[to be continued.]
SOME TRUE STORIES ABOUT STEEPLES.
BY C. F. M.
A great many years ago a hurricane occurred in Utica, New York. Just as it began it was noticed that a heavy swing sign in front of a store was held out in a horizontal position for some time.
Before long the force of the wind increased to such a degree that several houses on Genesee Street Hill were unroofed, and the spire of the Second Presbyterian Church was thrown to the ground.
After the storm was over it was discovered that the rod holding the weather-vane on the top of the tall steeple of the First Presbyterian Church was bent so that it became nearly horizontal. It was unsightly; but how to repair the injury was the question. It would be no easy task, as there was a large ball, or globe, on the rod below the vane. After a while a sailor offered his services. He ascended the steeple, and climbed the rod until he came just beneath the globe. Then he threw a rope out a good many times, until, after a while, the end looped around over the rod, above the globe, long enough to reach to him. Twisting the rope together, he let go of the iron rod, and trusting himself to the rope, swung out free. By climbing it he now managed to get on the top of the globe. Standing there, he succeeded in straightening the rod that held the weather-vane.
Now how was he to get down? Again trusting to the rope that was fastened to the rod above the globe, he swung free at a great height from the earth; then lowering himself, and swinging back and forth, he managed to grasp the rod beneath the globe, and soon reaching the spire, descended.
The steeple of Salisbury Cathedral is the highest in England, and next to that of Strasbourg Cathedral, the highest in Europe. Every year a man climbs to the top to grease the weather-vane. This is done by ascending the inside as far as possible, and then going out of a manhole and climbing the rest of the way by means of the brass staples fastened on the outer wall.
Once on a festal occasion, when the King was present, a reward was offered, as usual, to any person who would ascend and attend to the weather-vane. A sailor agreed to do it, and ascended in the way I have told you, until he came to the copestone, when, to show what he could do, he stood on his head. Then performing the task he was sent to do, that of greasing the vane, he descended, and claimed his reward. But the King was so exasperated at the sailor for needlessly frightening the people by standing on his head at such a great height, that he would not allow him to be paid.
A long time ago, in the town of Northam, England, the steeple of the church was found to be unsteady. It swayed back and forth whenever the great bell struck, and continued to sway thus, until, as it leaned over on one side, it opened large cracks on the opposite.
It was not long before the boys of the town found this out, and the bright idea entered the head of one of them, and was by him told to the others, that it would be a capital place to crack nuts. So, boy-like, they had to try it, and standing at the base of the spire, would fill the cracks as far as they could reach with good English walnuts, and then stand back for the steeple to return to an upright position, cracking the nuts. As the great clock in the tower struck, the jar caused the spire to lean in the opposite direction. The boys now got their nuts, and then put in more, that the operation might be repeated, for they considered it rare sport.
But in the course of time the people of the town who had such matters in charge decided that the steeple was unsafe, and strengthened it with bands of iron; but this not proving satisfactory, after a while each stone was numbered, and the steeple taken down and rebuilt in the old style. And from that day to this, to the regret of the boys, it has never been known to crack nuts.
During a great fire in New York, a few years ago, one of the buildings destroyed was a church having a very tall steeple. The flames ran up inside this steeple, and, bursting out at the top, melted the zinc and copper about the lightning rod, so that they fell in showers of green, gold, and crimson fire, producing a spectacle of most wondrous beauty.
FLOWER QUEENS OF NIGHT.
BY MARGARET EYTINGE.
"Pretty, fragrant four-o'clocks,"
Said the rose one day,
"Pity 'tis your buds unfold
Into blossoms gay
When the west begins to burn
With the sunset light—
Sweetness wondrous rare to waste
On the drowsy night.
"Other blooms have birds to sing,
Bees to hum, their praise,
Butterflies to visit them
Through the summer days.
Bee but seldom hums for you,
Bird but seldom sings,
Butterfly is ne'er your guest,
Pretty, fragrant things."
"Lovely, graceful, crimson rose,"
Said the modest flowers,
"Though the sun we scarcely know,
Happiness is ours.
Moon we have, and sparkling stars
(Each a heavenly gem),
And their light so gentle is,
We can look at them.
"And the flashing fire-flies
Round us gleam and glance,
Like a countless host of fays
In an airy dance.
And the moth king, velvet-winged,
Dainty kiss bestows,
As he whispers, 'You are sweet,
Sweet as any rose.'
"Grieve no more for us, dear friend;
Thrice content we are,
Loved by moth and fire-fly,
Dew-drop, moon, and star.
And while you o'er garden reign
In the bright daylight,
We are hailed by wand'ring winds,
Flower queens of night."
