or's action, which, of course, is merely complimentary to the boy. The latter takes his honors seriously and says he will feed the squirrels and see that their homes are looked after.

Detective Did you see a man and woman driving past here in a buggy about an hour ago?

Mrs. Blank-Yes.

Detective-Ah we're getting on track of them! What kind of horse was it? Mrs. Blank-They were driving so fast I didn't notice that. But the woman had on a Scotch mohair and wool jacket of turquoise blue, last year's style, with stitched lines, a white pique skirt with deep circular flounce, a satin straw hat, tilted and rather flat, trimmed with hydrangeas and loops of pale blue surah, and her hair was done up pompadour. That's all I had time to see.

Julian Ralph draws this picture of the face of Gen. "Bobs," Lord Roberts: "To me his face suggests the front of a granite mountain, seamed, lined, battered by storms, strain, and racking change. It records acquaintance with every trial to which mortals are put, all suffered in the solitude of undivided responsibility. Care, worry, sickness, danger, unceasing reflection, all had left their marks there, yet all were written across a gentle, sympathetic countenance, never gay or merry, yet seldom stern, and wholly ignorant of passion. I have known many great faces, but that of Lord Roberts is a face apart. I fancy that, in the minds of their worshipers, some of the soberer gods of the old mythologies had faces like his."

The following joke, told by Mark Twain, is retold in foreign papers, and commented upon as typical of American ethics. An honest fellow comes to the druggist of a Western Prohibition town to have his whisky flask filled. "Can't do it," says the modeler of pills, "not without a prescription, unless you have

been bitten by the snake." "Where is the snake?" inquired the thirsty one. The druggist furnished the address of the owner of the valuable reptile. In a short time the stranger returned, the agony of despair pictured in his features. "Mercy!" he gasped, "the snake is so tired out that it won't bite. Besides, its services are bespoke for weeks to come!"

APPLICATION VERSUS GENIUS.

In my boyhood days, says former Postmaster General Thomas L. James in "Success," there was a textbook used in the schools called the English Reader, which, alas! has gone out of use. It contained a selection entitled, "The Hill of Science." According to the story, the first one who attempted to ascend the hill was Genius, who made rapid progress, but became quite tired toward the end of the ascent, and foolishly stopped to rest, while Application, patient and plodding, pushed forward slowly up the hill and attained the summit first. I have noticed that those who succeed in life are not the geniuses. They are those who apply themselves to whatever business or profession they undertake with all their hearts and by patient,

plodding work, backed up by good

health and good habits, succeed.

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PARAPHRASED THE BURIAL SERVICE.

Mark Twain has been living quietly in England for some time now, and were it not that he appeared to give evidence before a royal commission on the question of copyright scarcely a soul outside his private and particular friends would have known he was there at all, relates the "Saturday Evening Post." The other evening he was dining at the house of a friend, and seated next to him was an American who had only that day reached England. They were, of

course, talking war, and the newcomer, wishing to know the feeling in England in the matter of the future of the Transvaal, asked Mark Twain how he found public sentiment in England regarding the independence of the republics.

"Well," said the genial humorist, "I find the English are paraphrasing a part of the burial service. They are all quietly repeating, 'Mr. Gladstone giveth, and the Lord Salisbury hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.'"

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The most common instrument of torture in a Chinese jail is the bamboo. No attention is paid to the law which provides how many strokes of the bamboo rod may be inflicted for certain offenses. Often the executioner of the sentence inflicts 10 or 20 times as many blows upon the naked victim as the law designates. The Shanghai newspapers awhile ago reported that between 2,000 and 3,000 strokes of the bamboo had been laid upon the backs of two old persons who had been found guilty of levying blackmail, and that in addition to this awful ankles punishment their had been broken with an iron hammer.

dence was given that such juries had been widely used in the country, and by a special statute of Henry VIII. juries. of six were allowed in Wales. The county court jury of five is of course a very recent, and some think a very unfortunate, innovation, and the court in which it sits is itself only 50 years old. But the jury of the grand assize consisted of 16 men, which still finds a parallel in the jury of presentments of the Liberty of the Savoy. The modern grand jury, the coroner's jury, and the jury at lunacy and ecclesiastical inquisitions number anything between 12 and 23, whereof 12 at least must agree on a verdict.-London Law Journal.

