28 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER, 



Jattuary 



poundy" 



"Why, really, I— I"— gasped Min- 

 nie. 



"Kin you tell me who is the vice 

 president of the United States?" 



••Why— I— I— Mr. B., isn't he? Or 

 is it"— 



"Kin you tell me where the Mis- 

 sissippi river rises and sets?" 



**I — I don't just know." 



"I reckoned ye didn't. Gimme 

 the good old days when gals and 

 boys went to school to I'arn sense." 

 —Our Dumb Animals. 



A I^ittle story of Stevenson's. 



I remember how Stevenson's face 

 looked when he said that long though 

 he had been tied to sedentary habits 

 and deeply though he loved the art 

 they permitted him to practice, the 

 one thing in the world that he held 

 to be the best was still the joy of 

 outdoor living. It was a beautiful 

 face just then, because it revealed a 

 Boul which could endure without be- 

 moaning itself. And for the same 

 reason it was beautiful again when 

 it turned merry over a little tale of 

 attempts to learn the art of knitting 

 as a solace for hours of wearisome 

 languor — unavailing attempts, al- 

 though he had persisted in them un- 

 til he brought himself to the verge — 

 nay, he declared, actually over the 

 verge — of tears. An amusing little 

 story it seemed as he told its details, 

 yet in itself and in the manner of its 

 telling it might have moved a lis- 

 tener to tears in his turn, so uncon- 

 scious did the teller seem that a life- 

 long story of smiling conflict with 

 bitter denials and restrictions, when 

 reduced to its very lowest terms, 

 then showed the vei'y sharpest, most 

 tragical edge of its pathos. — "Robert 

 Louis Stevenson and His Writing," 

 by Mrs. M. G. Van Rensselaer, in 

 Century. 



A writer in an Austrian paper says 

 that Prince Biismarck's family is of 

 Bohemian origin, and that the name 

 was originally spelled "Duschek. " 



MANY JEKYLLS AND HYDES. 



Strange Double Lives Led by Well Known 

 People. 



There are numbers of people who 

 lead double lives. While in some 

 cases the motives which influence 

 such persons are pretty evident in 

 many others one seeks a reason in 

 vain. 



A lady well known in fashionable 

 society, particularly in select ball- 

 room circles, and whose wealth and 

 personal attractions are matter of 

 common comment, is in the habit of 

 donning the role of a ballet dancer 

 at a celebrated west end theater, 

 where, under an assumed name, she 

 finds ready employment. Her dual 

 life is carefully kept a secret save 

 from one or two of her most inti- 

 mate friends, and neither her aristo- 

 cratic connections on the one hand 

 nor her associates on the stage on 

 the other have any conception that 

 Lady A — of polite society and Cissy 



M — of the theater are one and 



the same person. What the lady's 

 motives can be for indulging in this 

 dual existence it is not easy to see, 

 but it is a fact that any scheme for 

 the social improvement of theatrical 

 employees finds in her a ready and 

 munificent patron. 



Another lady, also well known in 

 society, leads a curious double life. 

 During the London season she occu- 

 pies a legitimate place at the head of 

 numerous social functions, but di- 

 rectly the curtain is drawn over the 

 high class carnival she shuts her big 

 house in Mayfair and retires to the 

 country, where, under another name, 

 she superintends and carries on a 

 prosperous business in the cheese 

 farming line. When the season be- 

 gins again, the management of the 

 concern is placed in competent hands 

 and the lady resumes her station in 

 society. Money making is evidently 

 not the influencing motive for this 

 twofold existence, for the lady's 

 private wealth is large, and the prof- 



