


88 
KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 

A BRIGHT VISION. 
Buve against the more blue Heavens 
Stood the mountain calm and still; 
Two white angels, bending earthward, 
Leant upon the hill. 
Listening leant those silent angels ; 
And I also longed to hear— 
What sweet strain of earthly music 
Thus could charm their ear. 
I heard the sound of many trumpets, 
And a warlike march draw nigh ; 
Solemnly a mighty army 
Passed in order by. 
But the clang had ceased ; the echoes 
Soon had faded from the hill— 
While the angels, calm and earnest, 
Leant and listened still. 
Then I heard a fainter clamor ; 
Forge and wheel were clashing near ; 
And the reapers in the meadow 
Sang both loud and clear. 
When the sunset came in glory, 
And the toil of day was o’er, 
Still the angels leant in silence,— 
Listening as before. 
Then, as daylight slowly vanished, 
And the evening mists grew dim, 
Solemnly from distant voices 
Rose a vesper hymn. 
But the chant was done ; and, lingering, 
Died upon the evening air ; 
Yet, from the hill, the radiant angels 
Still were listening there. 
Silent came the gathering darkness, 
Bringing with it sleep and rest ; 
Save a little bird was singing, 
In her leafy nest. 
Through the sounds of war and labor 
She had warbled all day long ; 
While the angels leant and listened 
Only to her song. 
But the starry night was coming, 
And she ceased her little lay— 
From the mountain-top the angels 
SLOWLY PASSED AWAY! 
From “ Household Words.” 

ENGLISH L-A-W. 

Taxe Notice !—If a man give you a black 
eye, you make him pay for it; but if he put out 
your eye, you get nothing. Whatever is taken 
from him, goes nominally to the Queen ; really to 
John Stokes or Jack Noakes, who has no concern 
at all in the matter. 
If a man kill your pig, you get the value of it. 
But if he kill your wife or your child, you get 
nothing. If anything is got out of him, it goes 
to a stranger as before. 
A man sets your house on fire. If by misfortune, 
you receive amends; if through malice, you receive 
nothing,—Brnrnam. 
[When simple truths are printed in naked array, 
how very eloquently they speak !] 

FORCED FRUITS AND COSTLY VEGETABLES. 
WHILST WALKING DOWN the principal 
avenue of Covent-Garden Market, and gazing 
upon certain extraordinary exhibitions of 
early fruit, flowers, &c., it has often puzzled 
us to imagine for whom all these unnatural 
things were intended. Connected with this 
subject, is an article in ‘‘ Household Words.” 
As it clears up the doubtful point, existing 
not only in our mind, but in the minds pro- 
bably of some thousands of individuals, we 
extract the final paragraphs pro bono :— 
Centre Row is awake and open now; but what 
may I find here that all the world does not know ? 
1 have been through Centre Row hundreds of 
times in summer and winter, and wondered who 
were the wealthy luxurious individuals who did 
not hesitate to pamper themselves with hothouse 
grapes at twenty-five shillings a pound, with 
pottles of British Queens or Black Princes at one 
shilling an ounce, with slender French beans at 
three shillings a hundred, peas at two pounds a 
quart, and new potatoes at four shillings and six- 
pence a pound ; and never knew till now that they 
are mostly bought by kindly friends as ‘‘a sur- 
prise ” for invalids and sickly and afflicted persons. 
It was worth walking through here to know that. 
I never knew till now, that the fruiterers here 
(who seem to be always having tea or coffee, and 
to divide their time between mugs, account-books, 
gold fish, and the vegetable world) can pay four 
or five hundred pounds per annum for the rent of 
a little shop; and that their shops pass from 
father to son, or to their nominees by will, on pay- 
ment of a fine, almost in the same way as copy- 
hold property. I did not know that the late Mr. 
Jonquil—who could not write his name, and’ was 
never anxious to learn—made thirty thousand 
pounds in one of these little Ionic pens. 
I was not aware that one back shop keeps sixty 
persons during the season constantly shelling 
peas; nor that nosegay-making has been an art 
since the Duchess of Sutherland made it one. 
Nor that girls who practise it skilfully can earn 
an easy living. Much less (sober bachelor that I 
am) did I suspect that a wedding nosegay will 
sometimes cost two guineas; or that those little 
bouquets in cut paper, which the premiere dan- 
seuse picks up and sniffs and smiles at, and presses 
to the rim of her corset, and feigns to guard as 
inestimable treasures, have cost from five to ten 
shillings each. 
The amount of money expended in this 
Avenue on “extraordinary ” productions of 
nature, is, no doubt, fearfully large. We 
have stood by, times out of number, and seen 
such sums cheerfully parted from that we 
have gone home lost in thought! 
CLOUDS AND SUNSHINE. 

Aut things bright have surely got their shadow, 
And every joy is but the gay reverse— 
The bright blank nothing, but the picture’s back, 
The portrait of their woe turned to the wall! 
J. 8. Bree. 
