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"Dead, sir; died last night," was the low reply. “Ah, I'm sorry to hear that. Well, here's a youngster that can take his place."

Mr. Saunders looked up slowly, put his pen behind his ear and glanced curiously from Tommy to Mr. Towers.

"Oh, I understand," said the latter. "Yes, he is small, very small indeed, but I like his pluck. What did Number Four get?"

"Three dollars, sir," said the still astonished clerk. "Put this boy down for four dollars. There! Youngster, give him your name, and run home and tell your mother hat you have a place at four dollars a week. Come back on Monday, and I'll tell you what to do. Here's a dollar in advance; I'll take it out of your first week. Can you remember?"

"Work, sir work all the time?"

"As long as you deserve it, my man.”

Tommy shot out of that shop. If ever broken stairs that had a twist through the whole flight creaked and trembled under the weight of a small boy - or perhaps, as might be better stated, laughed and chuckled on account of a small boy's good luck — those in that tenementhouse enjoyed themselves thoroughly that morning, as Tommy ran up to his mother's room.

"I've got it, mother! I'm took! I'm a cash-boy! Don't you know when they take parcels the clerks call 'Cash'? Well, I'm that. Four dollars a week! And the man said I had real pluck courage, you know. And

here's a dollar for breakfast. And don't you ever cry again, for I'm the man of the house now."

The house was only a little ten-by-fifteen room, but how those blue eyes did magnify it! At first the mother looked astonished; then she looked - Well, it passes my power to tell how she did look as she took her little manly boy in her arms, and hugged and kissed him; the tears, meanwhile, were streaming down her cheeks. But they were the tears of thankfulness.

THE MANLIEST MAN.

GEORGE W. BUNGAY.

The manliest man of all the race,
Whose heart is open as his face,

Puts forth his hand to help another.
'Tis not the blood of kith or kin,
'Tis not the color of the skin;

'Tis the true heart which beats within

Which makes the man a man and brother.

His words are warm upon his lips,
His heart beats to his finger-tips,

He is a friend and loyal neighbor.
Sweet children kiss him on the way,
And women trust him, for they may,
He owes no debt he cannot pay;

He earns his bread with honest labor.

He lifts the fallen from the ground,
And puts his feet upon the round

Of dreaming Jacob's starry ladder,
Which lifts him higher, day by day,
Toward the bright and heavenly way,
And farther from the tempter's sway,
Which stingeth like the angry adder.

He strikes oppression to the dust,
He shares the blows aimed at the just,
He shrinks not from the post of danger.
And in the thickest of the fight

He battles bravely for the right,

For that is mightier than might,
Though cradled in humble manger.

Hail to the manly man! he comes
Not with the sound of horns and drums,
Though grand as any duke, and grander;
He dawns upon the world, and light
Dispels the dreary gloom of night,
And ills, like bats and owls, take flight;
He's greater than great Alexander.

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind;
The thief doth fear each bush an officer.
Shakespeare. Henry VI. Part II.

--

HEROIC DEEDS.

Every word, look, or thought of sympathy with heroic action helps to make heroism.

CAPTAIN D'ASSAS.

On the 15th of October, in 1760, the French army, which was assisting Austria in the war against Prussia, was encamped near Klostercamp.

Captain d'Assas, of the Auvergne regiment, was sent out to reconnoiter, and he moved cautiously in the direction where they feared the enemy might be, until he was some distance from his regiment.

Suddenly he found himself surrounded by a number of soldiers, whose bayonets pricked his breast, and a low whisper in his ear said: "Make the slightest noise and you are a dead man.”

In a moment he understood all. The enemy was near. The soldiers were advancing silently so as to surprise the French. He had only to keep quiet and his own life would be spared, but many of his friends and countrymen would be slain.

Only a moment for prayer, not indecision, and he shouted: "Auvergne! Here are the enemy!"

By the time the cry reached the ears of his men, he was dead; but his death saved an army. The enemy retreated, knowing they could not conquer when the surprise failed.

They never fail who die in a great cause.

Byron.

THE YANKEE BOY.

JOHN PIERPONT.

JOHN PIERPONT (1785 – 1866), of Connecticut, published in 1816 "Airs of Palestine," and in 1840 "Airs of Palestine and Other Poems.”

The Yankee boy, before he's sent to school,
He knows the mysteries of that magic tool,
The pocket-knife. To that his wistful eye
Turns, while he hears his mother's lullaby;
His hoarded cents he gladly gives to get it,
Then leaves no stone unturned till he can whet it;
And, in the education of the lad,

No little part that implement hath had.

His pocket-knife to the young whittler brings
A growing knowledge of material things.
Projectiles, music, and the sculptor's art,
His chestnut whistle, and his shingle dart,
His elder pop-gun, with its hickory rod,
Its sharp explosion and rebounding wad,
His corn-stalk fiddle, and the deeper tone
That murmurs from his pumpkin-leaf trombone,
Conspire to teach the boy.

To these succeed

His bow, his arrow of a feathered reed,

His wind-mill, raised the passing breeze to win,
His water-wheel, that turns upon a pin;

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