"Well, good-night, Kebler," said Langdon, at length, turning

round.

Kebler looked up suddenly.

"You won't see me again, Hal."

"Oh, yes I shall. I don't leave for two more days, you know." He busied himself with his gloves.

"But I do," said Kebler.

"You? Why, where are you going?"

"To Germany on the first steamer I can catch."

Lucien Price.

TWENTY-ONE.

Tell me not of lovelorn shades,

Groping through the world in sadness,

Sickly youths and morbid maids,

And a love that burns to madness.

Underneath the cheerful sun

Tears are pitifully plenty,

Logical at sixty-one,

Imbecile at one-and-twenty.

Give me all the sunlit air,

And a girl who loves fine weather,
And we'll wander-who knows where-
Gladly through the year together.

Henry Adams Bellows.

ON BOOK-AGENTS.

In the rough world, among men of keenness and despatch, the agent's work is full of trouble, and with some frequency he meets failure and misfortune. But for sheer recreation, give him the aristocratic college dormitory. Engaged in such exploitation, he renounces the more subtle of his wiles, for the simpler arts will serve. The quarry, in fact, is his for the asking.

Agents differ; and their victims fall from divers causes. Perhaps the most successful variety is the individual who "represents" a "University Publishing Society." He talks to you as one educated gentleman to another. He gives you to understand that he is not out for profit, and informs you confidentially that the chance he offers is, in the eyes of the cultured student, only too plainly providential. If by birth and lack of breeding he happens to be a Cockney, so much the better. Moreover, if he is lucky enough to be accompanied by a passive person in loud-cut clothes who may casually be "introduced" as a "friend," victory is safely regarded as certain. The very air is thick with courtesy.

But the real weapon of this species is the ability to refer with studied ease to men and matters in history, and to point out the undoubted advantages of possessing a "Complete Compendium of the Cosmos," enriched by extracts from authors so varied as to include Confucius, Chaucer, and Chauncey Depew.

For the victim, after such a fall, there is no remorse. So reasonable, so free from guile appear the counsels of the "representative," that the proud owner of "Life's Lexicon" is never tempted to regret his careless blunder. Rather he blushes to recall the time when, all unknowing, he was ready to face existence without the help of "Historic Historians."

A far grosser type is the brute who builds frankly upon the basis that, being a normal college man, careful of your reputation, you know nothing about books.

"Here you are," he says in effect. "An empty book-case. Nothing to put in it except the directory and that charming picture of John the Orangeman. It's considered quite the proper thing to have at least ten cubic feet of books, and I have some here in conspicuous bindings."

If this appeal to the intelligence fails, he is ready with another. "All the fellows in the building are ordering them. Mr. X, '08, the noted athlete, has just signed for two sets." If he can launch this priceless recommendation, the day is won, and the volumes take their place among steins, class flags, and Gibson girls, like any other commodity.

The green youth is flattered by nothing so much as an appeal to his business acumen. This weakness is relentlessly exploited. Indeed, there exists yet another brand of agent, whose methods are those of the stock-broker.

He displays before you what he is pleased to call an "Edition de luxe."

"Now, of course," he concedes, "at present this set is not very valuable." In this, at least, you might agree with him.

"But some day," he adds, with an air of assurance, "every copy will be worth its weight in gold." Here you stare in some surprise at the volumes, and try with difficulty to realize a prospect so glittering. Now is his chance, and with a few bold strokes he sketches the future. When you try afterwards to repeat his eloquent words in cold daylight, you are face to face with something like the following:

"You buy these apparently innocent books now at the rate of five dollars a month for a year and a day. You put them on your shelves. You think no more about them. But every copy in that edition is numbered. In time they grow scarce; they are out of print. Book-lovers begin to search for them; collectors clamor for them.

The few sets they find are not enough to go round. They demand more at any price.

"Meantime you are in debt. Your allowance is cut off. Starvation and eviction stare you in the face. You sit on the edge of your last chair, and stare gloomily into the empty fireplace. With trembling, reluctant fingers you hold the revolver. One hurried thought of home and of the once happy future, one-the door-bell rings. Another creditor! Yes,-no! Hurried steps on the stairs. A loud knock. And there enters one with streaming hair and wild eyes who cries: "The books! the books! I must have them! Name your price, sir,five hundred, eight hundred,—here, take a thousand.' A swoop at the book-case for the precious armful, and the apparition is gone. . With the dazzling bit of priceless paper in your hand and the world again dancing bright before your eyes, you say softly, 'Thank God!' and the curtain rings down. .

Of course you agree to take the set. Who wouldn't? There is no time in such emergencies to reflect upon any more probable future. So the years go by; and though the door-bell rings not infrequently, the visitor, if he notes your edition at all, will do no more than remark the faded lustre of its "French" bindings. Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes.

Thus are the victims decked for slaughter and duly slain; and if they meet not their doom in one form, they will in another, for the snares of the book-agent are many and his weapons innumerable.

James Thayer Addison.

HER SOUL AND THE SEA.

At twilight dim, beside the sea, when it crooned with strange emotion, She loved and yearned and blent her voice with the passionate voice

of the sea,

Till milky mists came creeping in from a far and infinite ocean,

And, drawing close to my breast, she hushed, and breathed her love

to me.

Her eyes were pale like deep-sea lairs; her cheeks like dull skies. glowing

When suns burn out; and her brow was white, like spume on a combing wave;

Her hair was ashen, like sea-burnt ships, with a lambent flame still blowing,

And her voice was vague, like tones that weep beneath a billow's lave.

But the mighty mother called her child, and to her bosom caught her, And with salt fingers stilled her lips and quenched the flame in her hair;

Her cheeks' pale roses waned and died, and her pure eyes blent with the water,

But still her soul is mine and sings in music faint and rare.

And I have followed the nomad wind, and the joys of life have I tasted,

I have plucked the flowers that faint and fade and leave but thorns behind;