SEPT.4© 
a 
as we did; he and his predecessors were our 
“kinsman;” a sufflcientlj 7 vague description. 
Brandon’s mother had died whilst lie was 
an infant; and be had been neglected by his 
father. Knowing something of the gentle¬ 
man’s character, aunt’s remark, that the pro¬ 
perty might have been lost, did not seem to 
me without grounds. Mr. Lovel was suppos¬ 
ed to have sown whole acres of wild oats; his 
name and the names of his bosom friends were 
synonymous with wildness and folly, and he 
had gloried in this. 
Brandon’s life, thus far, could not have been 
happy: and it was not strange that he was 
grave and quiet; the wonder to me was that 
he had not followed the example of those who 
surrounded his father, but he seemed to have 
shrunk away from the atmosphere of dissipa¬ 
tion to the quiet, san ctuary of his study and 
the loved companionship of his books. 
As my playmate, the m an's nature had been 
visible in the child’s—for then, as now, ho was 
a student. His greatest delight had been to 
lie before the old-fashioned fireplaces, finding 
out the meaning of the pictures on the tiles, 
and relating stories to me, whilst aunt Dorothy 
•miled on us. 
Kingston and the Brandon estate was not 
very' far from our own, which, in extent and 
wealth, sank into insignificance beside the 
other. Perhaps we had a little more pedigree 
and bygone glory than had the Brandon- 
Lovels. 
I was near Stanton now—there was the 
spire of its church. 1 could picture the quaint 
building, the stained windows, the low porch, 
the green hedge and creaking gate. I looked 
out at the little station with its white railings, 
and beheld a rosy-facod groom clad in the 
livery of the Lovels. Ere many moments I 
was standing on the platform, rather faint 
after my long journey, my heart beating fast; 
but as there was no reason why I should burst 
into tears on being pluuged at by the groom, 
I drove them back, soon recovering my habitual 
calmness, and descended the steps, followed 
by my luggage. 
The air, as we drove along was cool and 
sweet. I gazed at white cottages, farms, fields 
and pastures ; then came green trees, with a 
gleam of water beyond their shadowy clusters, 
until I saw my home. There was the dear old 
house, gray and worn ; the velvet Lawn, with 
peacocks strutting on it as of old ; the garden 
filled with red roses, clove-pinks, and lavender 
—sweet old-fashioned blossoms, in which aunt 
delighted. 
The door was open, one or two of the ser¬ 
vants waiting; but I replied hurriedly to their 
welcomes, having caught sight of her dear 
face, and I hastened to greet her. 
She would scarcely let me say a word until 
I had gone to my room and refreshed myself 
after the journey; and I ran up stairs, feeling 
that this indeed was home. I had guessed 
that aunt Dorothy would givo me my own old 
room, and I could have remained examining 
the treasures in it, musing on the past for 
hours; but aunt was waiting, and I left the 
room. As I crossed the hall and saw the ar¬ 
morial bearings on the high stained window, 
a vision of my mother standing there, with 
the colors tinting her dress—of my father 
beside her—rose before my eyes and seemed to 
me like a welcome home. 
Aunt Dorothy’s parlor was a queer little 
room, with queer little ornaments—Queen 
Anno teapots, eggshell cups and porcelain 
dogs; a Dresden vase of rose leaves; a basket 
of lilies; and drawn near the window was a 
round table with a spotless cloth; purple-blhe 
and gold china; whilst, as the principal figure 
in the picture was a tall old lady, whose white 
hair was veiled by a high cap, whose eyes 
were soft and gentle, and whose delicate hands 
were half hidden by matchless lace. Such was 
aunt Dorothy. 
“ I am surprised, Kate,” she said, her hands 
hovering over the teacups; “I expected that 
you would still be a school-girl, but like 
Brandon, you are old—in manner, I moan, 
You are very like your father; the same dark 
hair and eyes, the same frank expression; but 
all we Lovels are ‘frank and fearless.’ We 
shall be very happy, I think. Your mother, 
Edward and myself never had an angry word, 
though people say pride and hot temper are 
our family failings.” 
I glanced for a moment at the face of him 
whom I had known all too slightly, who had 
not lived to bid his child welcome; opposite 
was my mother’s pare face; her image, too, 
was faint and indistinct. 
“ They were very fond of each other,” said 
aunt, “ Her room up stairs is just as she left 
it, Kate, for Edward would not have it dis¬ 
turbed; he did not long survive her; duty 
called him away and when he returned, it was 
only to die. We shall never see another like 
him, for the world and its ways are changed 
n >w, and what its future will be I know not, 
That other picture represents myself and Bar¬ 
bara. You don’t remember her?” 
