England, we see not the cloth merely; there rises up before the mind the noble aspect of that monarchy, which, more than any other on the globe, has advanced its banner for liberty, law, and national prosperity.

This nation has a banner too; and wherever it streamed abroad, men saw daybreak bursting on their eyes, for the American flag has been the symbol of liberty, and men rejoiced in it. Not another flag on the globe had such an errand, or went forth upon the sea, carrying everywhere, the world around, such hope for the captive and such glorious tidings.

The stars upon it were to the pining nations like the morning stars of God, and the stripes upon it were beams of morning light.

As at early dawn the stars stand first, and then it grows light, and then as the sun advances, that light breaks into banks and streaming lines of color,

the glowing red and intense white striving together and ribbing the horizon with bars effulgent, so on the American flag, stars and beams of many colored light shine out together. And wherever the flag comes, and men behold it, they see in its sacred emblazonry, no rampant lion and fierce eagle, but only light, and every fold significant of liberty.

The history of this banner is all on one side. Under it rode Washington and his armies; before it Burgoyne laid down his arms. It waved on the highlands at West Point; it floated over old Fort Montgomery. When Arnold would have surrendered these valuable fortresses and precious legacies, his night was turned into day, and his treachery was driven away, by the beams of light from this starry banner.

It cheered our army, driven from New York, in their solitary pilgrimage through New Jersey. It streamed in light over Valley Forge and Morristown. It crossed the waters rolling with ice at Trenton; and when its stars gleamed in the cold morning with victory, a new day of hope dawned on the despondency of the nation. And when, at length, the long years of war were drawing to a close, underneath the folds of this immortal banner sat Washington while Yorktown surrendered its hosts, and our Revolutionary struggles ended with victory.

Let us then twine each thread of the glorious tissue of our country's flag about our heartstrings; and looking upon our homes and catching the spirit that breathes upon us from the battlefields of our fathers, let us resolve, come weal or woe, we will, in life and in death, now and forever, stand by the stars and stripes. They have been unfurled from the snows of Canada to the plains of New Orleans, in the halls of the Montezumas and amid the solitude of every sea; and everywhere, as the luminous

symbol of resistless and beneficent power, they have led the brave to victory and to glory. They have floated over our cradles; let it be our prayer and our struggle that they shall float over our graves.

THE ENCHANTED SHIRT.

COL. JOHN HAY.

HE king was sick. His cheek was red,
And his eye was clear and bright;

THE

He ate and drank with a kingly zest,

And peacefully snored at night.

But he said he was sick, and a king should know,
And the doctors came by the score,

They did not cure him. He cut off their heads,
And sent to the schools for more.

At last two famous doctors came,
And one was as poor as a rat,-
He had passed his life in studious toil,
And never found time to grow fat.

The other had never looked in a book;
His patients gave him no trouble:
If they recovered, they paid him well;
If they died, their heirs paid double.

Together they looked at the royal tongue,
As the king on his couch reclined;

In succession they thumped his august chest,
But no trace of disease could find.

The old sage said, "You're as sound as a nut."
"Hang him up!" roared the King in a gale-
In a ten-knot gale of royal rage:

The other leech grew a shade pale;

But he pensively rubbed his sagacious nose,
And thus his prescription ran-

The King will be well, if he sleeps one night
In the shirt of a Happy Man.

Wide o'er the realm the couriers rode,

And fast their horses ran,

And many they saw, and to many they spoke,
But they found no Happy Man.

They saw two men by the roadside sit,
And both bemoaned their lot;

For one had buried his wife, he said,
And the other one had not.

At last they came to a village gate,
A beggar lay whistling there!

He whistled, and sang, and laughed, and rolled
On the grass in the soft June air.

The weary couriers paused and looked

At the scamp so blythe and gay;

And one of them said, "Heaven save you, friend!
You seem to be happy to-day."

"O yes, fair sirs," the rascal laughed, And his voice rang free and glad; "An idle man had so much to do That he never has time to be sad."

"This is our man," the courier said;
"Our luck has led us aright.

I will give you a hundred ducats, friend,
For the loan of your shirt to-night."

The merry blackguard lay back on the grass,

And laughed till his face was black;

"I would do it," said he, and he roared with the fun, "But I haven't a shirt to my back."

Each day to the King the reports came in

Of his unsuccessful spies,

And the sad panorama of human woes
Passed daily under his eyes.

And he grew ashamed of his useless life,
And his maladies hatched in gloom;
He opened his windows and let the air
Of the free heaven into his room.

And out he went in the world, and toiled
In his own appointed way;

And the people blessed him, the land was glad,
And the king was well and gay.

I

SAM'S LETTER.

WONDER who w-wote me this letter. I thuppose the b-best way to f-find out ith to open it and thee. (Opens letter.) Thome lun-lunatic hath w-witten me this letter. He hath w-witten it upthide down. I wonder if he th-thought I wath going to w-wead it thanding on my head. Oh, yeth, I thee; I had it t-t-turned upthide down. "Amewica." Who do I know in Amewica? I am glad he hath g-given me hith addwess anyhow. Oh, yeth, I thee, it ith from Tham. I alwayths know Tham's handwiting when I thee hith name at the b-bottom of it. "My dear bwother- Tham alwayths called me bwother. I-I thuppose iths because hith m-mother and my mother wath the thame woman, and we never had any thithters. When we were boyths we were ladths together. They used to ge-get off a proverb when they thaw uth com-coming down the stweet. It ith vwery good, if I could only think of it. I can never wecollect anything that I can't we-wemember. Iths-it iths the early bir-bird-iths the early birbird that knowth ith own father. What nonnonthenths that iths! How co-could a bir-bird know iths own father? Iths a withe-iths a withe childiths a withe child that geths the wom. T-that's not wite. What non-nonthenths that iths! No papawent would allow hiths child to ga-gather woms. Iths a wyme. Iths fish of-of a feather. Fish of a fea- What non-nonthense! for fish don't have feathers. Iths a bir-bird-iths b-birds of a feather-b-birds of a—of a feather flock together. B-birds of a feather! Just as if a who-who-whole flock of b-birds had only one f-feather. They'd all catch cold, and only one b-bird c-could have that f-feather, and he'd fly side-withse. What con-confounded nonthense that iths! Flock to-gether! Of courthse th