who have had me in their pockets, who were always trying to seem rather grander than they really were.

3. When I have been found out, I have been looked at with surprise and even anger, as you will hear. I believe I was made by some bad men, who melted down a zinc door-plate and a pewter mug to make me. Both these, I heard them say, were stolen, and all the time they were making me and my brothers they kept the door carefully locked, and even barred with thick logs of wood.

4. For of course if they were found out they would be punished; and I heard afterwards from one of my brothers that these men were soon caught, and would have to spend a great many years in prison.

5. I soon went out into the world, and was put down on the counter of a grocer's shop to pay for some tea. The shopman took me, and dropped me into a drawer, where I fell upon a heap of silver pieces-some bright and new, some old and worn.

6. "Good-day, brothers and sisters," I said, cheerfully, thinking myself so bright and smart that they must be glad to see me.

7. But to my surprise the shillings and halfcrowns turned up their edges at me, and even

the little sixpences slipped away as fast as they could.

7. "Come away, my children," said a Crown

piece to some little threepenny-bits, who were looking hard at me; "come away, my children. Avoid bad company."

8. "I am very sorry," I said; and if a bad shilling could blush I am sure I should have been very red, for I saw that "bad company"

meant me.

9. "Really," I said, humbly, "I wish I knew what I have done to displease you all. I could not help jumping in here, you know, because the man threw me in. Did I hurt any one ? "

10. They began to whisper to each other, and at last a very bright new Half-crown said, proudly, "Of course "Of course we know it is not your fault that you are a bad shilling, and we do not so much mind your being with us, but we do not like our little sixpennies and threepennies to be in vulgar company."

pun-ish-ed stif-fen

I I I.

dis-grace

won-der-ful

ma-chine beau-ti-ful

THE STORY OF A BAD SHILLING.-Part II.

1. I thought it rather hard that I should be punished in this way for what was not my own fault. I almost wished I could jump into a fire and melt myself, since I was such a disgrace.

2. "Please, sir," I said, humbly, "it seems to me that I look just like anybody else. May I ask how you know that I am a bad shilling?"

3. "Why, you are not silver at all!" shouted all the other Shillings. "Well, you are not pure silver," I said, getting rather angry because

they were so proud.

4. "If we were pure silver," said the Halfcrown, sadly, "we should be too good for this world. We should get bent, and worn, and spoiled in about a week. So we are forced to stiffen ourselves with a little common metal, which we call alloy."

5. "Oh yes! without that we could not bear the rough treatment those horrid men give

us," sighed a pretty little Sixpence, as she crept nearer to look at me.

6. "Well, then, I am not so very much worse than you after all," I said. Then they all shouted again, "Look at his edges! "What is the matter with my edges?" I said, very crossly.

my

7. " Why," replied the Half-crown, "just look how badly they are made! Look at nice tidy row of teeth. Yours look as if they had been made with a file."

8. "Of course they were," I said; and then all the coins shouted at once, "He's a bad, bad shilling!" Indeed I could not forget what a time the man who made me had spent in working away at me with a file, to make the teeth round my rim.

9. "My poor friend," said the Half-crown, in a tone of pity, "you seem to know nothing of the world. Let me tell you that we were made in a splendid place called the Mint."

10. "The Queen keeps this fine house in London on purpose for us, and has a great man, called the Master of the Mint, to take care of us."

11. "We were made in a machine, too; such