66 parents refused to return home. Their | The dog followed the scent and barked anxiety increased by knowing that the again; the party pursued him with all forests were inhabited by panthers and their speed, but they soon lost sight of wolves, and they could not but paint to him in the woods. Half an hour aftertheir imagination the horrid spectacle wards, they heard him again, and soon of some of these dreadful animals de- saw him return. The countenance of vouring their darling child. the dog was visibly altered; an air of joy seemed to animate him, and his actions appeared to indicate that his search had not been in vain. "I am sure that he has found the child!" exclaimed the Indian. But whether dead or alive, was a question which none could yet decide. The Indian then followed his dog, who led him to the foot of a large tree, where lay the child, exhausted from weakness and want of food, and nearly approaching death. He took it tenderly in his arms, and hastened to the parents. Derick, my poor little Derick, where are you?" frequently exclaimed the mother, in the most poignant grief,-but all was of no avail. As soon as daylight appeared, they recommenced their search, but as unsuccessfully as the preceding day. At last, an Indian, laden with furs, coming from an adjacent village, called at the house of Le Fevre, intending to repose himself there, as he usually did, in his travels through that part of the country. He was much surprised to find no one at home but an old negress, kept there by her infirmities. Happily, the father and mother were in some measure prepared for the return of their child. Their joy was so great, that it was more than a quarter of an hour before they could express their gratitude to the restorer of their child. Words cannot describe the affecting scene. After they had bathed the face of the child with their tears, they threw themselves on the neck of the Indian, to whom they were so much indebted. Their gratitude was then extended to the dog; they caressed him with inex 'Where is my brother?" asked the Indian. "Alas!" replied the negro woman, "he has lost little Derick, and all the neighborhood are employed in looking after him in the woods." It was then three o'clock, in the afternoon. "Sound the horn," said the Indian, "and try to call your master home-I will find his child." The horn was sounded, and, as soon as the father returned, the Indian asked him for the stockings and shoes that the little Der-pressible delight, as the animal, who, by ick had worn last. He then ordered his dog, which he had brought with him, to smell them, and immediately proceeded to describe a circle of nearly a mile in diameter, ordering his dog to smell the earth wherever he went. The circle was not completed, when the sagacious animal began to bark. This sound occasioned some feeble ray of hope to the disconsolate parents. means of his sagacity, had found their beloved offspring; and, conceiving that he, like the rest of the group, must now stand in need of refreshment, a plentiful repast was prepared for him; after which, he and his master pursued their journey; and the company, mutually pleased at the happy event, returned to their respective homes, delighted with the kind Indian and his wonderful dog. as follows. "Can you tell me, Tom, what all this corn is for?" "To be sure I can!" said Tom: "some of it is to feed the chickens with; some of it is to feed the pigs with; some of it is to feed the horse and cow with, and some of it is to be ground into Indian meal, to make Johnny-cake and brown bread with." "Well done!" says Dick. "It seems to me that the corn is very useful, then; for the chickens and the pigs, and the cow and the horse, and mother and Tom, and Dick and Lucy, all live upon it. Really, I never thought of that before. Then people, when they plant and plough, and hoe, and pick, and husk the corn, are working all the while for the hens, and hogs, and cattle, and people!" "Yes, to be sure," said Tom; "and what did you think all this labor was for, before you found out it was useful in this way?" "Why," said the boy, "I thought-I thought-I don't know what I thought; I guess I didn't think at all—or if I did, I thought it was all a kind of play. But I. know better now; I see that when people are at work, they are not playing, but they are doing something useful; and when mother sets me to work, I mean always to consider that she has a good and useful object in view, and that I must do it, not because it is play, but because it will do some good." "Very well," said Tom; "I hope you will always do so." By this time, the husking was done, and I came away. The Old Man in the Corner; or, the Pedler's Pack. NO. II.. THE STORY OF THE COTTON-WOOL. EVERAL Weeks ago I took a ramble through the beautiful town of Dorchester. In the course of my perambulation, I came to a paper-mill, and being attracted by the stirring sound of the machinery within, I entered and looked around me. In one place I saw an immense bin of rags, of all sizes and shapes, and of all hues, and apparently gathered from the four quarters of the globe. Never did I see such a motley congregation, crowded together in one place. As I was looking on the heap, the thought occurred to me that if each rag could speak and tell the adventures of its existence, we should have a collection of romances equal in extent, and perhaps rivalling in wonders, the thousand and one tales of the Arabian Nights. While I was gazing at the heap of rags, which, by the by, was in a dim and dusky room, I thought I saw something rise up in the midst, looking very much like the skinny visage of a very thin, old woman, about to speak. I