COUPON BONDS. PART I. On a certain mild March evening, A. D. 1864, the Ducklow kitchen had a general air of waiting for somebody. Mrs. Ducklow sat knitting by the light of a kerosene lamp, but paused ever and anon, neglecting her stocking, and knitting her brows instead, with an aspect of anxious listening. The old gray cat, coiled up on a cushion at her side, purring in her sleep, purred and slept as... more...

For several weeks the attention of the curious has been more and more attracted to a remarkable ethnological exhibition at the Society Library. Two persons, scarcely larger than the fabled gentlemen of Lilliput, (though one is twelve or thirteen and the other eighteen years of age), of just and even elegant proportions, and physiognomies striking and peculiar, but not deficient in intellect or... more...

MELONS BY BRET HARTE As I do not suppose the most gentle of readers will believe that anybody's sponsors in baptism ever wilfully assumed the responsibility of such a name, I may as well state that I have reason to infer that Melons was simply the nickname of a small boy I once knew. If he had any other, I never knew it. Various theories were often projected by me to account for this strange... more...

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK. The author of Fanny, Burns, Marco Bozzaris, etc., was born at Guilford in Connecticut, in August, 1795, and in his eighteenth year removed to the city of New-York. He evinced a taste for poetry and wrote verses at a very early period; but the oldest of his effusions I have seen are those under the signatures of "Croaker," and "Croaker & Co.," published in the... more...

THE HAVRE MARITIME EXHIBITION. The Havre Maritime Exhibition opened on the 7th of May. Will this exhibition awaken general interest, or will it prove a local affair simply? This is a secret of the weeks that are to follow. Should nothing chance to discourage the general interest that surrounds Havre, to dampen the enthusiasm of the public, or to act to the prejudice of the exhibitors, whose very... more...

I. There are words which have careers as well as men, or, perhaps it may be more happily said, as well as women. Mere words breathed on by Fancy, and sent forth not so much to serve man's ordinary colloquial uses, apparently, as to fascinate his mind, have their débuts. their season, their vogue, and finally a period in which it is really too bad if they have not the consolation of reflecting... more...

They all climbed up on a high board-fence—Nine little Goblins, with green-glass eyes—Nine little Goblins that had no sense,And couldn't tell coppers from cold mince pies;And they all climbed up on the fence, and sat—And I asked them what they were staring at. And the first one said, as he scratched his headWith a queer little arm that reached out of his earAnd rasped its claws in his hair so... more...

PREFACE What are the words most commonly misspelled by the average high school pupil? In an endeavor to solve this problem, two thousand letters, with five postal cards in each, were sent to representative high schools in every state in the United States, requesting the heads of the various departments to report the words most commonly misspelled in their classes. From the many thousand replies, this... more...

THE LOWTHER ARCADE. In No. 514 of The Mirror we explained the situation of the Lowther Arcade. We may here observe that this covered way or arcade intersects the insulated triangle of buildings lately completed in the Strand, the principal façade of which is designated West Strand. The Engraving represents the interior of the Arcade, similar in its use to the Burlington Arcade, and, although wider and... more...

CHRIST CHURCH, DONCASTER. (From the Gentleman's Magazine.) The town of Doncaster has been long celebrated for its beauty and cleanliness, for its striking approach from the south, its magnificent Grand Stand, and celebrated Race Course, its public buildings, its venerable Gothic Church, and stately tower; and latterly, by the erection of a beautiful Gothic Church, with an elegant spire, giving an... more...