what paler anti thinner than when he left us, 
but he seemed to have passed through the fierce¬ 
ness of agony and found the same peace that 
poor Wn.r. Dayton dwelt in; something deeper 
and holier than happiness. 
“ You see it is not so had as 1 feared," said he, 
smiling; “I can walk very well, and use my 
hand after a fashion, anti the doctors think if I 
am careful I shall not be likely to get any worse. 
I am so glad now to know that I am not to be 
helpless/’ 
“S oVimkfvl, you mean, do you not?” ques¬ 
tioned Miss WOODS, with a searching glance. 
“Yea, thankful. returned Vinton, earnestly; 
“ that is the right word.” 
“ And then we all sat silent, watching Peter, 
who was cutting back some young grape vines. 
“ Seems a pity to do it," soliloquized the old 
man, taking the long shoots in his hand; “must 
seem drefful ha'nil to the poor thing after it’s 
been a growin’ and a grow in’ all summer to cut 
smack off, but you can't ripen ail this wood you 
poor creeturs, and whar’ll be the grapes next 
year.” Then, after an unmerciful cutting, he 
went on, with an evident eye to his audience. 
“ Dat’s jest the way the good Lord sarves us. 
We get’s rooted down in a nice place, and we’s 
full o’ sap, and we grows and grows aud thinks 
we’s doin’ right smart Den de Lord comes 
along, and he sees we’s growin’ too much wood, 
and he cute us all up to de bar stem. Makes us 
grieve awful, and think we's clean gone, but 
that’s the time ute taring forth fruit, forty, fifty, and 
a hunderd fold.” 
“Just the sermon for ns, Witt,” said Vin¬ 
ton, laughing; “the old fellow brings out his 
point pretty well. Are you a contraband, Uncle 
Peter?” 
“’Spose so, massa," said Peter, “dough I 
ain’t quite elar what dem is, widout it jest 
means brack folks. I’se uncommon brack, any¬ 
way.” 
“So you ran away from your master, did 
you V' asked V INTON. 
“Bress you, no, massa.” said the old man; 
“ you see my old marse he b’longs to de ’federate 
army, and when he got on his hossto ride away, 
he said, • hike ear of ycrself, Peter,’ and so I 
tought 1 would.” 
“You pray for your old master, I suppose,’’ 
said Miss WOODS ; “ and what do you say?” 
“ I pray de Lord to shut up his way, on de 
right hand and on de left, and bring all his plans 
tonutlin. And I ax him to fill his heart with 
foolishness, and lead him right into the hands of 
the Yankees, and uot let him get away, ’cause 
he's so chock full of tricks he'll slip frew de 
leastest kind of a hole.” 
Peter utterly disclaimed any hard feelings 
towards his late master, and said he always 
“used him well,” but his whole sympathies 
were as ardently with his own oppressed and 
enslaved race, as are yours and mine with ours. 
.Success to our armies with him meant nothing 
more than freedom for the slave; therefore he 
prayed for our success with the fervent prayer 
of undoubting faith, which we are assured finds 
audience on high, whether it comes from the 
king in his purple and tine linen, or the unlet¬ 
tered bondman at his footstool. 
The summer slowly deepened into autumn. 
The grapes ripened into clusters of amethyst, 
the corn rustled upon the hill sides, the apples 
dropped mellow from the orchard boughs. Mrs. 
FORSTER’8 boarders drifted off again upon their 
separate ways, carelessly breaking the links that 
had held them together for a time as one family. 
I have introduced to you the various characters 
with some of their peculiarities, but if you ask 
me for their story, 1 can only say with the knife- 
grinder, ‘-Bless you, sirs! I have none to tell!” 
MBS. POESTEE'S BOAEDEES 
[CoDcltuled from last. page. I 
I cannot now recall the whole conversation, 
but I was struck with the good sense and com¬ 
prehension of childish character displayed by 
Miss Woods, and convinced that at least one 
old maid held theories of family government 
that were entirely reasonable and practicable. 
