"Oh, I pounded him on the head with a stone as he was making off. He is a pretty big fellow, and he must have swum from the mainland, Miss Schuyler."
"Yes, I never saw a snake on this island before."
"Come here, Nep," said Phil, "dear old fellow; good dog for taking care of Joe. Your head shall be my first picture for our sick children."
[to be continued.]
[EMBROIDERY FOR GIRLS.]
BY SUSAN HAYES WARD.
ne of the most exquisite pieces of embroidery I ever saw was brought from the Royal School of Art Needle-Work at South Kensington by a gentleman who imports the most beautiful art embroideries for sale in this country. This was a sofa pillow of soft yellow India silk, with the design outlined, and the rest of the surface darned back and forth in a rich old-gold-color. A few lines of pale pink veined the petals, and there was a narrow border of dull greenish-blue that inclosed the whole. The only stitch used was simply an irregular darning stitch. The work was so charming and so easy that any young girl would enjoy doing it. It would be a very pretty way of embroidering work-bags or squares for the backs of wall-brackets. The soft India silks are hard to find, but you may find a dull yellow Surah silk, and there is a soft cream-colored pongee that would do. Something near the color of a light yellow nasturtium would be best. Get a piece eight inches square, trace on it the design of Fig. 17, and back the silk with a piece of soft, very thin unbleached muslin, and overcast the edges. Fig. 17 is just the size of a tile such as is usually set in square wall-brackets. Buy a skein or two of old gold filoselle of a somewhat darker shade than your silk, or a good bronze-color that harmonizes well with it. First run the outline of your flowers in the dark yellow or bronze, and the shading lines, taking up but few threads of the silk with your needle, so that the outline will show strong and plain on the surface. Outline the leaves and stems in a dull, not too dark, green. Take two or three threads from a strand of filoselle in your needle at once, and do not take too long a needleful. Then darn the background back and forth, making the threads run parallel to each other, but with constant variation as to the length of stitch and the closeness of the lines—in this way: