Some writer says— 1 *Our daughters do not 
‘grow up' at all now-a-days; they grow all 
sorts of ways, as crooked as crooked sticks.'’ 
Our gills hardly get sunshine enough to grow 
at all in. Indeed many women amongst us 
Hover could have fully w 
penitent, I sought and found my precious 
Saviok, and arose to a new life. 
Mv paths since then have been any but 
straight, yet when in or near that little room, I 
live orev the unspeakable joy of that moment, 
and meet again the dear sisters who sought to 
aid me iu my efforts to gain light. One of them 
is teaching the dusky-hrowed children of India 
now, one has joined the itinerant array, and 
journeys from place to place, bearing glad 
tidings; yet I meet them in hours of holy 
thought, aud know them still faithful, still 
zealous. 
So it is. that the homes in which we dwell, 
the streets through which we walk, the groves 
in whose cool shade we love to sit, are peopled 
with faces aud forms that long ago we used to 
The books we read have an 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
THINK OF ME. 
MANY MANSIONS 
BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 
In my father’s house above 
Many mansions be; 
Surely, from that varied love, 
There is one lor me. 
But the lowest room I ask, 
With a hope, that so 
Love will, after some sweet task, 
Bid mo higher go. 
All enough to me is given, 
If how low Boe’er 
Provo my place, it be in heaven, 
And my Savior there. 
Savior, in Thy promised grace, 
Thou, though there most high, 
Fail'st not to prepare a place 
E’en for snch as I. 
BY W. A. TALLMADGE, M. D. 
;ot their growth, else 
why are they such tiny morsels, looking as if a 
puff from old Kewaydin would blow them away? 
We need to turn our girls out of d(M>rs—that is 
the long and short of it. They will never be 
good for anything until we do. The boys knock 
around and get oxygen enough to expand their 
lungs, broaden their chests, and paint their 
faces with health's own hue; but our lazy, lady 
daughters! Ah, there is the burden that breaks 
down the mother’s heart. IIow are they, so 
frail, and sensitive, and delicate, ever to get 
along in this rough world ? Mother, you must 
bestir yourself quickly, or they will he as unfit 
as your gloomiest imagination can paint them. 
You are responsible chiefly for making them so 
tender, Proteetthem suitably from the weather, 
and send them out of doors. The pure air will 
brace tip their unstrung nerves, strengthen the 
weak lungs, and some good gust of wind will in 
Bebiok a massive gateway built up in years gone by, 
Upon whose top the clouds in eternal shadow lie, 
While streams the evening, sunshine on quiet wood 
and lea, 
I stand and calmly wail till the lunges turn for me. 
The tree-tops faintly rustle beneath the breeze’s flight, 
A soft and soothing sound, yet it whispers of the night; 
I hear the woodthrush piping one mellow descant more, 
And sceut the flowers that blow when the heat of day 
is o'er. 
Behold the portals open, and o’er the threshold, now, 
There steps a weary one with a pale and furrowed 
brow; 
Ills count of years is full, his allotted task is wrought, 
lie passes to his rest from a place that needs him not. 
In sadness then I ponder bow quickly fleets the hour 
Of human strength and action, man’s courage and his 
power: 
I muse while still the woodthrush sings down the gold¬ 
en day, 
And ns I look and listen the sadness wears away. 
Again the hinges turn, aud a youth, departing, throws 
A look of longing backward, and sorrowfully goes; 
A blooming maid, unbinding the roses from her hair, 
Moves mournfully away from amidst, the young and 
When the fleecy clouds of evening 
Melt in golden hours away, 
When the arch above seems deeper 
In the twilight’s fading ray; 
When ail nature sinks in slumber, 
Save the murmuring leary tree: 
Making low melodious mnaic, 
Then, my loved one, think of me. 
When the sparkling, dancing waters 
Ripple past thee to their home— 
And the ear may catch their voices 
As they ask of thee to come— 
When the stars of night arc beaming 
Bright, and beautiful on thee. 
In that, honr of peaceful quiet, 
Wilt thou, loved one, think of me 
When the time of sweetest silence 
Brings the hour of sacred prayer, 
When you kneel at mom, or evening, 
Ask for one who is not there 
While the years of time are passing 
As a shadow o’er the sea, 
Ever shall my heart be asking, 
Dearest, loved one, thiuk of me 
Finley Hospital, Washington, D. C. 
meet and greet, 
added charm, because some loved one used to 
read them with us. What, then, is this power, 
or state, or faculty ? Is it memory, is it associa¬ 
tion, or is it a spiritual life, which brings mind 
aud soul in union with that which is past? 