Mrs. Pendleton's colored nurse was a 
“ contraband” whom her husband bad sent 
north, and who proved a perfect treasure in her 
way. She was completely devoted to the baby, 
and seemed never to tire of it, no matter how 
fretful it might be, She was a light mulatto, 
and not particularly intelligent, and seemingly 
had but one ungratifiod wish, which was that 
her “ole man" might escape from “dem rebs 
down souf,” and share her freedom. She believed 
in Mr. Pendleton’s greatness from the pro- 
foimdest depths of her grateful heart, and 
always culled him “deGen’l” when speaking of 
him. 
There was an unusual stir in the house one 
night, and wo were roused from our dreams by 
a confusion of voices, the loudest of which was 
a strange one to us. “ Mrs. Pen nr. Eton’s hus¬ 
band has come home from the army,” said 
Timothy, after listening a moment, and he 
quietly settled himself to sleep again. 
Next morning Our .ok was on the piazza with 
the baby, walking up and down before our win¬ 
dows, and as soon as she could catch my eye she 
burst out, 
“’Sped you’s heard de news missus: de 
Gcn’l done got home." 
“Y'es, T know,” said I smiling: “you seem to 
be very much pleased, ClILOE.” 
“ Laws yes, missus, lie’s fotehed my ole man 
with him,” and she burst into one of those hearty 
laughs by which the delight of the negro nature 
seems to bubble over from the heart. Little chil¬ 
dren laugh in the same wav, but white people of 
mature years never. 
C’hDOE’S “ ole man" proved to be a negro black 
as ebony, a preacher by profession, who had made 
his escape to our lines and been taken by the 
Gen’l, as they both called him, for a body ser¬ 
vant. The great dignitary himself, whom we 
met at the breakfast table, was one of those pom¬ 
pous. self-conscious, tittle bin men, of whom this 
war lias developed an untold number. One 
would have supposed, to listen to liis bilk, that 
he was head of the army and navy: that he hail 
planned, advised and executed every important 
movement since the beginning of the war. 
“ What is his rank,” 1 asked of my husband, 
when we had left the breakfast room. 
“Captain, by his uniform,” said Timothy; 
“otherwise I should have taken him for second 
Corporal. When 1 hear a man bilking loud and 
long about ‘our road,’ I always set him down 
for the one that peddles pea-nuts and carries 
hand-bills through the ears.” 
I learned during Capb Pendleton’s stay to 
understand the reason for his wife’s perfect free¬ 
dom from all anxiety for his safety, a thing that 
always puzzled me. He declared it to be an 
imperative duty for an officer to take every pre¬ 
caution for his personal safety, and never to ex¬ 
pose himself to danger since his life was worth 
more to the country than any number of privates. 
“ Privates can be replaced easily enough,” said 
he, “ but it is not every man that is capable of 
making a good officer.” 
“That is very true sir," .-aid Timothy, with 
a great deal of emphasis, “ not one man in a hun¬ 
dred is capable of it.” And the pompous little 
Captain considered himself complimented. 
“ He’s a mighty smart man,” said Chloe to 
me confidentially, “and i heard him tell missus 
he ’spected to be a ’Iiigadier fore the war was 
over. Should’ut wonder but he will, ef he don’t 
go and get liisself killed.” 
There was very little mourning outside of 
Capt. Pendleton’s own family wlieu his leave 
of absence expired, and he left for his “eom- 
mund.” Black Peter did not accompany him, 
for the reason that he was more valuable at tho 
North, lie was a gardener by trade, and Capt. 
Pendleton wanted Just such an appendage to 
Ids elegant establishment, which, for the time 
being, was shut up. In the meantime he was to 
remain with tho family and make himself gen¬ 
erally useful. And so he did in ways that wo 
least exported. From morning till night he was 
busy clipping, training and pruning till tho neg¬ 
lected yarils and garden put on mi umvouted 
beauty. He took poor Will Dayton under 
his especial care, and carried him everywhere, 
as if his weight was a mere leather, liis hearty 
voice, so full of enthusiasm, kept the place ring¬ 
ing with fragments of Methodist hymns, some 
times jumbled together sadly enough, and with 
missing hues supplied without much regard to 
anything but sentiment, but there was so much 
soul to his singing that we never thought of crit¬ 
icising. Full of fun as a child, and inexhausti¬ 
bly good natumi, there was yet a deep, unfeigned 
religious feeling in his breast that shone out con¬ 
tinually, and in the commonest things. 
