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TAR NIGHT BBFOBB NFCW IIAM. • BY RUORKB J. BULL. The tren on the hillside stand cheerieee and lone; The leaves ol "the woodland are scattered and htrown; ' The bar' cut IH gathered; the m«do»» ire otw; And the snovrflate* are falling 1U» down through the air. The windows arc frosted with crystalline leaves ; The glittering Icicle* c in« to the eaves; The night-wind ie walling, o'er mountain sua Pl"iD» - . . With a sonnd like the moan of a mortal In pain, TTi« the nitfht before New fear's. Time, hoary and gray, While the b»nds in his glw» «re fast gliding away, Lifts the curtain that hide* every mortal from aight, _ And beholds the whole world and Its wonder* to night. The pas-litrhte are drawing In Vanity Fair. Whilf beauty and fat-hion are worehspiDg (here; Where euvy. woere malice and selfishness reign; Where the lowly are greeted with haughty disdain; Where flowers arc fragrant in many & bower; Where men are displaying their riches and power; v>here red wine is running in bounteous flow; Where diamonds are sparkling on boeoms of snow; Where morey is better than genius or brains: Where music is heard in rolnpruouc strains ; Where wild eyes are glancing at each lovely lace; Where gay forms are, dancing in eixtin and lace; Where the prodigal squanders the ill-gotten gain That his miserly father ban bearded in vain; Where revelry dwells ; where the reckless will cry : •' Let us dance and be glad, ft,r U-inortow u* die /" In many a desolate hovel, to-night. The poor and the friendless are hidden from sight; Where the doors and the windows are broken and old; Where the cupboard is empty, the hearthstone is cold; Where, wearily wotklng in hunger and dirt, The sewingrgirl sings her sad " song of the shirt;" Where mothers are sighing o'er hopes that have fled; Where children are crying and begging for bread; Where vice in its hideous garb is revealed; Where strong men are raging; where crime Is oon- oealed; Where forms that were lovely, and cheeks that were fair, Are wretched with woe, and are haggard with care; Where beggars are crouching in squalor and cold; Where misers are counting their Ill-got ten gold. Heaven pity the poor, aird the ones led astray; May their woes and their burdens be banished away. In many a home On this bountiful earth, A bright fire burns on the family hearth, And innocent pleasures and pastimes are seen, Where nothing is heard that is vulgar and mean; Where friendship and filial affection are found; Where kind words are spoken, and comforts abound; Where the needy are clothed, and the hungry are Where Gvd is revered, and the Bible is read; Where family voices are blended in song; Where nothing is seen of oppression and wrong: Where the father each night, with an unselfish prayer, Commits his loved flock to the Lord's tender care. Though over the wide world we wander and roam, We find in no p ace the pleasure? of home ; The world-weary come from a far-distant land, To meet with a welcome and clasp of the hand. The sailor, afar on the billowy main, Is longing to be with his loved ones again. O home! thy sweet joys are more lasting and fair Than all the wild follies of Vaaity Fair. O Vanity Fair! what hunger and care, What pitiful scenes of distress and despair, What momenta of anguish, and hours of woe, Ton bring to the boeoms of beings belcw! Two prodigals, wasting your substance away; You llbertuiea.'liatniiie to early decaff; You maidens, fat-t losing your beauty and bloom-- Why rnsh with such reckless re solve to the tomb? You wrest from.the lowly the comforts they need. To revel in riot." and grovel in greed ; Never knowing the Joys of a.satisfied mind ; Never being a blessing to one of your kind. You creatures that cower in hunger and cold; You pititul wrecks that are friendless and old; Yon heart-broken sinners, now loaded with care, Are drinking the dregs of earth's Vanity Fair. You bands that are idle, in haunts that are low. May find in employment a-cure lor jour woe; You fi»rma that are lading, be hopeful and brave, And look to the J.ord for the comforts you crave. You beings of earth who are sordid and vain. Why struggle lor greatness, and grovel for gain ? All grandeur must come to the ct ffin and shroud; "Oh! why should the spirit of mortal be proud?" All hearts that are human have hopes of their own; There are hundreds renowned ; there are millions' unknown; Some are merry and young; some are wretched and old; Some are timid and weak; some are valiant and bold; Some are h"s!y and pure; some are^hful and vain; Some are doing good deeds; some are striving for gain; *Some are softened by love; some are hardened by crime; And all are the sport and the playthings of time. 