THE FOX AND THE MASK. A fox had stolen into the house of an actor, and in rummaging his various properties, laid hold of a highlyfinished mask. 'A fine-looking head, indeed!' cried he; 'what a pity it is it wants brains!' 3. Flashed all their sabres bare, All the world wondered; Plunged in the battery smoke, Fiercely the line they broke; Strong was the sabre stroke: Making an army reel Shaken and sundered. Then they rode back, but not— Not the Six Hundred. 4. Cannon to right of them, Cannon behind them Volleyed and thundered; Stormed at with shot and shell, They that had struck so well Rode through the jaws of death, Half a league back again, Up from the mouth of hell, All that was left of themLeft of Six Hundred. 5. Honour the brave and bold! MRS SEMPILL'S FIRST ATTEMPT AT All over Scotland, a custom prevails amongst persons in the least removed above indigence, of preparing every summer a certain quantity of gooseberry-jam and currantjelly, or one or other of these preserves, which they usually store in little pots, and set carefully by, to be used at high tea-drinkings during the ensuing winter, or applied as a cure for sore throats, supposing that any of the family should become liable to that ailment. As almost everybody in the country has a garden, in which the fruit is raised, the expense of this little luxury is not great; yet it is sufficient to put the article beyond the reach of the poorer class, who therefore only become acquainted with jelly or jam when, in the event of any illness befalling them, some kind neighbour in better circumstances sends a pot of the precious condiment, to aid in effecting a cure, or to alleviate the languor of a sick-bed. Amongst children of all denominations, it is the very first luxury known or enjoyed; and hence, to them, the season for making it is one of the most important in the whole year, seeing that it is not easy for mothers, or aunts, or grandmothers, to perform the operation without certain not inconsiderable spillings finding their way to young mouths. Though perhaps three-fourths of the respectable burghers' wives make these preserves, it may readily be supposed that all do not possess, as their own property, the brazen pan required for the purpose. In fact, very few pans are needed amongst a considerable population. By virtue of the general system of borrowing and lending, which subsists in country places, one pan may serve some twenty or thirty people every season. In a certain respectable west-country town, a few years ago, there were but three pans-one belonging to the minister, another to the master of the boarding-school, and a third to the relict of a wealthy citizen deceased. When the time drew nigh for the making of jelly, these pans were drawn from the seclusion in which they lay during the rest of the year, and carefully scoured. But it was odds if their respective owners got an easy or convenient use made of them. The applications for the loan of the utensil came so fast and thick, that it was with no small difficulty that either the minister's wife, or the wife of the keeper of the boardingschool, or Mrs Mitchell, the respectable old citizen's widow, could get her own jelly made on the very day when the ripeness of her berries rendered the process desirable. The ladies would either make a formal call to prefer the request in person, or, if more at ease, some such message as this would come by the errand-going daughter for the time being: 'My mother sends her compliments to you, Mrs Mitchell, and would be much obliged for the loan of the brass pan;' to which the answer would probably be: 'Make my compliments to your mother, and tell her that the pan is engaged to-day to Mrs Harper, and to-morrow to Mrs Jamieson, and on Friday to Mrs Thomson, and on Saturday I intend to use it myself; but your mother shall have it on Monday.' This will serve to give some idea of the active service which these three brass pans underwent in the jelly-making season. In fact, during three weeks of July, it was scarcely possible to walk along the street of this quiet old place without getting a glimpse of some one of these three flaming culinary articles, as it was whisked along in the hands of the servant-lasses from the house where it had been, to that in which it was to be used. One year, a certain Mrs Sempill resolved to make a few pots of currant-jelly for the first time. She was the wife of a watchmaker in a very small way, whose sign of a huge gilt watch on the outside, with the hands eternally indicating twenty-five minutes past nine, was but poorly supported within by an empty cloak-case, and three saucers on a table near the window, containing the disjected members of certain horologes long ago sent in to be mended, but which, after being taken down, had somehow never been put up again, so that the owners had ceased years ago even to inquire after them. Mr Sempill, however, had a small allowance for keeping the town-clock in order, and, what with repairing eight-day clocks at the houses of the owners, and other sources of revenue, he contrived to live much as other poor tradesmen do. The wife was a soft, good-natured, sluttish woman, with a large family of small children, who, as she had no servant, fell entirely to be managed, or, properly speaking, mismanaged, by herself. The back-room in which they lived was constantly overflowing into the shop and street with little creatures, in whom the human lineaments could scarcely be discerned beneath the thick stratum of dirt with which their faces were incrusted, but who, nevertheless, seemed as happy with pillows for dolls, and teaspoons for toys, as if they had had the contents of a bazaar at their command. The heart of the stoutest housewife might have sunk beneath such a tremendous load of duty as fell to the lot of poor Mrs Sempill. For her part, she had never attempted to grapple with it. If she could contrive to prepare their meals with some sort |