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in the meanwhile, the bedstead subsided. When we retired again, and were once more safely protected from the nipping cold, although pretty well cooled, I could not help speaking of the perfect operation of the bedstead in high terms of praise, although, by some accident, it had fulfilled its object a little earlier than had been desirable. As I am very fond of dilating upon a pleasing theme, the conversation was prolonged until Mrs. Sparrowgrass got sleepy, and the clock struck nine. Then we had to turn out again. We had to turn out every hour during the long watches of the night, for that wonderful epitome of the age of progress. When the morning came, we were sleepy enough, and the next evening we concluded to replace the "wake-up," with a common, old-fashioned bedstead. To be sure, I had made a small mistake the first night, in not setting the "indicator," as well as the index of the dial. But what of that? Who wants his rest, that precious boon, subjected to contingencies? When we go to sleep, and say our prayers, let us wake up according to our natures, and according to our virtues; some require more sleep, some less; we are not mere bits of mechanism after all; who knows what world we

may chance to wake up in? For my part, I have determined not to be a humming-top, to be wound up, and to run down, just like that very interesting toy, one of the young Sparrowgrassii has just now left upon my table, minus a string.

DEATH OF OUR HORSE.

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CHAPTER XVI.

Casualties will occur-Ice and ice-houses-A hint from the Flowery NationBaldwin's Pond-Skaters-Our horse gets into business and is launched upon an ice island-A Derrick-The result thereof.

CASUALTIES Will occur; there is no providing against the infinite chapter of accidents. We have met with a misfortune. Our country horse is dead. Much as we grieved over him living, still we cannot help brooding over his untimely fate. After all, sympathy, pity, tenderness, are inexplicable virtues; why should such a loss cast its little cloud over our domestic sun, when greater, more pitiable events, fail to affect us? Our horse is dead! Well, he was not worth his fodder, yet we sorrow for him. The loss of fifty thousand Russians at Kars or Erzeroum, would not, could not, touch us so nearly. This is a strange instrument-the human heart! An organ with unaccountable stops-a harp of a thousand strings, many of them, I fear me, deplorably short.

In the winter time, when the frost builds its transparent flooring over the ponds, it is customary to fill the ice-houses in the country. It is a good thing to have an ice-house in the country. You keep your summer Sunday dinner, your milk, and your butter, in great perfection, if you have such a frigid tabernacle. Sometimes, on a sultry day, it is pleasant to descend to its cool depths— to feel a winter atmosphere in the heart of the dogdays-to enjoy a sparry arctic in the midst of a flowery tropic. To build a good ice-house, you must have foresight, and a capable carpenter. In China they rear them above ground; say a circle of bamboo poles lashed together; at the top, thatched over with straw, and a few feet of earth thrown up around the base; these keep the ice, even until the next year. Here, where ornate architecture is a necessity, ice-houses are more elaborately structured. What with a cupola, and a bracketted roof, knobs, and balls, and bells, a very pretty temple can be made of pagoda pattern, but then, it must be conceded, not so well calculated to resist a heavy thaw in July, as others of plainer mould.

Our ice-house, however, is not of the ornate kind; nor is it of the conservative species. In

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style, it is of the super-and-sub-terranean order of architecture, and really holds its own quite comfortably-except in very hot weather. We fill it usually in December, and this season our horse was brought forth in all his harness, to draw the clear blue blocks from Baldwin's haunted pond, upon a strong sled ;-we supposed he could perform that duty with credit to himself. So we thought, "Alas poor Yorick !"

Baldwin's pond is a vast sheet of water, in truth it is The Nepperhan River dammed up; and around its legended brink there are villas, and gardens, and noble trees, and wild vines, and a couple of hat factories, and, just below it, a waterfall, and, in the distance, Chicken Island, and beyond that a bridge, and further on a gate, with a broad arch above it, through which you enter the village. In the summer time its sweet seclusion would enchant Kensett; in winter its picturesqueness would arrest Gignoux. The pond in December is a mine of wealth to the teamsters, as there are scores of ice-houses to be filled in the village; and from the transparent clearness of its waters, it makes pure, blue ice, valuable to pack, and to keep, and to use. "Alas poor Yorick!"