153

And then

apace

the infant grows

To be a laughing, sprightly boy,
Happy, despite his little woes,

Were he but conscious of his joy!
To be, in short, from two to ten,
A merry, moody child—and then?

And then in coat and trowsers clad,
To learn to say the Decalogue,
And break it, an unthinking lad,

With mirth and mischief all agog;
A truant oft by field and fen,
And capture butterflies-and then?

And then, increased in strength and size,
To be, anon, a youth full grown,

A hero in his mother's eyes,

A young Apollo in his own;
To imitate the ways of men
In fashionable sin-and then?

And then, at last, to be a man,

To fall in love, to woo and wed!
With seething brain to scheme and plaa
To gather gold or toil for bread;

To sue for fame with tongue and pen,
And gain or lose the prize-and then?

And then in gray and wrinkled eld,

To mourn the speed of life's decline; To praise the scenes our youth beheld,

And dwell in memory of lang syne, To dream awhile with darkened ken, To drop into his grave-and then?

JOHN G. SAXE.

THAT OLD BOOK.

Many sharp eyes are inspecting the Word of God and critics abound. Now it is a young man in Germany, whose hair has not yet started on his chin, and then it is a bold, gray-headed unbeliever in England or America, or it may be the other way, youth here and age in Germany. Any way, it is greenness at work. That phraseology, we think, can be sustained, for however skilled in scholarship the rationalistic school may absolutely be, we believe there is a still more thorough school of criticism which proves the rationalist both wrong and raw.

BIBLICAL criticism is very fashionable.

The point at which Biblical criticism aims may shift. One day it is the fourth Gospel, then all the Gospels, or various Epistles. The Old Testament is now one prominent mark that is shot at, and the Pentateuch in particular. How that old Pentateuch troubles the skeptical critics! Sharp are the pens that have been turned into shovels to take down and carry into some sea of oblivion this old Gibraltar in the word of God, which is so stubborn and refuses to go.

We are not afraid of Biblical criticism. Turn on the light. We believe the ore in this mine of the Lord will shine out the sharper. What may fittingly trouble the Church is not that any old crow's bill is pecking away at the Rock, but that its own members are not resting their hopes and efforts on this sure foundation with all the confidence which is warranted.

IT

OVER THE ORCHARD FENCE.

T'peared to me I wa'ant no use out in the field to-day, I somehow couldn't swing the scythe nor toss the

new-mown hay,

An' so I thought I'd jest sit here among the apple trees, To rest awhile beneath their shade an' watch the buzzin'

bees.

Well, no! Can't say I'm tired, but I somehow wanted

rest,

To be away from everything seemed sorter to be best;
For every time I
go around where there is human kind,
I kinder hunger after what I know I cannot find.

It's sing'lar how in natur' the sweet apple blossoms fall,
The breeze, it 'pears to know and pick the purtiest of

'em all;

It's only rugged ones, perhaps, can stand agin' the blastThe frail and delicate are made too beautiful to last.

Why, right here in the orchard, among the oldest there, I had a nice young apple tree jest startin' out to bear, An' when the ekinoctial storm come tearin' cross the farm

It tore that up, while to the rest it didn't do no harm.

An' so you've been away a spell? Well, how is things in town?

Dare say it's gettin' close an' hot. To take it up an' down

I like the country best. I'm glad to see you're lookin'

spry.

No! Things don't go jest right with me; I scarcely can say why.

Oh, yes! The crop is lookin' fair, I've no right to com

plain,

My corn runs well, an' I have got a purty stand of grain; My hay is almost made, an'- Well, yes! Betsy? She's so so

She never is as hearty as she ought to be, you know.

The boys? They're in the medder lot down by the old mill race;

As fine a piece of grass ground as I've got upon the place;

It's queer how, when the grass grows up, an' gits to lookin' best,

That then's the time to cut it down. It's so with all

the rest

Of things in natur', I suppose. The harvest comes for

all

Some day, but I can't understand jest why the best fruit

fall;

The Lord knows best. He fixes things to suit His own wise laws;

An' yet it's cur'ous oftentimes to figger out the cause.

Mirandy? Yes, she's doin' well; she's helpin' mother

now

About the house. A likely gal to bake, or milk a cow, An' No! I'm not half the man I were ten year ago; But then the years will tell upon the best of us, you know.

Another? Yes, our Lizzie were the best one of them all;

Our baby, only seventeen, so sweet, an' fair, an' tall.

Jest likely; always good, yet cheerful, bright an'

gay

We laid her in the churchyard, over yonder, yesterday.

That's why I felt I wa'ant no use out in the field to-day. I somehow couldn't swing the scythe nor toss the newmown hay;

An' so I thought I'd jest sit here among the trees an'

rest;

These things come harder when we're old; but then the Lord knows best.

HARRY J. SHELLMAN.

INTERVIEWING MRS. PRATT.

EARING that the noted Mormon, Orson G. Pratt, and family had arrived from Salt Lake and were quartered at the American House, one of the Tribune reporters took a notion yesterday morning that he would run down and interview Mrs. Pratt. The scheme of interviewing Orson was an old one-there would be no enterprise in anything of that kind, but the idea of a chat with the wife seemed new and brilliant.

"Can I see Mrs. Orson G. Pratt in the parlor for a few moments?" inquired the reporter at the office counter of the American House.

"Walk up to the parlor and I'll find out," said Mr. Smith.

The parlor was the largest the reporter had ever seen, It was eighty feet one way and seventy the other, and the ceiling was so high that the reporter thought they must have to use a telescope to determine when it needed