Blessed are we if this double life be a source 
of pleasure, and not remorse,—blessed, if this 
mingling be of good with good, and not evil 
with good. Alice Brown Nichols, A. B. 
Wilson, N. Y., 1864. 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
“CAN YOU STAND STILL 1” 
No, you cannot! It is beyond the power of 
any being to remain, in one sense of the word, 
quiet. Nothiug is quiet; but every thing, and 
every being, in the infinite universe, are con¬ 
tinually changing, whether consciously or no,— 
whether by their own will, or not. Every 
thinking, observing person, must see this law 
of change in animate, as well as in inanimate 
matter,—in the physical, as well as the moral 
world; and beyoud our world, is not the same 
grand and universal law a characteristic part of 
all visible creation? Do not the planets, and 
gloriously innumerable worlds of light, move 
majestically back and forth through immeasura¬ 
ble space, by the will of in finite power in oue 
eternal law of motion. Aud again, in our own 
world, does not all we see become transformed, 
though ever so slowly, from one object of great 
beauty to another of lesser beauty, but greater 
usefulness; or, perhaps, from the most appar¬ 
ently insignificant of all things, to beauty of the 
highest possible type of perfection, 
Written for the Rural New-Yorker. 
THE LOVE OF FLOWERS. 
Oh glory of our race that so suddenly decays! 
Oh crimson flush of morning that darkens as we gaze! 
Oh breath of Summer blossoms that on the restless air 
Scatters a moment’s Bweetness and flies we know not 
where! 
I grieve for life’s bright promise, just shown and then 
withdrawn; 
But still the sun shines round me, the evening bird 
sings on, 
And I again am soothed, and beside the ancient gate. 
In this soft evening sunlight, 1 calmly stand and wait. 
Once more the gates are opened; an infant group go 
out, 
The sweet smile quenched forever, and stilled the 
sprightly shout. 
Oh frail, frail tree of Life, that upon the greensward 
stxows 
Its fair young buds unopened, with every wind that 
blows! 
So come from every region, so enter, side by side, 
The strong and faint of spirit, the meek and men of 
pride; 
Steps or earth's great and mighty, between those 
pillars gray, 
And prints of little feet, mark the dust along the way. 
And some approach the threshold whose looks are 
blank with fear, 
And some whose temples brighten with joy in drawing 
near, 
As if they saw dear faces, and caught the gracious eye 
Of Him, the Sinless Teacher, who came for us to die. 
I mark the joy, the terror; yet these, within my heart. 
Can neither wake the dead nor the longing to depart: 
And, in the sunshine streaming on quiet wood and lea, 
1 stand and calmly wait till the hinges turn for me. 
THE DAWN OF LOVE. 
Bk our experience in particulars what it may, 
no man ever forgot the visitations of that power 
to his heart and brain which created all things 
new; which was the dawn in him of music, 
poetry, and art; which made the face of nature 
radiant with purple light, the rooming and the 
night varied enchantments; when a single tone 
of one voice could make the heart beat, and the 
most trival circumstance associated with one 
form is put iu the amber of memory; when we 
become all eye when one was gone; w r hen a 
youth became a watcher of windows and stu¬ 
dious of a glove, a veil, a ribbon, or the wheels of 
a carriage; then noplace is too silent for him, 
he has richer company and sweeter conversation 
in his new thoughts than any old friends, though 
best and purest, can give him; when all business 
seemed an impertinence, and all the men and 
women running to and fro in the streets mere 
pictures. For though the celestial rapture fall¬ 
en out of heaven seizes only upon those of ten¬ 
der age. and although a beauty, overpowering 
all analysis or comparison, and putting ils beside 
ourselves, we can seldom see after thirty years, 
yet the remembrance of these seasons outlasts 
all other remembrances, and is a wreath of 
flowers on the oldest brows. 
A woman writes us that she loves flowers. 
She has loved them since she was a small girl. 
She used to cultivate them. And she wishes 
little girls had the opportunity of cultivating 
them, and were taught to do so. Health, en¬ 
joyment and refinement would result to y oung 
misses, marriageable maidens and mature mat¬ 
rons from the exercise and interest excited in 
their floral pets, 
what she promises In her article—give our read¬ 
ers the practical details concerning hc-r mode of 
management. 
