[Curtain.]
[TOMMY ON NATURE.]
The blossoms ripple in a sea
About the garden way,
And on that old black apple-tree,
With bluebirds more than gay,
I watch those fragrant flakes of snow
That tremble in the air,
And in the breezes softly blow,
And frolic here and there.
I think that Nature is too slow—
For she that blossom spray
Should turn to apples all aglow,
And do it right away.
R. K. Munkittrick.
[A LITTLE HERO.]
Ruggsy was black, and it would have been a difficult matter to discern him in the dark tunnel of the mine were it not for the little flickering lamp he carried, and his occasional "Go 'long there, Lazybones!" that he addressed to his patient mule. Ruggsy drove a tram-car through the tunnels of a coal mine, and all his little life was wrapped up in the mule, the miners, and the click of their picks. But Ruggsy is a hero, and the way he became one is best told as he describes it:
"You see, boss, it wuz jes like this. De mule an' I wuz er workin' up towards de upper gallery on de steep grade when Ise heerd a rumblin'. Ise knew what dat meant. One of dem trams had slipped de brake, an' wuz er comin' down de grade mighty fast. Tell yer, boss, Ise wuz er scared little nigger. Way down de grade, in de narrow part, der wuz er lot er men widenin' de tunnel, an' Ise knew de car would be on dem befo' dey could get outen de way. Ise hit ol' Lazybones er smash wid de whip, an', he! he! dat wuz funny! He neber felt it dat way befo', yer see. He gib an awmighty kick, an' started pullin' like mad. Yer see, dere wuz a switch 'bout a short bit ahead er me, and er blind sidin' ran offen it. If Ise could get dere befo' de tram got dere, Ise could throw de switch an' send her plum into de wall at de end o' de sidin'. But, boss, I's mos' frightened; dat rumblin' was growin' louder an' louder, and Ise spect dat Ise would be too late. Ise could see it er comin', an' old Lazybones saw it, an' he done gone an' balked, a thing he neber done befo'. Ise jumped off de car an' ran as fast as Ise could to de switch. It wuz stiff, an' Ise tugged at it till de car wuz on me. Ise felt a smash an' Ise knew de switch turned, but somethin' hit me. Say, boss, when Ise come to dey had me up to de surface, an' all de whole crowd er miners wuz up dere too. Dey cheered like dey does 'lection-times. I wuz hurt bad, but Ise been a hero eber sence, an' de foreman gib me a job up here in de engine-room."
[FROM CHUM TO CHUM.]
BY GASTON V. DRAKE.
XIII.—FROM BOB TO JACK.
Paris.
MY DEAR JACKY,—Did I say London was a circus? If I did, this place is two of 'em. And I tell you what, one of the queerest things in the world is to get into a country where people speak another language, even the children. Pop says there's even such a thing as French baby talk. It seems awful queer to ask a fellow what time it is in just the simplest way you know how, and have him look as if you'd asked him a question in algebra that he hadn't ever studied about. And yet that's happening all the time. They don't even understand the word Hullo; and Pop says some of 'em don't know French very well either, because he'd tried some of his on them, and they've just stood still and looked blank at him. I don't know what I'd do if Pop hadn't hired a courier to look after things. Ma said she didn't think a courier was necessary, but Pop said he thought he was. "You can talk French well enough to make yourself understood," Ma said. "I know that," said Pop, "but these French can't. If I want to go to the Luxemburg in a hurry I can ask a John Darm the way, but when he tells me, I have to sit down on the curb-stone for an hour or two and get out my pocket dictionary to translate what he says into English so that I can make use of his information." "But a courier is expensive," said Ma. "Three dollars a day," said Pa, "and I waste fifteen dollars' worth of nerves every hour going on as we do now." So we took him. His name is Jules and he's a dandy. He can speak all languages except Chinese and a few others, and he's a native of France and Germany. He was born in Alsace when it was French, which made him French, and now Alsace is German, which makes him German. That gave him two tongues to start with and he's picked up all the others since that time. His English is splendid, but as Pop says a little unexpected sometimes because he's got some of his words out of a slang dictionary, like corker for instance. When Pop asked him if there were any fine pictures to be seen anywhere he said the Luxemburg was full of "shay doovers—or as ze English say it has in it the very best corkers of modern times."
He's a fine fellow, Jules is, and for exciting times he can beat Sandboys and Chesterfield. He's seen a bull-fight in Spain and if he hadn't learned how to play leap-frog when he was a boy he'd have been killed at it, because the bull got loose and came straight for him, being angered by Jules's red necktie. His first impulse was to run, but when he saw how fast the bull was coming he knew he wouldn't have any chance in a running match, so he just stood still and the minute the bellering beast came within reach he grabbed hold of his horns and leap-frogged right over his back. The bull stopped short and kept gazing round the sky after him, thinking he'd tossed him and intending to catch him on his way down, and while this was going on Jules pulled the sword out of his cane, crept around in front and stabbed him to the heart. So you see leap-frog isn't such a waste of time after all, though I don't know what we could use it for at home unless it was to escape from a cable car, and that would be pretty hard work unless you were ten feet high.