'Tie the night before New Year's; the morrow will dawn The year, with its pleasures and griefs, will be gone; The bells will ring, gayly, with sounds of good cheer; «0od bless yon, and givo you a Happy New Year. THE 1UMB£K FOllITJNK. . • ^ Wciv Yeux's Story. On the last day of the old year Mrs. Bi uiber entered horHliop ana served her •cut tomers abstractedly, for her mind was full of trouble. She was the most cheer­ ful ind sprightly of little women, with bright, keen, blue eyes, a ruddy bloom in her soft, wrinkled cheeks, and flaxen hair arranged in stiff cnrls about her forehead ; but to-day the demand of a small boy, in shrill tones, for a bottle of Bamber's Drops failed to produce the delight usually manifested by her under such circumstances. Bamber's Drops WJ*S the remedy of her late husband for all the ills flesh is heir to, and Mrs. Bamber believed in it firmly with the ardor of a sanguine nature and loving heart. The late Dr. Bamber's star had set in sadness and gloom before an un- sympathizing world had consented to take bis panacea by the teaspoonful. As far as the will of one fragile and very determined woman could make the world rescind its objections Mrs. Bt ru­ ber had prepared herself for the battle. When the small boy had taken himself off with his purchase she leaned her el­ bow on the counter aud sighed deeply. "To think of the Platts soming to this 1 If Archibald was alive, instead of only his wile 1 He knew a deal about law, poor dear, and needed to, what with imitators and spurious articles to injure the trade. I would sell out and give them every penny if I could find a Surcbast r, and it wasn't all so sudden. jchibaid was grateful to his dying breath, and I'm not likely to forget that we owe everything to Dr. Piatt. Dear, dear ! Five thousand dollars, or a fore­ closed mortgage. I tell you it's puie spite in that Hiram Driggs ; he don't know how. to behave himself yet as a rich man. Mrs. Bamber's gaze straved anxiously about the place, as if searching tor a way out of her difficulties. Did the clew actually lie in her giasp without her be­ ing aware of it ? The shop was very tiny, but exquisitely neat, and the variety of articles for sale, which made it almost ft museum, was arranged with a certain artistic perception of harmonious color­ ing. The late Dr. Bam her had been a ?. chemist, and one side of the place was still devoted to those medicines which a woman may dispense without being a licensed apothecary; but the rest of his stock had been removed across the way to the new drag-store, which was a grief to Mrs. Bamber's soul, and replaced on her shelves with a few books, stationery, and gay worsteds. " Why should I not be the apotheoary after Archibald?" she had said to Dr. Piatt, with an energetic nod of the head. " Don't I know as much as Pey­ ton Peyton was the rival over the way. Dr. Piatt, a rosy, good-natured gentle­ man, had made some soothing response calculated to mollify feminine vanity, and suggested the stationery department as a fresh field of usefulness. Mrs. Bamber's eyes rested on the vol­ umes opposite, a package of valentines ih which the town indulged at the proper season, a jumping-jack dangling help­ lessly from a nail. Never by any chance did her gaze wander to the shop win­ dow. She went over to the other side and opened a show case, which contained fat pin-cushions impossible, pen­ wipers, articles made by old ladios of the reduced-gentlewoman type and pre­ sented here for sale. "I believe that I would sell my own soul to raise the money and help them out of trouble," said Mrs. Bamber, vehe­ mently; and then she took up a pin­ cushion as if in hopes it might turn to gold ih her hand. " Pooh! thqao things have lain here for jeiors. What good are they ?" An aquarium occupied a place in the center of the shop--a crystal house where silky fibers of seaweed grew about mimic grottoes, and fish of metallic hues flashed through the water. A guilty pang smote the little woman at the sight of it. In all these years of hard work and lonely widowhood the aquarium was the only extravagance she had allowed herself,' and often would she spend her time of rest gazing into the miniature water-world. If she could now give the, money it had cost to the Piatt family! A white gleam came softly through the window from the snow-covered, streets; winter seemed to muffle the town of Stoneport in a mantle of silence, setting each household in a separate atmosphere of individuality. Up on the hill, where genteel Stoneport dwelt in large, old- fashioned mansions, the music of sleigh- bells and merry voices was to be heard, but down here, on the main street, the afternoon fell in quiet cold, deserted by traffic as soon as the sun quitted the narrow thoroughfare. Miss Simmon s, the milliner,peered