At a table-d’hôte at Ludwigsburg one of the company showed a very rare gold coin, which was passed around for inspection. After conjectures as to its origin and value, conversation drifted to other subjects, and the coin was temporarily forgotten. After awhile, the owner asked for it, and to the surprise of all, it was not to be found. A gentleman sitting at the foot of the table was observed to be in much agitation, and as his embarrassment seemed to increase with the continuance of the search the company was about to propose a very disagreeable measure, when suddenly a waiter entered the room, saying, “Here is the coin; it was found in one of the finger-glasses.” The relief to all was manifest, and now the suspected stranger broke his silence thus: “None of you can rejoice more than myself at the recovery of the coin, for I have been placed in a painful situation. By a singular coincidence I have a duplicate of the very same coin in my purse (here showing it to the company). The idea that on the personal search which would probably be proposed I would be taken for the purloiner of the coin, added to the fact that I am a stranger here, with no one to vouch for my integrity, was distracting. The honesty of the servants, with a lucky accident, has saved my honor.” The friendly congratulations of the company soon effaced the unpleasant effect of their unwarranted suspicions.
A Little Beggar’s Charity
A touching little begging story with a good moral is told by the Pittsburg Telegraph. A young man who had been on a three days’ debauch wandered into the office room of a hotel, where he was well known, sat down, and stared moodily into the street. Presently a little girl of about ten years came in and looked timidly about the room. She was dressed in rags, but she had a sweet, intelligent face that could scarcely fail to excite sympathy. There were five persons in the room, and she went to each begging. One gentleman gave her a five-cent piece, and she then went to the gentleman spoken of and asked him for a penny, adding: “I haven’t had anything to eat for a whole day.” The gentleman was out of humor, and he said, crossly: “Don’t bother me; go away! I haven’t had anything to eat for three days.” The child opened her eyes in shy wonder and stared at him a moment, and then walked slowly towards the door. She turned the knob, and then after hesitating a few seconds, walked up to him, and gently laying the five cents she had received on his knee, said with a tone of true girlish pity in her voice, “If you haven’t had anything to eat for three days, you take this and go and buy some bread. Perhaps I can get some more somewhere.” The young fellow blushed to the roots of his hair, and lifted the Sister of Charity in his arms, kissed her two or three times in delight. Then he took her to the persons in the room, and to those in the corridors and in the office, and told the story and asked contributions, giving himself all the money he had with him. He succeeded in raising over forty dollars and sent the little one on her way rejoicing.
Jack Sprat
Enthusiasts in folk-lore have undertaken to prove that subtle allegories or abstruse theological dogmas are the basis of popular tales. That in the celebrated story of Jack Sprat, for example, it is possible to discern an emblem of a rapacious clergy and an equally greedy aristocracy devouring the substance of the commons.
Franklin’s Brown Coat
When Benjamin Franklin, as minister to France, was formally presented to Louis XVI., he gained admiration for republican simplicity by appearing in a plain, ordinary suit. But when Nathaniel Hawthorne made the discovery that Franklin’s tailor had disappointed him of the gold-embroidered court costume he had ordered, simple-minded republicans were considerably disconcerted.
Sources of History
Early in the sixteenth century four Franciscan monks, living in a monastery in Donegal, compiled from a tangled web of tradition, song, story, and legend, the annals upon which all subsequent histories of Ireland have been based.