Now we have a few words for the eyes of the 
ladies who read this department of the Rural. 
We take it for granted that you are all sensible 
women—women with refined tastes; and that 
you love flowers. Many of you cultivate them. 
We know it, for we have seen some of your 
gardens and parterres —some of your parlor and 
living-room windows and conservatories. Some 
of you know bow to grow flowers that win 
premiums at Fairs. You have your likes and 
dislikes. This flower is pretty and that one is 
own. No one in this country can rely upon 
always having good, trained domestics in her 
house. The best require some instructions, 
are liable to leave you from sickness or other 
causes, and any household is in a pitiable con- 
We hope the lady will do | dition where the mistress is not equal for such 
Arthur's Home Magazine. 
MEAT FOR CHILDREN. 
Yes, all is 
ehauge, nil is one grand and infinite universe of 
motion. And that person who looks upon this 
law of God as visible in the material world, 
and yet denies that the same glorious law is at 
work iu the moral part of the universe, either 
does not understand one of the most plainly re¬ 
vealed attributes of Ills own being, or else is 
willfully blind to tlie fact that he cannot stand 
still in goodness, or evil. 
We must be growing constantly better, or 
worse; progressing in wisdom and goodness, or 
sorrow and degradation. Think not, deluded 
lover of sin. to say to yourself, thus far will I 
go, and no further,—and then, after enjoying for 
a season the rolling of sin as a sweet morsel 
under my tongue. I will turn, and live. It is 
impossible to pursue just that course ; whether 
consciously, or uo, you will continue to grow 
worse, if you do not grow better. The devil, 
and your own evil and weak nature, will not 
permit you to sit and complacently fold your 
hands upon the idea that when the “conve¬ 
nient season ” comes, you will repent—without 
constantly taking, though ever so gradually, 
and iusidlously, deeper draughts from the fatal 
cup of sin; and thereby rendering harder, every 
day of your life, the task of breaking your 
chuius, and moving in an opposite direction. 
Remember this, oh sinner! when you think that 
you arc not, cannot be standing still. 
Brockport, N. Y., 1801. Ycxo. 
or twelve years of age, a meat diet, commit a 
vital error. The great mortalit y among children 
of tender age, is, in my opinion, mainly attribu¬ 
table to ignorance on this point. A healthy 
infant or child glows with animal heat. His 
little vital machinery, fresh from the ingenious 
hands of nature, is full of life, electricity and 
animation. At birth, his palpitating little heart 
contracts from ISO to 140 times per minute. At 
the age of three his pulse is above ninety, while 
that of an adult averages seventy-five. Is it 
not. then, manifestly w rong to give him a stim¬ 
ulating diet? In rigid winters, the indigent 
mother sometimes freezes to death; not so the 
Ira be iu her arms. Who Cannot call to remem¬ 
brance some instance in illustration of this re¬ 
mark? The fact is, to speak electrically, chil¬ 
dren are in a positive condition. They are full of 
vital electricity; to augment in them that active 
element is simply lo inflame the blood and ren¬ 
der them susceptible to positive diseases. What 
I mean positive diseases are fever?, bowel com¬ 
plaints, croup, water on the brain, Ac. Hence 
their diet should be plain and nutritious: not 
stimulant. Vegetable food is the best adapted 
to the nourishment Of their little bodies, and 
keeps their blood pure and healthful, while flesh 
generates largo quantities of carbonic acid gas, 
which contains 72 parts of oxygen in 100.” 
A RELIGIOUS SMOKE, 
A correspondent of the Weekly Review, 
in a notice of the recent meeting of the Re¬ 
formed Secession Synod of Holland, says:— 
“The picture which we witnessed on our recep¬ 
tion in the Synod, was something which, I am 
sure, could not bo seen out of Holland. As we 
entered the place of worship in which we had 
preached the evening before, fumes of smoke 
darkened the air. A long table stretched along 
the place where the women had sat, which was 
lined on either side by ministers and elders, 
while at the head of this there was a transverse 
table, at which sat the moderator, the profes- 
Every man 
Written for Moore's tin ml X'lW-Yorker. 
OUR TWO LIVES. 
Every person is daily living two lives, but 
so mingled and intertwined are they, that we 
are scarcely aware of the double existence. 
One of these is the present —the now — the 
thoughts, words and deeds of to-day. The 
other is the past—the then —the hopes, fears, 
dreams and realities of yesterday. 
