Original in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING. IN THE OLD FARM KITCHEN. A LEAF FROM THE BOOK OF MEMORY. S the autumn days grew more frosty and biting, the charms of the old kitchen increased with the cold, and I used to experience a sensation of keen delight when I came from the out-door world of purple woods and orchards, brown hills, frost-nipped corn-fields and lowery skies, into that warm, snug, quiet place. The old clock ticked a loud welcome, the cat purred about my feet and the tea-kettle hummed a strain of its endless, wordless home song, while the smoky walls seemed an impenetrable defense against the growing dreariness outside. On such days, especially towards evening, when masses of gray clouds filled the sky, the old room with its shadowy corners and quaint belongings used to remind me of the Pegotty house, and I used to fancy that little David Copperfield must have felt as I did, when he stood in the boat-house and watched the storm-clouds over the sea,-a little lonely, perhaps, but unspeakably happy. But all those autumn days were not cold nor stormy; there were warm ones sometimes when the doors and windows were open, and the sunlight flooded out of the hazy sky and filled the room with its splendor; when the ruddy leaves drifted down from the oaks and sailed silently in at the doorway, and the meadow-lark's song echoed up from the prairie meadows, setting all the misty air trembling with its piercing, thrilling sweetness. That was the time of the apple-harvest, and I spent most of my time clambering around among the rugged branches, shaking down showers of Tallman Sweetings, Pound Sweetings, Northern Spies and Russets, but I found many opportunities to visit the kitchen. If late peaches or pears or quinces were being preserved I was never averse to giving my opinion of them, and if a loaf of ginger-bread was standing waiting for tasters, or a batch of cookies was swarming into the pantry I never failed to accept them at sight. If some domestic providence had baked a supply of sweet apples I counted myself lucky, for I have always considered baked Tallman sweets and milk a dish fit for the gods. I often used to sit in the south door with a bowl of that delectable food before me; looking out beneath the oaks across the hillside, I could see the prairie with its broad, brown meadows, its areas of plough-lands, its gray roofs and brown orchards, its faded woods and far, misty boundaries. This quiet scene was so mingled and intermingled in my thoughts with the nectar I was absorbing, that to this day every baked apple holds within its wrinkled brown skin the whole of that wide peaceful picture. But best of all were the busy days when Thanksgiving was waiting just around the corner of next week and the energy of the whole family was concentrated on the cook-book; when old Aunt Hannah's "receipt" for plum-pudding or fruit-cake was valiantly championed against some new-fangled recipe, and visions of mince-meat, pumpkin pies and fat turkeys haunted the minds of all the "women-folks," sleeping and waking. The stove was full of simmering kettles all day, and the oven was always occupied with some mysterious production which had to be peeped at and turned and guarded by a sleepless, keen-eyed dragon. What a rolling and stuffing of pies was there, my countrywomen. And what oblongs and rounds of brown fruit-cake, and snowy frosted cake and golden sponge cake were packed away in boxes and jars to ripen for that coming feast-day. There was an endless twisting and frying of doughnuts, and the smoke of their torments came out at the open door and spread afar in the clear, cool air outside, advising all comers of the good cheer preparing for them. "Old Shep" was as much a fixture in the kitchen, on those days, as I; he used to sit by the oven-door and whenever it was opened he looked in with as much interest as did the cook, and licked his jaws approvingly. Occasionally a spatter of hot lard from the fried-cake kettle would make him retire, but he was soon back at his post. There was an ominous squealing of ducks and turkeys and chickens about this time, and rows of plump, featherless specimens hung overhead in the wood-shed. Inside the dark-walled cavern of the smoke-house were seen clusters of brown hams and shoulders and strips of bacon; every day there was a little apple-wood fire built inside, and tiny threads of blue smoke came out at all the crevices and went spindling upward in the still air. Barrels of winter apples were trundling into the cellar and cider was coming home from the mill; cabbages, squashes, potatoes, turnips and all manner of vegetables were struggling for reserved seats in the root-cellar, all apparently vieing with each other for the honor of a place on the Thanksgiving table. The crowning day of all these good days was the one when the mince meat was being gathered together from the orchard, the garden, the tropics and the spicy Orient. Northern Spies and Baldwins were being peeled, and the red ribbons slipped down from the quick fingers into waiting baskets, while the white quarters fell under the chopping knife. The cider was bubbling and steaming on the stove, thickening into. the luscious syrup necessary for good mince-meat, the meat and suet and apples were being chopped, the raisins were being stoned and the citron chipped in thin, half transparent slices. When all the ingredients were ready they were mixed