from her window, and Mr. Peyton, the drug­ gist opposite, polished his door-panes mechanically with a bit of chamois leather. The harbor, now dark and wind-fretted, lapped up to Mrs. Bam­ ber's very back door. Pirates might have landed and carried her off at mid­ night, if they had been disposed, al­ though Mrs. Bamber was not daunted by fear of such violent abduction. In the old days piratical crews in rakish craft from the Spanish Main had not been unknown in the waters of this very harbor, and Stoneport had been more intimately associated with the slave- trade than was good for its reputation at a future date. Like BO many towns on the coast of New England, prosperi­ ty had ebbed away, the bud of promise been blighted by some mysterious fluc­ tuation of commerce. There were those who detected a righteous Nemesis in the decay of Stoneport, and here it was left to crumble away in the sunshine, a moss-grown memory of the past. The shop-bell rang suddenly, and a girl en­ tered. " Oh, Mrs. Bamber !" she cried ; and, throwing her arms impulsively about the little woman, burst into tears. The girl was taller and larger than her companion, and yet clung to her. > " Has anything more happened ?" in­ quired Mrs. Bamber, alarmed. " Now don't give way, my dear." "I can't help it," sobbed the girl, ex­ citedly. "Mr. Driggs has been to see me again. He came to the school-room, with all the children staring, and told me he would not 'oreclose on the Piatt property if I would marry him. Oh, what a cruel, cruel bargain!" " You never promised--" began Mrs. Bamber, breathlessly. The girl drew herself up. "I said no." ^ Charlotte Eaton was very attractive, certainly, even in her anger, with flushed cheeks and tearful eyes. A little scarlet hood covered her golden hair and gave her something of childish beauty. At this moment there was a stir in the de­ serted street ; people appeared like magic. A sleigh, curved lika a shell, and lined with robes of fleecy-Mhite fur, drawn by spirited black horses in flash­ ing harness, and driven by a solemn negro coachman in livery, slowly passed. The sole occupant was a small man wrapped in sable, with a keen, narrow face, who gazed down on the commo­ tion his splendor excited with irre­ pressible exultation. This man was Hiram Driggs, and to show himself ostentatiously to his world of Stone­ port was a pleasure which had not yet palled on the rich man. " His mother learned her trade when I did," said Miss Simmons, the milliner, "I am sure nobody thought her son would come to owning everything." The elder Driggs had, indeed, worked in secret many years, directing little rills of wealth, gleaned from any humble source, to his own dingy ware­ house. Miserly and reticent in the ex­ treme, Stoneport Lad not divined his riches until the son, now 45 years old, suddenly emerged from the bondage in which he- had been held by his stern parent while living to assume the role of millionaire. Hence the astonishment of the town; hence Hiram's love of dis­ play. In Mrs. Bamber's shop the two women grew rigid as the sleigh parsed, the widow with indignation, and the young schoolmistress with a curious admixture of euvy and repulsion. Had sbe not been urged, nay, almost threatened in all that she held dearest--her plighted troth with Charley Piatt--to share the sleigh with its fleecy robes? Might she not save the Piatt homestead, indeed, by paying this very price- of marrying Hiram Dfiggs? Mrs. Bamber took her hands. " Charlotte, let us go to this man and beg him to release them," she said, earnestly. " You must have influence with him." "I am afraid to go," said Charlotte. "Afraid! Wueii you %re to be Charley's wife f We must fight for him, my dear." These two champions saw the sins of Mr. Driggs in the light of intense parti­ sanship. He was a mean man, and the power of money would naturally make him tyrannical; moreover, he had se lected Charlotte Eaton to fall in love with as the sweetest and most blooming young lady in Stoneport. Hiram Driggs oould certainty afford to please himself at last! Unversed in the delicate phases of ro­ mance, he could by no means win a smile from Charlotte, and discovered in wrath and consternation that Charley Piatt was his rival. He would foreclose and take possession of the house. Stoneport saw in this measure only the grasping ten­ dencies of the man who wished to estab­ lish a home, while the victims detected revenge. Probably both factions were wrong. Mrs. Bamber, with trembling Char­ lotte by her side, presented herself be­ fore the tyrant. He still dwelt in the wing of the warehouse where his father had been contented to abide. Perhaps he was chagrined to be found in the small parlor, which he had furnished with yellow satin curtains and