He seemed to be lost in thought, and said nothing to attract attention until all the passengers who could be got into the yawl with him were seated. fore them was but the casket of the imprisoned | McNeil was much more in sorrow than in anger. but now freed spirit—or words to that effect and added, "Our beloved sister is not here; she has risen." And this is how the sentiment was repeated: "The pastor says, says he, Our sister ain't here; she's riz." "A GREAT DAY FOR PAUL." To appreciate the mental condition of McNeil at this juncture it is necessary to take in the situation as it was. Here were some twenty persons, men, women, and children, adrift on the wide expanse of ocean. Not a vessel was in sight save the one they had just left, and she was a mass of flames. In the hurry and confusion of leaving the vessel very few things had been remembered; the water and provisions which had been secured could not possibly have lasted over a week, and only one pair of oars had been found. Truly it was a time to appall the most courageous. SOME years ago there were in the city of Charleston, South Carolina, two rival grocers named McNeil and Paul, the first-named the senior of the firm of McNeil and Blair, the latter the head of the house of Paul and Brown. Their stores were on the opposite corners of Broad and Church streets, and both were well patronized. They had occupied their respective locations a long time, and a spirit of rivalry had almost insensibly grown up between them. Their numerous customers were aware of this, and many of them made use of the knowledge for their individual benefit; that is, by representing that one or the other, as the case might or might not be, was selling a cer-ingly prepared their minds for a solemn prayer. tain article for so much less per pound than it could be obtained for at the rival store. Suddenly a form was seen to rise near the prow of the frail boat. It was that of McNeil. He raised his arms aloft, and cast his eyes around him. Everybody believed that he was about to invoke the aid of Heaven, and accord But they were mistaken. McNeil's thoughts at that perilous time were far away from the scene of disaster. They had taken wings and tion, and there he beheld in imagination his old rival Paul complacently seated at his desk, and reading an account of the loss of the ill Both McNeil and Paul were Scotchmen, both were well-to-do, and both enjoyed the good-flown back to the beautiful city of his adopwill of the community. Of the two, McNeil was the more jealous of his neighbor, and consequently he was oftener "played upon" by those who dealt with him. He had a hot tem-fated New England. He fancied he could see per, and a very trifling thing would disturb his equilibrium if it related to any alleged superiority of Paul's groceries to his own. As was to be expected, he was occasionally the victim of a practical joke, one of which is related as follows: A customer purchased of him a quantity of high-priced tea, and waiting for a few days to elapse, he repaired to McNeil's store with a sample of it. Placing it before McNeil, he remarked, "Here is a tea which I can get at Paul's for twenty-five cents per pound cheaper than you charged me." McNeil glanced at it, and said, very contemptuously, "I don't doubt it, for it is a very inferior tea to mine." When informed that it was his own tea he had condemned, his rage knew no bounds, and his old customer had to beat a hasty retreat. On another occasion he made a great blunder in regard to several wines furnished as samples by Paul and himself, he in every instance giving unwittingly the preference to Paul's in the presence of those who had obtained the wines for the purpose of misleading him. McNeil, having acquired a fortune, resolved to revisit his old home in Scotland, and sailed from Charleston for Liverpool in the ship New England. While about midway across the Atlantic a fire broke out in the hold, and failing to extinguish it, the passengers and crew were forced to abandon the ship, and seek safety in the yawls belonging to her. On this occasion Paul's eyes twinkle and a smile wreathe his lips as he revelled in the assurance of being rid of a formidable competitor. Is it any wonder that, instead of making an appeal to the throne of grace, his fellow-sufferers heard him exclaim, in tremulous tones," This is a great day for Paul !" But Paul did not have the felicity of reading McNeil's obituary as the latter feared he would. The boat he was in was picked up by a vessel that hove in sight the day after the accident happened, and McNeil returned in safety to Charleston. It was, however, many years before his acquaintances ceased to twit him with his remarkable speech, in which he betrayed his meditations while on the great deep with only a few planks between himself and eternity. C. K. B. "IN ante bellum days it was customary in the South for the Methodist missionary to preach to the negroes and catechise them. I have witnessed many rich scenes on these occasions," says a Southern correspondent. "Among the slaves at our place was a venerable Virginia darky, tall, black as ebony, hair white, keen black eyes, and carrying himself as erect and proud as an old Roman. He was a sort of oracle, and told us children, as we would gather round him in the cabin, many marvellous stories of what he had seen 'Jack-o'-lantern' do in the gullies of 'Ole Virginny.' He had himself been led by this devil's fire two or three dark nights down into gullies so deep he thought he never courser gray, And kissed the battered talisman, and blessed the Up the ringing street he darted to the chief physi cian's door Heaven what ghastly company