with the spices in a great stone crock, and then the tasting began. It was a long process this combining and drawing together of the diverging family opinions, but the result was always excellent. The level sunbeams shone in at the western windows upon them as they sat tasting and discussing, and the soft light of the November sunset flushed up behind the trees before the jury agreed. When Thanksgiving day arrived and the kitchen was cleared for action, I divided my time between watching operations there, and in looking out for coming guests. I saw the great turkey stuffed and sewed and tied up, and Shep and I watched his symptoms very closely whenever the oven door was opened, for the purpose of basting him. I followed the processes of cooking the vegetables with more than usual interest, and I stole as often as possible into the store-room to look at the waiting glasses of jelly, the tempting pickles, the pies, the cakes, the grapes and the pears. It seemed as if the whole world was preparing to gorge itself, and I was delighted with the prospect of such a fate. When the table was set I stole out with such of the company as were near enough my own age to have healthy appetites and childish curiosity. It was a sight to be remembered, that Thanksgiving table, with its spotless cloth, its "best dishes," its shining silver, its bouquet of late asters, its steaming dishes and its brown turkey, its chicken pies and roast ducks with apple sauce, its ruby and topaz jellies, its clusters of yellowleaved, white-stemmed celery, and the rows of happy faces that soon gathered about it. But more precious than all the treasures of the loaded board were beams of hospitality and courtesy, the bonds of good-fellowship that reached from heart to heart around and athwart that table. If there was an evil spirit there it hid its head from the broad sunshine of good will that flooded the place and brightened even the clear November sunshine. After that great event was over that had been prepared for so anxiously, and the stacks of dishes-that unpleasant aftermath-had been disposed of, the kitchen was delivered over to the children. How the walls rung with the din of our games of hide-and-seek and old witch and other amusements, the names of which have vanished from my memory in the lapse of intervening ages. When the sun had set and the sky was glowing behind the oaks, we all sat around the stove telling stories, until my companions were wrapped up by careful mothers and driven away with the gathering twilight. How tired we were, and how glad, when it was all over, to hie away to our Thanksgiving dreams. Original in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING. RANDOM THOUGHTS. Original in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING. COMPANY MANNERS. THE RUINATION OF A HOUSEHOLD. ute know the meaning of that oldfashioned term, "good manners." She is always regretting the lack of culture among her neighbors, and there is not one of them who is not more polite than she is. I have heard her actually yell at her servants, and storm at her children, and I do not think her husband is the happiest man in the world. In society she is a charming woman. She knows always just what to say and how to say -Elizabeth Cole. it. I never saw a woman who could excel her in gliding The environments surrounding our birth are matters of chance, but whether we are trump cards, and win the game of life, is largely due to ourselves. Marriage is said to be a lottery at best; but if each party in the case would see to it, that the appellation of blank did not apply to him or her, more prizes would be the result. The friends who love and appreciate us for ourselves alone at fifty, who do not value and appraise us in a commercial point of view, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. across a room and sinking gracefully into a chair. Her little "If we don't," one of the children said, "we catch it when 66 Oh, these company manners!" They are the ruination of a household. They cannot always be put on and off at will. Traces of the every day discord and lack of harmony will manifest themselves through the affectation of all the mere "company manners" one can assume. Habitual politeness and kindness and gentleness should be the unwavering rule in every house, even on "Blue Mondays." I have been in homes in which it seemed to me that every member of the household seemed bent on seeing how hateful and disagreeable they could be to each other. The mother would speak in a nagging, fretful tone; the father "ordered everybody around;" the children quarreled; the servants went around with their noses in the air, ready and eager for little tilts with anybody and everybody. How wretched such homes are! In some of them they don't even have "company manners." Sometimes my wife and I say on Sunday: "Now let us agree that we will not say a single cross word to any one this whole week. Let us be studiously polite to each other and to the children. Let us be very mindful of the feelings of every person with whom we may come into contact. Let us not fret nor complain nor do anything that good, decent, well behaved Christians should not do." And if when the next Sunday comes we have, through the grace of God, kept this resolve, it goes without saying that we have been happy and the world has perhaps been made a little better for our being in it. -Zenas Dane. The following directions for making