Only once or twice had 1 seen her. 
“ She had some slight difference with Ed¬ 
ward, and did not care for Stanton. Mr, 
Hays is living, as you know, but we see noth¬ 
ing of him.” 
Her hands trembled a little, and I thought 
of her love-stmy: she did not allude to it, for 
she was one who never spoke unkindly of the 
living, and would have thought it a sin to 
speak of the dead save reverently and tend¬ 
erly. 
1 ‘ Edith is very like her father in some tilings; 
but she resembles Barbara very much indeed. 
You will see her to-morrow.” 
“ To-morrow ? I echoed. 
“Yes. She comes here when she pleases. 
It will be more pleasant, for her now that you 
are here, for it was dull, I’m afraid, for her. 
She is so like her mother I” 
From this I began to form my own opinion 
of Miss Edith Level's character. 
“ I hope you won’t be dull, Kate. There is 
but little society; Braudon comes, and some¬ 
times Nevil Varner.” 
“ Nevil Verner, aunt?” 
“ Ah! the Verners are strange to you, dear. 
They came to live at Newville, and, discover¬ 
ing that Mrs, Verner was an old friend of 
mine, I called to see her. 1 found her a con- 
finned invalid; she is a widow, Nevil her 
only son. As I am too old to go so far often, 
and she cannot, come, we correspond very 
pleasantly through Nevil. He brings mes¬ 
sages from her, and carries back mine. Edith 
and he did not agree, which was a pity, as he 
is so kind. I have much to he thankful for, 
though you would smile, perhaps, if you saw 
me, with Nevil reading for me or giving me 
the latest news.” 
I was not a little touched by her simple 
pride in this; and a feeling of gratitude to¬ 
wards the unknown Nevil Verner awoke in 
my heart. 
“ He took your portrait to show Mrs. Ver¬ 
ner, Kate. You see I have my friends; best 
of dll, I have Brandon.” 
Involuntarily I glanced at the blue and 
white tiles, and aunt Dorothy smiled. 
“He is my right hand, Kate. He often talks 
about yon, and calls this his other home. He 
gives me his arm round the garden, reads to 
me for hours, and always sends me something 
on my birthday. It is something for one so 
old to say that her birthday has never been 
forgotten. Though the world has sadly de¬ 
generated, the good and true still remain. 
King’s Rest is lonely for him, I fear; but he 
and Nevil are good friends.” - 
“And Edith?” 
“Edith and Brandon are excellent friends, 
though she teases him sometimes. He will 
never marry." 
Aunt said this so solemnly, that I looked up, 
expecting a story. 
“You know the prophecy—that one of our 
houses, in every generation, will remain un¬ 
married, and it has always come true. My 
uncle Sydney was never married, though his 
wedding-day was chosen. I am not married; 
and in the present generation the lot will fall 
on Brandon.” 
“It may fall on me, aunt.” 
“You are the last of the Lovels, for Bran¬ 
don’s family is but a branch; Edith is scarcely 
a Lovel; the race wall not die out, so the lot 
must fall on Brandon. ” 
“I would like to see Brandon, only I dread 
meeting him as a stranger.” 
“You will meet as though you had not par¬ 
ted. 1 ’ 
In this strain she continued for some time; 
then rising, led the way to a second parlor; a 
new piano, somewhat on of keeping with the 
old furniture, she told me belonged to Edith. 
Long after aunt Dorothy was, I hope, asleep, 
I wandered through the rooms in the light of 
a Summer moon: a strange occupation, but it 
suited my mood. No sound disturbed the 
silence of night; I gazed out at a sky whose 
color melted into the tenderest emerald tints 
where it seemed to touch the earth, and strain¬ 
ing my eyes, I fancied I even say r the trees 
surrounding Kingston; there was peace and 
repose here, and I laid my head on my pillow, 
feeling calm and tranquil as the night itself, 
with no foreshadowing of sleepless hou*e, of 
bitter tears, of sorrowful vigils, though they 
were indeed to be mine. 
(To be continued.) 
BRIC-A-BRAC. 
At Cambridge, General Washington had 
heard that the colored soldiers w ere not to be 
depended upon for sentries. So one night 
when the pass-word was “Cambridge,” he 
went outside the camp, put on an overcoat, 
and approached the colored sentinel. “Who 
goes there ?” cried the sentinel. “A friend,” 
replied Washington. “Friend, advance un¬ 
armed and give the countersign,” said the col¬ 
ored man. “ Roxbury.” “ No, sar !” was the 
response. “Medford,”said Washington. “No, 
sar !” returned the colored soldier. “ Charles¬ 
town,” said Washington. The colored man 
immediately exclaimed, “ I tell you what, sar, 
no man go by here ’out he say ‘ Cambridge.”’ 