OLD TIMES IN THE COLONIES.
BY CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN.
No. III.
ISAAC BRADLEY AND JOSEPH WHITTAKER.
Twelve miles from the sea, on the bank of the Merrimac River, is the busy town of Haverhill. It was a small settlement in 1690. There was a cluster of houses and a meeting-house. The country beyond, all the way to Canada, was a wilderness. The Indians came down the river in their bark canoes, carrying them past the falls where the city of Lowell now stands, past Amoskeag Falls, where the Manchester factories to-day are humming. They caught beaver, bear, and foxes, and sold the furs to the traders.
The Indians were under the influence of the French, and when war broke out between France and England for the restoration of James II. to the throne from which he had fled, the settlers of Haverhill, in common with the people all along the frontier, knew that the Indians, influenced by the French in Canada, might be upon them at any moment.
EARLY SETTLERS GOING TO MEETING.—Drawn by Howard Pyle.
The settlers had their guns ever at hand. If at work in the field, they placed them where they could seize them quickly. When they went to bed at night, they put a stout bar of wood across the door, and examined the flints and the priming. On Sunday, when they went to meeting, each man carried his gun, and the minister looked down from the pulpit upon men who had powder-horns and bullet-pouches slung across their shoulders, and whose muskets were standing in the corners of their pews. Some of the settlers kept watch outside while the others were in meeting. They went on scouts through the dark woods, peering among the trees to see if the Indians were prowling in the vicinity.
The settlers were obliged to work hard. While the men were at work in the fields, the women were spinning and weaving. Boys and girls had little time for play. There was always something for them to do. When a boy was sixteen years old, he was expected to do the work of a man. They all learned to shoot, and some of them, when they were only twelve, could bring down a squirrel from the highest tree every time, or shoot a deer upon the run.
Two boys—Isaac Bradley, who was fifteen years old, and Joseph Whittaker, who was eleven—were at work one day in Mr. Bradley's field, when suddenly a party of Indians sprang out from the woods and seized them. Isaac was small, but he was bright, cool-headed, and brave-hearted. Joseph, though four years younger, was as large as Isaac, but he was not so stout-hearted nor self-reliant as his companion.
The Indians were from Canada. They did not stop to kill any of the settlers, but hastened away, travelling through the dark woods northward to the beautiful Lake Winnipiseogee, where they remained through the winter. The lake swarmed with trout and pickerel, which they could catch through the ice, and the woods were full of bears and deer.
Isaac made himself at home in the wigwam, and picked up the language of the Indians in a very short time. The squaws made him do their drudgery; but the warriors liked him, and the Indian dogs wagged their tails when he looked at them out of his kindly eyes.
Winter passed and April came.
"We go to Canada now," said one of the Indians.
Isaac had no intention of going to Canada. Day after day he thought over the matter. He knew that the English settlements were far away to the south, but there was no path to them. He had no compass. How could he ever reach them? He would be guided by the sun by day, and the stars by night. He would make the attempt. He might perish, but death was better than captivity.
"I am going to try it to-morrow night, but I am afraid you won't wake," he said to Joseph, who always slept soundly, and snored in his sleep.
"Oh yes, I will," Joseph replied.
The Indians had killed a moose, and Isaac had managed to hide a large piece of meat in the bushes near the camp. He filled his pockets with their corn-bread. Night came. All were asleep except Isaac, who was so excited by the thought of escaping that his eyes would not close. Every sense was quickened. He arose softly and touched Joseph, who was sound asleep. He did not stir, and Isaac shook him harder.
"What do you want?" Joseph asked.
In an instant Isaac was stretched out, snoring; but the Indians did not wake, and after a little while the boys arose softly, and crept out of the wigwam, Isaac with an Indian's gun and powder and balls. They made their way to the meat, took it under their arms, and started upon the run, guided on their way by the stars. On through the wilderness, amid the tall trees, over fallen trunks, over stones, through thickets and tangled brushwood, they travelled till morning, and then crept into a hollow log.
Great the consternation in the camp of the Indians. Their captives gone! a gun lost! At daybreak the Indians, with their dogs, were on the trail, and in swift pursuit.
The boys heard the barking of the dogs, which soon came sniffing around the log. What shall they do now? Isaac is quick-witted.
"Good fellow, Bose! good fellow! here is some breakfast for you;" and he tosses the moose meat to them. The dogs know his voice, devour the meat, and are as happy as dogs can be. The boys are their friends. They cease barking, and trot around, with no further concern.
The Indians come up on the run. The boys hear their voices, as they hasten by, followed by their dogs.
ISAAC BRADLEY CARRYING JOSEPH INTO THE SETTLEMENT.