an excellent "turkey dressing" may be of service to your readers at the festive season of the year: Take one pint of soaked bread, and season with two teaspoonfuls of salt and Bell's poultry spice to suit the taste (on account of the purity, not more than a tablespoonful to the dressing for an eight-pound turkey), also one tablespoonful of butter, or fat, salt pork cut up very fine. An egg, well worked in, will make the dressing cut up nicely. A. M. B. PITTSFIELD, MASS. STAINED FLOORS AND WASHINGTON PIE. Editor of GOOD HOUSEKEEPING: Much has been said and written in connection with the cooking of oatmeal, and still very few know how to cook it well. The rhyming recipe for cooking oatmeal, given by Miss C. H. Thayer in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING, No. 19, to "boil-boil-and boil," was widely quoted by the press of the country from your pages. To this may be added, with good purpose and effect, the recipe of Mr. John McCann, the manufacturer of the famous McCann brand of Irish oatmeal, at Beamond Mills, Drogheda, Ireland, which is "to boil until it stops fluff-fluffing." The fame of the McCann brand of oatmeal is world-wide, the leading American importers using no other, and this recipe, in connection with that of Miss Thayer's, already published in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING, if carefully followed will leave nothing further to be desired in the matter of oatmeal cooking. E. M. P. NEW YORK CITY. THE STAINING OF FLOORS. Editor of GOOD HOUSEKEEPING: The following rule for staining and polishing floors, given me by a first-class workman, may be of service to the " Disciple of Good Housekeeping: " STAINED FLOORS.-If the floor is uneven or rough, have it carefully planed by a carpenter before staining. Oak, black walnut, cherry, and mahogany stains can be prepared at any good paint store, and come in tin cans, ready to use without mixing. Put the stain on the floor with a broad brush, following the grain of the wood. After the second coat of stain is dry, varnish with "Spar Varnish," so called because used for the spars of vessels. Put on a second coat of varnish as soon as the first is quite hard. This varnish is very hard, and will not scratch like other varnishes. Unless the floor has hard usage, once a year will be often enough to re-varnish It can be washed with tepid water. Never wax it if you wish to re-varnish, as the varnish will not adhere to a waxed surface. If "Disciple" has a good back, she can easily stain and varnish the floor herself. AN OLD HOUSEKEEPER. SOMETHING NEW. Editor of GOOD HOUSEKEEPING: In reply to a "Disciple of Good Housekeeping," asking for a In a recent number of your magazine, a correspondent asks in receipt to stain common floors, I send her the following: the " Cozy Corner," for help as to an entertainment, her desire being for something new. I find it quite difficult to keep the article within "Cozy Corner" space, but send it, hoping you may find it suitable for your pages. I am glad my article suggested her applying as she did to its writer for help, and hope this too may be helpful. A. S. CHERRY STAIN For Pine Floors.-Rain water, three quarts; annatto, four ounces. Boil in a copper kettle till the latter is dissolved; then throw in a piece of potash, the size of a walnut. Let it stand one-half hour longer, and bottle for use. I also send a receipt for Washington pie, so-called, but which in reality is a delicious layer cake. My family think it the best of all layer cakes: Beat four eggs very light, add one cupful of granulated sugar, and beat until thick; next, four tablespoonfuls of sweet milk, one and a half cupfuls of sifted floor, to which has been added two teaspoonfuls of baking-powder, and, lastly, one tablespoonful of melted butter. Bake in layers. For the filling, grate two sour apples and the rind of two small or one large lemon; add the juice of the lemon to the apple, a cupful of sugar, and one egg. A PINK TEA. Where dancing is for any reason out of the question in the entertaining of a number of young people, perhaps nothing is more enjoyable than "high-tea," and to make it quite a novel affair use, as far as possible, one prevailing color upon table and decorations, and the result is sure to be charming. As a tea allows of more latitude than dinner or lunch, in some one of its many forms it may be adapted to almost any circumstance and will of itself form the entertainment of the evening. Music and cards, however pleasant, afterwards are seldom necessary, too late a stay being "bad form." Several ways of serving are suitable. If the company be quite large, it may be more practicable to gather around one central table, as for an evening supper, in which case one quiet, quick maid should, with the help the gentlemen will give, be able to care for all present with ease, her duty being chiefly to see that the table is kept free from superflous dishes, and well supplied; also that the hostess, who alone sits at the table where she pours tea, has all which is needful. Again, a pleasanter mode is the use of separate small tables, around each of which groups of from two to six people sit. But by far the prettiest way, if the number present will permit, is to seat the guests at one large table and serve the tea, whether simple or elaborate, in regular courses. The latter plan is as easily managed as any and, if say a pink tea be decided upon, is far more effective. Now