To illustrate. At this moment I am sitting 
in the old school room, through whose long 
THE BETROTHED IN i GERMANY. 
An engagement is naturally a great phase in 
every woman’s life, but it seems to be the epoch 
of German existence. There is no mystery, no 
concealment about it. As soon as the betrothal 
take? place it is announced to the world—to the 
private acquaintances by cards, sometimes by 
an advertisement in the papers; to society in 
general by the happy pair appearing in public 
arm-in-arm. The young lady is bound to look 
as if site were in t he seventh heaven, and gene¬ 
rally clasps both hands tightly round her lover’s 
arm, as if to prevent all possibility of escape. 
She must also loudly proclaim his perfections 
and her happiness, have no hesitation iu speak¬ 
ing about him, nor in kissing before folks; re¬ 
serve in these cases is not understood. The 
gentleman seems to take it as easily as he can, 
but, as usual, is far more awkward in Lis new 
situation than his fair one. After all, it is com¬ 
fortable for a poor man, -who has always been 
accustomed to walk alone and swing bis arms, 
to find them hampered by a girl clutching at 
them, and to have her crinoline always beating 
about liis legs. Then, if she be short, he must 
not walk upright; he must go crooked, as if 
drawn down by the interesting weight hanging 
on him; if-site be tall, her bonnet trimmings 
tickle him so, and he can never keep step with 
bis fair companion. It requires a great deal of 
affection to smile under those circumstances. 
Until a girl is engaged site never takes any 
man’s arm. I wonder the young ladies do not 
learn how to do it in their dancing lessons; it 
would Ira a great blessing to their lovers. Their 
mothers cannot teach them; for as soon as the 
honeymoon is over man and wife go their sepa¬ 
rate ways. The wonder is how these attach¬ 
ments are formed, the sexes have so little inter¬ 
course except in the ball-room. Fathers and 
brothers spend their evenings iu their respective 
beer houses with their 
-or?, and other official gentlemen 
was smoking, or preparing to smoke. The 
moderator held a pipe hi one hand and a wooden 
hammer, with which to call attention, in the 
other. The clerk wrote, and puffed too. "While 
on the table, from one extremity to the other, 
boxes of lucifer matches, plates of tobacco, ink- 
bottles, papers, pens, books, Ac., were mingled 
in most admired confusion, a corps de reserve of 
long pipes being fixed in an ingeniously-con¬ 
structed wooden frame, lest the business of the 
?\ nod should come to a pause through want of 
the usual solatium. The audience stood on 
cither side smoking, with a look of placid and 
dreamy attention.” The correspondent adds 
that the proceedings were nevertheless carried 
on in a most business-like manner. 
Written for tlie Rural New-Yorker. 
SABBATH EVENING REFLECTIONS, 
“ How calmly sinks the parting sun, 
Yet twilight lingers still, 
And beautiful as dreams of Heaven, 
’Tis slumbering on the hill.’’ 
Nothing reminds one more forcibly of the 
rest that remaineth to the people of God, than 
the twilight of the Sabbath; the sweet, peaceful 
hour when we can commune with our own 
hearts and the great Father of spirits, and 
pleasures and perplexities of the week dare not 
intrude upon its sacredness. 
To-night tlie sombre shadow of Night’s half- 
drawn curtain is stealing silently over the earth 
as I sit here alone iu the gloaming; while my 
thoughts have wandered back to the has-been, 
and all along the corridors of the past are strewn 
the meraoreis of Sabbaths that arc gone forever. 
There arc some that, crowned with golden rec¬ 
ollections, gleam through the gathering mist 
“like stars in the dark vaulted heaven at 
night;” while upon others — shadowing by its 
sadness the light of all the rest -is fixed a label 
bearing the one dark word Misspent. 
Dear reader. In looking backward perhaps 
Memory may point you to a similar picture, and 
a “stil! small voice” will whisper “how has 
this Sabbath been spent? "When the last gold¬ 
en moment of this Sabbath shall have gone to set 
the seal of the past on .'mother page of thy lifo- 
book, what will be the record that shall there 
await the great da.v when the hooks shall be 
opened, and the world shall be judged there¬ 
from ?” 
I would entreat you. as a friend, to answer it 
well to your own heart, for the self-same ques¬ 
tion will be asked when you shall appear before 
the “ great white throne ” to be “judged accord¬ 
ing to tlie deeds done in the body.” 
