I might have laughed when I was eleven years old, dear, but I never go up a steep mountain nowadays without feeling, like your mamma, that there is danger as well as pleasure about the ascent. I am glad you have been to the top of Mount Washington, and have looked from there over the great mountains and deep valleys of New England.
Milton, Ontario, Canada.
I am a little girl twelve years old, and live in a small town thirty miles from Toronto. We are always very glad when your paper comes. I love to read the letters in the Post-office Box. I like "The Cruise of the Canoe Club." My father and four of my uncles are in Montana, and my aunt and her children are going out there next week. My uncle and his youngest brother belong to a surveying party, and have been surveying in the Rocky Mountains and Yellowstone Park all summer, and write home delightfully interesting descriptions of the wonders to be seen there—about the geysers and glass mountains, also soda mountains, and cañons. The Grand Cañon is the deepest of all; it is several thousand feet deep, and at the bottom is a rushing, roaring river. One of my uncles descended into it. It is so deep that if you go down into it and look upward, you can see the stars at three o'clock in the afternoon. The geysers spout up water to a tremendous height. One of them—I think it is called the Excelsior—throws water in which are pieces of rock to a height of three hundred feet. Often the eruptions are preceded by rumblings and shakings like an earthquake. Once when the party were near one of the geyser basins, suddenly the earth began to quake, and the water in the basin spouted ever so high, and the sky was filled with water and pieces of rock, and they had to run to get out of the way. Perhaps we will go to Montana if father stays there; and if we do, mother says that we may take an occasional trip to the Park, and then I will write and tell you of some of the things we see there.
Becca R.
The cunning little letter which follows was sent by a little girl five and one-half years old to her young lady sisters away from home. This little girl lives near a railroad, and every day she and her brother watch for their conductors, as they call them, and wave to them as the cars rush past the door. By the "tassels with the board on" little Amy meant a lambrequin which belonged on the mantel. Jumbo is a huge toy elephant greatly admired by the little folks in Amy's nursery:
Tenafly, New Jersey.
Dear Louise and Maggie,—It will soon be Roy's birthday. If you don't come home quick, you won't be here before it comes. Roy creeps. He can walk with our taking hold of him. He can stand up by the bath-tub. May S. don't know some of the words of her music-lesson. I say my lessons every day at home, and then I say them in school. I did not get a bad mark to-day; sometimes I do. I get apples in B.'s yard—they don't care—and take them to school over recess, and then I take them home. Mamma has to sew so hard, and we bother her, and she sends us out-doors. When it rains she don't; then we stay in the house, and play with our toys. Sarah's back, and we're glad, and she irons every Tuesday. We take walks with her sometimes. Mary's here too, and sometimes she goes out with her husband. I like him, and he gives me pennies. I would like to be over there and see your big dog Frank. Some Sunday afternoons papa's tired, and he don't want to go riding. We did go last Sunday. Last Sunday we took Roy. Marian plays with Roy every day, and mamma says Stop! when she hurts him. Clifford has to get his teeth fixed, and we can't go to P. until next Monday. Every day papa goes out to see the men fixing the trestle-work. On Roy's birthday we're going to have a little party; no one is coming, only us. Mamma has to send out when she wants papa—away out to the trestle-work. Mamma writes this letter, and I find the words. Marian has got lots of things in the corner by the bookcase again. Clifford's got lots of cars now, and he plays with them 'most every day. He's got a new tin train of cars from the Fair. We're getting our stoves fixed. There's fire in the sitting-room. Your tassels with the board on is up in the front parlor. We've got a Jumbo from the Fair. We take Jumbo out to see our 'ductors. Mine is away, and ain't home yet. Roy goes around picking up everything, and gets things out of mamma's basket, and dumped it over twice. It's near winter, and we've got the sleds down.
A kiss for Maggie, and a kiss for Louise. Love for Maggie, and love for Louise.
Amy D.