Through the day they lie hidden in the log, and when night comes, strike out in a different direction from that taken by the Indians. All night long they travel, nibbling at their hard corn-bread. Morning comes, and again they conceal themselves. Once more at night they are on the march. On the third day Isaac shoots a pigeon, but does not dare to kindle a fire, and they eat it raw. They find a turtle, smash its shell, and eat the meat. On, day after day, they travel, eating roots, and buds of the trees just ready to burst into leaf. The sixth day comes, and they suddenly find themselves close to an Indian camp. They peep through the underbrush, and see the warriors sitting around their camp fire smoking their pipes. They steal softly away, and then run as fast as their legs can carry them. The morning of the eighth day comes. Joseph's strength is failing; his courage is gone; he cries bitterly. They are in the wilderness, they know not where, with nothing to eat, their clothes in rags, their feet bleeding.
"Cheer up, Joseph; here are some ground-nuts. Here, drink some water," says Isaac.
No brave words, no act of kindness, can quicken the courage of the fainting boy. What shall Isaac do—stay and die with him, or try to find his own way out? Sad the parting, the younger lying down to die upon a mossy bank, the older turning away alone, lost in the wilderness.
With faltering steps, Isaac pushes on, and discerns a house. No one is there, but he knows there must be white men not far away. With quickened pulse, he turns back to the dying boy, awakens him from sleep, rubs his eyes, bathes his temples, cheers him with encouraging words.
"Come, Joseph, we are saved. There is a house close by."
Joseph's eyes brighten. He stands upon his feet, walks a few steps, and falls. Isaac is stronger than ever. He lifts his fainting comrade, takes him in his arms, staggers on, reaches the empty and desolate house, and discovers a beaten path leading southward. He goes on, resting now and then, but ever speaking words of cheer.
At last they see before them a placid river, and beside it a cluster of houses. They know that in a few moments they will be once more among friends, and brave Isaac Bradley is almost overcome with the joy of this knowledge.
What a sight is that which the soldier on the look-out at the garrison-house on the bank of the Saco beholds, just as the sun is going down—two boys, one carrying the other!
Saved. They are kindly cared for by the soldiers, their wounds are dressed, nourishing food is given them, once more they are clothed in the garments of civilized beings, and there are moist eyes in the garrison as they tell their thrilling story. And what rejoicing when at last they reach their homes!
TOM CHESTER'S SILVER MINE.
BY A. A. HAYES, JUN.
Tom Chester's father lives in a pleasant town in New England, and Tom himself grew up like other boys in that part of the country. In winter he went to the village school, in an old red building with a great stove in one corner, and on his way home "coasted" down the long hill at the foot of which he lived. In summer he helped the hay-makers, and rode on the high-piled cart, and went on picnics to Blue Mountain, and bathed in the clear brook under the willows. He grew to be stout, hardy, and red-cheeked, very unlike his father, who pored over his books, and took no exercise, and grew paler and thinner each year.
One day, as Tom was sitting on the door-step making a whistle out of a slip of willow, he saw old Dr. W—— drive up in his old-fashioned "sulky," tie his horse to a post, and go to his father's library, bidding him good-morning as he passed. He remained some time with Mr. Chester, and as he came out Tom heard him say,
"Very well, then, we will call that settled. And mind, the sooner you start, the sooner you may expect to find yourself better and stronger."
Mr. Chester, who had followed the doctor to the door, saw the inquiring look on Tom's face, and asked him, with a smile, how he would like to go to Colorado.
"What! to dig for silver?" cried Tom.
"No; to seek for what is more valuable than silver—health," said his father. "Dr. W—— says that I must go to the Rocky Mountains, and we shall start in a few days."
It was dark when the train rolled into Denver, and Tom, even if he had not been tired and sleepy, could have seen nothing of the town as they drove to the hotel. But in the morning, when he woke up and looked out of the windows of his room, which was on the western side of the house, he cried aloud with surprise and delight. All along the horizon rose a great range of mountains, with two lofty peaks towering over the others, one at the north and the other at the south. They seemed so near that Tom thought he could walk to them; but when he had dressed himself and gone down to the office, he asked the clerk how long it would take, and the man looked at him, and said, "I wouldn't advise you to try, you little tender-foot."
"My feet are not tender," replied Tom, sharply.
The people in the room all laughed, and a miner in a blue flannel shirt patted Tom on the back, and said, "That's right, my boy. You remind me of a kid of my own up at Fairplay. The fellow's only chaffing you. When any one's been just a little while in the country, they always call him a 'tender-foot.' You mustn't mind that."