sofas, when he would so soon take possession of the house on the hill. The mission was scarcely a successful one, although Mrs. Bamber made herself spokes­ woman on the occasion with all possible energy. She even offered up her shop, since Dr. Piatt had given it originally, and was laughed at for her pains. Mr. Hiram Driggs was not a pleasant man to ask for favors, especially when he oame quite close to Charlotte and said, harshly: " You know my terms." After that Mrs. Bamber drew her com­ panion away without another word. " He is a brute," said the little wo­ man, tingling with mortification at the remembrance of the coarse lau™h which had greeted her proposal of yielding up her all. They met a young man at the corner of the street. "Take care of her," said Mrs. Bam­ ber, transferring Charlotte to his charge. " My dear Mrs. Bamber, I do not need the injunction,' said Charley Piatt in a voice he strove to render steady and cheerful as he drew the girl's hand through his arm with an air of tender protection. Charlotte and Mrs. Bam­ ber looked at each other meaningly; then the latter turned away with a little pang at her heart. These two were made for each other, handsome Charley and pale, frightened Charlotte; but how would it be with them if evil in the shape of Hiram Driggs stepped be­ tween? When she reached her own door Mrs. Bamber was not only dis­ turbed and distressed, as she had been all day, but thoroughly out of temper. She wotdd have liked to set the world to rights, and had only succeeded in ruf­ fling her own amour propre in the in­ terview with a brusque, rude million­ aire. Perhaps it was this mood that made her shake her head at the three pictures in her window. " Oh, there you are! I only wish I c«uld recover the sum your frames cost me. Old masters, forsooth!" The pictures were small and dark, as if some shadow obscured their original meaning, even as brambles and moss might have overgrown the artist's grave. The sun shot a golden arrow in the win­ dow as Mrs. Bamber paused, and illu­ minated the dim canvas. Perhaps the radiance of revelation reached her soul in that glimpse, however faintly, the gleam of an angel's wing cleaving the sky, the wonder of the Virgin's up­ turned face; but the sunset faded, and Mrs. Bamber was left to sorrowful ocn- temptation of the garish frames. " Some papist trash," she soliloquized. " What­ ever possessed me to get 'em new frames? I shall never see the money back, I'll be bound ! I'm sure I would be thankful to get $25 apiece, allowing $20 for the frames; and I suppose the pictures are worth $5, if they amount to anything. Nobody will give that, though." A year before the shop-bell had brought Mrs. Bamber from her supper to the contemplation of a thin, cadaver­ ous stranger of the origand type, wrapped in a cloak, and with a broad hat drawn over his brows. The man was faint with cold, and coughed dole­ fully; he had no money and no friends. Mrs. Bamber was not the person to send away such a waif empty-handed. She placed him before the fire in her own tiny kitchen, and made Nanny, her small hand-maiden, serve him with hot tea; she wrote a note to the clergyman, who dispensed charity, to find a lodging; and she finally dispatched him with a bottle of Bamber's Drops as a gift. The stran­ ger lingered in the garret furnished him, reserved, a trifle sinister and only known to smile when Mrs. Bamber preached to him in a language which he but imper­ fectly understood. There came a day in rude March, when so many leaves drop from the tree of life, that the foreigner sent for Mrs. Bamber, bequeathing to her solemnly three small pictures set in carved wood. They are worth their weight in gold," he had whispered, and turned his inscrutable lace--in which there lingered a triumph to the end--to the wall. Mrs. Bamber had shed a few tears, and carried her gifts home cautiously, as if she held some explosive projectile. The clergyman surveyed the pictures through his spectacles, and chilled the possessor's enthusiasm somewhat by ex­ pressing a preference for engravings. He recommended replacing the quaint olive-wood frames with new ones and exposing them for sale in tta window. Clergymen are not always the nest finan­ cial advieers^ Mis. Bamber's face grew very long when she saw the franoer's bill. Stoneport was skeptical of these daubs; besides, the widow asked a fabulous prioe for them. Stoneport knew a chro mo and a modern landscape full of lively coloring, but such dismal things were not to its taste. The last night of '.he year closed in sadly. Mrs. Bamber sat long beside the morning-glory stove in the parlor back of the shop, sipping her tea, in which beverage alone lay consolation. A portrait of Dr. Bamber, representing him as a somewhat