“ Is this the road to Boston, old Charcoal,” 
roughly demanded a drover one day, as Fktkr 
was busily training the great honeysuckle over 
the gateway. 
“’Pends on which way you’s goiu’, massa,” 
replied Peter, with perfect good humor. 
“ One way it’s the road to Boston, and t’other 
way it’s the road to Springfield. Mighty curia 
rood, massa; pretty much like the road to 
heaven. ’Pears like they was a heap o’ folks 
on dat road dat’d never git thar, ’cause they’s 
got their faces sot the wrong way.” 
The drover may not have bestowed a thought 
upon tlie moral of tho answer, but all day long 
1 thought of the crowd of travelers, toiling 
along, many of them with pain and self-denial, 
on the road to heaven, but their “ faces sot the 
wrong way.” 
Wo had a visit from Vinton late in the sum¬ 
mer. lie walked with a cane, and was some¬ 
NAMES AND SURNAMES. 
“ Frank and I had a dispute lately, uncle, 
with John Darling, about surnames. He said 
that his ‘Darling’ was not his surname.” 
“What else, Robert?” 
“Why, he said John was hi., surname, and 
Darling was liis other name.” 
“His other name, Robert! What did he 
mean by other name? surely he didn’t mean to 
say that he had been christened ‘ Darling,’ which 
it must have been if John was his surname, for 
there are only two, Christian manes and. sur¬ 
names.” 
“That’s what I said, uncle. I also said that 
these surnames had not been a very great while 
in use.” 
“Well, they have been no great while in use 
in our branch of the human family, Robert. 
They were brought into England by the Nor¬ 
mans, A. D. 1100. The old Normans use Filz. 
which signifies for grandson, as Fitzgerald, Fitz- 
herbert, &e. The Irish use O for grandson, as 
O’Neil, O’Donnell. The Scottish highlanders 
use Mae, Macdonald, son of Donald. The Sax¬ 
ons add the word son to the father’s name, as 
Johnson, Wilson, Dickson, and the like.” 
“And were surnames used before these 
times?” 
“The Greek and other ancient nations em¬ 
ployed similar distinctions, such as Nkator , con¬ 
queror; Philopater, lover of his father; Philoma- 
ter, lover of his mother," &c. 
“ Why are such additional names called sur. 
names, uncle?” 
“ Suit, being the French name for over, it 
signifies what it really is, a name in addition or 
over and above the christened or Christian 
name. The names Black, White, Frost. Snow, 
«fee., were, no doubt, suruamesjadded to the first 
name for some special reason, John Frost may 
have been born on a vpry frosty day. Tom 
Brown may have been so called from his dark 
complexion, and so on."— Christian Magcmne. 
THE FLYING-FISH. 
more timid, dart-far away. Their ordinary 
flight is about two hundred feet; but some pro¬ 
ceed three or four times that distance. I have 
seen single fish pass over three hundred yards. 
Kirby, Ko^et. and other naturalists, who teach 
that the wings of flying-fish are only buoyant, not 
progressive organs, are mistaken—decidedly so.” 
The Rays are at first sight not unlike the 
turbot and sole, but a closer examination will 
show that the Rays really swim with their 
We present Rural readers with portraits of 
certain curious denizens of the waters. Nature 
breaks out sometimes into peculiar and wonder¬ 
ful formations, and in no portion of the varies! 
works of her hands does she exhibit stranger 
freaks than are to be found amid the inhabitants 
of the great deep. 