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JAIL ACCOMMODATION.

An American who has been reading about the diet in the Cardiff Workhouse writes: "I take this opportunity of stating, for the benefit of your readers, that the dietary and general accommodation in Sing Sing Prison compares favorably with that of any hotel in this city. If you visit Sing Sing in the morning about eleven you will fina both lady and gentlemen prisoners smoking and reading the newspapers. On Liberty Day (July 4) a special celebration was made in Minnesota State Prison, the menu being as follows:-Roast veal, dressing, mashed potatoes, green peas, onions, lettuce, apple pie, cheese, coffee, and cigars. Of Philadelphia jail an eminent author remarks, with pardonal le pride:-'Prisoners get the best food, the country produces, and it is served with such cleanliness and attention as would cause any hotel to be crowded.' Breakfast here consists of grilled pork and beans, preserves, hot cakes, and coffee and the rest of the tariff is equally inviting. Lady visitors bring the prisoners presents, cigars being generally preferred, and every weekly paper published in the United States at the prison, in order that the convicts may not be be

hind the times!" Who wouldn't be in jail in the States?"

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The Wales of the Future-will it be religious? Is there danger that the higher development of human life, and the ever-widening of its sphere of interests, should make the spiritual appear unreal, and communion with the divine superfluous? There is danger, inasmuch as we are always prone to abuse the very best gifts of God. But it is by no means the natural tendency of mental and moral culture to shut religion out of human life. Greatly as they enhance the beauty of the visible, and the joy of our present existence, they lead straight to the portals of the invisible, where such melodious strains pour upon our ears that it makes us forget our old illusion concerning the visible as something

Wives of great men all remind them,
They can make their wives a present,
And departing leave behind them,
What to us is quite as pleasant.
Sovereigns, which perhaps another,
After counting up his store,
Some morose and stingy brother,
Seeing, may add something more.
Let us then be up and spending,
With a purse for such a day,
And our wishes still extending,
Learn to purchase and to pay.

-Wrongfellow."

A South Wales correspondent vouches for the truth of this story: A servant asked for a day's leave to go to the funeral of her uncle. When she returned she was asked how she had fared. She replied, "It was the happiest day of my

We had a beautiful drive to the churchyard, buried uncle, and then went home to tea with aunt."

A parody on Longfellow's, "The Psalm of Life," by the hero of Mafeking, was written for a bazaar in Cape Town just before he left there last year (says the "Cornishman"). Some of the verses show distinct signs of his remarkable humor. The parody is as follows:"Tell me not in accents dreary

That you think bazaars a bore,
That of crewel work you're weary,
And the raffles you abhor.
Cash is needful! Cash is scanty!
At our efforts do not growl;
If it can't be raised by fair means,
Must it not be got by foul?

A Scotch minister tells of a Sunday he passed in a Highland inn. The day was rainy and close and toward night, as he sat in the little parlor of the inn, he suggested to his landlady that it would be desirable to have one of the windows raised so that they might have some fresh air. "Mon," said the old woman, with stern disapproval written plainly on her rugged face, "dinna ye ken that ye can hae no fresh air in this hoose on the Sabbath?"

A saloon license was granted in a Pennsylvania town to a building formerly used as a trunk manufactory. Over the door was a big sign, "trunk factory." The saloonkeeper asked a prohibition painter to change that sign to suit his business at the smallest possible cost. The painter took his brush and simply carried it around the crossline of the T, making the sign read "drunk factory."

"If I were to give you an orange," said Judge Foote of Topeka, "I would simply say, 'I give you the orange,' but should the transaction be intrusted to a lawyer to put in writing he would adopt this form: 'I hereby give, grant and convey to you all my interest, right, title and advantage of and in said orange, together with its rind, skin, juice, pulp and pits; and all rights and advantage therein, with full power to bite, suck, or otherwise eat the same, or give away with or without the rind, skin, juice, pulp or pits; anything herein before or in any other deed or deeds, instruments of any nature or kind whatsoever to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding.'"

