else has things right, and we always have things wrong!"

"Why, Joe, I am sure the corn-bread has never been in this state before! You see, the fire had a fit,' and couldn't be made to burn this morning."

"Oh, yes! you are always ready with an excuse. Now, there is Mrs. Smith; her stove never has fits. And she always has the lightest, sweetest bread and the nicest cakes and preserves I ever ate. I wish you'd take pattern by her."

"Well, I am sure, Joe, I do my best, and I think I succeed oftener that I fail. I wish I could suit you always; but that, I suppose, can scarcely be expected;" and Mary gave a weary sigh.

Mary Starr had been married about a year, during which time she had found house-keeping rather up-hill work. She was a neat little body, and conscientiously did her very best to please her husband; but he, whatever might be the reason, was very hard to please-in fact, seemed determined not to be pleased with anything she did. Perhaps, like the old soldier in one of Dickens' stories, he had a vital and constant sense that "discipline must be maintained." At any rate, he never allowed Mary to be pleased with herself on any occasion if he could help it.

Mary was an amiable wife, fortunately, and not easily irritated, though, to tell the truth, there were times when her forbearance was severely tried. For instance, whenever she and Joe took tea out, or went to a party, or even to church, he seldom allowed the opportunity to pass unembraced to animadvert on some deficiency in cookery, or manners, or dress, on the part of his wife,—and that pro bono publico. For instance it would be:

"Mrs. Jones, what beautiful sponge-cake you make! Mary, take notice how light this cake is. I wonder why you can never have it so puffy!" Or, "Mrs. Brown, you certainly are an adept at entertaining company. I wish, Mary, that you would try steal Mrs. Brown's art." Or, "Mrs. Green, your dress is always most becoming. Your taste is exquisite. I don't see why it is, Mary, that with all I spend for you, you never can reach the‘je ne sais quoi’ of Mrs. Green."

On these occasions Mary would blush and

bite her lip, and be inwardly annoyed, but she was a woman of too much pride and good sense to make a display of her chagrin; and was really too good-natured and Christian a person to let it change her feelings toward Joe, whom she knew to be, after all, very fond of her, and a very just man at heart. After a while, too, seeing that the fault was probably curable, she bethought herself how she should proceed in order to break him of his disagreeable habit.

Fortune favored her. One day a lady, one of her most valued friends and best neighbors, called to invite Joe and Mary to a tea-party at her house.

"It will be a small affair," she said, “but very pleasant, I think. You only are wanting to make the circle of harmony complete."

"Well," said Mary, "I will come, Mrs. Vane, on one condition."

"Condition! Is it come to this, that you must make conditions? Well, my dear, make your demand."

"The condition is," said Mary, "that you will allow me to furnish all the refreshments." "Well, that is an odd idea! Mary, my dear, I hope you don't mean to insinuate that I am getting poor?"

"No, Hattie; thank fortune, she has showered her favors on you quite liberally. But I have a notion for this, which, if you please, I will not divulge; only let me have my way this once, just for the oddity of the thing."

"If anybody but you, Mary, had made such a request of me, I certainly should have taken offense. But I never could be angry with you. So if it will be any satisfaction to you-though for the life of me I can't imagine what your drift is I will comply with your conditions. When may I expect my supplies?"

"Let me see; to-morrow is my baking-day, and your party is not before Thursday. Well, on Wednesday afternoon you shall be supplied with bread, biscuit, cake, and all the other accessories; and mind, the only thing I allow you to furnish is butter, which I do not make." "Very well, it's all settled, then, and I will leave you. On the whole, this arrangement suits me; it relieves me of a great responsibility, for your cookery is well known to be particularly nice. So good-bye till Thursday."

"Mind you say nothing about this, Hattie, to any one; it is a secret of mine."

"Very well, as you say, I'll keep mum. Good-bye again, for you will have your hands full, and I must not interrupt you."

So off Mrs. Vane went, inwardly wondering what crochet demure little Mary had got into her steady little head.

Everything came off on that baking-day precisely as Mary could have wished it. Her bread was light and sweet, and white as a snow-flake, with just a golden-brown line of crust surrounding it; her cakes were perfection; her biscuits crisp and delicious. Then she knew that her preserved fruits were nice; and if ever there was sponge-cake more like solidified froth, she would like to see it. Everything was sent into Mrs. Vane on Wednesday afternoon, and she had all Thursday to devote to her dress.

Mary looked very pretty that night at the tea-party, for her eyes shone with a purpose, and she had just excitement enough about it to redden her cheeks in a very becoming manner. Add to this that she was dressed with neatness and taste, and you will not be unwilling to believe me when I say that she was quite the belle of the occasion. Joe evidently thought so himself; for, strange to say, he made no remarks upon her appearance that night calculated to lower her self-esteem; but contrariwise, gazed at her from time to time with the most profound satisfaction.

But "murder will out." It came out on this occasion, when they sat down to supper. Everybody was delighted; there had not been such an unexceptionable "tea" in that neighborhood for a long time. Country people are very fond of their "teas;" they compare one with another with admirable connoisseurship. This one was a triumph.

