broken my oath. If, then, you ask, why I have come back, to let you work your will on this poor body which I esteem but as the rags that cover it,-enough reply for you, it is because I am a Roman! As such, here in your very capital I defy you! What I have done, ye never can undo; what ye may do, I care not. Since first my young arm knew how to wield a Roman sword, have I not routed your armies, burned your towns, and dragged your generals at my chariot wheels? And do ye now expect to see me cower and whine with dread at Carthaginian vengeance? Compared to that fierce mental strife which my heart has just passed through at Rome, the piercing of this flesh, the rending of these sinews, would be but sport to me. "Venerable senators, with trembling voices and outstretched hands, besought me to return no more to Carthage. The generous people, with loud wailings, and wildly tossing gestures, bade me stay. The voice of a beloved mother-her withered hands beating her breast, her gray hairs streaming in the wind, tears flowing down her furrowed cheeks-praying me not to leave her in her lonely helpless old age, is still sounding in my ears. Compared to anguish like this, the paltry torments you have in store is as the murmur of the meadow brook to the wild tumult of the mountain storm. Go! bring your threatened tortures! The woes I see impending over this fated city will be enough to sweeten death, though every nerve should tingle with its agony. I die-but mine shall be the triumph; yours the untold desolation. For every drop of blood that falls from my veins, your own shall pour in torrents! Woe, unto thee, O Carthage! I see thy homes and temples all in flames, thy citizens Proud in terror, thy women wailing for the dead. city! thou art doomed! the curse of Jove, a living, lasting curse is on thee! The hungry waves shall lick the golden gates of thy rich palaces, and every brook run crimson to the sea. Rome, with bloody hand, shall sweep thy heart-strings, and all thy homes shall howl in wild response of anguish to her touch. Proud mistress of the sea, disrobed, uncrowned and Scourged-thus again do I devote thee to the infernal gods! Now bring forth your tortures! Slaves! while ye tear this quivering flesh, remember how often Regulus has beaten your armies and humbled your pride. Cut as he would have carved you! Burn deep as his curse! JIMMY BROWN'S SISTER'S WEDDING. Sue ought to have been married a long while ago. That's what everybody says who knows her. She has been engaged to Mr. Travers for three years, and has had to refuse lots of offers to go to the circus with other young men. I have wanted her to get married, so that I could go and live with her and Mr. Travers. When I think that if it hadn't been for a mistake I made she would have been married yesterday, I find it dreadfully hard to be resigned. But we ought always to be resigned to everything when we can't help it. Before I go any further I must tell about my printing-press. It belonged to Tom McGinnis, but he got tired of it and sold it to me real cheap. He was going to exchange it for a bicycle, a St. Bernard dog, and twelve good books, but he finally let me have it for a dollar and a-half. It prints beautifully, and I have printed cards for ever so many people, and made three dollars and seventy-five cents already. I thought it would be nice to be able to print circus bills in case Tom and I should ever have another circus, so I sent to the city and bought some type more than an inch high, and some beautiful yellow paper. Last week it was finally agreed that Sue and Mr. Travers should be married without waiting any longer. You should have seen what a state of mind she and mother were in. They did nothing but buy new clothes and sew, and talk about the wedding all dav long. Sue was determined to be married in church, and to have six bridemaids and six bridegrooms, and flowers and music and all sorts of things. The only thing that troubled her was making up her mind who to invit Mother wanted her to invite Mr. and Mrs. McFadden and the seven McFadden girls, but Sue said they had insulted her, and she couldn't bear the idea of asking the McFadden tribe. Everybody agreed that old Mr. Wilkinson, who once came to a party at our house with one boot and one slipper, couldn't be invited; but it was decided that everyone else that was on good terms with our family should have an invitation. Sue counted up all the people she meant to invite and there was nearly three hundred of them. You would hardly believe it, but she told me that I must carry around all the invitations and deliver them myself. Of course I couldn't do this without neglecting my studies and losing time, which is always precious, so I thought of a plan which would save Sue the trouble of directing three hundred invitations and save me from wasting time in delivering them. I got to work with my printing-press, and printed a dozen splendid big bills about the wedding. When they were printed I cut a lot of small pictures of animals and ladies riding on horses out of some old circus bills and pasted them on the wedding bills. They were perfectly gorgeous, and you could see them four or five rods off. When they were all done I made some paste in a tin pail, and went out after dark and pasted them in good places all over the village. The next afternoon father came into the house looking very stern, and carrying one of the wedding bills in his hand. He handed it to Sue and said: "Susan, what does this mean? These bills are posted all over the village, and there are crowds of people reading them." Sue read the bill, and then she gave an awful shriek, and fainted away, and I hurried down to the post-office to see if the mail had come in. This is what was on the wedding bills, and I am sure it was spelled all right: Miss Susan Brown announces that she will marry at the Church next Thursday at half-past seven, sharp. With the exception of the McFadden tribe and old Mr. Wilkinson are invited. Come early and bring Lots of Flowers. Now what was there to find fault with in that? It was printed beautifully, and every word was spelled right, with the exception of the name of the church, and I didn't put that in because I wasn't quite sure how to spell it. The bill saved Sue all the trouble of sending out invitations, and it said everything that anybody could want to know about the wedding. Any other girl but Sue would have been pleased, and would have thanked me for all my trouble, but she was as angry as if I had done something real bad. Mr. Travers was almost as angry as Sue, and it was the first time he was ever angry with me. I am afraid now that he won't let me ever come and live with him. He hasn't said a word about my coming since the wedding bills were put up. As for the wedding, it has been put off, and Sue says she will go to New York to be married, for she would die if she were to have a wedding at home after that boy's dreadful conduct. What is worse, I am to be sent away to boardingschool, and all because I made a mistake in printing the wedding bills without first asking Sue how she would like to have them printed. LIFE. WALLACE. "Man," says Sir Thomas Browne, "is a noble animal! splendid in ashes, glorious in the grave; solemnizing nativities and funerals with equal luster, and not forgetting ceremonies of bravery in the infamy of his nature!" Thus spake one who mocked while he wept at 'man's estate, and gracefully tempered the high scoffings of philosophy with the profound compassion of religion. Certain it is that pomp chiefly waits upon the beginning and the end of life: what lies between, may either raise a sigh or wake a laugh, for it mostly partakes of the littleness of one and the sadness of the other. The monuments of man's blessedness and of man's wretchedness lie side by side: we can not look for the one without discovering the other. The echo of joy is the moan of despair, and the cry of anguish is |