HE DIDN'T WANT A COFFIN.

He came into the office of a West End undertaker yesterday with a look of great care on his honest face. His eyes were heavy and slightly bloodshot, telling of nightly vigils and loss of sleep. His hair was unkempt and shaggy. The soft-hearted man of coffins looked upon his visitor with a gaze full of pity and thankfulness-pity for the customer's loss, and thankfulness for his patronage. He was so young to be burdened with the loss of a dear one by death.

The manufacturer of burial cases nodded a silent assent and consoling recognition; the young man from the country said: "How d'ye?" Then ensued a painful silence, broken at length by the man of grave business.

"Can I do anything for you to-day, sir?"

"Wall, I reckin so, stranger!"

Another silence. Once more the undertaker began by suggesting: "Your sister?"

The young man stared a moment, then, as a light gradually broke upon his perplexed mind, he smiled a smile more suggestive of sorrow than happiness, and replied:

'No-expected su'thun' of the kind for several months." "When did it happen?"

"'Bout four o'clock this morning."

"Looks natural?"

"Rather." Spoken carefully, and expressive of some doubt. "About what do you want the cost of it to be?"

"Don't care for expense; git it up kinder nice. I'll treat her handsome, 'cause she is the first one I ever had." "Very well, my friend; you'll have it lined with white satin, I suppose?"

"Just as you say, stranger."

"Silver-headed screws, too, I suppose?"

"Y-a-a-s-Oh, certainly-you bet! Git her up sniptious, you know, old fellow. None of your pesky one-horse fixins for me. No, sir'ee"!"

"Just so.

Silver handles, of course?"

"Eh? What's that you say, stranger—silver handles? Oh, blame it, now, won't that be pilin' it on too hefty like? I kin stand silver screws and sich, but there's no use makin' the hull consarn of silver. The thing has to be moved, and must have handles, but I ain't quite so stuck up as that now— not quite, stranger."

"Very well," acquiesced the man of obsequies. "I'll put ordinary handles to it, then?"

Eggs-actly-them's 'em, mister, now yer talkin'. Or'nary handles'll do. But, I say stranger,—(reflectively) make the wheels glisten like thunder."

"Wh-wh-wh-eels?"

"Yas, wheels. What's the matter with yer, anyhow?" "But who ever heard of wheels to a coffin?"

'Coffin!" shrieked the dejected-looking young man. "Coffin! Now, who the dickins said anything about coffins?” "Why, don't you want a coffin?"

"No-o! I want a cradle-a trap to rock my new baby in." "And isn't your wife dead?"

"Not by a jugfull. Don't yer make cradles for sale?" "No, my friend, I am an undertaker."

66 'Undertaker of what?"

"I make coffins."

66

'Oh, Lord, let me ketch the feller that sent me here!" And the grief-stricken youth crammed his hat over his eyes, ran his hands deep down in the pockets of his trousers, and pounced out on the streets searching for vengeance

THE WIFE'S APPEAL.-W. C. BENNETT.

Oh, don't go in to-night, John!-
Now, husband, don't go in:

To spend our only shilling, John,
Would be a cruel sin.

There's not a loaf at home, John,
There's not a coal, you know,
Though with hunger I am faint, John,
And cold comes down the snow-
Then don't go in to-night!

NUMBER ELEVEN.

Ah, John, you must remember,
And, John, I can't forget,
When never foot of yours, John,
Was in the ale-house set.

Ah! those were happy times, John,
No quarrels then we knew,

And none were happier in our lane
Than I, dear John, and you.

Then don't go in to-night!

You will not go, John-John, I mind
When we were courting, few
Had arm as strong, or step as firm,
Or cheek as red as you.

But drink has stolen your strength, John,
And paled your cheek to white;
Has tottering made your once firm tread,
And bowed your manly height.
You'll not go in to-night!

You'll not go in! Think on the day
That made me, John, your wife;
What pleasant talk we that day had
Of all our future life;

Of how your steady earnings, John,
No wasting should consume,

But weekly some new comfort bring
To deck our happy room.

Then don't go in to-night!