as to the use of the color suggested; it is much more easy than may be imagined. The linen itself may, and in fact should be, pure white. In the middle of the table use a strip or square of pink plush, satin, velvet, or even lace-covered cambric, upon which place a bowl or vase of pink flowers, and place at the corners little plates of candy, each piece done up in a little pink paper cut to resemble some flower, or else merely fringed. Few are so fortunate as to be able to carry out the idea in china, but if any is to be had in which pink predominates, let it be upon the table for the first course. At the plate of each lady a bunch of pink flowers tied with pink ribbon gives a pretty bit of color. The gentlemen may receive each a carnation pink and leaf of rose geranium. Beside each plate also place two sticks of bread tied together with pink ribbon. Use for lighting, if possible, candles with pink shades, easily bought or even hand made; then, too, gas or lamp shades should be covered with the same shade of tissue paper drawn through the hand till closely crêpe. The water in the finger bowls may be tinted by dissolving in it a tiny bit of pink gelatine, kept as coloring for blanc mange, and so forth, by all the best grocers. In fact this pink gelatine will add greatly to many dishes, as the color is beautiful. It is perfectly harmless, and needs only to be melted in water or milk for use. Now as to the repast itself. It may, of course, be either simple or the reverse, but, as I have said, let it in either case be served in courses, as it only pleasantly prolongs the meal, is the more quiet way and often causes a modest tea to appear quite elaborate. The following bill of fare is, of course, but a suggestion, and the appended list of dishes suitable may be useful in making alterations: First Course.-Bouillon, a small cupful placed upon the plate of each guest from servant's tray. THE AMERICAN GIRLS' HANDY BOOK. Boys have had books without limit made for them explaining how such things are made as a boy likes to make, how to do what boys like to do, and enabling them to fill up many a happy hour with amusement and pleasant instruction. But girls have been neglected in this line until recently and have had to rely on their own native resources or on those of their acquaintances. What has been indeed " a long felt want" is now supplied by this volume by Lina Beard and Adelia B. Beard. The contents of the book are classified according to season. In the spring there are the amusements appropriate to April first there follow the months of wild flowers, which girls are instructed how to preserve, transplant, to press, how to preserve their perfumes, etc. Some points about walking follow. The chapter on Easter, alone, would delight any girl enough to pay to get this book. Instruction is given in the making of a lawn tennis net; and May Day sports are described. There is some fortune telling, seaside cottage decoration, and an outline of many ways in which a girl can amuse herself on the Fourth of July. How to make an impression album for ferns and leaves; how to conduct picnics, burgoos and corn-roasts; how to make a hammock, corn husk and flower dolls, fans, and how to conduct quiet games for the hot weather-all these are for the summer. In the autumn girls like to know what to do on Hallowe'en; how to employ leaves and flowers for decoration; how to draw and paint in water and oil colors; how to model in clay and wax and to make plaster casts; how to paint china and make picture frames; and about these matters the book is minute. Nutting parties and Thanksgiving amusements have their place; Christmas and New Year's festivities, gifts and games; the simple making and uses of a home gymnasium; scrap books, window decorations, mantel pieces and fireplaces, home made candy and St. Valentine's Day. Nothing more than a hint can be given in this notice as to the contents of this book, but the reader is already prepared to believe that it is really a remarkable compendium of information on topics that interest girls in a thousand ways. Explanations are plain and lucid and the materials to be used are within the reach of all and the outlay is in most cases little or nothing. The volume of 474 pages is handsomely bound and every girl would think herself fortunate to get it for a holiday present. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. BOSTON SCHOOL KITCHEN TEXT BOOK. The women who are carrying on this noble movement having for its object the improvement of the duties of the kitchen and Second Course.-Stewed lobster, garnished with parsley and home, are doing a great work for the homes of the American peoclaws, thin "fingers" of brown bread, passed by servant. Third Course.-Small birds on squares of toast spread with any acid jelly. ple. Among the leaders of this movement is Mrs. D. A. Lincoln of Boston, who is well known to the readers of GOOD HOUSEKEEPING. Her instruction in cookery is famed for its practical Fourth Course.—Beet and potato salad in bed of lettuce, toasted place in the average kitchen and for its sensible character. The crackers. Fifth Course.-Boiled chicken, parsley sauce, before host, boiled ham, well garnished and partially sliced. Slices unremoved before hostess. This is an English combination and a delicious one. Sixth Course.