Information has been received by the friends of the Welsh settlers in Patagonia that the Government of the Argentin Republic have voted $100,000 towards relieving the distress caused by the inundation of the Chupat Valley and towards the repairing of the river embankments and the irrigation canals. The proclamation of President Roca, which has been published in Welsh and Spanish, and circulated throughout the Colony, states that: "Whereas the Governor of Chupat has called public attention to the urgent necessity of repairing the great damage caused by the floods whilst the river continues low, and that it is the duty of the Government of the Argentine Republic to support and encourage the energetic Colonists who have lost the fruits of the labor of many years, and, further, that it is essential that 106 kilometres of embankments, and 175 kilometres of canals must be repaired, and that an estimated sum of $100,000 will be required, the President, having consulted the opinions of distinguished citizens, declares that the fund created by Statute No. 3,791 cannot be used to better purpose than the relief of such distress as this, and proclaims: (1) That the following committee are entrusted with the work of

repairing the canals, sluices, and embankments of the river Chupat, namely, Messrs. (Rev.) D. L. Jones (chairman), E. J. Williams, John S. Williams, J. M. Thomas, and Edw. Owen. (2) That the Minister of the Interior shall place at the disposal of the said committee a sum of $100,000 from the fund created by Statute No. 3,791, subject to the said committee reporting upon the progress of the work, for the proper completion of which they shall be held personally and jointly responsible to the State. (3) That the above-named sum be handed over by installments of $25,000 as required." The capital of the Colony has been removed from Rawson to Trelew. It will be remembred that Rawson was practically swept away by the floods. Trelew is situated in the uplands.

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THE AIR CURE.

"It's queer to me," said a healthy looking citizen, "that more people don't take the air cure. There's nothing like a breath of fresh air. It is delightful and refreshing, renovating and renewing, uplifting and invigorating, stimulating and exalting, and without any depression, and all this is absolutely free. There are far more people now than ever before in this country that go in for outdoor sports, for bicycling and all that sort of thing, and so get the fresh air; but there are many left who do not give themselves the benefit of it as they might. It isn't nccessary for a man to have a bicycle or a horse or a steam yacht to enable him to take the air cure. Such helps, of course, might make it easier to take, but they are not essential. It can be taken effectively walking, and there's nothing like it. Air might not heal a broken leg, but for many ills of mind and body it will be found a sovereign remedy."-New York Sun.

VOL. XX.

No more stupendous question confronts the young man of to-day than that of choosing a life work. And this question is more stupendous now than ever before, because the future of the modern youth is so largely in his own hands. He may be advised, persuaded, and even commanded, to select some particular calling, but if he have the vital spark of manhood, he will recognize that he must decide for himself. There may be among the readers of "The Cambrian" young men who have looked toward the Christian ministry with earnest desire. Our Sabbath Schools and Christian Endeavor societies frequently succeed in sowing the seed of ministerial ambition in the hearts of consecrated On the other hand. young men. certain phantoms arise to discourage; the time of preparation is long, the ministry is overcrowded. there is such unrest among theologians. Added to this is the peculiar difficulty arising out of connection with two spheres of life. Shall we aim to be Welsh preachers, or shall we aspire to the American min

No. 8.

istry? Shall we enter upon a ministry of necessity, circumscribed and unsatisfactory, or shall we enlist in a world-service? These and kindred questions are apt to occur to the young aspirant as he stands hesitant upon the threshold of his life. Of the modern ministry, it may be truly said that it offers an unequaled field of usefulness and influence. There is a magnificent opportunity for men of broad vision and aggressive faith. The minister of to-day is a leader of thinkers and workers. The true conception of the relation of the church to the kingdom of God leads to the undertaking of tasks that vary widely in their nature, and in all the pioneer work of the church the ministry bears a leading part.

As Welsh people we have fallen into the habit of speaking of the "Welsh-American pulpit." But the term is a misnomer; it stands for one of our popular misconceptions. The Welsh-American pulpit is a fond. figment of the imagination. Our pulpit is either Welsh or American. While the preaching is Welsh it is a Welsh pulpit; when the preaching is