Washington said “Cambridge” and went by, 
and the next day the colored gentleman was 
relieved of all further necessity for attending 
to that branch of military duty. 
Improving on Shakespeare, —One day as 
I was coming from the Lyceum, where I had 
been witnessing Booth’s “ Hamlet,” I got into 
a car with a rustic young lady and her swain, 
who had been present at the same perform¬ 
ance. “Oh, William,”said she, “it was per¬ 
fectly lovely, but so sad. I think it was an 
awful shame to drown ‘Ophelia’ and kill 
‘ Hamlet.’ They ought to have been married.” 
The swain heaved a sigh, drew close to his 
love, and said: “ I ain’t great on tragedy, but 
I guess that’s how I’d a-fixed it.” 
How an Arab Poetess was Inspired.— 
Many very good jokes are found in Arabic 
poetry, but these also for the most part de¬ 
pend upon some ingenious turn of a word, and 
are therefore untranslatable. The Arabs were 
very fond of the exercise of capping each oth¬ 
er’s rhymes. Akil ibn Ullafeh, a poet of the 
Koreish, one of whose daughters married the 
Caliph Yesid II., thus amused himself while 
on a journey with his son and daughter. When 
it came to the young lady’s turn to improvise 
a verse she sang as follows:— 
** All giddy then with sleep were they, 
As though with Sarkbads liquor strong, 
That through the veins doth llud Its way. 
And course through back and feet along." 
“By Allah!" exclaimed the father, “thou 
couldst not have described it so unless thou 
hadst drunk thereof,” and proceeded to admin¬ 
ister corporal punishment. The son remon¬ 
strated by shooting at his father with an ar¬ 
row, “ Never mind," said the old man, quoting 
a proverb, “ his temper is like Akhzam’s;” that 
is to say, “he is a regular chip of the old 
block.”—Temple Bar. 
If it be true that one man in twenty-five is 
color-blind, the cause of a great main' heart¬ 
burnings and alleged practical jokes has been 
discovered. There is the color-blind lover who 
said to his lady-love, who was a branette, and 
wore maroon, “You dear little strawberry 
blonde, what a nice green dress you wear; it 
just becomes your blue hair and yellow eyes.” 
He was merely color-blind. 
A chemist, expatiating on the late discov¬ 
eries in chemical science, observed that snow 
had been found to possess a considerable de¬ 
gree of heat, whereupon an old lady observed, 
“ that truly chemistry was a valuable science,” 
and, anxious that the discovery might be made 
profitable, inquired of the professor what num¬ 
ber of snow-balls would bo sufficient to boil a 
tea-kettle. 
“What kind of a house do you want?” 
asked the architect. “ Oh,” replied the citi¬ 
zen, wearily, “ I don’t want a house at all. I 
just want you to build me three tiers of clos¬ 
ets, like jail cells; one hundred and thirty 
closets in a tier, and put a roof over the top 
tier. I want to put up a house that will con¬ 
tain enough closets to satisfy my wife. But 
the architect, who was a man of broad ex¬ 
perience, told him ho would have to put a 
thousand closets in a tier and make the edifice 
six stories high, and then his wife would say 
when completed that there wasn’t a closet in 
the house big enough for a cat to turn round 
in.—Burlington Hawkeye. 
Philological Contrarieties. —A gentle¬ 
man having an appointment with another, who 
very seldom kept his time, to his great sur¬ 
prise, found him waiting, and thus addressed 
him—“ Why, I see you are here first at last; 
you were always behind, before, but I am 
happy to find that you have come early of 
late." _ 
“We had Some Words and Parted.”— 
A reverend gentleman horrified a small com¬ 
pany a few evenings ago by telling that he 
and his wife had separated. “ Not parted?” 
inquiringly exclaimed three or four in a breath. 
“Yes,” said the gentleman, with a sigh; we 
had some words, and parted.” A shudder 
went round the room, when some one inquired: 
“For good?”—“ Ob, no !” said the divine. 
“ She has only gone to the country, and will 
be back in a day or two.”—“ But,” said one 
of the bolder ones, after a while, “Did you 
really have any words with her ?”—“ Oh, yes! 
she said, ‘ Good-bye, dear;’ and so did I.” 
The Dark Side of Matrimony.—A slave 
in the West Indies, who had been married to 
another slave by one of the missionaries, at 
the end of three weeks brought his wife back 
to the clergyman, and desired him to take her 
again. The clergyman asked wh it was the 
matter with her?—“ Why, massa, she no good. 