January, 1864. Dbssik. 
HOME CONVERSATION. 
To subordinate home training to school train¬ 
ing, or intermit the former in favor of the lat¬ 
ter, is a most palpable and ruinous mistake. It 
is bad even in an intellectual point of view. To 
say nothing of other disadvantages, it deprives 
girls of tlie best opportunities they can ever 
have of learning that most feminine, most beau¬ 
tiful of all accomplishment?-the noble art of 
conversation. For conversation is an art as 
well as a gift, it is learned best by familiar 
intercourse between young and old, in the leisure 
and unreserve of the evening social circle. But 
when young girls are banished from this circle 
by the pressure of school tasks, talking with 
their school-mates till they “come out” into 
society, and then monopolized entirely by young 
persons of their own age, they easily learn to 
mistake chatter for conversation, and “small 
talk’" becomes. For life, their only medium of 
exchange. Hence, with all the intellectual 
training of the day, there never was a greater 
dearth of intellectual conversation. 
AFRICAN PROVERBS. 
He who disappoints another is not worthy to 
be trusted. 
A pig which has wallowed in the mire seeks 
a clean person to rub against. 
tVlien you are warned, warn yourself. 
Peace is tlie father of friendship. 
He who strives to Hhake the trunk of a tree 
only shakes hitusclf. 
It is easy to cut a dead elephant to pieces, but 
none dares attack a live one. 
A matter dealt with gently, prospers; but a 
matter dealt with violently, brings vexation to 
the author. 
The time may be very long, but a lie will be 
discovered at last. 
The dust of tlie bufl'ulo is lost in the dust ol" an 
elephant. 
Jle who claps hands for a fool to dance is no 
better than the tool himself. 
All men arc related to one another. 
He who cannot take up an ant, yet tries to 
take up an elephant, will find out his folly. 
He who sees another’s fault talks about it, but 
covers bis own with a potsherd. 
An ungrateful guest is like the lower jaw, 
which, when the body dies in the morning, falls 
away from tlie upper by night-time. 
Cars for Babies.— Some miserable bache¬ 
lor, or other, whose car has never been attuned 
to appreciate household music, petition- railway 
corporations for a separate car for babies, iu this 
wise:—“ If it is too much to ask for a separate 
car at first, let the experiment be tried on a 
small scale. Make one end of a passenger car a 
nursery. Let it be separated by a cry-tiglit 
compartment. Let it be supplied with an open 
stove, with porringers and skillets. Let there 
be a locker for pap-making ingredients, and let 
it contain all tlie other infantile paraphernalia 
which the fruitful wives that hang their clusters 
about the director’s houses will suggest to them 
with more force and propriety than my limit? 
or knowledge will permit.” 
some 
own sets, the mothers 
and sisters flock in troops to their coffee houses. 
They have their separate amusements and pleas¬ 
ures, until suddenly a couple fall in love some¬ 
how, and then they are never seen apart ; they 
become inseparable, like poker and tongs, knife 
and fork, or any other implement which is use¬ 
less without its fellow. As long as the gentle¬ 
man remains in the town his charmer dresses 
much better than usual; but if he must leave, 
she renounces all society, or if she cannot help 
“breaking resolution,” it is essential that she 
should make a “guy” of herself. A peculiar 
toilet—covered neck and long sleeves—in a ball¬ 
room, is as much a sign of betrothal as our wid¬ 
ow’s cap is of bereavement. 
Beginning of the Task.—"W e do not die 
wholly at our death; we have mouldered away 
before. Faoulty after faculty, interest after 
interest, attachment, after attachment, disap¬ 
pears; we are torn from ourselves while living; 
year alter year sees us no longer the same, and 
deatli only consigns the last fragments of what 
we wei’e to the grave. 
The last, best fruit which comes to late per¬ 
fection even in tlie kindliest soil, is tenderness 
toward the hard, forbearance toward the unfor¬ 
bearing, warmth of heart toward the cold, and 
philantlirophy toward tlie misanthropic,—Jean 
Paul. 
SdCRATES is barefooted. He has oue want so 
pressing that lie can have no other want, and 
has set his lips to a cup which hides his bare 
feet from his eyes—with a single garment for 
winter and summer lie draws the universe 
around him, a garment for the mind. 
The human heart opens only to the heart 
that opens in return.— Miss Edgeworth. 