A voyager to Brazil, “ the iand of the cocoa 
and palm,” speaks of the pleasure and 
interest afforded by the pretty crea¬ 
tures pictured above, while crossing M 
the “ flving-fish latitudes.” Few Jffc g 
nights passed, or evenings closed in. 
without some coming on board, al- 
lured by the cabin lights; and our Jr Z *4 
engraving is a portrait of one of the 
visitors. The writer (Prof. Ewbank) 
proceeds: w|| 
“Flocks of from twenty to two 
hundred spring up as the ship plow's 
in among them. They seem to take 
the air for pleasure, as w'ell as to 
escape danger; groups and individuals 
being observed leaping and making short trips, 
as if in more wantonness. They fly low, seldom 
mounting higher than six or eight feet; but they 
have the power to rise aud fall with the heaving 
surface, and to change their direction laterally. 
THE THORN RACK SKATE, 
backs upwards, whereas the turbot swims on 
its side. Tho movement of the Rav is very 
curious, and is admirably expressed by the word 
“sluddering”—used by an old fisherman. The 
jaws of the Rays are exceedingly powerful, and 
enable them to crush with perfect ease the 
various shell-fish on which they feed. 
The Sting Ray is another species, which 
is armed with a serrrated bone in its tail, 
with which it can inflict painful and even 
dangerous wounds. 
The Skate is caught in abundance on 
' our shores, and in England is much used as 
an article of food, although in Scotland it y* 
used principally for bait. The Thornback 
Skate derives its name from the spiny arm¬ 
ature of the tail, with which the fish de¬ 
fends itself most vigorously by bending 
itself almost into a semicircle and lashing 
about wild its tail. The female of the Thorn- 
back Skate is termed a 31 aid. It often attains to 
a large size, the largest known being twelve 
feet in length, and nearly ten in width. The 
Torpedo, remarkable for the electric pow'er it 
possesses, belongs to this family of fish. 
Dm you ever hear'the story of Amos aud the 
nails ? There was once a bad boy, whose name 
was Amos. His lather was a very good man, 
and was grieved and troubled at hi3 son’s wick¬ 
edness. He tried in vain to convince him of his 
sin, and induce him to do better. One day his 
father said to him, 
“ Amos, here is a hammer and a keg of nails. 
I wish you, every time you do a wrong thing, to 
drive one of these nails into this post.” 
“Well, father, I will,” said Amos. 
After a while ]Amos came to his father, and 
said: 
“ I have used all the nails : the keg is empty; 
come and see." 
His father went, to the spot, and found the 
post black with nails? 
“ Amos,” said he, “ have you done something 
wrong for each of these nails?" 
“ YV<, sir,” said the boy. 
“Oh! Amos ! how sad this is to think of ! 
Why will you not try to turn about, and be a 
good boy?” 
Amos stood thoughtfully for a few minutes 
and said” Father, I’ll try; I know I have been 
very bad. Now I mean to pray God to help me 
to do better.” 
Very well,” said his father: “ now take the 
hammer, and every time you do a good act,- or 
resist a wrong one, draw out a nail, and put it in 
the keg again." 
After a while the boy came to bis father, aud 
said: “Come, father, and see the nails in the 
keg again. I have pulled out a nail for every 
good act, and now the keg is full again.” 
- I am glad to see it, my son,” said his father, 
“ but see the marks of the nails remain 
So with every wicked deed; it leaves its mark 
as the wages of sin. Ah! how careful we should 
be to avoid sin. 
THE STING RAY. 
While the greater part of a flock goes off in a 
straight lint, individuals turn aside and pursue 
different courses, just like birds disturbed in a 
rice or wheat field. The distance they pass 
over varies with the impulse that rouses them. 