"Mrs. Vane, you are the perfection of breadmakers. Your biscuits are quite beautiful. Were ever such made before! How do you manage it, Mrs. Vane? What lovely spongecake!"

Mrs. Vane and Mary occasionally changed glances and smiled, but nobody noticed it.

Joe had been behaving so beautifully all the evening that Mary began to be afraid her plans had failed. He came out now, however, greatly to Mary's satisfaction.

This is a feast, indeed," he said. "A fellow is fortunate who has a wife that can make such bread as this, to say nothing of the spongecake; I can't see why it is, Mary; you improve, it is true, I will give you credit for that; but I don't see why it is that all women can not have the knack that Mrs. Vane has, at cooking to perfection. If you could make such bread as this, Mary, your husband would be a happy man."

Mrs. Vane looked at Mary, and Mary looked at Mrs. Vane. Light had broken upon the mind of the latter. It broke like a flash of lightning, and then there was an explosionnot of thunder, but of laughter.

Joe looked up, amazed. He was a man who petted his dignity enormously. What did these women mean to laugh so at a sober, sensible remark of his? Particularly, what could Mary mean, to so trifle with the respect she owed her husband?

He began to grow very red indeed. Mrs. Vane saw it, presently, and came to his and Mary's relief; for poor Mary had begun to be a little frightened at the success of her own scheme. She did not like Joe to be angry, at any rate.

Mr. Starr," said Mrs. Vane, "I am truly glad that you like this very excellent cookery, for it is all your wife's. By your own showing you ought to be a very happy man."

Here the whole company caught the infection, and joined in the laugh against Joe. It was of no use to get angry with so many people; so, before long, Joe joined the chorus himself.

And so the tea-party broke up with the greatest good-nature all round, and Joe went home with a lesson he never forgot; for it was the last time that Mary ever heard any complaints from him. He is now the most easily pleased of any husband in ten miles round.

LESSONS.

"OH dear! mamma, this lesson's hard," Cries Charlie. sorely vexed;

"I can not work this horrid sum,—
The rules are so perplexed.

"The teacher is a partial thing,-
Gives lessons by the score;
And if I miss a single one,

She makes me learn it o'er.

"There's Tommy Page, and Jimmy Brown, Who never learn a rule,

And I've the hardest, longest task
Of any boy in school."

"Hush! hush! my boy," the mother said, This whining will not do;

A lesson fit for Tommy Page
Would be no task for you.

"Time flies on golden wings, my child,— Improve it while you may,

And fit yourself to take the prize

Examination day."

And those of older, larger growth,
With Charlie's blindness cry:
"Life's lessons are too long and hard
For one so weak as I.

"My neighbor has an easier lot,

To him no cross is given;

Why must I bear such bitter grief
To gain a place in heaven?

"Why must my way be strewn with thorns

On which no roses bloom? Why unrequited toil and care,

And constant grief and gloom?

"And why should love and friendship fail,— My dearest treasures die?

The hopes that cheered youth's rosy morn In broken fragments lie?

"Why if a kind, impartial hand

Sends blessings for us all,

Of all His rich and bounteous gifts
My portion be so small?"

But faith, with tearful eye, replies:
"Cast from your heart all fear;

He knows your strength, and wisely sends
The lessons needed here."

Life's but a schoolroom, and to-day
Are tangled lessons given;

To-morrow solves the problem, with
A crown of life in heaven.

LINNIE LEE.

promised to give you some account of Prof. Arlt, and other oculists whom I should chance to meet. The picture of Arlt must be drawn from memory, for the boisterous Channel, and more boisterous France, stretch between us now.

Perhaps his stern features will lose some of their hardness in such a sketch. But time and distance are unnecessary to throw a mild light over his kind heart. Prof. Arlt was a poor shepherd-boy who did not begin his school-training till other boys of his age were several steps up the ladder of science. But the time was not wasted before he began his Latin and Greek. Nature was busy in giving him a strong frame and robust constitution; in teaching his eyes to serve the brain, so that in time he should be able at a glance to read a history through his well-trained perceptives. When at last the golden key was provided and the doors swung open before him, he passed into the halls of learning, and used his strength of body and mind with a will. In the course of time he was made professor at Prague; then at Vienna, where he still teaches and works, a terror to the inattentive and lazy, a warm friend to the diligent and attentive. The Government has lately shown its appreciation of his devotion and abilities by knighting him, an honor which he scarcely coveted, since it must bring him into the imperial presence, for no

man hates form and servility so much as he. Arlt holds his clinic, and lectures two hours a day for eight months of the year. Few teachers are so conscientious in teaching. With exemplary patience he repeats a thing till it is understood, and nothing gives him more pleasure than to answer intelligent questions.