The book says she obey me. She no wash my 
clothes. She no do wbat 1 want her to do.” 
The minister: “ But the book says you were 
to take her for better or for worse,”—“ Yes, 
massa, but she all worse and no better. She 
hab too much worse, and no good at all.” 
In a murder trial in Nevada a citizen was 
being questioned m to his qualifications to 
sit in the jury-box. One query was;—“ What 
would you do if you were on the jury, and 
the case was,” etc. “ Sure I’d do whatever 
was plazin’ to the rest of the company,” said 
he. He was excused. The local comment is 
that this teaches us that politeness is not al¬ 
ways to be encouraged. 
Village Postmaster to His Wtfe :—“Here 
is a postal card to Mr. Jones, saying that his 
brother and live children will bo here on Sat¬ 
urday. Now keep that card back till then 
and I will be at the depot, and when they find 
no one to meet them I will take them all over 
for ?3. 
The best periodical for ladies to take 
monthly, and from which they will receive 
the greatest benefit is Hop Bitters.— Adv. 
for Women. 
CONDUCTED BY MISS RAY CLARK. 
FANCY WORK. 
CARRIE V. SWEET. 
Much has been written in regard to fancy 
work ; and many articles have been wrought 
from printed instructions that have bright¬ 
ened many an otherwise plainly furnished 
room. Still much more may be written, even a 
repetition might be made with no detriment 
resulting therefrom. 
And now as the time for our annual fairs is 
at hand an agitation of the subject may result 
in some good. Some one may be incited to 
contribute a specimen of lmnd-i-work to the 
women’s special department. This depart¬ 
ment, possibly not strictly one of the essential 
ones, is in itself as great an educator to cer¬ 
tain classes as the “ cattle show" and “ horse 
racing” are to other certain classes. Unbiased 
people have admitted that a fine display of 
women’s work adds much to a good fair and is 
in no way detrimental to it. 
The taste of most individuals is modified by 
their surroundings, and whatever is new and 
pleasing to them lias a tendency to soften and 
refine the coarse side of their natures. These 
are facts well worth remembering ; facts that 
can be quite fully developed by the general 
tone of exhibitions at the county fairs. The 
most of us have probably made some articles 
for home purposes that “tell their own story" 
of neatness, industry and ability. If so send 
them to the fail', allow them to tell the story 
to five hundred homes some of which will 
profit thereby. The larger the collection and 
the gi-eater variety exhibited the better the 
people will be pleased and the greater the in¬ 
ducement to attend “ our fair.” 
If the ladies of the Rural New-Yorker 
will set themselves about contributing descrip¬ 
tions of how to make various articles of fancy 
work they will supply a much needed want in 
our rural homes. A want that is felt most by 
those that have the least chance to see such ex¬ 
hibits because of the distance from the city 
and inconvenience of going to town. 
A friend once said some mats would save 
her best table cloth. Handing her instructions 
she soon made a complete set of tublo mats. 
Another wished some edgings, giving her in¬ 
structions her busy hands soon made several 
yards of knit edging. This tends to prove 
that many an article would be made and ex¬ 
hibited if a little of the right instruction was 
timely given. Therefore my plea to “ Rural’* 
women is to exhibit all such articles at the 
county fairs. 
[Accompanying this article was a drawing 
for illustration of a figure for outline em¬ 
broider}', a pattern for applique, one for 
table mat, another for knit edging. The 
descriptions for the latter two are given be¬ 
low. The illustrations we are unable to in¬ 
sert—limited time and press of work will not 
a Uow of thei r reproduction. Any one familiar 
with crochet and knitting work will be able to 
use the descriptions without illustration in 
making mats and lace.] 
KNIT EDGINGS. 
Cast on 5 stitches, knit across plain. 1st 
row knit 1, throw thread over, knit 3 together 
throw thread over twice, knit 3. 2d row knit 
2, knit 1 loop, purl 1 loop, knit 3. 3d row knit 
1, throw thread over, knit 2 together, knit 4. 
4th row bind off 2, knit 4. 
TABLE MATS. 
Use German cotton No. 4. Begin at the 
center and crochet a chain of several stitches. 
Turn and crochet back, once into every stitch 
around to starting place, then turn the work 
and crochet around again thus forming a rib. 
At each of the lines widen one, stitch every 
time round, that is, crochet two stitches 
in one so as to keep the mat flat 
and good shape as it grows in size. 
Crochet as many ribs in each mat as 
there are center stitches. Hence if you make 
six stitches in the center chain, crochet six 
ribs for the mat. In crocheting around each 
time to starting point observe a little loop in- 
