Our Holidays King Henry IV, Part I. ST. SATURDAY BY HENRY JOHNSTONEOh, Friday night's the queen of nights, because it ushers inThe Feast of good St. Saturday, when studying is a sin,When studying is a sin, boys, and we may go to playNot only in the afternoon, but all the livelong day. St. Saturday—so legends say—lived in the ages whenThe use of leisure still was known and current among... more...

The Cat-tail Arrow BY CLARA DOTY BATES ittle Sammie made a bow, Well indeed he loved to whittle, Shaped it like the half of O— How he could I scarcely know, For his fingers were so little. As he whittled came a sigh: "If I only had an arrow; Something light enough to fly To the tree-tops or the sky! Then I'd have such fun tomorrow." Then he thought of all the slim Things that grow—the... more...

PREFACE These selections from Old English poetry have been translated to meet the needs of that ever-increasing body of students who cannot read the poems in their original form, but who wish nevertheless to enjoy to some extent the heritage of verse which our early English ancestors have left for us. Especially in the rapid survey of English literature given in most of our colleges, a collection of... more...

COME, LASSES AND LADS. Come, lasses and lads,                 get leave of your dads,  And away to the Maypole hie,For ev'ry fair has a sweetheart there,  And the fiddler's standing by; For Willy shall dance with Jane,  And Johnny has got his Joan,To trip it, trip it, trip it, trip it,  Trip it up and down! "You're out," says Dick; "not I," says... more...

EACH IN HIS GENERATION BY MAXWELL STRUTHERS BURT From Scribner's Magazine Every afternoon at four o'clock, except when the weather was very bad—autumn, winter, and spring—old Mr. Henry McCain drove up to the small, discreet, polished front door, in the small, discreet, fashionable street in which lived fairly old Mrs. Thomas Denby; got out, went up the white marble steps, rang the bell,... more...

I. "Lord, but English people are funny!" This was the perplexed mental ejaculation that young Lieutenant Skipworth Cary, of Virginia, found his thoughts constantly reiterating during his stay in Devonshire. Had he been, he wondered, a confiding fool, to accept so trustingly Chev Sherwood's suggestion that he spend a part of his leave, at least, at Bishopsthorpe, where Chev's people... more...

The first of May, eighteen hundred and fifty-one, will be remembered in the Calendar for centuries after those who witnessed its glories shall have passed away. Its memory will endure with our language; and the Macaulays and Hallams of the time to come will add brilliancy to their pages by recounting the gorgeous yet touching ceremonial of this great Apotheosis of Peace. Peace has occasionally received... more...

TWO CHANCELLORS. Although neither your readers nor I are politicians enough to interfere in the changes proposed with reference to the office of Lord Chancellor, I doubt not that some of them, now the subject is on the tapis, may feel interested in a fact connected with it, which our ancient records disclose: namely, that on one occasion there were two chancellors acting at the same time for several... more...

NOTES. TRADITIONAL ENGLISH BALLADS. The task of gathering old traditionary song is surely a pleasant and a lightsome one. Albeit the harvest has been plentiful and the gleaners many, still a stray sheaf may occasionally be found worth the having. But we must be careful not to "pick up a straw." One of your corespondents recommends, as an addition to the value of your pages, the careful getting... more...

NOTES. AUTHORSHIP OF HENRY VIII. In my last communication on the subject of Henry VIII., I referred to certain characteristic tricks of Fletcher's style of frequent occurrence in that play, and I now beg leave to furnish you with a few instances. I wish it, however, to be understood, that I advance these merely as illustrative specimens selected at random; as there is scarcely a line of the... more...