it." Mr. Slick willing to oblige, yielded to these entreaties and soon produced the clocka gaudy, highly varnished, trumpery-looking affair. He placed it on the chimney-piece, where its beauties were pointed out and duly appreciated by Mrs. Flint, whose admiration was about ending in a proposal, when Mr. Flint returned from giving his directions about the care of the horses.

7. The deacon praised the clock; he, too, thought it a handsome one; but the deacon was a prudent man; he had a watch, he was sorry, but he had no occasion for a clock. "I guess you're in the wrong furrow this time, deacon; it isn't for sale," said Mr. Slick; "and if it was, I reckon neighbor Steel's wife would have it, for she gives me no peace about it."

8. Mrs. Flint said that Mr. Steel had quite enough to do, poor man, to pay his interest, without buying clocks for his wife. "It's no consarn of mine," said Mr. Slick, "as long as he pays me, what he has to do; but I guess I don't want to sell it; and, besides, it comes too high; that clock can't be made in Rhode Island under forty dollars. Why, it isn't possible!" said the Clockmaker, in apparent surprise, looking at his watch; "why, as I'm alive,

it is four o'clock, and if I haven't been two hours here-how on airth shall I reach River Philip to-night? I'll tell you what, Mrs. Flint: I'll leave the clock in your care until I return on my way to the States-I'll set it a-going, and put it to the right time."

9. As soon as this operation was performed he delivered the key to the deacon with a sort of serio-comic injunction to wind up the clock every Saturday night, which Mrs. Flint said she would take care should be done, and promised to remind her husband of it, in case he should chance to forget it.

10. "That," said the Clockmaker, as soon as we were mounted, "that's what I call human nature. Now, that clock is sold for forty dollars it cost me just six dollars and fifty cents. Mrs. Flint will never let Mrs. Steel have the refusal of it, nor will the deacon learn until I call for the clock, that having once indulged in the use of a superfluity, it is difficult to give it up."

11. We can do without any article of luxury we have never had, but when once obtained, it is not in human nature to surrender it voluntarily. Of fifteen thousand sold by myself and

partners in this province, twelve thousand were left in this manner, and only ten clocks were ever returned-when we called for them, they invariably bought them. We trust to soft sawder to get them into the house, and then to human nature that they never come out of it.

HALIBURTON (1802-1865).

Topical Review.

How did Mr. Slick contrive to sell so many clocks? Name the chief element of soft sawder; the chief element of human nature. What is the difference between flattery and envy? (Both have their root in personal pride.)

A frosty chill was in the air,
How plainly I remember-

The bright autumnal fires had paled,

Save here and there an ember;

The sky looked hard, the hills were bare,

And there were tokens everywhere

That it had come November.

LXIV.

DESCRIPTION OF MELROSE ABBEY.

If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,

Go visit it by the pale moonlight;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray.

When the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruined central tower;
When buttress and buttress, alternately,
Seem framed of ebon and ivory;
When silver edges the imagery,

And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave,

And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave,
Then go but go alone the while-
Then view St. David's ruined pile;
And, home returning, soothly swear,
Was never scene so sad and fair!
The moon on the east oriel shone,
Through slender shafts of shapely stone,
By foliaged tracery combined;

Thou wouldst have thought some fairy's hand
'Twixt poplars straight the osier wand,

In many a freakish knot, had twined;
Then framed a spell, when the work was done,
And changed the willow wreaths to stone.

The silver light, so pale and faint,

Showed many a prophet and many a saint,
Whose image on the glass was dyed:
Full in the midst, his cross of red
Triumphant Michael brandishéd,

And trampled the apostate's pride.

The moonbeam kissed the holy pane,
And threw on the pavement a bloody stain.

SIR WALTER SCOTT (1771-1832).

LXV. DOUBTING CASTLE.

1. Now there was, not far from the place where they lay, a castle, called Doubting Castle, the owner whereof was Giant Despair, and it was in his grounds they were now sleeping; wherefore he, getting up in the morning early and walking up and down in his fields, caught Christian and Hopeful asleep in his grounds. Then, with a grim and surly voice, he bid them awake, and asked them whence they were and what they did in his grounds? They told him they were pilgrims, and that they had lost their way.

2. Then said the giant: You have this night trespassed on me, by trampling and lying on my ground, and therefore you must come along with me. So they were forced to go, because he was stronger than they. They also had but little to say, for they knew themselves in fault. The giant, therefore, drove them on before him, and put them into his castle, in a very dark dungeon, nasty and stinking to the spirits of those two men.

3. Here they lay from Wednesday morning till Saturday night, without one bit of