PHANTASMIA.

"Ho-thou lovest a ghost, Imogene!"

The wind of morning has blown out the stars
And the pale trees stir idly in the park,

With the deep quietness fades out the dark,
Beyond the dawning and the cloudy bars,
Along the gray sky-mark.

O what is this dumb portent of unquiet
That creeps upon me with the growing day,
What promised music draws my heart away!
Bend closer and lean low that I may sigh it,
Come close that I may say!

Across the edges of the world a singing

Of dim, phantasmal melodies is fled;

Why will you weep and bury your sad head,

Why will you make your arms so soft and clinging,
Enamored of the dead?

Beyond the windy and the widening portal

Of the gray, lonely, and unmeasured dawn,

I move, my soul is summoned and withdrawn,

I fade away, and I am made immortal,

I pass and I am gone.

John Hall Wheelock.

PERSONAL RESEARCH.

"But, Bob, how in the mischief can you expect me to go among those muckers and sit through such shows twice a week for-"

"Oh, nonsense, Hal. Don't be snobbish. They're people, you know, just the same as you are, even though they do smoke Sweet Caporals and chew. Besides," he continued, with a sudden break in the serious expression he had maintained throughout the conversation, "besides, it's great fun. Three years ago, when the course was called Phil. 5, Bill Truman and I worked the same thing. Heavy for Freshmen, wasn't it?"

"Well, what about it?"

"Why, we worked along the line of least resistance-"

"Oh, talk plainly. I don't feel 'thinky' to-night, and this is serious business for me. I'd cut it, but there's no mark in the course without it."

"That's what I thought when I registered in it. Now-" and Hal Lathrop shrugged his shoulders expressively.

"Don't get discouraged, Hal. It isn't nearly so bad as you think. In Social Ethics I you have to write a thesis on some specific topic, under the general head, 'Recreations of the Poor,' and you have chosen 'The Theatres,' so you won't have to do any reading. The material for this thesis-"

"Is to be obtained by special research in 'those parts of Boston inhabited by the less fortunate.' What do you keep repeating that for?"

"You've got a grouch to-night. Now listen. I'll tell you what we did-"

"What'd you pull out of it?"

"A-B. First we had a Russian evening in the gallery. I dressed as a mucker, went to the Bowdoin Square Theatre, selected a Russian, and sat down beside him."

"Where was Bill?"

"Oh, he was getting general impressions from a stage box. But that isn't necessary. If you go to eight shows, you ought to be able to write twenty-five pages."

"Well, what did you do after you sat down beside him?"

"Watched him closely, acted a little myself to keep him from suspecting me, managed to make an appointment to meet him at some vaudeville show. Wrote up afterwards what he did at each place-and there you are. The Russians do so and so at melodrama, and like such and such a vaudeville stunt. They are, etc.'

"That doesn't seem so very hard."

"It isn't. When I had finished with my Russian, I devoted the following week to an Irishman at the Grand and the Palace, then an Italian, and so on. It took us two evenings for four weeks. The last week we had for general impressions."

"Do you think I can act well enough for it, Bob?"

"Just do what they do."

"It oughtn't to be so hard. If they'd just wash-"

"They do sometimes. Try it, Hal; it'll do you good. But don't think you're in a Colonial box. They won't notice you at all if you act half decently."

me

"It can't do me any harm, I suppose. But, Bob-come on in with

"No. If a Freshman could do it, you can. I'll drop in and make you up the first night you go down. Better begin on a Saturday night, too. So long."

"Much obliged. So long."

It was raining when Lathrop slunk off a car in Bowdoin Square and ran into a drug store to check his coat. He felt discouraged before the work had begun. The rain depressed him; he could not see the use of all this masquerade. But, after all, it was more agreeable than hunt

ing up references, and reading dry stuff hours at a time and having to make some special research. Still

"Damn," he said, as he walked out of the lobby, having been told that tickets to the gallery were sold a few doors up the street at the gallery entrance.

He felt sure the eyes of the ticket seller saw through his disguise, and he thought he detected a twinkle as the man handed him a red ticket and fifteen cents in change.

"Only ten cents?" Lathrop asked, his heart sinking at the thought of all those vile people who could afford to spend ten cents for “recreation" once a week.

There was no doubt that the man with the long white beard, who collected the tickets at the foot of the stairs, watched him all the way up the first flight. When he reached the landing he pulled his cap low over his face-but he had forgotten there were still two or three flights to mount.

Finally, however, he reached the top step and walked with as much nonchalance as he could command past the candy-woman-at first sight he thought she was a man-to the head of the aisle. The scene was not prepossessing. There were no seats-just wooden benches, extending from aisle to aisle. They were unpolished, dirty, ard so carved and rough that they reminded Lathrop of the desks in Sever. The steps were steep, and slippery because of the expectoration, the patrons being prodigal to excess in this respect.

Over the whole scene there was only a dull light, gleaming hazily from the dusty and specked globes. The place looked almost lurid. From a dark arc light were suspended two incandescent lights, cleaner than the rest, and shaded from the stage, that illuminated the gallery during the whole performance.

On the front row were boys, from eight to twelve years of age, more unkempt than dirty. These boys were mostly Poles. The rest of the audience was splendidly cosmopolitan. Russians and Irishmen, Italians and negroes-old men and young, boys and their older brothers, lounged around with their caps on, chewing candy and expectorating with an enjoyment and a precision that was marvelous.

Lathrop, looking over the house, saw, sitting about four rows from the front, a dark, fiery man, low and slight, with straight black hair and an olive complexion. Immediately it struck him that he had found the pure Italian type. He stumbled down the steps and sat down beside him. Covertly he glanced at him, and his first impression was at once confirmed. The man was either a peanut-vender or a bootblack. He had the squint; the expressionless face, save for a touch of shrewdness and a slight leer resulting from the squint; the ill-fitting, gay-colored clothing of the "type." Yet the coat was not badly cut, and through its grime and spots showed signs of good tailoring. The flannel shirt and trousers, the red sweater coat, the tan shoes and blue cravat-all indicated a decline from better days.

"A Keezer outfit-might easily be a living advertisement of the thriving Max," Lathrop thought.

In the midst of his scrutiny he became aware that he, in his turn, was being scrutinized. He grew confused as he remembered his own dress: his old gray sweater, his checked cap, his false blond mustache, and, above all, the streak of dirt across his cheek. Bob had thought that streak a master-touch.

In his embarrassment he stammered out:
"Will you let me look at your program?"
His neighbor examined him curiously.

"Git yourself one," he answered laconically.

Lathrop flushed. He had been off his guard. "Yer needn't get huffy," he said, and leaving his cap on his seat to reserve it, he hastened back to the candy counter.

"Want ter buy a program."

"Don't sell 'em," the woman said in an off-hand manner, not glancing up from the paper she was reading. "I sell candy and pitch in a program with every two cents' worth."

"Well, give me some candy, then."

"What kind?"

"Any kind 'll do."

"What kind?" she asked quietly, but firmly, looking at him for the first time. Lathrop felt instinctively that she saw through his disguise