CONTENTS.

"THE FIDDLE AND THE BOW." [ 9 ]
Cherish the Little Ones [19 ]
Fat Men and Bald-Headed Men [22 ]
The Poet Laureate of Music [23 ]
The Convict and His Fiddle [25 ]
A Vision of The Old Field School [27 ]
The Quilting and the Old Virginia Reel [36 ]
The Candy Pulling [44 ]
The Banquet [48 ]
There is Music All Around Us [53 ]
The Two Columns. [61 ]
There is a Melody for Every Ear [63 ]
Music is the Wine of the Soul [66 ]
The Old Time Singing School [72 ]
The Grand Opera [78 ]
Music [80 ]
"THE PARADISE OF FOOLS." [ 83 ]
The Paradise of Childhood [ 90 ]
The Paradise of the Barefooted Boy [ 98 ]
The Paradise of Youth [104 ]
The Paradise of Home [112 ]
Bachelor and Widower [117 ]
Phantoms [119 ]
The False Ideal [121 ]
The Circus in the Mountains [123 ]
The Phantom of Fortune [128 ]
Clocks [130 ]
The Panic [133 ]
Bunk City [135 ]
Your Uncle [137 ]
Fools [140 ]
Blotted Pictures [143 ]
"VISIONS AND DREAMS." [147 ]
The Happy Long Ago [151 ]
Dreams of the Years to Come [160 ]
From the Cave-man to the Kiss-o-phone [169 ]
Dreams [175 ]
Visions of Departed Glory [178 ]
Nature's Musicians [181 ]
Preacher's Paradise [185 ]
Brother Estep and the Trumpet [189 ]
"Wamper-jaw" at the Jollification [190 ]
The Tintinnabulation of the Dinner Bells [193 ]
Phantoms of the Wine Cup [196 ]
The Missing Link [197 ]
Nightmare [198 ]
Infidelity [200 ]
The Dream of God [201 ]

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"THE FIDDLE AND THE BOW."

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I heard a great master play on the wondrous violin; his bow quivered like the wing of a bird; in every quiver there was a melody, and every melody breathed a thought in language sweeter than was ever uttered by human tongue. I was conjured, I was mesmerized by his music. I thought I fell asleep under its power, and was rapt into the realm of visions and dreams. The enchanted violin broke out in tumult, and through the rifted shadows in my dream I thought I saw old ocean lashed to fury. The wing of the storm-god brooded above it, dark and lowering with night and tempest and war. I heard the shriek of the angry hurricane, the loud rattling musketry of rain, and hail, and the louder and deadlier crash and roar of the red artillery on high. Its rumbling batteries, unlimbered on the vapory heights and manned by the fiery gunners of the storm, boomed their volleying thunders to the terrible rythm of the strife below. And in every stroke of the bow fierce lightnings leaped down from their dark pavilions of cloud, and, like armed angels of light, flashed their trenchant blades among the phantom squadrons marshalling for battle on the field of the deep. I heard the bugle blast and battle cry of the charging winds, wild and exultant, and then I saw the billowy monsters rise, like an army of Titans, to scale and carry the hostile heights of heaven. Assailing again and again, as often hurled back headlong into the ocean's abyss, they rolled, and surged, and writhed, and raged, till the affrighted earth trembled at the uproar of the warring elements. I saw the awful majesty and might of Jehovah flying on the wings of the tempest, planting his footsteps on the trackless deep, veiled in darkness and in clouds. There was a shifting of the bow; the storm died away in the distance, and the morning broke in floods of glory. Then the violin revived and poured out its sweetest soul. In its music I heard the rustle of a thousand joyous wings, and a burst of song from a thousand joyous throats. Mockingbirds and linnets thrilled the glad air with warblings; gold finches, thrushes and bobolinks trilled their happiest tunes; and the oriole sang a lullaby to her hanging cradle that rocked in the wind. I heard the twitter of skimming swallows and the scattered covey's piping call; I heard the robin's gay whistle, the croaking of crows, the scolding of blue-jays, and the melancholy cooing of a dove. The swaying tree-tops seemed vocal with bird-song while he played, and the labyrinths of leafy shade echoed back the chorus. Then the violin sounded the hunter's horn, and the deep-mouthed pack of fox hounds opened loud and wild, far in the ringing woods, and it was like the music of a hundred chiming bells. There was a tremor of the bow, and I heard a flute play, and a harp, and a golden-mouthed cornet; I heard the mirthful babble of happy voices, and peals of laughter ringing in the swelling tide of pleasure. Then I saw a vision of snowy arms, voluptuous forms, and light fantastic slippered feet, all whirling and floating in the mazes of the misty dance. The flying fingers now tripped upon the trembling strings like fairy-feet dancing on the nodding violets, and the music glided into a still sweeter strain. The violin told a story of human life. Two lovers strayed beneath the elms and oaks, and down by the river side, where daffodils and pansies bend and smile to rippling waves, and there, under the bloom of incense-breathing bowers, under the soothing sound of humming bees and splashing waters, there, the old, old story, so old and yet so new, conceived in heaven, first told in Eden and then handed down through all the ages, was told over and over again. Ah, those downward drooping eyes, that mantling blush, that trembling hand in meek submission pressed, that heaving breast, that fluttering heart, that whispered "yes," wherein a heaven lies—how well they told of victory won and paradise regained! And then he swung her in a grapevine swing. Young man, if you want to win her, wander with her amid the elms and oaks, and swing her in a grapevine swing.

"Swinging in the grapevine swing,