OCR Text |
Show ..Our Boys ana ri$. Edited by Runt Busy LITTLE BOY BLUE. The little toy dog is covered with dust-But dust-But sturdy and stanch ho stln?' 6t And t he little toy .oldie? is red fn And his musket molds in h?s hSuui ' Time -was -when tho uttle im- a. And the soldier waspa g "W And that was tho time U J Ktaed them and PuTthem", .Uttle ,5o" BIuc "Now don"t vou e-o mi t "And don't" Zu mHSe n' hr,SiM- Jnemile of a lutle fare. And ig1'01' as waiti,,B these ions 3ea" m-o dulsl ,f tnat Uttle chair, sin S conie of our Little Boy Blue Mnce he kissed them and put them there EUGENE FIELD. AUNT BUSY HAS HER. SAY. Hear Nieces and Nephews: Aunt- Busy hardly knows what to say 11S wook that the dear children who write to W - W iavc tk,r thoughts centered now on tho do, uays oi Lent. attended tho Lenten services every Wednesday Friday Fri-day and Sunuay n.ghts ; Of course, she does not I T?' a?U'-FS 1Vhis lU1i"11' b it is one ot her hu.-niess hat she only wants to remind he dear young- people that they ran attend church ..ur nights next week, even if they June not. been Jiltendnnr regularly during- Lent Lat Sunday a little girl asked Aunt Busv some- thmg about saying a certain number. of prayers on ti..ol J- nday. Aunt Busy promised to answer her this week, and will tell her what she knows about the special devotion. lhen Aunt Busy went to school she rciuomliers that all her class-mates used to sav 1.000 Jlflll Mnrv mi Cln.i.l V,'.l ti" , .... .vu.j iiu.i,v .11 u-rinHtHi. me, gins were always earnest about saying them and were told of the devotion by ih? good Sisters. Now Aunt Busy suggests that the little girl who wishes to know, should ask one of the clergy about the matter first. In any case there will be no harm in saying tli3 few prayers, on the contrary there will be much merit. Another beautiful act of devotion, and one that every child should do is to make .the stations of the cross on Good Friday afternoon endeavoring to be in the church at S o'clock, if possible. pos-sible. Xow Aunt Busy is only telling you what site was taught to do, and it will be better for all the young people to ask the priests or sisters for any further advice. In any case do not forget to say a prayer for old, AUNT BUSY, LETTERS AND ANSWERS. Salt Bake City, March 17. 1004. Pear Aunt Busy: This is my birthday and I i nought I would write 1o you. 1 am ten years old today and am iu the fourth B. Do you think Patrick is a nice name for a' boy? I don't, because all the bays call me Pat. I am going to try to win a watch, Aunt Busy. Your loving nephew. PATRICK LUIINS. Aunt Busy was very pleased to hear from her 0 I St. Patrick Day nephew. She thinks that you have a glorious name and a great deal depends on your self in regard to the nick name; Insist on being' called Patrick by your near friends and at home. By doing this you will probably escape being called "Pat."' Really Aunt Busy thinks that even "Pat" is idright. One of the very finest men she ever knew was called "Paddy" all his life, and he never did anything to disgrace the name, cither. So write toon again, Pat, dear. $ Harman, Idaho, March 1, 1904. J want to be accepted as one of your nieces. I ia ! and have 8 brothers. 4 living and four dead. My oldest brother is 20 and the next is IS, ihe next and ihe darling baby 1 year old. lie is very cute jn his little overalls. I am afraid my letter will be too lng, so I will close. Hoping to be accepted as a nioco, 1 remain with love. AGNES IIICKEY. You are, indeed, welcome, dear Agnes. Aunt ' Bu-y has been a long time answering your letter, but r-lv reached it at last. Aunt Busy would love to see the dear baby. Give him a kiss for her. You "forgot to tell his name. What a fortunate little girl to have so many brothers! Aunt Busy never had a brother. She has often wishod that she had one, too. Write soon again, I Agues. f . j Denver. Colo., March 12, 1904. X My Dear Aunt Busy: Have you forgotten me? 'I It is many mouths since I wrote you. Don't you wish spring would come? AVe have had a 'very dreadful winter and the time seems long since the lovely summer of last. year. I intend; td make my iirst. Holy Communion in May. Well, I will stop s- now. Hoping that vou have not quite fortrot ten ' your loving niece, MARY DESMOND. Aunt Busy never forgets any of her .young correspondents, cor-respondents, Mary. Spring will soon be here now. ; dear, so lo patient for a few weeks longer. Think of the beautiful summer days that are to come, not of the days that are gone; ihe dead days of the I past are. not always the happiest to remember, little girl, so look forward to the coming joys. May will be a happy month for you, Mary, if you make I your first Holy Communion. Best wishes for your i ; . happiness, little ni;-ee. jj HOW THE GOVERNOR SIGNED THE PARDON. I. (Eugene Field in Chicago News.) Everybody was afraid of the old governor because be-cause he was so cross and surly. And one morning morn-ing he was ciosser and surlier than ever, because f he had been troubled for several days with a matter I which he had already decided, but which many poo- I iilc wished to have reversed. A man, found guilty of a crime, had been imprisoned, and there were those who. convinced of his penitence, and knowing that his family needed his support, earnestly sought his pardon. To all these solicitations the governor re died, "No," and, having made up his mind, the ild governor had no patience with those who persisted. per-sisted. So ihe old governor was in high dudgeon nne morning and when he came to his office he said to his secretary: "Admit no one. 1 am