While some descend not far from you, others, 
gull, haeklet and cormorant—diving, gobbling, 
screaming, cackling, laughing, fighting — and 
overhead two or three stately gannets, too proud 
to mingle with the common herd, sailed round a 
hundred feet in air, in search of a vacant spot, 
and then, 
"Fell from the sky, like a cud. while the wind rattled 
hoarse in their pinions,” 
and rushed under the water, throwing up a per¬ 
pendicular jet of spray, exactly as does a cannon 
ball. And, over all, nearest the roof of cloudless 
blue, sailed out from her eyrie, in the white cliff 
the great hen-peregrine, the queen of all the 
shore. Slowly the falcon slides round and 
round, eyeing the mob below, till some fat her- 
riug-gull, full gorged with mackerel, flaps lazily 
away to digest, in a moment the great falcon's 
w ings are dosed over her back. With one long, 
silent rush she has reached him, and those terri¬ 
ble hind talons, which can strike the life out of 
a mallard's brain, and drop him into the mere at 
a single stroke, are fast in the gull’s shoulders, 
hut not to kill. After a moment’s flapping and 
screaming, adversity gives him wit. and neces¬ 
sity invention. Down drops a mackerel, shame¬ 
fully disgorged, and down after it drops the 
falcon, and. catching the fish in mid-air, bears it 
off in triumph to the ledge where her young 
are barking for their dinner. And so goes on 
the great hungry world, as it has gone since the 
first Lingula or Orthis gaped in pre-Silurian 
seas, some hundred and ninety-nine millions of 
years ago, and as much more as Sir Charles 
Lvell has need of—conjugating the primary verb 
“To eat.” I eat thee; he eats me; they eat 
him; other theys eat them; and so forth, ad 
mfinUum .— Prof. Kingsley, in The Header. 
but in Sir Walter’s time it was open to very bad 
puns. The same with Drake. 
Coke, too, would be thought low bail it never 
been illuminated by the Author of the “Insti¬ 
tutes,” and the owner ol' Holkham. In the 
absence of Sir Christopher, would Mr. Tigg like 
to have been called Wren? Hail there been no 
erudite giant of that name, would not Cheeke 
have been voted intolerable? In truth, scarcely 
anything depends on the letter, everything on 
the connection of ideas. Soiomdn was the wisest 
of men, and his name Is one of the noblest in 
literature; yet no prudent father, unless he were 
a Jew. would give it to his child, because in the 
present generation it happens to be ludicrously 
associated with old clothes. In its Saracenic 
form of Solymau it would still be considered 
magnificent. A current jest will destroy the 
picturesque beauty of the most famous uamos; 
a living Pompev would be set down a- a nigger, 
a living Caesar treated as a dog. Cyraon is a 
name which would attract the female eye. and 
perhaps, even reconcile it to the adjunct Smyth. 
Mrs. etymon Smyth would have an air upon a 
card. But the feminine instinct would recoil 
from Simon. And why tho difference? Is it 
not because Cymon is associated with Iphigcnia. 
and Simon with the simpleton who met a pie¬ 
man coming from a fair ? One of the objection¬ 
able names, to remove which from the face of 
the earth all gods and men are called to aid, is 
Vilain. Yet the Hogwards and Sty wards were 
all vilains; and one of the proudest houses of 
Europe, that of Count Yilain the Fourteenth, 
rejoices in the obnoxious name .—Athencmenu 
IT is a vulgar notion that some names are 
necessarily noble and romantic, while others we 
necessarily mean and base. Names are beauti¬ 
ful only in their associations. Worth, valor, 
genius, learning, have converted syllables Into 
poems, and words into histories. Look the 
British Peerage through, and in that bright list 
there is. perhaps, not one which does not seem 
to tho eye and the imagination picturesque. Yet 
in their beginnings most of them had nothing in 
sound or spelling that could be considered glori¬ 
ous. Howard is a Hogward; Seymour is a tailor; 
Leicester is a weaver; Percy is a gross fellow; 
Butler is a cellar-man; Stewart is a domestic 
servant. Vane, Vere, Hyde aud Pole sound the 
reverse of heroic. Hay is not intrinsically 
nobler than Straw. How is it. then, that Hay 
has come to represent the pink of aristocracy. 
Straw the lowest of vulgar cheats ? Simply by 
association. Would the complainants like to 
have boon originally called Blunt, Craven, or 
Gore ? There is nothing In Grey more attracting 
than Brown, as to cither sound or letters; in¬ 
deed, Grey is a shade or so less vigorous than its 
rival Brown. Would any one like to have been 
known as Roper or Touchet, if these familiar 
name- had never been immortalized by worthy- 
deeds ? W e do not know that Gimlet has a more 
familiar look than Bacon, Potty, Peel and Pitt. 
