Eutawville, South Carolina.
I am a boy of nine. I am spending the winter at my grandfather's plantation in South Carolina, but my home is in the Pennsylvania mountains. The Santee River is near here, and a deep swamp with bears in it. There are many young lambs here, and one day the buzzards caught two little weak ones. Another boy and I drove them off from getting another. The birds are very gay, and the woodpeckers tap on the house like mad. Love to the Editor.
E. B. C. Jun.
Poor little lambs! We are so glad you and your friend were in time to drive off the cruel buzzards before they carried away any more of them. Have you ever happened to meet a bear, or do they hide themselves in the swamp? What would you do if one came along? And are you studying the habits of the birds, so that when you go home again you will have acquired a fund of information about the warblers of the South?
C. Y. P. R. U.
Perhaps some of you would like to know how to make pretty scrap-books, either for your own pleasure or to give to little friends. These scrap-books are sources of enjoyment to children who have been ill and are getting stronger—who are what we call convalescent—and some of us know crippled children, or even grown people, who are shut in from busy life by weakness or disease. We ought to try to brighten their lives if we can. Gather together all the illustrated newspapers and books with pictures that you can command. Black and white pictures are as good as colored, and the two look well together. Cut these out neatly and carefully, with smooth edges. Torn and worn-out picture-books usually have something left which will do to cut out, and be thus saved from being wholly lost. Then there are the Christmas, New-Year, and birthday cards, of which nearly all of us have some. Take for the pages of your book, paper, muslin, or common glazed cambric; cut this into pieces ten inches long and eight inches wide. Three or four pages will make a book large enough to begin with. The cambric may be all white, or any color you prefer—pink, blue, red, or a part of each color. On these pages paste the pictures neatly on both sides, using your taste as to which pictures look well together and fit in nicely. The covers may be made of the cambric, neatly lined; but if you aim at durability, take light pasteboard covered on both sides with cambric, and sewed together over and over, or what is better, in button-hole stitch in colored worsted. Then with the scissors make holes through all, and tie the covers and pages together with a narrow ribbon or twisted worsted.
We are sure that none of you who can play and sing will neglect to learn the beautiful melody which we give you in this week's Post-office Box. We shall think we hear you singing it as we follow the paper in its flight over land and sea to the thousands of homes where little hands are outreached to welcome its arrival.