To see us, John, as then we dressed,
So tidy, clean, and neat,
Brought out all eyes to follow us

As we went down the street.
Ah, little thought our neighbors then,
And we as little thought,

That ever, John, to rags like these

By drink we should be brought.
You won't go in to-night!

And will you go? If not for me,
Yet for your baby stay ;-

You know, John, not a taste of food
Has passed my lips to-day.

And tell your father, little one,

"Tis mine your life hangs on!

You will not spend the shilling, John,

You'll give it him?-Come, John!
Come home with us to-night.

A YARN.-MARY E. HEWITT.

""Tis Saturday night, and our watch below--
What heed we, boys, how the breezes blow,
While our cans are brimmed with the sparkling flow?
Come, Jack-uncoil, as we pass the grog,
And spin us a yarn from memory's log.'

Jack's brawny chest like the broad sea heaved,
While his loving lip to the beaker cleaved;
And he drew his tarred and well-saved sleeve
Across his mouth, as he drained the can,
And thus to his listening mates began:

"When I sailed a boy, in the schooner Mike,
No bigger, I trow, than a marlinspike-
But I've told ye the tale ere now, belike?"
"Go on!" each voice re-echoéd,

And the tar thrice hemmed, and thus he said:

"A stanch-built craft as the waves e'er bore-
We had loosed our sail for home once more,
Freighted full deep from Labrador,
When a cloud one night rose on our lee,
That the heart of the stoutest quailed to see.

"And voices wild with the winds were blent,
As our bark her prow to the waters bent;
And the seamen muttered their discontent-
Muttered and nodded ominously—
But the mate, right carelessly whistled he.

"Our bark may never outride the gale-
'Tis a pitiless night! the pattering hail
Hath coated each spar as 'twere in mail;
And our sails are riven before the breeze,

While our cordage and shrouds into icicles freeze!'

"Thus spake the skipper beside the mast,
While the arrowy sleet fell thick and fast;
And our bark drove onward before the blast
That goaded the waves, till the angry main
Rose up and strove with the hurricane.

"Up spake the mate, and his tone was gay-
'Shall we at this hour to fear give way?
We must labor, in sooth, as well as pray:
Out, shipmates, and grapple home yonder sail,
That flutters in ribands before the gale!'

"Loud swelled the tempest, and rose the shriek-
'Save, save! we are sinking!-A leak! a leak!'
And the hale old skipper's tawny cheek
Was cold, as 'twere sculptured in marble there,
And white as the foam, or his own white hair.

"The wind piped shrilly, the wind piped loud-
It shrieked 'mong the cordage, it howled in the shroud,
And the sleet fell thick from the cold, dun cloud:
But high over all, in tones of glee,

The voice of the mate rang cheerily

"Now, men, for your wives' and your sweethearts' sakes! Cheer, messmates, cheer!-quick! man the breaks! We'll gain on the leak ere the skipper wakes;

And though our peril your hearts appall,

Ere dawns the morrow we'll laugh at the squall.'

"He railed at the tempest, he laughed at its threats,
He played with his fingers like castanets:
Yet think not that he, in his mirth forgets
That the plank he is riding this hour at sea,
May launch him the next to eternity!

"The white-haired skipper turned away,
And lifted his hands, as it were to pray;
But his look spoke plainly as look could
The boastful thought of the Pharisee-
'Thank God, I'm not hardened as others be!'

say,

"But the morning dawned, and the waves sank low,
And the winds, o'erwearied, forbore to blow;
And our bark lay there in the golden glow-
Flashing she lay in the bright sunshine,
An ice-sheathed hulk on the cold still brine.

"Well, shipmates, my yarn is almost spun-
The cold and the tempest their work had done,
And I was the last, lone, living one,

Clinging, benumbed, to that wave-girt wreck,
While the dead around me bestrewed the deck.

"Yea, the dead were round me everywhere!

The skipper gray, in the sunlight there,

Still lifted his paralyzed hands in prayer;

And the mate, whose tones through the darkness leapt, In the silent hush of the morning, slept.

"Oh, bravely he perished who sought to save

Our storm-tossed bark, from the pitiless wave,

And her crew from a yawning and fathomless grave,

SSS*