A LESSON OF PATIENCE

An interesting group of women, from widely differing homes, and from varied stations in life, sitting one sunny morning on a hotel piazza, fell into an interchange of experiences concerning the discipline through which each had come to her knowledge and practice of patience.

"I used to be a very impatient woman, and I think my children have been my best teachers," said a fair, young matron; as she glanced over the piazza rail at her two boys and a gentle girl, strolling on the sands below.

"I was an only daughter and rather spoiled at home, and spoiled again by my husband, who took my irritable words and ways very amiably; either laughing at them, or leaving me to get over my impatience at my leisure."

"A very remarkable specimen of a husband," said a plain old lady, whose cap-strings kept up an energetic flutter, as if keeping time to the click of her knitting needles.

"Yes," answered the speaker gently, "but even his unceasing goodness didn't cure me. His soft answer often turned away wrath, but I needed something to keep it from turning back again. But I began to get my lesson through my children as early as they were old enough to talk, and even earlier."

"How in the world could the children help you?" asked the lady, whose embroidery had dropped on her lap.

"When my boy Bertie was only a baby, he began my cure. Sometimes if he cried or resisted, I gave him a little shake, or a sharp, loud, word, or put him down a little roughly. This went on until the child was taken ill, and then I found he would not stay in my arms a moment if his nurse or his father were in the room. Their voices soothed him, mine seemed to make him feverish and irritable. Not once during weeks of watching, did he reach up his little wasted hands for me to take him. Now, you can judge what this meant to a mother's anxious heart. But that was not all. Bertie was the baby of three, and Helen, his sister, was six years old. One day her father had taken her to walk, and pausing on the piazza as they returned, he said; 'Now, run away and take the flowers to mamma, Helen, and ask her to come up with us to see if brother Bertie is awake.'

"I was sitting just within, by the window, and heard every word of the little girl's reply. 'I don't want to go for mamma. Let me go with you, I want to give the flowers to Bertie.'

But papa bought the roses for mamma, and surely her little girl would like to take them to her with a kiss?' said her father gently.

No, no, I don't want to go to mamma,' broke out the child, throwing down the flowers with an impatience of gesture so exactly like my own, as to make me feel for a moment as if I could shake her well, if she were within reach of my hand. But instead, her father drew the excited, trembling child within his arms. He did not ask her why she did not want to come to me. He knew too well, I fancy; but he stroked her hair gently, and when the angry

tears subsided, he gathered up the flowers, and, taking her by the hand, came on into the house. When he gave me the roses I could not trust myself to look in his face. And I felt, rather than saw, the little, shrinking creature hanging back instead of rushing gladly to her mother's arms. I assure you, ladies, it was a lesson never to be forgotten, and I never needed another of that kind.

"You may wonder how I can bear the humiliation of telling it, but I came so near wrecking all my influence over my children, that I am glad if my experience can be a warning to any one. They were such good children. They ought to have had the best mother and their father the best wife in the world." 'What's this I hear," said a tall, broad-shouldered man, coming down the piazza from the billiard-room. "Is my wife giving you the key to our skeleton

closet?"

"She is saying your children ought to have had the best mother in the world," said the old lady with the quivering cap-strings.

"And God knows they have," he answered, with a look of such pride and trust, as brought the swift color to the cheek of his wife. "When you see what nice children they are, you will know that only the best mother in the world could have made them so." And he passed on, while the little group broke up, laughing, but with tears suspiciously near the eyes of some of them. -Mary Lowe Dickinson.

"NOT AT HOME"

In very ancient times it seems that the excuse Not at home was, as now, in readiness for unwelcome callers, or callers who came at inconvenient hours or times.

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Cicero relates that Nasica called upon Ennius, and was told by the servant that he was out. Shortly afterward Ennius returned the visit, when Nasica exclaimed from within that he was not at home. What," replied Ennius, “do not I know your own voice?" "You are an impudent fellow," retorted Nasica; "when your servant told me that you were not at home I believed her, but you will not believe me, though I tell you so myself."

This custom, which confused the ancients and gave them play for wit, has by no means ceased from such offices, as witness the following dialogue from modern life:

Mistress (arranging with future servant). "Above all things I shall require of you obedience and truthfulness."

Maid-" Very well. And if you ask me to say you are out when you are in, shall I obey you or tell the truth?"

Bright is the beautiful land of our birth,

The home of the homeless all over the earth.-Street.