wail-eyed gentleman, hung above her, and opposite a cabinet displayed, among other relics, several skulls prepared by the lamented Archi­ bald. Her tbougnts went back to a dreary day on an emigrant wharf, when sue landed with her husband, who hod been injured by a fall on the voyage. The sense of desolate homesickness again swept over her now, twelve years later, and a gentleman witk a good-hu­ mored, rosy face spoke to her kitdly. Oould she ever forget that thia Samari­ tan was Dr. Piatt, of Stoneport, now gone to his reward? He had asked few questions, but had brought the friand- lesri chemist to his own town and estab­ lished him in business. No one knew the cost of it all. It was not the good physician's way to make his charity a burden. Mrs. Bamber wiped her ayes as she nlppud her tea by the store and the night closet! in. Up on the hill the old Piatt homestead was shrouded in gloom, and revealed only one dim light in the dining-room. It was a brick house, with white piilars Supporting a projecting roof, shaded in summer by large trees, and seemed in the clear, crisp evening surrounded by tender memories. Now it was all to be swept away, for the doctor's purse had been ever open, and he had left wife and son in straitened circumstances. The lovers stood in the window, hand clasped in hand, as if claiming a silent mutual support, while Mrs. Piatt, a stout lady with a querulous mouth, wandered from room to room gazing at her precious household gods. V Even little Mrs. Bamber owns the roof over her head, and all owing to the doctor," sobbed the poor lady, taking up a favorite tea-cnp with loving touch. The young son set his teach and drew a long breath. Charlotte could only lean her brow against the cool pane. If they knew all! The night brought sorrow, but the ensuing day was only anticipated with dread. Hiram Driggs made himself comforta­ ble on the yellow-satin couch of his little parlor, with a decanter of wine at his el­ bow and a cigar. If conscience is a mat­ ter of education, he should have been wholly at ease, but there had been an expression in Charlotte Eaton's eyes as she departed that day which pricked him smartly even in remembrance. This look he might never forget. The won­ derful, backward glance of the Cenci haunts a world. Lounging on the Jel:, low sofa, he reasoned himself out of these fancies. He would gain at a cheap rate a fine home. Dr. Piatt was a reck­ less spendthrift in his day, and his cred­ itors need not be blamed for that. As for Charlotte, he might make terms with that proud young lady yet. Alto­ gether the evening passed not unpleas­ antly for him in planning improvements on his new property. New Year's day dawned on Stoneport, bringing joy to many hearts and strik­ ing like a knell on other lives that found their burden greater than could be borne. All nature smiled beneath a cloudless sky; the snow was rose-flushed on the slope, and shrubbery glistened as if powdered with diamond-dust; the harbor, where two schooners rode at anchor, was a d ep blue. Stoneport did not keep the holiday especially, although it still adhered to the Puritan belief that New Year's day should be sanctified rather than Catholic Christmas. On the hill the young ladies appeared in pretty dresses of blue and pink, and there were cake and wine on the side-boards, should the young men call. The shops were open. At 10 o'clock a man passed along the main street, paused before Mrs. Bamber's show-window, shaded hia eyes a moment, and walked on. Mrs. Bamber observed him with the habitual curiosity of the resident of a small place. He was an insignificant person in a gray ooa with red whiskers and a round face. That was 'all. Pale and anxious after a sleepless night, she stood with her eyes fixed apprehensively on the clock. It could not be long before Hiram Driggs would do his worst. The shop-beli rang sharply. " What do you ask for your pictures, ma'am?" "Five thousand dollars," muttered Mrs. Bamber, abstractedly, still staring at the clock. What was that? The insignificant stranger in the gray coat had reached for the pictures, and was unceremoni­ ously striking off the splendid gilt frames with his stout cane. "Mercy! Stop! What are you do­ ing ?" Mrs. Bamber ran nimbly to his side and arrested his hand. "I don't want these frames," said the Granger, contemptuously. "You set your own prioe, and I will give you $5,000." Mrs. Bamber sank down on a stool in speechless astonish nent. How unreal everything had become--the snowy street, the shop, the man in a gray eoatf Surely Nanny would soon tap on her bedroom door and tell her it was time to get up.. Then, by a sudden and not unnatural transition of awakening, she became suspicious and vigilant. Her visitor wasted no superfluous words ; his broad, ruddy face betrayed not a trace of emotion as he produced a crisp bit of paper, dipped a pen into Mrs. Bamber's ink, and began to write. " If you are not cheating me, let me see the money," interposed Mrs. Bam­ ber, sharply. He wiped the pen, restored it to a silver sheath in his pocket, and took up the draft. "Very good," was his sole comment, and he went out. Mrs/ Bamber laughed hysterically. Would he ever return ? Perhaps he was a maniac. It seemed an hour before he returned and counted out a pile of broad, shining gold pieces that made a pleasant clinking music as they fell in a glittering heap--$5,000 1 Still phlegmatic, and apparently un­ moved, the purchaser folded the pict­ ures beneath his ample coat and re­ turned to the Stoneport Hotel, where he was the solitary guest. Once in his chamber his reserve melted ; he beamed in broad smiles, and rubbed his hands with a subdued chuckle of triumph. "Dirt cheap !" he said to himself, and fell to studying the dim canvas with the aspect of a connoisseur. He then wrote the following letter : To the Right ITonorable the Earl of H : MY LOUD : 1 have THE satisfaction of inform­ ing yon that I have found tlio three pictures, after two years' search in the States. Th«y were in the possession of an ignorant woman, keeping shop in an obscure town of the New England coast, who sold them to me for XI. 000. riu, picture are undoubtedly the missing orig­ inals of Itaifaolle Banzio. and will complete vour Lordship's collection. I tracked tho Italian, Luigi Oarnole, to the haunta of bis race in the city of New York, and was obliged to proceed with greater caution from the fact that he ap­ pears to have been actuated by revenge in the theft of the pictures. Your Lordship will be better able to determine than' I am whether this revenge was a loyal attachment to the palace of his master, the Duke, and consequent rage at the dispersion of its works of art co foreign lands, or a more strictly peraou&i motive, lie made no effort here to sell the pictures as originals to dealers or private individuals, and after a quarrel with some of hia countrymen he disap­ peared, in company with another Italian. Pur­ suit led me across the plains to the Pacific, where I found the second Italian, a wandering; musician, only to learn that he had parted with Lnigi Oarnole six months before in the oitv of New Haven. In the latter place he had li*"ed in poverty and bad health, and I was able to fol­ low his steps to my present locality, where he died. I return to England by the next mail. I have the honor to subscribe myself, Your Lordship's most humble and obedient servant, AJUIERNON SMITH. Mrs. Piatt sal in her best parlor, her eyes swollen with weeping, and the cur­ tains drawn to exclude the curious glanws of Stoneport. She held fast the hands of her son and Charlotte Eaton, and trembled at the stroke of the clock. The young people gazed sadly at each other across the black figure of the mother, who was attired as if for a funeral. Would Hiram Driggs relent, and give them more time ? Was it not probable that he would appear and claim ail ? The young man could only chafe at his own helplessness m the emergency and inability to protect his own. The sound of flying feet made them all listen. Mrs. Bamber, breathless and without a bonnet, rushed into the parlor and cast a leather purse down in Mrs. Piatt's lap. " OTJ, you needn't count it I I've done so a dozen times already. Here's $5,000, and the house is saved." Between laughter and tears she ex­ plained her unexpected wealth, and re­ stored it to the wife of her benefactor of years ago. Then a shadow crossed her face, just dimming its brightness for a moment. Much could have been done to advance the interests of Bamber's Drops, and place the remedy properly before an enlightened pubiic, with the aid of this money, She plucked Charley's sleeve in the midst of the thanks which overpow­ ered all coherent speech, and said, trem ulously: " You will not forget the Drops when you receive your 'diploma, will you, Charley ?" •• Neither the Drops nor my debt," returned Charley, in an unsteady voice. Then Mrs. Bamber, through a mis# of tears, saw Charlotte Eaton rise, tall and proud, and take the purse from Mrs. Piatt; for Hiram Driggs stood on the threshold. Thus a very humble little woman placed her gift on the altar of the New Year.