SUE'S ICE-CREAM PARTY—Drawn by A. B. Frost.
But there was an awful scene when the party tried to eat that ice-cream. Sue handed it round, and said to everybody, "This is my ice-cream, and you must be sure to like it." The first one she gave it to was Dr. Porter. He is dreadfully fond of ice-cream, and he smiled such a big smile, and said he was sure it was delightful, and took a whole spoonful. Then he jumped up as if something had bit him, and went out of the door in two jumps, and we didn't see him again. Then three more men tasted their ice-cream, and jumped up, and ran after the doctor, and two girls said, "Oh my!" and held their handkerchiefs over their faces, and turned just as pale. And then everybody else put their ice-cream down on the table, and said thank you they guessed they wouldn't take any. The party was regularly spoiled, and when I tasted the ice-cream I didn't wonder. It was worse than the best kind of strong medicine.
Sue was in a dreadful state of mind, and when the party had gone home—all but one man, who lay under the apple-tree all night and groaned like he was dying, only we thought it was cats—she made me tell her all about the salt and the golden syrup. She wouldn't believe that I had tried to do my best, and didn't mean any harm. Father took her part, and said I ought to eat some of the ice-cream, since I made it; but I said I'd rather go up stairs with him. So I went.
Some of these days people will begin to understand that they are just wasting and throwing away a boy who always tries to do his best, and perhaps they'll be sorry when it is too late.
At the end of its second volume, Harper's Young People counts its little friends in every quarter of the globe. The promises made by its conductors a year ago have been amply fulfilled. The paper has grown steadily better, fuller, brighter, and stronger, and its weekly arrival is hailed by thousands of children and youth with eager delight.
Our Post-office Box numbers among its contributors correspondents from all parts of the United States and Canada, and from Europe, Asia, Australia, and the islands of the Pacific. Wherever there is an English-speaking community or colony, there our paper finds a welcome, and from thence come evidences of interest in Our Post-office Box. The pictures of child-life drawn by little fingers are very refreshing to older eyes. We see that there is a great deal of youthful happiness in the world, as the children write freely about their studies, their pets, and their pastimes. We aim to make the Post-office Box educational, and stimulating to intelligent inquiry, and we try to answer questions, impart useful information, and enter into the children's plans for improvement and recreation. We shall hereafter give enlarged space to the letters, and in the new column C. Y. P. R. U. the Postmistress will endeavor to be in entire sympathy with the older as well as the younger readers of Young People. She intends in this department to include extracts from favorite authors, and stories from English classics, told briefly, from time to time, in her own way. Not only the little folks, but the older sisters and brothers, will have their cozy niche, whenever they wish it, in this informal column.