approached the bin, and loooked steadily at the grisly image-but, on closer inspection, it appeared to be only an old rag, which had, accidentally, assumed the questionable shape I have described. I proceeded to examine the several processes of the mill, and great was my admiration at seeing their magical result. I discovered that the rags of any hue, being put into a vat, were bleached as white as the "driven snow;" that they were then reduced to a kind of pulp, as soft as paste; that this, being mixed with water, produced a liquid like milk; that this liquid passed over a wire cloth, through which the water oozed, leaving a thin, white, even scum, which, settling upon the wire cloth, formed the sheet of paper. I looked on this beautiful process with wonder and delight. I saw the sheet of paper pass over several cylinders, gradually becoming firmer and firmer, by pressure and heat, until, at last, I could see it coiled up, smooth, white and polished, and several hundred yards in length. I then saw it unrolled, and, by a simple machine, cut into sheets, ready to be sent to market. point. At evening I sat down to write I rose up and stood aloof in fear. I was about to speak, when the ghost put her finger on her lip, and, stepping forward, stood upon the middle of the table. I have never seen any manufacture There was something awful about this which seemed to me so admirable. scene, and I felt chilled, with a creeping When I left the mill, I sauntered along horror, to my very heart. The creature the banks of the river, which turned the reached out a kind of crumpled hand, wheels of the mill. The place was and in a sort of frenzy I clasped it. But shady, and, it being summer, I sat down. no sooner had I touched it, than the While I was there, a pretty, black-eyed image vanished, and I found in my girl came along, and I beckoned her to grasp a roll of paper. This I unfolded, She came smiling, and we fell and found it to be an immense sheet, into conversation. She asked me to go written over in a neat, close hand. Castto her house, and being introduced to hering my eye at the beginning, I saw that parents, they gave the old man some it read as follows: food, and treated him kindly. "Will you tell me a story?" said the little girl. "I will write you one," said I—and so we parted. me. For some weeks I forgot my promise, when I received a note from the blackeyed girl, refreshing my memory on this "THE REMINISCENCES OF A RAG. "As the rising sun was just peeping over the bosom of the Atlantic, and tinging with gold the waters that play along the borders of Amelia Island, a negro man, named Bob Squash, was seen putting some little seeds into the ground, upon the eastern slope of said island. This event occurred on the 4th of March, 1839, as the wooden clock of the plantation was on the stroke of four. bale was of that sort. Of course, we, being of the aristocratic class, were proud of our descent; and, while we supposed the vulgar upland would be worked up into shirtings and sheetings, or, perhaps, cheap calicoes, we expected to be treated according to our quality, by being wrought into delicate muslins or you shall see, if you will peruse the next chapter. [To be continued.] "The seed was covered up in the ground, but in a few days it shot forth, and, in process of time, it became a large plant, covered with tufts of cotton.cambrics for the fair. So it chanced, as These were gathered by Bob Squash, and rolled into a wad and from this time I began to have a consciousness of existence. That ball of cotton was myself. I was packed into a bag with an immense heap of other cotton, and being put into a mill, we were awfully torn to pieces, in order to separate the seeds from the fibres. The teeth of the mill, which consisted of a thousand hooks, went through and through us, and thus we were parted forever from the seeds which had been born and bred with us, and which we had cherished from our infancy. The seeds, however, were black, and the combing process made us look very nice and clean. "I was now taken, with the rest of the cotton-wool, and put into a large, coarse sack, and, in order to make us lie snug, a little negro got into the sack and trod us down. He did n't stop to consider how we might like it, but he went on stamping and jumping, and singing Jim Crow, all the time. When the bag was full, the mouth was sewed up, and we were marked as weighing three hundred and seventy-five pounds. In this state we were called a bale of cotton.* You must know that there are two kinds of cotton-the short staple, or upland cotton, and the long staple, or sea island. The lat er is the best, and our THE SEA. From the great depths which have been actually ascertained in some places, and the great extent of sea in which no bottom has been found, we may conclude that we are under the estimate when, including banks and shallows, we allow one mile in depth for the whole. Even this gives us a most enormous quantity of water; a quantity which, estimated in tons weight, we have the entire quantity of sea water, with all its saline ingredients, amounting to the enormous weight of 600,000,000,000,000,000, (six hundred thousand billions of tons.) Of this enormous quantity, between three and four per cent. consists of different saline ingredients, and the rest of pure water so that water in the sea available for the purposes of animal and vegetable life, the supply of springs and rivers, and all other purposes for which water is needed in the economy of the land, amounts to five hundred and eighty thousand billions of tons; and the quantity of salt, at least of saline ingredients, to about twenty thousand billions of tons. |