--Harper's Weekly. Leather from Human Skin. The expei imerfts of two ingenious shoe makers are now exciting some attention among the curious, the result being the production of good leather from the skin of a human being, and the manu­ facture of a handsome pair of boots from it. The skin was taken from the heart, stomach, and back ol a man in a dissecting room, who had died suddenly from accident, and upon whom decay had not yet begun to act It was placed in a solution of hemlock and white oak barks, used in tanning, and in three weeks from the first steeping, ap­ peared as the upper leather and legs of the boots in question, the soles being made of oow skin. The tanning created a ligbt-brown oolor, and the leather proved somewhat warmer than calfskin, ami more porous. It appears that after allowing for the neoessary waste, the skin of an average-sized man will make two pairs of boots, including the soles, but the latter would not be sufficiently hard for economical use.--F.ew York 8itn. New York R*al Estate. Speaking of the depression in New York real estate, a correspondent of the Boston Journal says; "There is scarce­ ly a house in demand in Brooklyn over #1,000, and scarcely one in New York over S20,000, and it must be a $40,000 house at that. Vacant lots nobody will take. A single case will show this state of things. When the great boulevard was open in the upper part of New York, the ring was on hand for bargains. On the line of it Connolly built his magnifi­ cent dwelling at the public expense. Genet placed his more magnificent house, built on the same terms; hear Connolly's. Tom Field, not to be be Hind, bought an elegant mansion on the boulevard with sixteen city lots. No­ body placed its value, when the great driveway was opened, at less than $125,000. One of our most prudent ciash companies loaned on the estate $50,000. It was sold under a foreclosure, tmd the company had to buy it in. It is in the market at $40,000, with ho takers." Japans Congratulations* The Japanese Minister has presented to the President a letter addressed to him by the Mikado, of which the fol­ lowing is a tran-lation : To His Exoellenoy t he President of the United States, Gen. Ulj'BseB 3. Grant: GREAT ASI> GOOD FRIEND: Now that the great Exposition m honor of the 100th year of your Exoellenoy's National Government has been eminently successful, I write to congratu­ late you and the people over whom you preside. From my subjects in the United States 1 have heard nothing e&oept words of kindness in re­ gard to tho manner in which tney have been treated ; and I believe the reoent intercourse between our oountries will have a tendency to strengthen the friendship _ already existing. I would here express the sincere hope that the inooimng century will not only witness the con­ tinued progress and prosperity of your nation in all branches of industry but also prove an era of peace. This will be handed to yon in person by my'Minister residing near your Gov­ ernment, who has been directed to emphasize my very friendly congratulations. MTTTSTTHITO. Tokio, the 1st day of the 10th month of the 9tli year of Meiji. Chinese Justice. Chinese justice is a curious travesty. A mandarin was committed for trial at the mixed court outside the waHs of Shanghai for theft from a lodging- hou-ie. He was taken into the city, where tho Heien recognized him as the son of an old friend, whereupon he was acquitted. The mandarin then brought a charge against the accuser. , The lodging-house keeper was thrown into jail, beaten for refusing to sign a paper declaring that he had made a false charge, beaten again for attempting to poison himself with opium, and threat­ ened with another beating for declining to pay his enemy $40. IT is a pitiful sight to see a heavy ulster overcoat try to go home with a weak young man in a rain-storm. No MOKE SNEEZING or bad smells in your nose. Catarrh is cured by Dr. J. H. McLean's Catarrh Snuff. It soothes and re­ lieves irritation. Trial boxes 50c. ,by mail. Dr. J. H. MoLoao, 314 Chestnut, St. Doois. « THE OLD TEAR, BT VIOLKT jjfow the gray Old Year ia , aadly winter winds are sighing Round him sad and low; "a •* Fast his satids of life are falling, ; " •olce« from the shadows callinE' -•?' " Old Year, thou must go!" _ •. tl Year, there was cause for grieving the life which thon art learaiff, Cause for bittsr tears--- Tears for many a promise brokatk* •= Tears for words unkindly spoked In beloved ears. Friends have failed us, hopes have « Previous hopes most fondly 411 with thee have gone. Thougn the past has thus bereft May the future that is left us for the past atone. Oh, the years that have been wasted! All earth's pleanureH have been tasted-- Pleasures that beguile-- But with wild, unepoken longing For the purer visions thronging Bound us all the while. - Friends, when time hath oeised fOMVtr And from soul the body sever, * " In that awful day Oan we meet the dead years' fhcirs. Bearing of our lives the traoes Ne'er to pass away ? Carved as if in stone, revealing Every hidden thought, concealing Naught of good or ill-- Bear the Old Year gently pleading^ 44 <)h, my solemn