Then he went on to explain to Tom that the foot-hills which looked so near were at least fifteen or twenty miles away. Then he told him about the mining towns, or "camps," as they are called, and how the men who look for mines, called "prospectors," search through the mountains, seeking signs of silver ore; and that when they find them, they put stakes in the ground to mark the "claims" which the law allows, or the right to dig in a space 1500 feet one way and 300 the other. Then he described how they dig down in hopes of finding what they call "pay gravel," or ore which contains enough silver to make it worth sending to the works. He mentioned some men whom he knew who had sold "prospect holes," as he called them (or shafts partly sunk, and not yet proved to be good mines), for large sums. Tom was immensely interested in these narrations, and was eagerly listening when his father came in to find him.
"Guess you'd better let me have that boy of yourn to make a miner of, Colonel," said this new friend to Mr. Chester. "He's got plenty of sand."
Mr. Chester knew that people in the West give titles to almost every one, but it was some time before either he or Tom found out that it was a great compliment to say that any one had "sand," which means, in the rough but very expressive language of the mountains, that one possesses bravery and great strength and force of character.
After seeing all the sights of Denver, Tom and his father took the train one morning for a little town called Golden, near the foot-hills. Here they were transferred to a railroad only three feet wide, and found an open or "observation" car, from which they could see very well. The train entered what is called a cañon, or gorge, down which poured the waters of Clear Creek (which, by-the-way, were not clear at all, but very muddy). It wound up this cañon, the walls of which seemed to come together away over the heads of the passengers. No boy who is fortunate enough to make a journey to Colorado should fail to see this remarkable place. The little engine tugged at the train, and dragged it up the steep cañon, and by the side of the winding stream, until it came to a valley surrounded by high hills, where is the town of Idaho Springs. Here Tom and his father left the train, and walked to a neat-looking hotel, where they took up their quarters. Mr. Chester already felt the benefit of the change of climate, and he wanted to spend much time in excursions to different points. He and Tom went up by the railroad to Georgetown, and drove to Central City, and at both places they saw a great many mines. They went down in buckets, lowered by great ropes, six and seven hundred feet into the shafts, and then sometimes came out by tunnels cut from the sides of the hills. They saw mills in which gold ore was crushed by stamps, or great iron bars falling heavily on it, and works where silver ore was put into hot furnaces—in fact, they saw so many things that Tom became rather bewildered. All the time, however, he found himself thinking about what the miner had told him in Denver, and longing to try his own hand at prospecting. When he told his father, one day, that he would like to go up on the hill-sides or in some of the cañons and look for a mine, the latter at first laughed, and then grew rather serious, and began to talk about the danger of being led away by this desire to be suddenly rich without labor.
"You hear, my boy," he said, "about the one, two, or three men who succeed, but not a word about the hundreds, and even thousands, who make failure after failure, and pass their lives in the misery of 'hope deferred.'"
Tom listened respectfully to his father, but could not make up his mind that it would not be a fine thing to find a silver mine. He began to take walks by himself, and look out for the signs about which various miners had told him. At times he would think that he had found something, and he would bring little pieces of rock to show to a friend whose acquaintance he had made in the little town. This was an old miner named Sam, a rough but very kind-hearted man, who did not laugh at all, but told him pleasantly that he had not yet found any mine.
One day, while walking in a cañon near the hotel, and chipping with a hammer at the broken rock, he saw two poorly dressed men carrying bundles, as if on a journey, who stopped and asked what he was doing. They told him that there was no use in searching in that place, but that they had an excellent prospect hole, already showing "pay gravel," which they had been compelled to abandon on account of pressing engagements elsewhere, and which, although it was worth many thousands, they would sell him for ten dollars. Poor little Tom had just that sum, which his father had given him on his birthday, and to which he had proposed to add his savings, for the purpose of buying some fishing-tackle. Perhaps his slight "craze" about a mine made him less cautious than usual. At all events, he accepted the men's offer, and promised to meet them that afternoon near a tree which they pointed out.
He was there on the minute, with his ten dollars in his pocket. The men took him up the hill, and showed him a rather deep hole, into which a rough ladder led. Down this they went, and Tom saw some ore of just the kind that his friend Sam had told him he ought to find. Then the men set two stakes in the ground, on which they rudely marked "T. C.," took his money, and walked hastily away. Tom went down to the hotel full of his purchase. His father had gone to Georgetown, but Sam was there, and to him Tom eagerly narrated what he thought his good fortune. Sam heard him without remark, and then put on his hat, and taking pick and shovel, asked Tom to show him the mine. Arriving there, he shovelled up some of the ore which Tom had seen, and disclosed quite a different rock below. On this lay a piece of board, which he handed to Tom, who read thereon,
"u ar sold bad u yung tender-fut this aint no mine."
