About a year ago we bought an upright grand piano, and after we had had it a few months we noticed that one of the keys would stay down when touched, unless struck very quickly and lightly, and the next day another acted in the same way. That evening, after the boys had gone to bed, father and myself were sitting by the grate fire, when we thought we heard a nibbling in the corner of the room where the piano stood. I exclaimed, "Do you think it possible a mouse can be in the piano?" "Oh no!" he said; "it is probably behind it." We moved the piano, and found a little of the carpet gnawed, and a few nut-shells. Then we examined the piano inside, as far as possible, but found no traces there. I played a noisy tune, to frighten the mouse away, and we thought no more about it.
Two or three days after, more of the keys stayed down, and I said, "That piano must be fixed." The tuner came, and the children all stood around him, with curious eyes, as he took the instrument apart. Presently I heard a great shout. What do you think? In one corner, on the key-board, where every touch of the keys must have jarred it, was a mouse's nest, with five young ones in it! Those mice must have been fond of music! The mother mouse sprang out and escaped; but the nest and the little ones were destroyed.
Well, what do you suppose the nest was made of? Bits of felt and soft leather from the hammers and pedal; and the mouse had gnawed in two most of the strips of leather that pull back the hammers! So, when the piano had been fixed, there was a pretty heavy bill for repairs.—Very truly yours,
P. L. S.
RATTLE-BOXES.
You'd hardly believe how old-fashioned rattle-boxes are,—those noisy things that babies love to shake. Why, they are almost as old-fashioned as some of the very first babies would look nowadays. A few very ancient writers mention these toys, but, instead of calling them, simply, "rattle-boxes," they refer to them as "symbols of eternal agitation, which is necessary to life!"
Deacon Green says that this high-sounding saying may have been wise for its times, when the sleepy young world needed shaking, perhaps, to get it awake and keep it lively. "But, in these days," he adds, "the boot is on the other leg. People are a little too go-ahead, if anything, and try to do too much in too short time. Real rest, and plenty of it, is just as necessary to life as agitation can be."
Remember this, my chicks, all through vacation; but don't mistake laziness for rest.
A MOTHER WITH TWO MILLION CHILDREN.
No, not the old woman who lived in a shoe,—though old parties of the kind I mean have been found with their houses fixed to old rubber high-boots,—but a quiet old mother, who never utters a word, and whose house is all door-way, as I'm told. Every year she opens the door and turns two million wee bairns upon the world.