Externally, he is a plain, stiff man. His words are few and to the point. In manner, he is often almost rude, and indeed one might sometimes say rough. But beneath this unpolished surface is a gentle, kind heart that sympathizes with the suffering and feels for the poor. His is one of the rare cases where success does not cast a vail of forgetfulness over the fact that before success was poverty. Many a florin finds its way from his pocket to the hand of the needy in the course of the year. His time has not been wholly occupied in routine labor, but he has written several works which stand high in the esteem of the profession. But the labors of the hospital are gradually passing into other hands. His skilled assistants assume the different branches connected with ophthalmology, and greatly relieve Prof. Arlt. One teaches how to operate; another, the use of the opthalmoscope; still another, the anomalies of refraction; and a fourth, the histology of the eye. There can be hardly a doubt that these young men are building for themselves foundations which will raise them higher than even Arlt has stood, and within twenty years the names of Biermann, Reuss, Schulek, and Sattler will be known in the scientific world. One is a Bohemian, two are Hungarians, and one a Salzburger.

The ten months at Vienna, like all earthly things, came finally to an end, and one lovely August morning the genial face of Prof. Horner, of Zurich, Switzerland, was before me. Born in Zurich, and living there most of his life, he is a striking example of a prophet having honor in his own country and among his own people. Personally and socially, he is a charming man. In his profession he stands high. His eye-clinic is no large, but is well cared for, and he had a great number of interesting cases. His soul is big and honest, and he hates all shams and shows. His great lament was over the multitudes of brochures, books, etc., on the eye, most of which he described as being only "words, words, words,” written for calling attention to the author's

name.

Only a few times did the glowing sunset clouds light up the beautiful lake before my eyes when I was advised to hasten on to reach

Paris before the Prussians should. There are in Paris three celebrated oculists-Desmarres, Liebreich, and Wecker. But there was no time to visit them, and with hasty steps I came on to London. It was with a feeling of hesitancy that the doors of the Royal Ophthalmic | Hospital were approached. No woman had tapped on those doors for admittance, and one could not know beforehand whether there were lions or lambs shut up in that building. But Prof. Arlt's introductions were an "open sesame," and in five minutes from the time of knocking, the fearful one found herself in the center of such a group as Critchett, Cowper, Wells, Lawson, and Adams, names well known not only in London but far abroad. It would be hard to tell which was the kindest of them all. Freely and fully all the advantages of the institution were thrown open. And you can imagine how extensive these advantages must be from the fact that every year they have between 19,000 and 20,000 cases! Not a day passes without three or four, sometimes eight or ten operations. Each man seems to have his own method, and some of them operate most beautifully. One sees during the week three sets of surgeons. Among these Bowman, Hutchinson, Streatfield, and Hulke, each famous in his way.

The last, Mr. Hulke, is a geologist as well, and has quite a collection of fossils, over which he is very enthusiastic. He has this year discovered two entirely new saurians, and still another old-world monster, quite unknown to the modern world.

tiful ophthalmoscope, which has no mate in England; and indeed there exists but one other, and that is in threatened Paris.

To-day I try my fate at King's College Hospital, introduced by Prof. Liebreich, who is spending his vacation here. I have not much to fear.

Should I, in the course of my two months in London, find any more friends to women, I shall certainly tell you.

London, the city, with all its extent, is lost sight of in the kindness of its people. One still visits the Tower and the museums, and wanders over the unending Regent and Hyde Parks, sighing meanwhile for the ever-varying beauty of Central Park, instead of the monotony of gravel walks, trodden grass, and lines of shade trees; but after all, it is more 66 the people, oh, the people," that take up the thoughts.

BELLA BARROWS.

eral Robert E. Lee breathed his last after an attack of congestion of the brain, which was induced in great part, doubtless, by the sedentary life incident to his connection with Washington College, Lexington, Va. His sudden death has occasioned no little sorrow throughout the South, and much regret also in the North, for General Lee, notwith

"royal" hospital given, but invitations here and there to others in the city were extended. These of course were gratefully accepted, and the theater of London Hospital for the first time echoed to the tread of a "woman doctor's"

foot. So also Guy's, where in one afternoon

Mr. Bader made twenty-six eye operations, sending the patients home immediately after,

even after the extraction of the lens!

Even proud St. George's could not say "No" after the example of the before-mentioned. To be sure, an hour was consumed in waiting for admission, which hour was spent in reading Fowler and Wells' "Annual" and Ayer's Almanac, found lying on the table! But the end of the hour brought a cordial reception and some well-made operations. Mr. Carter, the ophthalmic surgeon there, proved himself as kind and attentive as any of his London brethren, and with extreme thoughtfulness gave me an invitation to his house to see a new and beau

our late war, was generally regarded in the North as well as in the South as a high type of American manhood.

General Lee may have been said, physically, to be a thoroughly developed and

well balanced man. In temperament, while the Motive may have predominated, it was finely blended with the Mental, and both gracefully softened by the Vital.

In stature he was fully six feet high, weighing, in health, nearly two hundred pounds, without an ounce of superfluous flesh. His figure was firmly knit, but flexible; and every movement supple, easy, and graceful.

The proportions

of his figure were almost faultless, his chest being broad, full, ample, and