For a moment he did not understand; then came a shock of disappointment, and then a sense of indignation, not so much against the men who had deceived him as at himself for his delusion and stupidity.
Sam looked kindly at him. "Pretty rough on you, Tom, wasn't it?" he said. "Why, my boy, this is an old claim of mine, which I gave up long ago as no good. They've just gone and salted it—I mean, put some good ore in to deceive you. So they walked off with your ten dollars, the miserable scamps! Tell me what they looked like."
Tom described them.
"Ho! ho!" said Sam. "I saw those same fellows taking the train for Denver. I'm going down there to-morrow, and the Chief of Police is a friend of mine. Perhaps we'll run across them some day."
As they walked home, he tried to cheer Tom up by telling him stories of clever men who had been served in similar ways; but Tom was sober, not on account of his loss, but because it had come to his mind how foolish he had been from the first. He felt easier when he had told his father the whole story.
The latter laughed heartily, and said, "Well, Tom, my boy, considering how badly you had the mining fever, I do not think that ten dollars was a large price to pay for a cure."
Some time after Tom had returned to his home he received a letter from Colorado, which proved to be from his friend Sam, reading partly as follows:
"... I am glad to tell you that we catched them two claim-jumpers [men who steal claims]. They'd spent all your stamps, sure enough, and you won't never see them no more; but it's a comfort that they got two years at Cañon City [where the penitentiary is]. Better luck next time. Come out again next summer, and I'll help you find an A1 mine...."
But Tom says that if he ever has any money at all, it will be earned in some good old-fashioned way; that he is not a "tender-foot," and that he does not want any more interest in prospect holes.
WOLF-CHILDREN.
BY JAMES GREENWOOD.
Some years ago a soldier stationed at Bondee, in India, while passing near a small stream, saw three wolf cubs and a boy drinking. He managed to seize the boy, who seemed about ten years old, but who was so wild and fierce that he tore the trooper's clothes, and bit him severely in several places. The soldier at first tied him up in the military gun shed, and fed him with raw meat; he was afterward allowed to wander freely about the Bondee bazar. A lad named Tanoo, servant of a Cashmere merchant then at Bondee, took compassion on the poor boy, and prepared a bed for him under the mango-tree where he himself lodged; here he kept him fastened to a tent-pin.
Up to this time he would eat nothing but raw flesh, but Tanoo gradually taught him to eat balls of rice and pulse. In about six weeks after he had been tied up, and after much rubbing of his joints with oil, he was made to stand and walk upright, whereas hitherto he had gone on all fours.
One night, while the boy was lying under the mango-tree, Tanoo saw two wolves creep stealthily toward him, and after smelling him, they touched him, when he got up. Instead, however, of being frightened, the boy put his hand upon their heads, and they began to play with him, capering about while he pelted them with grass and straw. Tanoo tried to drive them off, but could not. At last, however, they left, but the following night three wolves came, and a few nights after four, which returned several times.
The wolf-boy, however, could not be entirely reconciled to civilized life. In being removed from place to place he never lost an opportunity of endeavoring to escape into the jungle. At last Tanoo was sent away on a short journey, and when he returned, his savage charge had disappeared, and was never again heard of.
The story of another wolf-child is even more wonderful than the above.
In March, 1843, a cultivator who lived at Chupra, about twenty miles from Sultanpoor, went to cut his crop of wheat and pulse, taking with him his wife, and a son about three years old. As the father was reaping, a wolf suddenly rushed upon the boy, caught him up, and made off with him toward the ravines. People ran to the aid of the parents, but soon lost sight of the wolf and his prey.
About six years afterward, as two sipahees were watching for hogs on the border of the jungle, they saw three wolf cubs and a boy come out from the jungle and go down to the stream to drink; all four then ran to a den in the ravine. The sipahees followed, but the cubs had already entered, and the boy was half way in, when one of the men caught him by the leg and drew him back. He was very savage, bit at the men, and seizing the barrel of one of their guns in his teeth, shook it fiercely. The sipahees, however, secured him, brought him home, and kept him for twenty days, during which he would eat nothing but raw flesh, and was fed accordingly on hares and birds. His captors soon found it difficult to provide him with sufficient food, and took him to the bazar in the village of Koeleepoor, to be supported by the charitable till he might be recognized and claimed by his parents.
He is unable to speak or to articulate any sound with distinctness. In drinking, he dips his face in the water, but does not lap like a wolf. He still prefers raw flesh; and when a bullock dies, and the skin is removed, he attacks and eats the body in company of the village dogs.