Yet these have become by association some of 
the most reverential and gracious or English 
names. Milton, Suekville and Shelley- are not 
necessarily aristocratic and poetical. Had they 
not been glorified by genius and by rank, they 
would perhaps have been included in Mr. Bug- 
gey’s list. Churchill, Fuller, Kidd, Quarles, 
Donne, Bowles, Savage, Quincy and Dickens, 
now household words, borne by some of the 
choicest of our national jxiets and humorists, 
would certainly have been so. Not much better 
as to round are Cowper, Lamb and Bulwer. 
People used to laugh and joke at i veil. Talbot 
ami Talmash would be considered vulgar. 
Every one considers Raleigh a romantic name. 
“Shall I Learn to Dance?”—A sks a 
young reader. Certainly, by all means. Com¬ 
mence with the " Quickstep ” out of bed in the 
morning, keep it tip till the “chores” are fin¬ 
ished. The boys will of course have a “cow 
drill” at the barn, while the girls are engaged 
iu a “country dance” in the kitchen. After 
this, all hands “change,” and promenade to 
school, keepiug step to merry laughter. Repeat 
the same on the way home at night, with an 
occasional variation in winter by “tripping the 
toe" and having a “break-down” in the snow¬ 
bank. A " reel ” now and then will be quite in 
place for the girls who have learned to spin, but 
the boys should never think of it. If these and 
kindred dances are thoroughly practiced, they 
will leave little time aud no necessity for the 
polkas, schottisehes, and other immodest fooler¬ 
ies of the ball-room. 
It is not good to live in fear, nor Is it our habit. 
A tight with natiu-e is better than a fight with 
our fellow man; and. after all, this world would 
be little worth living in, were there no work to 
do to exercise the faculties and energies that God 
has given to us. The land where fruits grow 
spontaneously, and where peasants live on milk 
aud chestnuts, as do wild animals, is no laud for 
the grand old English race that has done more 
than all other races put together to win the 
world from the wilderness, and make it a habita¬ 
tion for civilized man. 
Houses in China. —Iu China a man is not 
allowed to build a house above his legitimate 
rank iu society. He may acquire a foi-tune by 
his ow n exertions, but, unless he holds some 
office, or is born to some rank, he has no liberty 
of architecture. Every matter relating to build¬ 
ing is the subject ol' regulation by tho police. 
The law-s of the Empire detail and enforce, with 
the greatest precision, the movie of constructing 
a residence for a pi Luce of the first, second, or 
tliinl rank, of a grandee, of a mandarin. Accord¬ 
ing to the ancient law, the number -anl height of 
the apartments, the length of a building, arc all 
regulated with predion, from the plain citizen 
to the mandarin, and from the mandarin up to 
the emperor himself. 
Cliffs overhead, ribbed and scarred, four 
hundred feet in height, over which peeped 
many a gallant deer! Stacks of rock-island at 
their feet, os large as great men-of-war with all 
sails set, ribboned with yellow, black and red, 
pierced with vast arches, through which shone 
the infinite gleam of the Atlantic; round the 
stacks and in and out of the arches mackerel in 
tens of thousands, breaking water an acre at a 
time, with a soft roar, as, out of the water, 
flashed before them millions of shining splinters 
—some water-beads sparkling in the sun, some 
“brett” —the herring-fry which they had 
chased in shore. In among them the boat slides 
with throe lint* out, and each taken ore the bait 
was two oars’ length from the boat; while over¬ 
head and all around was a Babel of wings and 
voices which confused eye and car alike of 
mer and shearwater, blaekback and herring- 
To excel iu anything valuable is great, but to 
be above conceit on account of one’s accomplish¬ 
ments is greater. 
TVk nearly always talk of a tiling before w-e do 
it: every action, like a statue. Is first, modeled in 
the poor wax of words. 
Faith is a star that shines brightest in the 
night-time ot trial, desertion and tribulation. 