THE SEWING MACHINE

Got one? Don't say so! Which have you got?

One of the kind to open and shut?

Own it, or hire it? How much did you pay?
Does it go with a crank, or a treadle? Say-
I'm a single man, and somewhat green.-
Tell me about your sewing machine."

"Listen, my boy, and hear all about it

I don't know what I could do without it;

I've owned one now for more than a year,
And like it so well, I call it 'dear ';

'Tis the cleverest thing that ever was seen,
This wonderful family sewing machine.

"It's none of your angular Wheeler things,
With steel-shod beak and cast-iron wings;
Its work would bother a hundred of his,
And worth a thousand! Indeed, it is;
And has a way-you needn't stare-

Of combing and braiding its own back hair!

"Mine is not one of those stupid affairs

That stands in a corner, with what-nots and chairs,
And makes that dismal, head-achy noise,
Which all the comfort of sewing destroys;
No rigid contrivance of lumber and steel,
But one with a natural spring in the heel.

Mine is one of the kind to love,
And wear a shawl and a soft kid glove;
None of your patent machines for me,
Unless Dame Nature's the patentee;
I like the sort that can laugh and talk,
And take my arm for an evening walk.

"Tut, tut-don't talk. I see it all:

You needn't keep winking so hard at the wall:
I know what your fidgety fumblings mean;
You would like, yourself, a sewing machine!
Well, get one, then, of the same design;
There were plenty left when I got mine!"

IT TAKES TWO TO MAKE A QUARREL

Be the injurious person never so quarrelsome, the quarrel must fail if the injured person will not fight.-Fire sometimes goes out as much for the want of being stirred up as for want of fuel. And perhaps the greatest unquietness of human affairs is not so much chargeable to the injurious as the revengeful. A storm could not be hurtful but for the trees and houses by which it is withstood and repelled. It has the same force when it passes over the rush or the yielding osier; but it does not roar or become dreadful till it grapples with the oak, and rattles upon the tops of the cedars.-South.

HOME ARTISTS

Only two peasants working in a field. A bell rings out, they bow their heads in prayer-a common-place scene witnessed in the Old World at every set of sun. Yet, one day, an artist seeing it, found beauty in the common-place, transferred it to canvas, and gave the world the lovely painting called "The Angelus." The artist finds beauty and gives it to us in such common-place things as pots and pans, an old broom and a basket of vegetables. This is the way we should take life-find beauty in the common-place, give beauty out of the common-place. It is no great credit to make a home beautiful if we have unlimited means at our command; to keep a home in perfect order if we can hire all the servants we want; it is no great credit to make people happy if we have money to give all we wish, to do all we will. But out of nothing to give something; with limited means to make home so full of the radiance of a beautiful spirit that the rich might covet to dwell therein; this is really worth while. Of course, a musician, a poet, a sculptor, a painter, a great writer, a great preacher, can give pleasure and do good-extraordinary gifts make it an easy task. But one cannot be listening to music, or seeing pictures or reading books, all the time, while one must be living all the time. So our world's most necessary, most useful, most blessed artists are those who fill common-place, every-day home life with comfort and beauty. The well-made beds, the tidy parlor and the tidy kitchen, the flowers, and the sweet, light bread on the table; above all, the love that blesses the dinner of herbs, the smile that makes the humblest feast royal, the dear, every-day patience that converts uncongenial tasks, hard trials, and even bitter sorrows, into ministers of grace-these are the masterpieces of thousands of artists who seek no fame, but except for whom the most beautiful thing in the world, true home life, could not exist. "Whatsoever ye do, do it as unto the Lord," is a motto that will elevate the lowliest occupation into a dignity commanding recognition

THE DAUGHTER-IN-LAW

The following tribute was paid to her mother-in-law by Mrs. Robert Tyler, in a letter to her own family, written while she was living in the home of her husband's parents.

Mrs. Tyler, it will be remembered, became "Lady of the White House" as her mother-in-law's representative during John Tyler's Presidential term. The letter below was reproduced in Halloway's Ladies of the White House: The room in the main dwelling furthest removed and most retired is 'the chamber,' as the bedroom of the mistress of the house is always called in Virginia. This last, to say nothing of others, or the kitchen, storerooms and pantries, is a most quiet and comfortable retreat, with an air of repose and sanctity about it; at least I feel it so, and often seek refuge here from the company, and beaux, and laughing and talking of the other parts of the house. For here mother, with a smile of welcome on her sweet, calm face, is always