teachings heediniL Time is left ye still!" For the gray Old Year is dying, Sadly winter winds are sighing Round his aged head; Fast the sauds of life are falling, Voices from the shadows calling. An3 the Year ia dead ! Pith And Point. Ons touch of nature makes the whole world grin. _ " AN eel is not as slippery as a politi­ cian, but it oan live on water longer." WWER a man has <( seen his best days" there is one consolation. He has genet- ally seen his worst also. LATE tailoring notes say: " The busi­ ness vest is cut high and long." Ii oan easily be pulled down. " IN Norway drunkards are compelled to sweep the street as a penance." Tnat's nothing. They have to hold up lamp­ posts in this oountry. THIS is the sort of weather when a woman feels that all the flour she can heap upon her nose is as ineffectual as " sounding brass or a tinkling cyaibdl." MEN are frequently like tea--the real strength and goodness are not properly drawn out until they have been in hot water. AN imprudent adventurer having mar­ ried an heiress, a wit remarked that the bridegroom's brass was outshone by the bride's tin. A WISGQNSIX newspaper says: " The Board of Education have resolved to erect a building large enough to accom­ modate 500 students three stories high." A VAN aooustomed to the Blysian fields of poetry, who slops over into pol­ itics, will find the change agreeable in proportion to his capacity for being flayed and saad-pupeied for the sake of promoting the circulation of his blood. AFTER an Arctic lover has set up with his girl three or four hundred hours it is no uncommon thing for the young lady's papa to come floundering in from another snow-hut aud ask the pleasure of the young man's company to break­ fast. " CHAJaiiKS," said a young wife to her husband, as they sat at the windm . watching the fashionables on their way to church, "when you die, and I gef hold of the insurance money, I intend in have a fur cape and muff just like thai> lady has on over there." A 6-YKAB. OLD girl of Anoka, Miss., was overheard telling her playmate that she had attended a churoh sociable the evening before, and that a little boy kissed her while they were engaged in f play, but she said, " That's no harm, 'cause it was our preacher's boy,, you know." " I'VE, often seen men," said a veteran General, " who could stand a fere of shell or canister without showing any sign of uneasiness, but I never yet saw a man who could sit in a room where a bottle of soda was about to be opened wi hout screwing up his eyes and look­ ing nervous." A LOCOMOTIVE engineer, who had been discharged for some cause, gave vent to his spite, eminently characteristic of American humor. He said it was about time he left the company, anyhow, for the sake of his life, for " there was nothing left of the old track but two streaks of rust and the right of way." A ITAWYEB and a parson were talking about wnich way the wind was. The former said : " We go by the oourt- house vane." "And we," replied the parson, " go by the churdh vane." " Well," said the lawyer, " in the mat^ ter of wind that is the best authority !" And the parsoif went home to cogitate. THE I/OVKR8. To church the two together went, Both doubtless on devotion bent; »he parson preached with fluent ease On Pharisees and Sadducees; And, as they homeward slowly walked^ The lovers ou the sermon talked; And he-- he deeply loved the maid-- In soft and tender accents said: •• Darling, do you not think that we Are Pharisee and Sadducee t" She flashed on him her bright black ejrea, In one swift look of reied surprise, \ 'ind then he hastened to aver He was her uonetant worshiper; " But, Mary, I insist," said he, " That you are very fair, I Bee; I know you don't care much for me. And that makes me sad, you see." J j THE CLOSING YEAR. The year is dying, dying; And watching his bier, in sooth Tis as hard to believe in sun and flowera. As for age to realize gulden hours. When hope, and joy, and trust arose. As violets waken trom winter snows. Ah! at April's call they return onoe mam. But never for us on the farther shore Dawns the morning of love and yoath t The Russian Siberian Expedition. Capt. Vigans, the Englishman who last year opened a new passage through the Sea of ;£ara from St. Petersburg to the northern shores of Siberia, was intrusted at the commencement Oi the present year with a new expedition, organized by means of a subscription of Russian and Siberian merchants. It is now feared that the expedition has perished, as now news whatever has been received of it. Funds are being collected in Russia to send another party in search of Capt. Vigans and his companions, who possibly have fallen victims to their courageous attempt to disoover a route to Northern Siberia through the frozen sens.