was standing it could 'fetch his foot. Two things he did not | And the light-hearted lover onward he spurred his mon. GENERAL HARDEE was one of the martinets of the Southern army, the very model of a vieille moustache, immaculate in dress, soldierly in bearing, and a great disciplinarian. On one occasion he was sent to Arkansas to deal with some very refractory volunteer brigades that had lost all idea of military discipline, and one day near camp came upon a soldier who was sitting down under a tree, had taken his gun apart, and was cleaning it diligently. As the general approached he looked up, but neither rose nor saluted, and presently went on rubbing, and singing as he worked. The general pulled up, intent upon reproving a breach of military etiquette. "Do you know who I am, sir?" he asked, sternly. "No, I don't know, and I don't care a said the soldier. "Sorter general, ain't yer?" "I am the general in command, sir; that's what I am," said Hardee. The soldier got up, stuck his hands on his hips, cocked his felt hat impudently over his eyes, and said: "Well, I said you was a sorter general, didn't I? And if you'll hold on till I git my gun together and loaded, I'll give you a sorter salute." THE TALISMAN AND THE LEECH: A FRAGMENT. A withered white-haired beggar that made for alms The lordly lover cast her his purse from saddle-bow. "Take this;" the crone, upstarting, placed on his Of dull and tarnished copper, a mean and battered thing. "Wear this, and when thou ridest up to the leech's door, See for thyself what company of guests doth stand before." And before the knight could thank her she vanished quite away, And there was naught but a wee brown bird sitting upon the spray; The souls of all the slain were there, ten thousand Like witch-fires in a pallid night a-wavering to and On passed the knight to another leech, but before Was quite as ghastly if not quite so great a company; Watched the spirit of each patient under a monu- And thou shalt save a precious life, and win a price- Up sprang the good physician then behind the gal- And swiftly up the sounding road clattered the And merrily the knight he sang and shouted in his "A blessing on the kindly fay that guided me to "Now, by our good Saint Anthony, what is it thou Dost thou not know, Sir Knight, there is ne goblin, But tell me truly who it was to me thy steps did For how should a poor leech be known throughout "Oh, trust me, trust me, Master Leech, thy fame On every side of thy healing skill what miracles we For though thy cheek doth brightly bear the rosy There is no doctor so renowned in all the land, good "Sir Knight, it ill becomes thy rank to mock a sim- One who doth practice Galen's art with all the skill But only yesterday I hung my shingle out at door, "Now, by Saint Anthony !" exclaimed the knight. - .. * Under a monument-to distinguish them from Patience on a monument. 1 NEW MONTHLY MAGAZINE. No. CCCCVI. MARCH, 1884.-VOL. LXVIII. ST. LOUIS. OME years ago the journals of the was fitting that they should be on the fur SOME country were laughing at a person whom they called "The Capital-Mover." This was one T. U. Reavis. Caricatures were made of Reavis in which he was represented as carrying the Capitol at Washington on his back, with various others of the public buildings under his arms, and striking out boldly for St. Louis. He had discovered that that place was the geographical centre of the country, and the future centre of its population, and that it was to be the future great city of the world. This being the case, he desired to have the seat of government also removed thither without further delay. The Capital-Mover did not succeed in his designs, and meanwhile the new War and Navy Departments and other costly improvements have more firmly anchored ther shore, where the river need not be But it is with St. Louis that we are to deal. I have seen it at different seasons, and from many points of view, but from no other can it be called so impressive as from the great bridge, of steel tubular arches, which forms the approach to it over the Mississippi, on a winter day when the river has moving ice in it. The bridge complete is a mile and a quarter long, and the government to Washington than ever; the part over the water about a third of VOL but this does not prevent St. Louis from being a vast and imposing city on its own account, without the aid of any such factitious resource. The title of "The Future Great City of the World," usually contracted to The Future Great," given to it, half in derision, in these discussions, has stuck, and is quite generally recognized. a mile, which is divided into three vast A Dwellers on the Eastern sea-board find it hard to comprehend the great Westnot so much the far West, of which they have some wild and fanciful ideas, but the central West, which presents a cultivated area, and a thickly populous civilization like their own. Get upon a railway train, and come a thousand miles across the country to the Mississippi River. It is lined with cities all along its course. The greater ones, in obedience to a law plain- a bit of sand-bar on the opposite shore, ly in operation, are on the western bank. | They have had their starting-point as depots of supplies for people who were moving further on, and as depots of supplies it appear. The sun strikes with a gleam on emerging mysteriously from the smoke, as if it were only now that the chaos was beginning to give place to physical order. The city itself is barely visible. Of all Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1884, by Harper and Brothers, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. VOL. LXVIII.-No. 406.-31 |