Ah, brave, brief moment, cancelling years of wrong! Ah, fair and
fatal decoration, serving as a mark for a hidden foe! The sharp
crack of a rifle broke the stillness of the night, and with those
hopeful words upon his lips, the young man sealed his purpose with
his life.






THE KING OF CLUBS AND THE QUEEN OF HEARTS.

A STORY FOR YOUNG AMERICA.





_FIVE_ and twenty ladies, all in a row, sat on one side of the hall,
looking very much as if they felt like the little old woman who fell
asleep on the king's highway and awoke with abbreviated drapery, for
they were all arrayed in gray tunics and Turkish continuations,
profusely adorned with many-colored trimmings. Five and twenty
gentleman, all in a row, sat on the opposite side of the hall,
looking somewhat subdued, as men are apt to do when they fancy they
are in danger of making fools of themselves. They, also, were _en_
costume, for all the dark ones had grown piratical in red shirts,
the light ones nautical in blue; and a few boldly appeared in white,