weary of ihese senseless importunities." Xow, the secretary had a discreet regard for ihe EiTd governor's feelings, ami it was seldom that, his presence of mind so far deserted him as to admit ;f his suffering iho old governor's wishes to be disregarded. dis-regarded. He bolted the door and sat himself down at his modest desk, and simulated intense, onthusi-Bsm onthusi-Bsm in his work. , j His simulation was more intense than usual, for never lefore had iho secretary seen the old governor in such harsh mood. ... "Has the mail come ? Where are the papers and ihe lettersY' demanded the old governor, in a gruff roice. ...... "Here they are. sir,' said the secretary, as lie s Put. the bundle on the old governor's table; ''These I are addressed to you privately; the business letters ' J ire on my desk. Would you like to sec them now?'' "No, not now,"'" growled the old governor; "I will read the papers and my private correspondence first."' But the old governor found cause for uneasiness. The papers discussed the imprisoned man and these private letters came from certain of the old governor's govern-or's friends, who, strangely enough, exhibited an interest in-terest in the self-same prisoner. The old governor was disgusted. ''They should mind their own business,'' muttered mut-tered the old governor. "The papers are officious, and these other people are impertinent. My mind is made up nothing shall change it.'' - Then the old governor turned to his private secretary sec-retary and bade him bring the business letters, and presently the private secretary could . lira r the old governor growling and fumbling over the pile of correspondence. He knew why the old governor was excited; many of these letters were petitions touching the imprisoned man." A - ' v. "Humph!' said the governor at last. "I'm glad lm done with them. There are no more, I suppose." sup-pose." When the secretary made no reply the old governor gov-ernor was surprised. He wheeled in'his chair and searchingly regarded the secretary over his spectacles. specta-cles. He saw that tho secretary was strangely embarrassed. em-barrassed. ' "You have not shown all," said the governor, sternly. "What is it you have kept backP Then the secretary said: "It is nothing but a little child's letter I thought I would not bother you with it." The governor was interested. A child's letter what could it be about? Such a thing had never .happened before. "A child's letter! Let me see it," said the governor, gov-ernor, and, although his voice was harsh, somewhat of a tender light came into his eyes. " 'Tis nothing but a scrawl," explained the secretary, sec-retary, "and it comes from 1 he prisoner's child Monckton's little girl Monckton, the forger, you know. Of course there's nothing in it; a mere scrawl, for the child is only 5. years old. But the gentleman who sends it says the child brought it to him and asked him to send it to tho governor." The governor took the letter, and he scanned it curiously. What a wonderful letter it was, and who but a lit tie child could have written it! Such strange hieroglyphics and crooked lines it was a wonderful letter, as you can imagine. But the old governor saw something more than the heiroglyphics and cooked lines and rude pencil-lings. pencil-lings. He could see in and between the lines of the little child's letter a sweetness and a pathos he had never seen before, and on the crumpled sheet lie found a love like the lose his bereaved heart had vainly yearned for, oh! so many years. As the old governor looked upon the, crumpled page and saw and heard the pleadings of the. child's letter, he thought, of his own little one God rest her innocent soul ! And it seemed to him as if he hear her dear baby voice joining with this other's in truthful pleading. The secretary was amazed when the old governor said: "Give me a pardon blank." But what most amazed him was the tremulous tenderness in the old governor's spectacles, as he folded the crumpled page and put it carefully in the breast-pocket df his greatcoat. "Humph," Ihought the secretary, "the old governor gover-nor has a kinder heart than any of us suspected." When the prisoner was pardoned and came from his cell, people grasped him by the hand and eaid: "We saved you.' But the secretary knew and the old governor, too God bless him for his human heart! they knew that a dimpled baby hand opened those prison doors. LI'L" WHITE BABY CHILE. Part ob you's mine, does you understan'? Kaze I washed you an" dressed you wid dis black ban' When you fus come down frum de glory lan. LiT white baby chile. I knowed you was comin, I did. fo" sho, Kaze a voice in de pussly hed tell me so, En I was a-lovin' you fo'e you know, LiT white baby chile. Ez purty a baby I neber did spe Ez you when you laugh at de sight ob me; En none dat am sweeter kind eber be, LiT white baby chile. I's lib a long time, en soon, I know, De sickness gwinc come an' lay me low. But I s glad you wuz bo'n fo'e I had ter go, LiT white baby chile. Margaret A. Bichard in the Rosary. THE PRINCE AND THE DAISY. A prince went into the vineyard to examine it. He came to a peach tree'and said: "What are jou doing for 1110?" The tree said: "In the spring I give my blossoms' and fill the air with fragrance, and on my bough hangs the fruit which men will gather and carry into the palace for you." "Well done!" said the prince. To the chestnut tree he said: "What are you doing?" "I am making nests for tho birds, and shelter cattle with my leaves and spreading branches."' Well done!' said the prince. Then he went down to the meadow and asked