We first met Jules at the railway station. The proprietor of the hotel sent him to see that we got through the French custom-house all right. I guess maybe he knew that we weren't quite used to the French language and that Jules would help us out and it was a good thing he did because I never saw Pop so excited as he was when we got here. He wasn't feeling well anyhow. We'd all been so awfully seasick crossing the British Channel that Pop hadn't time on board to be seasick himself, so he'd saved up a headache for the land. Then he was pretty mad at a French waiter at Calais who was such an idiot he didn't know what eggs were even in his own language. Pop asked him for uffs eight times and the fellow couldn't understand until finally Pop got mad and grabbed up a half a dozen buns and made a rush for the train forgetting to pay, with the waiter and a John Darm after him. We got the row all straightened out after a little while, but Pop couldn't get over it all the afternoon, and finally when he reached Paris he was ready to fight the whole French nation, and I heard Ma tell Aunt Sarah she was glad he didn't know enough French to insult anybody with it because she didn't want to have any trouble. And then Jules turned up and took charge of us all, even Pop. Pop didn't know who he was at first, but Jules told him, and then Pop got calm again and didn't want to fight anybody.
I have a sort of an idea that Jules is really a duke in disguise, because everybody sort of gives up to him. The custom-house people as soon as they saw Jules with our trunks never said a word but past 'em right through, and all he did was to shake hands with 'em for their trouble. Then we got in a fakir and rode to the hotel. Ma and Aunt Sarah and the children had gone ahead in an omnibus. Fakir is French for hack. They generally have only one horse and are open like a phaeton, with a little seat for boys just behind the driver. The drivers all have red faces and wear beaver hats made of patent leather some of 'em white but mostly black, and even when they cheat you they're awful cheap.
Pop tried some of his French on our driver on the way and you'd ought to have seen Jules try to keep his face straight. The driver looked amused too but Pop said he understood his French better than any other man he'd found yet in France.
"Yes, sir," said Jules. "I haf no doubt. Ze coshay he is vat you call a Irrishman."
The Paris streets are fine. They're so clean you could fall down and get up cleaner than you were when you fell and everybody's as polite as a dancing master. The hotel keeper acted as if we were some long lost relatives that he knew by the strawberry marks on our arms, he was so glad to see us, and when we went up to our rooms where the rest of the party already were, we found Ma and Aunt Sarah in a gorgeous parlor with fresh flowers on the centre table, but they still had their things on.
"We don't want this do we?" said Ma.
"Why not?" said Pop. "I think it's very nice."
"But it must be a million a day," said Ma.
"Oh no," said Pop. "I fixed that. It isn't any more expensive than back rooms on the top floor of a Yonkers hotel."
"All right," said Ma, taking off her coat and hat. "If that's so, I think we'll need two more rooms."
That shows you how very cheap everything is here.
To-morrow Jules is going to take us to see Napoleon's tomb, and I'll tell you about that and other things when I write again. I'm going out now with Pop to take a bicycle ride in the Boys de Bologna which is French for Central Park.
Good bye then for the present.
Bob.
The only artificial event now remaining on the Inter-collegiate card, and on the cards of the more important interscholastic associations, is the mile walk; and there is good reason to believe that within a year or two this will be relegated, with the standing-high-jump and the high-kick and the tug-of-war, to those regions whence acrobatic performances never return. Nothing in this life is worth doing or working at unless it is for some useful purpose, or unless there is an advantage to be gained by some one in its successful accomplishment. If the man who labors at becoming proficient in the mile walk does so because he believes he can afford amusement to the crowd in the grand stand by his acrobatics, very well. It is commendable to desire to add to the gayety of nations. But if he trains at walking—I am speaking now strictly of the heel-and-toe method—because he thinks he is doing athletic work, he is deluding himself.
Nothing, however, that is said here derogatory to artificial walking, as practised by the athlete, should be construed as reflecting in any way upon natural walking. There are few exercises for the general run of men any better than walking—walking across country at a natural gait, head up, chest out, toes turned out, and arms swinging easily at the sides. Such walking is natural and healthful. "Athletic" or "heel-and-toe" walking—exaggerated stride, heel pounding, toeing in, and all that—is artificial, and of no particular benefit. It is not harmful, of course, because it is exercise, and all normal exercise is beneficial.
The true test of the value of any field or track event is that of common-sense. For instance, it is well to learn to run 100 or 220 yards at great speed, because there are frequent occasions when it is necessary to cover those distances in quick time. It is well to train for quarter-mile and half-mile running, because if one wants to go to any place distant a half a mile of so, the quickest way to get there unaided is to run. It is the same way with the mile or the three-mile run. If you come to a brook, you use your knowledge of the running broad jump to get over it—not the standing broad jump. If you want to clear a fence (to escape a bull, for instance) you try the running high jump—not the standing high jump. If it is a high wall, and you have any knowledge of the pole vault, you likewise have an advantage. Hurdle-racing teaches you to get across country fields and fences, and both the hammer and the shot events on the card give good training for emergencies that may arise.
But there is no emergency that I can think of where proficiency in the mile walk would be of the slightest service. When it becomes necessary to travel a mile, running is by far the easier and the faster gait. There is no good word of any kind, so far as I know, to be said, for the mile walk. Yes, I will make one exception: it is a great thing for the digestion. I recommend it to dyspeptics! The rolling motion of the hips keeps the digestive organs in such constant exercise that they cannot become stagnant, and so perhaps for the American nation a little heel-and-toe now and then may be of value. But still, there are less acrobatic methods of helping the digestion than mile-walking.