-Pink wine-jelly, cut into squares and piled in separate cups made of pink tissue paper in shape of flowers, or fringed and pasted to paper foundation; or the paper may be attached by touches of flour or starch paste to any cup. Seventh Course.-Pink ices, angel cake, frosted with pink, and tea and coffee. If too elaborate any of the following dishes are allowable, and fewer courses just as suitable: Oysters as pâtes, creamed or fried. Lobster, curried or plain, or chopped rolled into shape of chops in bread crumbs and fried. Birds, chops and tomatoes, pressed chicken, liver-pâtes, filet of beef, stake covered with lemon juice and parsley; beef olives in brown or wine sauce jellies; cakes, ices, glacé fruits. Any good supper dish is indeed suitable, and to an enterprising hostess a hundred "pink devices" will present themselves. Altogether we are almost certain that the full measure of success we wish her awaits the person who undertakes a "pink tea," ANNA SAWYER. book at hand, written by Mrs. Lincoln, is designed to be a school book; it is not a cook book, in the ordinary meaning of the name, but it gives reasons for its directions and connects these reasons with first principles. The understanding is engaged and thought awakened. It does not load the memory with a lot of rules and precepts, nor is it content to accept mere imitation; but it is a practical book written by a practical woman. The substance of all the lessons has been worked out in the cooking class rooms or school kitchens connected with the Boston public schools. Mrs. Lincoln well says, “Cooking cannot be well done by guess work; there is a right way and a wrong way, and the right way is usually the easier. To show the right way and the reason for it, has been our endeavor in preparing these lessons. Above all our object has been to elevate this department of work; to show its bearing upon many vital questions; to impress upon girls that all work well done is honorable; that it is as really a part of education to be able to blacken a stove, to scour a tin, or to prepare a tempting meal of wholesome food, as it is to be able to solve a problem in geometry, to learn a foreign language, to teach a school, to decorate a plaque, to make an elegant gown, or to interpret the melodies and harmonies of the great masters of music." Mrs. Lincoln aims to awaken in girls an enthusiam for the per formance of the common duties of life, and nothing but an unnatural girlhood can fail to respond. There are twenty lessons, together with numerous rules, charts, suggestions, tables of cost, and many receipts. The book is for use in public and industrial schools, and we do not see why an intelligent housekeeper cannot use it for the home instruction of girls. Boston: Roberts Brothers. THE BOOK OF FOLK LORE. The uses of such books as this are now coming to be understood. It is a late day, but still the day is here, when the worth of imaginative literature for children is insisted upon and appreciated. Imagination underlies every invention that has been made; it is the primal requisite of every chemist, of every one who is concerned with art designing. The time to cultivate this faculty that is at the very foundation of civilization itself, is in childhood, and the means for then doing it must be simple stories which shall make things seen that are unseen. This book contains some of the most famous of the household tales known to the English speaking people, which have descended from prehistoric times by word of mouth. These are "The Story of the Chicken Licken," "The Old Woman and her Pig," "The Three Bears," ," "The Elves and the Shoemaker," "Hans in Luck," "Little One Eye, Little Two Eyes and Little Three Eyes," "Puss in Boots," "Cinderella," "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood," "Beauty and the Beast," Jack and the Bean Stalk," "Tom Thumb," "The White Cat," Dick Whittington and his Cat," and "Little Red Riding Hood." The stories are rewritten by Horace E. Scudder, as he only can do such work, and are in language that can be read by children eight or nine years old. The book is excellent for schools in the upper primary and intermediate grades. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Company. Springfield: James D. Gill. Price 60 cents. VOICE CULTURE AND SPEAKING. Among the multitudinous works on voice culture and volumes of selections for speaking, the recent publications of Lee & Shepard deserve attention. "Vocal and Action Language," by E. N. Kirby, instructor in elocution in Harvard College, gives in simple and concise language the rules and methods for obtaining a pleasing style of oratory. The book is valuable to those who have not the time or the money to devote to a course of study under an instructor to obtain one of the greatest of all attainments, an elegant style of conversation and public speaking. It does not attempt to teach the dramatic style. The latter part of the book contains several selections for drill; conversational, descriptive, didactic, narrative and forensic. George M. Baker's "Humorous Speaker" is a series of popular selections in Yankee and English, Irish, medley and negro dialects. The several parts are also sold separately in paper covers. They contain most of the better known character songs and recitations and many more not so familiar but not less deserving of popularity. Mr. Baker also edits and the same firm publish "The Debater's Handbook," including J. Sherman Knowles' debate on the character of Julius Caesar, "The Grand Army Speaker" and "The Reading Club." The price of the "Voice and Action Language" is $1.25; the "Humorous Speaker" $1; the "Debater's Handbook" 30 cents. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: James D. Gill. CA IRA. Mr. Laurence Gronlund's] "The Coöperative Commonwealth" has won its way to the front as the standard popular exposition of socialism. This is due to the fact that it is almost the only constructive work on the subject. The German socialists, following Rodbertus and Marx, have all been analytical and critical, Ferdinand Lassalle alone excepted. They have undertaken only to discover the short-comings of the existing social order. Mr. Gronlund has made an ingenious and eminently readable forecast of what he believes is to be the coming social order, which he names "collectivism;" pointing out how it will develop itself out of the present system, outlining the political and legal machinery that will be found necessary in the new order, and indicating the principal social effects to be expected. "Ca Ira, or Danton in the French Revolution" is a supplement to "The Coöperative Com 66 monwealth." The earlier work, to use Mr. Gronlund's own description, treats of the statics of collectivism, the plan and character of the new social order. "Ca Ira" considers the dynamics, the working forces of socialism, which are bringing about the coming revolution. The concrete exhibition of these forces Mr. Gronlund finds, as do other writers of his school, in the French Revolution, but he finds them more especially in that fifth act of the drama which John Morley has said "is still dark to us." As a fresh study of Danton " Ca Ira " will probably modify, somewhat, prevailing conceptions of that remarkable man. As a study of social forces it is suggestive, but Mr. Gronlund exhibits in every chapter that distorted judgment which vitiates all socialistic reasoning. His habit of mind is that of the criminal lawyer, always mentally posturing before a jury, not at all that of the dispassionate scientific investigator, determined to see all the facts if he can get at them and to look at every fact in all its bearings. Nevertheless, one who would know what modern socialism is, must per force read Gronlund, and the task will not be a dull one. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: James D. Gill. Price $1.25. STORIED HOLIDAYS. It was a happy idea of Mr. E. S. Brooks to re-write some stories of the holidays for the reading of young persons. There never was a holiday, says the author, but had its store of stories that might be told, if only the heroes and heroines thereof could find audience or opportunity. He has chosen a story each of Christmas, New Year's, St. Valentine's day, St. Patrick's day, April Fool's day, May day, Midsummer eve, Independence day, Michaelmass, Hallowe'en, Thanksgiving, and one of the Olympic games, and put them all in language for young readers. The literary skill with which this has been done, and the dramatic and pointed effects secured, make a book of uncommon interest, even for older readers. The scenes of most of the stories lie in England, in the olden time, and the author studies, quite successfully, to reproduce the scenes, the language and manners of the day. The characters and incidents are historic and among the former who appear are King James and his little son Prince Charlie, Sir Thomas More and his daughter Margaret, William Penn, Francis Bacon, the famous Samuel Pepys, and others less familiar to the reader. Each story is accompanied by a full page illustration drawn expressly for it. Mr. Brooks knows how to write a story and to get the most out of it, as the readers of Wide Awake and St. Nicholas know. Boston: D. Lothrop Company, Price $1.50. THE ART OF PROJECTING. A second edition has appeared of the useful "Art of Projecting," by Professor A. E. Dolbear of Tufts College. This compact book of 178 pages is a lucidly written manual of experimentation in physics, chemistry and natural history, with the porte lumiere and magic lantern. The present edition contains new matter and the whole book has been revised. With this book the skillful teacher can utilize the sunbeam in schoolroom demonstrations, that, by other methods, would be too difficult and costly. Of the new matter in the present edition a part that, if we are not greatly mistaken, will make a profound impression upon progressive teachers, and will stimulate much new and fruitful experiment is the remarkable series of beautiful experiments illustrating the phenomena of vortex rings. Professor Dolbear believes this to be the most complete series of such experiments at present known, and himself to be the discoverer of a considerable number of them. Be this as it may, they wonderfully illuminate the vortex ring theory of the constitution of matter. Boston: Lee & Shepard. Springfield: James D. Gill. Price $1. THE BRIDAL OF TRIERMAIN. We doubt if any of the flood of holiday books contains, for a majority of not uncultivated readers, more elements of agreeable surprise than a sumptuous quarto edition of Scott's "Bridal of Triermain," with fourteen striking illustrations by Percy Macquoid. There has been a general revival of interest in Scott in the last two or three years, but it is doubtful if one reader in a hundred of those who know by heart pages of “Marmion,” the "Lady of the Lake," and even the "Lay," has ever read a line of the wierd, almost uncanny romance of Triermain. And of the |