The one church-bell in the distant town
Chimes softly forth for twelve o'clock;
Another clang of the door-yard gate,
A sudden hush in the tender talk.

She flies to meet him--the transformed child!--
Her heart keeps time to her ringing tread;
'O father! he's come!' and she needs no more
To pinch her cheeks to make them red.

MARIE MIGNIONETTE.

* * * * *

A friend who doth such things has kindly jotted down for us the
following 'authentics':

Sometimes I have thought that the reply our Irish girl gave the
other day, was of the nature of her usual blunders, and again that
it meant a good deal. On her return from a funeral, where a man,
who had previously lost his wife, had buried his only child, an
infant a few weeks old, I asked her how the father appeared?

'Oh! he was a dale sorry; but I guess _he's glad to get rid of
it_!'

_It was only a_ WAY _he had._--Whiggles, on being told that a boy
down-town, only sixteen years old, weighed six hundred and fifty
pounds, was further enlightened by the information that he weighed