the grass what it was doing. "We are giving our lives for others; for your sheep and cattle, that they may be nourished." And the prince said: "Well done!" " " Last of all, he asked a tiny daisy what it was doing, and the daisy said: "Nothing, nothing. I cannot make a nesting place for the birds, and I cannot give shelter for 'ihe cattle, and I cannot send fruit into the palace, and I cannot even give food for the sheep and cows they do not want, me in the meadow; Ail I can do is to look up cheerfully at everybody that passes by and be the best little daisy I can be." And the prince bent down and kissed the daisy and said: "There is .none better than thou." BABES IN THE SNOW. One of the most curious customs of the Laplanders Lap-landers is the manner of taking the babies to church. The mothers go regularly, even when they have wee. tiny babies. Sometimes they ride ten or fifteen miles in a sleigh drawn by a reindeer. They all have warm clothes on, the baby in particular. Oftentimes Of-tentimes it is wrapped in bear skins. As soon as ihe family arrives at the little church, and ihe reindeer is secured, the father Lapp shovels a snug little bod of snow and mother Lapp wraps baby snugly in skins and lays it down there., Then father Lapp piles the snow all around it, and the parents eo into the church. I Over twenty or thirty of these babies lie out there in ihe snow round the church, and I never heard of one that was suffocated or frozen. The snow does not make them cold; for when it covers a person all over, if he has clothing enough so lhat it will not melt and wet him, it will keep him warm. The little babies are not strong enough to knock the snow aside and get away, so they just lie still and sleep. When the church is out ihe father goes to where the baby is. puts his hands down into the snow and pulls ihe baby out, and shakes off the snow; then the reindeer trots off. a good deal faster than a horse and takes them all home again. The New-World. New-World. LET THE BOYS HELP. "Let us meet here at quarter of seven, and have a moonlight coasting party!" cried Fred Baker. "We all have supper at six, and that will give us Jots of time to get here." "I can't come until half-past half-past seven," said Will Adams, after the other boys had shouted a noisy assent. "I have to wash the supper dishes and put the room to rights." There was a chorus of derision. "Wash dishes a boy wash 'dishes! Who ever heard of .such a thingr" "I have." said Will quietly. "I know pf" three' boys in the Hamilton hotel who wash disb?s three timis a day." "Oh, but they are paid for it." "Well, do you mean to say that you would do for pay what you wouldn't do to help. your sick mother?" Exchange. Ex-change. JACKIE HAD NEVER SEEN HIS PAPA. (From the Washington Star.) "T met a relative of mine pretty close one that I'd never seen before, when I got . back to Washington the other day," said an army officer, who returned from a tour of duty in the Philippines Philip-pines recently. "That relative happened to be a son of mine. He was burn a couple of months after I made the start for the islands three years :'go. "I was due in Washington about 11 o'clock af night, and they tacked the dining car on somewhere some-where around Ilarrisbui-g. J was hungry for United Unit-ed States food, as I had been for three years, and I didnt' seem to be able to get enough of it. One J of the things that madi- an instant hit with me on I the table was a nice long dish full of tine looking spring onions, littered up with little particles of ! ice. i "I simply couldn't resist, thorn. I gobbled up j the whole plateful, resolved that when T met 'my j wife and she noticed the aicma I'd simply have to throw myself on the mercy of the court. "Well, my wife was at the station, of course, to meet me it was pretty nigh midnight. She was too busy looking me. over and commenting upon riiy coat of bronze to mention the onions, even if she had noticed 'em, and sho had too much to tell me about the kid, anyway, as we sped uptown ou the street, cars. The kid was asleep, of course, and when we slipped into the room and turned up the gas 1 suppose, sup-pose, maybe I didn't take a good look at the little tyke and maybe, of course, there wasn't a lump about the sizez of an old-fashioned gourd just at the point where my front collar button presses against my neck. "Then I grabbed the still sleeping kid out of the bed. He opened his eyes and surveyd me with a calm-scrutiny while I gave him a hug. Then be turned his head away from me, with a very decided expression of disapproval. This hurt his mother and she instantly told him: "'Why, Jackie, that's your papa.' "The kid urned his head away from me in the other direction and struggled to be turned loose. " 'I don't care who he is,' he replied in the calmest calm-est accents imaginable. 'I ain't a-goin' to let anybody any-body blow onions all over me !' " BOYS, PLEASE DON'T Show the surly side of your disposition when at home. Make your family smile at your vain-glorious boastings. Take advantage of the generous impulses of jour mother. Talk back to your father with the thought that it is smart. Say things which would make father wish you would take a back seat. Fail to extend to your family a pleasant greeting greet-ing on going home. Think it appears smart to become excessively taciturn when at home. Think it unmanly to once in a while bestow a caress on your mother. Expect your mothers and sisters to give you as much, attention as though you were a child. Do things which will necessitate a humiliating explanation. 1 . .. . |